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儿童英语读物 The Ghost of the Chattering Bones CHAPTER 7 Going … Going … Gone!

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“Don’t keep us in the dark,” pleaded Violet “What are you thinking?”

Jessie pointed1 to Pam’s name spelled out in sprinkles. “See that?”

Henry nodded.

“Remember the first two lines of Meg’s verse?”

“Sure,” Benny told her. “We’ve read it about a hundred times.”

Jessie went over to the table where she’d left her notebook. Pulling up a chair, she printed the words ETON’S LOOP on a blank page. With her pencil poised2 over her notebook, she recited, “When last goes first, and first goes last.”

The others stared at her. They looked totally confused.

“I don’t get it,” Violet said as they sat down.

“That makes two of us,” Benny said.

Henry added, “Three of us.”

“I’ll do the same thing Benny did,” Jessie told them. “I’ll switch the letters around.”

She paused to look at everyone, hoping they’d see what she was driving at. “I’ll make the first letter in each word go last, and, the last letter go first.” Jessie held up her notebook for the others to see—ETON’S LOOP had become STONE POOL!

“Oh, my goodness!” Violet said, putting her hands to her mouth.

“Wow!” said Henry. “That’s good detective work, Jessie.”

“I helped, too,” put in Benny, who was busy scraping the last of the frosting from the bowl.

“You sure did.” Jessie nodded. “You gave me the idea when you switched the letters around in Pam’s name.”

“What I can’t understand,” said Violet, “is what the village of Stone Pool has to do with the mystery.”

“That’s what we’re going to find out,” stated Henry.

Benny licked some frosting from a corner of his mouth. “How will we find out?” he wanted to know.

Henry thought about this. “Maybe the answer’s in that photograph of Stone Pool. The one that Norah showed us.”

Violet’s eyebrows3 rose. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Let’s keep a lid on this for now,” Jessie suggested. “If it turns out we’re on the wrong track, Norah’s bound to be disappointed.”

Just then, Annette poked4 her head into the kitchen, a pencil stuck behind her ear. “Hey, there!” she said, smiling as if glad to see them. “Do you mind if I join you?”

The children stared at Annette, wondering why she was suddenly so cheery and friendly.

Without waiting for an answer, Annette stepped into the kitchen, shutting the door behind her. “So … how are you making out with the old mystery?” she asked, giving them a big smile.

“Well, we figured out that …” Benny stopped talking in mid-sentence. He suddenly remembered not to talk about the mystery.

Annette was instantly curious. “Go on,” she urged, as she pulled up a chair and set her coffee cup down on the table.

The children looked at one another. They didn’t want to lie, but they also knew it was best not to discuss the mystery just yet.

“We have a lot of questions,” said Jessie, “but not many answers.”

Annette began to tap her pencil on the table. “Surely you’ve figured out a clue by now.”

“A clue?” asked Jessie.

Annette sat back in her chair, looking at Jessie. Then, without another word, she got to her feet, grabbed her coffee cup, and marched out of the room.

When the door had closed behind her, the Aldens breathed a sigh of relief. “Can you believe it?” said Jessie. “One day she’s making fun of us for being detectives, and the next she’s—”

“Pumping us for information,” finished Henry. “How weird5 is that?”

“Maybe we should forget about Annette for now,” advised Violet. “We have a mystery to solve, remember?”

“You’re right, Violet,” said Jessie. “Time to check out the photograph of Stone Pool. I’m sure Norah won’t mind.”

“The album’s in a cabinet somewhere in the living room,” Benny recalled. “At least, that’s where Pam was supposed to put it.”

Sure enough, the Aldens found the album on the bottom shelf of an old pine cabinet with frosted glass doors. They made themselves comfortable on the sofa, then leafed through the album until they came to the old photograph. Jessie read the words at the bottom aloud one more time. “The village of Stone Pool as it appeared on a summer afternoon in 1810.”

“That’s funny,” Violet said, looking over Jessie’s shoulder. “The date’s been underlined three times.” She wasn’t sure but she thought it might be some kind of clue.

But Jessie had a feeling the photograph itself contained a clue. She held it at arm’s length, tilting6 her head to one side and then the other. “I don’t get it,” she said at last. “I can’t spot anything unusual, can you?” She passed the photograph to Henry.

Henry bent7 over to examine it. “It’s just a picture of a village in the olden days. Nothing strange about it.” He passed the photograph to Benny.

“I can see lots of people going in and out of stores,” observed Benny. “Nothing strange about that, either.”

Violet took the photograph that Benny handed her and studied it closely. “There’s something wrong here,” she said. “But I can’t figure out what it is.”

“There must be something we’re not seeing,” said Jessie.

But Henry was having second thoughts. “Maybe we’re on the wrong track.”

Without taking her gaze off the photograph, Violet said, “I think we’re on the right track, Henry. I’ve got a strong hunch8 about it.”

“Well, right now we’re going nowhere fast,” Henry pointed out.

“And I think better on a full stomach,” added Benny.

Henry grinned. “We get the hint, Benny. Let’s get some lunch.”

“We’d better not take the photograph into the kitchen with us,” Jessie said. “We might get food on it.”

As Jessie placed the photograph on the coffee table, she thought she heard something—a slight shuffling9 sound in the hall. Was it just her imagination? Or was someone listening to them?

Violet swallowed a mouthful of soup. “It’s so strange.”

“What’s strange, Violet?” Henry asked, helping10 himself to a grilled11 cheese sandwich.

“I can’t put it into words, but there’s something about that photograph of Stone Pool that bothers me.”

“It’s a really old photograph, Violet,” Benny pointed out. “It’s kind of faded.”

“That’s true, Benny.” Violet poured more lemonade. “It’s more than that, though. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something’s not right.”

“When it comes to mysteries,” Jessie said, “your hunches12 are seldom wrong, Violet. We’ll check it out again after lunch.”

After the delicious cookies had been sampled, and the dishes done, the Aldens made a beeline for the living room.

“Where’s the photograph of Stone Pool?” Benny demanded.

“It’s gone!” Jessie said. “It ought to be right here on the coffee table.”

Violet nodded. “I remember seeing you put it there.”

“Then … what happened to it?” asked Henry, glancing around in bewilderment.

Violet had a thought. “Maybe somebody put it back in the album.”

“I sure hope that’s the explanation,” said Jessie. She quickly checked it out, but it was no use. The photograph of Stone Pool wasn’t there.

“I can’t believe it,” said Violet. “Who could have taken it?”

“A thief—that’s who!” declared Benny. “And it looks like an inside job. I don’t see any broken windows.”

This made Henry smile a little. “Let’s not jump to any conclusions, Sherlock.”

“I bet Annette stole it,” said Benny, who wasn’t about to let go of his idea.

Jessie looked over at her little brother. “We shouldn’t suspect people, Benny, until we’re certain it was stolen.”

With that, they walked slowly around the room, checking behind cushions and under chairs. But the photograph of Stone Pool had disappeared.


点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 pointed Il8zB4     
adj.尖的,直截了当的
参考例句:
  • He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
  • She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。
2 poised SlhzBU     
a.摆好姿势不动的
参考例句:
  • The hawk poised in mid-air ready to swoop. 老鹰在半空中盘旋,准备俯冲。
  • Tina was tense, her hand poised over the telephone. 蒂娜心情紧张,手悬在电话机上。
3 eyebrows a0e6fb1330e9cfecfd1c7a4d00030ed5     
眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 )
参考例句:
  • Eyebrows stop sweat from coming down into the eyes. 眉毛挡住汗水使其不能流进眼睛。
  • His eyebrows project noticeably. 他的眉毛特别突出。
4 poked 87f534f05a838d18eb50660766da4122     
v.伸出( poke的过去式和过去分词 );戳出;拨弄;与(某人)性交
参考例句:
  • She poked him in the ribs with her elbow. 她用胳膊肘顶他的肋部。
  • His elbow poked out through his torn shirt sleeve. 他的胳膊从衬衫的破袖子中露了出来。 来自《简明英汉词典》
5 weird bghw8     
adj.古怪的,离奇的;怪诞的,神秘而可怕的
参考例句:
  • From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来,他好像有点怪。
  • His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。
6 tilting f68c899ac9ba435686dcb0f12e2bbb17     
倾斜,倾卸
参考例句:
  • For some reason he thinks everyone is out to get him, but he's really just tilting at windmills. 不知为什么他觉得每个人都想害他,但其实他不过是在庸人自扰。
  • So let us stop bickering within our ranks.Stop tilting at windmills. 所以,让我们结束内部间的争吵吧!再也不要去做同风车作战的蠢事了。
7 bent QQ8yD     
n.爱好,癖好;adj.弯的;决心的,一心的
参考例句:
  • He was fully bent upon the project.他一心扑在这项计划上。
  • We bent over backward to help them.我们尽了最大努力帮助他们。
8 hunch CdVzZ     
n.预感,直觉
参考例句:
  • I have a hunch that he didn't really want to go.我有这么一种感觉,他并不真正想去。
  • I had a hunch that Susan and I would work well together.我有预感和苏珊共事会很融洽。
9 shuffling 03b785186d0322e5a1a31c105fc534ee     
adj. 慢慢移动的, 滑移的 动词shuffle的现在分词形式
参考例句:
  • Don't go shuffling along as if you were dead. 别像个死人似地拖着脚走。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
  • Some one was shuffling by on the sidewalk. 外面的人行道上有人拖着脚走过。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
10 helping 2rGzDc     
n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的,辅助的
参考例句:
  • The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
  • By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。
11 grilled grilled     
adj. 烤的, 炙过的, 有格子的 动词grill的过去式和过去分词形式
参考例句:
  • He was grilled for two hours before the police let him go. 他被严厉盘查了两个小时后,警察才放他走。
  • He was grilled until he confessed. 他被严加拷问,直到他承认为止。
12 hunches 647ac34044ab1e0436cc483db95795b5     
预感,直觉( hunch的名词复数 )
参考例句:
  • A technical sergeant hunches in a cubicle. 一位技术军士在一间小屋里弯腰坐着。
  • We often test our hunches on each other. 我们经常互相检验我们的第六感觉。
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