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“I’d like to bet with each bookie . . . kind of as a peace offering. But I don’t know where they’re all at. Can you tell me where I can find them all, so I can place some more bets?” I said.

He told me the names and locations of the other nine bookies operating at my school.

I thanked him and he left. Vince came in, and I let a huge smile spread across my face. Just like that we had the name of every kid in the school currently working for Staples. We also had the identity of his top guy here, Justin Johnston. Now that I knew exactly who I was up against, I could start making an actual plan to take them all out.

“We’re making progress,” I said to Vince. “We might have this whole thing cleared up before the World Series after all.”

“Yeah, but we probably won’t have any money left,” Vince said.

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, that was expensive, but you can’t deny the advantage it just gave us. Now we know who we’re gunning for. We’re not fighting blind anymore.”

Vince nodded. “You’re right. That was a pretty nice move, Mac. Man, that Jacky Boy kid sure loves money. He treats money like my grandma treats the Pintsized Midnight Moonbeam Workers who live in her purse.”

I laughed and it echoed throughout the bathroom. Vince’s grandma was always opening her purse and talking to the Pintsized Midnight Moonbeam Workers. Sometimes she’d just say hi, but other times she would thank them for all the money they left in her wallet.

“Those darn Moonbeam Workers. I need to find out how to get some of them to live inside my wallet,” Vince said.

Later that day Joe, Brady, and I stood on the edge of the upper-grade playground and watched as Kitten approached the recess supervisor. We could see every inch of the playground from our carefully chosen spot.

Kitten tugged at the edge of the RS’s shirt. She turned around and smiled when she saw who it was. Adults adored Kitten as if he was the greatest thing since the advent of manners. Adults just went crazy over the whole dress pants, nice hair, sweaters, and dress shirts thing. Plus, he used “please” and “thank you” more than any kid I knew, and those words were like drugs to adults.

We watched as Kitten started talking to her. He pointed at something down near the goalpost of the football field. Then he grabbed her hand and led her away. She was happy to follow, of course. Kitten didn’t talk much normally, but, man, could he tell long and pointless stories like a pro when he needed to. And for some reason adults always found his stories really cute and interesting.

As soon as I was sure that Kitten had the RS’s complete attention for the duration of his story, I turned my hand over and passed a small mirror under the sun’s light. I saw it reflect brightly across the playground to where Vince was waiting for my signal.

He nodded in our direction and gave his own signal to Little Paul. Except Vince’s signal was a massive sneeze so obnoxiously loud and overdone that I thought I’d blow the whole operation by laughing myself to death.

Little Paul heard the signal and then approached Barnaby Willis, who was playing basketball with some seventh and eighth graders. Little Paul walked right into the middle of their game. He was one brave little kid, that was for sure. They all stopped and watched as he walked up to the kid with the ball, took it from his hands, and marched right up to Willis. Willis towered over him by at least a few feet. But that didn’t stop Little Paul for a second.

What he did next actually went a little above and beyond what I’d instructed him to do, but it still worked. He threw the ball right at the Collector’s face. It bounced off the Collector’s nose with a rubber pop that sounded like he’d just bricked it off the rim. Everybody on this side of the playground gasped.

Then Little Paul took off running. Willis followed just like we knew he would. A guy like the Collector doesn’t let a little kid get away with disrespecting him in public.

Little Paul was a fast