The Diamond Mistake Mystery

by Sylvia McNicoll

  But then things turn really strange. Mr. Van Ooute and Mrs. Whittingham throw their arms around each other and hug a really, really long time.

  Renée’s mouth drops open. Ping continues to drag her forward and her feet stutter.

  “Is Mrs. Whittingham divorced?” I ask Renée, because she’s usually up on these things. Pong trots to pass Ping.

  “No. No, she’s not. Her husband helped my dad when his car wouldn’t start. Just last week.”

  Well, this is a big mistake on their part. Mistake eight. If we think it looks like they’re boyfriend/girlfriend hugging, then the rest of the neighbourhood will, too.

  “Cheerio, luv,” Mr. Van Ooute calls to Mrs. Whittingham as he gets into his SUV. “Chin up!”

  DAY TWO, MISTAKE NINE

  “What does ‘chin up’ actually mean?” I ask as we power walk to keep up with the dogs.

  “Mmm. I think it’s like ‘be strong,’” Renée answers.

  “Yeah, ’cause I can’t do a chin-up to save my life. You’d have to be strong.” As it is, I’m breathless from walking so fast.

  “It’s not like what you have to do in gym class.” Renée tugs back on Ping’s leash. “Hey, slow down, mister!” When Ping looks up, she shakes her head at him and he does trot along closer to her. “Chin up means don’t let your head droop when things go wrong. Keep smiling.”

  “Which must mean Mrs. Whittingham is having some kind of problem, right?”

  “Probably money. I’m telling you, no one takes in that many kids just because they like them. Is it even legal?” Renée asks. We cross the street and turn the corner.

  Ping and Pong both start growling, a rumble duet. They’re looking toward Mr. Rupert’s driveway, where the Animal Control van has just parked. The driver jumps out.

  “Hi, Ms. Lacey!” Renée calls. “Raccoon catching again?”

  “Heck no, Mouse-girl. Giving out a citation.” She jogs up the pathway to the front door and pounds on it.

  “Oh, this should be good,” I tell Renée and we hold up the dogs to watch.

  The door flings open immediately. Mr. Rupert steps out, one bushy, blond eyebrow thunderbolts up. “What do you want? I’m not buying any.”

  “City of Burlington Animal Control.” Ms. Lacey points to a badge on her jacket. “A dog owner complained about being attacked by a cat.” She hands him a piece of paper that looks like a parking ticket.

  “Not my Bandit!” Mr. Rupert takes the paper and squints at it, then shakes it in Ms. Lacey’s face. “What am I supposed to do? We adopted the cat from your shelter.”

  “Hey, hey, hey!” Ms. Lacey holds up her hands. “Just doing my job, here. It’s a warning. You’ll have to keep Bandit inside until you can socialize him. Can’t have any scratched puppies, right?”

  “Fine!” Mr. Rupert backs into the house again and slams the door.

  “Well, that went better than I expected.” Ms. Lacey smiles as she heads back to her van.

  “That cat is nasty,” Renée tells her as we meet her at the van door. “He chased us, too.”

  “Feisty. I like that in a cat,” Ms. Lacey says. “That dog, though!” She points at Ping, who rumbles again. “Doesn’t he nip noses?”

  Ping does like jumping up and giving overly friendly kisses that can involve teeth if he gets carried away.

  Quickly, I move in between her and Ping and change the subject. “How are the raccoons doing?” Pong shuffles to my side. He stares at Ms. Lacey with a white sliver of fear showing at the side of his eyes.

  “They’re all at the Wildlife Rescue Centre. It’s like an all-inclusive for raccoons. They’ll love it there. Thanks for turning up those kits, by the way.”

  “No problem,” I tell her.

  “Got a date with the handsome pirate dude out of it, too!” She winks at me.

  “Mr. Rogers?”

  “Yup. Took your advice and asked him to the Brilliant Diamond Show.”

  “My advice? I didn’t even know he was single.”

  “Really? You told me it was a great idea. Worked out, anyway. He thinks marrying myself is a cool idea. He’s gonna help me find my new engagement ring. Says he has lots of jewellery he wants to unload, too.”

  Really? A pink diamond, maybe?

  “Great, great!” Renée doesn’t sound like she means it. She breaks into a toothy grin, kind of the way Ping does when he growls.

  Ms. Lacey climbs in the van and slams the door. “See you at the show!” she calls through the window as she backs up. Then she toots the horn as she drives off.

  We haven’t given Ping and Pong a full hour yet, so we haul them down a street, off our regular route. Even though it eventually winds around to Brant Park, too, Ping and Pong don’t know that. But it’s a busy street so it should be well lit. Less scary for Ping.

  Immediately, Ping yaps sharp warnings at the tissue ghosts dancing from a pine tree. Even when Renée pulls him away and he looks down, the street light shadows keep him barking.

  We jog a little to get away.

  But then we hit a spot where a couple of the street lights are out. It’s super dark and eerily quiet. I switch on the flashlight in my phone and the dogs pounce on the round white light on the sidewalk.

  Renée suddenly stops and holds up a finger.

  The dogs lift their ears. Ping tilts his head. I hear a squeak and a squawk.

  “What is that?” Renée asks.

  “A YouTube video playing from someone’s phone?” That’s what I hope, anyway.

  Someone whistles a couple of clear notes. There’s more squawks and then a long moan.

  Renée gasps. My heart bounces against my ribcage.

  The moan changes into a witch’s cackle. Ack, ack, ack, ack, ack! Then a screech and a yell: “Get lost, kids!”

  Mistake nine. That can’t be any YouTube video. Someone or something knows we’re here and wants us gone. We rush to give them what they want, sprinting faster than we’ve ever run before, all the way back to the Bennetts’ house.

  DAY TWO, MISTAKE TEN

  Doubling over to catch my breath at the Bennetts’ door, I reach up to stab in the key code. When the lock makes the whirring noise, Renée pushes down the handle and we all squeeze inside the hall at the same time. “What … was … that, really?” I ask. Ping bounces up to lick my nose.

  “I don’t know. Someone pranking us?” Renée suggests.

  I push the little dog away from my face. “But it didn’t sound human.” I straighten before Ping can jump up again.

  “I know, right?” Renée answers. She looks around the dark, empty house. “Aren’t the Bennetts ever home?”

  “Mr. B should be back later tonight.” I aim the flashlight beam ahead and the dogs bark and jump at it. “That was a short walk, though. Wanna hang with them a bit?” I always feel bad leaving the dogs by themselves, anyway, but this time I don’t really want to rush out into the dark again without them.

  I sweep the flashlight beam up the wall and Ping leaps after it.

  “Okay,” Renée answers. I swipe off the phone light and switch on the kitchen light. Renée turns on the tap and fills up the dogs’ water dishes for them.

  Slap, slap, slap. Their tongues lapping at the water makes a happy sound. Afterward, we play another game of phone-flashlight tag, and when the dogs pant with exhaustion, I turn off the flashlight again. “We better give them their supper, too. In case Mr. Bennett gets caught in traffic.”

  I scoop out some kibble for Pong. His is three times the size of Ping’s tiny bite-sized kibble. He gets more, too, a whole cup. I pour a half a cup of the tiny stuff into Ping’s bowl.

  “Stay, stay!” Renée raises one finger to hold Ping back. “Sit!” she tells both of the dogs. “One thousand, two thousand, and three thousand. Go!”

  They both rush their bowls at the same time. Crunch, crunch.

  I motion for Renée to sneak out the door with me. We tiptoe quickly toward it. Not quickly enough. The dogs finish the last bit of kibble a
nd hurl themselves after us.

  I shut the door in their faces. They rush to the windows and watch wide-eyed as we desert them.

  “Awww. Sorry, Ping,” Renée calls.

  “Your dad will be home soon, don’t worry!” I wave to the dogs. Their tails silently wave back.

  As we stroll away, heads still turned toward the window, watching them, Renée bumps smack into someone stepping off the city bus.

  Plenty of street light here now, and with her trademark black hoodie and flowered leggings, it’s easy to recognize Star. “Whoa, careful, little sister!” Star grabs Renée’s shoulders to steady her.

  Renée’s face squeezes up. Star is her brother’s girlfriend, not Renée’s sister.

  “Hi, Star,” I say.

  “Hey, champ!” She straightens and walks alongside us, kind of in a little bounce. Her house is in the same direction as we’re heading, but we pass it and she continues with us.

  “You’re coming to see Attila,” Renée says, more like a complaint than a question.

  “Yup. Going my way?” Star asks.

  “Going home, yes. We were hoping Attila would help us with our Halloween costumes.”

  “Oh, I love working on that stuff. Did you see the parrot I sewed on his pirate jacket?”

  “Okay. ’Cause we need to be ready for the party at Brant Hills Library tomorrow. We’re going as X-Men. I’m going to be Storm. Stephen will be Wolverine …”

  We pass Mrs. Whittingham’s house. I see August in the window and wave, which reminds me … “We need a unicorn horn for Pearl,” I add.

  “Paper towel roll, tinfoil, and hairband.” Star nods as we walk. “Can we bleach your hair?” Star asks Renée. The hair that shows from beneath Star’s hood is a long, black flip with a blue streak that covers one of Star’s eyes.

  “No.”

  “I may have a white wig somewhere, anyway. You need a black body suit. High boots. Maybe Attila can drive us to Value Village.”

  Passing Mr. Rupert’s, I notice Bandit stretched out just inside the picture window, eyeing us, tail flicking. “Did you say you have claws for Wolverine?” I ask Renée.

  Star snaps her fingers and points at me. “We need a mask and a yellow body suit for you. We can stuff it to give you muscles.”

  “No mask. They make me itchy and I can’t breathe.” We pass Reuven’s house. Luckily, he’s not outside so he can’t bug us for the metal detector money.

  “I can work around your mask thing.” Star squints at me and fingers my hair. “Some gel.”

  Finally, we arrive at Renée’s. “Looks like Attila’s still at Mr. Kowalski’s,” Renée tells Star. “His car’s not in the driveway.”

  “Okay. I’ll keep walking. See you.”

  “You’re still going to help us with our costumes?” I ask.

  “’Course!” She winks and does a little head flick to get the hair out of her eyes. That’s when I spot it, a flash of pink. I wait till she’s farther down the block, then whisper at Renée. “Did you see that? Star’s wearing pink diamond earrings!”

  Renée opens the door to her house. “Oh, come on, Stephen! They’re not real. What do you think? She found the diamond and had it restyled into earrings in like one day?”

  “You’re right. Probably not.” I follow her into the hall. But probably not also means maybe.

  Inside the Kobai world of white and neat, I take off my sneakers and hang up my jacket, carefully. Sleeping over again, I can do this. Not like Mr. Kobai’s going to pop into the room in the middle of the night to look for his passport.

  “Hi, Mom!” Renée calls out.

  “Hi, Mrs. Kobai,” I say as her head pokes out of the kitchen, a cell phone against her head. She waves and smiles.

  “Let’s go downstairs and say hi to Mickey and Minnie,” Renée suggests.

  “Okay.” But she’s already halfway down the stairs. My answer doesn’t matter. I chase after her, down and then through Attila’s room into the laundry room, where she keeps their cage. We kneel down on the floor in front of it.

  Mickey, of course, is excited to see us. He rushes out of his little cardboard-box house and stands at the rungs of the cage, sniffing.

  Renée immediately gives him a morsel of cashew nut.

  Minnie stays in her paper towel tube pretending to sleep. I carefully lift the tube out of the cage and try to lure her with another morsel. She won’t come out. I peer into the tube and she’s wide awake, eyes big and scared. I push the cashew into the tube.

  “Why did you do that? Now she’s going to stay in the tube to eat,” Renée says.

  “She can come out when she’s good and ready,” I answer.

  “Whatever. We can’t ask Attila to use his computer since he’s not here. Let’s go to Dad’s office and use his for our French homework.”

  We can’t ask him, either, I think. But she’s not waiting for my answer, again.

  Back up the stairs we go, Mickey riding on Renée’s shoulder while I carry a paper towel tube full of Minnie. “I’d like to look up some more information on diamond heists. We have the whole weekend for homework,” I say as we reach the top.

  “We should get it over with,” Renée answers.

  I look around the corner toward the kitchen. “Your mom’s going to be okay with this? Mice on ground level?”

  She pulls me into her dad’s office and shuts the door. “Mom won’t care if we clean up the mess.”

  With Mickey still on her shoulder, Renée sits down at the coffin desk and switches on the computer. “How would you say ‘drinks’ in French? Boiver is to drink. Oh, here it is: boissons.”

  “I think there’s a fancier word for when you have a drink in a restaurant. Do you have an actual French–English dictionary?” I ask.

  She points to a blue book on the shelf above her dad’s desk and I take it down.

  “We have to find out more about why diamonds are valuable, too. Mrs. Worsley was annoyed when I said it was just about them being rare.”

  The computer suddenly warbles some notes — doo doo doo doo doo doo — up and then down. A ringtone. Renée hits a key and a face appears.

  Gah! I’m wrong again. Mistake ten of the day: thinking he wouldn’t make a surprise appearance when he’s on the other side of the world. Mr. Kobai’s face stares back at us on the screen, bony, bald, and scary. Behind him on a tree sits a grey-brown monkey with a raccoon-striped tail. “Hello, Renée. I see your friend is in my office again. And what the heck is that on your shoulder?”

  DAY TWO, MISTAKE ELEVEN

  Renée grins and squeals, “Daaaaad. Hi!” She points to Mickey. “This is the mouse I adopted from the animal shelter. And Stephen here has Minnie in the paper towel tube.”

  I lift up the roll but I don’t really know if he can see it or not.

  “Where are you?” she asks.

  “Monkeyland. It’s a sanctuary for rescued primates. Remember you told me you wanted me to bring you a monkey?”

  “Yeah. I was just messing with you. I know you can’t bring me a live animal.” Her voice drops, like she’s sad about it.

  “That’s correct. So I just thought I’d show you this fellow. Bring him to you this way.”

  Mr. Kobai’s face disappears as he focuses his tablet on a monkey’s face. It has a white triangle mask with black rings circling its caramel-coloured eyes. Those eyes drill into us as the monkey comes closer to the screen. His hairy fingers grip the sides of the tablet.

  “He’s a ring-tailed lemur from Madagascar. Thirteen white rings, thirteen black! Easy there, boy.”

  “He doesn’t look like a monkey. Not like a chimpanzee anyway,” Renée says.

  “Actually, his face mask and tail stripes remind me of a raccoon,” I say.

  “Me, too,” Renée says and tells her dad all about the one who visited the kindergarten play area and how Animal Control got him out of the tree and how, later, I found the raccoon’s kits.

  “You’re quite the hero.” Mr. Kobai smiles.
“Make yourself at home in my office. Use the computer whenever you like.”

  I can hear the smile in his voice, just like with Mom. Wow, so not what I expected of him. The monkey’s head tilts as his face fills the screen. Closer, closer. His pointed snout snuffles. “I think he likes your pet mouse!”

  Suddenly, his tongue washes over the screen.

  “Whoa!” Renée says and we both laugh.

  Mr. Kobai pulls the tablet away, and the lemur opens his mouth and caws like a crow. “No, no!” Mr. Kobai scolds him. The lemur bounces away. Mr. Kobai’s face appears again.

  “He’s so cute, Dad. That was the best. How did you even know we’d be online?”

  “I didn’t. Thought I’d leave you a video message. I knew sooner or later you’d be into my things.” Even though it sounds like he’s complaining, he’s smiling again.

  “Hey, Dad. You’re working with a diamond company, right? We’re researching why diamonds are valuable. Isn’t it just because they’re rare?”

  “Actually, there’s a funny story behind that.”

  Wow, the yeti tells funny stories.

  “Here in South Africa, De Beers mines plenty of diamonds. Stockpiles them in a warehouse and releases them slowly to make sure there are not too many available.”

  “So, they make them rare?” I ask.

  “Yes, and they also create more demand. They advertise diamonds as the true symbol of love over emeralds and sapphires, which are what people used to buy. De Beers made diamonds the stone for engagement rings. Then for anniversary rings.”

  “You mean eternity rings?” Renée asks.

  “Where the little diamonds go all around the finger?” I ask.

  “Those are the ones. Basic economics. Shorten the supply, increase the demand. The diamond becomes precious and expensive.”

  Renée nods. “Interesting.”

  I can see where Renée gets her smarts from. Mr. Kobai’s story is not funny ha ha, like the ones Mom usually tells. It’s more just like Renée says: interesting.

  The lemur suddenly appears in the background with a friend. The two of them bounce, up, down, up, down, like they have built-in pogo sticks. They whistle, whortle, and caw. Over Mr. Kobai’s shoulder, one face draws closer. Hairy arms reach and then … “Hold on there, buddy. Hold on!”