The Curse of the Ancient Emerald Read Online Free PDF

was familiar, like something I’d seen so often that I didn’t even notice it anymore.
    I stood up abruptly. “Wait here,” I said, and sprinted to my room. I headed straight for the DVDs stacked on my bookcase. I scanned the titles with rising excitement, yanked one out, and hurried back downstairs, holding up the cover for everyone to see.
    It was an old kung fu movie called The Traveling Warrior .
    â€œThat’s not the same,” Frank pointed out.
    My grin faded. “Well, yeah, but it’s similar .”
    Frank frowned. “I don’t think similar is going to cut it.”
    â€œMaybe it’s the same idea,” said Chet, taking out his phone. He tapped away on the screen for a while, then held it up. “Joe might be onto something.” He nodded. “The Wandering Warrior is a term used for a Japanese samurai without a master. They were called ronin . These guys would wander around ancient Japan, hiring themselves out as mercenaries.”
    â€œYou see?” I said excitedly. “ ‘ The Masterless Man.’ ‘ The Wandering Warrior.’ I was right.”
    â€œFair enough,” said Frank. “Can I take a look?”
    Chet handed over his phone. Frank scrolled through the entry for a while, then glanced at us. “It says here the ronin use a pair of matched swords called daishō . The term comes from two separate words, daitō , meaning a long sword, and shōtō , meaning a short sword.”
    â€œâ€Šâ€˜Big or little, little or big,’ ” said Amber.
    â€œAnd those last two lines referring to ‘two,’ ” I said. “ ‘ Think two stop me, think two save them.’ They could refer to the swords! If you stick in a comma, they each make sense. ‘ Think two, stop me; think two, save them.’ ”
    â€œSo we’re talking about a pair of swords from ancient Japan? That’s what he’s going to steal?” Chet asked.
    â€œNo,” said Frank grimly. “He’s not. Because we’re going to stop him.”

FINGERPRINTED
5
FRANK
    S O WE’D CRACKED THE RIDDLE , but our next problem was actually finding the daishō weapons that the Phantom was planning to steal.
    The first thing we did was phone the museum, but they didn’t have any Japanese items on display. We tried farther afield, each of us taking towns and cities surrounding Bayport. Some had Japanese exhibits, but none had the ancient weapons the ronin used.
    After about an hour we gave up. It was evident that the daishō were incredibly rare, and every museum we talked to would kill to get their hands on a matched pair.
    â€œSo what’s next?” asked Chet. He glanced out the window. “It’ll be dark soon.”
    Joe paced back and forth. “If we can’t find out where these swords are, there’s nothing we can do. The Phantom wins on the first night. He frames us, and we spend the rest of our lives in jail.”
    â€œWe won’t,” I said firmly. “There must be something. . . .” I paused. “I just had a thought.”
    â€œCareful now.” Joe grinned. “You don’t want to overheat your brain.”
    â€œWhat if the swords aren’t in a museum? What if they’re in a private collection?”
    The others stared at me. Then Amber clapped her hands together. “Slow clap for Frank. I think he’s got it.”
    â€œThere’s an auction house downtown,” Chet informed us. “My mom wanted to buy something but took one look at the opening bids and nearly fainted.”
    We managed to track down the auction house’s phone number.
    â€œWaterson Auctions,” answered a cultured British voice after I had punched in the number.
    â€œUh . . . hi there,” I said. “I was wondering if you happened to have any Japanese artifacts going up for auction anytime soon.