As Carter turned, he found himself cornered by Bosso, the Walrus, and the Spider-Lady.
“You’re done, boy,” Bosso said. “Give me the diamond.”
Carter looked desperately around the room. There were shelves of old props, a table with an antique gramophone, musty curtains, and giant mirrors. He grabbed a baseball bat from a nearby shelf, accidentally turning the gramophone on. Instead of playing, the needle rubbed against the record as it spun, making a terrible scratching sound.
Carter swung the bat as Bosso reached for him. “Leave me alone!”
“Give me the diamond you stole!” Bosso growled.
“You stole it first!” Carter snapped.
“And now I’m going to steal it back!” As Bosso lunged at Carter, Carter swung again. Bosso backed off, but a sinister grin crawled across his face. “You’re trapped, boy. Give it up and I might let you live.”
“Like Mr. Vernon?” Carter said. “You framed him!”
“The old fool had it coming,” Bosso spit. “Well, I’ve got news for him. Once the diamond is mine, I’ll have everything I’ve ever wanted right at my fingertips. And Dante… Goody-Boy Dante… will be left to rot in a prison.”
“Until everyone realizes you replaced the Star of Africa with a fake during your act,” Carter said, swinging the bat as the Walrus and the Spider-Lady reached for him.
“By then, I’ll be long gone. I’ll be in Bora Bora, sipping frosty umbrella drinks and working on my tan,” Bosso said.
“You’re horrible, you know that? First you set up your carnival games so no one could win, then your Pock-Pickets robbed the people who came to your show, you paid off the sheriff so he’d look the other way, and now you’ve stolen the Star of Africa by switching it with a fake! You ruin people’s lives. Admit it!” Carter demanded.
“I admit all of it! It’s not my fault that the world’s too stupid to realize when it’s being suckered. I only show up where I know I can take advantage.” Bosso’s wild smirk grew on his face. “I’m an entertainer. People adore me.… Will that ever make me rich enough? Hardly! But that diamond sure will! So yeah, I took it. What are you gonna do about it, kid?”
“Only everything.” Carter smiled, dropping the bat on the floor. “Thank you, Mr. Bosso. That’s all we needed to hear.”
“We?” Bosso whispered.
Carter pulled a rope hidden in a far corner. The four walls and ceiling of the fake prop room fell away. Carter, Bosso, the Walrus, and the Spider-Lady were left standing on the center of the stage. The entire audience—cops and all—had heard everything Bosso had confessed.
“How?” Bosso screamed.
“You were chasing me backstage through curtain after curtain,” Carter said. “I led you in one big circle, straight into a trap. And just in case anyone missed your confession…” Carter moved the needle back on the gramophone record and switched it from Record to Play.
“I admit all of it! It’s not my fault that the world’s too stupid to realize when it’s being suckered.” Bosso’s recorded voice played back for the audience.
Ridley had been holding up a sign for the audience that said: SILENCE!! She tossed it on the floor and wheeled backstage with the others.
Then Ridley, Olly, Izzy, Leila, and Theo pushed a line of hotel room service carts, one tied to the next, onto the stage. They removed the silver tray lids, one after the other. Each cart was heaped with the stolen goods from Bosso’s bathtub: wallets, rings, bracelets, watches, wedding bands, and more.
“Police, townspeople, visitors,” Carter shouted. “Bosso tried to steal the Star of Africa, but he was also working with the sheriff and a dangerous band of pickpockets. If you lost something in the last few days, it’s probably here.”
“He stole my wedding ring!” someone in the audience shouted.
“He stole my wallet!”
“He stole my earrings and bracelet!”
“I spent my whole allowance on his dumb games!”
The entire audience began booing him.
Two police officers took the sheriff into custody, while the rest rushed the stage and surrounded Bosso and his goons. Theo asked, “Would you like to take a final bow?”
Leila ran off the stage and over to Mr. Vernon. She hugged her dad and said, “We did it!”
“Yes, you did,” Mr. Vernon said, rubbing at his bruised skull. “I never had a doubt in my mind.”
“Let me take those handcuffs off,” the policeman said.
“No need. I’ve been getting out of handcuffs since I could walk.” Mr. Vernon made a peculiar motion with his hands, and the cuffs fell off. He gave them to the police officer. “Voilà!”
“Brilliant,” Carter whispered.
TWENTY-ONE
From the top of the stationary train car in the train yard, Carter could see the Grand Oak Resort, the quiet town of Mineral Wells, and the tents of Bosso’s carnival, which was silent and still in the morning light. After everything that had happened in the last few days, Carter wondered if he was beginning to believe in magic. Not the kind where you can actually make things disappear or cast a spell, but the kind where you can’t sleep because you’re so full of joy that you stay awake and watch the sun come up.
Carter was certain that he’d never seen such beautiful colors in the sky before. Sitting cross-legged on top of B. B. Bosso’s “loot car,” Carter watched below as the police cracked open the locks. When they finally got the metal train car door open, a mountain of wallets and watches and rings and more poured out. Later, the police would find that there had been a rash of thefts in every town B. B. Bosso’s carnival had been to.
Carter and the misfits had solved hundreds, if not thousands, of unsolved petty theft crimes.
While the police collected and boxed the goods, trying to figure out how to return everything to their proper owners, Carter continued to marvel at the sky’s streaks of yellow, orange, and red, all tied together like the multicolored silk handkerchiefs that his father had used in a magic trick long ago. As the brilliant sun crowned the horizon, it sent a fan of rays toward him, surrounding him with warmth.
A few tracks away, a freight train chugged off into the distance, fleeing from the rising light. Carter wondered what he would do next.
He couldn’t stay at Theo’s house for long. Mr. and Mrs. Stein-Meyer would only start asking questions. Should I hop a train, he wondered, just to see where it takes me next?
“You weren’t going to leave without saying good-bye, were you?” Mr. Vernon asked.
“Gaaah!” Carter screamed, startled to find he was no longer alone. The magician sat next to him, as if he had been there the whole time. “How do you do that?” Carter asked.
“Very quietly.” Mr. Vernon smiled. “Well, were you? Going to leave town?”