Apparently Nanny X has the shopping skills of a rabbit, or maybe a harbor seal, because no human being would want the food she bought. Still, I followed her to Mr. Strathmore’s office at the Chamber of Commerce, which was a tall, thin, brick building squashed between Colliton’s Bike Shop and Robinson Funeral Home.
Since he’d been onstage looking at the crowd (until he started fighting with the anti-factory lady and the mayor got hit), Nanny X thought Mr. Strathmore might have seen something. It was pretty clear to me the only thing he saw was dollar signs.
He was sitting in his office, still dressed in his suit. But he wasn’t alone. A man was in there with him.
The man wore a Hawaiian shirt, and he smelled like he’d taken a bath in suntan lotion. His eyes were small and beady, like Jason Geddy’s hamster’s.
He was short but he had big hands, and one of those hands was holding a tall glass of something. You didn’t have to be a special agent to figure out that it was a coconut smoothie.
“Good afternoon,” said Nanny X, not flashing her badge for once. “We are concerned citizens who were at the rally this afternoon.”
“I’m sorry, miss, this is a private meeting,” said Mr. Strathmore, who was also drinking a smoothie.
“So polite,” Nanny X said to us. “You see, children? Good manners are important when you deal with the public.” She turned back to Mr. Strathmore. “Excuse me, but we won’t take up much of your time. We hoped you could tell us some more about that interesting company that wants to set up shop here.” She turned to the Hawaiian-shirt man. “Or perhaps you could tell us?”
The man grinned at Nanny X, showing off a mouthful of perfect teeth. “Who, me?” he said. “It could be that I’m just a concerned citizen like yourself, trying to make sure that Lovett is open for business. It’s business that rules the world, you know.”
“Business that drives the economy,” agreed Mr. Strathmore.
“Business that gives you power,” said the stranger. “Business that is king!” He laughed. “We’re sure you’ll see it our way, once we replace the park with a factory and a small airstrip. All kids love airplanes.”
“But there are two airports nearby already,” Nanny X said. “And the noise—”
“—will be the noise of progress!” said Mr. Strathmore. “Now, I’m sorry, but you really must go. Like I said, this meeting is private. You’ll have to make an appointment.” He shut the door, but we could still hear them talking. Part of it sounded like “blah, blah, blah,” but we distinctly heard the words “Listen, Big Adam.”
The man in the Hawaiian shirt was Big Adam. Something told me that Nanny X knew all along.
“You don’t have any drinking glasses in that diaper bag, do you?” I asked her.
“Are you thirsty?”
I was, but that wasn’t the point. “For listening. I’ve tried it; it really works.” I didn’t mention that I’d tried it on my parents when I was trying to find out more about our nanny situation. I didn’t overhear anything, except that my mother was not hiring a woman named Lola because she refused to change diapers.
“I don’t approve of eavesdropping,” Nanny X said, “unless we’re doing it for professional purposes. Which we are.” She fished around in the diaper bag for a minute and came out with a purple sippy cup with a juggling panda on the front. “Voilà.”
From the outside, it looked like an ordinary sippy cup. But inside, there was a jumble of wires. She reached into the cup part and pulled out a teething cracker, which she slid under the door.
“Follow me,” she said. “Quickly.”
We followed her down the hall and stopped outside the bathroom.
“I can’t go into the ladies’ room,” Jake announced.
“Fine,” said Nanny X. She led all of us into the men’s room.
“But you can’t come in here,” Jake said.
“This is an extraordinary situation, Jake Z. Desperate times. Desperate measures.” For once, I agreed with Nanny X. I hadn’t been inside of a men’s room since I was about Eliza’s age. One thing I noticed right away was that they had pink soap, just like they have in the ladies’ room.
After the bathroom door swung shut, Nanny X fitted the top part of the sippy cup into the bottom part—only upside down, so it looked like a tiny satellite dish. At first all we heard was static. But Nanny X pushed a button on the panda’s nose, and the top part of the cup started rotating. Two voices came through the speaker, clear as day.
“The mayor’s completely sold on my plan.”
“So am I, Big Adam.”
I knew those beady eyes meant something bad, the B.A.D. kind of bad.
“You may call me Coconut King if you’d rather. Or King for short. How many votes have we got?”
“We’ve got three of the five committee members. Kathleen Walker is undecided. And Hans Baxter is against. But I haven’t been able to reach Hans today—he appears to be missing.”
“Is that so?” said Big Adam with an evil laugh. “It’s locked up, then. In five hours, the path will be cleared and my empire will have found a new home.”
“Cheers,” said Mr. Strathmore.
“Cheers,” said Big Adam.
“Eeee eeee.” The sound that came over the speaker was almost human, but it could have been a squeaky desk chair. Yeti’s ears perked up and he turned his head sideways, but he didn’t bark.
“Hush,” said Big Adam. “Now. That woman who was just here—I didn’t like her. She was too nosy.”
I looked at Nanny X over the sippy cup, and she put her finger to her lips.
“She might cause trouble,” Big Adam continued. “We need to make sure she stays out of the way.”
“What trouble could she cause?” said Mr. Strathmore. “She’s a grandmother or a baby-sitter or something.”
“Yes, but I saw those children she was with talking to that other kid,” said Big Adam. “The one who . . . took out the mayor. They may have been in on it.”
“I don’t see how that’s possible,” said Mr. Strathmore. “And while we’re at it, I don’t think that kid was responsible, either. Something about it just doesn’t add up.”
“You don’t think the kid was responsible?”
“No,” said Mr. Strathmore. “I really don’t. I was on that stage when the mayor got hit. The angle was all wrong for the kid to have done it. And why would he have bothered? It doesn’t make sense. Listen, Big Adam—”
“King.”
“Listen, King. Goodness knows Lovett wants your business, and you know we want to accommodate you in any way we can, but I can’t see doing it at the expense of Lovett’s children. We’re already taking their park. We can’t be throwing kids in jail and getting grandmothers out of the way, can we? That’s not what a friendly community does.”
“I’m telling you, we need to keep our enemies where we can see them. That’s good business.”
“The missing commission member—Hans Baxter—you wouldn’t know anything about his whereabouts, would you?”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want answered.”
“Then you—”
“I’ll tell you what, Strat,” Big Adam interrupted. “I’m going to make a little pit stop, and when I come back, I’m hoping you’ll stop asking questions and see things my way. My little friend will stay here to keep you company.”
What little friend was he talking about? We hadn’t seen anyone else in the office.
“Are you threatening me?” Mr. Strathmore asked.
“So what if I am?”
“If you are, I’m not sure how much I want you for a business partner after all.”
“You back out now,” said Big Adam, “and you’ll see what I can do with a coconut.”