3 Coming Unraveled by Marjorie Sorrell Rockwell Read Free Book Online Page B

them. “Okay, okay. Let’s see if there’s a loose thread.”
    Bootsie rolled her eyes, but joined the up-close examination of the quilt. “Here’s a square that’s kinda loose,” she pointed.
    “Hand me those tweezers,” Maddy pro mpted her granddaughter. “Let’s see if I can work it loose without breaking the thread.”
    “Pretty shoddy sewing,” harrumphed Liz zie. “Looks like it was done in haste. No attention to the stitching.”
    “I agree,” said Bootsie. “Surprising that Harry Periwinkle would want this ugly old thing. Poor needlecraft. Boring design. Stuffed with old newspapers. Can’t be worth more than twenty dollars at yard sale.”
    “Not newspapers,” said Maddy. Something in her voice got their attention. The women turned to stare at the quilt.
    Maddy’s tweezers had extracted a long green piece of paper … US currency featuring the image of some stuffy looking man in formal military attire.
    “ T-that’s a thousand dollar bill,” stammered Lizzie. “Look it says so in big numbers on the backside.”
    “There no such thing as a thousand dollar bill,” Bootsie stated flatly. “This must be counterfeit.”
    “No,” corrected Cookie, calling on her encyclopedic memory. “ Small-size Federal Reserve notes in the amount of one thousand dollars were first issued in 1890. They bore the portrait of General George Meade.”
    “He wasn’t a president,” said Aggie, having studied t hem in school last year.
    “Neither was Ben Franklin or Alexander Hamilton,” Maddy patted her granddaughter’s hand. “And they’re on hundred s and twenties.”
    Maddy fished out another $1 000 bill.
    “These are red seal bank notes. ” Cookie pointed to the circular red blob on the front of the bills. “They were known as Grand Watermelons because the zeros are shaped like large watermelons, oblong and dark green with black streaks.”
    “Watermelons,” laughed the mayor’s wife. The town was famous for its annual Watermelon Festival. “How appropriate.”
    “Are there more in there?” asked Lizzie.
    “Let’s find out,” said Bootsie, ripping at the stitches she’d earlier tried to protect. “Holy cow! This quilt is filled with thousand dollar bills.”
    “N -no wonder Harry Periwinkle wanted it,” stammered Maddy. “There must be a million dollars in here.”
    “But half interest in E Z Seat has got to be worth more than that,” said Bootsie.
    “This pile of money is worth much more than its face value,” countered Cookie. “ A $1000 Grand Watermelon is the most expensive US banknote ever sold at auction. One of them went for a world’s record price of $2,255,000.”
    “One of them?” gasped the banker’s wife. “There must be hundreds of them here.”
    Cookie nodded, dumbfounded by their discovery. “ Before we opened this old quilt, only two red seal Grand Watermelons were known to still exist. The one that sold at auction and another that’s in the museum at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.”
    “ Amazing,” muttered Liz. “We’ve just figured out what this Lost Boy charade was all about – a hidden fortune.”
    “Yes,” said Maddy Madison. “But now the question is, where did Amos Purdue’s grandmother get this much money?”
     
     

 
    Chapter T hirteen
     
    The Haney Bros. Circus had returned to the Bentley farm on its way to a gig in Illinois. Ben was a sucker for helping out wayfarers in need of a place to camp out – whether stranded RV’s, itinerant workers, gypsy troupes, or pocket-sized circuses.
    Ben even helped the Haneys pitch their two tents. Big Bill and Little William slept in one, Bombay and Sprinkles the Clown shared the other.
    Sneezy the Baboon had his own folding cot in the second tent. The horses were tethered out back. The elephant was chained to a stake. The lion and tiger had their own cages. And Sleepy the Bear slept in the back of the truck.
    “We had a great run at the Burpyville Mall,” crowed Big Bill, still