Free Watson's Case by F.C. Shaw Page B

of? Maybe he should devote more time to inspecting that newspaper. Rollie walked back to his room. No one else was there. Rollie pried up the loose floorboard and found the newspaper lying on his hollow Shakespeare book. He plopped on his bed and spread the old newspaper on his lap.
    Carefully he peeled open the first page and studied the tiny text. Nothing of interest caught his eye. No Dancing Men, no other visible codes. This time he grabbed his magnifying glass and ran it over the page for a closer look.
    Wait.
    There was a tiny black ink sketch in the top left corner of the page, hidden behind the text. He would not have noticed it without his magnifying glass. He had a hard time making out what it was . . . looked like part of a staircase . . .
    He flipped the page and scanned the corners. Another black ink sketch this time in the bottom right corner. Again hard to decipher . . . maybe more of the staircase . . .
    Rollie flipped to the next page and quickly spotted another obscure sketch on the top right corner. Following that, the next page boasted a sketch in the bottom left corner. The remaining two pages revealed similar sketches in their corners. Rollie leapt from the bed and knelt on the floor to spread out the newspaper, and separate the thin pages. He ran his magnifying glass from one corner sketch to the other.
    Was this the map? He could not fully determine the sketches. Each drawing looked incomplete, like part of a bigger picture—
    â€œThat’s it!”
    Rollie slid the pages around on the floor to match the corners. It was like fitting a puzzle together. It took a few minutes of shuffling papers around and checking them through the magnifying glass until a decent picture formed. Rollie hunched and used the lens to study the black ink sketch he had assembled.
    What he pieced together looked like a rough floor plan of a building—wait, not just any building. It looked like Sherlock Academy! There was the downstairs hallway, the staircase, the headmaster’s office, the library, and the teacher’s lounge at the end. But there was something extra . . .
    A tunnel-like space snaked along behind the hallway and teacher’s lounge.
    â€œA secret passage!” Rollie breathed.

Sleepy Eyesand Nosey Minds
    Rollie squinted at the ink sketch closely. He knew he was looking at Sherlock Academy’s first floor plans. The opening to the secret passage appeared to be in the northern hallway corner between the teacher’s lounge and the staircase. The tunnel ran within the walls. At the top of the floor plan where the sketch disappeared off the page was a trio of numbers: 1, 6, 54. While the opening was clear in the drawing, he did not recall seeing any feature resembling an opening or a door in the actual hallway. How would anyone be able to find the opening unless he or she had this map?
    â€œThe holes!” Rollie’s heart nearly skipped a beat as he realized what he just deduced.
    Someone was looking for the secret passage by pounding holes in the walls.
    What else would someone be looking for behind the walls? A hidden room, a vault, a tunnel? Carving holes was a good way to see what was behind the plaster façade.
    Whoever was looking had not found the passage yet, for all the holes Rollie had investigated revealed only pipes and brick.
    Another thought struck him: Herr Zilch’s mole.
    Perhaps the mole was the seeker. If this passage was secret, the mole would search for it by his or her own means instead of asking Headmaster about it—assuming Yardsly knew about the secret passage. Rollie had to assume Headmaster knew—he seemed to know about every other secret at Sherlock Academy. Whether he shared those secrets with the teachers or not was yet to be determined. Rollie wondered if Yardsly had other reasons for keeping so many secrets.
    For now, finding the secret passage excited Rollie. If he could find it before