Lilly tucked the photograph in a crack in the railing of her bed. The photograph was upside-down and sideways. When Lilly lay on her bed and looked up, she could see her father perfectly.
“Lucky how?” she asked sitting up. Dorian sat on the floor and leaned against the wall.
“You’re lucky you know who he was. My father left right after I was born. He probably didn’t like having a kid with a tail.”
Lilly bit her knuckle nervously. She wanted to tell Dorian she was sorry his father left. But she didn’t want her words to sound automatic like the message on the gum machine, ‘Sorry. Out of peppermint. Out of cinnamon. Out of Dads.’ Lilly wished there were different words for different kinds of ‘sorry.’ I can’t say it right, thought Lilly. So she said nothing.
Dorian seemed to understand. “That’s okay,” said Dorian. “I have a pretty good mom but it’s weird not knowing who my father is. My mother won’t talk about him. For all I know he could be Mr. Stinchfield.”
“IMPOSSIBLE! Differrrent species entirely!” screeched Tobias. He’d been eavesdropping and flew to the bed rail. “Mr. Stinchfield cannot be your father, Dorian. Impossible!”
“Mr. Stinchfield is a different species? I knew he wasn’t human!” shouted Lilly. “I knew it! I knew it!”
“Plumage talking! Sorry to disappoint you, Lilly,” said Tobias. Lilly pouted. She was disappointed.
“Plumage talking?” asked Dorian.
“Plumage talking means my speech is as colorful as my feathers. When I said Stinkfield is a different species I was exaggerrrating to make a point. Stenchfield is human but he’s a bad sort. I know where you did not come from with as much certainty as I know where those iguanas did. There is only one place in the world where Blue Iguanas can be found.”
“Where?” asked Dorian.
Tobias turned his head, his one eye giving Dorian a singular stare. “The Cayman Islands. They were originally the outcroppings of an underwater mountain range in the Caribbean Ocean. Some of the most unique plants and animals in the world can be found there. The Blue Iguana is one of them. There are fewer than one hundred and fifty Blue Iguanas in the wild. For that reason, they are endangered.”
Lilly was puzzled. “Why did someone put three Blue Iguana babies in the mail?”
“Someone smuggled them into the United States, Lilly,” said Tobias. “It’s against the law to take Blue Iguanas out of the Cayman Islands. You may wonder how anyone could hurt such treasures.” Lilly and Dorian nodded.
“It happens more often than you would believe. People smuggle animals, even endangered animals by hiding them on people or in the mail or by mixing them in with illegal drugs or with shipments of legal animals.”
“Smugglers will try anything. Animals are drugged, sometimes blinded. Their mouths are taped shut to keep them quiet. Their legs or wings are tied together to keep them from moving. It’s cruel but the people who do it don’t care about the animals. They care about money. They know half of the animals will die.”
“They know animals will die?” exclaimed Lilly.
“It’s the prrrrice-price of doing business,” said Tobias. “Big business! Big business!”
“Who’s buying the animals, Tobias?” Dorian spoke quietly.
“Prrrivate collectors. Or pet stores. The people who sell endangered animals in their pet stores can make even more money than the smugglers who bring the animals into a country.”
“Do you think Mr. Snodgrass and Mr. Stinchfield are selling illegal animals, Tobias?” asked Lilly.
“NOT HERE!” screeched Tobias. “To the woods. To the woods.”
Lilly turned to Dorian. “Tobias wants us to go for a walk in the park.”
“Humans walk,” answered Tobias. “Parrrots fly.” The three of them left for the park with Tobias leading the way.
Chapter 30
With so many pent up questions, Lilly felt she’d burst but Tobias refused to speak until the town was behind them. When they entered the woods, Tobias signaled he was ready, “PRRROOCEEED, Lilly!” he commanded.
“You think Mr. Snodgrass and Mr. Stinchfield are smuggling animals, don’t you, Tobias?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me!” said Dorian before Tobias could answer. Dorian kicked a rock down the dirt road and watched it ricochet off a boulder.
“DOOR-ian’s right!” shrieked Tobias. “DOOR-ian’s wrong! No need for them to smuggle. Other people can bring the animals into the country illegally. Here is my hypothesis: Mr. Snodgrass and his brother buy from the smugglers. Then they sell the animals to private collectors or roadside zoos or to customers who think they’re buying an animal born in the U.S.A.” Tobias began to sing, “Born in the U.S.A.! I was born in the U.S.A.!” Tobias’ outbursts made Lilly wonder if she should give the radio back to Dorian.
“Were you born in the U.S.A., Tobias?” asked Dorian.
“No, I was born free as a bird, a bird in the wild that is.”
Dorian turned to Lilly, “The secret room you told us about in the pet store, the one you’re not allowed in, maybe that’s where Mr. Snodgrass keeps illegal animals.”
“DOOR-ian may be right,” said Tobias hopping from Lilly’s shoulder to Dorian’s. “It’s not like selling a puppy.” Tobias sang, “How much is that Komodo Drrragon in the window. I do hope that drrragon’s for sale!” Tobias paused and continued speaking. “Nope. You don’t put a Komodo Dragon in the window of a pet store.”
“A Komodo Dragon, Tobias? Are you kidding?” asked Lilly.
“THIRRRTY thousand,” said Tobias. “People pay thirty thousand dollars for a Komodo dragon.” Dorian looked incredulous, too.
Tobias continued, “SIXTY thousand. People pay sixty thousand for a parrot. One hundred thirty-two Blue Lear macaws left in the world. The fewer there are, the more valuable. People cut down trees to steal nests. Collectors pay thousands of dollars for one egg. It is a grrreed and rrrecklessness that staggers my imagination!”
Lilly stopped. Thinking she was still with them, Dorian and Tobias continued to walk. “I heard you say you’re the last of your kind, Tobias. I hate to think what would happen to you, if the wrong person found out how rare you are. A collector might pay a million dollars for you.”
“PRICELESS!” screamed Tobias. “I’m priceless, Dorian!” Dorian smiled at the ancient bird. “Serrrriously,” Tobias said, “tens of thousands of my fellow birds lose their lives every year being smuggled into this country alone.”
Lilly didn’t hear any more of their conversation. She was lost in her own thoughts. Thinking about money reminded Lilly that she and her family were days away from losing their home. The auction was in ten days.
Lilly stared down without seeing, not the dirt road or her sneakers or the line of ants that marched like soldiers in and out of a nearby hill. Well, at least I’ll always have Tobias, thought Lilly, and the thought of being separated from her mother and the animals in her room became a white-hot sadness that paralyzed her.
“What’s wrong, Lilly?” called Tobias.
Dorian ran toward her. Plumes of dust rose where his sneakers hit the dirt road. “Come on,” he said. His tail shot out and took her hand. His furry embrace startled her then felt comforting. Gently, his tail pulled her along. When she reached Dorian and Tobias, the tail let go.
“Tobias says the ‘magician’ you saw in the pet store was an egg smuggler, Lilly.”
“BUF-IIIE!” screeched Tobias. “The baby monkey? It was a Buffy-headed Marmoset, an endangered species. I believe the woman drugged the poor creature so he’d fall asleep. Then she hid him in her monstrous hairdo and smuggled him into the country.”
“And the poor Blue Iguanas,” murmured Lilly.
Tobias shook his feathered head, “Another endangered species. GHAST-ly.”
Lilly stopped thinking about losing her home and thought instead about the hundreds of thousands of wild animals being stolen from their homes. She heard Tobias mutter angrily, “Under our beeeeaks! It’s happening
right under out beaks! I’d like to get my beak on the people responsible for all this suffering!”
“Can’t we do something, Tobias?” asked Dorian. “If it’s happening in our town, can’t we stop it?”
Tobias flew from Dorian’s shoulder to a nearby branch where he spread his lime green wings. “That’s up to Lilly,” he announced.
“Me?” said Lilly taken aback.
“Yes, you and no one but you,” said Tobias. Lilly and Dorian listened as Tobias outlined his plan. Lilly would spy on Mr. Stinchfield while she worked in the pet store this summer. She would report anything suspicious to Tobias. Tobias explained they needed proof before they could tell the sheriff that the pet store was selling animals illegally.
“But I don’t want to work in the pet store anymore,” Lilly protested. “I’m quitting tomorrow!”
“It’s perfectly understandable if spying on Mr. Stinkweed frightens you, Lilly. It would frighten anyone,” said Tobias softly.
Lilly wanted to say it didn’t frighten her but the words stopped short. She was frightened. Very frightened. And she was hurt Tobias would ask her to do something dangerous. Of course looking for criminals could be dangerous but it hadn’t been. Spying on Mr. Stinchfield was different. Who knows what he would do to me if he found out I was spying on him in the pet store? thought Lilly.
Tobias spoke as though he’d read her mind. “NERRRVE! Your mother had backbone when she stood up against her parents to marry your father. And your father was an exceedingly brrrave man, Lilly.”
“But I’m not brave, Tobias. I don’t want to be brave.”
“NERRRVE, Lilly,” Tobias repeated. “Nerve.”
“I don’t have nerve, Tobias. I’m just nervous.”
Tobias shook his feathered head. “Animals are like young children, Lilly. They cannot protect themselves. I ask you to do this because of your father. He fought to protect animals from extinction. I see your father in you, Lilly.”
Tobias flew to her shoulder, murmuring, “Look for your father in the place that remembers forever… Ask him to help you, my dear.” The three friends said little on the way home, and Dorian left Lilly’s house looking more serious than ever before.
That night Lilly lay in bed staring at the nearly full moon, which nearly filled her window. “White Tigress,” whispered Lilly, “It’s me, Lilly. I can’t find my father anywhere. I can’t even find the place that remembers forever. If you know where he is, please tell him I need him.”
As she drifted off to sleep, Lilly wished she hadn’t promised Tobias that she would spy on Mr. Stinchfield. My father was brave and look what happened to him, he was eaten by a tiger. It was her last thought before she slept and before she dreamed.
In the moonlight, a white cat no bigger than a mouse, leaped from somewhere inside Lilly. The cat leaped through the open window. Lilly’s cat feet barely touched the grass when they sprang again into the dark, night air.
Lilly sprinted faster and faster away from the sound of heavy footsteps. The footsteps crushed a path through grasses and bushes and trees. Lilly leaped into the garden where the pounding of giant footsteps was replaced by the pounding of her heart. She didn’t hear how close the beast had come until four giant paws pounced and landed next to her.
Lilly’s white fur bristled. Her spine arched. Her claws spiked. She grew still and thought only about her breath. She breathed in slowly and followed her breath to a place deep within herself. She lost herself in her breath. Slowly, slowly Lilly filled herself with her breath and breathed out. She felt her breath slip away from her body and with her breath, Lilly slipped away. Lilly slipped into her liquid self and floated as a pool of cat.
Lilly looked up. Two giant paws stood at the edge of her cat pool. Lilly’s eyes followed orange fur from paws to legs to broad torso striped in black. Up her eyes flew to the enormous shoulders and outstretched limbs and higher to his face. Standing on hind legs, the beast’s face towered too high for Lilly to see.
Then the beast leaned down and stared into Lilly’s cat pool. The beast’s tiger face was as broad as the moon. It loomed over Lilly and roared with laughter. His laugh rippled through Lilly and sunk down into her like a rock dropped from an enormous height. Lilly knew this laugh.
“I’m the King of the Animals!” growled the tiger-faced Mr. Stinchfield. “I see you floating there. Do you think you’re safe?” Lilly watched the beast reach into the air and grab a straw. Then he stabbed the straw into Lilly’s cat pool and bent down.
“He wants to drink me!” thought Lilly in a panic. She tried to breathe but where her breath had been was fear. And where fear filled her, her breath could not. Lilly struggled to think. If she turned back into herself, into her cat-self no bigger than a mouse, the King of the Animals could eat her up in one gulp. But if she stayed as she was, a pool of cat, he would take his straw and drink her up. Either way, she would disappear forever.
Maybe, thought Lilly, if I stay floating then disappearing won’t hurt as much. After all, I’m already half-gone.
As Lilly looked up, she noticed the nearly full moon had completely disappeared, blocked by Mr. Stinchfield’s tiger face. Lilly closed her eyes. She hoped disappearing didn’t hurt very much.
That morning when Lilly opened her eyes, the moon had disappeared replaced by the sun. Looming ever larger were thoughts of Mr. Stinchfield. Lilly sat on the edge of her bed shaking her head as if doing so might clear her mind and help her get ready for her first day at the pet store with Mr. Stinchfield.
Chapter 31
Lilly arrived at the pet store and watched Mr. Stinchfield through the window. He stood at the counter sipping from a paper cup. He stirred with a straw and sipped again. Lilly trembled. The corners of her mouth twitched. “Calm down. It’s only one day,” Lilly muttered to herself. Lilly had decided to pretend it was only one day because any more was too frightening.
Mr. Stinchfield, noticing Lilly standing outside, raised his eyebrow and walked to the door. Like a rabbit getting wind of a coyote, Lilly had an overwhelming urge to bolt. It took courage to simply stand there.
Mr. Stinchfield held the door open. “You’re right on time,” he said with a smile. Now it took courage for Lilly to simply pick up her feet, one at a time, and walk into the store. “I knew you would be on time. You’ve never been late for school, have you?”
“No,” said Lilly glancing at him. “I mean, ‘yes.’ I mean yes, Mr. Stinchfield, I haven’t ever been late.”
“You deserve a medal, don’t you, Lilly?” She expected a sneer but Mr. Stinchfield laughed pleasantly. Lilly was puzzled.
Mr. Stinchfield hit a button on the cash register. The drawer popped open. Lilly watched him strike rolls of quarters, dimes and nickels against the metal drawer and crack them open as though they were eggs. Each crack made Lilly jump. One by one, Mr. Stinchfield poured the rolls of silver coins into the wells at the front of the drawer. He saved the copper pennies for last.
As he worked, Mr. Stinchfield continued to speak in a friendly voice. It reminded Lilly of the way Isadora spoke when she wanted something from her father. “My niece, Isadora, tells me you’re a real animal lover, Lilly. So I’ve decided the best way for us to work together is to allow you to do what you do best.”
He smiled at her again. Is this Mr. Stinchfield? thought Lilly. Or did a nice person take over his body?
“Anything wrong?” he asked. “You’re rather hoppity today, Miss Wilder, more hoppity than White Rabbit, which by the way my brother took with him. One less litter box to clean.”
“Nothing’s wrong,” Lilly fibbed.
“Good. Why don’t you do whatever it is you, do, Lilly? I suppose you clean the cages and feed the animals?”
“Yes,” said Lilly. “I usually change their – “
“Spare me the details,” interrupted Mr. Stinchfield walking toward the back. “I trust you know what to do. Call me if a customer wants to make a purchase. Only family opens the cash register.”
Lilly went to the storage room and brought back a variety of food pellets and flakes, fresh straw and cleaning supplies. In addition to taking care of the animals, Lilly took care of customers. With every purchase of tropical fish, Lilly reminded the customer to let the bag float in their aquarium at home for thirty minutes before releasing the fish. That way the fish would adjust to the temperature. When a little boy asked for a rabbit, Lilly told his mother that rabbits can be litter box trained but need litter made from newspaper. When a man who was ferret-faced himself asked about ferrets, Lilly told him everything she knew. Lilly knew a great deal about animals because of course she took care of animals at home but she had also read all the books and magazines that the pet store carried.
Mr. Stinchfield appeared to ring up sales but left Lilly to handle everything else for the morning. When he joined her for the afternoon, Lilly was busy talking to an older lady about her lovebird, Betsy. Lilly told her how to handle Betsy’s eggs so the bird didn’t lose too much calcium. Otherwise Betsy’s legs could get weak and break.
Tyger Lilly Page 14