Philip and the Fortune Teller (9781619501317) by John Paulits Read Free Book Online Page A

way out of their
dilemma.
    “Maybe,” Emery offered, “we should think up a
story and stick to it. We were at the circus, and then we met your
father, and that’s that.”
    “And when they ask us how our fingerprints
got on the jewelry box and in the old lady’s garage? Go on. Finish
the story.”
    Emery couldn’t.
    “Look,” said Philip, “we gotta do something
to get the jewelry box back to the lady so there’s no need for any
investigation.”
    Emery stopped walking.
    “Philip! Let’s tell the police where the
jewelry box is. In the gypsy’s tent!”
    “Good, you go tell them. I’ll wait for you in
Mrs. Logan’s bushes and never come out again.”
    “No, on the telephone.”
    “The telephone?”
    “Sure. We call them and tell them where the
jewelry box is, only we don’t say who we are. They get the jewelry
box, arrest the gypsy and the pharaoh, and they don’t even have to
worry about fingerprints or anything. The gypsy doesn’t know who we
are really. Just two kids.”
    Philip saw possibilities.
    “You know, Emery, sometimes you get good
ideas. Let’s do it.”
    “Okay, you go home and call them.”
    “What! I can’t call them. My parents are
home. They can’t hear me call the police and tell them about stolen
jewelry. You go home and call them.”
    “I can’t. My mom’s always there. She doesn’t
hear much when I talk to her, but she’d hear that. Guaranteed.
That’s how parents are. They hear what you don’t want them to hear
and don’t hear the other stuff you tell them.”
    Philip couldn’t argue with that.
    “I told my mother I needed a cell phone,”
Emery grumbled.
    “That idea’s dead then,” said Philip, his
spirits plummeting.
    “How about one of those old fashioned
phones,” Emery suggested.
    “What old fashioned phone?”
    “The kind on the street you drop money
into.”
    “Where’s one of them?”
    “There’s one near the school.”
    “What, the one without the thing you put to
your ear? What good’s that?”
    “There gotta be others. Let’s find one.”
    The boys walked to the supermarket and along
the stores lining the small outdoor mall attached to the
supermarket. They found one phone, but when Emery put the receiver
to his ear he heard nothing.
    “I think it’s dead,” he reported. Philip put
the receiver to his own ear and agreed.
    “Wasn’t there one by the corner store where
we hid the box?”
    Emery thought back. “Yeah, on the side wall.
You think it might work?”
    “Let’s go and see.”
    The boys raced to the store, and when they
arrived, they gave two people walking by a chance to pass.
    “Go try it,” Philip said.
    Emery put the receiver to his ear.
    “It’s buzzing like a real phone.”
    Philip read the instructions and said, “Put
in two quarters and call the police.”
    “You sure we’re allowed to do this. Call the
police. I only know 911; not the real number.”
    “We have no choice. Make the call real quick
so they can’t complain about it.”
    Emery hung up the phone and pulled a dollar
out of his pocket.
    “This is all I got.”
    Philip checked his own pocket and pulled out
a dime, two nickels and a penny.
    “Get change,” Philip suggested, pointing to
the store. “Four quarters.”
    Emery hustled inside the store but returned
with a glum look on his face.
    “What?” Philip asked.
    “He won’t give me any change. Says I gotta
buy something.”
    “So go buy something! What’d you come back
for? Go. Go.”
    Philip gave Emery an encouraging little
shove, and Emery headed back inside the store. He returned a moment
later, the same glum look on his face.
    “What now?” Philip cried in exasperation.
    “The cheapest thing is a pack of gum, but
it’s sixty cents. I won’t have enough to make the phone call.”
    Philip dug in his pocket and turned his dime
over to Emery.
    “Take this. If you spend sixty cents and give
him your dollar and my dime, you’ll get fifty cents back. Make sure
it’s two