J.M.J.

Author's note: Thank you to Savvy for the review! More stories here and the next part of the White Roses series will be coming in the next few weeks!

Spark Plugs

George – Secrets Can Kill (original)

1998

Several times on the drive home, George glanced pensively at the lights on the dashboard. They had come on about a mile back. One warned her to check the engine and the other said that the ETS was off, whatever that was. George knew her dad was always telling her that if warning lights came on in her car, she ought to check them before driving anywhere, and one way or another, she always seemed to be ignoring that advice. This time, her reason was that she was only ten minutes away from home and she really, really didn't want to take the time to stop, find a phone, and call her dad to come and check the car so she could drive the rest of the way. By that time, she might as well walk home. Besides, her friend, Nancy Drew, was supposed to call soon. Nancy was headed for Florida to work on a mystery. Sometimes, George got to accompany Nancy on her sleuthing adventures—she was an amateur detective with quite a resumé of successful cases built up—but this time, she hadn't been able to. At the very least, she wanted to hear all about everything as soon as it happened, and Nancy had promised to keep her up to date. George didn't want to miss that phone call. The ol' car was just going to have to hold together until she could get home. She just hoped it wasn't anything was going to cause the engine to explode or something.

In a few minutes, those fears were relieved. George pulled into the driveway without so much as any smoke coming out of the engine. She noticed that her dad's car was there; he was home from work. Perfect. He could help her figure out what these lights were all about.

She rushed inside and found her dad sitting at the breakfast nook table, reading the afternoon paper. He looked up when he heard George come in. Russ Fayne and his daughter had a good relationship, with George taking after her dad a little more than her mom.

"Hey, Dad," George said. "How was work today?"

"Not too bad. How was your day?" Russ folded the paper and put it on the table.

"Good," George replied. "All except the last few minutes."

Russ raised an eyebrow slightly. "What happened in the last few minutes?"

"Well, nothing too serious. I hope. Some lights came on in my car. The check engine light and one about the ETS being off. I was close enough to home, I thought I might as well drive it back."

"Mm-hmm. I guess we'd better go and take a look, then."

Russ folded the paper up and went outside with George again. She turned the key partly on to show him the offending lights.

"Okay, so the ETS is the Enhanced Traction System," Russ explained. "That's what monitors the anti-brake system and watches for slippery road conditions and such. Obviously, the roads aren't slick today, so that can't be the issue. Let's check what the owner's manual says about it."

George reached over for the glove compartment and took out the owner's manual. It took a minute or two to find the relevant page. She read through it.

"It says what you just said and then it says it will come on if the shift lever of the car is in first or second. Obviously, it isn't in either of those. Let's see. It also says that it will come on if the parking brake doesn't fully release. I don't think that would be it since it came on while I was driving."

"Let's check it anyway," Russ said.

George turned the engine on and released the parking brake. The light remained on.

"Okay, so it says if you tried all that and the light is still on, then there's something wrong with the system. It doesn't say what. Helpful, huh?"

"Very," Russ replied with a grin. "We might have to take it to a mechanic, but first, let's see if we can find anything ourselves. Go ahead and pop the hood."

George pressed the button to open the hood, and then she followed her dad around to the front of the car. She watched with interest as her dad checked several different things without seeing a problem. Finally, he took out one of the spark plugs and looked at it.

"This could be the problem," he said. "Looks like the spark plugs are about due to be replaced. Let's take this down to the auto parts store and see if we can get a new one."

"Oh, but I was waiting for Nancy to call," George replied.

"If she calls while we're gone, then she'll call back," Russ said. "Let's go and get this taken care of tonight so we won't have to worry about it tomorrow."

"Well, okay," George relented.

She got into the passenger seat of her dad's car and they drove down to a small auto parts store in downtown River Heights. They went up to the counter and Russ handed the spark plug to the young man working there. He was kind of cute, and in the back of her mind, George wished she knew more about cars so she could impress him, but she didn't waste too much time on the thought.

The young man looked over the spark plug. "Let me see if we've got any of these in stock. How many do you need?"

"Four," George spoke up quickly, glad that she knew that much at least.

"Okay. It'll just take a second."

He went into a back room and was gone for a couple of minutes. Then he returned with a box of four spark plugs.

"You're in luck," he reported. "I've got four left exactly. Otherwise, I would have had to order them and it would have taken a couple days to get them in."

"Thanks," Russ told him.

He paid for the plugs and then he and George headed back for home.

"So we just take the old spark plugs out and put in these new ones?" George asked, opening the door of her car again so she could pop the hood.

"Not so fast," Russ replied. "First, we've got to gap the plugs."

"What does that mean?"

"Each plug has this electrode at the end." Russ pointed out the slender piece of metal at the end of each spark plug. "Different engines can use the same plugs, but they need the electrodes bent to different positions. If you don't gap them right, you'll cause yourself some problems. Does the owner's manual say how much we should gap them?"

"Uh, let me check."

"While you do that, I'll get my gapping tool out of the garage."

George thumbed through the owner's manual again and found the needed information. "It says point-zero-four. Does that sound right?"

Russ nodded as he returned with the tool. "If that's what it says. Let me show you how it works.

The tool was round with edges that grew wider as they went around. The different widths were marked. Russ took the first spark plug and put its electrode at the narrowest part of the edge and then rotated the tool until the electrode had reached the point that was marked 0.040. Then he handed the tool to George and she did the same for the other three spark plugs.

"Now do we just switch them out?" George asked.

"Right."

That took a little longer than George expected, The other spark plugs were just as dirty and worn as the first, which made Russ more and more confident that that was, indeed, the problem. When he had finished, he instructed George to turn the engine on again.

She turned the key. Of course, all the dash lights came on for a second or two, but they all quickly turned off again, except for the check engine and the ETS. George frowned.

"They're still on," she reported.

Russ sighed. "Well, then, I guess we'll have to take it to a mechanic, after all. At least your spark plugs really did need changed, so it wasn't a total waste of time."

"No, it wasn't," George agreed. "Say, Dad, could you teach me everything you know about cars?"

Russ chuckled. "That would be a short lesson, but sure. Why the sudden interest? It doesn't have anything to do with that kid in the auto parts store, does it?"

George felt her cheeks grow warm. "Of course not. I want to learn so I can fix my own car and not have to run to a mechanic whenever anything's wrong."

"I don't know enough to save us a trip this time."

"Maybe not, but it could still come in handy."

"Okay, then."

They went around to the front and Russ pointed out the different parts of the engine and gave a brief explanation of things that might go wrong with them and what would happen in those cases. He was just closing the hood when George's mom, Louise, stepped out the door.

"George, Nancy's on the phone," she said.

"Great! I'll be right there!" George turned to her dad. "Thanks for the help."

"I don't know how much help I was."

"It was fun hanging out with you," George insisted. "Besides, I learned a lot. Like a bunch of things that aren't wrong with my car." She grinned teasingly as she ran into the house to take the phone call.