“I think I’ve got it.”
“The culprit, Granddad?”
“Aha!”
“And it isn’t Dailan Kifki, is it?”
“We’ll see about that very soon,” he said, calmly. “I’ve found a footprint with a circumference of one centimetre in diameter. Now we just need to measure Dailan Kifki’s feet. If they’re the same size, he’s certainly the guilty party. There are many identical tracks.”
“I think Dailan Kifki’s feet are a bit bigger than that, Granddad.”
“That’s what I’ve got to check with my ruler and compasses. Bring me the accused at once!”
I went to fetch Dailan Kifki, who had finished his soup, and led him by the ear to appear before the detective.
“Very good,” said Granddad. “Let us proceed to the chronological, numismatical, peripatetical investigation of the fingerprints of this proboscidean, in a philatelical comparison with the parallelepipedical and symptomatical tracks found in the neighbouring terrain.”
Which must have meant he was going to see if Dailan Kifki’s feet matched the prints he’d found in the mud.
Granddad took out his little notebook and checked the measurements of the footprints: one centimetre.
Then he took his ruler and compasses and, with my help, bent one of Dailan Kifki’s legs and carefully measured the sole of his foot.
“Forty-eight centimetres, fifteen millimetres,” said Granddad, and made a note in his notebook.
“You see?” I said. “They aren’t his footprints.”
“Just to be sure, let’s test them out in practice.”
And he positioned Dailan Kifki’s foot over one of the small holes he had discovered in the ground.
“There are precisely forty-seven centimetres and fifteen millimetres to spare,” he said. “Therefore these footprints do not belong to the accused.”
I gave a sigh of relief.
The footprints were small round holes, arranged regularly.
Those weren’t made by shoes, I thought to myself, or by a skateboard, or by chickens.
“These footprints are very odd,” I said to Granddad. “If you ask me, they’re the prints of an animal with only one foot.”
“Nonsense!” he said. “Have you ever seen an animal with only one foot?”
“Well, let me think…”—and I put my finger to my forehead and started to think—“Snails don’t have any, flies have several—but anyway why would they bother walking if they can fly… Tables do have legs, but they aren’t animals…”
“That’s it!” Granddad interrupted me. “You’re right, the guilty party might have one or more feet but not be an animal at all!”
“Just one foot…” My head hurt from so much thinking. Then… “I’ve got it, Granddad!” I cried suddenly, overjoyed. “An umbrella!”
“That’s it!” cried Granddad, hugging me, his eyes filling with tears. “These are umbrella footprints! I suspected it all along!”
“But Granddad,” I said, trying to calm him down, “you aren’t telling me that a poor umbrella could have caused such an earthquake?”
“Oh no?” replied Granddad mysteriously.
And he walked over to where the busybodies were, and the dignitaries, and the neighbours, and all the people drinking mate with perfectly innocent expressions on their faces.
But he stopped halfway, took out his little notebook, and wrote:
THE CASE OF THE KILLER UMBRELLA
34
Granddad climbed up onto a rock, rang the bell clang clang, and shushed emphatically several times, until he had managed to get everyone impressively quiet.
Then he said:
“Children!”
“Present…” everybody replied, filled with fear, and with terror, scares and afraidness.
“Following my extensive investigations,” said Granddad, “and thanks to my magnifying glass and my pipe, I have been able to discover that the guilty party, or the main accomplice of this immense catastrophe, has only one foot, and therefore is an umbrella.”
A murmur of amazement came from the crowd.
“I ask anyone present who is in possession of an umbrella,” he went on, “to come forward at once and present themselves at this police station.”
And then he stopped, peering down at them like some kind of big-shot and waiting for the guilty umbrella to show its face.
Nothing.
Nobody moved.
“This is your last chance,” Granddad said severely. “I would advise any umbrella that is among you, whether living or dead, wet or dry, to show itself at once.”
And then we heard a shrill voice protesting:
“Why are you going after a poor, defenceless umbrella, when everybody knows that pesky elephant is the guilty one?”
I got furious when I heard such slander, but that was nothing compared to Dailan Kifki’s reaction. He shook his ears and trunk as though he were about to eat my Auntie Clodomira all up.
Because she was the person who had spoken, getting quite indignant and waving her umbrella as she did.
She immediately began to argue with Granddad, and everyone started to make comments and argue and take sides and bet on one or the other.
There was such a commotion that nobody realised my auntie was twirling the very object everyone was looking for: her umbrella. The famous umbrella she was never separated from, not even leaving it in the umbrella-stand when she went to bed.
In the middle of the fight, Granddad spotted it, and said:
“But how can you dare to accuse this poor innocent elephant when you’re holding the true culprit in your very hand for all to see: Your Umbrella!”
“What?… Who says?… But how?… For whom?…” stammered my Auntie Clodomira, staring at her umbrella and squinting cross-eyed with amazement, since with all the arguing even she hadn’t realised she was holding it.
“What do you want with my poor umbrella who wouldn’t hurt a fly?” whimpered my aunt at last.
“We must see if its footprints match the ones I’ve made a note of in my notebook!” bellowed Granddad, snatching the umbrella away from her.
I don’t have to tell you that at this point my aunt fainted.
While one of the Ambassadors tried to get her out of the plant pot she’d fallen into, Granddad measured and re-measured the foot of the umbrella, which as everybody knows is called a ferrule, and compared it, magnifying glass in hand, with the footprints.
Soon afterwards, my Auntie Clodomira came to again, only to faint again when Granddad said solemnly:
“I hereby declare that this umbrella is, if not actually the culprit, certainly highly suspicious.”
The crowd, looking askance at my Auntie Clodomira, said:
“Ooooooooooooooh!”
I went over to Granddad and said:
“Granddad, have you ever seen an umbrella that could walk around on its own, or smash up a living room on its own?”
“That’s because it didn’t do it alone,” said Granddad. “It was in your aunt’s hand, as it always is.”
“That’s not possible,” I said. “Why would she want to smash up Mister Carozo’s living room?”
“We shall question her,” said Granddad.
And off he went to question my Auntie Clodomira.
When she saw him walking towards her, looking so determined, my aunt got into a real dither, saying:
“Itwasntme, itwasntme, itwasntme, itwasntme…”
But it wasn’t long before, beset by remorse, she confessed to everything.
And I, following my granddad’s orders, took notes in shorthand of my aunt’s confession.
My Aunt’s Confession is so important it deserves a chapter to itself.
If you read it, you’ll learn absolutely all of truthfullest truth from the mouth of the real culprit.
I didn’t change a single comma of the confession, but it’s possible there might be a few words missing because there was a sparrow pecking at the piece of paper wh
ile I was making my notes and, as far as I can tell, there were certain words it particularly liked, even if they were written in shorthand.
And the ones it liked, it pecked out and took away with it.
That was how, the next day, I saw a nest full of pencil scribblings…
But that has nothing to do with the bloodcurdling crime story I was just telling you.
Sorry about that.
35
MY AUNTIE CLODOMIRA’S CONFESSION
It wasn’t me, it wasn’t me, it wasn’t me…
Well, yes, all right, it was me. But I didn’t do it on purpose!
You all know very well, gentlemen, that I’m not a bad person, or a nasty person or a person who breaks things. On the contrary, I’m considerate and obliging, and wasn’t I brewing up mate for all of you just a week ago? What happened was, everybody wanted to get into the house of Mister Dwarf Carozo Somethingorother.
Isn’t that true? Yes—everybody! Everyone was curious, and so was I, gentlemen of the jury. I was desperate to go in and have a nose around, and why not? Where’s the harm in that? I also wanted—just like everyone else—to taste the hot chocolate in pretty little porcelain cups. But as the house was so small, we ended up with only Granddad and my niece getting in, and no one else. But when I smelt that hot chocolate smell, I did so want to look in a little—only just a little. And so I peered through the door to the living room, and since the doorway was so narrow, I ended up getting stuck there, unable either to go in or out. Not in, or out! Of course it’s true: I am a bit fat, almost as fat as that elephant or as four letterboxes tied together with a piece of twine. And so I pushed a little, using my umbrella as a crowbar, and… Crash bang clang Ker-BLAM! The door came down and the rest of the room with it, including that lovely big window with glass in every colour. But I can assure you my umbrella is innocent! He didn’t even want to try the chocolate! And now that I’ve confessed everything, Mister Detective, you can arrest me and…
(At this point my aunt’s tears were flowing so fast that they wiped away the rest of the confession and flooded the garden.)
36
“What punishment does she deserve, too-loora-loora-lay?” asked Mister Dwarf Carozo.
“Let me think,” said Granddad, with his finger on his forehead.
Nobody knew how she ought to be punished. Not until Mister Carozo himself had a brilliant idea:
“Make her rebuild my castle living room!”
“But how am I supposed to rebuild it when I’m not a builder?” protested my desperate Auntie Clodomira.
“So make it out of wood instead, too-loora-loora-lay,” sang Mister Carozo.
“But I’m not a carpenter,” said my aunt, in the middle of an attack of hiccups.
“So make it out of leather then, too-loora-loora-lay,” insisted Mister Carozo.
“But I’m not a leatherworker!” said my aunt.
“So make it out of sweet meringue, too-loora-loora-lay,” insisted Mister Carozo.
And then my aunt said nothing.
Because cooking… well, that was something she did know how to do. And especially making meringues, sponge cakes, puff pastries and tarts with flourishes of cream and chopped walnuts.
“Very well, then,” said my aunt, heading for the kitchen with a determined look on her face.
But since we were scared she’d break the kitchen, too, we took several heaters and all the ingredients out into the garden.
And so like that, bit by bit, with a great deal of patience and skill, my Auntie Clodomira began to rebuild the room, all the while using her umbrella to shoo away the busybodies who kept wanting to taste it.
She prepared huge bricks of sponge cake, and used them to put up the walls.
It goes without saying that she joined the bricks together using thick, sticky dulce de leche.
The walls were perfect, and everyone applauded.
“Don’t applaud yet,” said my aunt. “There’s still a lot to be done.”
And she started to prepare the famous windows, using candies of every colour. They were almost identical to the windows that had been there before.
Then she put on the roof. Made of chocolate, naturally.
At that point the military authorities from our expedition had to step in, to prevent all the people there from eating it.
When she was done with the roofing, everyone applauded again.
My aunt waved her skirt at them and said:
“No, no, don’t applaud yet. There’s still a lot to be done.” And she started to paint the walls with the whitest sugar.
Again everyone applauded, but my aunt warned them:
“Don’t applaud yet. It still needs the finishing touches.”
And she dotted the newly whitened walls artistically with coloured sweets.
And now, yes, now my Auntie Clodomira, wiping her brow with her apron and absolutely exhausted, received all the great applause from the crowd, beaming with delight.
Mister Carozo, glad to have his living room back, asked me to pick him up so he could give my aunt a kiss.
And so the Case of the Disappearing Room and the Killer Umbrella ended happily for everybody.
And I had won Mister Carozo’s football, because Dailan Kifki was innocent.
Ha ha ha.
37
But I soon had to stop laughing when I saw Mister Carozo heading over very calmly to fetch his sleepy football to put her back into his little living room.
“Just one moment, Mister Carozo!” I called out to him.
“What’s the matter?” he replied, playing dumb.
“I’m very sorry to tell you,” I answered, “that the ball you’re carrying is no longer yours but mine, completely mine and so very much mine.”
“Supisichi,” he answered. “This ball is mine, completely mine and so very much mine and has been for a hundred and eighty-five years.”
“No, sir. Maybe because you’re a dwarf you have a very short memory, but let me remind you, sir, that you bet me that football, sir, and I won it from you fair and square, sir.”
“Me?” he asked, pretending to be shocked. “Me, bet my precious football? Me? Do my ears deceive me?”
I picked him up again, pushed aside his hat, lifted the hair of his sideburns a bit and yelled in his ear:
“Yes, sir, you bet me the football and you lost so I’m taking her away with me!”
“And what were we playing when I bet her?” he asked me, his eyes wide. “Were we playing ludo, hopscotch, dominoes, body-part tag, jacks?”
“No, sir,” I said, this time lifting the sideburn from his other ear, “you bet me because you thought Dailan Kifki was the person who murdered your living room, and the police investigation has shown that the poor creature was innocent.”
“Oh, by sampiolín,” he replied impatiently. “Put me down, I have a lot to do.”
“No, sir, there’s no way I’m putting you down,” I answered, still holding him up in the air, even though he was kicking his feet like crazy, his slippers spinning. I held him a bit farther away from me, but I did not put him back on the ground.
“The football is mine, so very much mine!” I insisted.
“Oh, and what do I care,” he said, at last. “Take your football. The Forest of Gulubú is full of footballs just as clever as that one.”
And so I put him down on the ground, and he ran into the house and quickly came back out with the football in his arms.
He gave her to me. But very unwillingly.
38
It seemed that our problems were over, along with our muddles, our plans, turnarounds, disasters and all the chocolate in those little cups.
It seemed we were at last going to be setting off back to Ituzaingó station, and from there back home.
Everyone was making preparations: they were buffing their top hats with their sleeves, buttoning up their waistcoats, blowing the dirt off their shoes, combing their hair with their fingers, and so on.
Granddad
made us line up in front of Mister Carozo, and we took it in turns to shake his hand and say, “Thank you very much for your hospitality.”
The owner of the house seemed quite downhearted at our departure, and as he combed his beard with his little finger he muttered thoughtfully:
“Supisichisupisichisupisichi…”
It was obvious that the moment we left he was going to start crying.
Dailan Kifki was very sad, too. He had loved it in the Forest of Gulubú, which must surely have reminded him of his home in Africa.
But really, we couldn’t stay for ever.
No sooner had we taken our first few steps away than my Auntie Clodomira shouted:
“Halt! Eyes… right!”
And we all turned towards the work she had created—which by then was covered in flies and bees—with one final admiring glance.
We were just about ready to go on our way, with Mister Carozo waving us goodbye with a handkerchief much bigger than he was, bathed in tears.
I had to promise him we would be back.
He threw his arms around my knees, drying his eyes and his sideburns on my pinafore.
I had to tickle the back of his neck.
When he had calmed down a little, we began our retreat.
Dailan Kifki was at the head of the retinue, and I was behind him, my arms around the sleepy football, who was snoring away happily.
Following us in procession came: my family, the Fireman, the Captain, the Ambassadors, the Mini-Secretary, the Mayor and all the other characters you know about already. And behind them, the neighbours, busybodies, ice-cream sellers, altar boys and a dog with two tails.
It was beginning to get dark, and a dreadful question occurred to me. Where were we going? Because the Forest of Gulubú is very large.
I went over to Granddad and asked him in a whisper:
“Granddad, where are we going?”
“What do you mean, where are we going?” he replied. “To Ituzaingó station.”
“Yes, I know that, but did you ask Mister Carozo where it is?”
An Elephantasy Page 9