by Matthew Ward
“Oh, I don’t know. Like maybe a clown suit?”
“Nope. No clown suit.”
“Oh. Well…did you happen to get his name?”
“I’m afraid not, my boy. The incident occurred during warm-ups for the amateur speed-shooting challenge, and in the end, he declined to compete—before his name had even made the roster. The event’s just finished, I believe—but you might still catch him, if you’d like to have a chat with him about clown clothing. Last I saw him, he was hanging around with this really short fellow. Rather unpleasant looking chap. You really can’t miss them.”
Another chill met the boy’s spine.
As the man turned and walked away, Arthur glanced over at Ruby. She’d heard the whole thing—and seemed to know as well as he did what it meant. The dwarf and the giant were there—and apparently up to their old tricks.
Ruby gave Arthur a look that said, What are you going to do?
As much as Arthur wanted to inform his parents of his suspicions, he had learned the hard way not to open his mouth without the proof to back it up. Before he presented his case, he would have to do some investigating.
“Father,” the boy asked, making his way toward Mr. Whipple, “may I go watch the amateur foot archer speed-shooting challenge?”
“Hmm? Oh. Yes, that’s fine. But don’t be gone too long. Extreme croquet is coming up soon, you know.”
“Yes sir,” Arthur replied. “I won’t be long.”
Then, without so much as a word to each other, Arthur and Ruby walked side by side to the stairs that overlooked the Archery Area—and promptly began the descent.
Unfortunately, there was no sign of the oddly sized suspects at the foot archery field. Indeed, there was no sign of anyone. The participants and spectators of the recently concluded amateur speed-shooting challenge had all since dispersed, leaving behind only abandoned targets and concessions wrappers.
With a disgruntled sigh, Arthur set about scouring the area.
“Now, what exactly are we hoping to find here?” asked Ruby. “I mean, I thought we were after the clowns from the party—without the clown suits, apparently—but since they’re obviously not here, what is there to look for?”
“Clues,” replied Arthur, not looking up.
“Oh, right. Clues. Of course.”
Ruby began staring casually at the ground. “So—I mean, I hate to say I told you so—but now that they’ve started shooting arrows at your family members, are you willing to admit that clowns might be just a little bit evil?”
“An isolated incident,” muttered Arthur. “Their chosen profession has nothing to do with it.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that one,” said Ruby. “But I still say you should have told somebody about them.”
“Noted,” said Arthur.
The two continued their search in silence. But the more Arthur thought about it, the less he could focus on finding clues. Just who did this girl think she was, anyway? Telling him what he should and shouldn’t do. She didn’t have the pressure of trying to belong in her family. She already was a world-record holder—and she didn’t even seem to appreciate it. After several seconds of stewing, he could no longer hide his indignation.
“You know, you’ve got a lot of—”
“Wait, Arthur—look at this!” Ruby cried, pointing at the ground in front of her.
As Arthur hunched over for a closer look, he forgot all about his intended tirade. There in the mud was an enormous shoeprint.
The two exchanged dumbstruck glances, then crouched down to examine their find more closely. The impression was over twenty inches in length and nearly eight inches across.
“Do you think this counts as a clue?” whispered Ruby.
“Well, I’ve never really found one before,” Arthur admitted. “But yes, I’m pretty sure this counts.”
Upon further inspection, it became clear that the print was not simply an orphan. Every five feet or so, the children found another matching shoeprint, so that a traceable path in the mud was soon revealed. If there had been any doubt as to who had left the prints, the children’s next discovery instantly confirmed their suspicions.
“Whoa—look at these,” Arthur gawked.
Running alongside the first set of prints was a barely noticeable second set, made up of shoeprints so tiny and so faint that they could only have been left by a toddler—or a very small dwarf.
“So, what now?” asked the girl.
“I guess we try to follow the footprints and see if they lead us to our suspects,” replied Arthur.
“And after we track down this nine-foot giant assassin and his stealthy sidekick, then what?”
Arthur shrugged. “We apprehend them?”
Ruby shot the boy a skeptical look.
“I don’t know,” said Arthur. “I’m still pretty new at this detective stuff. We’ll figure that out when we get there, I guess. But for now, I think the proper detective thing to do is to just follow the clues where they lead.”
“So we’re detectives now, are we?”
Arthur suddenly felt immensely embarrassed for saying that part out loud. He had forgotten that his junior detective credentials were mostly in his head.
“I just thought…I mean, if you don’t want—”
“No, no—‘detectives’ is good,” Ruby cut him off. “As long as I get to be the hard-boiled private eye who’s addicted to the job almost as much as he’s addicted to the bottle. Oh, and at some point, I get to wear a trench coat.”
“Uh…sure,” said Arthur, surprisingly encouraged. She seemed even more into this than he was.
“All right,” Ruby declared, “so what are we waiting for? Lead the way, Detective Whipple!”
ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS; OR, WHERE THE CLUES LED
Arthur and Ruby followed the trail nearly fifty yards, until it disappeared into the dense grove that divided the Archery Area from the extreme croquet lawn. Halting just outside the trees, Arthur stared into the gloomy woodland, then glanced to his partner for encouragement—or, preferably, restraint. But Ruby would not be so easily intimidated.
“After you,” she smiled.
Upon entering the grove, the duo found the tracks increasingly difficult to follow. While fallen leaves obscured the ground underfoot, the canopy overhead blocked out the fading daylight—as well as whatever slight warmth it had provided.
“This must be how they avoided unnecessary attention,” Arthur suggested, breathing into his hands and rubbing them together. “These trees are the only things tall enough around here to provide cover for a giant.”
“True,” said Ruby, “or it could be a trap. They could be hiding in here still, knowing no one will be around to stop them from brutally murdering us.”
The sound of leaves crunching beneath Arthur’s feet suddenly took on a rather ominous quality. “I suppose that’s another possibility,” he admitted, hoping the girl didn’t notice his sudden increase in pace.
When Arthur glanced up to gain his bearings a short while later, he was relieved to see light poking through the thinning trees ahead of them. Only a hundred feet left to go amongst the trees, and they’d be able to continue tracking in the open again—where there was far less chance of being ambushed by vicious off-duty clowns. Things were looking up.
At that moment, it began to rain.
Soon the children’s ears were filled with what sounded like the World’s Largest Batch of Popcorn being popped directly over their heads. Arthur felt a cold pinprick on the back of his neck. And then another. And another—until there were too many to distinguish one from the next. He was quickly becoming drenched.
Looking back at Ruby, he couldn’t help but smile at their ridiculous circumstances—but as he returned his gaze to the ground, he noticed the water pooling up in one of the giant shoeprints.
A terrible thought struck him. Soon the tracks would be completely washed away—and with them, their first and only lead.
“Run!” cri
ed Ruby, apparently arriving at a similar conclusion.
Arthur spun back around and charged forward, doing his best to follow the dissolving trail of muddy shoeprints through the undergrowth. But soon, there was nothing left to track.
In their haste, the children had failed to notice the trail veer sharply to the right and curve behind an enormous oak tree. As a result, they also failed to notice the two pairs of eyes—one unusually large, the other unusually small—peering out at them through the crook of a tree branch. Had they noticed this, of course, more than just their mission might have ended right then and there.
Unaware of their recent brush with death, Arthur and Ruby scrambled onward. Moments later, they burst out of the trees and onto a swampy stretch of lawn.
“Wow,” said Ruby, rain pouring off her nose. “Good work keeping to the trail through all that. I lost it a long time ago.”
“Well, actually,” said Arthur, “so did I.”
“Oh,” said Ruby.
“I thought I’d be able to pick it up again once we were out of the trees,” Arthur gasped, rainwater spilling down his face, “but it seems it’s been completely washed away—and now we’ve lost our one chance at finding the clowns and setting things right.”
Ruby put a hand on the boy’s sopping shoulder. “Don’t worry yourself, Arthur. We’re bound to find them sooner or later. But first—let’s try to get out of this rain, shall we?”
Arthur drew a breath, then wiped his brow and nodded.
Surveying the area, the pair found that the lawn sloped down from the trees and butted into a paved thoroughfare some thirty yards ahead of them. There, streams of pedestrians made their way across the Unsafe Sports Complex—some of them carrying umbrellas, others darting from shelter to shelter.
They then noticed a medium-sized snack stand on the far side of the road, complete with patio tables and a large awning—under which several umbrellaless pedestrians currently huddled.
At once, the pair set off sloshing toward it.
By the time they had ducked in under the overhang, their teeth were thoroughly chattering. Exhausted in body and spirit, Arthur collapsed into a patio chair, while Ruby continued toward the concessions window.
A minute later, the girl pulled up a chair beside Arthur and placed a steaming paper cup on the table in front of him.
“ExploCocoa?” she offered.
“Thanks,” replied the boy, managing a brief smile as he took it.
Casually pulling the tab from the top of the lid, Arthur raised the cup to his lips and began blowing frantically through the opening. He now had two minutes to drink the beverage before a tiny explosive charge was detonated at the base of the cup, spattering scalding hot cocoa onto his face and hands. On any other day, the challenge would have given Arthur an immense thrill, but in his current mood, the usual joys of ExploCocoa were entirely lost on him. At least it was keeping him warm.
“Cheer up, Arthur,” said Ruby. “We’ll get ’em next time.”
“I don’t know,” the boy sighed in between breathy sips. “It’s hard to imagine a better opportunity than the one we just—”
But before the words had even left his mouth, Arthur was forced to rethink them. There on the pathway before him, jutting out above the heads of passersby, emerged the upper portion of an extraordinarily tall man. Seated on the man’s shoulder, holding an umbrella over both of their heads, was a dwarf.
Arthur glanced at Ruby—and found she shared his shock.
Thinking quickly, the girl grabbed two snack menus from the center of the table and held them in front of their faces.
Peering over the tops of their paper shields, the junior detectives surveyed their suspects as they passed in front of the snack stand. Far from their previous carnival attire, the oddly sized pair now wore matching burgundy blazers. It was almost creepier.
Suddenly, the dwarf turned his head in the children’s direction. Having ventured a bit too boldly above their foldable hiding spots, Arthur and Ruby’s faces were exposed from their noses upward—and for an instant, the miniature man’s eyes seemed to lock onto them. Hearts suddenly racing with the dread of being discovered, the children ducked back behind their menus.
Clamping his eyes shut, Arthur longed to return to a simpler time—a time when he had yet to learn that closing his own eyes had no effect on the ability of others to see him. But it was no use. He was not invisible. He could practically feel the giant assassin towering over him—ready to render him permanently speechless.
“Psst—Arthur,” Ruby whispered, to the boy’s surprise. “They’ve nearly passed.”
Cautiously opening his eyes, Arthur peered around the menu—and caught a glimpse of the giant’s back as it exited his field of view.
By some miracle, they had escaped discovery after all.
“Come on,” said Ruby, rising to her feet. “We don’t want to lose them again.”
Gasping with relief, Arthur joined his partner, and the two hurried off toward the bustling thoroughfare, not noticing as their abandoned cups abruptly burst behind them—two quick pops leaving the table covered in steaming hot chocolate.
Crowded as the pathway was, the young trackers had little trouble following their newly found suspects, as the back of the giant’s enormous head consistently hovered several feet above everyone else’s.
“Where do you think they’re headed?” asked Ruby as the giant and dwarf turned a corner and briefly disappeared from view.
“Maybe they’re on their way to another sabotage,” Arthur replied, “and we can catch them in the act.”
But as the children ventured around the bend, it became clear their suspects had far simpler plans—starting with fleeing the scene of the crime. The pathway ahead was intersected by a series of gates, each leading off the grounds of the Unsafe Sports Complex.
While Arthur and Ruby looked on, the giant squeezed through the center exit and ducked through the gate, the dwarf still seated on his shoulder as he lumbered toward the adjoining roadway.
“What do we do now?” whispered Ruby.
“I guess we get our hands stamped,” said Arthur. “I mean, it hardly seems right to just let them get away after all that.”
“Hardly.”
As the pair approached the gate, they each offered a hand to the attendant for a return stamp, then stepped through the turnstile.
Arriving at Unsafe Sports Street, the children caught a glimpse of their suspects rounding the next corner.
“There they go!” Ruby shouted, then broke into a run, with Arthur following just behind her.
Fearing the fugitives would disappear into the dark recesses of the city before they could reach them, the children splashed onward, burrowing through the perpetual wall of rain.
When they got to the corner, Arthur and Ruby peered around the Unsafe Sports Complex’s outer wall—and could scarcely believe what they saw. Far from vanishing into the maze of city streets, their suspects stood less than fifty feet away, patiently waiting for the signal at the nearest pedestrian crossing—with hardly a vehicle on the road.
It was quite a disconcerting sight. What sort of criminals had no qualms about sabotage and murder, but saw fit to obey even the most trivial traffic laws? With each new trait, these villains only grew creepier and creepier.
The next moment, the light changed, and the umbrella-carrying duo made their move to cross.
Edging around the corner, the children tiptoed down the pavement in silent pursuit. Once their suspects’ backs were completely turned to them, Arthur and Ruby darted across the empty street, effectively committing the very violation at which the assassins appeared to draw the line.
The young detectives proceeded to follow their marks onto Chancy Lane, then Hazard Street, and then Deathtrap Road, all the while ducking behind various stoops and waste bins to avoid detection, narrowly dodging sudden backward glances from the dwarf on numerous occasions. The next series of turns led them through a patchwork of increasingly d
windling and darkening alleyways, the likes of which neither Arthur nor Ruby would ever have had the courage to venture down alone.
It was becoming more and more difficult to remain undetected in such cramped surroundings, so it was much to the children’s relief that the alleyway finally opened out onto a proper street, despite its being a rather deserted one.
By this time, Arthur and Ruby had lost any notion of their whereabouts within the city, but they surmised by the backdrop of boxy gray buildings before them that they had been led into some sort of commercial district.
Peering out from behind a crate of moldy cabbages, the children breathed through their mouths as they watched the dwarf-carrying giant trudge across the street and onto the rear lot of what appeared to be a large warehouse. The two men took shelter beneath an overhang, and the dwarf collapsed his umbrella as the giant lowered him to the ground. Then, retrieving a shiny cigarette case from his jacket, the giant removed two cigarettes—placing one in his own mouth and handing the other down to the dwarf. After hunching almost completely over to light the dwarf’s cigarette, the giant lit his own, extinguished the match, and then checked his watch.
For the next several minutes, the sinister twosome simply stood against the wall of the warehouse, exchanging a few inaudible words in between puffs of smoke and periodic watch checks.
“This must be the rendezvous point,” whispered Ruby. “The place where they get instructions from the boss.”
“Right,” said Arthur. “So we should probably wait till they make contact—and then apprehend the lot of ’em…. Any ideas on how we might do that?”
Ruby shrugged. “We really could use some backup right about now.”
As much as Arthur had imagined single-handedly hauling the culprits down to the police station, he had to agree with Ruby. Though they might have been able to handle the dwarf, the giant was well out of their weight class.
Just as he started to worry their showdown had ended before it had even begun, Arthur spied one of the city’s signature plum-colored telephone kiosks on the street corner across the alleyway.