The Clue at the Zoo Read Free Page B

last name, anyway?”
    “Yes. It could be a girl,” said Jill. “Rachel.”
    “It could be anything,” said Dawn. She bent over and flipped to the next page.
    “What is that mess?” Jill asked. She looked over Dawn’s shoulder.
    “Two arrows,” said Dawn. “Two thick pieces of paper pasted in like boxes. Two D’s.”
    She reached for her private eye box. She opened it and fished around for her magnifying glass. “Let me take a look. . . .” she began.
    “Two of everything,” said Jill.
    Noni picked up her crossword puzzle. “Just like twins.”
    “And nothing else in the rest of the book,” said Jill.
    “Wait a minute,” said Dawn. She dropped the magnifying glass back in the box. “I just thought of something.”

CHAPTER SEVEN
    D AWN AND J ILL HURRIED up the path.
    “Stop at the alligator swamp,” Noni called after them. “Make sure Arno’s all right.”
    Dawn waved back. “Don’t you see?” she asked Jill.
    “No.” Jill tossed her braids in the air.
    “One,” said Dawn. “No poison.”
    Jill stopped at a fountain for a quick drink.
    “How do you know?”
    Dawn sighed. “I’m a detective. I figured it out. Those boxes. They were thick. Pasted on.
    Jill raised one shoulder.
    “Paste,” said Dawn. “White paste. All those gritty little things . . .”
    “They were paste?” Jill asked.
    Dawn nodded. “Now we’ve got to look for something else.”
    “Arno.”
    Dawn stood on tiptoes. “I have to get up that hill across from the snake house. Then I’ll be able to see—” She broke off. “No, not Arno.”
    They started up the hill.
    “What are we looking for?” Jill asked.
    A whistle blew.
    It blew a second time.
    Dawn turned around.
    “Off the hill,” said a voice.
    It was the woman with the tan uniform. “You’ll mess up the grass,” she said.
    “No, we won’t,” Dawn promised. “We’ll tiptoe. We have to look for balloons. Two of them. Red ones.”
    The woman looked up in the air. Then she nodded. “Go ahead.”
    Dawn led the way up the hill.
    Jill puffed behind her. “I don’t understand,” she said. “I just don’t—”
    “Two boxes,” said Dawn. “Two boys.”
    “Of course,” Jill said. “Two boxes. Two boys.” She shook her braids. “What does that mean?”
    They reached the top of the hill.
    Dawn shaded her eyes with one hand. “Now listen. First we were on the path. Then we found the book. Right?”
    “I guess so.”
    “So who was on the path? Who could have dropped it?”
    Jill pulled on her braid. “Candy.”
    “Yes.”
    “The woman with the dog and the rose in her hair.”
    “Yes.”
    Jill nodded. “And that’s it.”
    Dawn shook her head. “No.”
    “You can’t count us,” said Jill.
    “What about—” Dawn began.
    Jill grabbed her arm. “You’re right. There was somebody else. Two other people.” She pointed. “And there they are.”
    Dawn looked across the zoo from the hill.
    There was a crowd in front of a building.
    Above the crowd two red balloons were floating along.
    “Twins,” said Jill. “Twins were on the path too.”
    “Good thinking,” said Dawn. About time, she said to herself.
    They raced down the hill, over the rocks, and back onto the path.
    The balloons disappeared.
    “Inside,” said Dawn. “They’ve gone inside.”
    Dawn darted in between a group of people. “Bat house,” she said.
    “Not me,” said Jill. “If you think I’m going near those bats, you’re crazy.”
    Jill plunked herself down on a bench. “I’ll wait right here.”
    Dawn took a breath.
    She didn’t think bats were so bad.
    Not nearly as bad as snakes.
    She opened the door to the bat house.
    Inside, everything looked red.
    “Special lights,” said the guard. “Bats sleep in the daytime. With these lights, the bats think it’s night. They stay awake so you can see them flying around.”
    Dawn nodded. She stopped to look at a few bats hanging upside down.

    It almost looked as if one were winking at her.
    She winked back,