A Coded Message Carter hauled his backpack up on his shoulder as he trudged up the front steps His mom stood right inside the front door juggling a portfolio and easel as she snagged her car keys from the rack beside the door Hi honey How was school His mom reached up to brush his hair off his face only to have it fall right back We need to get you a haircut I have to run or I’m going to be late for my painting class Grab a snack Dad’s cooking tonight I put your mail on your bed Carter blinked as his mom closed the door behind him Sometimes these fast-forward conversations took a minute to sort out Mail on his bed Cool He dashed up the stairs and dropped his backpack next to his desk with a 4
thud He snatched the postcard from his bed He knew it was from Uncle Dan before he even looked at the message Dan Hunter collected weird postcards and sent them with his secret messages The picture was usually some kind of hint This card showed two kids sitting a few inches away from a television eyes intent on the screen Behind them two robots stood reading thick books Carter wondered if his uncle was trying to teach robots to read or maybe he was trying to hypnotize people by television Uncle Dan worked on a lot of high-tech projects and some of them were supersecret things for the government Carter fl ipped the card over and noted the date fi rst 12 23 2009 At fi rst glance it would look like his uncle was seriously behind in his mail but Carter knew that the date was a clue to the code Then he read the message You wouldn’t believe the great new fi shing rod I bought last week I want to take you fi shing so we 5
can try it out Our job will be to catch the biggest fi sh in the lake We can top the giant catfi sh that we caught last year My secret bait and this new rod are the key to success I know the bait stinks Fish don’t think like us That stuff is like giving the fi sh a call Carter knew that Uncle Dan hated fi shing and would never ever buy a fi shing pole So that meant this was defi nitely a coded message The date told him which words to underline The string of numbers 12232009 meant that he needed to underline the fi rst word in the fi rst sentence the second word in the second and third sentences the third word in the fourth sentence and so on He had to skip the sixth and seventh sentences since they had zero code words When he was done he knew the coded message was You want job top secret call He fi gured the fi rst part was a question You want job The rest meant that the job was a secret and he should call his uncle 6
Carter crammed his hand in his pocket to snag his cell phone Then he remembered it was dead because he’d dropped it in the toilet at school You’d think phone companies would make those things waterproof He trotted downstairs to the phone in the kitchen to make the call His uncle picked up on the fi rst ring Speak Uncle Dan said I got your card Carter said I’d love to um go fi shing I could really use a good fi shing trip Great Uncle Dan said Come over tomorrow morning We’re taking Isabelle too Carter moaned at the click of his uncle hanging up He couldn’t think of too many things he’d enjoy less than working with his brainiac cousin Maybe Dad will spring for one more phone he muttered And I can pass on the Dizzy Izzy job Unfortunately his parents did not respond well to his ruined cell phone 7
