by M. E. Kerr
For courage, Shoebag sang to himself a favorite old cockroach song.
We lurk around and on our mark, we come out in the dark.
Hey de hi ho, we don’t need a coach
To get there!
He de hi ho, if you are a roach,
You’ll get there!
We creep around and find the crumbs, happy to be chums,
Hey de hi ho, we hunt high and low,
In kitchens.
Hey de hi ho, the parties we throw,
In kitchens!
But it did not sound like a happy song, anymore.
Still, Shoebag never, ever, lost his hope altogether, for that was not his way.
And even in the darkest hour, a cockroach prayer was often heard by the Great Cockroach in the Sky.
How else to explain the astonishing news that Gregor Samsa himself was on his way to this place?
Gregor had rescued him before, and Shoebag believed that he would rescue him again, if there was only some way for him to get the spokesboy’s attention.
For once a roach, always a roach, never mind that Gregor had abandoned roachdom for stardom!
If there were anyone who could help Shoebag, Gregor was that person!
Such were Shoebag’s thoughts when the thin lariat of spider silk was thrown around his shell.
And pulled tight.
“DEATH TO ALL INSECTS!” Shoebag heard, as he fainted.
Thirty
GREGOR SAMSA WAS MUCH taller than Stanley, and he was huskier, too.
He was also mysterious, for he wore very dark glasses, the kind with mirror lenses in which you saw your own reflection. And he had a strange, long nose, with a twitch to it, as though he was catching the scent of something wild. His hair was so short it was almost like a beard on his head, a bristle, and it was black as midnight.
But the spookiest thing about him was his voice, which was not as loud as it was deep, like a grown man’s.
“Does your smile smell?” he asked Stanley, with a chuckle, and he handed him a package of gum. “Chew Great Breath!”
Stanley did not tell him that at Miss Rattray’s School for Girls (and now one boy) no one chewed gum.
He pocketed the package and proceeded to show him around the school.
“And this is my room,” Stanley said near the end of the tour.
“It’s not a very big room, is it?” Gregor Samsa said.
There on Stanley’s desk was the plastic container he had ready for the Mexican blonde. Over it was Bagg’s Hootie & The Blowfish T-shirt.
“No, it’s not a big room,” said Stanley, pushing the container to one side, quickly.
“And you have no television,” said Gregor Samsa, who was carrying a Watchman, which he turned on at every opportunity.
“But I have a computer,” Stanley said, “and I have fifty games. … And back at my home, I have a hundred more.”
“You should watch more television,” said Gregor Samsa. “I watch it all the time, since I am a television actor.”
“Where do you come from?” Stanley asked.
“I come from here and there. I used to go back and forth.”
“I come from Castle Sweet,” said Stanley. “I go back and forth. I will go forth for Thanksgiving, and then back here after.”
Last Sunday Stanley had called Tattle’s cottage at Castle Sweet, telling him he was bringing the Mexican blonde with him.
“Be very careful handling her, Stanley,” Tattle had told him. “Nudge her gently into the palm of your hand. Don’t let her fall, for her abdomen could burst! Remember how I carried Weezer, and don’t overhandle her!”
Stanley had some potting soil ready in his closet, to put into the plastic container … and also a small rock for the Mexican blonde to hide behind.
He had put a square of screen where the neck of the T-shirt opened, so he could look in at her once he smuggled her from the Science Room.
So far, the only food Stanley had to offer the Mexican blonde was a dead roach, wrapped up in a spider’s dragline. Stanley supposed it was the same poor roach he had seen in his room one evening when he was saying his prayers.
Stanley had found Butter batting it about under his desk, and even though tarantulas liked only live prey, Stanley knew he could get her to eat it if he jiggled it to make it look alive. So Stanley had dropped the roach into the container, near the rock.
Gregor had been staring at the mirror above Stanley’s desk, his long fingers touching his mouth as though he was examining something there.
“Is anything wrong?” Stanley asked him.
“It’s just the mirror,” he answered. “I have never liked mirrors much.”
Then he pulled himself together and said, “Carry on, Sweetsong!”
As Stanley and Gregor left the room and passed Josephine Jiminez’s room, Butter darted out into the hall. He had probably been sniffing around, trying to find the captive roach.
“A cat!” Gregor Samsa jumped back.
“It’s only Butter,” said Stanley. “Butter won’t hurt you.”
“I’ve never trusted a cat,” Gregor Samsa said.
“Butter wouldn’t hurt a fly,” Stanley told him.
“How about a roach?” Gregor Samsa asked with a slanted smile, as they kept walking along. “But I suppose there are no roaches in this school, hmmm?”
Stanley decided not to say there were. It would not be polite to tell a visitor roaches were around.
“No roaches,” Stanley fibbed, as Butter scampered ahead of them.
“There probably are a few, though,” Gregor Samsa said. “Roaches have been on this earth for two hundred-fifty million years. They were here two hundred-forty-nine million years before people were. They are great survivors.”
At the bottom of the stairs, Miss Rattray’s girls were squealing with joy at the sight of the spokesboy celebrity.
“I hope you don’t mind giving autographs, Mr. Samsa,” said Stanley.
“Gregor. Call me Gregor … and I don’t mind. I like to be noticed! I like being a star!”
In every way but one, Gregor Samsa behaved like a star, too. But whoever heard of a star who did not like mirrors?
Thirty-one
I WILL BE BACK to get you, Shoebag.
Of course, Stanley Sweetsong did not hear Gregor promise that. Stanley Sweetsong did not even know that Gregor had looked down the neck of the T-shirt and spotted Shoebag tied up in the bottom of the plastic container.
But roaches have not been around for 250 million years without picking up a few smart tricks.
Shoebag did not even have to open his mouthpiece to communicate with Gregor. Gregor did not have to open his mouth, either. Bug language is always silent.
Hold your horses, Gregor! I’m alive down here!
Shoebag? How did you wind up in a spider’s dragline, old friend?
Never mind that. The formula isn’t working, Gregor.
Did you say it on a Wednesday night?
Oh, oh, Shoebag had not always waited for dark, and not always for a Wednesday.
I was careless, Gregor.
You fouled up, did you? You may have lost your power to go back and forth forever.
I think I am going to be fed to a tarantula.
I will be back to get you, Shoebag.
So it was not Zap that had done him in.
It was his own foolhardy recklessness.
That fact would not have surprised Under The Toaster.
The very thought of his stern papa brought a shudder of longing to Shoebag’s shell. He yearned to be free again, and to find his way to his family, somehow. Even if it meant going to Tennessee.
At least the lucky Hootie & The Blowfish T-shirt was over him. Now all he had to do was wait for Gregor.
But waiting for a star is always risky.
Thirty-two
“HERE IS THE KEY to the Science Room,” said C. Cynthia Ann Flower. “Don’t lose it, Stanley, for I would be in deep trouble if anyone found out
I gave it to you!”
Stanley knew she was nervous, for her hand was moist, as was the key she slipped to him. And she was excited, too, for now she was face-to-face with her idol, Gregor Samsa.
They stood backstage in the auditorium. Stanley introduced them.
“Pleased to meet you, C. Cynthia Ann Flower,” said Gregor Samsa, whipping off his dark glasses, his long nose twitching with pleasure. “And my, my, my, you are a flower!”
“Tee-hee! Tee-hee!” giggled the president of the Science Club, and also the president of the Betters. “I have always wanted to meet you, Gregor.”
Stanley said, “As soon as you are finished, Gregor, C. Cynthia Ann will take you to the Science Room, where all the parents will be, and I will be.”
Gregor Samsa shook his head. “As soon as I am finished speaking, I have a private errand I must take care of before I do anything else.”
“A private errand?” said Stanley anxiously. “Can’t it wait?” For timing was everything in this first Butter Surprise.
“It can’t wait,” Gregor Samsa said firmly.
“Oh, please, can’t it wait?” C. Cynthia Ann begged him. Gregor Samsa frowned.
“Please?” C. Cynthia Ann begged him, knowing she might miss the chance to escort him down to see the prizewinners.
And what would Stanley do, if there was not time to get the delicate Mexican blonde up to his room?
“Please?” again from C. Cynthia Ann.
It was plain that Gregor Samsa could not resist her. The sharp edges of his long face softened. His nostrils quivered. His very deep voice rose slightly. “Oh, all right,” he said. “But I cannot stay there long. I have this private errand.”
It was time for Gregor to go out on the stage, while C. Cynthia Ann waited backstage.
It was time for Stanley to hurry across to Mr. Longo’s room, unlock the door, and fetch the Mexican blonde. In her place, he would put the Butterfinger, which was already softened slightly from being in his back pocket.
As he ran from the auditorium, Stanley could hear the applause for Gregor Samsa.
Tarantulas are very quick, as well as very delicate.
Stanley remembered exactly how Tattle had handled Weezer.
Before he picked her up, he took some withered moths from the tank and wrapped them in a Kleenex.
“And I have some lettuce for you which I saved from lunch,” he told the Mexican blonde. “And there is a roach, too.” He did not say that it was dead.
Then he reached into the tank and took her up quickly, making sure that all of her eight legs left the ground at the same time.
Since being lifted up in such a manner was totally new to the Mexican blonde, she made herself become paralyzed.
“It’s all right,” Stanley told her. “I am rescuing you.”
He slipped her into a small paper cup.
Then he dropped the Butterfinger down into the tank.
“It’s all right,” he kept whispering into the cup. “I have a safe place waiting for you.”
Stanley could not bear to look at the king snake or the African frog.
Perhaps another time the Butters would release them, too, when they could find someone to take them in.
But right now, Stanley had to get the Mexican blonde up to his room, then hurry back to the Science Room.
When C. Cynthia Ann and Gregor arrived, along with the parents, Stanley had to be there, too. Be there, and act just as surprised as they would. Be there and exclaim, “A Butterfinger! But where is the tarantula?”
Thirty-three
PLOP!
“Gregor? Is that you?”
“My name is not Gregor. My name is Blonde.”
Shoebag was bound and gagged shell-up, and could not immediately see who was there. “My name is —”
Blonde finished the sentence for him. “Dinner,” she said. “Your name is ‘Dinner,’ and you look like a very tasty meal to me.”
“Oh, no!” Shoebag moaned. “Not the tarantula?”
“Cómo se va?” said the Mexican blonde. “A cucaracha, hmmm? In that dreary tank there was nothing to eat but dead moths. You may have one for your last meal, if you wish. I believe the boy who rescued me dropped some in here with me.”
“Thanks anyway,” said Shoebag, “but I’ve lost my appetite.”
“That can happen, Cucaracha. I’ll have the lettuce myself, then. I’ll wrap it around your legs, if I can wait until dinner. Your legs are very tempting.”
“Speaking of moths,” said Shoebag, stalling for time “why did the moth eat through the carpeting?”
“You tell me,” said Blonde.
“He wanted to see the floor show.”
This made the creature laugh very, very hard.
She laughed so hard she spread out her long legs, and good grief, Shoebag saw one!
It was huge.
It was hairy.
It had black bottom leg segments.
It was a tarantula, all right!
Under The Toaster had seen one in National Geographic once, and come panting back from the library to say, “They even have fangs!”
Shoebag could not see her fangs. But his shell shook against the silk spider thread, and his antennae did a sorrowful dive.
“That was a good joke!” said the tarantula. “No one in the Science Room told jokes. There was nothing amusing in there, which was a pity, because we Mexican blondes like to have fun. Blondes always have more fun, you know. We’re not serious like scientists.”
Where was Gregor?
Thinking with the speed roach minds are known for, Shoebag said, “Why did the scientist disconnect his doorbell?”
“Why did he?”
“Because he wanted to win the Nobel Prize.”
This broke up the Mexican blonde, and Shoebag giggled along with her in a hysterical, panic-stricken way.
“More! More!” cried the tarantula. “And when you can’t think of anymore, it will be dinnertime.”
Thirty-four
“HOW AMUSING! A BUTTERFINGER!” said Mrs. Pedro Jiminez. “A snake, a frog, and a Butterfinger!”
“There was a spider here, once,” said Miss Rattray.
“I guess it turned into a candy bar!” said the general, who was out of uniform now, but still very much an Army general. His voice boomed through the Science Room. “Someone is a magician. Is it you, Mr. Longo?”
Mr. Longo was red-faced and angry, hiding it with a sickly smile. “I am not known to be a magician,” he said.
“We needed some comic relief,” Ethel Lampert’s mother spoke up. “The assembly speaker told me more than I wanted to know about how hard an actor’s life is!”
“I’m glad my daughter heard that,” said the general. “She is very involved with theater. She puts on her own plays, which she writes herself. It is not a good ambition to have if you want to get somewhere in this world!”
“My daughter,” said Mrs. Lampert, “belongs to a secret club.”
“The Betters?” Mrs. Jiminez asked.
“Not the Betters!” Mrs. Flower answered before Mrs. Lampert could. “My daughter is a Better, and she has never mentioned your daughter.”
“My daughter says her club is better than the Betters,” said Mrs. Lampert.
“Nothing is better than the Betters!” said Mrs. Jiminez. “The Betters did not want my poor daughter and it broke her heart!”
Miss Rattray intervened. “Well, now, we have seen the prizewinners, so let us move along out of here.”
“But where is my daughter’s spider?” Mrs. Flower asked, and she called over her shoulder, “C. Cynthia Ann! Where is your prizewinner?”
“I think it escaped,” said Stanley Sweetsong.
Someone had to answer Mrs. Flower. Her daughter was too taken with Gregor Samsa to care where her spider was. She stood at the back of the Science Room looking up at the spokesboy, while he beamed down at her.
“The Mexican blonde didn’t escape!” said Mr. Longo. “Someone took h
er! Someone put that Butterfinger there in her place.”
“If you ask me,” said Mrs. Lampert, “someone has a delightful sense of humor! I am so pleased I almost feel like making a contribution to this school!”
“Almost?” the quick-eared Miss Rattray said. “Why almost?”
“Well, I wouldn’t want my money to go to more tanks for this room, unless,” and she giggled at the thought, “they were for more Butterfinger tanks.”
“Moi aussi,” said Mrs. Flower, from whom C. Cynthia Ann had gotten her habit of slipping into French. “I would not want my beautiful daughter poring through more bug catalogs. She should be interested in important things like clothes and cosmetics. Not spiders, not my beautiful daughter!”
“Money is always needed,” said Miss Rattray wisely, “and its use is not necessarily restricted to acquiring more tanks for this room.”
Mrs. Lampert said, “I wish there were no tanks in this room. When I was a girl, we did not catch wild creatures and keep them locked in our schoolroom.”
“But this is now their home, Mrs. Lampert,” Miss Rattray said sweetly.
“They’d be better off in a zoo, Miss Rattray. Mr. Lampert and I contribute regularly to some excellent zoos.”
Miss Rattray’s ears perked up at the verb “contribute.” “All things are possible,” said she.
“But what happened to the Mexican blonde?” Mr. Longo said. “She was a very valuable spider.”
C. Cynthia Ann Flower couldn’t have cared less, anymore, about her expensive prizewinner.
She hooked her dainty little arm in Gregor Samsa’s long arm and said, “Let me show you the rest of the school.”
Miss Rattray nudged Stanley. “You’re his escort, dear. You are the one to show him the rest of the school.”
But when they looked behind them, Gregor and C. Cynthia Ann had disappeared.
The general said, “It seems the lovebirds have flown the coop, too.”
Thirty-five
BUTTER, SLEEPING RIGHT UNDER Stanley Sweetsong’s desk, drawn by the strong scent of the tarantula, but fearful of her, too, opened one eye.
