Hoof Beat by Bonnie Bryant Page B

That was a valuable machine that her father had loaned her. He’d be furious if she’d lost it, and she’d be paying for it with her allowance until she had gray hair!
    Hurriedly, she dumped out everything in her backpack. She found some old pencils and a stale pack of chewing gum, but there was no sign of the dictating machine.
    When had she used it last? she asked herself. She recalled sitting on the bench in the locker area, right before Trudy had come in, dictating Trudy’s name to herself so she would remember to write the ill-fated column that had appeared in today’s paper. She hadn’t seen it since then, she was sure. She’d put it away in her cubby that day, but where was it now?
    For a few nightmarish moments, Lisa considered the possibility that there
was
a crime wave at Pine Hollow. The same person who had stolen Stevie’s wallet had come back for her dictating machine—or maybe the theft of the machine was purely for revenge!
    Now frantic, Lisa got down on the floor to reexamine the inside of her cubby on the bottom row. The deep cubby appeared to be completely empty. She reached in as far as she could. All she could feel was bare wood and then the wall at the back. Shescrunched down lower and extended her arm farther. Then she felt something. She felt the edge of a small metal case. It took all the stretching and reaching she could manage to grab hold of it. With a sigh of relief she pulled out the dictating machine. Somehow, it had gotten so far back in the cubby that it had gone off the back end of it and was wedged between the bottom shelf and the wall.
    Grateful to have solved the problem, she dropped the machine into her backpack and headed for Stevie’s. She’d had enough problems for one day!

“Y OU DON ’ T HAVE to say anything,” Carole told the weary Lisa when she arrived at Stevie’s. “Trudy has told us the whole story. And don’t worry, nobody’s mad at you. You did a fabulous job rescuing Trudy, and anyway, we knew you’d eventually see what was happening with Hoof Beat. After all, you’re our friend so you’ve got to be pretty terrific, right?”
    Lisa smiled gratefully. “Thanks. It’s a good thing I’ve got friends like you because when you mess up the way I have, you really need them!”
    Stevie tossed a half-inflated beach ball at Lisa. “Come
on
! Go put on your bathing suit. We’ve been waiting for you so we could have chicken fights!”
    “I’ll be right back,” Lisa promised, grinning over at Carole and Trudy. She headed for Stevie’s room where she could change.
    Stevie, who had been lying on her stomach on her towel, abruptly sat up. Although she was relieved to see the end of Lisa’s weird behavior, she realized that all her troubles were not solved. She put her elbows on her knees and cupped her chin in her hands with a sigh.
    “There’s still one really big problem left,” she said to Carole, “and that’s your dad’s birthday money.”
    “Something will work out,” Carole said.
    “Nothing’s going to work. I’ve tried everything!” Stevie said.
    “You’re such a pessimist,” Carole teased.
    “Since when are you such an optimist!” Stevie retorted.
    “I’m a realist,” Trudy interrupted. “A realist knows that if you work smart instead of hard, problems get solved.”
    Carole and Stevie looked at her and burst out laughing. “Okay, smarty, what’s our next step?” Stevie asked.
    “I don’t know,” Trudy told her. “I always know what to say. I don’t have to know what to do.” She rolled over to sun her other side and put on her lime-green and black mirrored sunglasses to indicate she was done with her pronouncements.
    “Okay, so we’ll let the realist sleep,” Stevie said to Carole. “Here comes our resourceful journalist. Let’s see if she has any ideas.”
    It was such a hot, sticky day that Lisa didn’t evenpause to greet her friends before she walked straight into the pool. She felt the cool water refresh her,