The Case of the Loose-Toothed Shark Read online

  The Case of the

  Loose-Toothed Shark

  BY NANCY KRULIK

  ILLUSTRATED BY GARY LaCOSTE

  For Amanda, who was always excited

  when the tooth fairy came!

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  “MOMMY!” my sister Mia whined as we walked into the aquarium on Saturday. “Jack’s not wearing my birthday party T-shirt!”

  I thought about throwing my jacket back on so my mother couldn’t see that I was wearing my Houston Astros jersey, but it was too late.

  My mother sighed. “Jack, we talked about this,” she warned.

  “I know,” I said. “But I always wear my Astros shirt to birthday parties. It’s my have-fun-at-a-party shirt.”

  “This is Mia’s day, Jack,” my mom said. “Can’t you just wear the T-shirt?”

  Mom wasn’t really asking. She was telling. So I took off my Astros shirt and pulled Mia’s birthday shirt out of my backpack and slipped it on over my undershirt. I shoved the Astros jersey into my pack.

  I was glad none of my friends was there to see me wearing a pink T-shirt that read I Did Something Fishy at Mia’s Birthday Party. Luckily, the aquarium didn’t open to the public until noon. So for now the only people I’d be seeing were Mia’s friends and the aquarium workers.

  Just then, I heard someone complaining.

  “Get away from my gravel!” he shouted.

  I turned to find out who it was, but the only thing I saw was an enormous fish tank with a crab sitting at the bottom.

  Two clown fish swam into view.

  “Hoho, what do you call someone who lives in the sea, is grouchy, and hates neighbors?” one clown fish asked the other.

  “I don’t know, Bobo,” Hoho said.

  “A hermit crab,” Bobo answered.

  “Grrr …” the crab grumbled. He shoved his head back into his shell. “I hate clown fish!”

  I laughed. Those fish were pretty funny.

  “MOM!” Mia shouted out. “Jack’s making fun of me.”

  “I didn’t say anything,” I told her.

  “You laughed,” Mia said.

  “I wasn’t laughing at you,” I told her. “I was laughing at —” I stopped myself. What was I supposed to say? I was laughing at two clown fish joking around with a crab?

  But it was the truth. I’d understood every word the fish had said. That’s because I can talk to animals. No, really. I can.

  It all started one day when I was taking my dog, Scout, out for a walk in the front yard, and two squirrels were up in a tree having target practice with some acorns. Unfortunately, my head was the target, and they got me good.

  Ordinarily, the only thing an acorn bash to the head would have left me with would have been a lump. But the oak tree in my front yard is a magic tree. Seriously. If a human is hit with an acorn from that tree, he gets special powers — like being able to talk to animals.

  A magic tree? I didn’t believe it at first, either. But the squirrels told me about it. And once I realized I could understand two squirrels, I figured there was something to their story about the magic tree. Ever since that day, I’ve been able to talk to all kinds of animals. Even fish.

  “Jack, come here,” my mother said. She was standing next to a tall, skinny woman with long, dark hair. The woman was wearing a blue shirt that read Friend of the Fishes: Seaside Aquarium.

  “This is Alyssa, Mia’s party helper,” my mother explained. “She has a surprise for you.”

  “Why does Jack get a surprise?” Mia demanded. “It’s my birthday.”

  “We have surprises for you, too,” Alyssa assured Mia. “But you have to be at least eight for this one.”

  “I’m nine,” I announced.

  “Then you’re old enough to swim with our sharks!” Alyssa told me.

  Yikes. That sounded scary. And dangerous. “You want me to get into a tank with a bunch of giant, man-eating sharks?” I asked.

  I gave my mom a funny look. This was the same woman who didn’t like to let me sled down steep hills or jump off the high diving board at the neighborhood pool. Now she was going to let me swim with killer sharks? It didn’t make any sense.

  Alyssa laughed. “Our sharks aren’t giant or man-eating. They’re sandbar sharks. They only grow to be about three to four feet long.”

  Those were my kind of sharks. “When can I dive in?” I asked.

  “In a little while,” Alyssa said. “You can swim with the sharks while Mia and her friends watch a puppet show.”

  My mom took my swim trunks out of her pocketbook. “I snuck these from your drawer,” she explained. “I wanted the shark swim to be a surprise.”

  Mia scowled. “I don’t want Jack to swim if I can’t,” she said. “It’s my birthday.”

  “Mia, you’re six now,” Mom scolded. “You need to act more mature. Come on. Let’s see how your cake turned out.”

  Double wow. I sure wished my best friend, Leo, was here to see this. Not only was I going to swim with sharks, but my mom had yelled at Mia the Pain on her birthday! Maybe this day wasn’t going to be as awful as I had thought.

  “MOM!” I heard Mia whining again from down the hall.

  Grrr. Or maybe it would still be awful. After all, I was going to be trapped in a sea of kindergartners for the entire morning.

  Chapter 2

  “Hi, Jack!”

  Suddenly, I heard a voice behind me. It wasn’t a fish voice or a crab voice. It was the voice of the smartest girl I knew, Elizabeth Morrison.

  “Hi,” I said. “What are you doing here?”

  Elizabeth shot me a goofy smile. I hate that. It looks like she likes me or something. I definitely do not like her — at least not like that. I only like Elizabeth like a partner. Which is what she is. My detective partner.

  Yup, Elizabeth and I solve mysteries. We’re pretty good, too. We’ve already solved three cases. We found Leo’s science fair plans after they’d been stolen. We rescued my sister’s tortoise, Tut, after he had been kidnapped. We also caught the prankster who turned the school guinea pig green. We’re practically professionals.

  But there weren’t any mysteries going on right now. Unless of course you counted the mystery of why the smartest girl in the third grade was at my little sister’s birthday party.

  “My little brother, Alfred, was invited to Mia’s party,” Elizabeth explained. “Your mom invited me as your guest.”

  “Oh.” If my mom had told me I could bring a guest, I would have invited Leo. He’s really fun to have around. But Elizabeth was better than no one. She was actually pretty nice, once you got to know her.

  “Elizabeth, I’m scared,” Alfred whined.

  I looked at him. “What’s scary about fish?”

  Alfred shook his head so hard his red hair fell in his eyes. “It’s not the fish,” he said. “It’s the tsunami. That’s a giant wave that destroys everything in its path.”

  “That won’t happen here,” Elizabeth assured him. “You need an underwater volcanic eruption to make a tsunami. There aren’t any volcanoes in those tanks.”

  The Brainiacs sure had some weird conversations. But Eliz
abeth had made Alfred feel better. He ran off to play with the other kindergartners.

  “He’s such a worrier,” Elizabeth said. “I guess it’s because he’s so smart.”

  I shrugged. It was possible. He was part of the Brainiac family, after all.

  “You want to explore?” Elizabeth asked me. “I’d like to learn all about the sharks before we swim with them. I’m not you. I can’t just ask them questions.”

  Elizabeth is the only person who knows I can talk to animals. I haven’t even told Leo, because I’m afraid he’ll think I’m really weird. I actually never told Elizabeth about it, either — she’s just such a Brainiac that she figured it out on her own.

  “Sure,” I agreed. “My parents said I can explore the aquarium as long as I come back to the party in time for the cake.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Elizabeth said.

  As Elizabeth and I walked down the hall, we spotted a giant squid hanging from the ceiling. It was huge — the size of my school bus!

  “Amazing!” Elizabeth gasped.

  “I wonder how many fishermen it took to drag that thing in,” I said.

  “Probably a lot,” Elizabeth said. She walked a little farther down the hall, and then stopped in front of what looked like a giant triangular-shaped brown rock.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  A kid with a Mohawk haircut walked over before Elizabeth could answer. “It’s a megalodon shark tooth fossil,” he said.

  “A shark tooth?” I asked nervously. The thing was the size of a cell phone!

  “Relax,” Elizabeth said. She read the sign on the wall. “This is a fossil from a twenty-million-year-old shark. Sharks today don’t have teeth this big.”

  “Yeah,” the kid with the Mohawk agreed. “Most shark teeth are much smaller. People wear them as charms on necklaces. You couldn’t walk around with that thing around your neck.”

  “No,” I agreed. “But I’d sure like to have it in my bedroom. How cool would that be?”

  “Very cool,” the kid with the Mohawk said. “And expensive. Shark tooth fossils cost a lot of money.”

  “How do you know so much about shark teeth?” Elizabeth asked him.

  “My dad works here,” the kid said. “I help out sometimes. I’m Teddy.”

  “I’m Jack. And this is Elizabeth,” I said. “We’re here for my sister’s birthday.”

  “You actually have a job here?” Elizabeth asked. She sounded impressed.

  “Sort of,” Teddy said. “You can’t have a real job when you’re in sixth grade. But my dad pays me to do chores, which is great, because I’m saving up for a bike. Are you guys going to swim with the sharks later?”

  We nodded.

  “I’ll swim with you,” he said. “I can swim in the tanks any time I want.”

  “Right now, I need to check in at the party,” Elizabeth told Teddy and me. “Alfred seemed nervous before.”

  “Alyssa took the kids up to the fifth floor to see the baby eels,” Teddy said. “It’s the first stop at every party.”

  “Thanks,” Elizabeth said. “We’ll see you later.”

  “Yup,” Teddy agreed. “Meet you in the shark tank!”

  A few minutes later, Elizabeth and I found Mia and her friends watching electric eels swim in a tank.

  “I wanna touch one!” Mia started to stick her hand in the tank. Alyssa stopped her just in time.

  “Those land creatures are so annoying,” I heard one electric eel say.

  “Their behavior is shocking!” his friend agreed.

  Just then, Elizabeth grabbed my arm. “Jack! I’ve got a problem,” she exclaimed. “Alfred is missing!”

  Chapter 3

  I looked around at the crowd of little kids. There wasn’t one redheaded Brainiac in the bunch.

  Oh no! Elizabeth and I had found missing homework and a kidnapped tortoise. But we had never solved a mystery this big. And I wasn’t sure I could.

  “What am I going to do?” Elizabeth asked me nervously.

  What was she asking me for? She was the Brainiac. She should have known what to do.

  “Well, you could take out your detective notebook and start writing down clues,” I suggested.

  “Are you kidding?” Elizabeth demanded. “We don’t have time for that!”

  “Whatcha doin’?” a small voice asked us.

  Elizabeth whipped around. “Alfred!” she shouted. “Where have you been?”

  “It takes a long time to walk all the way up to the fifth floor,” Alfred explained.

  “Why didn’t you just take the elevator with everyone else?” I asked him.

  Elizabeth sighed. “Alfred doesn’t take elevators,” she said. “They scare him.”

  “The cable could break, and then because of gravity, the elevator could fall to the ground.” Alfred looked at me. “You know about gravity, right, Jack?”

  “Sure,” I told him. “We learned that in science class.”

  “Alfred, go hang out with the other kids.” Elizabeth sounded tired.

  “Well, that’s a mystery solved,” I said as he ran off. “And we didn’t even have to do anything.”

  Just then Alyssa clapped her hands three times. The kindergarten kids clapped back and quieted down. “Okay, let’s go back to the first floor. I want to show you our turtle pond.”

  Lucky for Alfred, this time the party walked down the stairs instead of taking the elevator. Elizabeth and I tagged along behind my mom and dad.

  “I have a tortoise,” Mia told Alyssa as we walked downstairs. “His name is Tut. A tortoise looks like a turtle but they aren’t the same. Turtles have to live in or near the water. But tortoises don’t.”

  I frowned. I was the one who had told her that. Now here she was bragging like she had learned it all by herself. But I didn’t say anything. It was Mia’s birthday. I could let her feel smart for one day.

  When we reached the first floor, Alyssa led us into the hall with the giant squid. We had to go through the hall to get to the turtles.

  “Wow!” The kids all gasped as they looked up. The squid had looked huge to me. But to little kids like them, it must have seemed enormous.

  “That’s a giant squid,” Alyssa told them. “It lives deep in the ocean.”

  “When it’s alive,” Alfred pointed out. “But that one’s dead.”

  “Gross,” Mia groaned. “I don’t like dead things.”

  “I’ve seen lots of dead things,” Alfred said. “Like at the natural history museum.”

  “It’s not a dead squid,” Alyssa assured the kids. “It’s a life-size model.”

  “Ooh. Don’t say ‘dead,’” Mia whined.

  “I think we should move on,” my dad recommended.

  “Let’s go look at the huge shark tooth,” Alyssa said, hurrying the kids away from the squid before Alfred could freak anyone else out. “This shark tooth is actually a fossil. That means it is from a long time ago. This tooth is twenty million years old.”

  “That’s older than you, Daddy,” Mia said. My dad laughed.

  “The tooth —” Alyssa began. Then she stopped and stared at the shelf. “The tooth is gone!” she exclaimed. “It’s been stolen!”

  Frank the guard ran over. “Oh no,” he said. “It must have happened while I was in the other room.”

  “Did you see anyone in here before it disappeared?” Alyssa asked.

  Frank thought for a minute. “Yeah, a couple of kids. One of them was really interested in it.” He looked around and then pointed. “There he is.”

  I turned to look in the direction where Frank was pointing. But there was no one there. And when I turned back, I realized everyone was staring right at me.

  Chapter 4

  “Me?” I asked nervously. “I didn’t steal anything. Why would I steal a shark tooth fossil?”

  “I heard you tell Teddy and that girl over there how you’d want to have a giant shark tooth fossil in your room,” Frank the guard said.

  Everyone sta
red at me.

  “Did you say that, Jack?” my mother asked me.

  “Yeah, but I didn’t mean I’d steal it,” I told her. “I just said it was cool. And it was. Really cool.”

  “I want to see the cool shark tooth!” Mia whined. “It’s my birthday, and now I don’t get to see the shark tooth. It’s all Jack’s fault.”

  That’s why I call her Mia the Pain.

  “It’s not my fault. I didn’t steal it,” I insisted. “I didn’t steal anything.” I opened up my backpack and showed them the inside. There was nothing in there but a few baseball cards, my Astros jersey, and my bathing suit. “See?” I said.

  “You’re ruining my birthday party!” Mia shouted at me.

  “I’m not ruining anything,” I insisted.

  “Are too,” Mia said. She crossed her arms across her chest and stuck her tongue out at me.

  “Shut up!” I shouted at her.

  “MOM!” Mia shouted. “Jack said ‘shut up.’ We’re never supposed to say ‘shut up’. You said so.”

  My mother rolled her eyes. “Maybe we should move on to the turtle pond?” she suggested to Alyssa.

  Alyssa nodded. “Come on, kids,” she said to the kindergartners.

  As the kids left, I turned to my mom and dad. “I didn’t take it. I swear,” I told them.

  My dad looked at me. “If you say you didn’t take it, you didn’t take it,” he said. But he didn’t sound 100 percent sure.

  “We have to go help with the little kids,” my mother told Elizabeth and me. “We can talk about this later.”

  As my parents walked off, I sat down on a bench near the giant freshwater fish tank on the wall. Elizabeth sat down next to me and put her hand on my shoulder.

  “I know you didn’t steal anything,” she said.

  Just then I heard kissing noises.

  “Kiss. Kiss. Smooch! I love you,” someone said.

  “No, I love you,” someone else added.

  Oh great. That was all I needed.

  “We are not kissy faces!” I shouted out. I pushed Elizabeth’s hand off my shoulder.