Philip and the Thief (9781619500648) by John (COR) Paulits Page A

mystery!
    “ Emery,” said Mr. Felton, “I have good
news for you. Philip the Great will help you find your missing
ball.”
    “ Who’s Philip the Great?” Emery
asked.
    “ Me, Emery. Me.”
    “ What makes you so great?”
    “ Explain it to him, Philip,” said Mr.
Felton. “I have to go. Good luck finding your ball, Emery. See you
later.”
    “ My dad’s joking. I solved a mystery
the way Nate the Great does, so that makes me Philip the
Great.”
    “ Find my Superball,” said Emery sadly,
“and I’ll feel like Emery the Great.”
    “ Let’s go over your house,” said
Philip. “Tell me what happened and maybe I’ll be able to find a
clue.”
    “ I hope so.” And the boys
left.
     
     

Chapter Two
     
    As the two boys crossed the street to Emery’s
house, Emery said, “I only got the Superball yesterday. It bounces
like crazy.” Emery began to get excited. “I threw it down hard as I
could. You should have seen it fly all over the living room almost
faster than the eye can see. It took me awhile to find it a couple
of times after it finally settled down. My mother told me to stop,
though. The babies. I don’t know why they have to sleep so much.”
Emery had two little sisters. “Anyway, I put the ball down and this
morning I couldn’t find it.”
    They arrived at Emery’s house and went
inside. Emery went straight to the TV and turned it on. He and
Philip sat on the sofa.
    Philip frowned. “You still got this same TV?
The last time we watched cartoons on it, the trees were blue. Look,
the picture’s all jiggly. I thought you were getting a new one; the
flat kind.”
    “ My father keeps promising, but he
never does. I told him a million times. Forget about the TV and
think about my ball.”
    “ Where’d you put it down?” Philip
asked.
    “ In the kitchen.”
    “ Did you ask your mother about
it?”
    “ No,” said Emery. “I’m afraid she’ll
say she threw it away.”
    “ I’ll go ask,” said Philip. “Fix the
TV.”
    Emery got up as Philip left and went to the
TV where the picture rolled and flickered.
    Philip found Emery’s mother in the kitchen
and greeted her. “Hello, Mrs. Wyatt.”
    “ Good morning, Philip. How are
you?”
    “ Fine,” said Philip. “I’m helping Emery
find his Superball. Did you see it?”
    Mrs. Wyatt bent down to put some dishes into
the dishwasher. “Yes, I saw it last night. He left it in the
kitchen.”
    “ That’s what he said,” said Philip.
“Now he can’t find it. Do you know what happened to it?” If Emery’s
mother threw the ball away, Philip hoped he wouldn’t have to be the
one to break the news to his friend.
    “ Over there on the counter,” said Mrs.
Wyatt.
    “ It isn’t here,” he said.
    Mrs. Wyatt turned to Philip. “No? Oh, I
remember picking it up from there.”
    “ What did you do with it after you
picked it up?” Philip spoke calmly, like he thought a good
detective should.
    “ What did I do with it?” Mrs. Wyatt
asked herself softly. “I went into the living room . . . I don’t
remember. Tell Emery when he finds it not to be bouncing it all
over the house. He’ll break something and wake up his sisters.” She
turned back to the dishwasher.
    Philip returned to the living room to report
back to Emery. “Your mother said she picked it up and brought it
into the living room.”
    “ I looked all over the living room,”
Emery said in exasperation. “It’s not in the living room. Oh, it’s
probably lost forever,” he said glumly. “I’ll look again.” He got
down on his hands and knees and began searching under things.
Philip helped him, but neither one could find the ball. They sat
back on the sofa to think.
    “ Why didn’t you fix the TV?” asked
Philip. “We could watch while we think.”
    “ I tried fixing it,” Emery snapped. “It
won’t fix.”
    Philip walked over to the TV. He pushed every
button he could find, but the picture continued to dance and
twist.
    Philip wiggled his nose and bent