Jasper couldn’t help it. His body needed air.
A twitch, at first… his head bucking … the tape flexing over his clamped mouth …
The serpent, irritated, began to stir.
Jasper tried to hold himself still… but clamor was everywhere within him.
He began to thrash. The ropes held him fast.
Lashed to the chair, he bucked back and forth—the asp toppled to one side—and, groggy, hissed—Jasper helplessly beat against the ground—losing hope—losing breath—losing consciousness—the snake, angry, raised its fanged head—
Jasper—seeing stars—began to pass out—
The snake lunged at his throat.
“I retch and drool
My liquids pool
My pupils disappear.
My jaw just flaps
My lungs collapse
I get brrrreathless whenever you’re near—
“I gag and fall
And voiceless call
For an ambulance to appear.
I cough and back—
You slap my back—
But though you smack
I fade to black—
Each alveolar sac
Completely slack—
For I go BREATHLESS,
So totally BREATHLESS,
So helplessly BREATHLESS
WHEN—E VER— YOU’RE—
NEEEARRRRRRRRRR!”
Everyone burst into applause.
It was a delightful evening.
Jasper—his senses fading—saw the serpentine head approaching his throat in slow motion—whipped his chaired body as hard as he could away—away—away.
And went tumbling off the cliff.
He was unable to scream as he fell.
Dessert usually is fun. It was not fun that evening, however, for Katie and Lily. They felt as if everyone was still staring at them because of Katie’s accusation. The Black Forest cake seemed dry. The New York cheesecake tasted more like Delaware.
While the girls forced themselves to eat dessert, they had to listen to the Cutesy Dell Twins and the water polo team across the room laugh heartily at all kinds of jokes no one else could hear. Katie had to see the Cutesy Dell Twins looking at her and whispering. They had to watch Dr. Schmeltzer get served plate after plate of mosquitoes, which he ate with gusto like popcorn shrimp.
They heard Mrs. Mandrake say in passing, “There’s that little girl who made the big fuss.”
“Don’t listen,” whispered Lily, but it was too late. Katie had heard.
After that, the two girls sat on either side of the table, not eating. Katie didn’t like being called a “little girl.” She felt like everyone thought she was an idiot.
“I believe that you really heard the thief,” said Lily. “Even though you didn’t…” She trailed off.
“What?” said Katie.
Lily shrugged.
“You mean I didn’t say anything to you,” said Katie.
“Yeah,” said Lily. “I didn’t know you heard anything. Until just now.”
Katie looked at her friend. She wished, in a funny kind of way, that Lily would get angry with her. She wished Lily would yell at her for not saying something about the robbery earlier.
They sat there, not talking about the crime for several minutes. This would have been a great time for them to review motive, means, and opportunity—those three essential things that a good detective has to establish about every crime. It would have been a good time for them to discuss the motive for kidnapping the Quints and then stealing the necklace—and whether the same person even committed both crimes, or whether the crimes weren’t related. It would have been a great time to discuss who had the opportunity to commit each crime. It also would have been a super chance to ask who would bother to send out mysterious invitations to a free dinner which was not, in fact, free, but $21.95 a head.
Yes, it would have been a great time to do and say a lot of things. Instead, the two girls just stared at the tablecloth and listened to the rustling of the dancers’ skirts and dresses.
This is what tension between friends can do: ruin a perfectly good opportunity to pursue the kidnapper of singing quintuplets.
Finally, Katie said, “So that guy Rick really didn’t go to the bathroom when everyone else did?”
“No,” said Lily, embarrassed she couldn’t give a more positive answer. “He really didn’t. But almost everyone else did. Eddie Wax did, for example.”
“Eddie Wax,” said Katie. “Is he here now?”
Lily looked around. She shook her head.
“What was he like?” asked Katie.
“Nice. I feel really bad about his horse. He loved that horse.”
“He sounds a little insane,” said Katie. She shrugged. “But freckly.” She sighed and pushed away the last of her cake. “I can’t eat any more. I feel like the cake is filled with eyes.”
Lily squinted at her.
“Everyone is staring.”
“No, they’re not,” said Lily.
“Yes, they are. They think I’m crazy.”
“They’re not thinking about it anymore.”
“Yes, they are.”
“There’s other stuff going on,” said Lily.
Katie turned her fork upside down on her plate.
“Let’s go to the bathroom. I need to hide for a minute.”
They got up and walked to the exit.
When they got to the bathroom, Katie sat inside a marble stall and said, “You can leave if you want to. I just need to sit here and calm down for a minute.”
Lily said, “I’ll just lean against the counter.”
“Don’t lean against the counter,” said Katie. “You’ll get splash-back on your sweatshirt.”
“I’m not near the sink.”
They rested for a minute. Other women came into the restroom, and used it, and left.
“Are you still there, Lily?” said Katie.
“Yeah.”
“Why don’t you leave for a minute?”
Lily hesitated, then said, “Oh. Okay.”
She started to leave.
“Hey,” said Katie. “Hey, Lily, are you still there?”
“Yeah. I’m near the door.”
“I’m really sorry. I was kind of a jerk earlier today.”
Lily shrugged. “Um, that’s okay.”
“Okay?”
“I’m fine,” said Lily. “You weren’t… Well, you weren’t too much of a jerk.”
Katie thought about this, then laughed a little. “Like, only eight out of ten?”
“Six,” said Lily, smiling. “Or six point two.”
“Thanks,” said Katie. “You know you’re my best friend?”
Lily shuffled nervously. She didn’t like people talking about that kind of thing out loud. “Sure,” she said. “Hey,” she added in a reassuring voice, “we’re going to solve this mystery, aren’t we? Together?”
“Yeah,” said Katie. “Maybe.”
“Don’t worry,” said Lily. “When Jasper gets back, we’ll have a big discussion and figure out who’s the guilty party.”
Katie sat for a minute before she said, “I feel like I’m the guilty party.”
Lily stood awkwardly with her hand on the door. Finally, she said, “I’ll go up to the Sky Suite and meet you there when you’re ready.”
“All right,” said Katie, from inside the stall. Her voice echoed. She heard Lily go out. She sat bent forward on the closed toilet seat, her elbows on her knees. She stared at the grain of the wood on the stall door.
Lily, meanwhile, walked across the lobby. She hoped Katie felt better. She paused for a moment and looked back toward the bathroom door. Still closed. Diners from the restaurant strolled out into the lobby to chat or to grab croquet mallets and head out to the lawn for an evening game. Lily passed by huddled groups that discussed the crimes in quiet tones.
As she was heading for the elevators, she noticed an odd shape scurrying down a hallway.
She trotted a short way along the corridor to see what it was.
It was Eddie Wax.
He was coming out of his room, carrying something bulky in a bag and looking terrified. Lily stepped backward into one of the elevators. She let the door close in front of her, but she hit the Hold button, which kept the elevator from moving. In a minute the doors slid open again.
Carefully, she peeked out. Eddie was sneaking away.
She followed him, noting his room number.
He looked very worried.
Meanwhile, Jasper was falling thirty— Oh, I’m sorry. You probably want to hear more about Katie and Lily and their winning ways. Okay, fine. We’ll just leave poor Jasper hanging in the air until you’re ready. I’ll start over.
Meanwhile, Katie stepped out of the bathroom, feeling a bit better after sitting there alone for a while. She headed for the grand staircase.
She hadn’t even made it across the lobby when the huge front doors slammed open and the Manley Boys rushed in. They stumbled on the rug. They were a mess. Their faces were scratched and twigs and leaves hung off their varsity sweaters.
“We found a—”
“Jasper Dash has been kidnapped!”
“Its a cave!
“He’s been kidnapped!”
“Jasper Dash!”
“He’s—”
“Excuse me,” said Sid, coming over to them. “Pardon me.” He held his hands over their mouths. “If every hour on the hour,” he hissed with some menace, “people are going to stagger into this lobby and make catastrophic announcements—kidnappings, thefts, secret caves, alien abductions, radiated salamanders, trolls, underground cities, mysterious and deadly games—the hotel management would be grateful if instead of shrieking about local disaster so all the other guests can hear, you could please fill out this simple, quiet complaint form, available from the concierge.*”
“But Jasper, he’s—,” said Fud.
“Those handsome Manley Boys, they’ve solved another—,” said Jank.
“Hup! Hup!” Sid led them over to the desk. He handed them two forms. They bowed their heads and started writing. The hotel manager stopped them, grabbed their pencils, and said, “In pen, please. Press hard. This has to be in triplicate.”
While Jank, who thought the alphabet was for sissies, gripped his pen and tried to tell their story in hearty, masculine pictograms, Fud said, “It took us a real long time to get back. Without Jasper.”
“Not because he knew the way better or anything,” said Jank, looking up from his drawings. “We just got turned around from, uh, magnetism. And lost the map climbing a tree. So it’s been a while since we left him.”
Katie rushed over. “Where is he?” she demanded. “Why didn’t you stay with him?”
“Because we were saving him,” explained Fud, “by running away. So we could tell every-one.”
“Tell them what? That you’re chickens?” cried Katie.
“We had to tell the people that we found the cave,” said Jank. “We are the well-built sons of ace detective Bark Manley.”
“Is Jasper in danger?” Katie said. “What’s going on? Where?”
“In the cave!” said Fud.
“What cave?”
“We found.”
“Where?”
“On the mountain.”
“Where?”
Fud emphasized, “THE. CAVE.”
Katie emphasized, “Where. Is. The. Cave?”
“The. Cave. Is. On. The. Mountain.”
“Where. On. The. Mountain?”
“IN. THE. CAVE.”
Before this moronic conversation could go on any longer, suddenly, across the lobby, there was a bloodcurdling scream.
* See appendix B.
Eddie Wax made his way down the service stairs, a grain sack filled with something lumpy in his arms.
Lily walked carefully behind him. She had learned various tricks about how to shadow people from Katie and Jasper when they talked about their previous adventures. Most of these clever techniques, though, were only good if you were following people on a crowded street. When there was no one else around, it was a different story.
By the time Lily reached the bottom of the service stairs, Eddie was gone.
She looked around. One set of doors led into the laundry room. One led into the garbage pit. One led to a breezeway and the outdoors—and that door was still swinging slightly.
Lily opened the inner swinging door, and then, very slowly, the door to the outside.
There, in the glaring lights of the back parking lot, Eddie Wax, with his mysterious package, was making a run for the woods.
In a moment, he had disappeared into the darkness.
Time, Lily thought, to go through that bathroom to the Sky Suite and find Jasper’s lock-picking tools.
She was going to pay a visit to Eddie Wax’s room.
Meanwhile, in the lobby, a hideous scream had stopped everyone in their tracks.
“Pardon,” said Dr. Schmeltzer. “I did not mean to startle.”
People breathed a sigh of relief, or perhaps irritation.
“I could not help but overhear the young gentlemen,” said Dr. Schmeltzer. “They appear to have been disoriented. I suspect they no longer can state with clarity where lies the grot within which their benighted playmate is immured.”
No one knew what he was talking about. They nodded and prepared to do something else.
“The cave,” explained the cloaked professor, “where their friend is being held. They don’t know where it is.”
Exasperated, Fud insisted, “The. Cave. Is. On. The. Mountain.”
“But we, young man, are on the mountain, and we are not in the cave. My point, ladies and gentlemen, is this”—everyone turned to listen— “If young Jork and Flick Mandeley here had navigated not by sight, but by echolocation, as the clever bat does, they would have no trouble leading us back through the darkness to the cave. But because …”
Everyone groaned.
“Wait!” cried the professor. “Wait, before you dismiss me!” He swept his cape back and declared, “I, good people—I know where the cave is! Three years ago I went there to conduct a survey among the bats. Indeed, it was to return to the aforementioned cave that I came to this hotel. Thus: Using echolocation, I, ladies and gentlemen, I can conduct a search party thither posthaste.”
“I’ll go with you,” said Katie. “Let me just find my friend Lily, and I’ll be right back!”
“Very good, young lady,” said Dr. Schmeltzer. “I will wait for you on that landing.”
Katie ran up to their room—or to the room that led into their room—and found the door ajar and the occupant of 46B sitting in bed. “If you’re looking for that girl with bangs over her eyes,” he said, “she went into the bathroom. I think she’s building something in there.”
Katie ran to find Lily in the Sky Suite. Quickly, throwing their hands around a lot, they each explained what had happened to them since they had parted in the restroom. They agreed they’d split up: Lily would go break into Eddie Wax’s room and see if she could find any clues. Katie would go with Dr. Schmeltzer to find Jasper.
“I’m glad we’re working together again,” said Lily.
“Me too.” Katie nodded, then looked down at her good skirt. “My assignment for next time: Find some nice-looking shoes that wear really well for crime fighting.”
Quickly, the two girls grinned at each other.
Then they set off running. Lily went through drawers in the crime lab, looking for Jasper’s lock-picking device. Katie threw off her fancy shoes and hopped back through the bathroom of 46B, pulling on her sneakers.
The man in 46B had turned over on his side and wrapped the pillow around his head.
Katie ran downstairs. As promised, Dr. Schmeltzer was waiting on the landing, hanging from the railing, in fact, grooming himself with his teeth.
“I’m ready,” said Katie.
“Good, then,” he
said, nipping at vermin on his cape. “Let’s be off.”
With a horrifying shriek, he dropped to the ground, swirled his cape, and ran for the exit.
Katie ran right behind him.
Jasper hit the ground hard. He slid. The chair cracked beneath him.
He slid on shale.
He rolled on scree.
He came to rest near a river. It chortled over stones.
The snake was gone, but Jasper was still suffocating.
His legs were free now; that wouldn’t help if he passed out again.
He rolled to one side and the other, writhing.
Something was lumpy under his stomach, pressed against the rocks.
He jumped—thinking it was the snake.
But no—it was just Fud’s pepper grinder, which Jasper had shoved in his belt.
If only it had been an item of some use… something that could…
But then he had an idea.
Trembling, he smeared himself along the ground. He rubbed his stomach on the stone; and as he did so, the pepper grinder turned. It left behind it a trail of freshly ground pepper.
Feverishly, Jasper shoved his nose into the spicy mix. He snorted in as hard as he could. Nothing.
He sucked in harder—but just succeeded in choking on globs of sputum like softball pitches of cottage cheese.
He buried his nose again in the peppery dirt and drew breath with all his might.
And—miraculously—Jasper Dash sneezed.
He sneezed so hard that the plugs shot out of his nose. He sneezed so hard that he kicked with his feet, and the chair cracked again beneath him and fell apart.
He lay in the dying sunlight, listening to the pittering of the river, breathing deeply, fully at last. Bubbles of goobery joy slid down his cheeks. Air, sweet air, sweet air filled with spores, flooded back into his lungs to begin the whole cycle again.
But now Jasper had time.
He kicked with his legs and broke the chair to pieces. The back and one of the struts hung awkwardly from the ropes, but the rest lay on the rocks of the little valley where he had come to rest.
Jasper put his knees up near his face. He scraped them across the frayed corners of the duct tape. He clapped them together on the edges of the tape, seizing the corners between them. He pulled.
The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen Page 7