Chapter 1

Convenient Sweatshirt Pouches

Alec Flint looked down at his socks, trying to decide whether they were the sort of socks a super sleuth would wear. They were green. With black stripes. Black was a super-sleuthy color, as far as Alec was concerned. Green, not so much. But he liked it just the same.

“Alec!” his father yelled up the stairs.

“Almost ready!” Alec yelled back.

He slipped on his favorite green sweatshirt — it had a hood and a convenient pouch in the front where he could store things. Like his hands if they got cold. Or detective pens.

Alec owned one really good detective pen that could write even if you were holding it upside down. His mom got it for him when she went to Washington, D.C., a while back. Alec grabbed the pen off of his desk and put it in the sweatshirt pouch. You never knew when you’d need a good detective pen.

“Alec!” his father yelled again. “You don’t want to miss the bus!”

But Alec didn’t answer. He was too busy putting gel in his hair to make it spiky. Alec liked running his fingers back and forth over the hard spikes when he was thinking. It was like rubbing thoughts into his brain. While he was spiking, he heard the phone ring. Then his dad yelled up the stairs once more.1“Al! The station just called! I have to head back over to the museum! You’ve gotta come with me — now!”

Ooh, he was going to get to go on official police business!

“Coming!” Alec yelled downstairs.

Then he grabbed his backpack and crawled under his bed — somehow his sneakers always ended up there no matter where he remembered taking them off. Yup. There they were. Black. Size 3. Laces still in a double knot from the day before. Maybe his dad had stuck them under his bed while he was sleeping. Maybe his dad always stuck them under his bed while he was sleeping. Alec hadn’t thought of that before, but it was possible. He might have to do a sneaker stakeout one night to see. That is, if no other more important super-sleuth cases came along first.

Alec slipped his feet into his sneakers and ran downstairs. He didn’t make his bed. It was a deal he had with his dad. When Mrs. Flint was away on business and it was just the boys, no beds got made in the whole house. Not even if guests came.

When Alec got to the kitchen, his father handed him a baggie filled with Cap’n Crunch cereal. It was Alec’s favorite. He loved eating the Cap’n Crunches one by one, chewing them up as quickly and quietly as he could. He figured that’s how he would have to eat when he was on a stakeout — quickly and quietly — so he practicedwhenever he was able.

Alec Flint and his father got into an unmarked vehicle — at least, that’s what Officer Flint called it. It was a car that the police department gave him, but it wasn’t a patrol car with flashing lights or anything. It did have a little light on the inside you could stick on the roof if you had to speed to chase a perp. Perp is what Officer Flint called a bad guy. Alec liked the word. Perp. He said it a few times in his head for fun.

At the museum, Officer Flint and Alec walked through the big marble lobby they’d entered into the day before. They’d been there because Officer Flint was supposed to guard the Christopher Columbus exhibit. Which he’d done. Only, Alec learned in the car, once they’d left, a perp came and stole the entire thing.

Alec followed behind his father, trying to walk quietly. Super sleuths always did things quietly — at least, that’s what Alec figured. But unfortunately, the hard marble floors of the museum were not made for sleuth-walking. Alec’s sneakers squeaked and squealed and generally made a racket as he walked behind his father. Without even looking down, Alec knew that Officer Flint was not wearing sneakers — he was wearing his black shoes with the bottoms that clip-clopped as he walked.

You could tell a lot about people by the way their shoes sounded, Alec thought. His father’s shoes sounded serious. His own shoes sounded noisy and kidlike . . . not the best sound for a super sleuth. Maybe he could get his dad to buy him some new shoes.

As Alec squeaked down the hallway, trying to make his sneakers sound sleuthier, he heard a third pair of shoes. These shoes swish-swished on the ground. They sounded sneaky. And not like sneakers sneaky, like plain-old-sneaky sneaky. Alec couldn’t even tell how close they were. Swish-swish. Swish-swish. Pop! A security guard popped up out of nowhere, right next to Officer Flint. Alec observed him. His name tag said fernando, though he said to call him Frank, and he had come to escort Officer Flint to the room that formerly held the Christopher Columbus exhibit.

“Really a pity,” Fernando said, and then started tugging on his collar. “Warm in this place, no?”

Alec’s hands were shoved into his useful sweatshirt pocket.

“Not to me,” he said.

Fernando-call-me-Frank gave him a Look. Alec didn’t even have to be a detective to know what that kind of Look meant: Fernando did not like Alec Flint. And Alec Flint? He did not like Fernando.

Once they got to the exhibit room, Officer Flint and Alec were greeted by Dr. Glumsfeld, the curator of the American History Museum. Alec knew from his father that Dr. Glumsfeld was supposed to be very smart. And he was good at making rich people give money to the museum, which, according to Officer Flint, was very poor. In fact, Dr. Glumsfeld had told them yesterday that one of the rich people donated the whole Christopher Columbus exhibit from his own personal collection of artifacts. Only, Dr. Glumsfeld didn’t call the guy a rich person — he called him an anonymous benefactor, which Officer Flint said really meant a rich guy who didn’t want anyone to know who he was.

Alec Flint thought that was funny — if he were a rich guy and gave a whole entire exhibit to a museum, he’d want his name hanging on the door. In big letters. Preferably green. But then again, maybe the rich guy was a super sleuth. In which case, Alec understood. Sleuths had to keep a low profile. It was part of their job.

Dr. Glumsfeld had the annoying habit of always using long words that Alec didn’t understand, like apprehensive and perspicacity. It made it very hard for Alec to figure out what he was talking about. He’d had the same problem yesterday.

“Oh, Officer Flint!” Dr. Glumsfeld said, walking very quickly to Alec’s dad’s side — his feet swish-swished too, kind of like Fernando-call-me-Frank’s. “You wouldn’t believe what happened! The sound that swelled from those alarm bells really was just too much. It made me quite apprehensive. I hope we can count on your perspicacity in this matter and that you’ll find the thief instantaneously.”

Officer Flint rolled his eyes at Alec. They had laughed about Dr. Glumsfeld the night before at dinner, Alec’s dad saying things like, “Alexander, may I have another serviette?” instead of, “Hey, Al, can you pass me a napkin?” Alec tried too with, “May I please have some carbonated beverage?” But Officer Flint said, “Nice try, buddy.” Soda was not allowed in the Flint house, except on special occasions. And a regular old Sunday night was not a special occasion.

While Alec’s dad spoke to Dr. Glumsfeld, Alec wandered off and retraced the route he’d taken through the museum the day before. Only now he had to remember what the exhibit used to look like — to see what wasn’t there. That would be the tricky part. Yesterday, he could just open his eyes and look at the different artifacts. Now he could only imagine. Alec closed his eyes and rubbed thoughts into his brain.

Yesterday the room had been packed. Alec Flint hadn’t been able to look anywhere without seeing huge glass cases filled with books, or roped-off displays of cutlasses and broadswords. There had been chests and boxes that looked like they belonged in a pirate story, and a glass container that held a big pile of gold coins. Alec kept rubbing his head to remember more about the exhibit. He had looked at the gold coins for a long time yesterday and thought that they must’ve been worth three thousand dollars. Or maybe a million.

Alec wasn’t sure how much gold or other jewelry stuff cost since he never bought any. The only jewelry he wore was the detective watch his mom got him the last time she went to San Francisco. It had buttons that let you set three different time zones, and a stopwatch, and it was glow-in-the-dark besides. But detective watches weren’t really jewelry as far as Alec was concerned, and they certainly weren’t made of gold. They were only sort of jewelry. The kind that was okay for a boy to wear without feeling girlie.

Alec opened his eyes and checked his detective watch. Still twenty minutes until school started. Alec read the plaque on the wall next to the case where the gold coins used to be. The perp hadn’t taken the plaque. It said, “These coins are part of the treasure Christopher Columbus brought on the Niña during his first voyage to America . Columbus planned on trading them for goods in the Indies.”

Officer Flint was still talking to Dr. Glumsfeld — Alec checked — so he kept wandering around the empty exhibit.

He remembered yesterday when he’d walked around with Emily Berg. She was there because her dad, Alfred Berg, was in charge of the insurance company in Laurel Hollows. As far as Alec knew, that meant if expensive things got stolen, Officer Flint had to find them fast, otherwise Emily’s dad’s company had to pay big bucks to whoever lost them. In this case, it would be the anonymous benefactor. Officer Flint got invited to things like the Christopher Columbus exhibit to keep an eye on what was happening. Alfred Berg was not invited, but came anyway.

Emily Berg was bouncy. She was also Alec’s next-door neighbor. And in his same class at school. Alec Flint had been looking at the gold coins when Emily squeak-squeal-bounced over to him and said, “Hey, Alec, isn’t this stuff cool?”

“Uh, yeah,” Alec had said. “Totally.”

It wasn’t that Alec didn’t like Emily — he liked her tons more than he liked Fernando the creepy security guard, for example — but sometimes he wished she would stop bouncing for a while. Even talking to her made him a little tired.

“I love going to museums like this, don’t you, Alec? Don’t you?” she had said, bouncing.

Alec did like going to museums like this, especially when the exhibits were on the FBI or old TV shows where people were police car partners. There was one exhibit he and his dad saw that was all about the old TV show named Car 54, Where Are You? Alec liked how Officer Toody and Officer Muldoon got to be detectives together. Like a team. Alec thought, as he had on many occasions before, that it would be nice to find someone to be a detective team with him. But not Emily Berg. As far as Alec was concerned, Emily Berg would make a terrible sleuth. She wouldn’t be quiet long enough to go on a stakeout or anything.

“I’m working for my dad today, Emily,” he’d said to her yesterday. “I can’t really talk.”

“Oh!” Emily had said, her eyes wide. “Got it!” Then she’d zipped her lips — actually zipped them all the way across with her fingers — and, much to Alec’s surprise, stood quietly next to him while he’d examined the exhibit and watched for perps.

After the gold, Alec had checked out a big leather-bound book in a glass case. He’d stood on his sneaker toes to see inside. The front cover hadn’t said anything — it was just sort of brown and leathery. It had looked like someone made it out of an old, worn shoe.

Alec closed his eyes and rubbed some more thoughts into his brain so he could remember what the book was like when it was actually there, but he couldn’t think of anything else, other than the shoe thing. So he opened his eyes and looked at the plaque that was still on the wall. It said: “Captain’s Log of Christopher Columbus.” And since you couldn’t see inside the book — even before it had gone missing — because it was locked in the case, there were pictures stuck on the wall of what was inside. Alec glanced at the pictures, which were mostly just round, curly handwriting in another language, and kept going. He checked his watch again — Officer Flint was still talking to Dr. Glumsfeld, and there were fifteen minutes left until Alec had to get to school.

On the side of the next empty case, Alec read from a plaque that said: “Part of the Pinta’s Sail.” The air-conditioned box was still there, where the piece of Pinta sail had been stored so it wouldn’t rot, but the fabric was gone. Alec wondered who had found this sail section and where the rest of the Pinta was. Maybe rotting somewhere at the bottom of the ocean. Alec secretly hoped so. He was not a fan of Christopher Columbus or his ships.

Alec moved on from the empty air-conditioned box to the empty stand where yesterday he and Emily had looked through the telescope that one of Columbus’s men used to spy land. It hadn’t been all locked up, and you could actually touch it. Yesterday, Alec had slid the wooden telescope in and out, making it longer and shorter. When he’d looked through the lenses, he’d seen Emily’s eye up close.

“Can I try?” she’d asked.

“Sure,” Alec had said.

After he’d handed it over, Emily had put one hand on her hip and twirled the telescope around like a baton in the other hand. Then she’d dropped it. The clatter had echoed through the big room. Alec had bent to pick up the telescope and had given it back to Emily.

“Good thing the piece you look through didn’t break,” he’d said, slightly worried that it wouldn’t be shady characters who ruined the Christopher Columbus exhibit, but it would be Emily Berg.

After the clatter, Dr. Glumsfeld had swish-swished over and appeared next to Alec and Emily.

“I think it would be a wonderful idea if the two of you returned to your fathers,” he’d said, and looked hard at Alec.

Emily Berg had stuck out her tongue behind Dr. Glumsfeld’s back. Alec had not stuck out his tongue. He’d had the notion that Dr. Glumsfeld’s idea was more an order than a suggestion and wanted to get away from him as quickly as possible. Alec had squeak-squealed back to his father. Emily had squeak-squealbounced back to hers.

And that’s what Alec Flint did again because he realized that, according to his detective watch, he only had four minutes to get to school before the bell.

“Dad!” he whispered loudly to Officer Flint. “School!”

Officer Flint looked at his watch and his eyes popped open very wide. “Cripes!” he said, which Alec Flint knew meant his dad thought they were in trouble. He only said “cripes” when things got bad.

“Dr. Glumsfeld,” Officer Flint said, “I’ll be right back. Just have to take my son to school. If you’ll fill out this missing-items report, I’ll be back to go over it with you in a jiff.”

“Of course!” Dr. Glumsfeld said.

Fernando-call-me-Frank escorted Alec and Officer Flint out of the museum. Alec spied on him as they walked. It looked like there was a bulge in the back of his pocket. A bulge the size of a gold coin. Alec looked over at his dad, but Officer Flint wasn’t paying attention to Fernando. Hmm, thought Alec, this might be a case for a super sleuth. He pulled his detective notebook outof his pocket and his pen out of his convenientsweatshirt pouch. Then Alec Flint began to write.

Excerpted from ALEC FLINT, SUPER SLEUTH: The Nina, the Pinta, and the Vanishing Treasure © Copyright 2012 by Jill Santopolo. Reprinted with permission by Orchard Books, an imprint of Scholastic, Inc. All rights reserved.