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at which way the cars are coming before you cross the street, be polite to everyone, etcetera, etcetera.
    She did not say, “And if a mystery pops up right in front of your face, stay out of it.” Which was a good thing. Because the next day we stepped right into the middle of a mystery, and we could start solving it with a clear conscience.

9
    Go A-way
    Here’s another place the story begins: in the National Gallery.
    Lucas and I were supposed to meet Mom at the National Gallery entrance at five thirty. We chose to meet there because it’s in the middle of London on a place called Trafalgar Square, right across from the Lord Nelson column Robert had talked about. By the way, Lord Nelson is the guy who led the Battle of Trafalgar, where the English navy defeated Napoleon. If you’re interested in that kind of thing.
    Anyway, we were having a totally cool time. First I showed Lucas the Tower of London, which is an old, old castle kind of place with teeny slits for windows and a stone wall around it. Famous people used to have their heads chopped off there in the olden days, including a couple of the wives of Henry VIII. While we were there we also went into the part where they keep the Crown Jewels, which are the crowns and things that all the kings and queens of England have worn for hundreds of years. You wouldn’t believe how many diamonds there are on the main crown they use these days, or how big the diamonds are and how they sparkle.
    After the Tower of London we found a McDonald’s. Mom had told us that the menu at McDonald’s is different in different countries. She was right. I had a Toasted Deli Sandwich Chicken Salad on a brown roll and an Orange Matchmakers McFlurry. Then we went to Piccadilly Circus, which is not a circus at all. I guess circus is an old word for a ring or circle, and this is a circle right in the middle of town that’s kind of like Times Square in New York only with smaller buildings and not as many signs. We went to a few stores and scoped out the boys. We decided most of them looked just like the guys from Minnesota.
    We planned to keep walking around central London all day and not get to the National Gallery until the last minute, but it started to rain, and the museum isn’t far from Piccadilly Circus, so we got there early.
    In America, the word museum can mean a place where they have a collection of almost anything, or a place where they mostly have art. But in England, places where they have just art are usually called galleries. So the National Gallery is a place where they just have art. We still called it a museum most of the time, because that’s what it seemed like to us. Besides, it’s kind of confusing, because gallery is also another name for a room inside the museum.
    Anyway, like I said, the National Gallery is full of nothing but art, mostly thousands and thousands of old paintings. So we started looking at the paintings, just to pass the time. I actually like a lot of old paintings, but after I’ve seen a few hundred of them, the only way I can possibly not be bored is to try to look for funny things in them.
    A lot of the people in paintings are naked, and if you try to have a sense of humor when you look at them, you suddenly see that they’re doing all sorts of weird things, like riding horses and tending sheep and having picnics together in the country and talking to angels, all without any clothes on. If you look at the paintings that way, a lot of them are really funny.
    So Lucas and I went from room to room laughing and having a great time, until we got to the Rembrandt room.
    One of the things that’s cool about the paintings by Rembrandt is that there are kind of darkish parts, and then there are parts that look like there’s a light shining on them, and Rembrandt was able to make that happen just by using paint. I love that. Also I’ve painted enough to know how hard that is, so I wanted to look at