Only the Good Spy Young (Gallagher Girls) by Ally Carter Page B

sword that had belonged to Ioseph Cavan. “Is there something I can help you with?”
    I wanted to know why my mother’s door was closed to everyone, even me. I wanted to ask how it could be true about Mr. Solomon—how it could be true at all. But there was only one thing that I knew it was okay to ask.
    “It’s spring,” I said.
    “It is?” Professor Buckingham glanced out a window streaked with freezing rain.
    “I mean, it’s the spring semester. You said last fall that you might be able to teach me about the Circle of Cavan in the spring. And . . . it’s spring.”
    All around us, girls were filing into classrooms, rushing out the front doors to P&E. The halls were growing quiet. School was back in session—life was back to normal. But behind Patricia Buckingham, my mother’s office door stayed closed.
    “Junior year curriculum is very challenging, Cameron dear,” she said.
    “I know, that’s why I—”
    “You need to focus and learn as much as you can.”
    “I know, but the Circle is—”
    “Cameron, the lessons of this school are essential for fighting the evils of the world—no matter what that evil calls itself. You have to learn those lessons ,” she snapped, and I knew it wasn’t advice; it was an order. And she was right. My classes weren’t less important now. Not by a long shot.
    “And even if that were not the case, I’m afraid there are a number of... pressing matters that require my attention for the time being.”
    And then it hit me: for the first time that I could remember, our oldest faculty member looked . . . old.
    Her hands were dry. Her eyes were puffy. And I could have sworn I heard her voice crack as she said, “Now, if I’m not mistaken, you’re about to be late for Covert Operations. You don’t want to keep our newest teacher waiting.”

R unning through the halls toward the elevator to Sublevel Two, I tried to brace myself for what I had to do.
Learn what (if anything) Agent Townsend knew
about my mother, Mr. Solomon, and the Circle of
Cavan.
Discern whether Agent Townsend would lean
toward practical or theoretical examinations and
how to best master each. (Because being the target
of an international terrorist organization is no excuse for letting your GPA slide.)
    When I reached the small hallway beneath the Grand Staircase and the large mirror that was supposed to slide aside and show me the way to the Covert Operations classrooms, I pressed my hand against it and waited for the eyes of the painting behind me to flash green. But the glass beneath my palm stayed cool, and nothing happened.
    It was my first lecture with Agent Townsend, and I was already late. I actually knocked on the mirror as if there were someone back there, waiting to let me in.
    Still nothing.
    I was turning, starting for one of the other elevators, when I saw it: a small, neatly typed piece of paper taped to the wall.
    ATTENTION STUDENTS: UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE, THE SUBLEVELS WILL BE CLOSED. ALL COVERT OPERATIONS COURSES WILL TAKE PLACE IN ROOM 132
    I didn’t know what was happening. All I knew for certain was that I was late, so I turned on my heel and ran through the empty hall, past the library and the student lounge—all the way to the classroom that had been nothing but a big storage closet at the end of last semester. I almost ran right past it, but at the last second I grabbed the door frame and skidded to a stop.
    “Oh, there you are.”
    Okay, I don’t know about regular schools, but let’s just say that at the world’s premiere spy school, tardiness isn’t exactly typical . And when it does happen, it’s almost always met with questions like “Was there an explosion in the chemistry lab?” or “Do you have another concussion?” It is most certainly never met with “Oh, there you are.”
    But those were the words Agent Townsend chose, and for someone who had questioned me in a top secret facility just hours after one of the world’s most wanted men had