Mom let me keep my paper route even though there was a dognapper on the loose. It was a tough sell, but I convinced her I was a ganbariya, with the spunk to slog through the mud pits of life.
Mom was distracted by my clever Japanese skills and didn’t suspect a thing about my detective work. It was always about the detective work.
But even girl detectives with ginormous watchdogs named Genki got nervous about dognappers roaming their town before sunrise. So when I delivered papers, I rode my bike fast and kept my eyes open for suspicious characters.
This morning I stood on the pedals of my baby-blue Schwinn cruiser as I turned the corner at the end of my block, the crunching gravel under my wheels loud in the still streets. Genki ran beside me, nearly as tall as the bike. Dad had trained him to be my slobbery bodyguard, and there was no place I could go that Genki wouldn’t shadow me.
My basket was packed with rolled newspapers, and they caught air each time my bike jumped the curb or hit a rock. Like always, I had pulled my sneakers on without tying them, and the laces wagged in the wind.
At dawn, the fall sky in Denver, Colorado, was the color of purple velvet, and the air smelled like wet dirt and smoke, probably from people using their fireplaces for the first time. No one turned their porch lights on this soon after summer, so the streets were crowded with dark shadows.
I cycled with my head down, pumping so fast my feet nearly spun off the pedals. As I neared the corner house, where a kitchen light glowed like the Bat-Signal, I noticed movement in the back garden. Genki’s head snapped to attention.
I slowed down, and Genki’s gallop turned to a trot as my bike hugged the curb. We both watched as a shadowy figure shuffled around the garden, pausing to hunch over a pile of dirt. I squinted past the squat trees surrounding the yard that looked like soldiers standing guard. I could just barely see the person drag something heavy into a hole, followed by a loud “Oomph!”
I swung my leg over the crossbar. Genki matched my steps and studied my face as I rested the bike gently against the sidewalk. We hid behind a tree.
The suspicious character wore a dark robe and walked like a hunchbacked monster. As if savoring each moment, it began to fill the hole with a miniature shovel. It had to be burying a body, probably one of the dogs that had been snatched by Denver’s Dognapping Ring—nearly fifteen dogs had disappeared over the summer.
Genki leaned into me as I knelt, his whining a low and practically soundless vibration in his chest. Even though he was a big dog—a mastiff—he had a social anxiety disorder. At least, that’s what Mom said.
As I peeked around the tree trunk, my elbow knocked over a metal rooster that decorated the lawn, and it clattered like a tin-can tower tumbling to the ground. The hunchbacked monster’s head snapped up, a halo of hair frizzing in the kitchen light. I jumped and Genki barked.
I darted across the lawn and stood my bike upright before running it alongside me, Genki trotting behind. When I turned onto Colonial Avenue, I let it go. It wobbled a few feet and then crashed in front of my BFF March Winters’s house, the newspapers in my basket exploding onto the road.
Scooping an armful, I ran to March’s window—the last one on the second floor—and began chucking papers. They thudded against the house, missing his window wildly, but his light flicked on anyway. March was always the first to wake up in the Winterses’ house, rising as soon as his alarm went off at six thirty. Show-off.
He strained to open the window and then shook his head when he recognized me. “What are you doing here this early, Kazu?” he whispered.
“You need to call the police,” I whispered back. “Your neighbor is a criminal.”
March rolled his eyes. His springy dark hair was flat on one side from sleeping. “I’m not calling the police.”
“Well, I can’t do it.” I looked over my shoulder for the Hunchbacked Monster but just found Genki plopping down behind me and licking his front paws. “On account of they don’t take my calls anymore.”
“Why should I join that list?”
“Because there’s someone burying a dog over there.” I pointed across the street with a shaky finger.
Suddenly March’s alarm blared, and he disappeared from the window. I crouched on his lawn and began collecting the rolled newspapers around me, watching for the Denver Dognapper as I worked. Genki became interested in my movements and pounced on each paper before I could pick it up.
“Stop it!” I snapped, and Genki finally stopped.
“You saw it?” March reappeared in the golden light of his window frame. “My neighbor, burying a dog?”
I stood with my newspapers. “Probably one of Denver’s Missing.”
He sighed and folded his arms across his chest, tapping his elbow with his pointer finger. “I’ll call. But you stay until the police get here—in case you’re wrong.”
“Do you not know me?” The sun was coming up, and the new light made me brave. I stopped whispering. “When would I skip out on an investigation?”
“Stay right there,” he said. “I’ll unlock the front door.”
I sat on March’s curb while Mom talked to the policeman and Eleanor Fitzman, the old lady who lived kitty-corner from March. Genki leaned into me, breathing into my ear and getting slobber on my shoulder.
Mrs. Fitzman bent over her cane while she talked to Officer Perks. She was wearing a navy-blue bathrobe and had Einstein hair. The policeman glared at me from over her head, twice as tall as Mrs. Fitzman, his hair black and curly. He looked like an ordinary guy dressed in a policeman costume.
Mrs. Fitzman held one hand to her neck as she spoke. “Mister Mapples had been with me for fifteen years, which is long for a pug. And that’s five years longer than Hank now,” she said. She looked at Mom, adding, “Mr. Fitzman passed five years ago.”
Mom nodded dramatically, as if her rapt attention made up for my dognapping accusations.
As the old lady explained the slow decline of her now-dead husband, I rested my head on my knees, looking up the street at all the houses still waiting for their newspapers. At the corner house I caught an old guy watching us, his upper body leaning over a garbage can. I craned my neck to get a better look, and he turned around, pulling the garbage can behind him.
Mrs. Fitzman was still talking. “When I awoke this morning—early because of the insomnia—Mister Mapples was gone. I couldn’t bear to sit with his lifeless body one minute more, so I buried him in the flower patch.” We all knew this was true because she had unburied him for us ten minutes ago, and then shuffled inside to locate the doggie adoption certificate and a framed photograph as proof that Mister Mapples was indeed her dead dog.
Officer Perks looked like he was competing in the Most Bored Person on the Planet Contest. He pretended to take notes. Mom cinched her cotton robe tighter, stole a glance my way, and narrowed her eyes at me, deepening the crease between her brows.
“I’m so sorry Kazuko disturbed you this morning,” Mom said, motioning me over. Even though she had left the house in a hurry, her black hair was slick and perfectly straight.
I stood and walked toward them, shoving my hands deep into my jacket pockets. Genki followed, hanging his head like he knew we were in trouble.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Oh, sweetie,” Mrs. Fitzman said. She reached out and grabbed my hand. Her palm was soft and fleshy, and the dirt smiling beneath her fingernails made me like her. “You performed your civic duty. With all the dogs disappearing, you had every reason to be suspicious. Right, Officer Perks?”
Officer Perks hesitated before responding. “Kazuko is known for her passionate pursuit of truth and justice.”
Mom nodded as Officer Perks repeated, “Well known.”
“Then,” Mrs. Fitzman said, tapping her cane to each word, “good for you.”
I smiled, but stopped when Mom’s face hardened, her jawline suddenly pointy and dangerous.
“Kazuko will be late for school if we don’t hurry. And I still have to finish her route,” Mom said, squeezing my hand knuckle-tight as she did. She wasn’t happy about doing my job when she still had her own to do. She was designing a new exhibit for the Denver Exploration Museum for Kids. “My apologies, Officer Perks. And, Mrs. Fitzman, I’m sorry for your loss.”
The policeman stepped forward and grabbed my elbow to stop me. “Your dog is off its leash.” With all the dognappings, the city had gotten pretty strict about leash laws.
I shrugged. “He’s really good about following me.”
Officer Perks scratched something down on his pad and then ripped it off with flair. I took it from him and read, Loose dog warning. Next time, maximum penalty. Signed, Officer Warren Perks. I folded the paper into a tiny square and shoved it into my pocket, pinching my lips together so I wouldn’t say anything.
Mom and I walked to the car, which was parked in front of the Winterses’ house. To all the neighbors peeking from behind their curtains, it probably looked like a loving mother was guiding her daughter to the car with a gentle hand pressed to her back. But actually, Mom’s fingers drilled into my spine, and under her breath she rattled off stinging threats about extra chores and reduced screen times that continued as we drove down the street.
Genki lay across my lap, his whining echoing inside the car. “It’s okay, pup pup.” I scratched his ears to make the social anxiety go away.
“This troublemaking binge has got to stop, Kazuko Jones.” Mom drummed her fingers on the steering wheel. “What happened to my sweet girl who was all about crafts and swimming lessons and lunch dates with Mom?”
“I’m nearly eleven and one-quarter,” I said, unable to stop myself. “Not seven.”
Mom’s lecture continued as we turned onto Summer Glen, and I distracted myself by studying the house where I had seen the old man earlier. It was one of my houses, and the spookiest one on my route. Dark brown and barely visible from the road, it was shrouded by fir trees and gave me the creeps. And as we passed, I could have sworn I saw someone peeking at us through the blinds in the corner window.