Inspector Flytrap in the President's Mane Is Missing

by Tom Angleberger

  “What?”

  “I said, ‘That’s why we’ve got to do something about it!’”

  “I heard your loud, grating voice through the earmuffs,” said Nina, rolling her eyes. “I meant: WHAT are you going to do about it?”

  “Uh . . . ,” I started, but I didn’t know what to say next. What could we do about a 400-foot-tall fly? I know everything about normal-size flies but nothing about giant ones. I needed information!

  “Nina, hand me volume F of the encyclopedia so I can look up ‘Flies’!”

  “Ate it.”

  “Nina! How could you? OK, hand me volume G so I can look up ‘Giant Flies’!”

  “Ate it.”

  “NINA! Those were expensive! How about volume V for ‘Venus Flies’?”

  “Ate it.”

  “I for ‘Insects’?”

  “Ate it.”

  “B for ‘Bugs’?”

  “Ate it.”

  “Uh . . . M for ‘Musca domestica,’ the scientific name of the housefly?”

  “Drank it.”

  “Drank it? How could you drink a volume of the encyclopedia?”

  “Mmm . . . book smoothie!”

  “This is ridiculous! Is there ANY volume left?”

  “Page 57 of the P volume.”

  “All right, let me see it.”

  She handed me the single page.

  “Pig,” I read. “The pig, or common swine, is one of the smartest of all animals. In fact, some scholars think pigs may have invented the—”

  Nina ate page 57.

  “Hmm,” I murmured thoughtfully. “If pigs are so smart, maybe I should ask some pigs for information about this giant fly disaster. But where am I supposed to find a bunch of pigs?”

  Chapter 11

  My phone rang.

  “Hello,” I said. “Flytrap Detective Agency. Inspector Flytrap speaking.”

  “Oink,” said a smart voice.

  “Are you a pig?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Are you one of those smart pigs?”

  “Yes.”

  “How smart are you?”

  “I’m the president of the National Science Headquarters.”

  “Wow! Could you guys help me save the city from destruction by giving me information about the giant fly from Venus?”

  “Sure. Come right over.”

  “Great, we’ll be right there.”

  “OK,” said the smart voice. “See you later.”

  “Just a second,” I said. “You were the one who called me. Did you want something?”

  “Actually, I must have dialed the wrong number. I was trying to order a pizza.”

  She hung up.

  “Nina, Let’s go!” I shouted. “Get me to the National Science Headquarters, so our nation’s greatest thinkers can help us solve this THRILLING national emergency.”

  “Could we stop at a bookstore on the way?” asked Nina. “It’s almost lunchtime.”

  Chapter 12

  Nina pushed me out the door, and we hailed a taxi.

  “Quick!” I ordered. “Take us to the National Science Headquarters, so we can get help from our nation’s greatest thinkers.”

  “I can’t,” said the cabbie, who by the way was a donkey.

  “Why not?”

  “Your goat just ate the steering wheel.”

  We hailed ANOTHER taxi!

  “Quick!” I ordered. “While carefully protecting the steering wheel, gearshift, and other important car parts, take us to the National Science Headquarters, so we can get help from our nation’s greatest thinkers.”

  “OK,” said the cabbie. He drove about thirty feet and stopped.

  “What’s the problem?” I demanded.

  “We’re there,” said the cabbie, who by the way was a mule.

  Oops. I had forgotten the National Science Headquarters is right next door to my office.

  “That’ll be fifty bucks,” said the mule.

  “Yeah, and two hundred bucks to replace my steering wheel!” shouted the donkey from thirty feet away.

  Suddenly the buzzing sound got louder. The giant alien space fly was coming right for us. Two of its massive legs—each as big as a telephone pole—reached down and grabbed the two taxicabs.

  Luckily, Nina pushed us out the door just as the fly was taking off with the taxis.

  Clatter! went my skateboard onto the sidewalk. Thud! Oof! went me and my flowerpot onto the sidewalk. Spluff . . . went Nina as she landed softly on a nearby sloth, who was eating a hot dog.

  Nina helped get me and my flowerpot back on the skateboard, and then she began eating a sign that said NATIONAL SCIENCE HEADQUARTERS—RING BELL IN CASE OF THRILLING NATIONAL EMERGENCY.

  “No time for that now, Nina!” I yelled, pushing the doorbell button. “We’ve got to get inside and solve this case before the giant Venus fly strikes again.”

  “Pig deal,” she said.

  I saw that the door was open and twenty-three pigs in lab coats were waiting for us.

  Chapter 13

  NINA!” yelled all twenty-three pigs, and they rushed forward to hug her.

  “Ahem . . . ,” I said.

  Nina took off her earmuffs and they all began chattering away about celebrity gossip, nuclear physics, and hoof care products. Why is Nina always so popular? I’m the famous detective! And I don’t go around eating things that don’t belong to me unless they are flies. “This is not a hugging emergency. It’s a THRILLING emergency! We need to solve this giant-fly problem.”

  “OK, go ahead, solve it,” said the first pig.

  “Yeah, we’re waiting,” said the second pig.

  “Well, I don’t have a solution yet!” I snapped. “That’s why I’m here! I need some scientific information about the giant alien space fly.”

  “Well, first of all, it’s big,” said the third pig.

  “I already knew that,” I said.

  “REALLY big,” said the fourth pig.

  “REALLY REALLLLLLLLLY BIG,” said the fifth pig.

  “We’ve never seen anything like it before!” said the sixth pig.

  “Well, actually, we’ve seen lots of flies like this before,” said the seventh pig.

  “Just smaller,” said the eighth pig.

  “We’ve used the Computatotron 80001 to pinpoint every sighting of the giant Venus fly on this map,” said the ninth pig, pulling a map from the computer’s printer.

  “Could you please ask your goat not to eat the map?” said the tenth pig.

  “Thank you,” said the eleventh pig.

  “As you can see, the giant fly is basically flying in circles around the city,” said the twelfth pig.

  “That wouldn’t be such a problem if it wasn’t destroying national landmarks every time it lands,” said the thirteenth pig.

  BUZZZZZ . . . CRACK . . . CRASH! came a terrible noise from outside.

  The fourteenth pig wet his pants.

  “That was the Washington Monument!” said the fifteenth pig.

  “But why is he doing this?” said the sixteenth pig.

  “WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY?” squealed the seventeenth, eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth pigs together.

  “Big squeal,” said Nina, and she put her earmuffs back on.

  “Brilliant!” I said.

  “Really? Which one of us was brilliant?” asked all the pigs together.

  “The ones who asked Why? Why? Why? Why?”

  “Why?”

  “Yes, that is the correct question. I have been asking the wrong question. If you ask the wrong question, you’ll never get the right answer. And if you never get the right answer, you’ll never be the World’s Greatest Detective.”

  “None of us wants to be the World’s Greatest Detective,” said the pigs.

  “But I do!” I said. “And that’s why I am now going to ask the right question: ‘Why is the fly doing this?’ If we can answer that question, then we’ll know how to stop it.”

  All the pi
gs squealed with excitement.

  “So tell us why, already,” said Nina.

  “Er . . . I don’t actually know why.”

  All the pigs grumbled with disappointment.

  “But I know how to find out!”

  All the pigs squealed with excitement. But I have to admit they didn’t squeal as loud as they had before, and a couple of them left to check their email.

  “To solve a crime, one must think like a criminal,” I told the pigs. “So in this case it will be necessary for me to think like a fly.”

  I thought like a fly.

  “AHA!” I shouted. “I have solved this THRILLING mystery!”

  “You have?” asked the twenty-first pig.

  “By thinking like a fly?” asked the twenty-second pig.

  “Yes!” I said! “What is different about this city today? What is here now that wasn’t here yesterday?”

  “A statue of President Horse G. Horse, with most of the mane missing?” said the twenty-third pig.

  “Yes!” I said. “Now, think about it from the giant fly’s point of view. He sees a horse . . . the biggest horse he’s ever seen . . . a horse bigger than the Capitol Building! So what does he think?”

  No one said anything, so I told them.

  “Every fly—big or small—knows one thing: Where there’s a horse, there is horse poop! And flies sure do love horse poop! Since a regular-size horse makes a regular-size poop, this giant alien space fly is waiting for this giant horse to make a giant poop so it can have a giant lunch!”

  “Speaking of lunch . . . ,” said Nina.

  “Not now, Nina,” I said. “We’ve got to tell the President to tear down the statue before the giant Venus fly destroys Washington, America, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness!”

  Chapter 14

  We raced back to my office to save the country!

  But then I heard something—a buzzing sound.

  “Nina, STOP!” I yelled.

  Nina stopped. Unfortunately, I kept rolling!

  SLAM! I crashed right into a trash can.

  Now the buzzing sound was REALLY loud.

  But it wasn’t the scary buzzing sound of one gigantic alien space fly. It was the beautiful buzzing sound of about a dozen regular-size flies. Mmmm!

  “Inspector! Welcome!” called a familiar voice.

  “Penguini!” I cried. “It is great to see you! But what are you doing here? Your restaurant is on the other side of town.”

  “Yes,” said Penguini. “But this is my new food truck. Now I can serve food anywhere in the city!”

  “Wonderful!” I cried. “Now I can eat the flies that hover around your garbage cans anywhere in the city!”

  “Yes,” said Penguini, “and your goat may eat as much of the garbage as she wants.”

  “Blurp,” said Nina, who had already eaten ALL of the garbage. “Don’t forget about supper,” she added.

  “Ah, yes! Penguini, we need to make a reservation at your restaurant tonight!”

  “A date with that beautiful rose?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Ahem,” said Nina.

  “. . . and two goats,” I said.

  “Very good!” said Penguini. “I’ll see you there tonight!”

  Chapter 15

  The President’s phone rang.

  “Hello,” he said in a rude voice.

  “This is Inspector Flytrap! I’ve solved the mystery. The giant fly is attracted to the giant statue of you because it thinks a giant pile of horse poop is going to come out. But since it’s a statue, that won’t happen, so the fly will just keep buzzing around until it destroys the whole city, the whole country, the whole world!”

  “NEVER!” said the President. “Isn’t there some way to stop it?”

  “Yes, there is! I, Inspector Flytrap, have the answer! Mr. President, for the sake of the city, for the country, for the world . . . tear down that statue!”

  “Nope,” he said.

  “WHAT?”

  “Nope. You’ll just have to find another way. The statue stays.”

  “BUT—”

  “I said Nope, you stupid plant. And I’m the President, so you can’t make me! So HA-HA! So find some other way to save the city, the country, and the world. I’ll be busy taking photos of myself holding my salt and pepper shakers next to my limo parked under my statue of me! Say hi to Nina!”

  He hung up.

  Chapter 16

  If science can’t help solve this THRILLING national emergency,” I said to myself, “that leaves art. But how can art help us now?”

  That’s when I realized it was the skill and vision of an artist that had created a horse statue so lifelike it fooled the giant fly. Perhaps . . . perhaps that artist could save us now.

  “Quick, Nina! Take me to the studio of Vanessa Cowcow right now!”

  “That rhymed,” said Nina.

  “Oh, sorry.”

  “I don’t like rhymes,” she said.

  “I said I was sorry,” I pleaded.

  “You’d better be,” she said.

  Nina was grumpy and rude all the way to Vanessa Cowcow’s studio, but she got me there without too much trouble.

  “Vanessa Cowcow! Vanessa Cowcow!” I yelled, banging on the door with a leaf.

  The door opened. A cow came out.

  “Mmmm! Yummers! Lunch!” the cow said and tried to eat me!

  Nina stepped in the way. No one was having lunch without her.

  “NO! I’m not lunch! I’m Inspector Flytrap, and I need your help to save the world!”

  “Oh . . . OK. Come right in,” she said.

  I explained the problem.

  “Since the President won’t let us take the statue down, we need you to make a new, even bigger statue that will make the fly go away.”

  “A bigger statue? OK . . . but what will it be a statue of?”

  “It needs to be the scariest thing in the world . . . to a fly.”

  “A spider?” she guessed.

  “No, that would scare everybody else, too.”

  “A flyswatter?” she guessed.

  “No, that would be ugly! We need something beautiful!”

  “I give up,” she said.

  “Oh, come on . . . think . . . something that scares flies . . . but is also beautiful . . . or perhaps I should say handsome!”

  “Oh no,” groaned Vanessa Cowcow.

  “Oh no,” moaned Nina.

  “Oh yes!” I exclaimed. “What we need is an enormous statue of . . . ME!”

  Chapter 17

  My phone rang. I was busy, so I let the caller leave a message on my voicemail.

  “Hello, this is Inspector Flytrap. I can’t answer the phone right now because I am posing for the famous artist Vanessa Cowcow, who is sculpting a 500-foot-tall statue of me to ride on top of the statue of President Horse G. Horse.”

  Click.

  “Flyslap! This is President Horse G. Horse! Tell Vanessa to hurry! The alien space fly has destroyed the Millard Fillmore Monument and the Supreme Court’s Robe Depository. Worst of all, it’s eaten the world’s largest banana from the U.S. Botanical Garden!”

  “Big peel,” said Nina.

  Chapter 18

  For the next week, the giant alien space fly continued to fly above the city.

  But the citizens were no longer helpless!

  Oh, wait—they were still helpless, actually, when the giant fly swooped down to eat their cars, houses, bicycles, garages, and supermarkets.

  But they weren’t HOPELESS!

  They all had hope now, because, soon, high above the city buildings, a giant statue of me would stand guard.

  Following orders from Vanessa Cowcow, whole herds of sheep were working to create the largest statue in America out of bricks, marble, steel beams, duct tape, and empty egg cartons.

  Each day it grew by five or six stories. But no one could see it, because Vanessa Cowcow insisted that it be kept under a tarp.

  “
Oh, Nina,” I sighed. “Imagine how beautiful the city will look with this giant statue of me towering above it!”

  Nina began hacking and gagging. Possibly she was choking on the linoleum floor she was eating.

  Chapter 19

  My phone rang.

  “Flyclap! Get down here! Statue’s ready!” yelled the very familiar, very rude voice of President Horse G. Horse.

  “My name is—,” I began.

  But he had already hung up.

  Nina pushed me down to the Capitol Building.

  There was the enormous statue of President Horse G. Horse, and perched on its back was an even taller statue covered with an enormous tarp.

  The whole area was packed with turkey news reporters, donkey congressmen, sheep sculptors, duck Secret Service agents, a sloth eating a hot dog, and nine geese in their underwear. (These were the Supreme Court Justices. You may recall that their Robe Depository had been destroyed.) Thousands and thousands of other animal citizens were there, too.

  Nina pushed me up to the Capitol steps, where the President and Vanessa Cowcow were waiting.

  “Hurry! Hurry! The alien space fly is about to attack the White House! That’s where I live!”

  “OK . . . unveil the sculpture!” shouted Vanessa Cowcow, and a team of oxen began pulling on the ropes attached to the tarp. Finally it fell free, and the world’s most amazingly beautiful statue was revealed.

  It was me looking extremely brave. . . and, of course, handsome.

  But would it work? Would it really scare away the giant alien space fly?

  A loud roaring buzz gave us our answer! The mighty insect was zooming in close to get a good look!

  Then the giant alien space fly made a thunderous hacking and gagging sound.

  Then it turned skyward and zoomed away . . . up, up, up through the atmosphere and into space . . . leaving our planet in peace forever.

  Chapter 20

  The crowd let out a mighty cheer!

  President Horse G. Horse hopped up and down, neighing, “You saved the White House! You saved my salt and pepper shaker collection! You saved my limo! Oh yeah—also the city, the country, and the world!”