Lot nineteen. An important zucchini crayon,” said Alf, sounding a little nasal. “Who will start the bidding at one thousand dollars?”
“Why is everything he sells ‘important’?” I wondered. “He keeps using that word.”
“Maybe ‘important’ is auction-talk for ‘stupid,’ ” said Freak. “Everything he’s called important so far has looked pretty stupid to me.”
“You guys”—Fiona sighed—“are so important.”
I was right. She was beginning to like us.
“Five? Do I hear five? FiveFiveFiveFiveFive—six! Any advance on six? Make your mark with a zucchini crayon!” Alf threw the comment at Avram Belize, who promptly bid six.
“Be the envy of all the other kids on your block, with your very own zucchini crayon!” brought a bid of seven from the guy from Topeka. “Hold it with your toes; stuff it up your nose—eat it with some cheese; kiss it if you please—if you’re the high bidder!”
Alf, I could see, was getting cranked up. He was sounding more and more like the fast-talking auctioneers you sometimes saw on TV. What was worse, he was talking in hip-hop rhythm. “Scribble on your legs; fry it with some eggs—make you feel complete; wouldn’t that be neat?”
“He’s a crayon rapper,” said Freak.
I realized Alf was taunting his father. His last rhyme had been a jab at his father’s CCD, and it sounded like he was just getting started.
“Use it in the dark; feed it to a shark—you will be fulfilled, when you pay the bill!”
Topeka stood up. He weighed about four hundred pounds. It was possible he was Edward Disin wearing a fat suit. We had about ninety discarded toothpicks, though, that said he wasn’t.
“Eight!” said Alf. “EightEightEightEightEight!” It sounded like he was describing what Topeka had done to most of the hors d’oeuvres.
Avram Belize jumped up and glared at Topeka from across the room.
“Nine!” said Alf. “Any advance on nine?”
Belize and Topeka faced each other like gunslingers in a showdown. Topeka loosened his tie. Sweat broke out on his forehead.
“Twenty. Thousand. Dollars,” said Cicely Shillingham slowly and deliberately from the back of the room.
Everybody turned and stared at her. She cocked one eyebrow and sat with her arms folded across her chest like she was ready to take on anybody there.
Belize scowled and threw himself back in his seat. “Out!” he growled. Topeka sighed and lowered himself back onto his chair. The chair creaked a little.
“I have a bid for twenty thousand dollars,” said Alf. “Increments of two thousand, please. Do I hear twenty-two?”
Sheik Geisel al-Rashid quietly raised his lollipop stick.
“All right!” said Freak, nudging me with his elbow. “Here we go!”
“Come on, Alecto!” I cheered under my breath, making Cicely Shillingham the home team.
“I have twenty-two for an important zucchini crayon. Make your bid just right—take it home tonight! Do I have twenty-four?”
I held my breath. By the terms of our agreement with Alf, Fiona and Freak and I would share equally in whatever amount the crayon finally sold for. Twenty-four thousand dollars split three ways was eight grand each. I knew of one debt Freak’s father had that eight grand would make a decent dent in. I wondered how generous I could bring myself to be with my share.
Then I remembered how Freak’s father had treated him when we were trying to catch the cat. If it would help make Freak’s life any better, I decided I could be pretty generous.
Cicely Shillingham pretended her hand was a pistol and shot it toward the ceiling.
“Twenty-four,” said Alf.
The sheik raised his lollipop stick.
“Twenty-six.”
Cicely fired another shot at the ceiling. She brought her index finger to her mouth and blew imaginary smoke away from her fingertip. We hadn’t been introduced, but I decided I liked her.
“Write a little poem, when you get it home—BUT you can’t begin it, until you win it! Do I hear twenty-eight?”
“Sure,” said Cicely, folding her arms back across her chest like playtime was over for the year. “Why not?”
Alf looked at the sheik. The sheik looked at Alf. “No rhyme?” asked the sheik.
“Stick it in your ear; make it disappear,” purred Alf.
The sheik once again raised his lollipop stick. By this time, the end of it was pretty well chewed.
“Thirty!” said Alf. “Any advance on thirty?” He looked at Cicely. The silence in the room was so deep, you could have heard a lollipop stick drop. Unfortunately, none did. I thought I saw Alf shake his head ever so slightly. Cicely stared at him and did nothing.
“Thirty thousand dollars for lot nineteen,” said Alf. “An important zucchini crayon. Going once, going twice—sold to Sheik Geisel al-Rashid for thirty thousand dollars!”
Alf banged his auction gavel. Everybody applauded.
Freak and Fiona and I let out a loud whoop! then linked arms and danced around in a circle, stopping only when we realized we had linked arms and were dancing around in a circle.
“Thank you all for attending,” said Alf, banging his gavel again. “Those wishing to settle their accounts may do so with me at the far table. Eight bidders were responsible for procuring all nineteen lots; this should not take long.”
Alf headed for a folding card table set up in front of the French doors. As the auction guests started to get up from their seats, Sheik Geisel stood, plucked the lollipop stick from his mouth, and dropped it to the floor.
“Got it!” I said, and raced in with my tray.
I almost got it. A group of four people shuffled along the aisle where the sheik had been sitting and, after they had passed, the stick was gone.
The sheik motioned to his driver, and the driver walked briskly to the accounting table. He was not quite quick enough. The representative from the House of Wax, a crayon museum in Los Angeles, got there first. She proceeded to write a check for her auction lot.
I kept my eye on the four people. Fortunately, three of them stopped at the end of the aisle and got involved in a conversation. I ran over to them and shouted, “Congratulations!”
That was my entire plan. Shouting “Congratulations!” I had no idea what came next.
They stopped talking and looked at me.
“Hello,” I said, a big smile frozen on my face. I looked desperately around the room. Freak gave me a “What the?” shrug. Fiona was oblivious, gazing down at her feet. Alf was looking desperately around the room, searching for a sign from us.
“One of you,” I said, looking at the three expectant faces, “may have… won the door prize! Could you check the bottom of your feet?”
“Check the bottom of our… feet?” said a redheaded lady.
“We’re looking for a piece of paper with the word winner on it.”
“Aren’t those things usually on the bottom of our seat?”
“Oh!” I said. “Seat! We thought he said feet. Could you check anyway?”
At the accounting table the sheik had produced three fat envelopes from within his burnoose. Alf opened the first envelope and slowly started counting one-hundred-dollar bills, all the while casting nervous glances around the room. The two federal agents positioned themselves on either side of him.
The redheaded lady obligingly sat and stuck her legs out. I looked at the bottom of her shoes. “No, I’m sorry,” I said.
“Is that it?” asked one of her friends, bending her left leg back and craning her neck over her shoulder to see.
“No,” I said. “That’s toilet paper.”
None of the three had the lollipop stick. I looked around for the fourth person who had been in the sheik’s aisle. Avram Belize. He was standing at the end of the payment line. As I raced over to him, Alf was counting out the second envelope.
“Excuse me, sir,” I said breathlessly, “but you’ve just won a free shoeshine!” I snapped my waiter’s towel smartly and bent down. Belize stood solidly on both feet and refused to move.
“I’m wearing paint-spattered overalls,” he growled. “Do you think I ever get my shoes shined?”
I stood up. “You’ve won a shoeshine OR the equivalent value in cash!”
“Really? How much?”
“I’ll have to do an estimate.”
I dived down again. This time, Belize picked up his feet for me. Stuck in the tread of his right boot was the stick. I grabbed it, stood, and raced over to where Alf could see me.
I held up my DNA tray, placed the lollipop stick against it, and pushed the button.
Nothing happened.
The tray did not glow. The DNA on the stick did not match that of Edward Disin. Alf looked stricken.
He finished counting out the contents of the final envelope. He smiled weakly and handed the box containing the zucchini crayon to the sheik. The sheik bowed formally to Alf and turned to leave. The male Treasury agent—Mr. North—whispered in Alf’s ear. Alf shook his head and North frowned. The sheik headed for the door and nobody tried to stop him.
“I don’t believe this,” said Freak, coming up next to me. “How could Disin not be here?”
Fiona hopped over to us on one foot. She was holding one of her shoes in her hand.
“What’s with you?” I asked.
“I stepped in gum,” she said, waving her shoe under my nose. “Can you believe it?”
I couldn’t believe it. Here, all of our plans had gone wrong, we weren’t about to capture Edward Disin, the population of the planet Earth would soon be slaving away in his shipyards singing show tunes, and Fiona was worried about gum on her shoe. She started scraping it off with her tray.
Mr. North cleared his throat authoritatively and seemed to come to a decision. He bolted around the accounting table and trotted across the room, intercepting the sheik just before he and his driver made it to the door.
“Excuse me!” North bellowed, loud enough to get the attention of everyone in the room. “Sheik Geisel al-Rashid? Of the Unaligned Emirates?” The sheik nodded. “I am agent William North of the United States Treasury Department.” North flashed his ID. “And I am arresting you in the name of the United States government. You have the right to remain silent…”
We listened, stunned, as North read the sheik his rights. North’s partner, Ms. Beauceron, seemed as much caught off guard as the rest of us, but she recovered quickly and raced over to assist him. Neither one of them had drawn a gun.
“What is the charge?” asked the sheik.
“There is probable cause to believe you are a key figure in a terrorist plot against the United States.”
“I have come to this country only to purchase this crayon,” said the sheik, waving the box Alf had just given him.
“A crayon,” said North, “that could easily be used to draw plans, sketch maps, and send messages inimical to the welfare of the people of the United States. I will take that, thank you.” North plucked the box from the sheik’s hand. “Cuff them.”
The sheik and his driver exchanged glances, and the sheik shook his head as the two were handcuffed.
“This is a very bad example of the worst kind of profiling,” said the sheik.
“No,” said North, tucking the crayon box into his jacket. “It’s a very good example of the worst kind of profiling. Can you explain to me your reasons for wearing a false beard?”
North grabbed the sheik’s beard beneath the left ear and pulled. The beard came off the sheik’s face with a loud ripping sound.
“I am very self-conscious about the dimple in my chin,” explained the sheik. “So I wear the beard to conceal it.”
“Why not just grow your own beard?” demanded North.
“Then I would not match my passport photo.”
“Your passport is no doubt bogus to begin with. The name Geisel, while similar to the name Faisal, is not a genuine Arabic name. It is, in fact, the real name of beloved children’s book author Dr. Seuss.”
“My mother was very fond of The Cat in the Hat,” said the sheik. “You know nothing of the people of the Unaligned Emirates!”
“Watch these two,” said North to Ms. Beauceron. “I’m going to the car to radio for backup.” North turned to leave.
“Wait a minute,” said Fiona. When no one paid her any attention, she shouted, “HEY! WAIT! DON’T LET THAT MAN OUT!” She sprinted toward the Treasury agents, waving her DNA tray in the air.
The chewing gum she’d been prying off her shoe clung to the tray, and the tray was brightly glowing.
There had been only one person in the room chewing gum. That had been Treasury Agent North.
All three of us had offered North and his partner things from our serving trays, but when both had declined, we hadn’t pressed them. They were the agents Alf had invited there to arrest Edward Disin. It had never occurred to us that one of those agents might, in fact, be Edward Disin.
Fiona flashed her glowing tray at Alf as she ran past him. Freak and I charged after her, waving our arms in the air, shouting, “WAIT! STOP! THAT’S HIM! HELP!”
Alf shouted at Beauceron, “HE’S NOT WHO YOU THINK HE IS! IT’S HIM!”
Edward Disin, already at the double doors that led to the hallway, twisted the handles and tried to fling them open. They opened about an inch and stopped abruptly.
Disin threw his full body weight against the doors and they opened another inch. Then they refused to budge. His look of triumph was replaced by one that, to me, looked like panic.
We stopped short, realizing we were almost within grabbing range of him but weren’t quite sure how dangerous it would be to grab him. He plowed his shoulder into the doors and still they refused to give. Through the two-inch gap between them I could just see what was holding them shut.
It was the back of a very familiar dark green sofa.