middle-grade-mystery

Who hides a ring? Who sets up this whole cockamamie production with puzzle pieces and treasure hunts and who knows what else over a ring?

Winston Breen was solving a puzzle, but then Winston Breen was always solving a puzzle.

It will take some time to adjust, but I promise you, this will be a real adventure for all of us.

Bullies were only triumphant when they made other people feel smaller than they themselves felt.

You want us to love you, is that right? Love, Tabitha Crum, is to be earned, not given away to just anyone like a festering case of fleas. She'd been seven when her mother had made the comparison of love and irritable itching. Tabitha remembered the statement quite well because it was the same year children at school had suddenly gotten it in their heads that she had a case of head lice. That had been a difficult time and nobody had gotten close to Tabitha since. Of course, with the addition of a pet mouse over the last year, her lack of friendship could perhaps be further explained by the misapprehension that she spoke to herself. Pemberley was a most excellent consultant in all matters, but he tended to stay out of sight, so Tabitha could somewhat understand the slanderous comments. Or it might have been the unfortunate, uneven unattractive, blunt-scissored haircut her mother was so fond of giving her. Or it could have been the simple truth that making friends can be an awkward and a difficult thing when it's a one-sided endeavor and you've a pet mouse and you've been painted as odd and quiet and shy, when really you're just a bit misunderstood. In any case, nobody at St. John's seemed lacking for companionship except her. But Tabitha reminded herself that there were far worse things than not having friends. In fact, she often made a game of listing far worse things:_ eating the contents of a sneeze_ creatures crawling into her ear holes._ losing a body part (Though that one was debatable depending on the part. An ear or small toe might be worth a friend or two.

The trouble with disagreeable people, Tibbs, is that the majority of them seem to be either one's direct relations or part of one's daily job. Present company excluded, of course. - Inspector Percival Pensive, The Case of the Haughty Housemaid

Winston and his sister walked for a time in silence, each in an invisible, vibrating pocket of excitement.