The Newspaper Thief

Every morning at six, a boy on a bicycle threw newspapers onto the porches of Maple Street. But one cold week in January, some of the newspapers started to disappear.

Mrs. Grant at number twelve was the first to notice. "Somebody is stealing my paper!" she told everyone. The next day, Mr. Ortiz's paper disappeared, and the day after that, the Kim family's paper was gone too. People were angry. Some of them called the newspaper office, and the boy on the bicycle got into trouble, but he said, "I deliver every single paper. I promise!"

Eleven-year-old Ellie Brooks loved mystery books, and she decided to catch the thief. On Friday night, she set her alarm for five-thirty. The next morning, while her family was still asleep, she sat at her bedroom window and watched the street.

It was snowing lightly, and under the streetlights everything was quiet and white. At six o'clock, the paper boy rode past and threw the papers. Ellie waited. About ten minutes later, she saw something small and brown. It was running quickly from porch to porch.

Ellie put on her coat and boots and ran outside. The little brown animal was gone, but there were small tracks in the fresh snow. They weren't a person's footprints. They were paw prints, like a dog's.

Ellie followed them down Maple Street, around the corner and along Pine Road. They stopped at a small blue house at the end of the road. Ellie knew the house. An old man named Mr. Abbott lived there alone. He was quiet and never smiled, and the kids in the neighborhood were a little afraid of him.

Ellie took a deep breath and knocked. When Mr. Abbott opened the door, she saw a pile of newspapers on the floor behind him. Next to the pile, there was a small brown dog with a very happy face and a newspaper in his mouth.

Mr. Abbott looked at Ellie, then at the papers, then at the dog. His face turned red. "Biscuit! What did you do?"

Biscuit was new. Mr. Abbott had gotten him from the animal shelter in December. "His first owner taught him to bring in the newspaper every morning," he said. "But I don't get the paper. So he goes out and finds one somewhere else!"

Ellie started to laugh, and after a moment, Mr. Abbott laughed too. She had no idea he could laugh like that.

That afternoon, Ellie and Mr. Abbott walked down Maple Street with Biscuit and a big bag of newspapers. They knocked on every door and apologized. Mrs. Grant was angry at first, but then Biscuit sat down and gave her his paw, and she smiled.

The next week, Mr. Abbott started getting his own newspaper. Every morning, Biscuit carried it proudly to the kitchen, and no more papers disappeared from Maple Street. And on Saturday mornings, Ellie visited the blue house on Pine Road. Mr. Abbott made hot chocolate, and they did the puzzles in the paper together, with Biscuit asleep at their feet.