Maisy And The Missing Mice

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Maisy And The Missing Mice - book excerpt

Prologue

The light from the street lamps made gray circles on the sidewalk and pavement all around her. Maisy rested against the building, adjusted her fedora hat, and pulled her last cherry lollipop from her pocket. Distracted by the sweet scent of her candy, she didn’t notice her dog’s low growls that should have warned her of the approach of someone on a bike who was rapidly coming toward her. Suddenly, she heard a low, gruff voice call her name. She looked up in time to see a paper being tossed into one of the circles of light on the ground. She pushed herself off of the building and made her way toward the lamp post. With unsteady fingers, Maisy reached down to pick up the note. She opened the crinkled paper and saw it was smudged with dirt from where it had rested on the sidewalk. It only took her a moment to read the note.

If you ever want to see your lollipops again, forget about the missing mice.

-The Black Boot

Her eyes narrowed into tiny slits. The Black Boot, as he had taken to calling himself, appeared to be nothing but a thief. Maisy didn’t know how, but she was going to take him down. Of course, she had to figure out who he was first. It was bad enough that he had stolen the school’s mascots, but now he had admitted to stealing her collection of cherry lollipops. And nobody got away with stealing Maisy’s cherry lollipops.

Chapter 1

It had all started earlier today at lunch. Maisy and her best friend, Veronica, had been enjoying their pizza and talking about Veronica’s birthday party that was to take place tomorrow night at an Italian pizza restaurant. They were excited that Veronica’s mom and stepdad were throwing her party at the Andiamo Pizzeria. It was the girls’ favorite restaurant in town, because it had a lot of fun stuff for kids to do. It was a regular restaurant, but there were also a lot of games to play in the arcade. Plus, both girls tried to keep pizza as a steady part of their diets.

Maisy and Veronica had only been seated for a few minutes when the principal had come over the intercom with an announcement. Her voice was calm, but it was obvious she was annoyed. “Students, this is Principal Hollendar. Our school mascots have been stolen from their home in the science lab. If anyone has any information, please come to the office. A student reported seeing a black boot disappearing around the corner in the hallway shortly before they were discovered to be missing. That is our only clue at this time. A reward will be given to any student who helps find and return the mice.”

Veronica was furious. She tossed her blonde hair over her shoulder and joined the other students in their shouts of anger. Maisy just closed her eyes at the mention of a clue. She could feel her skin tingling with excitement. She loved mysteries and was excellent at solving them. In fact, the other students knew of her talent and came to her whenever they had a problem. They knew she would solve the case quickly and for a fair price. But, Maisy didn’t work for money. She worked for cherry lollipops. They were the second most precious thing to her, the first being her little dog, Reesie.

Maisy Sawyer was not like the average fourth grade students that attended West Valley Elementary. She had grown to love old black and white mystery movies, the kind that grandparents had watched when they were children back in the Stone Age. When she was on a case, her world seemed to fade to the black and white of one of those mystery movies. Shades of gray colored everything. She even imagined her bedroom at home to be her detective agency office. Most of the time, it had walls painted in bright blue and almost everything else was purple, including Reesie’s dog bed. But, when she was on a case, the room changed into something from an old movie. The walls were cracked, the window’s blinds broken and stuck in one position, and it was cluttered with old boxes and furniture. It was also shaded in gray, black, and white. The window showed a view of a city skyline, instead of the reality of a small neighborhood in a little Ohio town. The one constant between Maisy’s imaginary detective agency office and reality was her little typewriter. Maisy didn’t have anything against computers, but she liked to type her case notes the old-fashioned way. Maisy couldn’t explain why everything changed to black and white when she was on a case. She just knew that with her world in black and white, putting together clues to solve a mystery was much easier.

Now, as she sat in the cafeteria, listening to the outraged cries of her fellow students, she opened her eyes. The color drained from her vision, like paint running in lines down a white canvas. The yellow cafeteria walls, the bright red trays on the long, wooden tables, and even the people around her, shifted into black and white versions of themselves.

Maisy smiled. She knew the principal was a generous lady. Maisy had once helped her find her missing keys, and she had gotten three lollipops from the candy drawer that was usually reserved for teachers. That hadn’t even been a real case! But, this was a big case. She wondered how many cherry lollipops Principal Hollendar would give her for solving it.

Of course, like the other students, Maisy also loved the little mice that had become the elementary school’s mascots. The official mascot of West Valley’s high school and middle school was actually a rather vicious looking tiger. The elementary students were officially known as the tiger cubs. But, last year, Lizzie Franklin had liberated some live mice from her brother, who had intended to feed them to his pet snake. She had brought them to school and asked the science teacher, Mr. Brown, if they could be class pets. After the full story came out, Principal Hollendar had insisted that Lizzie return them to her brother, since she had stolen them. But, her parents had agreed to let Lizzie keep them at school as long as the principal and science teacher approved. Both of them had, and the little mice became quite popular. The students had started seeing them as sort of unofficial mascots of the elementary.

“Earth to Maisy. Come in Maisy.”

Maisy laughed as she realized she had been lost in thought. Veronica stood and picked up Maisy’s tray. “What are you doing?” Maisy asked.

“Well, don’t you have a case to solve?” Veronica replied, raising her eyebrows in curiosity.

Maisy just smiled, nodded her head, and rescued her lollipop she had been saving for dessert from the tray Veronica was about to dump. She unwrapped it, and savored its delicious flavor for a moment before exiting the cafeteria.