Since a girl can only read somany back issues of Espionage Today, I usually spent those pre-semesterdays wandering around the mansion, discovering hidden compartments and secretpassageways that are at least a hundred years old and haven't seen a gooddusting in about that long. Mostly, I tried to spend time with my mom, butshe'd been super busy and totally distracted. Remembering this now, I thoughtabout Bex's mysterious absence and suddenly began to worry that maybe Liz hadbeen onto something. Then Anna Fetterman squeezed onto the bench next to Lizand asked, "Have you seen it? Did you look?"

Anna was holding a blue slipof paper that instantly dissolves when you put it in your mouth. (Even thoughit looks like it will taste like cotton candy, it doesn't—trust me!) I don't know why they always put our classschedules on Evapopaper—probably so we can use up our stash of the bad-tastingkind and move on to the good stuff, like mint chocolate chip.

But Anna wasn't thinking aboutthe Evapopaper flavor when she yelled, "We have Covert Operations!"She soundedabsolutely terrified, and I remembered that she was probably the only GallagherGirl that Liz could take in a fist-fight. I looked at Liz, and even she rolledher eyes at Anna's hysterics. After all, everyone knows sophomore year is thefirst time we get to do anything that even approaches actual fieldwork. It'sour first exposure to real spy stuff, but Anna seemed to be forgettingthat the class itself was, sadly, kind of a cakewalk.

"I'm pretty sure we canhandle it," Liz soothed, prying the paper from Anna's frail hands."All Buckingham does is tell horror stories about all the stuff she saw inWorld War Two and show slides, remember? Ever since she broke her hip she's—"