Minerva Clark Goes to the Dogs

by Karen Karbo

  “When is Frank sending Oreo out?”

  “Friday, the last I heard. What day is it, Tuesday?”

  I nodded, trying to add things up as quickly as I could. Frank overheard Mr. de Guzman telling his business partner about bringing the diamond into the country in Chelsea’s ring. He’d wanted to mug Chelsea, but Sylvia convinced him that it would be simpler and cleaner to see if she might simply buy the ring from Chelsea as soon as she got off the plane. She knew what Chelsea looked like from Frank’s description, and followed her when she got off the plane and into the crowded ladies’ room, where she heard Chelsea ask her mom about stopping at Coffee People for a cappuccino, just as Chelsea and I had guessed. Now, in three days’ time, Frank was going to feed the red diamond to a pigeon named Oreo, who was going to fly with it to another state where another guy, McCarthy, would take the gem from the bird’s craw and sell it. Then they would all split the money.

  I’d started to sweat. I thought about taking my hoodie off, but if we heard Frank return, I’d want to jump back on my chair and pretend my hands were still tied. Putting my sweatshirt back on would take too much time.

  “So, you going to call the cops now and get us the hell out of here?”

  “In a minute,” I said. There were a few huge holes in the story. Like where was the diamond now, and why had Frank locked Sylvia in the shed?

  Sylvia stood up. She was one of those people who seemed taller than she was. “How old are you anyway?” she asked.

  “You said Frank stuck you in here because you wouldn’t bend to his will.”

  Every time I mentioned Frank’s name Sylvia exploded. I never really knew what it meant when people talked about pressing someone else’s button, but I saw how the subject of Frank was Sylvia’s button.

  “We were going to split three ways, right? Frank, McCarthy, and me. Then the day I get the ring I come here and find Frank in the break room, talking on his cell with McCarthy about how maybe they can cut me out once they get the diamond. I hear Frank say he’ll give me a little something for my effort, maybe a grand or two, that that’s a lot of money for someone like me.

  “I say to him, ‘What’s to prevent me from just selling the diamond myself?’ Frank turns around. He sees me standing there and goes nuts. He can’t stand that I’ve heard his nasty little scheme, and that I still have the diamond and didn’t bring it with me. So he throws me in here. He starts telling me that all this is my fault.” She stopped and inhaled, collected her thick hair into a ponytail and tied it in a knot at the back of her neck.

  “You can do that, too,” I said. “Tie your hair in a knot.”

  “It’s hot in here,” she said. Her rant about Frank left her exhausted. She wiped the sweat from the bridge of her nose with her sleeve.

  I felt sorry for Sylvia, but at the same time didn’t trust her. I didn’t know how to say what I needed to say in a way that would convince her of my plan. This was a weak point for me, saying things in a convincing way. The only thing I knew how to do was throw the topic out there and start arguing when the other person disagreed. “Sylvia,” I said, “if you want to get back at Frank for what he’s done to you, you’re going to have to give the diamond to him.”

  She snorted. “There’s a fantastic idea.”

  “Think about it. If I call the police now, they’ll come and rescue us, they’ll charge Frank with kidnapping, but you won’t be able to tell them about Frank and McCarthy without implicating yourself. You’re the one who’s got the diamond, after all. Frank will say he knows nothing about it. He’ll go to jail for kidnapping, but you’ll go to jail for having stolen goods.”

  I wasn’t too sure about this—someone could argue that she bought the ring from Chelsea fair and square—but at least I had Sylvia’s attention now.

  “How do you know?” she asked.

  “My dad’s a lawyer. And anyway, don’t you want to stick it to Frank but good?”

  I told her my plan. It felt like skateboarding down a new street I’d never before laid eyes on. I made it up as I went along. The plan had two parts. First, I told her, I would phone Chelsea, who would go to Sylvia’s apartment, collect the diamond, and bring it to us. Sylvia would hide it somewhere, as if she’d always had it on her …

  “Wait a minute,” Sylvia interrupted, “you’re calling that rich daughter of de Guzman? No way. She’ll probably just take the diamond back to her daddy and then when Frank finds out, he’ll beat me but good. We call my brother. He knows where the diamond is hidden and how to get here.”

  “Isn’t he on the movie set?”

  “If I called him, he would come.”

  She was probably right. If Sylvia was all he had in the world, he’d be more likely to do what she asked ASAP, even if that meant walking off the set. If I called Chelsea, and she was getting a manicure or riding her horse or whatever, we’d have to wait. And we couldn’t afford to wait. I had to take the chance.

  I reached beneath my hair, felt for the button on my earpiece. Sure enough, my cell phone was close enough to pick up the signal. I voice dialed the number Sylvia gave me and handed the earpiece to her.

  She fumbled as she hooked it around her ear, but caught on to how it worked quick enough.

  “Tonio? It’s me!” She started to cry again, waterworks city. In all my life I’ve never cried as hard as Sylvia did that moment. We needed to get out of here, and fast.

  She spoke to him for a few minutes in Spanish.

  Then she hung up and handed me the earpiece. I wondered why she looked so smug. “He’s coming immediately. Now it’s your turn.”

  A bad feeling swept over me. Something had shifted. Now Sylvia seemed like the adult that she was and I was the stupid kid. I was in eighth grade. I still had a bed time. I had been in control, and now Sylvia was in control. On the Scale of Scared, I’d inched up to an eight. What I was about to do next was not going to turn out well—the second part of my doomed plan—calling the police.

  The not-very-well-thought-out idea was that they would arrive just after Tonio had showed up at the shelter and turned over the diamond to Frank. Then Frank would be in possession of the diamond, and Sylvia and I would still be locked in the shed, kidnapped, held hostage against our will, our lives endangered, and a bunch of other charges that would put Frank in jail for a long time.

  I called 911.

  My heart lifted a little when I didn’t recognize the voice of the operator who answered. It was not the lady with the deep musical blues singer voice, but some woman, probably Sylvia’s age, who sounded as if she was from Texas or somewhere.

  “I’m being held captive at the animal shelter,” I said.

  “What is the address,” said the operator.

  “The address? I don’t know. Isn’t there only one animal shelter in Portland?” Panic danced in my stomach. “Look, a guy who volunteers here locked me in a shed with another girl. My name is Minerva Clark and—”

  “—one moment please,” said the operator, cutting me off in mid-sentence.

  Then I knew I was doomed. Another person came on the line, my old familiar operator with the old-timey blues singer voice. “Minerva Clark, you’ve got to stop this. Now I’m serious, honey. I think you should get yourself some psychological help.”

  Sylvia didn’t seem to mind that the police were not coming. She sat with her legs crossed, tried to clean the grit from beneath her nails, straightened her skirt, arranged her hair a little more. I could tell she was a girl waiting to be rescued.

  I tried to keep my mind from straying to thoughts of Jupiter. Just the thought of Frank doing anything to hurt him made tears spring to my eyes. I could not afford to cry, not now. I focused on what everyone said, that Frank loved animals. Even though he was a hateful thief/kidnapper/liar, with a stupid nickname, he was still an animal lover. I tried to picture Jupiter sacked out in one of the nice small animal habitats inside the shelter, safe and sound.

  As Sylvia had predicted, Tonio dropped everything. I bet it t
ook him less than half an hour. Outside the shed there was the sound of two people clomping through the urban wilderness, and two voices, Frank’s and Tonio’s. They sounded all buddy buddy. We heard the screech of the rusty bolt, then the creaky door swung open. The inside of the shed was suddenly bright with sunlight.

  I’m not a total dork when it comes to love. I’ve had an almost-boyfriend, witnessed Reggie mooning over Amanda the Panda, and have seen my parents kiss and make up a thousand times, until they couldn’t do it anymore. I thought I was getting a handle on the mystery of love and attraction, but then I saw Sylvia with Frank and realized I didn’t know a thing. Here was this creep who’d betrayed her and she still loved him.

  I watched, horrified, as she stepped out of the shed and into Frank’s arms.

  “You’re a pain, you know that?” His voice was soft. He ran his hands down her hair.

  “You love it,” she said. “Eres tan estupido como un perro.”

  I have had one year of Spanish. I think she said, “You are as stupid as a dog.”

  I should have run. Behind Frank’s shoulder I could see the highway, the cars cruising by, but I just stood there. The emergency exit door was propped open as usual, but I just stood there. I glimpsed my phone not far away, shining among the weeds and broken glass, but I just stood there.

  I am only in middle school, after all.

  Tonio reached into his pocket and produced a piece of duct tape, folded over on itself to make a small packet. Frank plucked it from Tonio’s palm, ripped it open, and gazed at the red diamond. It wasn’t big, less than a carat, I guessed. It didn’t look very impressive, stuck to the silvery tape, just a small piece of something very old and close to perfect that came from deep in the earth.

  “I’d say it’s time to give Oreo his afternoon snack,” said Frank, closing his hand around the diamond. “And tell him he’s flying the coop earlier than planned.”

  For a second I thought they were all just going to walk away and leave me there, which never happened on TV.

  Then, faster than a lizard startled while sunning himself, Frank leaped to my side, grabbed me around the neck, and pressed a towel to my face. He moved so fast he even startled cooler-than-thou Tonio, who stood next to his sister, just watching. Frank kept mashing the towel against my face. I tried to wrench myself away, but he was too strong. The towel smelled like Downey, and like the medicine you put on sore muscles. And then I went limp.

  11

  I woke up.

  Where was I? In another shed? This time there were lights. Bars of neon lights across the low ceiling. Cool cement floor. No windows. Not a shed. Air-conditioning. A small room. Okay, I thought, okay.

  Don’t freak out. Do not freak out. Hearing your own self scream is one good way to launch a freak-out, so don’t do that.

  I was lying on my side. It was not the side I normally slept on. I’d been dumped on that side, facing the wall. Concrete wall. My hands weren’t tied. Not a good sign. Meant there was nothing easy to do to get myself out of here. Laid there for a minute, listening.

  No voices, no traffic. Quiet, except for a low humming sound, a click, a clank.

  As soon as I sat up, my head throbbed as if my heart had relocated itself in my skull. It ached as if a steel cap was being slowly tightened by the hand of an unseen torturer. It was a headache out of some horrible sci-fi universe. I didn’t know the meaning of headache until that moment.

  In a way, this helped me. It hurt so much I couldn’t think about how long I’d been there, or whether my brothers were frantic with worry, or whether the brilliant pigeon Oreo had already taken off to find McCarthy and deliver the diamond.

  I was thirsty.

  I didn’t have to pee, so I reasoned that I hadn’t been there long. Maybe I’d just gotten there. Maybe it was still broad daylight outside.

  I stood up, looked around. Frank had stuck me in a large closet, half the size of my bedroom. It was given over mostly to electrical stuff.

  I went to the door and tried the handle. Duh. Of course it was locked. I banged on it for a while with my fists.

  “Help!” I yelled. “Help me!”

  Hearing myself scream for help made me even more afraid than I already was. No one was coming. No one was going to rescue me.

  I looked around the room. On the opposite wall there were things we hadn’t even gotten to in basic electronics—I wish I’d paid more attention to bitter old Mr. Lawndale than to Bryce Duncan—big gray boxes with circuit breakers and glass bulbs and spinning meters. There were other gauges with long bars of red, yellow, and green, with a needle sitting smack in the center of the green. There were thick red and blue wires that disappeared into blocks, other wires that were clamped to the wall with oversized screws. There were signs all over the place. DANGER! HIGH VOLTAGE! DO NOT TOUCH!

  I had no idea what I was looking at, or how it could be of any help to me. My stomach grumbled. It’d been hours since that bowl of Frosted Mini-Wheats. I could turn off the power, I guess, but what would that accomplish?

  In a corner opposite the wall with all the electrical stuff, I spied a dried-out mop that looked as if it hadn’t been used in a year, a push broom and dustpan, a few big plastic buckets full of spare parts, spools of copper wire, and a cardboard box of something that looked sort of familiar. I picked one up. It was blue, the size of a salt shaker, with two prongs sticking out of one end. I leaned over and read the side of the box: 400 μF CAPACITORS.

  Capacitors … weren’t those the exploding things from basic electronics?

  It’s amazing what hope will do for hunger, thirst, and a headache fierce enough to drive your eyeballs right out of their sockets.

  I could do this.

  I looked around. I needed something to set the capacitor on. Something near the lock. In class, we’d had those pieces of wood called breadboards. I wondered if there was anything like that here. I spied the cleaning supplies, picked up the dustpan, turned it over in my hands. Would this work?

  I wedged the dustpan into the crack between the door and the doorjamb, right above the lock. The handle stuck out, creating a little shelf. I set the capacitor on the side of the handle, right next to the door. I went to the electrical side of the closet, found a pair of wires—one red, one black—that disappeared into a fuse box with a giant on/off lever. I pulled the lever down, to off, half expecting the lights to go off, but nothing happened.

  That was good. My palms were slick with sweat. I tried to remember just how Mr. Lawndale did it.

  I yanked the wires from their clamps. Any pair of wires would work, right? As long as one was positive and one was negative, right? I kept waiting to get zapped but, I reasoned, I lived through one gigantic electric shock—the shock that changed my life—I could survive another one.

  Nothing happened. The room hummed with electricity. Click. Clank. I could taste my bad breath from not having eaten.

  I tugged the wires across the narrow room to where the capacitor sat perched on its dustpan shelf wedged into the door beside the lock. I go to a Catholic school even though we Clarks are not Catholic. I knew some patron saints, however. I sent a prayer up to St. Clare, who ran away to become a nun when she was my age. She was the patron saint of television, and not electricity, but it was the best I could do.

  I twisted the red wire around the short leg of the capacitor, the black wire around the long leg.

  I dashed across the room to the fuse box. My hands were shaking. I flipped on the lever, and crouched low in the corner behind the cleaning supplies.

  I waited.

  What was taking so long? Maybe I’d done it wrong? Just as I was trying to figure out my next move, the capacitor exploded.

  I was deaf, my nose filled with the burnt aroma of melting plastic and that bizarre peanut butter smell. My eyes watered from the smoke. I leaped up, and sure enough, there was a hole the size of my fist by the doorknob. I turned it and the door sprung open and out I went, running down the long dingy hallway, headac
he gone, hunger gone, thirsty yes, but who cared about thirst? That psycho Frank had stuck me in the basement of some warehouse. At the end of the hallway, up two flights of metal stairs there was a door to outside. I took the stairs two at a time. I could see a thready frame of sunlight around the edges, and I crashed out the door and onto the street, startling a girl in a halter top walking by with her dog on a leash, one of those cute mutts that live forever.

  Where was I? I’d been worried that I would make my escape only to find that I was somewhere so foreign that getting home would be as hard as getting out of that stupid closet. But no. The Burnside Bridge loomed up beside me. Straight ahead was Waterfront Park, and then the river. I was on Burnside, the busy main street that separates the north side of Portland from the south side of Portland. I craned my neck, and there, soaring above me atop the roof of the warehouse I’d just busted out of, was the MADE IN OREGON sign, our city’s famous landmark.

  I knew right where I was. And what I had to do.

  There’s something called adrenaline, which is a magical drug that your body produces all on its own. It’s the fight or flight drug. It makes time slow and pain disappear and helps contribute to that feeling that you might just be an undiscovered superhero. I am going into eighth grade with no special skills and I just almost blew a door off its hinges. When I was a little girl, and used to watch Star Wars over and over again with Morgan, I dreamed of being a princess with a blaster. Now I am practically her.

  I should have gone straight home to Casa Clark, told Mark Clark I’d been held captive first in a shed, then in an electrical closet, by the same dumb but scary security guard turned jewel thief, asked him to make me one of his special chicken salad sandwiches, let him call the police and file the report and wait for the detectives to come and take my statement, called Chelsea de Guzman and let her know what I’d gone through, all in the name of finding the rare red diamond that had gotten her in trouble with her dad.

  I should have, but I was a princess with a blaster, and a mission.