Bailey’s Peoria Problem Read online

  “That was too close for comfort!” Bailey searched Brian’s face for any hint of remorse.

  “You said you were going to be careful,” Alex accused.

  “I was careful! I got out of the mess, didn’t I? And I even got permission to look through the record book.” Brian held up the ledger.

  Bailey sighed. “Yeah, you did. Sorry. I was just scared, that’s all.”

  “Don’t be such a worrywart.” Brian scowled. “You’re worse than my mom.”

  “Well, this is our investigation, and we’ve worked hard on it already!” Bailey crossed her arms dramatically and frowned. “We just don’t want it getting messed up by one careless move—or person!”

  “It’s okay, Bailey.” Alex patted her friend on the back. “Brian didn’t mean to upset you, did you, Brian?” She looked pointedly at him.

  “No, of course not.”

  “I’m sure he’ll be more careful in the future. And he did a fabulous job getting the book quickly so we have lots of time to look it over.”

  “We? I never said you could see it,” Brian said.

  Now Alex stood straight, glaring at Brian. “What did you say?”

  “I told my dad I wanted to look at it. I never said you could look at it. It’s private business.”

  “Brian Chang, you give me that book!” Bailey charged at him.

  Brian laughed and held it up higher than her reach. “I’ll look at it and then tell you what I find out. That way we can keep everyone happy. If my dad asks me if I showed it to anyone, I can honestly say no.”

  Bailey growled, her eyes flaming, then collapsed in a chair. “Fair enough. We don’t want Uncle Nathan to get mad at you.”

  “But you have to promise to tell us everything you find that might relate to the mystery,” Alex said.

  “I promise.”

  “Hope to die?” Bailey prodded.

  “Not particularly, but if it will make you feel better, then I guess.” Brian grinned.

  Bailey opened her mouth to speak but was interrupted by her cousin.

  “And sure, I’d love to stick a needle in my eye, too, while I’m at it!”

  Bailey laughed. “Okay. I’m happy now. But remember, this is top secret!”

  “Like you’d let me forget.” Brian playfully shoved Bailey. “I need to get back to the barn. I’ll keep you posted.”

  The next morning, Bailey and Alex arose early for their second day of shearing. Bailey wrapped her arms around herself in the crisp air as the sheep bleated their greetings. She was happy to see that Alex was much more at ease with the animals than the day before. She went right into the pasture to talk to them. Little Bow baaed her greeting to the girls, and Alex bent down and hugged her neck. Bailey joined her and immediately spotted the lamb with the message on it. “Let’s see if it smells like marker,” she suggested.

  “I don’t know if we’ll be able to smell anything but sheep with all these others around.” Alex held her nose.

  They pushed their way through the herd to the yearling. Its mother stood between them and her baby.

  “It’s okay, Mama,” Bailey cooed. “We aren’t going to hurt your baby.” She held out her hand for the sheep to nuzzle while Alex moved around to the other side of the lamb.

  Quickly, Alex knelt and sniffed the markings. “All I can smell is sheep. Let’s take it further away from the others and try again.”

  “I don’t think his mama will allow that.” Bailey tried to distract the ewe, but she moved closer to her lamb.

  “You’re a good mother,” Bailey told her. “We’ll let you be.”

  “You girls ready to get started?” Uncle Nathan called from the barn.

  “Coming!” Bailey yelled.

  Bailey and Alex took up their work, each at her own shearing station today. Uncle Nathan had put several lambs in pens for them to start on. The girls sheared in silence for about an hour; then Bailey heard Alex yell. She flipped off her shears. “What did you say?”

  “Come here!” Alex shouted. Her arm waved Bailey over.

  “Just a minute. I’ve got to finish up here first.” Bailey turned the shears back on and quickly completed the job. She led the newly shorn lamb back to its pen and joined Alex.

  “What’s up?”

  “I think we have another message.” Alex pointed at the lamb she was shearing, tightening her grip on the rope around its neck. “Look.”

  Bailey studied the strange black streaks. “I can’t read it.” She tilted her head to get another angle.

  “Let me finish shearing it, and we’ll see if the other side says anything,” Alex said. “Maybe it will help us figure out what this side says.”

  Alex ran the shears along the side of the sheep. The thick fleece dropped to the barn floor, uncovering more black streaks. “Yep. There’s something here, too.” Alex turned off the shears and showed Bailey.

  “Looks like it starts with a B.” Bailey examined the lamb closely, running her hand over its marked skin. “Let’s take her out to pasture so we can see it in the sunlight. I’ll bring another one, too, to avoid suspicion.”

  The pair coaxed the noisy lambs out of the barn and into the bright sun. “Come on.” Bailey pulled on the rope lead. “You can come out here where Bow is.” Bailey put her lamb back in the pasture then tried to read the message on the young sheep Alex held. “‘Bundle’?” Bailey guessed at the word. “‘Bridle’? I’m not sure. You try.”

  She and Alex traded places. Alex stared at the writing, not saying anything. She walked around and looked at it from all angles. “‘Brindle’?” She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know if that’s even a word, but that’s what it looks like to me.”

  “Take a look at the other side now and see what you think.” Bailey turned the lamb around.

  Alex gazed at its side. “‘Branch.’”

  “Are you sure?” Bailey asked.

  “Not completely, but it’s the best I can come up with.”

  “‘Brindle Branch.’”

  “Or ‘Branch Brindle,’” Alex offered.

  “Maybe it’s not ‘branch,’ but ‘ranch.’”

  Alex looked at the writing again. “No, it definitely starts with a B.”

  “I wonder what it could mean.”

  “I think brindle might be an animal color. Seems like I heard that word when I was watching a dog show on TV. We’ll have to look it up when we get back in the house.”

  “Let’s hurry up and finish shearing so we can check this out.” Bailey pointed her camera watch at the lamb bearing the message and snapped a few pictures.

  After they finished their last few lambs, they returned all the sheep to the pasture and returned to the barn.

  “Uncle Nathan! We’re done!” Bailey yelled over the buzz of the shears.

  Uncle Nathan stopped his work and smiled. “You’re done, huh? You must be getting pretty fast shearing those lambs. I’ll have to bring more in for you tomorrow!” He laughed his big, hearty laugh.

  “So can we be done working for today?” Bailey smiled and batted her eyes at her uncle.

  “How can I say no to those sparkling brown eyes? Go on!” Uncle Nathan shooed them out of the barn with a wave of his hand.

  Bailey gave Uncle Nathan a quick peck on the cheek. “You’re the best!” She and Alex turned and raced back to the house, eager to investigate the latest message.

  Alex opened her laptop and went to her online dictionary. “B-r-i-n-d-l-e.” She typed in the word. “Here it is. ‘Brindle or brindled: gray or tawny brown with darker streaks, patches, or spots.’”

  “I’ve never seen a branch look like that,” Bailey said. “What could ‘Brindle Branch’ mean?”

  “Let’s go outside and look at the trees. Maybe one will look more brindled than the others and give us a clue.”

  As the pair strolled the grounds of the Curly Q, they kept their eyes on the trees but saw nothing unusual.

  “Let’s go look over by the grove of trees where we saw Yell
er disappear the other night,” Bailey suggested. “There are more trees to study there.”

  In the grove, they spied a variety of trees. Some had rough bark, and others were smooth. The colors ranged from dark brown to ruddy red to almost white, but none looked patchy or streaked.

  “I can’t imagine what kind of tree would look like that,” Bailey said.

  “We’ll just have to keep our eyes open from now on. Maybe we’ll spot one that matches the description in the dictionary.”

  “What are you looking at?”

  Bailey jumped, and Alex inhaled sharply.

  “Brian! You scared us!” Bailey scolded her cousin. “You pop up in the weirdest places!”

  “I could say the same thing about you.”

  “How’d you find us out here?” Alex asked.

  “I saw you pass the barn. Not much out this way but the old grove.” Brian looked around. “So what are you doing?”

  “Investigating trees.” Bailey looked up at the canopy of branches.

  “That sounds like a good time.” Brian patted his mouth as he yawned dramatically.

  “Brian, we found another sheep with a message on it.”

  Brian’s yawn ended abruptly and his eyes widened. “You’re joking. What’d it say?”

  “Brindle Branch,” Alex said.

  “Brindle Branch?” Brian repeated.

  “Yeah. Any idea what it could mean?” Bailey asked.

  “Not really.” Brian scratched his head. “Sounds like it would have something to do with a tree.”

  “That’s what we thought.”

  “I’ll have to think about it.” Brian looked at the trees around them. “I was just getting ready to drive into town. Want to come?”

  Bailey looked at Alex and shrugged. “I guess so. I’ve never ridden with you since you’ve been old enough to drive. Maybe we’ll spy a brindle tree along the way.”

  “I’ll tell Dad you’re going with me.” Brian ran to the barn while the girls piled into the car. He returned and climbed in behind the wheel. “Buckle up!”

  “All set.” Bailey sat in the backseat and Alex in the front.

  Brian slowly pulled forward and onto the country road. “I have to pick up a few groceries for my mom. The Historical Society isn’t far from there. Want me to drop you off? Maybe you can get some clues to your mystery.”

  “Yeah!” Alex said. “Maybe we’ll find out more about Marshall Gonzalez or his family.”

  Brian turned onto Washington Street and parked in front of an old building with a sign that read: PEORIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY.

  “I’ll pick you up in an hour. I’ve got my cell phone if you need me to come get you sooner.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Bailey climbed out of the backseat, and she and Alex marched up the steps to the main entrance.

  “This place looks old,” Alex said.

  Bailey used all her weight to pull open the oversize wood door.

  They each paid the suggested two-dollar donation and then went through a turnstile leading into the museum. The first thing they saw was an old, yellowed map of Peoria hanging on a wall in a glass case. It had brown lettering showing what the area had looked like before it was developed into a bustling town. Farmland covered much of the landscape, which the caption said the Illini Indians originally inhabited.

  Bailey looked closely at the map, reading off the names of the rivers and creeks. “Alex! It says, ‘Brindle Creek’!”

  “No way. Where?”

  Bailey pointed to a small creek that ran between acres of farmland.

  “Unbelievable!”

  “The map’s so old I can’t tell where the creek’s located in relation to where the Curly Q is now.”

  “Me either,” Alex said. “Let’s keep looking. Maybe we’ll find another clue.”

  Bailey and Alex split up and looked at two more maps, each more current than the last.

  “Here it is!” Bailey called to Alex, who came rushing over. “Brindle Creek runs right between the Curly Q and that run-down house where Yeller, Dude, and Rude live.”

  “It must be the creek you were telling me about,” Alex said. “Didn’t you know what it was called?”

  “That one’s been called Woolly Creek for as long as I can remember, because of all the sheep farms surrounding it.”

  “Maybe it’s not the same one then,” Alex said thoughtfully. “But it sure looks like it on the map.”

  “Or maybe the name changed over the years as sheep farmers moved in.”

  “Could be.”

  “Can I help you girls?”

  Bailey turned and saw a plump, gray-haired woman with crinkles around her gentle green eyes. Her name tag indicated she was the museum curator.

  “Yes,” Bailey said. “We were wondering if this Brindle Creek still exists.”

  “Yes, it does. It runs along the same path, though it is much smaller than it used to be.”

  “Does it still go by the same name?” Alex asked.

  “Oh no. It changed with the times, as most things do. Its name was changed to Woolly Creek about twenty years ago when the sheep industry took off in that area.”

  Bailey grinned at Alex, who gave her a thumbs-up.

  “Thank you,” Bailey said. “You’ve been very helpful.”

  “If I can answer any other questions, feel free to ask,” the curator said warmly.

  “Is it okay if I take a few pictures of these maps with my cell phone?” Alex asked.

  “Certainly.”

  Alex snapped a picture of each map showing Brindle Creek. “We can send these to the Camp Club Girls when we get home.”

  “At least we have more to go on than we did a couple hours ago,” Bailey said.

  “Yeah,” Alex agreed. “We didn’t even know what brindle meant, and now we have a map showing us where it is!”

  “Now if we could only figure out how it might fit into our mystery.”

  Held Captive?

  The next morning, Brian sauntered into the kitchen as Bailey and Alexis ate breakfast. He spread strawberry jam on his two pieces of toast, poured a big glass of milk, and sat down at the table. “Dad’s already at the pasture bringing sheep into the barn, and Mom’s at work,” he said. “Here’s what I found out from my dad’s record book. We bought sheep from three different farms last year.”

  “Which ones?” Bailey asked around a mouthful of cereal.

  “Hazelwood Sheep Farms, Hollyhock Acres, and Whitestone Ranch.”

  “Do you know where any of them are?” Alex asked.

  “Their addresses were in the record book.” Brian smiled proudly.

  “Which one is closest?” Bailey wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her sweatshirt.

  “It looks like Hazelwood Sheep Farms is closest, but I couldn’t be sure from the address.”

  “Great. We can research it and find out.” Alex looked at the clock. “Let’s finish eating and get out to the barn”

  “Yeah,” Bailey agreed. “We need to check my shearing time again today.”

  “How’s that going?” Brian asked.

  “Pretty good. I’m down to eighteen minutes, twelve seconds.”

  “Way to go! You only need to trim five minutes, fifty-two seconds to match last year’s winning time.”

  “And it’s only Wednesday.” Alex carried her bowl to the sink. “You still have three days to practice before Saturday’s competition. If you keep knocking two minutes off each day, you’ll beat last year’s time easily!”

  Brian wiped his mouth with his napkin, tossed it into the trash, and gulped down the last of his milk. “I’ll go on out to see if Dad needs any help. See you out there!”

  Bailey whipped out her phone. “I’m going to text Sydney to see if she can research Hazelwood Sheep Farms for us.”

  “Maybe we’ll get an answer by the time we’re done shearing today.”

  “That would be great.” Bailey texted the message and sent it to Sydney, then put her phone back in her jeans pocket
. “We only have three days left to solve this. Do you think we can get it done by Saturday?”

  “Of course! We get more information every day!”

  Shy scrambled across the yard to greet them. Bailey bent and scratched the dog’s head. “I guess Uncle Nathan must have all the sheep already penned, or Shy would still be out there helping round them up.”

  Bailey took her place at her shearing station. “Let me know if you uncover anything interesting.” She winked at Alex.

  “You got it!” Alex moved to her spot and started working on a small black lamb.

  The shears hummed along with the flies creating a buzzing symphony. Fleece dropped silently to the cement floor. Sheep baaed their complaints. The swish of brooms sweeping wool from the barn floor added rhythm.

  Soon Bailey led her fourth lamb to the shearing floor, sat it on its rump, and ran the shears along its body. Black streaky marks appeared with each stroke. Another word! Bailey sheared faster, revealing letter after letter. H-e-l-d. She looked at Alex who was working, head down, on her own yearling. Quickly Bailey turned the sheep and sheared the other side. More letters; these were closer together and harder to read. Bailey again glanced toward Alex and caught her eye. She waved her over.

  Alex returned her lamb to its pen and rushed to Bailey’s station.

  “Look!” Bailey said. “Another message. This side says, ‘Held,’ but I’m not sure about the other side.” She flipped the lamb over for Alex to see.

  Alex sounded out the word slowly as she read it. “Cap-tain?”

  “Doesn’t seem like that would be right.” Bailey scrunched up her face. “Try again.”

  Alex stared at the lamb. “The letters are so close it’s hard to tell where one starts and the other stops.” She studied the writing again. “C-a-p-t. That much I’m sure of. Maybe the last part is i-v-e.”

  “C-a-p-t-i-v-e. Captive! Alex, that’s it!” Bailey squealed. The lamb squirmed. “Okay, baby. Let’s go outside so we can take your picture.”

  Alex slipped a rope lead around the neck of the lamb Bailey held and got another lead to go on another lamb. She and Bailey led the animals out to pasture after snapping some photos of the mysterious writing.