The Secret at Jefferson's Mansion Read Online Free Page B

Marshall asked when they’d closed the front door behind them. The fog was still thick near the ground, but KC could see a glimmer of blue sky.
    â€œI want to ask Mr. Tea some questions,” KC said.
    â€œWhy?” Marshall asked as he ate his cookie.
    KC led Marshall around the corner of the house. She stopped next to some thick bushes. “Didn’t you think that whole thing about some stranger was weird?” she asked. “Okay, maybe it was just a stranger who stole the horses. But first he had tosneak into the basement. Then he had to look in a desk and find a key. Then he had to go into the house, see the case, unlock it, and walk away with the horses. And nobody saw him all this time?”
    â€œWell, we were upstairs, and Dr. Spender and Mrs. Peeps were in his office,” Marshall said. “And we know Mr. Tea was in town. So there was no one left to see a crook sneaking in.”
    â€œBut, Marsh, the crook wouldn’t know there was no one around,” KC said. “A stranger wouldn’t know about the horses, either. Something smells funny, that’s all.”
    They found Mr. Tea working on the basement door. He had spread a tarp on the wet ground and was kneeling on it. The old lock was on the tarp near an open toolbox. Mr. Tea was pulling a shiny newlock from its container. He held a thin screwdriver between his lips.
    â€œHello,” KC said as she and Marshall approached the man.
    Mr. Tea dipped his head and muttered something that sounded like “Hiya.”
    He took the screwdriver from his mouth and glanced at the kids. “They think I did it,” he said.
    â€œBut you weren’t here,” KC said. “Dr. Spender said he sent you into town to buy that lock.”
    â€œIt was Pearl Peeps who sent me, not the doc,” Mr. Tea said. “So you’re right, I wasn’t here, but they still think I’m involved.”
    Mr. Tea looked KC in the eye. “I love this place, respect it,” he said. “There is no way I would steal some old kiddie horses.”

    KC remembered something. “Were you looking through the windows yesterday around noon?” she asked.
    â€œI’ve enough to do around here without peekin’ in windows,” the man said. “Besides, right after we locked the horses in the case, Mrs. Peeps reminded me to go into town for this lock. I stopped and had lunch with my wife before I came back.”
    Mr. Tea placed the new lock into the hole left by the old one. “My wife will tell you the same thing,” he said. “I was ten miles away eating soup when the horses went missing.”

6
The Figure in the Fog
    KC and Marshall left Mr. Tea to his job. “Come on, I want to check something,” KC said.
    She walked around the building, stooping to look at the ground under the windows. “Yesterday I thought I saw someone looking through a window,” she said. “Whoever it was would have seen us put the horses in the case.”
    â€œWell, if you’re looking for the peeper’s footprints, don’t forget it rained last night,” Marshall said. “They’d get washed away.”
    â€œMaybe not,” KC said. She pointed up at the roof. “The roof overhangs the edgeof the house. So the ground under it might stay dry.”
    KC stopped under one window next to a shrub covered with red berries. “I think this is the window in the main room,” she said. Ignoring the wet grass, she got down on her knees. She moved the palm of her hand across the dirt. She felt a dent. “Look, Marsh!”
    Marshall knelt down, too. “What am I looking at?” he asked.
    â€œThe ground is flat here, like someone walked on it,” KC said. “But look at this.”
    She put her fingers in two deeper dents, closer to the building. “I think these holes were made by someone up on tiptoes,” she said. “The windows are high, so anyone looking in