Free Mystery of the Star Ruby by Gertrude Chandler Warner Page B

Jessie.
    “You have to keep rinsing,” Jonathan instructed. “Rinse and then shift the rocks around. You have to do this until the water runs clear. Then you’ll be able to see the rocks that are left.”
    The Aldens rinsed and tilted their trays, letting the muddy dirt wash away.
    “Is this good enough?” Benny asked Jonathan.
    “Not yet. Keep rinsing.”
    After a while, Jonathan checked their trays. “Great! Now let’s see what you’ve got.” He sorted through the small stones in Violet’s tray first.
    “I don’t see any rubies,” she said. “All I see are a bunch of rocks.”
    “Rubies and sapphires don’t come out of the ground polished and cut like you see in jewelry stores,” Jonathan said. “They’re embedded in matrix, a rocky material. So they look like rocks at first.”
    Jessie peered into her own tray. “If they look like rocks, how will we ever know we found a ruby?”
    “There are clues to help you identify gems in the rough,” said Jonathan. “Visit the Ruby Hollow Gem Museum. There are displays to help you see what rubies and other gems look like with and without matrix.”
    “I can see there’s more to this than we thought,” Grandfather said with a laugh.
    “You’ll catch on fast.” Jonathan leaned over Grandfather’s tray and sorted swiftly through the stones. He held up a black rock. “This is obsidian.”
    “What do I have?” Benny asked.
    Jonathan examined the stones in Benny’s tray. He dropped a tiny stone into Benny’s palm.
    “Here’s a sapphire,” he said. “Nice going!”
    “A sapphire!” Benny cried.
    Jessie’s and Violet’s trays contained pretty chunks of pink quartz. Henry’s tray yielded a nice-sized garnet.
    “Not bad for your first day,” Jonathan pronounced.
    Benny put his sapphire in his pocket. “Rock-hunting makes me hungry!”
    Grandfather laughed. “Everything makes you hungry. But it is dinnertime.”
    “I’ll walk with you up to the restaurant,” said Jonathan. They all turned in their trays and washed up at the old-fashioned outdoor pump.
    The restaurant was inside the main building. Outside the entrance, the menu was written on a chalkboard. Guests dined family-style at the big pine tables.
    Jonathan and the Aldens sat down.
    They were soon joined by a woman around Grandfather’s age and a dark-haired man wearing sunglasses and a white cotton shirt.
    “I’m Sybil Finley,” the elderly woman at the table said. She wore a white oversized man’s shirt and carried a straw hat. “I saw Jonathan helping you on the flume.”

    “Is this your first day, too?” Benny wanted to know. He popped a hush puppy in his mouth, enjoying the crunchy sweetness of fried cornmeal and onion.
    Sybil grinned at him. “Not hardly. I’ve been a rock hound my whole life. I’ve been to every gem mine around. But I keep coming back to Ruby Hollow.”
    “What brings you back?” Grandfather asked.
    “Well, it’s the only mine that has star rubies,” replied Sybil. “And I also enjoy the contest.”
    “You might as well go home, Sybil,” the dark-haired man spoke up, pulling off his sunglasses. “ I’m going to win that contest.”

CHAPTER 2
Mysterious Lights
    “How come you’re going to win?” Benny asked the man, who’d said his name was Donald Hodge. “The contest doesn’t end till Saturday”
    “Because I found a Papa Bear ruby” Donald said smugly “It’ll be a challenge for anyone to find a bigger stone.”
    He pulled a black velvet bag from his pocket and opened the drawstring. A large pinkish rock with red glints tumbled onto his place mat.
    Jonathan whistled. “Is that the stone you found in your last bucket today?”
    As Jonathan reached for the rock, Donald deftly scooped it up and dropped it back into the velvet bag. “Can’t touch my contest winner,” he said jokingly.
    “Like Benny said, the week’s not over,” Sybil reminded Donald. “Somebody could find a ruby in that class that’s bigger than yours, you