Sally's Bones

by MacKenzie Cadenhead

  “Yes, I suppose that’s true, but that was just a coincidence,” she explained. “You see, Princess Poopsy’s bones had started to go missing a bit before that, just about a month. I simply hadn’t noticed because, well,” she giggled to herself, “Poopsy has so many bones I sometimes lose track.”

  The crowd laughed politely at Vivienne’s adorable embarrassment of riches while the D.C. prepared his attack.

  “Princess Poopsy’s bones started to go missing almost a month before your daughter’s birthday, you say? Talk about a coincidence!” He turned toward Sally, though he continued to address the witness. “That would put the first theft at right about the same time that demon dog arrived in Merryland! As Officer Stu himself knows, Bones Simplesmith’s recorded rebirth date is September first!”

  The stunned onlookers could not keep quiet. Officer Stu banged his gavel as Sally took in the crowd. At the front of the audience sat her father, pinching his fingers and adjusting his glasses as he studied the proceedings. Beside him was a small group of Sally’s supporters, lead by Chati Chattercathy and Susannah Oh. Across the way was a gathering of PAD protestors, holding pickets signs with slogans like “Death to Death” and “Give a dog a BONES!” And flanking the sides of the gathering was an assortment of frustrated dog owners and their victimized pups. Though the animals were, for the most part, on their best behavior, Sally didn’t like the crazed looks in their eyes or the way they drooled whenever they caught a glimpse of Bones.

  “One final question, Mrs. Vanderperfect,” the D.C. shouted over the crowd, snapping everyone back to attention. “Would you please reveal to us the identity of the criminal mastermind behind these bone thefts?”

  “I’d be happy to,” Vivienne replied, as pleasantly as ever. Sally slumped in her seat, fearing the worst. “But I’m sorry to say I can’t.”

  Sally bolted upright as the D.C. glared at his witness.

  “What was that?” the D.C. asked.

  “I’m sure many people will point their fingers at the creature in the monkey-bar jail over there, but I’m sorry, I just can’t tell you without a doubt that he is the one who did it. I would if I had seen him with my own two eyes, but I didn’t. I took an oath to answer your questions truthfully, and that’s all any of us can be expected to do.”

  Sally regarded the prosecution’s witness in appreciation and amazement.

  “Sally, do you have any questions for this witness?” Officer Stu asked.

  “No, I don’t,” she replied. “I think Mrs. Vanderperfect has said it all.”

  Vivienne Vanderperfect stepped down from the witness stand, and Sally smiled at the woman who really had been her mother’s friend.

  At Officer Stu’s request, Sally and the D.C. approached the bench. “Does the prosecution have any other witnesses, preferably ones who can speak directly to the accused’s guilt?” Sally stifled a giggle as the D.C. growled.

  “One final witness,” he replied. “The prosecution calls Thomas Gunn.”

  Sally no longer felt like laughing. Why would the D.C. call Tommy? While she knew they had had their differences, she hadn’t expected him to play for the other side. As Tommy took the stand, he kept his eyes trained on the ground. Sally heard a small cheer break out from the crowd. One of the PAD protestors was waving at Tommy. Sally shook her head in disbelief. It was his mom.

  “Mr. Gunn, can you tell us about a particular fight you and the accused’s owner had during recess a few months back?”

  Tommy shrugged. “I wouldn’t exactly call it a fight.”

  The D.C. clarified, “Disagreement, then. When did it happen, and what was it about?”

  Tommy stared at Sally for a long time without saying a word. She glared back at him until he finally looked away.

  “It was the first day back at school after Skeletor, I mean, Bones, showed up at Viola Vanderperfect’s birthday party,” Tommy explained. “I’d seen Sally arguing with you and Officer Stu earlier that morning and when I asked her about it, she freaked out.”

  “Freaked out?” the D.C. asked. “How exactly did she ‘freak out’?”

  “She yelled at me for getting her dumb dog’s name wrong and then told me to get lost.” Tommy looked to Sally again. “I wasn’t trying to make her mad. I just wanted to be nice.” The audience awwed. Sally began to get scared.

  “But if you were just being nice, Tommy, wouldn’t you say that Miss Simplesmith’s reaction had nothing to do with your actions and must have been because she was on edge trying to cover up her companion’s crimes? Couldn’t it be that she was taking her stress out on you?”

  The audience leaned in, waiting for Tommy’s accusation. Sally glanced back at Mrs. Gunn, who was hugging her picket sign and nodding to her son encouragingly. Somehow, Tommy Gunn had become an incredibly sympathetic witness for the prosecution.

  “Maybe,” he finally replied. “But I wouldn’t know for sure, because when I went to find her later at the garbage shed where we sometimes hang out—”

  “Wha-what did you say?” the D.C. asked, flummoxed.

  “I said I went looking for her at the garbage shed that we all know about and can go to any time we want.” Tommy glanced quickly at Sally, who could have sworn she saw him wink.

  “No further questions for this witness,” the D.C. muttered quickly. “He’s dismissed.”

  Though the gathered crowd had not yet caught on, Sally understood exactly the opening Tommy had just given her.

  “Wait, I have a question,” she said before Tommy had moved from his seat. “Tommy, you said that everyone knew about the garbage shed where Bones and I sometimes hung out, correct?”

  “Yep,” he replied, coolly.

  “So if everyone knew about it, anyone could have gone to it at any time, correct?”

  “Yep.”

  “Therefore it stands to reason that anyone who knew about it and had access to it could have put the stolen bones there, thus making the D.C.’s assertion that the stolen bones found in the shed could only have belonged to Bones incorrect. Correct?”

  Tommy hit his forehead with the heel of his palm. “Gosh, I guess you’re right. I suppose anyone who knew about the shed could have been the real bone snatcher. Maybe it wasn’t Bones after all.”

  “Thank you, Tommy,” Sally said, and she meant it. “This witness is dismissed.”

  As Tommy left the stand, the crowd heatedly discussed his testimony. Realizing he wouldn’t quiet them any time soon, Officer Stu called a ten-minute recess.

  “I’d like to wrap this up,” he told counsel as he headed inside the school for a bathroom break. “And I’d prefer not to have any more unreliable testimony about Bones’s guilt or reference to the pile of bones found in an obviously public shed. Let’s hear some new evidence, or let’s go home.”

  The D.C. stomped away, muttering words to himself that Sally was sure she was too young to hear. Though she tried to temper her elation, fully aware that the trial had not yet been won, she couldn’t resist skipping a little as she headed over to give her client a hug.

  Chapter 13

  “You’re doing great, Sal,” Mr. Simplesmith said as he greeted his daughter at the monkey-bar jail.

  “Thanks, Dad.” Sally smiled. She pet her incarcerated pup, who wiggled and wagged in delight. “I just want this whole nightmare to be over.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you do, you poor dear!” Vivienne Vanderperfect said as she appeared at Seymour’s side. Viola slogged behind her.

  “Well hey there, Viv.” Mr. Simplesmith smiled. “Wasn’t that nice of Viola and her mom to come out and show their support, Sally?”

  “It really was,” Sally agreed. “Thanks so much for your testimony, Mrs. Vanderperfect.”

  “Now, I told you to call me Vivienne, darling!” Viola’s mother reminded. “And no thanks are necessary. I simply answered that man’s questions. I have f
aith that things will turn out right in the end.”

  Sally beamed at Vivienne, and for her sake tried hard not to glare at Viola, who refused to look up from her newly manicured nails.

  “I just think it’s so terrible that you have to go through this. And you, Seymour,” Vivienne took his hand. “I’m sure it was hard enough when Sally brought home that…well, ‘dog’ is probably the wrong word. But to agree to house him and then have him turn on you like that? Such a shame.”

  “But Bones is innocent, Mrs. Vanderperfect,” Sally declared, shocked that the same woman who had just given such helpful testimony was actually suspicious.

  “Of course he is, honey,” Vivienne humored.

  “No, it’s true,” Sally insisted. “He doesn’t even like bones!”

  Viola looked up. “How can he not like them? He’s made out of them.”

  “No, I mean he doesn’t like chewing on them. He thinks it’s repulsive,” Sally explained. “That’s how I know he didn’t do what he’s accused of. It would gross him out too much.” Sally waited for some sort of apology from Viola and her mother, but Viola merely shrugged as Mrs. Vanderperfect indulged Sally with an exaggerated expression of concern. Sally was preparing to explain again when her father spoke.

  “But Sal,” Mr. Simplesmith said uneasily. “Don’t you remember the chicken bone, that first night?”

  Officer Stu returned to the picnic bench and called the court to order.

  “What?” Sally asked, surprised.

  “The first night you brought Bones home, I gave him a chicken bone. And, well, don’t you remember honey? He took it.”

  Sally pulled her father away from the Vanderperfects. “Oh, yeah, that,” she mumbled as Stu’s gavel banged for the fourth time. “Look, Dad, I can’t explain now, but not everything is exactly how it looks. I’ll fill you in later, but please keep the chicken bone to yourself and trust me. I swear Bones didn’t do this, all right?”

  “But—”

  “Daddy. Please.”

  Mr. Simplesmith hovered for a moment but said nothing more and returned, perplexed, to his seat. Sally looked at Bones through the monkey bars. “You ready, boy?”

  “GGGgggrrr-uff!” he replied. Sally smiled at him proudly.

  “Court is now in session,” Officer Stu announced. “Does the prosecution have any other witnesses?”

  “Not at this time,” the D.C. grumbled. Sally felt her heart skip.

  “Sally, is there anyone you’d like to call to the stand?”

  “Yes, Officer Stu, there is. I would like to call the defendant, Bones Simplesmith.”

  Bones was released from the monkey-bar jail and led to the witness box. The majority of the onlookers glared and growled at him as he paraded past. The confused canine dropped his ears and tucked his tail. He looked at Sally, who offered him her most comforting smile as she guided him to the chair behind the milk crate.

  “Now, Bones,” Sally began. “I will make this brief. Since you can’t speak, please just reply in the affirmative or negative to each question asked. Are you one Bones Simplesmith?”

  “GGGgggrrr-uff.” The incarcerated carcass spun around in a circle.

  “Thank you.” Sally proceeded. “Are you guilty of the crime brought against you? Did you steal all the neighborhood dogs’ bones?”

  “Grwof,” Bones replied. He placed his front paws on a milk carton and lowered his chin on top of them.

  “If it please the court, I’d like to do a demonstration that will prove why my client could never have committed this cruel crime.” Sally motioned to Chati Chattercathy, who stepped forward with a brown paper bag.

  “Thanks, Chati.” Sally smiled at her friend. She was wearing a homemade “Free Bones” button, and Sally had to force down the lump in her chest that had grown out of Chati’s kindness. She cleared her throat.

  “In this bag, I have two items. One of them Bones loves, while the other, he detests more than anything else in the world.” Sally handed Officer Stu the bag. “If you’d please pull out one item and offer it to Bones, you can judge his reaction for yourself.”

  Officer Stu reached his hand into the bag. He pulled out a plush toy bone and waved it in front of the little cadaver. Bones panted and wiggled and wagged excitedly.

  “GGGgggrrr-uff! GGGgggrrr-uff!” he yapped. He jumped out of the witness box and onto the picnic table. He grabbed the toy in his teeth. The crowd tittered at the joyous display.

  “Officer Stu,” Sally continued, “please offer Bones the other item.”

  Stu reached into the brown paper bag and produced a juicy, marrow-filled bone, fresh from the local butcher. Instantly, Bones froze. His tail stilled, and he dropped the plush toy from his mouth. He made gagging noises before rebuking Officer Stu with a resounding, “Grwof!” Turning his back on both the toy bone and the real one, Bones stomped over to the witness box and sat. The wounded animal refused to look in the lawman’s direction.

  “Let the record show that the accused could not have stolen the neighborhood dogs’ bones because he is disgusted by them. In addition to having no motive, Bones would never have allowed himself to touch one in the first place!” Sally slammed her fist on the picnic table and shouted, “I call for an immediate dismissal of this shameful case!”

  The assembled spectators erupted. The D.C.’s shouting was impossible to make out over all the noise, and Officer Stu’s banging gavel barely made a sound. Sally picked up the two bones with which she had made her case and placed them back in the paper bag. She walked to the witness box and sat on a milk crate next to Bones. “I think it’s over,” she whispered. The dead dog smiled.

  In the general confusion, it took Sally a few moments to realize that the D.C. was demanding to call another witness.

  “You’ve already called your witnesses,” Officer Stu hollered over the intensifying din.

  “But I just found out what this witness knows. I only have two questions for…” The D.C. paused for effect. “Seymour Simplesmith!”

  The crowd immediately fell silent. Sally’s father apprehensively stepped forward. “Me?” he asked. “What do you want to know from me?”

  The D.C. wasted no time, rattling off his questions before Seymour could even make it to the stand. “Are you the defendant’s owner’s guardian?”

  “Well, I’m Sally’s father, so I guess that’s a yes.” Seymour looked questioningly at Sally, who shrugged.

  “So you’ve known the defendant since your daughter brought him home,” the D.C. submitted.

  “Sure.”

  “Then you must have known that the accused hates bones, that he would never ever touch one himself. Tell me, Mr. Simplesmith. Is it true?” The D.C. waited.

  “Oh, well, um…” Seymour stalled. Sally felt her entire body tense.

  “I’m sorry, was that question too hard? How about this: Your daughter swears that the defendant could not have committed the crime of which he is accused because he absolutely detests touching real bones. But tell us, Mr. Simplesmith, haven’t you seen him chew one?”

  The entire crowd held its breath. Sally’s father mopped his brow with his sleeve. He looked to his daughter, who was silently begging him to ignore his data just this once, to trust her, to lie. For all Seymour knew, Bones had enjoyed the chicken bone he had been offered their first night together. Sally had forced Bones to lie so that Seymour would accept him. She had never trusted her father with the truth, and now she watched, helpless, as he struggled between his paternal instinct to help his daughter and his scientific responsibility to trust the facts.

  Mr. Simplesmith looked at the ground. “I’m so sorry, Sal,” was all she heard of her father’s confession before the crowd was on its feet, roaring for a guilty verdict.

  Sally looked at Officer Stu as he banged his gavel and shouted for order. She saw the D.C. turn red as he screamed for a
n immediate judgment. She watched her father, unable to look at her, nervously pinching his thumbs. She surveyed the audience of her bloodthirsty neighbors and their maniacal mutts. Then she looked at Bones, so small and helpless, boxed in by a half dozen milk crates. He tilted his head and looked up at her with empty black eyes. Leaning toward her hand, he gave it a single lick.

  Looking back, Sally would never remember the first few steps she took toward freedom. It was only when she was running from the schoolyard with a liberated Bones in her arms that she even realized what she had done.

  Sally Simplesmith was a fugitive.

  Chapter 14

  “Four twenty-five, four fifty, four sixty, four sixty-five.” Sally regarded the money in her left hand. “All we’ve got is a lousy four dollars and sixty-five cents to start our new life on the lam.” She closed her fist around the cash. “We are so totally toast.”

  Bones and Sally sat in a large abandoned drainpipe on the outskirts of town. Her first instinct had been to hide at the cemetery, until she realized it would be the first place the police would look. She couldn’t go home, and school was off limits. She didn’t have a single friend she was sure wouldn’t turn her in, and how could she blame them? Her own father had just stabbed her in the back.

  The old waterworks was the only place Sally thought they might be safe, at least for tonight. The fact that it was on the way to Watta City also worked in its favor. Sally hoped that there, in a city of millions, she and Bones might begin fresh. But with only $4.65 in her pocket, Sally was starting to think things might end before they could even get started. She was calculating the likelihood of becoming Tone Death’s roadie when Bones began to paw at her crossed arms.

  “Bones, stop,” Sally said, exhausted. The little corpse continued to tug and scratch, undeterred.

  “Bones, come on,” she whined. “Just give me a few minutes to think.” She turned away, but the dog stayed with her.