Stink and the World's Worst Super-Stinky Sneakers Read Free Page B

“What do you mean? I know it’s today.”
    “One of the judges caught a cold and he can’t smell right,” said Sophie. “So they had to cancel the contest.”
    “No way.”
    “Yah-huh. Mrs. D. said! I’m not even in the contest, but I feel bad for you and Sophie,” Webster told his friend.
    Stink could not believe his stinky, awful, no-good, very bad luck. “You mean I wore the same socks for six days and slept in my sneakers and tromped through mud puddles and swamp water for nothing?”
    Just then, Stink saw his teacher. “Mrs. D.!” called Stink. “Is it true? There’s really not going to be a stinky sneaker contest?”
    “Well,” said Mrs. D., “we might have a way to save the day.”
    “Really?” everybody asked.
    “Stink, when we heard one of the judges was sick, I thought, who else do we know who just might have an amazing, incredible sense of smell? And right away I thought of you, Stink Moody, The Nose.”

       “Stink could be a judge!” said Webster.
    “What do you say, Stink?” asked Mrs. D.
    “Me? A judge? For real? You mean I, Stink Moody, get to be a real-and-true professional smeller?”
    “Just call him Professor Smells-a-Lot,” said Judy.





 
    In the middle of the park stood a big red-and-white-striped circus tent with a banner that said:

       “Dad and I will wander around and meet you kids back here later,” said Mom.
    Stink opened the flaps and stepped through the tent door.
Phew!
A great wall of smell almost knocked him over. It was like standing smack-dab in the middle of a cloud — a giant, invisible, cumulonimbus stink cloud. Worse than thirty dead elephants. Worse than sixty corpse flowers. Worse than ninety-nine bottles of toilet water.
    Lined up on tables all around the tent were dozens of putrid sneakers. Each pair had a number, so nobody would know who owned which sneakers. Stink took his smelly shoes out of the bag and set them on the table.

       “You’ll be number twenty-seven,” said a lady behind the table.
    “Stink!” said Judy. “You can’t enter your own shoes in the contest.”
    “Why not?” Stink asked.
    “Don’t you get it? You’re a judge now. Judges can’t win the contest. That’s like voting for yourself for president.”
    “So?”
    “Stink, would you think it was fair if I were a judge, and I picked my own sneakers to win?”
    “Not really,” said Stink.
    “See? Picking your own sneakers makes you a cheater head.”
    “A cheese head?” asked Stink.
    “No, a big fat
Cheater
Head,” Judy said.
    Just then, Mrs. D. motioned for Stink to come over to the important table up front, where the judges sat. Red and blue ribbons were set out on a fancy tablecloth, alongside the shiny Golden Clothespin trophy.
    “What’s with the fancy clothespin?” whispered Judy.
    “That’s the award,” said Stink, pinching his nose shut, like with a clothespin, and making a P.U. face.

       “Here’s your new judge,” Mrs. D. told the other two judges. “Meet James Moody. Believe it or not, he goes by the name Stink.”
    The other two judges laughed. “Well, your name alone qualifies you to be a judge,” said the woman from Odor-Munchers. “Thanks, Stink. You really saved the day.”
    “Glad to meet you. I’m Mr. Moore. Call me Steve,” said the other judge.
    “You sure are tall,” said Stink, shaking his hand.
    “Stink,” said Mrs. D., “this is the man I wanted you to meet. Mr. Moore — I mean, Steve — is a professional smeller.”
    “That’s me,” said Steve.
    “You mean that’s your job — you smell stuff?” asked Stink.
    “That’s my job. I work for NASA, and they call me the Master Sniffer.”

       “They call me The Nose!” said Stink excitedly. “I want to be a professional smeller when I grow up. But my sister said —”
    “What kind of stuff do you smell?” Judy asked Steve.
    “Anything that goes up into space, I’m your man. If it’s too smelly, we can’t have it aboard the space