— 11 —
“I DID WHAT?” MADISON LOOKED outraged. “You think I vandalized the storage area?” She looked from Bob to Mrs. Food and back again.
“She did WHAT?” Butterbean yelped. “It wasn’t Madison! It was the raccoons, right, Oscar?”
“Right,” Oscar said in a low voice. “Oh, this is bad.”
Mrs. Food put her hand on Madison’s shoulder. “That’s a very serious accusation, Bob.”
Bob raised his hands defensively. “I don’t like it any more than you do. But you can take a look at the surveillance video. Madison, you were the last one to go in last night. The ONLY one to go in. There was no damage before you went in. I had just checked it myself.”
“But it wasn’t me,” Madison said. She turned to Mrs. Food, her voice pleading. “I didn’t touch anything. I just went to our storage area. I told you, everything looked fine when I left.”
“But can’t they see it was the raccoons?” Butterbean whispered.
“Those cameras, they only show the humans—isn’t that what Dunkin said?” Walt said softly. “They’re positioned too high to show the floor.”
“Right. And the raccoons wouldn’t be coming in through the door.” Oscar clicked his beak in frustration.
“I believe you, Madison,” Mrs. Food said, shooting a steely glare at Bob. “Bob, this is a mistake. Madison didn’t do this.”
“I’d love to hear an alternate explanation. I really would. Madison?” He folded his arms and waited. “Can you explain this?”
Madison shifted from foot to foot. “No? I mean… I didn’t…” Her chin started to quiver.
“Madison, why don’t you finish getting ready for school while I talk to Bob,” Mrs. Food said, patting Madison on the back. “I’ll take care of this misunderstanding.”
Madison nodded wordlessly and ran to her room.
Bob waited until Madison’s door was shut before he turned back to Mrs. Food. “Look, there is nobody who wants this to go away more than I do. But the surveillance footage is pretty clear. It has to be Madison. And the sooner she comes clean, the better.”
“She says she didn’t do it, Bob.” Mrs. Food’s voice was hard. “I have to believe her. I’ll want to see those surveillance tapes.”
“Sure, sure.” Bob rubbed his forehead. “And I admit, it’s not like her. Maybe you’ll see something I didn’t. It’s just that lady on six, she’s on the condo board, and she’s talking fines, disciplinary hearings, you name it. She’s a real piece of work.”
“Has she seen the tape yet?” Mrs. Food asked.
Bob shook his head. “Not yet. I’ve kept Madison’s name out of it for now, but I won’t be able to much longer.”
Mrs. Food looked grim. “I’ll be down to see the tapes right after Madison leaves for school.”
Bob nodded and turned to leave.
“We’ve got to get those raccoons to stop!” Butterbean said after Bob had gone. “They’re getting Madison in trouble!”
Oscar narrowed his eyes. “Oh, they’ll stop. They’ll have to. Or they’ll have to deal with me.”
Mrs. Food went downstairs to watch the surveillance tapes as soon as Madison left for school. Madison hadn’t even said goodbye to the animals when she left. She had just stared at the floor and nodded whenever Mrs. Food tried to comfort her.
When Mrs. Food came back, she had Mrs. Third Floor with her. Mrs. Third Floor was Mrs. Food’s best friend, and she said she was there for moral support. (Butterbean felt like that should be her department, since she was training to be a therapy dog, but she didn’t say anything. Mrs. Food looked like she needed all the moral support she could get.)
“So if it wasn’t Madison, who could it have been?” Mrs. Third Floor asked, sipping a cup of coffee. “There wasn’t anyone else in the video?”
“No one,” Mrs. Food said, frowning. “It was just like Bob said. No one went in after Madison. Not until Bob went in this morning.”
“Aha!” Mrs. Third Floor said triumphantly. “Maybe it was Bob!”
Mrs. Food shook her head. “No, he barely comes into the room before he leaves again. You can see him reacting to the mess.”
“Shoot,” Mrs. Third Floor said, stirring her coffee. She stared into her cup.
“I don’t see an explanation,” Mrs. Food said.
“Could it be…” Mrs. Third Floor hesitated. “I mean, it couldn’t be a ghost, could it?”
“NO!” Mrs. Food and Oscar and Walt burst out simultaneously. They’d already had to deal with Mrs. Third Floor imagining ghosts in the building. They didn’t want to deal with that again.
“No, I don’t think so,” Mrs. Food said more calmly, patting Mrs. Third Floor’s hand. “It is a mystery, though. I just wish I knew what to say to get Madison off the hook.”
“Maybe you should talk to someone official? Maybe Carmen?” Mrs. Third Floor said tentatively. Carmen was a police officer who’d recently moved into the building. Butterbean’s ears pricked up. Carmen had been helpful in their past investigations.
Mrs. Food shook her head. “She’s out of town this week,” she said. “And I really don’t want to get the police involved if I can help it, even informally.”
“That’s understandable.” Mrs. Third Floor sighed. “Well, we know Madison didn’t do it. Maybe she can just lay low for a while, and it’ll work itself out?”
“Maybe,” Mrs. Food said. But she didn’t sound convinced.
Walt was also not convinced. “That plan will absolutely not work,” she said as they watched Mrs. Third Floor leave. “If some condo board member is out for blood, Madison won’t be able to lay low enough. There won’t be a low enough.” She bristled at the thought. “Oscar, how soon can we activate Operation Raccoon?”
“Now,” Oscar said, opening his cage door. “I’m going down now.”
Walt blinked. “Um, hold on there a sec,” she said, shooting a look in the direction of Mrs. Food. “How are you planning to do that? It’s daytime. We can’t just go down there, especially not if they’re cleaning up the storage area. People will see us.”
“I’m not going to the storage area,” Oscar said calmly. “Here’s the plan. Walt, you and Butterbean stay here. We need you to keep Mrs. Food occupied so she doesn’t notice I’m gone. Marco and Polo—you head down into the vents. See if you can get information on what’s going on in the storage area. I’ll head down to talk to the raccoons.”
Walt rolled her eyes. “Did you not hear me? The storage area has PEOPLE in it.”
“That’s not a problem,” Oscar said, watching as Mrs. Food walked slowly down the hallway to her office. “Because I’m not going to the storage area. I’m going to the loading dock.” He hopped out of his cage and flexed his wings. “Walt, open the window, please. I’m flying. OUTSIDE.”
Operation Flying Outside (as Oscar was secretly calling it) took longer to implement than he’d expected. About fifteen minutes longer, to be exact. Mostly because he hadn’t expected to spend fifteen minutes arguing with Butterbean and Walt, who were convinced that his flying to the loading dock alone was a bad idea.
Oscar was finally able to convince them they were wrong. And now, seconds after leaping dramatically out of the apartment window, he realized he’d been right. It wasn’t a bad idea.
It was a terrible idea.
Sure, launching himself out of the window had felt heroic and exciting. But once Oscar was airborne, he was forced to admit a few uncomfortable truths. Namely, he was an apartment bird, and as an apartment bird, he was not in great flying shape. Also, he didn’t know his way around outside very well. (“Very well” in this case meaning “at all.”) And there were people. Lots of people. He could see them on the sidewalks, in cars, standing at bus stops, everywhere. Everywhere.
Oscar decided to ignore the people. (They were making him light-headed.) Instead, Oscar decided to focus on flying and keeping himself in the air. (Which was easier said than done.) He dove down a little lower and circled the building, scanning the ground for the loading dock. When he finally spotted it, he took one last backward glance in the direction of his window. He couldn’t even tell which one it was anymore. Oscar didn’t want to think about how he was going to find his way back.
Looking around anxiously, Oscar landed clumsily on the loading dock, trying hard to stay on his feet. His wings felt like jelly. And the last thing he wanted was to be seen by someone who knew about birds. Partly because a crash landing was always embarrassing, and partly because that someone would know that a mynah bird probably shouldn’t be hanging out next to the building dumpster. (It was mostly the embarrassing part, though.)
But there was no one. Oscar breathed a sigh of relief, and then frowned. No people was a good thing. But no rats? No raccoons? That was a problem.
Oscar perched on the edge of the loading dock and peered down to the ground below. It was going to be very difficult to get the raccoons to stop if he couldn’t find them.
Oscar cocked his head and examined the dumpster. If there was one place on this loading dock likely to attract raccoons, it had to be that dumpster. The lid looked like it was shut tight, but there was some intriguing-looking crud lying underneath on the ground. That had to be the spot.
Taking a deep breath, Oscar hopped off the loading dock. He just hoped he wasn’t making the worst mistake of his life.
Marco and Polo hurried down the vents, their footsteps echoing as they went.
“We don’t have Chad, so we won’t be able to go into the storage room through the door,” Marco said as he slid down one of the connecting vents.
“We’ll just look through the grates. That’s better anyway,” Polo said. “I don’t want to accidentally run into Bob.”
“Or a raccoon,” Marco agreed. Polo shuddered. “So where should we start?” Marco asked. “Storage room or main basement area?”
“Basement?” Polo said.
“Right.” Marco peered down a vent. “I think this is it?” The vents on the main floor weren’t set up the same way as the upper-floor vents, since there were no apartments. “If we’re lucky, maybe we’ll find Dunkin or one of the other rats. We might not find them, though. Those guys can be pretty stealthy sometimes.”
He slid down into the basement vent and then stopped short, blocking the vent opening. Polo slammed into him from behind, sending them both tumbling forward as she shot into the room.
“Hey!” Polo said. “What’s the—oh. Guess we got lucky, huh?”
She stood up and looked around. The basement vent had basically become one long rat dormitory, with rats sprawled out on small white beds all along the walls. Polo examined the nearest bed. “Wait a minute! Is that a—”
“Pom-pom sock, that’s right,” Dunkin said, appearing out of the darkness. “Those are the best, see, because they have a built-in pillow.”
“I know!” Polo said. She’d slept in a pom-pom sock once, and it really was comfortable. “Where’d you get them all?”
Dunkin looked shifty. “Oh, you know. Around.”
“Um. Okay,” Polo said, making a mental note to check Madison’s sock drawer. “So what’s going on down here? Any sign of the raccoons?”
Dunkin snorted. “Not hardly. They’ve taken over all of our best spots, and now the storage area isn’t even safe. So this is what it’s come to. Bunking in the vents.” Dunkin made a face. “Did you know that maintenance guy has been in the storage area all day? Just because those raccoons had a party.” He rolled his eyes.
“I know it seems bad,” Polo said encouragingly. “But it’s practically taken care of.”
“Oscar’s going to talk to the raccoons on the loading dock right now,” Marco said. “He’s got it covered.”
“He was very determined,” Polo said.
Dunkin snorted again. “Well, he’ll have to get past that big one. The Raccoon King, I call him. He calls all the shots with those guys. And I don’t think he’s going to listen to any apartment bird. No offense.” Dunkin shrugged. “Am I right, Ken?”
An arm shot up from the depths of one of the pom-pom socks and gave a thumbs-up. “Right,” Ken’s muffled voice called out.
Marco and Polo exchanged a worried glance. “Well, you don’t know Oscar,” Marco said.
“Yeah,” Polo added. “One thing about Oscar. He knows what he’s doing.”
Oscar did not know what he was doing. It was insane, that’s what it was. The patchy asphalt around the loading dock had gravel strewn around on it, and Oscar’s feet made crunching sounds as he hopped awkwardly toward the dumpster. He was going to twist an ankle—he just knew it.
Taking one last look around to make sure the coast was clear, Oscar shaded his eyes and peered under the dumpster. There, in the shadows, he could see a dark pile, half-hidden by the dumpster wheels. It looked furry.
“Raccoons,” Oscar said under his breath. He fluffed his feathers up to make himself look bigger, and then took one tentative step under the dumpster. The raccoons were asleep, which would make it easier to deal with them. He just needed to be firm. Stand tall. Tell them what’s what. He could do that.
Taking a deep breath, Oscar marched over to the furry pile and nudged it with his foot. He braced himself, waiting. Then he nudged again.
Nothing.
Something was wrong. Oscar leaned over the fur pile, pushing it again with his foot. It felt wrong, somehow. Oscar cocked his head. It didn’t just feel wrong. It SMELLED wrong. He peered closely at the pile and then gave a sharp barky laugh. It wasn’t a pile of sleeping raccoons. It was a wadded-up fur coat.
Oscar felt himself deflate. He couldn’t believe he’d been fooled like that. The coat smelled like flowery perfume and mothballs—it was obviously one of the items missing from the storage unit. He might not know everything about raccoons, but he knew enough to know that they didn’t smell like flowers and mothballs. Oscar couldn’t believe he’d wasted all this time for nothing.
He gave the coat one last frustrated kick, glaring at it as he did. He was just in time to see a pair of eyes gleaming in the darkness of the coat’s folds.
And a hand reach out and grab his leg.
