Free The Mystery of the Soccer Snitch by Gertrude Chandler Warner Page A

ask me…”
    â€œWell, I’d like to take a closer look at the gargoyles,” said Benny, “and the rest of this cool castle-looking library that they live in!”
    â€œThis library sure is cool,” laughed Miss Hollenberg. “I’ll surely miss it when they tear it down—now that we’ll have the new library to use. I don’t see why you children can’t take a look around, as long as you behave yourselves, and as long as your grandfather says yes.”

    â€œWe promise to behave,” Jessie said. “Can we explore the library for a bit, Grandfather?”
    â€œWhy, surely,” said Grandfather Alden. “I’m already late to see an old friend at the football stadium. But when you’ve finished your library visit, why don’t you meet me there? We can watch the Goldwin Bears practice.”
    The Alden children followed Mrs. Hollenberg through the tall, arched doorway. Benny looked up before walking inside and saw the gargoyles were still looking down at him, grinning.
    Miss Hollenberg pointed the children to a stairway that would lead them to the top floor of the library. “You all explore,” she said as she stepped behind her computer desk. “I have library work to do.”
    â€œRace you to the top!” shouted Benny, running ahead of his brother and sisters.
    â€œI bet we can win the race,” Henry told his sisters. “Do you see that elevator?”
    The other three Aldens pushed the up button on a nearby elevator panel. When the doors slid open, a library worker pushing wheeled carts of books also climbed onto the elevator. The carts were connected to each other, allowing three of them to be pushed at the same time.
    â€œThose look like the boxcars from a train!” Violet said. Henry and Jessie laughed. Violet’s comment made them think of their own boxcar back home. When the Alden children became orphans, they had run away and lived in an old boxcar in the woods. They had been afraid to live with their grandfather, fearing that he wouldn’t be nice. But when they found what a kind man Grandfather Alden was, they were happy to live with him in his big house in Greenfield. As a gift, he even placed the children’s boxcar in the backyard, where they used it as a playhouse.
    â€œThese are just books that have been recently returned,” said the man who worked in the library, pointing to a sign on the first cart that said “TO BE SHELVED.”
    The elevator slowly went up floor by floor. Ding. Ding. Ding. Halfway to the top, the doors opened and the library worker wheeled the cart out of the elevator.
    â€œMaybe this elevator wasn’t the fastest way of getting to the top,” said Jessie.
    At last the elevator doors opened at the top floor.
    â€œBenny!” Violet called out. “We beat you!”
    But there was no Benny. There were only bookshelves full of books, stretching row after row in all directions.
    â€œWhere do you think he is?” Jessie asked.
    â€œI don’t know,” said Henry. “Maybe taking the stairs was even slower than that slow elevator.”
    â€œOr maybe he stopped on the way up,” Violet said. “Maybe he got tired…or hungry.”
    â€œI bet you’re right,” said Henry. The youngest Alden was always hungry, though the library seemed like a better place to find a book than a snack.
    Jessie looked back into the stairwell. She called her little brother’s name. “Benny!” her voice echoed.
    Just then, the three children heard their brother’s voice echo back up the stairwell. “Oh, no!” Benny screamed. “A gargoyle is staring right at me!”
    â€œA gargoyle?” gasped Violet.
    â€œThere’s no way Benny could have seen a gargoyle,” said Henry. “The gargoyles we saw from the ground were at the top of the building, on the outside. We’re at the top of the building, not Benny. And