“Are there surveillance cameras?” I asked. “For your security system?”

“Funny you should ask,” she said. She unfolded her hands and lay them flat on the desk top. “I just sent an email to our security people asking the same thing.” She winked at me. “Great minds think alike, I suppose.”

“Uh, yes, I suppose so,” I said.

“Tell me again your son's name?” she asked.

“Daughter,” I corrected. “And it's Emily. She's a tenth grader.”

“Ah, yes, I believe I know who she is,” she said, though I wasn't quite sure why when she couldn't even get the gender correct. “A lovely girl, one of our best. : ”

It was an odd statement; did they rank the kids from best to worst? What sort of assessment did they use?

“And she enjoys attending Prism?” Mrs. Bingledorf asked.

“Yes,” I told her. “She was homeschooled through eighth grade and chose to come here last year. She likes it very much.”

“Excellent,” Bingledorf said, nodding. “That's our goal – for the students to want to come here each day and expand their horizons.”

It sounded like something you'd put on an advertising brochure, but I understood the sentiment. And it made me think of the advertising already out there for Prism, the thing they prided themselves on: technology.

“Can I ask a question?”

The principal president smiled. “But of course. Anything at all.”

“With all of the computers being gone, what will the plan be for the kids in the technology classes?” I asked. “Given that it's a core requirement here, I know every single student has a technology class each of their four years, so that means every student is supposed to be in the lab at some point each day. What are you going to do?”

Her hands came back together on the desk top, lacing in to a tight knot. “That's an excellent question. It's one I intend to take up with the board this very afternoon so that we can come up with a plan of action. The inconvenience that this is going to cause for students is inexcusable and we'll need to do something in order to continue their technology education without a gap that could set them back. Teachers will be inconvenienced, as well, and that also isn't something we can tolerate. So, yes. We will be coming up with a plan of attack and I'm hoping that plan will be in place just as soon as possible.”

That sounded more like a politician's answer than a plan, but to be fair, I knew that she hadn't had a lot of time to think about what they were going to do when they'd just learned that morning that the computers had been stolen. It was probably going to take a lot of schedule juggling and manipulation to come up with an interim plan.

“So then,” she said, giving me the same million watt smile I'd seen earlier. “Is there anything else I can help you with right this second?”

I stood, taking my cue. “I don't believe so. I'll go find Mr. Riggler and get to work on this so I can get it back to you.”

“Excellent,” she said, nodding. “I'm sure Ellen can give you directions to the lab if you need them.”

“Okay, thank you.”

“You're welcome,” she said, still smiling. “And thank you again for your assistance. And, once again, for your discretion.”

She sure seemed focused on my discretion.

SIX

I was vaguely familiar with the school's layout, having been there for open houses and some after school programs, but I didn't know it backwards and forwards. I reached the end of the hall and turned right toward the gym, hoping my memory would serve me correctly. A classroom on the left had its door closed and there was a small sign mounted on the wall. Computer Lab.

I knocked.

A muffled voice said, “Come in,” and I pushed the door open.

I'd remember seeing the lab during Emily's first open house, not wanting to be impressed as I walked through the door to the state-of-the-art computer lab. But my jaw had dropped as I took in the vast numbers of computers and printers spread out in the room. Will had quickly counted the computers on each desk and table, announcing that there were forty seven of them, plus five laptops. Emily, who had gone on to her history classroom, had frowned at him when he repeated the information to her, telling him there was no way there were that many. She'd come home the next day after school, forced to admit he'd been right.

But now all of the desks and tables were empty, adorned only with cables and cords that had nowhere to go.

“Can I help you?”

The voice startled me and I looked up. In the far corner of the room, a skinny man in his late twenties was looking at me. He wore jeans and a short sleeve buttoned down shirt and rimless glasses were perched precariously on his nose. His blond hair looked like it had just been buzzed down that morning. He was taller than Jake, all arms and legs, and he reminded me of one of those marionette puppets that danced when you moved the wooden cross at the top.

“Are you Mr. Riggler?” I asked. “I'm Daisy Savage. Mrs. Bingledorf sent me down.”

“Oh,” he said, his hands on his hips, his elbows forming perfect right angles. “Yes, I'm Mr. Riggler. Why did she send you down?”

I held up the spreadsheet. “She asked if I could help you put together an inventory of what was stolen. For the police and the insurance company.”

“Ah, right,” he said, looking around the room, almost as if he'd just realized the computers weren't there. He pushed the glasses up his nose. “Okay. Um, do you work here?”

“No, I'm volunteering,” I said. “My daughter is a tenth grader. Emily Bohannan.”

His eyes lit with recognition. “Oh, okay. I have Emily in a class. Yeah, she's a great girl.” He wove his way through the desks and extended his hand. “I'm Miles Riggler.”

We shook hands and stood there awkwardly for a moment.

“So, Mrs. Bingledorf printed this out,” I said, showing him the sheet again. “I think she just wants an official accounting.”

He took the sheet and studied it, as if he were hoping information would suddenly materialize on the paper in front of him. “Right, right. Sure. Okay. Hmmm.” He laughed nervously. “I guess we'll have to try and remember what was in here before the weekend.”

I thought that was a strange response. “Or we could check to see if there are old purchase orders through the business office?” I suggested. “From whenever the school purchased them?”

He nodded, but didn't seem like he was listening. “Oh, yeah, we could do that, too. Well, why don't we put down as much as we can from memory and then maybe we can see where she wants to go from there?”

I raised my eyebrows but decided not to question his methods. Maybe he had a photogr pa ap hic memory. “Okay.”

He glanced at his watch. “And we'll have to hustle a little because I've got a class coming in ten minutes and there's no way we'll be able to work with kids in here. My understanding is they don't want us talking about the theft.”

I looked around the computer-less Computer Lab. “I'm pretty sure they'll figure it out.”

He laughed again. “Well, sure. I guess what I meant is that they don't want us discussing it with the kids. And I'm going to need to figure out what we're going to do to keep them occupied.”

That made a little more sense.

We spen d t a few minutes walking the room and I started recording what he called out to me. Several Apple laptops. A couple of Dell PC's. A printer. Several cables. He was walking the room, stopping at each desk, trying to pull from memory what had been on each desk. We got through about half the room when he glanced at his watch again and turned to face me.

“I know that's not everything but I really need to do a few minutes of planning before the students arrive,” he explained. “We'll have to finish later.”

“I can take this back to Mrs. Bingledorf and let her know this is where we've gotten to so far.”