Chapter Ten: Beware! This Is the Scary Part

Maybe you think there’s no such thing as Garbage Monsters from Outer Space, and maybe you think they don’t really have big reddish eyes and four white teeth. Well, you think whatever you want. I saw him, and he was a Garbage Monster from Outer Space. No question about it.

And what really chilled me to the bone was that there might have been dozens more of them, hundreds more. For all I knew, the place was crawling with them and I was already surrounded.

Fellers, sometimes I hate to admit that I’m scared. This time I have no problem admitting it. I was scared out of my wits. No wonder Rip and Snort had run off. Heck, I would have run off too, only . . . I didn’t. I couldn’t. My legs didn’t work. They had turned to mush.

I fell down and waited to be eaten by all those red-eyed Garbage Monsters.

It was exactly the kind of response we could have expected from Drover, but not from me. In all my years of Security Work, I had never collapsed in the face of something awful and scary, but this time it happened.

So there I lay on the ground, helpless and pitiful, petrified and paralyzed, and watched the approach of the terrible monster. He was a little guy but had these huge reddish-pink eyes, and we’re talking about eyes as big as grapefruit halves, really huge eyes compared to the size of his face.

Did I mention that they were reddish-pink? Maybe so. They were a very spooky color, and they were huge and they had this awful way of staring at you. Maybe they were shooting out laser beams or Paralyzer Rays. Yes, that was it. They were shooting out deadly Paralyzer Rays that caused even brave dogs to faint and fall upon the ground.

And those teeth! They were even awfuller than the eyes, scariest things I’d ever seen: skinny white spikes, four of ’em, that resembled . . . I don’t know what. The four white spikes on a plastic fork, and they looked very sharp and ready to tear skin from bones and bones from meat and meat from hair and . . .

He spoke.

The monster spoke. I heard his voice, plain as day, a squeaky little voice. I raised my head and swiveled one ear so that I could hear his dreadful message. What would it be, what would he say? Something about “Lowly Earth Dogs, you will now be eaten by the Garbage Monsters from Planet Ozona”?

Anyways, he spoke and I strained to hear every word, and he said . . .

HUH?

I blinked my eyes several times. I took five deep breaths and tried to calm my racing heart.

Whew! You can relax. False alarm. Did you think he was a Garbage Monster from Outer Space? Ha ha. Not me, he didn’t fool me for . . . okay, maybe I fell for his trick for a second or two, but it didn’t take me long to figure out . . .

It was Eddy the Rac. Can you believe that? Boy, what a relief. Here’s the scoop.

See, Eddy was asleep inside that second garbage barrel. All at once he heard noise and woke up and found himself locked inside a barrel with two hungry cannibals. Now, Eddy was a smart little coon, so instead of trying to run or hide, he built himself a disguise with the materials at hand.

He broke off the handle of a plastic fork and placed the bottom half under his upper lip, so that it appeared to be a set of long white fangs. And those eyes, where did he get the eyes? Ha. Two grapefuit halves. (Didn’t I say they looked “as big as grapefruits”? I did say that.) He held ’em up to his face, and all at once the little sneak had himself a pretty convincing monster disguise, good enough to send the cannibals fleeing in terror.

It even fooled me for a second or two. When it came to sneaky tricks, Eddy was the champ.

Well, he stepped out of the barrel, dropped his grapefruit eyes, and spit out the fangs. He gave me a grin. “Oh. Hi. How’s it going?”

I let the air hiss out of my lungs. “Well, you almost caused me to have a heart attack and a stroke, but otherwise, everything is great.”

“Yeah. Coyotes are bad guys. Always hungry. Dumb, too. Fell for those grapefruit eyes. Hee hee.”

“Yeah, well, those eyes were pretty convincing, pal, and even some of us who aren’t dumb got fooled.” I sat down and gave my heart a chance to slow down. “What are you doing over here in the park? Last time I saw you, you were at ranch headquarters.”

“Right. I do barrels, move around, stay busy.”

“I noticed, and would you like to guess who got blamed for that mess you made at ranch headquarters? ME. I saved your skin and then my skin got caught—and blamed. I’m now living in exile.”

“Yeah?”

“Or to put it more accurately, I’m now starving in exile. I haven’t eaten anything but grub worms since I left the ranch in disgrace.”

“Bummer. Listen, got a deal.”

I stared at him for a long moment. There he was, sitting on his back legs in the moonlight and rolling his busy little hands together. His beady eyes were sparkling with some kind of mischievous light. I had seen all of this before.

“A deal, Eddy? No thanks. I’d just as soon take my chances with cannibals and monsters as do business with you. In the long run, it would be a whole lot safer. In other words, no. No more deals.”

“You hungry?”

“No. I’m stuffed.” My stomach growled. “Okay, I’m hungry but not desperate or crazy.” It growled again. “Okay, I’m starving, but I’d rather starve than . . . what did you have in mind?”

He glanced over both shoulders and motioned me to come closer. I did. He dropped his voice to a whisper. “Listen. Two barrels. One for you, one for me. Fifty-fifty. Quick job, in and out, no heavy lifting. Bingo.”

“Eddy, listen to the voice of reason. This is a public park. We could get shot. And besides that, it’s wrong. Do you know the difference between right and wrong?”

“Sure. Smell that chicken?”

“No.” I sniffed the air. “Yes.”

“Does it smell right or wrong?”

“It smells . . . great, if you must know.”

“Is great right or wrong?”

“Well . . .”

He threw his hands in the air. “What’s great can’t be wrong, right? Which barrel you want, left or right?”

“Eddy, I feel that I’m being manipulated.”

“Left or right? Need to hurry.”

I heaved a sigh. “Eddy, I should know better but . . . okay. Anything that smells as great as that chicken can’t possibly be wrong.”

He flashed a grin. “See? Bingo. Pick a barrel.”

“I pick the one with that chicken smell.”

He pointed toward the left barrel. “Canned chicken. Good pick. Smart.”

“Thanks, but what is canned chicken?”

“Big can, had a whole chicken inside, lots of gravy on the bottom. Nice pick. You’re tough in a deal, got the best end.”

“Yeah, well, a guy has to be tough, Eddy, especially when he’s doing business with . . .” He walked away and was about to enter his barrel, the one on the right. “Wait a minute, Shorty, and listen to me. I see pink streaks on the horizon. The sun will be up in half an hour, which means that the campers and park rangers will be moving about, which means . . .”

“Right. In and out. Quick job and vanish. Better hurry.” He ducked inside the barrel.

“Thirty minutes, pal, and then I’m highballing it back to my ranch. If you’re not done, I’ll have to leave you.”

“Got it.”

Well, maybe this wouldn’t be so bad. Thirty minutes would be plenty of time for the job. I marched over to the left barrel and crawled inside. I picked up the chicken smell right away. I mean, it was strong and very interesting. This was not your ordinary smell of fried chicken, but a heavier deeper aroma—the aroma of chicken cooked in its own gravy. Wow!

I scratched my way through piles of junk—paper plates and cups, newspapers, soda pop cans—until at last I found the source of the delicious chicken aroma. Eddy had called it right. The fragrant waves were coming from a can, a large can, and I realized right away that most of the delicious gravy was located at the bottom the the can.

Well, that was no big deal. I mean, a lot of your town mutts and ordinary dogs wouldn’t have dared to stick their heads into a can, even a large one, because . . . well, fear of tight spots and dark places, I suppose. But that was no impelliment to me. No sir. When I smell chicken gravy, I can’t be stopped or discouraged by silly fears. I go right to it and take care of business.

I plunged my nose, face, and entire head into the can, and soon found myself lapping up large quantities of bodaciously good chicken gravy, the best I’d ever eaten. Wonderful stuff. Oh, and amidst the gravy and juice, I also found a few hunks of meat. This was turning out to be a heck of a deal, even better than I had dared to hope.

I mopped it up with my tongue and put a nice little shine on the bottom of the can, and at that point I was ready to . . . well, withdraw my head from the can, but I seemed to be experiencing a little difficulty . . .

Sometimes these cans don’t come off as easily as they go on, don’t you know, but maybe if I tugged with both paws . . . maybe if I stepped outside the barrel . . .

I stumbled through the garbage mess, slipped on a ketchup bottle, kicked a pickle jar, and finally bulled my way out into the fresh air of morning. It made a lot of noise, but that couldn’t be helped.

There. Now all I had to do was . . . if I could just . . .

I pulled. I tugged. I ran backwards and forwards and around in circles. I thrashed my head from side to side and . . . BONK . . . must have hit a tree or something, and by George, getting my head out from the can was turning out to be . . .

“Eddy, we have a little problem here—nothing major, nothing to cause a panic, but I need to borrow your hands for just a few seconds. See, I stuck my head into this stupid can and now . . . ha ha . . . I can’t seem to get it out, so would you . . .”

I stood still and listened and waited. Nothing.

“Eddy? Listen, pal, this may be a bigger problem than I thought. I know you’re busy in there, but I’d be mighty grateful if you’d . . . Eddy! Listen, you little sneak, you got me into this mess and I’m ordering you to come here at once. Do you hear me? Hello? Eddy? Can you hear me?”

I waited and listened. My heart began to stink. Sink, I should say. What I heard was NOT Eddy coming to rescue me from Canned Fate but . . .

. . . the hum of an approaching vehicle.

It stopped. Two men got out. Fellers, I was in deep trouble.