Zachary Stuart was walking home from his Boston High School with his friend Hunter Evans, and his new girlfriend Jessie Williams. As Hunter walked up his front steps and onto the porch, Zach and Jessie continued on their way. They discussed the pop quiz they had both struggled on in Mr. M’s class. Nobody called Mr. M by his real name, Mr. Moltzenlodger.

At 2 O’clock, Zach and Jessie made it to the Williams’ house. Zach gave his girlfriend a kiss and Jessie walked off the sidewalk and up her driveway, squeezing past the Cadillac that her mother had once again parked several feet to the right of where it should have been. Zach had almost a mile more to walk, and without any more companionship, he strolled down the street watching nothing more than the ground below him. It’s no wonder he didn’t see it.

It was right there, in the bushes of his house, and yet he didn’t know it. He didn’t find it until two days later on his long walk to school. Zach was usually grumpy in the morning, but for some, unexplainable reason, he was overcome by the need to stop and look at the beauty of the sun. Then he saw it. It glistened like gold in the orange and pink of the rising sun. But it was better than gold. It was without a doubt, a very large diamond, and as Zach approached the diamond, he could easily recognize it on its long silver chain as the one posted on fliers all over town. Mrs. White was offering a ten thousand dollar reward for this diamond necklace given to her by her late husband only three days before he had passed away. Zachary Stuart would never dream of keeping or selling the necklace knowing who the owner was, but he also wasn’t one to turn down ten thousand dollars.

Zach went inside and used his new three-way-calling to call Jessie and Hunter. Suddenly, the three of them heard a clicking noise, and then they heard static. Zach explained that the necklace was worth a lot of money and that he’d bring it to Mrs. White in two days. He also said that he’d leave it on his desk until then. Just before the end of the conversation they heard the static stop and another click. No one paid much attention to these clicks until the next morning when Zach found his desk empty and his window open.
Zach immediately thought the obvious. “It had to be Jessie or Hunter. They were the only ones who knew.”
They both denied it, but Zach couldn’t be sure. Then, Jessie suggested that he go to the local discount store and pick up a children’s spy set with a finger print tester. Of course, neither Jessie nor Hunter matched the desk. “It’s time to do some research.” Zach stated ready for a new adventure. That necklace belongs to Mrs. White and she’s going to get it back.

Hunter immediately took charge. He knew what to do and gave everyone a job. Hunter didn’t waste any time. He copied and blew up the finger prints and took them to the police station to find out if they matched any known criminals. While Hunter was busy doing that, he told Jessie to look up criminals who were recently caught in the Boston area. Zach was to go and buy another spy kit to make sure there were no more prints on the desk. The last thing Hunter said, was, “we have to make sure at all costs, that nobody but the three of us can ever find out about this.” And with that, the friends separated to their destinations.
Zach was obviously the first one back to his house, but aside from his own, there weren’t anymore finger prints on the desk. Zach had struck out, but Jessie, the next one back to the Stuarts’ house, had done a little better. She found out that there were a string of robberies in northern Boston by a man who goes by “Dave the Diamond Man.” Other than that, there were no other recent robberies in their part of Boston. Luckily, Hunter had done better than Jessie and Zach together. He found a match to an uncaught criminal named David Moltzen. When Hunter shared his information, the same two thoughts entered all three brains: Is he related to Dave the Diamond Man, and is he related to Mr. Moltzenlodger?

The first question was easy to answer. Zach, Hunter, and Jessie went to the library as a trio this time and found an old Boston Globe which was headlined, “David Moltzen, also known as Dave the Diamond Man, has just robbed several jewelry stores in Northern Boston.” The Moltzenlodger problem would be the tough one, but once again Hunter had the answer. They went to the city hall to find out if anyone had ever changed their name from Moltzen to Moltzenlodger or vise versa. Hunter had not planned very far ahead however. He had not planned for the possibility that the government wouldn’t give information to fourteen year old kids who were supposed to be in school. They went back to Zach’s house, and this time, Jessie was the one with the idea.
As Jessie walked into the city hall, she “fell” and hurt her ankle. While the guard tended to her ankle, Zach “borrowed” the name files. He quickly copied the information and snuck out of the building. Hunter then pretended to help Jessie out of the building and they followed Zach back home. Zach had some good news and some bad news. The good news was that Dave the Diamond Man and Mr. Moltzenlodger were definitely related. The bad news was that the name was changed over two hundred years ago. Mr. M may not even know who Dave the Diamond Man is.
There was another possibility however. Mr. M might know who Dave is, and more importantly, where he is. Zach, Hunter, and Jessie had to investigate the possibility. They knew Mr. M was at school, so they looked his address up in the phone book, and snuck into his house through an open window. They didn’t find a trace of Dave except for an empty room with a key and an unsent email. It said:

Dear Martin,

We both know I’m going nowhere with my life and
I need to get back on my feet. I don’t want to rely on my
third cousin to take care of me for the rest of my life. I’ve
stolen a diamond necklace and bought a condo. I’ve left
you the address and a spare key. If you need anything you
can drop by. I don’t get home until three o’clock though.






Love,





Dave


Suddenly, Zach felt sorry for Dave, but he still had to get Mrs. White’s diamond necklace back. Seeing as it was only 1:53, Zach, Jessie, and Hunter used the key they found in Mr. M’s house to steal back the necklace. Zach gave the necklace back to Mrs. White and collected the reward, but he still felt like there was something else that had to be done.


David Moltzen walked into his apartment at 3 O’clock and went to the table where he had left the diamond necklace. It wasn’t there, but something else was. On the table, there was a pack of hundred dollar bills. 100 bills in the pack added up to ten thousand dollars. Next to the bills was a note. It said:

Dear Dave,

I couldn’t let you keep that necklace knowing it
was so important to someone. I did however leave you the
reward for the necklace to help you get your life together.
I believe you can do it.

Yours truly,
A Friend