A Taste Fur Murder

by Lyle, Dixie

“No way,” snorted Kenny Gant.

  “Surely not,” said Mr. Kwok.

  “Whee!” said Keene. “Sorry, couldn’t contain myself—this is the most fun I’ve had since the last time I had this much fun. If not Estevez, then who?”

  “Good question,” I answered. “But think about this: Maria was shot with a poisoned dart fired by Estevez’s quadracopter—but who was at the controls? We all saw him demonstrate it, right? It looked pretty simple to me.”

  Everybody studied everybody else, while trying to look like they weren’t. Five pairs of eyes, darting and staring and quickly looking away.

  Tango had been under my chair the entire time, listening.

  Thanks, but I’m not done yet. “Here’s something you may not know. Estevez claimed that not only was he innocent, but the flight log of the controller would clear him.”

  “And did it?” Oscar asked.

  “We don’t know. It couldn’t be found.”

  “Well, that doesn’t make sense,” Kenny Gant pointed out. “Why would he get rid of the thing if it would prove he didn’t do it?”

  Mr. Kwok grunted. “Because the real killer did so, obviously.”

  Hana shook her head. “Not necessarily. He could be lying about it to make himself look innocent. If he knew no one would ever find it, no one could prove he was lying, either.”

  Thank you, Hana; that’s exactly where I wanted the conversation to go. “That’s easier said than done, though. Footage from security cameras proves that Estevez didn’t leave the estate between the first murder and his arrest—so if he hid the controller, he hid it somewhere on the grounds.”

  “Aha!” Keene exclaimed. “Brilliant! We shall comb the estate within an inch of its finely groomed life, and find the thing!”

  Oscar gave him a sour look. “Do you have any idea how large this property is? Searching the house alone would take weeks, and that doesn’t take into account outbuildings or servants’ quarters.”

  I nodded. “True. But I’ll bet we could narrow it down if we approached it logically. Where would be the best place to hide a small, handheld electronic device?”

  “Another dimension,” Keene said. “No, wait. That’s the first place I’d look.”

  “You could bury it,” Kenny Gant said. “Dig up some sod and put it back. Be almost invisible.”

  “You’d need a shovel,” I said. “Or some sort of digging tool. Then you’d have to get rid of that.”

  “There are many nooks and crannies in this place,” Oscar said, “but the maids are extremely thorough. If it were me, I’d do my best to destroy the evidence.”

  “How?” asked Mr. Kwok. “Garbage cans can be searched. Fire seems unlikely—burning plastic gives off a terrible stench.”

  “How about inside something?” Hana suggested. “Techies like Estevez always carry around a multitool—I saw him with one the first day. He could have unscrewed the back of an appliance or vent or something.”

  “Now you’re thinking,” I said. “But that’s still problematic. If he did that in a public area, he’d risk getting caught. His own room would be too dangerous, too. Outside is more likely.”

  “Inside the lion cage!” said Keene. “You’ve got lions here, right?”

  “Not at the moment. But there are dangerous animals in the menagerie.”

  “Some of which have pools,” mused Oscar. “Shallow, but quite muddy. I daresay you could throw almost anything in there and not have it dredged up for years. I threw a small metal car in the hippo pool when I was six, and remember trying to find it years later when Mother had the pond drained for some reason or other.”

  “Any luck?” Kenny Gant asked.

  “No, but I did discover a number of ancient golf balls—my grandfather enjoyed the game.”

  “Do the police know about your theory?” asked Mr. Kwok.

  “Sheriff Brower doesn’t care about the controller,” I said. “The fact that he found the poison in Estevez’s room is enough for him.”

  “But not for you,” said Gant. “You think he was framed?”

  I knew he was, but I couldn’t say that. “Let’s just say I’m not convinced he’s guilty.”

  “And here’s the soup!” Keene announced. “Excellent—solving crimes always make me famished.”

  We ate our soup in silence. Tango asked.

  We’ll see.

  * * *

  “I think we should look for the controller,” Hana said over the salad.

  “I’m in!” declared Keene.

  “I suppose,” Oscar said grudgingly. “If Estevez didn’t poison Mother, then we must find the one who did.”

  “If we’re going to do this, we should be organized about it,” said Gant.

  “Perhaps teams of two would be best,” said Mr. Kwok.

  “Why?” asked Gant. “There’s a lot of ground to cover, and we can do that quicker if we split up. Or are you afraid the poisoner is going to strike again?”

  “It is not that,” said Kwok. “But it would seem chances are high the poisoner is one of us.”

  There was another moment of silence.

  “We partner up to keep each other honest,” said Keene. “Terrific idea. I pick Foxtrot.” He grinned at me with such glee it was hard not to grin back.

  “Unless it’s one of the staff,” said Gant. “In which case, the controller has no doubt already been removed from the premises.”

  “That is a possibility,” I admitted. “But I still think a search is worth doing.”

  We strategized over the main course. I called up a map of the estate on the wall screens and we divided the house and grounds into grids, assigning different teams to each one. Keene and I would take the menagerie and outbuildings, Kenny Gant and Hana Kim would search the grounds, and Mr. Kwok and Oscar would look through the house. We all agreed it made sense for each team to switch assignments once they were done, to provide fresh eyes that might see something the first team missed.

  By the time we got to dessert, Hana Kim was taking notes, Oscar’s drinking had slowed noticeably, and even Keene started providing intelligent suggestions. We ended dinner by agreeing to meet at nine AM for breakfast and then begin the search.

  Nobody pointed out the obvious: If the poisoner was one of us, chances were he or she would try to sneak away during the night to either move or destroy the controller. But I could see from the looks on their faces as we said good night that it was on everybody’s mind.

  What I didn’t tell any of them was that I had my own plans.

  * * *

  After dinner I went upstairs to check on Tiny—or rather, Zanzibar. He lifted his head alertly when I walked in. [Foxtrot. Nothing to report, I’m afraid.]

  “Well, I’ve got something.” I told him about how the dinner went, and what I intended to do now. I could tell from the look on his face he wasn’t happy with my plan.

  [I should be there. You’ll be a target.]

  “I’ll be fine. Even if the killer shows up, he or she won’t expect me to be there—I didn’t say anything about the menagerie myself.”

  [It’s not just the killer I’m worried about.]

  “What, you mean the pit of man-eating vipers I’m going to search? Relax—my research shows they’re actually quite timid.” I hadn’t told Tiny about the hippos; I figured he had enough to worry about without knowing I was going swimming with a couple of enormous, ill-tempered, aquatic warthogs. “Oh, and I brought you a little something.” I opened the Tupperware container I’d brought with me and set it down on the floor. “Beef Wellington. Hope you’re okay with leftovers.”

  He sniffed at it and licked his chops. [I sense you’re trying to distract me.]

  “Is it working?”

  [I’ll tell you when I’m done.] He tore into the meal and devoured it in less than thirty seconds. Then he sat back, licked his lips again, and said, [No.]

  “Wel
l, try not to worry. I need you here, and I’ll have Tango with me to stand lookout. Her night vision’s as sharp as her claws, and she’ll give me a telepathic shout if anyone comes within a hundred feet.”

  [Mmmm. I suppose. But be careful, all the same.]

  I assured him I would, then patted ZZ’s hand. “Don’t you worry, either, boss. I’m gonna get whoever did this to you, I promise. But first I have to borrow some of your vacation gear.”

  ZZ’s past indulgences have included forays into hang gliding, rock climbing, kayaking, and of course sky- and scuba diving. I had to dig through a storage room to find what I needed, but I managed to uncover a face mask and a waterproof flashlight—I wasn’t experienced enough to mess with anything like tanks or a regulator. Besides, the water I was going into was only five or six feet deep.

  Tango, though, was looking at me like I was planning a trip to the moon.

  “We could wait all night and not get any results. This way, at least we’ll know if the thing’s actually down there.”

 

  “Well, I have to try.”

  I had just one more errand: I picked out a big hunk of meat from the walk-in freezer, thawed it out in the microwave, and stuck it in a ziplock bag. That went into my backpack along with the mask, flashlight, and a few more items. Then it was time for a trip to the zoo.

  Bongo—which I’d learned was the Banda word for “hyena”—seemed pleased to see us. She yipped and giggled while intently watching me pull out the bag of meat.

 

  “Tell her I had to go to the moon to get the meat and my flying rhino was out of gas.” I’d also learned hyenas practiced deception in the wild, sometimes giving false warning cries to convince other hyenas to run away when there was no threat present. I thought Bongo needed to know I could make stuff up, too—if nothing else, maybe she’d appreciate the joke. Of course, even if she did, how would I ever know?

  More whoops, chuckles, and yips.

  I grinned. “Sure. Tell her she can have some now, and the rest after she’s answered my questions.”

  I tossed a chunk of the meat over the fence, where Bongo pounced on it and swallowed it whole. When hyenas gather around a kill, they don’t eat in order of dominance the way some packs do–it’s strictly first come, first fed. As a result they learn to feed fast: A full-grown hyena can down a gazelle fawn in two minutes.

  “Okay, then. You want the rest of this, you’re going to have to tell me the truth. What did you see last night, when the two-legged one was here very late?”

  Tango translated, listened, then translated the reply.

  “Wait. He or she?”

 

  I sighed. “Well, that’ll have to do. Thank her for me, will you?” I dug out the rest of the meat and chucked it over the fence, where it disappeared down her gullet as fast as the previous piece.

  I eyed the hippo pool nervously. If I were the killer, I’d pick one of two spots to throw the controller: either in the very center of the pool … or fairly close to the bank where the hippos entered and exited, where it stood a good chance of being stepped on by half a ton of herbivore and driven deep into the mud. If that were the case I’d have to go to much greater lengths, probably involving Caroline, a tranquilizer rifle, and a metal detector. I hoped that wouldn’t be necessary.

  “All right, let’s do this,” I said. I marched up to the edge of the hippo enclosure, Tango trailing behind me.

  At least one of the hippos appeared to be awake; I saw a single brown eye with a horizontal slit peeking at me from just above the waterline. The other hippo was just a grayish bulk beside it. “Um, hello.”

  Tango emitted a loud, groaning bellow that didn’t sound like it could come from a cat’s mouth. I stared at her.

 

  There was no reply for a moment; then the hippo that was looking at us snorted water through its nose. It made a few irritated-sounding snuffling noises.

 

  “I’d like to go swimming in your pool.”

  Grunts, splashing, snorts. <“No. Go away or I’ll bite you in half.”>

  Charming. “Let’s make a deal. I just want to look for something on the bottom of your pool—it won’t take long. Let me do that, and I’ll give you some of these.” I opened the backpack and pulled out one of half a dozen cantaloupes I’d crammed in there. While hippos generally ate grass, they had prodigious appetites and seemed to like anything in the melon family. I was hoping these two were partial to what I’d chosen, since hauling watermelons around wasn’t really practical.

  The hippo eyed the cantaloupe, then opened his mouth. And when a hippo opens its mouth, it opens its mouth; I could have dropped an office chair in there. I pitched the cantaloupe in, feeling a little like I was throwing a grape into the Grand Canyon. The hippo’s mouth closed. He didn’t bother chewing.

  “So, we good?”

  A long pause, followed by a single snort. <“More.”>

  I had five left, and I threw three of them into that gaping maw. “That’s it for now. You get the rest when I’ve done my swim.”

  Even though it worked with Bongo, I really wasn’t sure if the same would hold true with the Big H. For a creature that liked to chow down on 150 pounds of vegetation at a time, a few cantaloupes might not be worth the trouble. But when he snorted and snuffled his reply, Tango translated it as

  I glanced around. Nobody in sight. Was I really going to do this?

  I was wearing a borrowed swimsuit from ZZ’s closet under my clothes. I kicked off my shoes, skinned off my pants and top, then dug the flashlight and diving mask out of the backpack and stuffed my clothes in. “Keep a sharp eye out, okay? Anyone comes anywhere near here—”

  She gave a visible shudder.

  I climbed over the fence and waded in.

  The water was warmer than I expected. Warm and muddy, with things floating in it. I tried hard not to think about that; hippos—much like humans—like to poop in water. At least they were herbivores.

  I made sure the mask fitted snugly around my eyes and nose, turned on the flashlight, and waded out to the center of the pool. I felt horribly exposed. If Mr. or Mrs. H decided they didn’t want me in their home after all, I’d have to thrash my way through this muck all the way back to the fence, a good thirty feet or more. I felt Mr. H’s horizontally slitted eyes on me the whole time.

  But I was committed now. I took a deep breath and plunged my head under the surface.

  Silt swirled in front of my eyes in the flashlight’s beam. The water had a green tint to it, like swimming in mouthwash—murky, muddy mouthwash. It was only about five feet deep, so it wasn’t hard to reach the bottom. Easy to reach, but not so easy to see; the closer to the bottom I got, the thicker the silt. I wound up groping my way through the muck with my hands, using touch more than sight to try to locate what I was searching for.

  When I couldn’t hold my breath any longer, I popped up to the surface. Mr. H was still watching me with those eerie eyes; it felt more like being studied by a giant snake than the distant relative of a whale.

  I took a deep breath and submerged once more. I was trying to work in a spiral pattern, starting at the center of the pond and working my way outward, but it was hard to stay consistent with no visual markers. I kept expecting to hear a massive splash as Mr. H changed his mi
nd and decided to make good on his threat to chomp me in half. Even though hippos were herbivores, there were documented cases of stressed individuals eating other animals—even engaging in acts of cannibalism.

  My fingers brushed against something hard and angular. I grabbed it and surfaced, but it was just the crushed remains of a beer can. Down I went again.

  And then I found something else.

  This time I held it up to the flashlight’s beam and examined it while still submerged. Rectangular, with bits of glass glinting in the light …

  I’d found it.

 

  The panic that surged through me fought with my growing need for air. Should I surface and risk detection, or try to stay here and hope whoever it was kept going?

  And then I heard—and felt—the heavy splash of something big launching itself deeper into the water.

  Uh-oh.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Decisions, decisions …

  This one should have been easy to make. Definite threat from half a ton of toothy aquatic animal versus possible threat from an unknown human being equals Foxtrot heading for dry land ASAP.

  But.

  Said human being might be a cold-blooded killer coming to retrieve the vital piece of evidence I held in my hand. Said toothy animal could just be going for a swim.

  So.

  My lungs broke the stalemate. They didn’t care about the finer details of risk management, they just wanted oxygen. I compromised by surfacing as quietly as I could, trying to keep my head mostly underwater. Since the diving mask covered my nose, this wasn’t as successful as I’d hoped.

  I found myself face-to-face with Mr. H. He snorted, spraying my mask with water. I stayed very, very still. Tango?

 

  Uh-huh. Can you handle sentry duty and translate at the same time? I have a hippo here who’s trying to tell me something.

 

  Can you tell him I’d be very, very happy to give him the cantaloupes? But that I need to get out of the water, first?