Moonlight Madness

by John R. Erickson

  Eddy seized the cage wire with both hands and looked at me with pleading eyes. “You don’t understand. They’re calling me!”

  “Calling you? Oh, I get it. You’re hearing voices. Yes, that fits in with the overall pattern of Moon­light Madness. We’re familiar with those symptoms, but I’m afraid you’ll have to stay in your cage. See, the voices aren’t real.”

  “Oh yes. They are. Can’t you hear them?”

  I cocked my ear. “No. I hear Slim snoring and you blabbering.”

  “No, no. The voices. Listen.”

  I listened, and you may not believe this but, by George, I thought I heard someone singing.

  Free the Cookies

  In the darkness of the cabinet, we are hiding in the gloom.

  We’ve been locked away in silence, imprisoned and marooned.

  Our lives have no significance, we’ve lost our will to be.

  Won’t you open up the cabinet door and kindly set us free?

  We are cookies and we want to be eaten.

  We are cookies and we want to get out.

  What meaning has a cookie in a package in a drawer?

  Heck, we might as well be window weights or rugs upon the floor.

  Someone needs us, someone wants us in this world of woe and pain.

  There’s no reason to be cookies if we’re wrapped in cellophane.

  We are cookies and we want to be eaten,

  We are cookies and we want to get out.

  If you’ll break into this jailhouse and release us from this paper,

  We’ll reward you with a sugar-coated yummy gummy wafer.

  If you care about what’s decent, if you care about what’s right,

  Strike a blow for peace and freedom, set a cookie free tonight!

  I couldn’t believe my ears, and for a moment I was too stunned to speak. “Hey Eddy, did you just hear someone singing?” He nodded. “So it wasn’t just my imagination?” He shook his head. “Okay, next question. Have you ever heard of . . . well, singing cookies? Or cookies singing?”

  He nodded. I began pacing, as I often do when I’m plunged into periods of deep concentration.

  “Singing cookies. This isn’t a subject I’d want to talk about with just anyone, Eddy. I mean, there are people and dogs in this world who would think you were a little weird if you started talking about . . . singing cookies. But you DID hear that song, is that correct?”

  “Heard it. They need our help.”

  I stopped pacing and stared at him. “They need our help? The cookies need our help, is that what you’re saying?” He nodded. I began pacing again. “I thought that’s what you were saying. I’d hoped you might be saying something else. You see, all my life I’ve never wanted to believe in singing cookies. I don’t know why. I’ve just never wanted to, think that cookies could . . . well . . . sing.”

  “Yeah. Right. Me too.”

  “Really? You understand that? Oh good, be­cause . . . I’ll be honest, Eddy. I don’t know how to respond to this. I mean, those cookies were calling for someone to help them.”

  “Yeah. Poor cookies.”

  “Exactly. Poor cookies. How would you like to be a cookie, wrapped up in paper and locked away in a drawer? It must be terrible.”

  “Yeah. They just want to be free.”

  “Exactly. Free to express their cookiness with the rest of the world. Is that so bad, Eddy? Is that unreasonable?”

  “Nah. That’s what I’d want. If I was a cookie.”

  “Me too.” I stopped pacing and took a deep breath. “What do you think, pal? Should we help them?”

  He shrugged. “It’s up to you. It’s your ranch. You’re in charge.”

  “Good point. I’m in charge, Eddy, and sometimes the responsibility of being in charge is a very heavy burden. I mean, up here where I operate, all the decisions are tough. This one is even tougher than most.”

  He seized the bars of his prison cell with both hands and leaned toward me. “You want my advice?”

  “I . . . I’m not sure that I do, Eddy, to be real honest about it. I mean, let’s face it. You’re a coon and coons have a pretty bad reputation on this ranch. And then there was that deal about the elevator. Remember that?”

  “That’s history. Gone. Past. We must . . . free the cookies. You and I. Teamwork.”

  “Hmmm.” I had to study on that for a few moments. “They do need our help, don’t they? And I guess it wouldn’t be too much trouble, would it? And it might turn out to be . . . well, a pleasant or rewarding, let us say, experience.”

  “Yeah. Helping others.”

  “That’s what I meant. Helping others. Exactly.”

  Eddy held up his hands. “These hands can do it. Open the drawer. Throw off their chains. Bring freedom to the poor cookies.”

  “Hmm, yes, I’ll bet they could. There’s only one small problem, Eddy. Your hands are locked up with the rest of your carcass. Or to frame it up another way, is there some way of getting out of there?”

  “Yeah. Same as last night. Push the latch.”

  “But now there’s the string, Eddy. Slim tied the door shut with a piece of string, and I’m afraid that strings are out of my league.”

  “Push the latch. I’ll handle the string.”

  “Well, I . . . I suppose we could . . . this isn’t another of your tricks, is it? I mean, you didn’t come up with the Singing Cookies just for . . . no, that would be too clever, even for a coon. Okay, pal, let’s see what we can do.”

  “Freedom for the cookies!”

  And so it was that I pushed the latch with my nose, while Eddy used his busy little fingers to untie the knot in the string.

  He stepped out of the cage and together we marched into the kitchen—to set the cookies free!

  Chapter Eleven: Freedom for the Cookies

  You ever see a coon at work in a kitchen? Very impressive. The little guy could do things with his hands that no dog could do or even dream of doing.

  He monkey-walked into the kitchen and I followed. He went straight to the very drawer where Slim had left the . . . that is, where the cookies had been imprisoned and locked up and deprived of their rights of . . . cookiness.

  He climbed that cabinet with no trouble at all. He had these really unusual back feet, don’t you see, which were hinged sideways, so that he could climb a flat surface. Pretty slick equipment, seemed to me, and he shinnied right up the cabinet, sat down on the countertop, and opened up the drawer.

  He reached in and pulled out the cookies. What a proud moment for our ranch! My whole body tin­gled with . . . well, the joy of striking a blow for free­dom and . . . the, uh, expectation of sinking my teeth into a newly freed cookie or two. Or three.

  Eddy tore open the package and stuffed a cookie, a proud, liberated cookie, into his mouth. I watched and tingled and moved my paws up and down and swept my tail across the floor, until at last he pitched me one.

  Snap! Gulp.

  And another. Snap! Gulp.

  This was going very well. Eddy and I made a great team, and of course the cookies were very happy to be free of the, uh, bondage of their paper chains.

  Happy cookies make a happy ranch, and I was . . . snap, gulp . . . very happy for them and . . . snap, gulp . . . happy for Eddy and me for being so brave and . . . snap, gulp . . . selfless in our . . . snap, gulp . . . devotion to duty.

  Boy, I love cookies!

  One left? I was pretty sure that Eddy would let me have it. I mean, the Head of Ranch Security ought to . . . he ate it.

  HE ATE MY COOKIE!

  “Hey, what’s the deal? That was the last cookie and last cookies always go to the Head of Ranch Security.”

  He held up one hand, while he chewed and smacked and swallowed the cookie. “No problem. Another package for you. The whole thing.”

>   “Well, that sounds more like it.”

  He climbed down the cabinet, and I don’t know what his claws were finding to hang onto but they found something. He climbed down the cabinet, opened up one of the doors, and pointed inside.

  I peered inside. It was very dark, don’t you know, and all I could see was a bunch of pots and pans.

  “In there?”

  “Quick. Hurry. Not much time.”

  Okay, I guessed I could . . . I squeezed myself into the narrow space, amongst the pots and pans, and . . . the door slammed shut? Suddenly it was even darker than before and I was seized by a strange feeling of déjà voodoo (an Ethiopian term, by the way, which means “I’ve been here before”).

  “Eddy? Did you say there were some cookies in here? I’m looking for cookies, Eddy, but it’s very dark and I’m not finding . . . Eddy? Eddy!”

  I heard his feet on the cabinet above me. I heard the sound of things being opened and tossed about, almost as though . . .

  The little sneak. The little wretch. The backstabbing, two-timing, counterfeit little . . .

  Actually, I had never believed the business about the Singing Cookies, not 100 percent. A little glimmer of doubt had remained. I mean, cookies don’t sing, right? That’s ridiculous, but I had played along with his little game, just to see . . .

  Undercover Work is what we call it in the security business. A guy plays along with a certain scam or plot just to see where it will lead, so you might say that I had fulfilled that part of the, uh, mission.

  Boy, what a long night! You can’t imagine how uncomfortable I was, squeezed in there with all the pots and pans. But the important thing is that I was still in control of things and had gained some valuable information on . . .

  Slim would never understand, I mean, about Undercover Work and so forth. He would probably . . . ho boy, I sure didn’t look forward to seeing him in the morning.

  Nevertheless, morning came. Not that I could see the sunrise or anything, but I did hear his bare feet coming down the hall.

  They stopped. A long throbbing silence followed. Then I heard him say, and these are his exact words, he said, “I know a dog and a coon who need killin’.”

  Gulp. It appeared that my best course of action would be to, as they say, lay low and keep mum.

  The footsteps moved into the kitchen. “Hank, I know you’re in here somewhere. Hank? Nice doggie.”

  Ha! Did he think I would go for that “nice doggie” business? No way, Charlie. I had no intention of revealing my location to . . . but drat the luck, I must have had my Tail Waggeration switched over to automatic, and on the sound of my name, the old tail just . . . well, started wagging, you might say.

  Thumping, actually, and he must have heard it, because the next thing I knew, the cabinet door opened and, yikes, what a terrible face! Red eyes, hair down in his face, pillow wrinkles on his left cheek.

  “Hank, you dingbat, what are you doing in there?”

  I . . . well, there were these Singing Cookies, see, and they sang their touching little song about . . . well, freedom and the true meaning of being a . . . cookie, so to speak, and . . .

  “Get out of there. Hike! Hyah!”

  Aye, aye, sir. I scrambled out. You won’t believe this but he aimed a kick at my bohunkus, and what was I supposed to do? Just stand there so he could boot me into the next room?

  Forget that. I moved. Any intelligent dog would have moved, and this was a very serious kick he aimed at me, and when it missed my tail section . . . well, you might say that his foot went so high in the air that it sort of made him fall over backward, and we’re talking about a big crash to the floor.

  It also pulled the large muscle in the back of his leg, but I sure couldn’t be held responsible for that. All I’d done was . . .

  It pulled his muscle and he howled in pain, got up, and began limping around in the . . . well, in the flour and sugar that Eddy the Home Wrecker had dumped out on the floor.

  Was that my fault? Had I ordered a pet coon for the ranch? Heck no, but guess who got blamed.

  Me.

  “Hank, you clam brain! I left you in charge of the coon!”

  Boy, he was hot. I tucked my tail and dropped my head and gave him Mournful Eyes. That seemed to help. He appeared to be settling down.

  “Coffee,” he muttered. “I’ve got to have coffee.”

  Without looking, he turned the stove burner to “on.” The pilot lit the burner. I saw another disaster about to happen and I barked.

  “Hush. You should have done your barking last . . . ”

  Remember the note? He’d left it there on the stove burner where he “couldn’t miss it.” Well, he’d missed it, and it went up in flames before our very eyes.

  He slapped his forehead with the palm of his hand. “Holy smokes, can we go back to bed and start this day all over again? That was my note.” I could have told him that. “And I don’t remember what it said!”

  Well, it said something about . . . thirteen head of ladies from the church, and a picnic, and it was too complicated a message for me to pass along through barks and wags, although I tried.

  He swept the burned paper off of the stove and put his coffee water on to boil. Then he turned to me.

  “Where’s the coon?”

  Hey, I’d just arrived on the scene myself, and I had no idea where the thieving little scamp had parked himself for the night.

  “Well, we’d better find him before he tears down the rest of the house.”

  Fine with me. I had a few matters to discuss with Eddy myself.

  We searched the house from one end to the other, from top to bottom, and found no sign of the little sneak. Oh, we found plenty of signs all right—flour tracks and handprints and wreckage—but no coon.

  We must have looked for an hour or more. I sure felt sorry for Slim. Gee whiz, there was this poor skinny cowboy, limping around in his under­pants. He looked pretty pathetic, but he also needed to get some clothes on. I mean, the church ladies were due to arrive at any time, right?

  Let the record show that I tried to warn him. I barked, and we’re talking about barks of great urgency.

  I might as well have saved my breath. He missed the whole point. He thought I needed to go outside to “answer the call of the wild” as he put it.

  No. That was totally wrong. Well, not totally, but mostly wrong. I could have waited. But he went to the door and let me out.

  As I rushed past him, I heard him say, “I could use a little fresh air myself.” He stepped out on the porch, leaned his arm against the pillar post, and yawned. “I wish I could remember what that note said. I know it was something . . .”

  Who or whom do you suppose came toodling out of the house at that very moment? Hint: He wore a mask. Hint: He walked like a monkey. Hint: He was no friend of mine or Slim’s.

  Chapter Twelve: A Happy Ending Except That Slim Got Caught Up a Tree

  Did you guess Eddy the Rac? Very good, be­cause that’s exactly who had joined us on the front porch. He looked so meek and sleepy, it was hard to believe that he had spent most of the night trashing Slim’s house.

  Slim glared down at him and shook his head. “Son, you’re giving the orphans in this world a real bad name. I’m about ready to give you back to them stray dogs.”

  Eddy’s eyes went from Slim to me, and perhaps he noticed that I was beaming angry glares at him too. He seemed surprised. “What’s the deal?”

  “The deal? Did you see all the flour and sugar on the floor?” He nodded. “Would you care to guess who did that?”

  “Not me. Surely. I slept all night. Honest.”

  “You didn’t sleep all night, pal. I happen to know because I was there. I didn’t happen to see you in action, since you locked me in the pot and pan cabinet, but I did get to listen to it. You were a very busy little coon, believe
me.”

  “Oh boy.” He bowed his head and covered his eyes with both hands. “What a rat. What a louse. You guys should have locked me up.”

  I couldn’t believe he’d said that again. “Hey Eddy, we guys DID lock you up. The problem is that you’re Houdini when it comes to getting out of a cage.”

  “I know. Can’t help it. Moonlight Madness. Happens all the time. Lock me up. Throw away the key. I don’t deserve friends.”

  “You’re right, Eddy. You don’t deserve friends. You’re just a bum. In the mornings, when you’re sleepy, you’re a fairly nice bum, but show me a fairly nice bum and I’ll show you a bum.”

  “What can I say?”

  “I don’t know, Eddy, but I can tell you this. If that pack of stray dogs happened to show up at this moment, Slim and I wouldn’t lift a finger to help you. I mean, we’ve had it with you and coons and . . . what are you looking at?”

  Eddy’s gaze had shifted. His expression had changed and the hair on his back had begun to rise. Oh yes, and he cut loose with one of those deep growls that you really don’t expect to hear from a little guy like him.

  I turned my head toward the direction of his . . . HUH? Holy smokes, unless my eyes were deceiving me, Buster’s gang of thugs had just climbed out of the creek bottom. They all wore big sloppy grins. Their eyes were locked on . . . well, either Eddy or me, but probably Eddy. And they were coming our way.

  I shot a glance at Slim. He wasn’t there. Apparently he had wandered back into the house, perhaps to get a cup of coffee. I turned to the coon.

  “Hey Eddy, do you see what I see?”

  “Yeah. Bad luck for me.”

  “It is bad luck, Eddy, and I’m sorry things turned out this way. You’re a bum but I hate to see this happen. Give ’em a good fight.”

  “Thanks. I’ll try. Sorry for all the things I did.”

  “I guess you couldn’t help it.”

  “Yeah. See you around. Maybe.”

  I felt kind of bad about walking out on the little guy, leaving him to fight for his life against a whole gang of hoodlums, yet deep down in my heart, I knew that it was the right thing to do.