Shadow shook from head to tail, knocking Ellsworth Eagle from his perch. Cody and Ellsworth went sliding, but the quick-acting eagle managed to grab onto a scrap of fur behind Shadow’s ear. Dangling by a talon, Cody glanced down to see what waited below. He saw clumps of grass, and hoped that he could disappear within their tall blades until the coast was clear.
Before Ellsworth released his grip, however, The Hugh grabbed the pooch behind his ears and gave him a rebuking, but loving shake. He felt something in his right hand. When he pulled his hand back to examine what the dog had picked up, his jaw dropped.
Hugh’s surprise came nowhere near Cody’s, who looked up in terror at the man’s face. His cover blown, he thought if there were any lingering doubts before, now The Hugh knew for certain that Coin Island was alive with living coins.
The Hugh peered closer.
Cody froze and played dead.
Coins rarely had to freeze because people’s belief that coins were inanimate objects was so deeply ingrained that the individual depicted on the coin could stick its tongue out and spit a razz and the human wouldn’t see it. People saw only what they were prepared to see, and few humans were prepared for a living coin.
But Hugh Stewards was not the average person. The Hugh knew, all right, and so Cody dared not move. He feared that the man might decide to pocket him, take him home, and stick him somewhere for safekeeping.
Hugh took the Washington quarter between thumb and forefinger, held it up and examined it. He noted the coin’s obverse side: George Washington’s profile, the first president staring pensively into the future, as if wondering what fate awaited the young republic he did so much to establish; LIBERTY embossed over the great man’s head; the motto IN GOD WE TRUST below the portrait’s chin, and the coin’s date, 1951.
He turned the quarter over and gave the reverse an equally close inspection. He saw nothing out of the ordinary. As with every other quarter he’d ever stared at, it held the same details: a majestic eagle with wings spread; inscribed above the bird’s head the words UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and the motto, E PLURIBUS UNUM; and at the bottom of the coin, also in capital letters, the coin’s value, QUARTER DOLLAR.
Hugh returned the quarter heads-up and held it in his open palm.
“Don’t be afraid, little fella,” he said. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He looked about to make sure no one had wandered onto the scene. “I’m really sorry about your home. I’ll make it up to you somehow, I promise.”
Cody nodded in understanding, but his gesture was too tiny for the man to detect.
“Do I set you down here on the ground, or toss you back onto your island?”
The man put the coin to his ear. He heard nothing. He glanced towards the island and spotted the cloud of eagle-backed coins circling above it, the afternoon sun glistening off their shimmering wings.
“Well,” Hugh Stewards said, “here goes nothing.”
He clenched his fist, swung it low, and then tossed the coin towards the center of the island. Midway, the coin appeared to stop and hover in the air, whereupon it transformed into a silvery butterfly.
The winged coin circled back and flew to Hugh. It floated a foot from the man’s eyes.
A big, wondrous smile blossomed on Hugh Stewards’ face, an expression of both gratitude and relief.
Shadow yapped at the shiny, fluttering object and leapt snatching at it.
The quarter easily evaded the dog’s playful snap, and laughed.
“Whoa, boy,” The Hugh said. “You’ve caused enough trouble for one day. Let’s go.”
The Hugh slapped his thigh for Shadow to follow, and headed back to his bench to collect his things. He cast a departing glance, and waved goodbye.
“See you tomorrow, Cody Quarter.”
Cody Quarter? Where’d I come up with that?
Hugh Stewards chuckled and shook his head.
Cody wondered the same, but he wasn’t chuckling.
When Cody returned, he found the colony of coins scurrying about Camp Coin like ants whose hill had just been invaded.
He set down and bucked over to Coinhenge, which housed the CBS and its sacred reflecting pond. There he found the chief, Deirdre Dime, and the others discussing the damage.
“Chief?” Deirdre said with a heavy sigh. “Is this too for the good?”
Chief Iron Tail grimaced, then lifting his chin in a demonstration of his unflinching faith, he nodded and said, “Yes, bubbeleh. Gam zu l’tovah.”
Cody rolled up, giving the coins their only welcome news of the day. After his friends expressed their relief and joy at seeing the quarter alive, they asked him what The Hugh had said.
Cody reported all that had happened, including that The Hugh seemed to know his name.
“A lucky guess,” Harper said. “You look like a Cody.”
Cody laughed. “Harper, I look like George Washington.”
“Not to me, you don’t.”
“To humans we all look the same,” Deirdre said. “It might have been a lucky guess, or it could be something else going on.”
“Again with the psychobabble?” Harper said. “Are you saying it might have something to do with that healing business we were talking about before Genghis Canine the Mongol mongrel demolished half our island?”
Deirdre nodded.
“Yeah? How so?”
“We’re connected someway. The Hugh has managed to tap into our collective unconscious.”
“He knows what we’re thinking?” Harper said, dubious. “I don’t even know what you’re thinking most of the time. And besides, when we want to communicate across distances we need fire or water as a medium for that.”
“I’m not talking mental transaction. I’m talking dream stuff—archetypes, symbols, and flashes of inspiration.”
Harper turned to Cody and asked, “Does The Hugh believe in that hooey?”
“Dunno, but I have seen him reading books on psychology. Freud and Jung and other people I had never heard of. I always figured it was research for his articles and short stories. The Hugh writes for several pulp magazines, or tries to, anyway—weird tales, science fiction and fantasy. From what I’ve read, he has a good imagination.”
“Imagination is important,” Deirdre said, “but belief is more important.”
Chief Iron Tail grunted. “The Hugh has crossed over.”
“Crossed over to what?” Two Loons asked.
“He has entered Coinworld.”
The others looked warily around, as if expecting to see a new face among their coin brethren, one that looked like The Hugh.
The chief snorted. “Not literally, shmendriks. Knowing and believing have become one.”
“But what does it mean, Chief?” Deirdre asked.
“For us or for him?”
“Both.”
The chief shrugged. “Heck if I know. I’m not aware of it happening before. We’re in new territory here.”
“None of your visions have spoken about such a thing?”
“Not yet.” He turned to Two Loons. “Did Chief Laughing Hawk ever mention anything about human awareness of Coinworld?”
Two Loons thought back and shook his head. “It was a long time ago now, and back then we didn’t understand half the stuff he yakked on about. We loved Laughing Hawk, but to be honest, most of us thought the old nickel a tad on the batty side, you know?”
The others, their eyes avoiding Iron Tail, nodded in understanding. And nodded some more. Noting his friends’ averted eyes and unanimous agreement, the chief frowned.
Two Loons quickly added, “But like I said, back then we didn’t know what we know now. If we had, I’m sure we’d have paid a little more attention.”
“Did Laughing Hawk mention humans at all?” Deirdre asked the nickel brave.
“You mean besides them wiping out Coinworld?”
“Yes, Two Loons. We got that part down pretty good already.”
“In one of his last visions before the sea monster got
him, he did mention something curious, though I don’t see how it would tie in with what you’re talking about.”
“Everything ties into something,” the chief said. “What was it?”
“Laughing Hawk said that in his vision he saw armies of men holding sticks with what looked like a plate at one end. They were looking for something. The machine was clumsy and had a gauge of some kind that made a funny noise.”
Harper said, “It sounds to me like a metal detector. They’ve improved a lot since Laughing Hawk’s day and are easier to lug around. I saw a guy using one on a beach in Fort Lauderdale.”
Cody asked, “Were they looking for coins?”
“Apparently, yeah.”
“Did the guy find any?”
“Sure did. About a buck fifty in change. I don’t know how long those coins were buried, but they were the happiest coins you ever saw. They never thought they’d see another day of commerce.”
“So this metal detector is a good thing, right?” Cody said.
“It is if you’re a coin that wants to be found,” Deirdre said.
“All coins want to be found,” Cody said.
“Now, sure. But what if the day arrives when we don’t?”
“Whattaya mean?” Cody said. “You think people are going to start hunting us down to kill us or something? They don’t even know we’re alive.”
“Clearly some people know,” Deirdre reminded him. “The Hugh knows.”
“But The Hugh is good,” Cody insisted. “I don’t think he’d hurt a fly, and especially not a coin.”
“Monroe Stryker knows,” Deirdre added.
“Okay, but he’s a nut. Nobody would believe him.”
Harper said, “If they know, the odds are good that others are on to us too.”
Two Loons said, “Laughing Hawk didn’t seem to think the contraption such a good thing. He said it was ‘just the start.’ None of us understood what he meant by that. Back then, I think we were all kinda hoping some person would show up here with one of those things and rescue us.”
Chief Iron Tail had yet to chime in. He had that distant look in his eye that the others knew rarely meant anything good.
“Laughing Hawk was right,” he said finally. “All human inventions can be used for good or ill, and eventually they are. Remember I told you about those machines I saw in a vision some years back? The ones that looked like television sets with typewriters attached, and others with movie screens that hung from walls like a painting or sat on desks, and even little ones that could fit in a person’s hand?”
Deirdre said, “The things with the colorful flags and fruit?”
“Right. Last week I saw them again, only this time they weren’t in some office or laboratory. They were everywhere, and it seemed every person on the planet had one in his or her pocket. These gadgets, they could do just about anything.”
“Like what?” Harper asked, always fascinated by human ingenuity.
“They could do what we do, for one. Only better, and without the need of water or fire.”
“Telephones aren’t new,” Cody said. “People have had them for decades now.”
“In their pockets?” the chief said. “And with visuals like a television? When we communicate by water, we can see and hear, but let’s admit it, the quality ain’t that great. In my vision, it was crystal clear.”
“Wow,” Harper said. “That’s amazing. But it must be far off in the future, because I haven’t seen anything even close to that yet. All the telephones are plugged into a wall.”
“Progress that used to take a thousand years became a hundred,” the chief said, “and now a hundred years takes ten. The future isn’t nearly the distant time it used to be.”
“I still don’t see how this ties in with any of what we were talking about,” Cody said.
“In my vision,” the chief continued, “these hand-held thingamajigs weren’t metal detectors. They were,” he squinted at the recollection, “aw, heck, I don’t know what they were exactly, but I had the impression they were…life detectors.”
Deirdre gasped. “Whose life? Our life?”
The chief nodded gravely. “That was my impression, yeah.”
“We have to stop them,” Cody declared. “Imagine such a device in the wrong hands.”
“In any hands,” Harper said. “If people were to learn of the existence of Coinworld it would be as big a story as a UFO landing on the fifty-yard line during the Super Bowl. Nothing would ever be the same for us again.”
Two Loons said, “But how do we stop something that hasn’t even been invented yet? We wouldn’t even know where to start looking.”
“We can’t,” Deirdre said, “but we have to be vigilant. And to do that, I’m afraid we have to expand our operations yet again. We need more coins like Cody in the field.”
“More Cody Quarters?” Two Loons said.
“Spies. Moles and secret agents.”
“But don’t we already have such a network?”
“Nothing like what I’m thinking,” Deirdre answered. “If what the chief is talking about is true, we have to go global.”
“Global?” Two Loons said, incredulous. “How on earth are we going to recruit and train enough coins to do that? And few coins can speak the number of languages you do, Deirdre.”
“Calm down,” Deirdre said. “That’s not what I’m calling for. What the chief is talking about is technology. We just have to find out who is working on such things and plant moles in their operations.”
“Corporate spies,” Harper clarified.
“Still,” Two Loons said, “that’s gonna mean a lot of new recruits. And who’s going to train them? Cody can’t leave The Hugh, especially now that we know the man is definitely on to us.”
“Me,” Deirdre said. “I’ll do it. I’ll be the first, and then I’ll train the others.”
Two Loons stifled a snort. “Deirdre, you’re one dandy dime, but you haven’t been in the field for years.”
“Ever,” the chief corrected, clearly not thrilled by the idea.
“Ever,” Two Loons repeated. “And despite your dinky size, Mercury dimes are rare today. You’d stand out like a fly in a saucer of milk.”
“I don’t plan on being spotted,” Deirdre said.
“You have no eagle,” Two Loons further argued, unimpressed by the dime’s defense. He turned to Cody. “Cody, tell her how many times Ellsworth has saved your skin.”
Cody nodded. “Two Loons is right, Deirdre. You can only be so careful, you know?”
Two Loons, who loved the spunky dime like an overprotective uncle, wasn’t nearly done with his objections. “And what about our CIA? You are the Coin Intelligence Agency. We haven’t anyone to take your place.”
“I’ll call Darla back from the Grand Canyon base. Kipp Quarter can take over the operation there.”
Deirdre looked at the others and saw their unanimous disapproval. Not because they didn’t think Darla Dime was up to the job, but because they knew how vital she was in the field.
“Camille,” Deirdre tried again. “Camille Quarter can do it.”
“Oh no, you don’t,” Harper said. “Camille and I are a team. You can’t split us up. Ned has Hannah, and I have Camille. We go together like peanut butter and jelly, like spaghetti and meatballs, like beer and pretzels, like biscuits and gravy, like, like…”
“Macaroni and cheese?” Two Loons offered.
“Exactly!” Harper said.
“Milk and cookies?” Cody said.
“Yes!”
“Bacon and eggs?” Two Loons said.
“Pancakes and maple syrup?” Cody said.
Deirdre turned to the chief in exasperation. “Chief, talk sense to these chowderheads.”
“I don’t know, they’re making a lot of sense to me.” He looked around. “Anyone else suddenly hungry?”
“Chief,” Deirdre said, unamused, “you know I’m right. If we don’t get ahead of this problem, we will regret it one da
y.”
“Yes, bubbeleh,” the chief replied. “You’re right as usual, but so are they. We can’t spare you, change. You’re too important, and the mission is too dangerous.”
“Then who do you suggest we send?” Deirdre said.
“You know who,” the chief said, his eye boring into Deirdre, as if he was trying to implant the thought.
She squinted back, not understanding.
“Think,” the chief ordered her, staring harder.
“Chief,” Deirdre said, her irritation ruffling the wings on her Phrygian cap, “spit it out already, would you please?”
The chief turned to the side and Buffalo gave Deirdre a little wake-up kick.
“Ouch, hey…”
The others exchanged baffled glances, wondering what was going on, and who the chief could be talking about.
“Ned?” Cody said.
“Leo Lincoln?” Harper said, dismissing the suggestion as soon as he offered it.
“Me?” Two Loons said tentatively. And then screwing up his Indian brave courage, he said with new authority, “Yes, Two Loons and his trusty buffalo, Liberty. We will go!”
Liberty peeked her buffalo head around and emitted a brave snort, seconding the motion.
“Ah…no, Two Loons,” the chief said. “We appreciate the offer, but we need you here. The island’s a mess and we’ve got a lot of fixing up to do.” He turned to Deirdre. “Dime,” he commanded, “follow me.”
The chief bucked out of earshot from the others, Deirdre trailing behind him.
The chief turned to Deirdre and said in a roaring whisper, “Yo, dummy, who else could I have been talking about?”
“Chief, if I knew wouldn’t I have said so?”
“No, nudnik; that’s the point. We can’t say so, get it?”
Deirdre still didn’t get it, and then it hit her like a sledgehammer. “Them?” she said with disbelief.
“There’s no one better,” the chief insisted.
“No one worse!” Deirdre said.
“They’ve done a bang-up job so far.”
“Bang-up is right. It’s like sending in the Three Stooges or The Marx Brothers.”
Coinworld [Book Three] Page 9