6 PANCAKE FALLS

PANCAKE FALLS The first thing Bean did was dust for fingerprints. Al Seven was always dusting for fingerprints. Here's how you dust for fingerprints: First, you sprinkle powder. Then you gently dust it away. And then you whip out your magnifying glass and peer through it, and— ta-DA!—you see the fingerprints of the bad guy! Bean didn't really understand how that part worked, but the dusting part was fun. Gently, Bean sprinkled baby powder on the yellow rope. Gently, she brushed it away with a paintbrush. Everyone leaned in to look.

比恩做的第一件事是取下指纹。 艾尔·Seven一直在采集指纹。 下面是采集指纹的方法：首先，撒上粉末。 然后轻轻地掸去灰尘。 然后你拿出放大镜，透过它往里看，然后——砰！你看到坏人的指纹了！比恩不太明白这部分是如何工作的，但除尘部分很有趣。 憨豆轻轻地把婴儿爽身粉洒在黄色的绳子上。 她轻轻地用画笔把它刷掉。 每个人都凑过去看。

Bean whipped out her magnifying glass and peered through it. She saw rope. "Just as I thought," she said. She nodded slowly and made her voice low. "There are no fingerprints here." Ivy nodded slowly, too. "No fingerprints." "But that doesn't help us at all!" said Dino. "Why is there a rope on my house?" Bean made her eyes very narrow. "Time will tell." She put her magnifying glass in her pocket and looked at the sky. Speaking of time, it was almost time for dinner. Her dad came out on the front porch. "Bean!" he called. "You can't leave now!" said Dino. Al Seven never said good-bye. He said things like "Catch you later, chump." But that was really mean, so Bean said, "Bye, you guys. See you tomorrow."

比恩拿出放大镜，透过它往里看。 她看到了绳子。“和我想的一样，”她说。 她慢慢地点了点头，压低了声音。 “这里没有指纹。” 艾薇也慢慢地点了点头。“没有指纹。” “但是这对我们一点帮助都没有！”迪诺说。 “为什么我的房子上有根绳子？”豆子把她的眼睛弄得很窄。 “时间会证明一切。”她把放大镜放在口袋里，看着天空。 说到时间，快到吃晚饭的时间了。 她爸爸走到前廊。 “豆子！”他喊道。“你现在不能走！”迪诺说。 阿尔·西连再见都没说。 他说“回头见，笨蛋”之类的话 但那真的很刻薄，所以比恩说：“再见，你们。 明天见。”

The next morning was completely regular— yawn, splash, stumble, cereal, banana, where's my jacket, somebody took it, oh here it is, bye— until Bean got outside and saw Ivy. Ivy was standing on the sidewalk in front of her house, watching the ground. She was watching the ground so seriously that she didn't hear Bean running up behind her. "Bug?" asked Bean. She hoped it was a big one.

第二天早上一切都很正常——打哈欠、溅水、绊倒、麦片、香蕉，我的夹克在哪里，有人拿走了，哦，在这里，再见——直到比恩走到外面，看到了艾薇。 艾薇站在她家门前的人行道上，看着地面。 她非常认真地看着地面，没有听见比恩从后面跑过来。 “虫子？”比恩问。她希望是一个大的。

Ivy shook her head and pointed. The yellow rope had grown in the night. Where it had ended the day before, on Dino's lawn, there was now a knot. More yellow rope went across the lawn, circled around Dino's tree, down his driveway, and next door to Ivy's house, where it snaked in and out of her fence posts and ended at her stairs. "Wow," said Bean. It was a real, genuine mystery. "Yeah," said Ivy. She turned around and looked at Bean carefully. "Did you do it?" "Me?" squawked Bean. "No! No way!" She stopped squawking and looked carefully at Ivy. "It wasn't you, was it?" Ivy shook her head. "No. I thought it was you." "How would I get up to Dino's chimney?" Bean pointed out.

艾薇摇了摇头，指了指。 黄色的绳子在夜间长了起来。 在前一天结束的地方，在迪诺家的草坪上，现在有了一个结。 更多的黄绳子穿过草坪，绕着迪诺的树，绕着他的车道，绕到艾薇家的隔壁，在她家的栅栏柱上蜿蜒而过，最后到达她家的楼梯。 “哇，”比恩说。这是一个真正的谜。 “是的，”艾薇说。她转过身，仔细地看着比恩。 “是你干的吗？”“我？”憨豆尖声说。 “不!没门!”她停止了尖叫，仔细地看着艾薇。 “不是你，对吧？”艾薇摇了摇头。 “没有。我还以为是你呢。” “我怎么才能爬上迪诺家的烟囱？”比恩指出。

They both turned and stared at the rope. "It's the real thing," muttered Ivy. Bean nodded. They both tried to look tough. But they couldn't. "Cool!" they yelled at the same time. For some reason, Dino didn't think it was cool. "It's creepy," he said, when they met up that afternoon. Sophie S. and Ruby and Trevor nodded. They thought it was creepy, too.

他们俩都转过身来盯着绳子。 “这是真的，”艾薇喃喃地说。 豆点了点头。他们都试图表现得强硬些。 但他们做不到。“酷！”他们异口同声地喊道。 出于某种原因，迪诺觉得这不酷。 “这太可怕了，”那天下午他们见面时，他说。 苏菲·s、鲁比和特雷弗点了点头。 他们也觉得很恐怖。