Pie

When Alice and Charlie enter Alice’s kitchen for lunch, they notice a bad smell. Ruth’s chocolate cream pie sits on the table, clearly a failure. Alice makes peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and they discuss how much they will miss Polly. Charlie tells Alice that people all around town are baking pies to try to win the Blueberry Award for themselves.

After lunch, they go upstairs to Alice’s room to try to figure out what happened to Lardo. Alice said she heard a clinking sound. They cannot understand how Lardo might have made this sound when he climbed out the window. Alice sees something shiny lying underneath the radiator by the window: a gold hoop earring made for someone with pierced ears, which her mother does not have. Alice grows convinced that someone opened her window the previous night, climbed in, and catnapped Lardo.

Arriving home, Alice’s parents call her downstairs. They have been with Chief Decker at the pie shop. The chief has decided that no one broke into the shop since the door lock was not damaged. Ruth says that Polly wore the key around her neck even in the casket and, therefore, the lawyer must not have locked the door after acquiring Polly’s will.