Talon shakes his head and takes a deep, shuddering breath. He is clearly distraught by this topic. It’s understandable. He is king of the tree-huggers and animal-lovers. The deaths at the zoo must be taking a terrible toll on his tender heart. “Yes, that’s definitely a horrible set of horribleness. It’s just horrible and terrible and horrible.” He wrings his hands in distress.
Great. I’ve rendered him unable to construct a cohesive sentence. But I am relentless in my pursuit of truth, justice, and the American Way. I probe further. “Yes, it’s horrible. And terrible. Also, horrible again. But what does PUPAE know about it?”
Talon Smithfield stands tall and puts on a brave face. “The official stance of PUPAE is that we are very much against those animal deaths.”
“Hooray!” shout the PUPAE people.
“But what if they’re not just deaths?” I probe. “What if they are murders?”
He blanches at the thought.
“Who might be guilty of such a horrible, terrible, and horrible thing?” I ask.
He starts pacing anxiously. I have plainly upset his delicate constitution. “Probably not Weird Bubba,” he says. “More than likely, it is some evil corporation. Or some other sinister people. I hate to speculate. But whoever it is, we are against them.”
“Hooray!” shout the PUPAE people.
But if I’m going to get to the bottom of this, I need this guy to speculate whether he hates to or not. “But WHO?” I shout. “Who would be killing endangered species?”
Talon Smithfield looks around, like it’s a secret that he’s not sure he wants to share. But then he steps forward and says it. “My money is on CES.”
“CES?” shout the PUPAE people.
“Cageless Enclosure Solutions,” clarifies Talon Smithfield. “A company led by this woman.”
He holds up a CES pamphlet with a picture of a middle-aged woman. “Her name is Haughtry Vain. Her company is negotiating with the zoo to renovate all the animal cages in the entire zoo into open-air enclosures.”
“Open-air enclosures,” I say. “Isn’t that a good thing?”
“A good thing?” says Talon Smithfield. “Enclosed animals are never a good thing.”
“Yeah!” shout the PUPAE people.
“If this deal with Middling Zoo goes through, CES will make millions of dollars on the zoo renovation. At the animals’ expense!”
“That’s exploitation!” cries Holly Creskin.
“Indeed, it is, Miss Creskin,” says Talon Smithfield. “If CES had their way, every endangered species in the world would live in one of their expensive open-air enclosures. We believe that the best animal enclosure is the wild.”
“Hooray!” shout the PUPAE people.
“Hooray is right,” says Talon Smithfield. “These animal deaths seem to be just the thing to make the zoo move forward with this deal. So, who stands to gain by these animal deaths? Cageless Enclosure Solutions, that’s who! And we at PUPAE do not support CES and their greedy corporate agenda!”
“Hooray!” shout the PUPAE people.
Bingo, I shout inside my head. It’s all coming together.
“So keep recruiting, people!” he says. “And I’ll see you at next month’s meeting.”
I lean over to Peanut, who is wedged into four empty seats behind me. With no Darvish to accompany me, I recruited Peanut for moral support.
“The person you saw in the shadows. The one that opened your cage. Could it have been that woman? Could it have been Haughtry Vain?”
“Oh gee whiz,” he says. “So hard to say. It was so dark. And I was distracted by the peanuts.”
So far, Peanut is failing in his task to support me morally.
But the evening is not wasted. We have a clear suspect. Haughtry Vain. Even her name sounds sinister. If we can somehow prove that she is behind this litany of carnage, my dead pet squad is home free.
Most of the PUPAE members are clearing out. I am still cookieless. Which is an affront to humanity, not to mention my stomach. I linger toward the front in the hopes of finding an undiscovered snack tray.
“That is the one,” says a soft voice.
I shiver with an unexpected chill and turn around. I am face-to-face with a panda. Its fur stands on end like it lost a fight with an electrical socket. Ghastly green ghost vapor rolls to the floor around it. It sits casually in a folding chair. Chewing on a cookie.
This is getting out of hand. Another dead animal. And what’s even worse, the panda has a cookie and I don’t.
“What did you say?” I ask it.
“That is the one,” she says again, pointing. “That is the human who killed me.”
I turn around, following the panda’s accusing paw. She is pointing at the picture of Haughtry Vain. Talon Smithfield is holding it up between himself and Holly Creskin. No doubt using it as a shield against Holly’s shameless flirtatious advances.
I turn back to the panda before me. She is cute beyond all reason. And yet, despite her fuzzy-wuzzy adorableness, a harsh realization hits me afresh. This panda bear is dead. Yet one more victim to appear before me, robbed of life. I feel my heart sink. Perhaps the plight of these poor creatures is beginning to make my own heart as tender and mushy as Talon Smithfield’s.
And yet, despite my mushy heart, I can’t help but feel a surge of victory coursing through me. For this panda has been able to do what a rhino, gorilla, and elephant have been unable to do before her. Identify her killer.
Yet something remains unanswered. The one question that could be the key to everything. The riddle that could unlock so much. And only I am brave enough to ask it.
I lean in close to the panda. And I boldly ask the question that needs asking.
“Where’d you get the cookie?”
28
It seems that lately, every time I return to my bedroom, I have another dearly departed zoo animal in tow.
Only tonight when I return, the other deceased animals and the deceased barnyard bird are giving each other manicures with nail polish they have pilfered from my mom.
Which does not happen every time I return to my bedroom. Nor should it.
“Can I come in?” I ask.
“It’s your room,” says Tater Tot.
“Well, I don’t want to disturb whatever you call this.”
“We call it spa night!” says Drumstick.
“Oh, how fun!” says Peanut, joining the merriment.
“It was the chicken’s idea,” says Sea-Monkey.
“We’ve got to pass the time somehow,” squawks Drumstick. “Eternity is a long time!”
“I had my doubts,” says the gorilla. “But this is really quite relaxing.” His nails are Sea Glass Green. Which, I must admit, brings out his eyes. He munches on chocolate truffles. Also pilfered from my mother.
On the drive home, the panda spilled the beans on her recent demise. Listening to the horrors of this encounter in the backseat of the Creskin-mobile without tipping off Holly Creskin or her mother was no easy feat, let me tell you. But I’m learning to mask my emotions to the mortals around me behind a facade of cool detachment.
The panda’s story is this: Earlier this evening, somebody opened her cage. That same somebody released her from her cage. She was then attacked by that selfsame somebody—with a Taser—which accounts for her high-voltage hairdo and her current less-than-alive status.
I close my bedroom door and teleconference Darvish in. Which, to the layperson, means I call him on the phone. He’s not supposed to have calls after 9:00 p.m., but this is mission-critical.
“What’s going on, Rex?” he grumbles. “You know I can’t have calls this late.”
“You are on speakerphone, Darvish,” I inform him. “And I should preface this Meeting of the Minds by clarifying that there is a dead panda in our midst.”
“A panda?” he groans. “Why am I not surprised? And the correct term is Spirit Summit.”
“You should also be advised that my room is currently a nail salon.”
; “Spa,” corrects Tater Tot. “It’s obviously a spa.”
“Why are you calling me, Rex?” Darvish whines. “I’m going to get in trouble.”
“If you hadn’t been off gallivanting with your Nani, you would know,” I tell him.
“We weren’t gallivanting. She’s ninety-two. She doesn’t gallivant.”
“Try to stay on topic, Darvish,” I say. “Clearly, the circumstances are dire or I wouldn’t be calling. Dire circumstances overrule your parents’ arbitrary rules. I don’t mean to be rude, but this is the way the world works. The sooner you come to terms with it, the better.”
Darvish sighs in defeat. “What is it?”
I turn to the panda. “Tell them.”
The panda looks around the room. “I know who killed us.”
“Holy crud!” says Drumstick.
“Holy crud!” says Tater Tot.
“Holy crud!” says Sea-Monkey.
“Holy crud!” says Peanut.
“Mfwolymwud!” says the shark.
“Holy crud indeed,” I confirm.
“What’s going on?” Darvish’s voice crackles with exasperation. “You know I can’t hear them!”
“Oh, sorry.” I keep doing that. Associating with the spiritually unattuned can be burdensome at times. “The panda knows who killed her.”
“Her who?”
“Her the panda.”
“Are you sure?”
“She identified the killer,” I say. I look to the panda for support, but she is wrapped up in the task of picking a new nail color. She’s had a rough day. Maybe a manicure is just the thing to lift her spirits.
I turn back to the phone and whisper to Darvish. “It’s some person named Haughtry Vain.”
“Holy crud!” says Darvish.
“Holy crud indeed,” I confirm.
“The president of CES?” he says.
“How do you know about Cageless Enclosure Solutions?”
“I read, Rex,” he says. “It makes total sense! They are working with the zoo. Remember that article of mine you read for current events?”
“I remember reading an article,” I say. “However, if I recall correctly, the exact ownership of the article was up for debate.”
“Whatever. It said Haughtry Vain is a consultant for the zoo! Which means that she has zoo access.”
The kid is onto something. “I hate to admit it, but you’re right,” I say. “Haughtry Vain had both motive and access.”
“Why do you hate to admit it?” he asks. “I’m right at least seventy-five percent of the time.”
I don’t have time to coddle Darvish’s ego right now. There is an electri-fried panda with Passionfruit Pink nails tugging on my sleeve. The service in this spa is exceptional.
“We must stop the killer, Rex,” the panda says. “Kou Kou could be next.”
“She says Kou Kou could be next,” I say.
“She who?”
“She the panda!” I shout. “Do your level best to concentrate, Darvish.”
I turn back to the panda. “Who’s Kou Kou?”
“The other panda,” answers Darvish. “I just looked it up on the Internet. Mei Mei and Kou Kou are the two giant pandas at the zoo. And, Rex…”
“What?”
“If it’s Mei Mei that’s with you…”
“It’s the girl one.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because she’s wearing a skirt.”
“Really?”
This kid. “No, Darvish! Not really! It’s obviously because she has a girl’s voice. Try to keep up, son.”
“Right,” he says. “Then that means Kou Kou is the last one.”
“The last what?”
“The last endangered species at the Middling Zoo.”
A hush settles over the crowd. Nail-polish brushes freeze mid-stroke.
“That clinches it!” says Sea-Monkey. “This could be our last chance to properly pummel whoever’s doing this!” He blows on his nails.
“You’re right,” I say.
“I told you, I’m right like seventy-five percent of the time,” says Darvish.
“Not you,” I clarify. “Sea-Monkey.”
“Right about what? I CAN’T HEAR THEM!”
I stand on my bed in triumph. “We’re going to infiltrate the Middling Zoo!” I proclaim. “We’ll save Kou Kou and catch the culprit once and for all!”
“What about the pudgy guard?” Darvish sounds worried.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it!” I say. “We have a panda to save!”
It’s the perfect plan. Detailed. Thorough. Astute. Nothing can go wrong.
“Hooray!” cheers Drumstick. “Another field trip to the zoo!”
The chicken jumps into the air, spilling Ooh-La-La Orange all over my pillow.
I shake my head in frustration. This is why I can’t have nice things.
29
Turns out, you cannot flush a pillow down the toilet.
“It’s not technically my fault,” I say.
“What are you doing?!” my dad asks, sloshing through the ankle-deep water.
Being responsible, that’s what.
First, I knew my parents would be emotionally agitated at the sight of a nail-polish stain on my furniture. Getting rid of the offending pillow saves them pain and suffering. Win.
Second, I would have had to explain the presence of said nail-polish stain. I am running out of good cover-up stories. This might have led to the discovery of my ghostly houseguests. Nobody benefits from that. So I took responsibility for my steamrolled chicken’s buffoonery and attempted to dispose of the evidence. Win-win.
Plus, if the pillow is in our septic system instead of in my room, my dad does not have to launder it. Win-win-win.
Except there is a small hiccup that nobody, and I mean nobody, could have foreseen. Turns out, you cannot flush a pillow down the toilet.
My dad is doing some deep-breathing exercises, which seems counterproductive to the present predicament. Mopping would be far more helpful.
“Don’t blame yourself,” I tell him comfortingly.
“What?!”
“It’s true. We would not be in this situation if you had sprung for better plumbing instead of these chintzy low-capacity pipes we have.”
“Please get out of here,” he says. Tears fill his eyes.
Poor guy. He can be so hard on himself. “Never skimp when it comes to plumbing.” I offer these parting nuggets of wisdom to encourage him as I take my leave. These are words to live by. I can see by the throbbing vein in his forehead that he knows it.
It is the kind of forward thinking that I try to imbue my life with. The sort of well-thought-out reasoning that dooms my zoo infiltration plan to glorious success.
30
Villains come in all shapes and sizes.
Some have mechanical octopus arms.
Some were burnt by acid as children and now wear clown makeup to compensate.
And some are missing half their heads.
Haughtry Vain is the latter. Darvish has printed off a picture of Haughtry Vain from the Internet. He brought it to school today. She should fire her photographer. Because her picture looks like this:
As you can see, she is very capable of the travesties of which she is accused. Anybody with pixels covering half their face like that would be likely to lash out at the world.
“My printer was running out of ink,” says Darvish. “That’s why it looks like that.”
Haughtry Vain can blame it on Darvish’s printer all she likes, but it’s quite clear: This woman is capable of anything.
“I still don’t understand,” Darvish says. “Exactly how are we supposed to catch her?”
I breathe the exasperated sigh of the eternally patient.
“It’s easy,” I explain. “We go to the zoo after school today. We hide somewhere until after closing. We catch the villain in the act, expose her misdeeds, and emerge victorious.”
; I sometimes forget that the obvious needs to be spelled out to people. If I have a flaw, it’s that.
“But HOW exactly are we going to catch her?” he persists. “After we hide, what are we going to DO?”
“We’ll wing it.” It’s the perfect plan. I still don’t see why he can’t get on board.
“But what if somebody catches us in the zoo after hours?”
“Don’t worry, Darvish,” I assure him. “I have Fists of Furry to protect us.”
“Don’t you mean Fists of Fury?”
“First, do you want to be on the receiving end of Fists of Furry?”
“No.”
“I don’t want that either,” I tell him. “So please stop contradicting me. Second, I am talking about gorilla fists. And they are furry. So, when I say Fists of Furry, rest assured that I mean what I say.”
But Darvish has spotted another “hole” in what is otherwise a foolproof stratagem.
“I’m not allowed to stay out that late,” he protests.
“Well, don’t tell your parents that’s what you’re doing,” I say. “You tell them you’re sleeping at my house. Which you’ll do. After we emerge victorious. So, it’s not a lie.”
I have a lot of work to do still, molding my sidekick. He doesn’t seem to grasp that dire situations will always trump rules and regulations.
“By the way,” I say, “your idea to invite Holly Creskin to the Evening of Enchantment Dance may be ill-advised.”
“What??” Darvish sputters. “That wasn’t my idea. It was yours!”
“There’s no need to quibble on the details, Darvish. I know heartbreak is hard. But you should try to put her from your mind.”
He rolls his eyes to the heavens. “What are you talking about?”
I decide to let him down easy. “There is a high schooler named Talon Smithfield who is vying for her affections. He is tall. And dreamy. And has crystalline eyes that are the steely blue of an iceberg on a crisp December night. You cannot hope to compete with that.”
“I’m not trying to compete!” he hisses. “I don’t like Holly Creskin!”
“That’s the spirit,” I say, patting him on the arm.
The Incredibly Dead Pets of Rex Dexter Page 9