The Kumquat Legacy

by Randal Koster

  “There are two sheets of paper in here as well,” said the mayor, reaching into the box. “I’ve looked at them carefully, and they are identical. You can each have one.” He handed one sheet to Loni and one to Cyril. Loni held it up so that Brent and I could look at it with her. This is what we read:

  Another mayor, another city.

  Hand the mayor this kumquat pretty!

  The gift will buy a revelation –

  The mayor has the combination.

  Here’s where to go:

  1. Arkansas, New Mexico, Kansas, Louisiana, Texas, Iowa, Wyoming, Missouri, Colorado, South Dakota

  2. Tennessee, Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, North Carolina, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Maryland.

  3. South Dakota, Kansas, Louisiana, Texas, Wyoming, Arkansas, Missouri, Colorado

  4. Montana, Kansas, Oklahoma, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wisconsin.

  5. Oregon, Utah, California, Washington, Arizona, Idaho.

  6. Colorado, Minnesota, Montana, Wyoming, Missouri, Iowa, North Dakota.

  “What does this mean?” Cyril demanded. “These are states! How are we supposed to find the city with the right mayor?

  Mayor Winston shook his head. “You know I can’t answer that. You’re on your own now.” He turned away from Cyril to look at the rest of us. He smiled. “It was a great pleasure meeting you,” he said, pushing his chair back and standing up. “I hope you’ll let me know what happens!”

  “Absolutely!” I said. We thanked him as we got up to leave.

  ****

  Soon we were out in the afternoon air, greeted warmly by the afternoon sun, a gentle breeze, and a cloudless sky. I pulled the golden kumquat from my pocket and was about to study it when I saw the look on Loni’s face. She was eyeing it excitedly. I could tell she wanted to hold it herself. Grinning, I handed it to her. She held it before her eyes, the kumquat’s surface shining brightly in the sun. We were all dazzled. She seemed to be holding a tiny star.

  We stared at it. How I wish I had been looking around, instead. Remember when I said that Cyril would make our lives miserable that afternoon? Well, now was his moment. He approached us quietly, from behind. None of us heard him. When he reached us, he snarled loudly, “What kind of deal is this?”

  We all jumped. “What’s the matter?” Brent asked, when he caught his breath.

  “You took the better kumquat!” Cyril snarled. “That’s cheating!”

  “They’re exactly the same,” I argued. “Identical!” I wondered what he was getting at.

  “Identical?” he said. “Hah!” Then, without warning, he grabbed Loni’s wrist with one hand and used the other to snatch the kumquat. Loni screamed.

  “Hey! Give that back!” Brent shouted. It was too late. Before we could do anything, Cyril was running down the steps to the street. A taxi was waiting for him there.

  “Get back here!” I shouted. I ran down the steps after him.

  The cab was pulling away just as I reached it. It stopped about thirty feet down the road, and Cyril stuck his head out the window. “I’ll have these things compared by experts!” he called out. “You want things to be fair, don’t you! You have my word that you’ll get it back!” Before I could respond, the taxi sped off and was hopelessly out of reach.

  ****

  We sat down on the steps, shocked into silence. Cyril had both kumquats. We doubted if we would ever see either of them again.

  The taxi had been sitting right there, at the foot of the steps. Cyril must have paid the cabby to wait for him. He must have known that he would want a quick getaway. Though I’m sure he didn’t know about the golden kumquats when he first arrived here, he must have planned to cause some kind of trouble all along. The taxi was ready for him.

  I looked over at my friend and my sister. They were both resting their heads on their hands. All that trouble for nothing. No treasure. Brent must have been really depressed, for he held a granola bar in his hand but didn’t eat it. My mom was quiet too. I think she wanted to say something but didn’t know what.

  I sighed and leaned backwards. Somehow, we had to get our kumquat back. We had to have a plan.

  This is going to sound stupid, but I wanted to be the one to come up with the plan. Loni had solved the first puzzle, and Brent had figured out that we should talk to the mayor instead of the governor. So far, I hadn’t contributed anything – not really. That was starting to bug me, more than you can imagine.

  And suddenly, it hit me. Maybe it was luck, but suddenly, I did come up with a plan. Not a great plan – I would be amazed if it actually worked – but it was a plan, and it was better than nothing.

  I wondered what the others would think about it. “Hey,” I said aloud, “I have an idea. Have you guys noticed anything about Cyril? Other than the fact that he’s a big jerk and has crazy hair?”

  Brent looked up and thought for a second. “I don’t know,” he said without enthusiasm. “I guess he shouts a lot. And he gets mad easily.”

  “Right!” I said. “He gets mad easily! I think can use that to get our kumquat back!”

  ****

  We packed our bags quickly back at the hotel and drove to the airport. The others sat on a bench by the ticket counter while I called the lawyer’s office on the telephone.

  “We’re in luck!” I announced, coming back. “Cyril is booked on the 6:00 flight to Los Angeles. I got us tickets on the same flight.”

  My mom shook her head in wonder. “I’m glad we’re using someone else’s money for this,” she said. “Do you know how much it costs to get tickets for a same-day flight?”

  I shrugged, not wanting to think about such things. “Look – we have to keep an eye out for Cyril. If he gets past us, there’s no hope!” I quickly organized a watch. My mom and Loni would monitor the doors on one side of the terminal, while Brent and I would keep track of the other end. First, though, I went to the gift shop and bought two of the biggest hats I could find – mine was a goofy one with the word “Columbus” stitched above a picture of the Santa Maria, and Brent’s said something like “Oh, My! Oh, My! Ohio!” Brent and I also pulled some different shirts out of our suitcases and threw them on. I didn’t think Cyril would recognize our clothes, but I didn’t want to take any chances.

  The next hour was slow and boring. We stared at those terminal doors like hawks, watching hundreds of people go in and out, with no sign of Cyril. And now it was five o’clock. Where the heck was he? I began to worry that I had gotten the day wrong – if he was supposed to leave the next day at six o’clock instead of today – when I felt a tug on my sleeve. It was Loni.

  “He’s here!” she said, panting. She had run as fast as she could from her post. My mom had followed in a quick walk and soon joined us.

  “Did he see you?” I asked quickly.

  “No!” she said proudly. “My face was behind this magazine!”

  I looked at the magazine, which she must have found discarded on a bench somewhere. She had been reading Business Executive Quarterly! Fortunately, Cyril didn’t notice. We looked across the room at the check-in line. We could see him standing there, pacing in place, looking impatient.

  “Let’s get in position,” I said, putting on my new hat and drawing it down over my eyes. “It’s show time!”

  ****

  The line moved slowly forward. One by one, people placed their carry-on luggage on the conveyor belts and stepped forward through the security scanners. The security guards, or whatever you call them, directed the line and watched each person carefully.

  There were about 20 people ahead of me when I took off my hat and tapped the person just ahead – Cyril – on the back. He turned to face me. “Hey!” I said. “What a surprise! I thought that was you!” I tried to sound friendly.

  He stared at me. He looked totally shocked. His eyes bugged out, and his mouth hung open stupidly. No words came out, thoug
h.

  “You took our golden kumquat,” I said calmly. “Can I have it back now?”

  Cyril’s eyes became slits. I could tell that he was thinking hard. “I don’t have it,” he said finally, his voice filled with phony dismay. “It was stolen!”

  “What?!” I cried. “Stolen?”

  “Yes,” he said, more quickly now. “I got mugged on the way back to my hotel. The thief – he was … a big ugly bald guy, with a gun – he stole my money and also got away with both kumquats. I don’t have mine any more, either! And all I wanted to do was have an expert look at them, to help us both out! The police can’t do much, of course. What a stinking world this is!”

  I smiled inwardly. I knew he would come up with something like this. I took a breath. “I don’t believe you,” I said. “I think you’re lying!”

  The words hit him hard, just as I hoped. Cyril looked stunned all over again. “What? Me? Lie? How dare you!”

  “You’re lying,” I continued. “You have my kumquat. Give it back!”

  Cyril’s voice rose. He was becoming angry. “I don’t have them!” he said fiercely. “I was trying to do you a favor, having them looked at by an expert. And now you accuse me of stealing? Leave me alone!”

  I pressed on. “You’re a big dirty liar. You have my kumquat. It was not stolen.”

  Cyril’s face turned a familiar deep red, and his eyes bugged out more than ever. His head began to quake, and this sent the ends of his wild hair jumping around in all directions. He looked almost too furious to speak. “I don’t have them!” he finally shouted, this time loud enough for just about the whole terminal to hear. “They were stolen! Do you hear me? Stolen!”

  “No kumquats?” I asked innocently.

  “No kumquats!” he shouted. “I don’t have any golden kumquats!”

  Of course, everyone around us was now staring at him. “Golden kumquats?” one woman asked another. “What’s he talking about?”

  Cyril turned around in fury, ready to ignore me, to pretend that I no longer existed. To his surprise, he found himself at the front of the line. The guard was motioning him forward.

  Cyril stepped up quickly and placed his small suitcase on the conveyor belt. “Your shoes too, sir,” the guard said. Cyril removed his shoes, placed them on the conveyor too, and stepped forward through the scanner. Instantly, it responded with a loud beep.

  “Step back, sir,” the guard said. “Make sure your pockets are empty and try again.”

  Suddenly, Cyril stopped looking angry. Suddenly, he looked worried. “Maybe it’s my belt buckle,” he chuckled lamely to the guard. He took his belt off and placed it in a plastic basket. He then reached into his pocket, found his keys and some coins, and put them in the basket, too.

  Trying to look confident, he stepped through the scanner again. BEEP! “This way, sir!” the guard said, sending Cyril toward another guard, who stood against the wall in back.

  I didn’t see what happened next, because Cyril positioned his body to block my view. Brent, though, saw everything. Brent, hiding under his hat, had gone through the scanner just ahead of Cyril and was now standing quietly beside the other guard.

  Brent told me later what happened. The second guard’s metal detector went off right in front of Cyril’s jacket pocket. Cyril winced and, with a backward glance to make sure I couldn’t see, reached in and held something out to him. “It’s probably just these,” he said quietly. “Completely harmless, but I suppose they are metal.”

  The guard took them in his hand. Suddenly, Brent pulled off his hat. “Those are the kumquats!” he said, loudly and excitedly. “The golden kumquats! The ones you just said were stolen from you!”

  “You have my kumquat?” I said. I had stepped through the scanner by then and now appeared at Cyril’s side, looking shocked. “You told me – heck, you told everyone here – that you didn’t have any golden kumquats!”

  Cyril ignored me. “Heh! Heh!” he chuckled to the guard. “These kids are nuts. You know how they are these days. Video games and junk food. Their minds are a mess! Listen, can I have my things back now?”

  The guard looked at him uncertainly and then looked back down at the two golden kumquats in his hand. He must have heard Cyril’s shout earlier, so he knew that Cyril was lying. Still, it wasn’t the guard’s place to deal with arguments like this. I faced the guard and spoke. “This fellow and I each got one of these things from the mayor,” I said. “If the mayor asks you, would you be willing to tell him what you’ve seen and heard here today?”

  “What?” the guard asked, newly confused. “Mayor Winston?”

  “Yes,” I continued. “You’d be able to describe this fellow easily enough, wouldn’t you? Wild hair, buggy eyes, face like a ferret? I’m sure that if the mayor heard this fellow here had both kumquats and wouldn’t give ours back, he would make a phone call to southern California. He would have this fellow disqualified, and I would get the Legacy!”

  “Disqualified? Legacy?” stammered the guard. “What are you talking about?”

  Cyril knew he was beat. He spoke up quickly. “Wait a second!” he said. “We don’t need to bring the mayor into this. I see my mistake now.” His fingers stroked his mustache, as if he were in deep thought. “Yes, yes, of course! How silly of me! One of those kumquats is yours. The thug who mugged me stole the two golden tangerines I had, not the golden kumquats. I always get those things confused! Heh, heh! Silly me!”

  “So… you’re saying that one of these things really does belong to the boy?” the guard asked slowly.

  “Yes, yes! Of course!” Cyril said. “A stupid mistake on my part. I’m so embarrassed! We needn’t trouble the mayor.” He held out his hand and waited expectantly.

  “We haven’t finished inspecting you,” the confused guard said.

  I held out my hand. “Can I have mine?” I asked. To my relief, the guard, still looking confused, dropped one of the kumquats into it. I gripped it tightly. I wasn’t about to lose it again.

  Cyril fumed at us as we left the security area. I didn’t mind. What a jerk! Let him fume! There was nothing he could do about it now. We had our kumquat back, and we were back in the race. Brent and I waited for Loni and my mom to join us, and the four of us walked to our plane’s departure gate.

  ****

  We were sitting at the gate a few minutes later. Loni found an airline magazine and opened it to a page showing a map of the United States. She sat there and stared at it intently. She was also holding the list of states from the second puzzle.

  At twenty minutes to six, I nudged her. “It’s time to get on board now,” I said. “They’re calling our seating zone!”

  She looked up at me and, for a moment, acted like she didn’t remember who I was.

  “Loni?” I said. “Let’s go!”

  “What?” she said, her mind obviously elsewhere. Then she looked very serious. “No!”

  “No?”

  “No! No!” she said. “We shouldn’t get on that plane!”

  “Loni, it’s time to go,” my mother said sternly, as she stood up.

  “No, Mom!” Loni persisted. “We shouldn’t go home. We need to fly somewhere else! I’ve solved the second puzzle!”

  Chapter 5: Cyril at his Worst

  Loni pulled my mom aside and whispered into her ear. Loni held up the airline magazine and pointed to an inside page, her finger moving around in random circles. I leaned forward to see what she was pointing to, but she jerked the magazine away. She wouldn’t let me see anything.

  “We’d like to welcome aboard all remaining passengers on Flight 1067, with service to Los Angeles,” a loudspeaker said somewhere.

  I looked at the gate. A small line of people – the rest of the passengers – were standing there, handing their boarding passes to the airline workers and getting ready to step out on the jetway. If we wanted to catch our pl
ane, we needed to be in that line. My mom, though, wasn’t moving. Loni had handed her the magazine and the list of states from the puzzle, and now she (my mom) was studying them intently. She was even moving her finger inside the magazine, just like Loni.

  “Mom,” I said. “We should…”

  “Just a second, Honey!” she said absently. “We have time yet!”

  Several minutes passed. “This is the final boarding call for Flight 1067, with service to Los Angeles,” the loudspeaker said. “All passengers should now be on board.” My mom acted like she didn’t hear. She was now staring off into space, thinking hard.

  I tapped her on the arm. “It’s now or never!” I said urgently. “Should we get on the plane?”

  She waited a second before answering. “No,” she said.

  “No?”

  “No,” she repeated. “Loni’s right. We’re not going back to California, at least not now. We’re going somewhere else!”

  “Where?” Brent and I asked together.