‘Mystery Teacher’
“Are you Super Spies?” asks the postman.
“That’s us!” the kids call out.
The postman hands them a brown box.
Jack rips opens the official Super Spy Kit. He and his pal Jill have been waiting weeks and here it is at last. He pulls out spy hats, spy glasses, Secret Powder and fake beards.
“I can’t wait to solve a mystery!” Jack says.
“Me, too!” answers Jill.
The next day at school, the principal asks them, “Please take this to your substitute teacher, Ms. Beecher.” He holds out a note. “She’s in the lounge.”
The intrepid super spies head to the room marked Teachers Only! Jack knocks softly. Inside, a tall woman is sitting on a cot. A tangle of white sheets is piled beside her.
“Ms. Beecher?” Jill asks.
She smiles and nods, pulling a curler from her hair.
Jack gives her the note, then he and Jill skedaddle.
“Do you think Ms. Beecher spent the night at school?” Jack asks on the playground.
“It’s a mystery!” Jill says.
After school, Jack tells Jill his secret spy plan. They squat behind a trash can outside the teacher’s lounge.
Ms. Beecher finally comes out, rolling a large suitcase. She heads down the hall and disappears into the library.
“I bet her clothes are in there,” Jack says quietly.
“Make-up and hair-dryer.”
Jack smoothes his beard. “Why is she taking it to the library?”
The detective duo makes sure the teachers’ lounge is empty before tiptoeing quietly inside. Jill sprinkles Secret Powder on the cot. Jack sets a sticky mouse-catcher – borrowed from the custodian – underneath it.
The next day, Ms. Beecher is leaning against the chalkboard. She dabs red, puffy eyes with a tissue. “I must be allergic to chalk dust,” she says.
“Secret Powder! Jack whispers across the aisle. “She must’ve slept on the cot!”
Jill eyes the teacher’s fuzzy pink feet. The mouse-catcher is stuck to her slippers.
“Reading circles! What’s your favorite type of story?” Ms. Beecher asks them.
“Mysteries!” Jack and Jill echo.
Ms. Beecher winks. “Me, too!”
On Friday, Ms. Beecher carries in two sacks of groceries.
“She’s probably tired of cafeteria food,” Jack says.
Jill points at the coat rack. “A bathrobe!”
“Does everyone know what Sunday is?” Ms. Beecher asks.
The room nearly bursts. “ Halloween!”
Jack stares at Jill. Jill stares back. “We forgot our favorite holiday!”
“I thought we’d celebrate today,” Ms. Beecher says. “Since this year Halloween falls on the weekend.”
Ms. Beecher unloads the sacks – popcorn, fist-sized pumpkins, and apples for bobbing. She takes decorations from her suitcase – pipe cleaner spiders, vampire bats and a stack of goblin books.
Then she shakes out the white sheets. “Who wants to be a mummy?”
“I’m going to be a super sleuth,” Jack says, putting on his beard.
“That makes two of us!” Jill adds.
“I’m an absent-minded professor,” Ms. Beecher says, passing out candy corn. “Some days I forget to brush my hair before leaving home. Just yesterday I showed up at school in my house-slippers!”
Jack and Jill trade knowing looks. Mystery solved!
Special thanks to Kim Dwinell for her illustration. To see more of her work, visit kimdwinell.com. Visit the author at sherryshahan.com
For more Kids’ Reading Room, visit latimes.com/kids.