Encyclopedia Brown and the Case of the Carnival Crime Read online

  Dexter blinked at him. “Anyway, I tried one of the shooting games with a rifle, hitting these little ducks that swim back and forth. You know the ones?”

  “Yes,” Sally answered.

  “Okay,” said Dexter. “I don’t know why, but for once I couldn’t miss. The ducks went one way—I knocked them down. They went the other way—I knocked them down. I just had the right feel. When my time was up, I had the high score and won a sharpshooting medal.”

  “Great!” said Encyclopedia.

  “Congratulations!” said Sally.

  “Thanks,” Dexter said. “Naturally, I was pretty excited. As I said, I’d never won anything before. A few kids came over to see what the medal looked like up close. I was happy to show them. Then they all left, all except one, another kid from my class, Max Bungleson.”

  Max Bungleson was one of the Tigers. They were so mean that milk would go sour if they looked at it the wrong way.

  “He said a few nice things about my steady hands,” said Dexter. “Then he asked me if he could hold the medal for a minute. I didn’t have a good reason to say no, so I gave it to him. He held it for a few seconds. Then he put it in his pocket. When I protested, he just laughed. He said he deserved the medal for all the years he could have been picking on me and hadn’t.”

  “Only a Tiger would think that made sense,” Sally said. She turned to Encyclopedia. “We should help Dexter get his medal back.”

  “You can do that?” asked Dexter.

  “If we can get Max to admit he took it,” said Encyclopedia.

  “You make it sound easy,” Dexter said.

  “That remains to be seen,” Encyclopedia replied.

  They found Max near the roller coaster, showing off the medal to a group of young admirers.

  “I won this for my eagle eye,” Max bragged. “Robin Hood had nothing on me.”

  “I’m sure he didn’t,” said Encyclopedia. “After all, he used a bow and arrow.”

  “That was his loss,” said Max.

  “It wasn’t really his fault,” Encyclopedia pointed out. “Guns hadn’t been invented yet.”

  “Never mind all that,” said Dexter, jumping in. “That medal’s mine. I won it fair and square and you swiped it.”

  “I think you’re a little confused,” said Max, grinning broadly. “I don’t blame you for wanting it. Medals like this are hard to win.”

  “Which is exactly what I did,” said Dexter.

  Max turned to the others. “As I was saying, I won this shooting those little ducks. They didn’t know what hit them. Me and my six-shooters were on fire.”

  Dexter sighed. “I guess there’s nothing we can do, Encyclopedia.”

  “Don’t give up,” said Encyclopedia. “We’re not out of ammunition quite yet.”

  WHY NOT?

  (Turn to page 86 for the solution to “The Case of the Carnival Crime.”)

  Solution to The Case of the Vanished Sculpture

  Encyclopedia thought it was odd that the janitor would carry a wet mop over his shoulder after cleaning the floor. Surely the mop would leave drip marks. The only reason to carry the mop was because it wouldn’t fit in the pail. And the only reason for that was if something else was in the pail besides the dirty water—something like the missing sculpture. Confronted with this information, the janitor confessed to the crime and returned the stolen sculpture. He’s now cleaning floors at his new address—the state prison.

  Solution to The Case of the Glittering Diamonds

  As Encyclopedia knows, diamonds are the hardest substance in nature. Therefore, if the diamond Bugs had in the box was real, there was no reason for him to be worried about it getting scratched. Since he was worried, the diamond was clearly a fake. When faced with this fact, Bugs admitted that he made up the story so that the Tigers could afford to buy the supplies to make their own baseball diamond.

  Solution to The Case of the Tempting Toys

  Cooper always barked at strangers. Encyclopedia had noticed that Cooper didn’t bark at Biff when they arrived. That meant they had met before. When faced with the fact, Biff admitted he had met and petted Cooper earlier when he was taking the toys. He had planned to impress some girls by giving them prizes he could have claimed to have won at the fair. Without the stuffed animals, Biff could only impress the girls with his charm—which meant he was really out of luck.

  Solution to The Case of the Missing Songs

  Encyclopedia noted that the manager knew what the songs were about even though he had said earlier that Fiona had shown them to no one. The only way the manager could have known they were love songs was if he had taken them himself. It turned out that Fiona was planning to fire him. He planned to “discover” the songs later, earning her gratitude and thereby continuing on as her manager. As things turned out, he was fired even sooner than he expected.

  Solution to The Case of the Home-run Hitter

  Encyclopedia knew that Babe Ruth of the Yankees had hit three home runs in a game four times. However, Ruth could never have hit the home runs Sammy described. The home team doesn’t come to bat in the bottom of the ninth inning if it is already ahead, and Sammy had stated the game had taken place in Yankee Stadium, the Yankees home field. So the Babe could never have hit the home runs as Sammy said. Caught in his lie, Sammy confessed. He had found the ball in the back of his closet, but he figured if he was the only one left in the line when the museum opened, they would put his ball on display. When Chip took out some of the mementos he had brought, Sammy knew he had struck out.

  Solution to The Case of the Lazy Lion

  Encyclopedia had been surprised that the lion’s sleepiness had been unexpected. After all, the ringmaster had brought out the wheelbarrow filled with steaks during the act—and it had to have taken time to prepare that. Therefore someone had to have known the lion would be unable to perform.

  That someone was the ringmaster. He was hoping to make the lion tamer look bad so that he would have to leave the circus. That would improve the ringmaster’s chances of dating Lola. Since he didn’t want the performance to be ruined, he had prepared the steaks in advance. Once he was exposed, he confessed his misdeeds and was forced to clean up after all the animals for a month.

  Solution to The Case of the Explorer’s Map

  A lot of what Nate said about Columbus and his explorations were true. Any first map of Columbus might not have much on it. However, Columbus sailed under the Spanish flag for Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. Anything written on the map, such as “Atlantic Ocean,” would have been in Spanish, not in English. When Encyclopedia pointed this out, Nate quickly rolled up his map and sailed back home as fast as possible.

  Solution to The Case of the Arrowhead Hunters

  Encyclopedia noted that while all three campers had similar alibis, two of them, Jack Muir and Teddy Rose, were sitting by smoky fires. That indicated that the wood they were using was wet—which made sense because it was raining when they gathered it. However, Frank Donner’s fire was burning brightly, which meant his wood was dry. That only was possible if he had gotten his wood before it rained and put it in his tent. Then he stole the arrowheads while the others were gathering their wood. When told this fact, Frank admitted he had taken the arrowheads, and he returned them and added three more that he had found.

  Solution to The Case of the Courageous Camper

  The story of Buster’s cousin was certainly exciting, and it sounded possible until Buster explained that his cousin had turned his compass until it pointed east. Encyclopedia knew that compasses always point north toward the magnetic North Pole. Once Encyclopedia realized that part of the story was wrong, he had doubts about the rest of the story as well. Under further questioning, Buster owned up that he had invented the whole thing. The only cousin he had lived in a skyscraper in a big city.

  Solution to The Case of the Carnival Crime

  Dexter had explained that he had won the medal using a rifle—the only kind of gun used at a shooting gallery.
But when Max was bragging about his aim, he mentioned using six-shooters. Six-shooters are pistols, and there are none of those available at a shooting gallery. When Encyclopedia pointed this out, Max blinked a few times and admitted that maybe his aim was a little off. Then he gave the medal back to Dexter.