“The only way to break Homer’s heart would be to keep him from pursuing his passion,” Uncle Drake had said. “But I don’t expect you to understand that.”
“You think I’ve never felt passion?” Mr. Pudding had cried, tearing his cap off his head. “I had plans, or have you conveniently forgotten? This farm was yours to inherit, remember? You’re the eldest son. You were supposed to take over after Dad died. But you abandoned Ma to go off on your adventures. If I hadn’t stayed, Ma would have lost everything. I know what it’s like to have dreams, then have them squashed. I don’t want you doing that to Homer.”
They had both looked up at Homer’s window. Homer, realizing he had overheard something very personal, had darted behind his curtain.
Homer hadn’t thought about that conversation until that moment on the cloudcopter. His father’s dreams had been squashed? But he loved goat farming. It was all he ever talked about.
“Nearing The City,” Ajitabh said, his voice pulling Homer from his memories. “Setting cloud cover to maximum.” Fluffy puffs settled between Homer and Zelda. Ajitabh disappeared behind a blanket of whiteness. “I’ve picked up the ’copter’s coordinates.” He paused. Then with utmost seriousness he said, “She’s landed at the museum.”
No longer could Homer deny the truth. Lorelei was working for Madame.
Zelda’s hand reached out and patted his.
They landed beside the stolen ’copter on the northernmost corner of the museum’s grounds, next to a grove of trees. Far from streetlights, the ’copters were well hidden by night’s shadows. Homer, Zelda, and Ajitabh stripped off their goggles and climbed out.
“No sign of her,” Ajitabh said, sliding his arms through his backpack straps.
Homer walked behind the ’copter. “Dog?” he called, hoping with all his heart that Dog had escaped. “Dog?” His jacket caught on a shrub. As he pulled it free he stepped on something. It was the bone that Mumble had given to Dog. Lorelei had probably used it to coax Dog into the ’copter. He reached into his jacket pocket. The rope leash was also missing. She’d thought of everything.
“Any idea where we can find this lair?” Ajitabh asked from the other side of the ’copter.
Homer had promised Lorelei that he’d never tell anyone about her secret entrance. But things had changed. She no longer deserved his promises. “I know how we can get in.”
Homer was just about to step around the copter, when someone shouted, “There they are!” A flashlight beam landed on Zelda’s face. She had no chance of hiding.
Ajitabh reacted swiftly. “Stay back,” he whispered. Homer flung himself under the ’copter’s belly. Fortunately, the cloudcopter was still in minimal cloud cover mode so it looked like a thick bank of fog had settled. Pressing himself against the ivy-covered ground, Homer watched as Mr. Twaddle and two policemen charged at Ajitabh.
“Halt!” The police officers pulled clubs from their holsters. Zelda dropped her bag and held up her hands.
“Officer,” Ajitabh said. “This is a misunderstanding, I assure you. We are tourists, out for an evening stroll.”
“Holy cow,” the first officer said as he strained his neck to look at Zelda. “Get a load of this one.”
“They’re trespassing,” Mr. Twaddle said. “They’re up to no good.”
“Hand over that backpack,” the second officer said.
“I say, do you have a search warrant?” Ajitabh asked.
The second officer pointed the club at Ajitabh’s face. “Hand it over.”
Mr. Twaddle yanked the backpack from Ajitabh. He reached in and pulled out the Swiss army knife, a hatchet and some pliers. “Evening walk, my foot! These are the thieves, officers. No doubt about it.” Then he pulled out Ajitabh’s sword.
“Thieves?” Zelda asked.
“Someone’s been stealing from the Museum of Natural History,” the first officer said, still gawking at Zelda.
“Looks like you’ve caught the perpetrators,” Mr. Twaddle said, a smug smile settling on his face.
“You’re both under arrest,” the second officer said. “Come with us.”
“What about my personal belongings?” Ajitabh asked.
Mr. Twaddle handed the backpack to the first officer, but he kept the sword behind his back. As the officers led Ajitabh and Zelda away from the grove of trees, Ajitabh said, loudly, “Sometimes it is best to go home and wait.” Although he didn’t turn around when he spoke, Homer knew that the words were meant for him. “I repeat, sometimes it is best to go Homer, I mean, go home and wait.”
“You’re not going home,” the second officer said. “You’re going down to the station for questioning.” Then he waved his club at Mr. Twaddle. “You’ll have to come, too, to press charges.”
“Of course. Got a few business obligations to tend to. I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Mr. Twaddle called after them as they headed for the street. “Be sure to lock them up nice and tight. No telling what they might steal next.” He snickered, then hurried back toward the museum, floodlights gleaming in the sword’s blade.
He hadn’t noticed Homer.
Homer waited until the coast was clear, then crawled out from under the ’copter. He wiped dirt from his chin and anxiously looked around. Ajitabh wanted him to go back home, but that would accomplish nothing. There was only one person who could save Dog now.
“You must face the final test of endurance and intellect on your own,” Uncle Drake had said.
So be it.
30
Swallowed Alive
Lorelei’s secret entrance smelled like mildew and maybe something dead, but Homer didn’t want to think about that. Why hadn’t he brought a headlamp? Holding his small flashlight between his teeth, he crawled as fast as he could. The fit was tight but he managed. Hold on, Dog, I’m coming.
Spiders scattered, disturbed by the thundering of his knees. Hopefully, any lurking rats would slink in the opposite direction. Small, dark spaces were a common component in treasure hunting. If a treasure hunter couldn’t deal with crawling into the unknown, then that treasure hunter wasn’t going to get very far.
Besides, if Lorelei, the stinking rotten liar, could do it, he could do it.
Dampness soaked through to his knees. If Lorelei were with him, and if she were still his friend, she’d probably tell him that this was just like when Odysseus went to the underworld to get information from a dead guy. Homer also wanted information. He wanted to know if Madame had killed his uncle. He wanted to know why Lorelei had deceived him. He wanted to know if either of them had found the map. But the answers to those questions were not as important as the ultimate goal—to save Dog.
Up ahead, light began to bleed into the tunnel. Homer crawled toward the light and just as his knees started to chafe, the tunnel ended at a metal grate. Cautiously, he peered between the bars.
The grate was set high in a wall. A hallway, dimly lit by sconces, stretched to the left and to the right of the grate. Lorelei had told him that the tunnel ended in the basement. The place was eerily quiet.
He pressed his face against the grate to get a better look. What was that thing to the right? He aimed the flashlight beam at a gigantic statue of a tortoise. It stood on its hind legs, much taller than a full-grown man, and much wider. While its head stuck out from the wall, the tortoise’s shell appeared to melt right into it. Its narrow reptilian eyes caught the flashlight’s beam, giving them the illusion of life. Homer shuddered and scooted away from the grate.
It’s just a statue, he told himself. He turned off the flashlight and stuck it back into his pocket. Then he pushed the grate. It opened easily, just as Lorelei had said. He swung his legs out the opening and was about to jump onto the marble floor when footsteps approached. Pulling his legs back in, Homer quickly closed the grate, then shrank into the tunnel’s darkness.
Mr. Twaddle, his suit coat flapping, hurried down the hall. “I have to do everything around here,” he mumbled. He must have stopped at the gift shop
because he was shoving Dinookies into his mouth. Crumbs flew as he imitated Madame’s shrill voice. “Get rid of the boy, Twaddle. Deal with the trespassers, Twaddle. Find the map, Twaddle. Do what I say, Twaddle, or I won’t keep paying for your vacations.” He threw the empty cookie package onto the floor. In his other hand he clutched Ajitabh’s sword. “I hate her.”
Something buzzed. Twaddle froze as Madame’s voice shrieked from a wall speaker. “Twaddle! What’s taking you so long? Get back down here this instant! I need you to deal with this girl and her ugly mutt.”
Lorelei and Dog were in Madame’s lair. Homer clenched his fists. If she did anything to Dog…
“On my way,” Mr. Twaddle said through clenched teeth.
“You’d better be on your way.” Then she added, “You big dummy.”
“One of us is a big dummy and it’s not me,” Mr. Twaddle muttered.
“I heard that!”
Homer inched forward to get a better view as Mr. Twaddle stopped in front of the tortoise statue. “Why should I have to deal with the girl?” he mumbled. “I’m not the one who hired her.” He reached up and poked the statue’s left eye. Then he stepped back. A grinding sound rolled down the hall. Homer gasped as the tortoise’s mouth slowly opened.
The mouth grew larger and larger, stretching like a grotesque sock puppet. It’s mechanical, Homer realized as the grinding sound continued. When the grinding stopped, Mr. Twaddle took a quick look around. He slid the sword into the tortoise’s mouth, then pulled himself into the cavernous hole. After his two-tone shoes had disappeared, the mouth snapped shut, then shrank back to normal size.
Of course! A secret lair had to have some kind of secret entrance. It reminded Homer of the entrance to the Reptile King’s Temple, which was guarded by an enormous stone serpent. According to the biography The Life of Wilma von Weiner, it had taken Wilma three days to figure out that she had to crawl into the serpent’s mouth to enter the tomb.
Homer opened the grate and jumped to the floor. Then he shut the grate and crept toward the statue. He reached up and pressed the tortoise’s eye. The grinding sound began and the mouth cranked open, wider and wider, until Homer found himself looking into a yawning black hole. A sick feeling churned in his stomach—a mixture of nervousness and horror as he remembered that his uncle had spent his final minutes inside a tortoise’s stomach. Or maybe he hadn’t. But it was still a repulsive image.
But there was no time for nervousness because Dog was in trouble.
Homer took a deep breath, then stood on tiptoe and pulled himself into the mouth. As soon as his feet cleared the opening, the mouth snapped shut. Blackness engulfed Homer. The space was a tight fit. Is this how Odysseus felt when he sat inside the Trojan Horse, waiting to sneak up on the enemy? Homer didn’t want to use the flashlight, just in case Mr. Twaddle was nearby. He took a deep breath. The only direction to go was forward.
And that’s what he did. He crawled a few feet forward.
And that’s when the ground gave way.
31
Inside the Lair
Whoa!”
Homer slid face-first, around and around, in a dizzy corkscrew. It was just like the Whirl-a-Tron at the Milkydale County Fair. The one time Homer had ridden that contraption, he’d upchucked his curly fries. Terrified, he closed his eyes as he flew off the end of the slide and landed in a belly flop on the floor. The impact knocked the air out of him and pressed his compass into his chest. “Ow.” Sitting up, his head still spinning, he tried to get his bearings and his breath.
The room was small. The end of the slide jutted out from the wall behind Homer. A narrow staircase wound back up the slide, for exiting purposes. In front of Homer, light trickled from an open doorway, as did distant voices. The room swayed as he struggled to his feet. Once the dizziness had passed, he checked his compass to make sure it wasn’t broken. Then he stuck his head out the doorway.
It opened onto a balcony with a railing. The voices were too far away to understand or identify. Homer crept from the room and peered over the railing. And the first thought that came to his mind was, I want a lair.
He gazed down at a huge underground fortress. If he hadn’t known better, he would have sworn it was the Temple of the Reptile King. How had Madame managed to build such a realistic replica? It looked exactly like the photos in Homer’s treasure-hunting books. The stone walls and floor, the giant serpent and lizard statues, even the murky pool where the king had kept his treasured potbellied toads, looked authentic.
However, Madame had added some modern touches. A snazzy red speedboat was moored at the edge of the pool. Dozens of chandeliers, heavy with crystal droplets, hung from the overhead pipes. Lush oriental carpets lay here and there. A red velvet couch sat next to a red velvet throne. And there were three vending machines, one for snacks, one for espresso drinks, and one for live mice. A vending machine for live mice? The little white critters ran back and forth in their glass cubicles. A few of them sat very still, staring through the glass at a large tank in which a cobra lay curled.
A row of security monitors lined the other side of the room, revealing different parts of the museum and the museum grounds. One of the monitors was focused on a fog bank. Oh wait. It was the cloud cover for the cloudcopter. So that’s how Mr. Twaddle knew we had landed. One of the monitors was focused on the little VIP party balloon, still floating in the Life on the Edge exhibit.
The voices seemed to be coming from beneath the balcony. Homer still couldn’t catch the words or recognize the voices. And he didn’t see any sign of Dog or his uncle’s belongings. He’d have to take the steep stairway that led from the balcony down into the lair. But just as he worked up the courage to move, footsteps approached. Homer flattened himself on the balcony’s floor, then peeked through a space in the railing.
He caught his breath. Lorelei walked out from under the balcony. Her pink hair was messier than usual and her footsteps were slow and tired. She stopped at the vending machine and punched a button, then collected a bag of potato chips. Leaning against the machine, she ate the chips, one at a time, as if she had nothing more pressing to do. As if she didn’t give a hoot that Homer might be worried and missing his dog. He clenched his fists.
“Get back in there!” Madame la Directeur appeared from under the balcony and stomped toward the vending machines. “I’m not paying you to snack. We need to find that map.” Her blouse had come untucked and she’d rolled up her sleeves. A few strands of her perfectly sprayed hair were out of place.
“Yeah, yeah,” Lorelei said, biting a chip in half. “Hold on to your bloomers, lady. A girl’s gotta eat.”
“That’s all you do is eat. And that ugly dog, too.” Madame punched a button on the mouse vending machine. A mouse disappeared from the upper-left-hand compartment. Madame reached into the dispensing drawer and picked the mouse up by its tail. It wiggled wildly as she opened the top of the cobra’s tank and tossed it in. “I don’t know why you insisted on bringing that dog here. All it’s doing is stinking up the back room.” She ripped the potato chip bag from Lorelei’s hand. “Get back in there and keep looking. The map has to be in that junk somewhere.”
Homer narrowed his eyes. He’d just learned four important things: Dog was safe, his uncle’s belongings were in the other room, Madame had not found Rumpold Smeller’s map, and Madame clearly didn’t know that Dog could smell treasure. Which meant there was still a chance that Lorelei didn’t know.
Lorelei glared at Madame, then stomped beneath Homer’s balcony. “Little brat,” Madame snarled. Homer held his breath, pressing his body against the floor. His mouth was dry, his body sweaty. How could he get Dog’s attention and make a quick exit?
As Madame ate the last of Lorelei’s chips, Mr. Twaddle walked out from beneath the balcony. His suit coat was gone and his shirtsleeves were also rolled up. “This is a waste of time, I tell you. There’s no map to be found. Why would he have kept it in his apartment? That’s too obvious.”
�
�Exactly. No one would suspect a priceless treasure map to be sitting in an apartment. Drake was cunning that way.”
“But…”
Madame threw the potato chip bag into the pool, then pointed a finger at her henchman. “Don’t but me, you nitwit! The map is there and we’re going to find it. I need money. The self-destruct button’s on the fritz again. Do you know how much it costs to replace a self-destruct button?”
“Why don’t you just help yourself to another gem from the Cave of Brilliance?”
“Because I’ve already replaced most of them with fakes and the rest I’ve reported as stolen. So you see, I have no more money. I need Rumpold Smeller’s treasure.” She grabbed Mr. Twaddle’s shirt collar. “Finding his treasure is going to make me rich and famous and I’m tired of waiting to be rich and famous. Now get back in there and keep looking.”
“But I still need to go to the police station, to press charges.”
“You can do that later. Ajitabh and Zelda aren’t going to get in our way. They’re just a couple of amateurs. I’m not worried about them. But I’ll tell you who I am worried about.” She leaned close to him. “I’m worried about the girl. She knows too much. As soon as we find that map, I want you to get rid of her.”
“You want me to throw her out, like I did with the boy?”
“No. Read between the words, Twaddle. I want you to get rid of her. Just like I got rid of Drake. Feed her to the tortoise.”
Homer almost cried out.
Twaddle backed up. “Hurting a child was never part of our arrangement.”
Madame smiled sweetly and patted Mr. Twaddle’s bald head. “Now, now, she’s just a street urchin. No one will even miss her. And then, you and I can claim our glory. Oh, and get rid of the dog, too.” She walked beneath the balcony. Mr. Twaddle stood frozen, his face pale. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his brow. Then he followed Madame.
Smells Like Dog Page 18
