Jerry Todd and the Talking Frog

When I started writing this book, I thought of calling it: JERRY TODD AND THE PUZZLE ROOM MYSTERY. But Scoop told me that wasn’t the proper title. “There is more in the book about the talking frog than there is about the puzzle room,” he pointed out. “So why don’t you call it JERRY TODD AND THE TALKING FROG?” So it was our leader, you see, who gave this book its title. Like my other books, this is a fun-mystery-adventure story. The “fun” part is where we peddle the spy’s beauty soap. Bubbles of Beauty, let me tell you, was very wonderful soap! At first we couldn’t believe that it would do all of the amazing things that Mr. Posselwait claimed for it. But that is where wegot a surprise! There is a ghost in this story. B-r-r-r-r! At midnight it comes to the old haunted house, walking on the porches. Creepy, I’ll tell the world. We kept the doors locked. For we were all alone in the brick house, Scoop and I and Peg and our new chum, Tom Ricks. It was to help our new chum that we braved the perils of the haunted house. You see, a puzzle maker had met with a strange death in the brick house, and that is what made it haunted. “Ten and ten.” That was the Bible’s secret. What was “ten and ten”? Why did the ghost come nightly to the inventor’s home? We found out, but it took us many exciting days to solve the mystery.