Mask on the Cruise Ship by Melanie Jackson Page A

stateroom. The Raven himself wouldn’t be clever enough to get out of that.”
    Julie shot up, Slinky-like, to spike — BONK! — a fast, spinning ball Jack had punched over. Our side applauded.
    I forgot about threats to the Raven. Jack whammed the ball over. It bounced neatly on the top of my head, soared up —
    And would have landed on our side, a loss for us, except that Julie spiked it back.
    Our cheers were interrupted, however. Somebody on the other team objected that my “head return” wasn’t in the volleyball rulebook.
    â€œWhat rulebook? Where?” said everyone else. We just wanted to play. But we all ended up in a huddle to argue about it. Julie and I rolled our eyes at each other.
    I happened to roll mine in the direction of a set of stairs coming up from a stateroom level. Halfway up the stairs, staring open-mouthed, was Evan Brander.
    Maybe the concept of a volleyball court was a new and startling one to my pianist.
    I didn’t think so. Evan was surprised to see someone.
    He was looking at —
    Julie?
    Turning, Evan hurried back down the stairs.
    â€œWeird,” I muttered.
    â€œExactly,” said Jack, addressing the person who’d complained. “This isn’t pro volleyball, buddy. It’s for fun.”
    He proceeded to lecture everyone about how sports were meant to build teamwork and friendship. How that was way more important than the actual score.
    Yup, Jack was a natural to be a teacher, all right.
    Meanwhile, my natural curiosity was acting up. Who had Evan seen to make him bolt like that?
    To me, curiosity is like a huge bowl of chocolate ice cream. You can’t resist it — especially if no one is noticing how much you indulge.
    I slipped out of the huddle of arguing volleyball players. An advantage to being short was that I was beneath their line of vision.
    I plunged down the stairs after Evan.

Chapter 8
Talk about your bad-hair days
    W hen I reached the bottom of the stairs, Evan was whisking around a corner. Whatever he was up to, he was in a tremendous hurry about it.
    â€œLoved your show last night,” a deep voice rumbled behind me. It was a handsome, grinning steward, wheeling along a trolley of trays and dishes that he’d been picking up outside people’s doors.
    Evan looked around. He was beside the fourth door down.
    â€œThanks,” I told the steward and gave Evan my bared-teeth phony smile.
    â€œWhat are you doing here, Dinah?” Evan asked — with a tinge of impatience.
    â€œI...uh...” Panicky memo to self: Have excuses ready before these awkward moments occur. I brightened. “I thought we could work on some lyrics for your song. For dah DAH dah dah DAH dah.”
    â€œOh.” Evan seemed to thaw. “That’s nice, Dinah. Not right now, though.” He swiveled away from the door and walked off.
    Why hadn’t he gone into his room? I wondered. He’d been about to twist the knob.
    Weirder and weirder.
    â€œThey’re still arguing,” Julie greeted me, with a nod toward the huddle of players.
    She noticed my expression. “Is something wrong, Di?”
    I told her about Evan. “I had problems with my last pianist,” I mourned. “My fault, I admit it. This time I really wanted things to be different.”
    Julie was gaping at me. “Did you say four rooms down? That’s my room!”
    I gaped at her in return. One of the ever-present stewards glided by with a tray. Assuming our mouths were open in readiness for food, he held out the tray.
    For once my appetite failed me. “So Evan was skulking outside your room,” I said faintly.
    â€œPreparing to pick the lock, you think?” Julie asked. She clutched her spiky hair. “This is too melodramatic, Dinah. Can’t be true!”
    Nevertheless, like a couple of anxious moms, we went down to check on the Raven. “I won’t breathe easy until tomorrow’s over,”