Bow Wow

by Spencer Quinn

  “… right about that, Birdie,” the sheriff was saying. “No doubt in my mind now that there was a struggle out here and that Snoozy’s in some sort of trouble. Next step is to go back over things with Longstreet.”

  “Has he done something to Snoozy?” Grammy said, her voice a little wavery, very unusual for her.

  “Not saying that,” the sheriff said. “And Longstreet may not be the culprit. But I’ve got a hunch he knows more than he’s saying.”

  “Are you going to arrest him?”

  The sheriff shook his head. “Surest way to make him clam up. At least he’s talking now.”

  “But he could leave whenever he wants?” Grammy said.

  “Correct.”

  “Would you arrest him then?”

  “Cross that bridge when we come to it,” the sheriff said. Was there another way to cross bridges? I got the feeling the sheriff might not be on top of his game today. “I’m counting on his too-smart-by-half side to keep him talking. Meanwhile, you two might as well— Hey there, Bowser.” He reached out. “Whatta you got there?”

  What I had was not for him. Did Sheriff Cannon really believe I’d be giving him little gifts while Birdie was around? No, not on top of his game today, not close. I sidled over to Birdie, my eyes on the sheriff the whole time in case he was planning a fast one, and laid the red flip-flop at her feet.

  “What’s this?” she said, picking it up. If she’d sniffed it she would have figured out the answer right away, but the idea didn’t seem to occur to her. Or to any of them, for that matter. Not one of them took a single sniff at that flip-flop. Humans could be a puzzle.

  “Birdie?” Grammy said. “Remember those flip-flops I gave Snoozy at Christmas last year?”

  Birdie squinted inside the flip-flop. Just smell it! “Says size seven,” Birdie said.

  “Snoozy has very small feet for a fellow his height,” Grammy said.

  “How about we try to locate the other one?” the sheriff said. “Where’d you find this, Bowser?”

  I sat down. As if I was suddenly on the sheriff’s payroll!

  “Bowser!” Birdie said. “You be good!”

  I bounced right up and trotted toward the scrubby path. Ol’ Bowser: on nobody’s payroll, better believe it. At the same time, when Birdie speaks, I listen. I even listen when she’s silent. No payroll necessary between me and Birdie.

  Soon we were all standing around the spot where I’d found the flip-flop. Birdie, Grammy, and the sheriff split up, went off thrashing around in different directions. I stayed put. No more Mr. Manly smell in the air. This search was going to come up empty, guaranteed.

  Some humans give up sooner than others. This little group we had out in the dense and spiky brush on Little Flamingo Island was the type that gives up later, very much later. But at last, when it was over—no second red flip-flop or anything else at all interesting found, hardly needs mentioning—and they were fanning themselves and passing around a water bottle, the sheriff said, “The flip-flop doesn’t really add anything, just confirms what we already know. Namely that Snoozy was here.”

  “And left in a way I don’t like,” Grammy said.

  “I’m afraid so,” said the sheriff.

  We pulled away from the dock in Baie LaRouche, Grammy at the wheel and Birdie and me in the bow, Birdie dangling her feet over the side. And me with a couple of paws dangling over the side myself—why leave that out? So much fun to do what Birdie does! Sheriff Cannon and Officer Perkins stayed behind with Mr. Longstreet. The sheriff had asked Grammy if she wanted to say good-bye to Mr. Longstreet and she’d shaken her head. “I’ll have something to say to him in due time,” she’d said.

  And since then she’d been pretty quiet. Birdie and I watched the water, so smooth in the bayou, slipping past the hull of Bayou Girl. That sight will put you in a thoughtful mood. No actual thoughts came to me, but I still felt the mood, maybe even better with no thoughts in it. Birdie started singing, her voice quiet, almost a whisper.

  “Are you real, Mr. Nice Guy?

  Mr. Nice Guy, Mr. Nice Guy,

  Or are you a bad, bad dream?”

  I chipped in, making musical sounds of my own, a kind of wee-oo wee-oo, quite pleasing to my ear. Birdie seemed to like it, too: She gave me a nice little smile. Looking past her, I noticed Grammy watching from her place at the console.

  “Birdie?” she said. “Whyn’t you come on back here?”

  “Sure, Grammy.”

  We rose, moved along the narrow walkway between the cabin and the outside rail—we’ve got very good balance on boats, me and Birdie—and joined Grammy.

  “Wanna take the wheel?” Grammy said.

  “I don’t know, Grammy. The legal part, and all.”

  “Well now, it just so happens that I’m right here. And if you don’t drive the boat, how you ever gonna learn?”

  “But I already know, kind of.”

  “All the more reason!” Grammy stepped away from the controls and Birdie took over.

  “Same course and speed, Grammy?”

  “Yup. Just chuggin’ along at a civilized bayou speed, west bank goin’ down to the sea, east bank comin’ home.”

  “Red right returning,” Birdie said.

  “Bingo.” Grammy gazed at Birdie’s hands on the wheel. “Bayou Girl likes chuggin’ along like this. Feel that in your hands?”

  “I think so.”

  “She’s a fine old lady,” Grammy said.

  “I love her,” said Birdie.

  We were almost back in St. Roch, the gentle arch of the Lucinda Street Bridge in the distance, when another boat came up quickly from behind. “Darn cowboy,” said Grammy.

  I checked out this boat as it closed in—an untidy boat of the kind Grammy calls a floating yard sale.

  “Hey,” Birdie said. “That’s Dixie Flyer.”

  Dixie Flyer pulled toward the middle of the bayou to pass us, its engine making a high whine that I knew was not a good sound. Deke Waylon was at the controls, his stringy hair straight back in the breeze.

  “Corner-cutting no-account,” Grammy said. We always waved to other boaters. Grammy has two waves—a quick side-to-side for folks she thinks are okay, and a raised and quickly lowered hand for the not okay. Deke Waylon got the second kind. What was this? He didn’t wave back, actually turned away and maybe even sped up a little, bluish smoke drifting above the prop wash. Bayou Girl rose up in the wake of Dixie Flyer, Birdie doing something at the wheel that smoothed everything out.

  “Maybe he’s mad at us,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “Because Snoozy didn’t join up with him for the bounty hunt.”

  “Then Deke Waylon’s an idiot,” Grammy said. “Which we already knew. And did you catch the state of that boat of his?”

  “Floating yard sale,” Birdie said.

  “You can say that again.” Which Birdie did not. That didn’t stop Grammy from going into a long explanation on the meaning of shipshape, complete with many details, all of which I’d heard before, even remembering some of them. But I wasn’t really listening. Instead, I was looking ahead at Dixie Flyer, now in front of us and moving away fast. There was a big, brass padlock on the cabin door, glinting in the sunshine. It interested me, although I had no idea why.

  We passed under the Lucinda Street Bridge. Junior, leaning against the back of the food truck, spotted us, waved wildly, and started running along the path. We were going real slow, almost at the Gaux Family Fish and Bait dock, so he had no trouble keeping up.

  “Birdie! Birdie!”

  “For goodness’ sake,” Grammy said, taking over at the wheel, “quiet him down.”

  Birdie went to the side of the boat. “Hey, Junior.”

  “Birdie! Birdie!”

  “What is it?”

  “The contest, Birdie! We’re gonna win! I know for sure!”

  SOME HUMANS ARE KIND OF SLUGGISH, hardly moving at all. Others are just the opposite and don’t know how to stop. Junior Tebbets
is both! He can lie around on the grass by the food truck not doing a blasted thing, as his dad Wally often says, or he can be like now, inside Gaux Family Fish and Bait, unable to sit still or stand still, bouncing around with a rod in his hand, practicing sideways casts even though there was no reel.

  “We’re gonna win! We’re gonna win!”

  Birdie glanced out the sliders at the back, where Grammy was busy hosing down Bayou Girl’s deck.

  “Songs are coming into my head so fast I don’t have time to write them down! And I’m forgetting most of them. But it doesn’t matter—more keep coming. What do you think of that?”

  “Well …”

  “We’re gonna win, Birdie! And then—watch out, music world!”

  “Um, Junior,” Birdie said. “What makes you so sure? Have you heard from anybody?”

  “Huh? Like who?”

  “Like someone at the radio station.”

  “Not yet. Way too early. But don’t you ever just know something?”

  “Depends what you mean.”

  “Besides, I had this dream.”

  “You dreamed we won the contest?”

  “Not just that. I mean, that too, yeah. But we were at the Grammys, Birdie! I dreamed we were at the Grammys—me, you, and Nola—and it was so real it had to be true, understand? I had a true dream about the actual future.”

  I didn’t know where to begin. First of all, I, too, had had dreams about being at Grammy’s. We live with Grammy, after all, at 19 Gentilly Lane. Second, Junior and Nola had both been at Grammy’s in real life, no dreaming necessary. Third, while I’m sure those visits had been pleasant, why all this sudden excitement? I’d always thought I understood Junior pretty well. Now I wasn’t so sure.

  “… sparkling golden dress,” he was now saying. “You were in these cool ripped jeans and a T-shirt, and I—”

  “Nola was wearing a sparkling dress—”

  “Golden.”

  “—and I had on jeans and a T-shirt?”

  “The cool ripped kind of jeans.”

  “You said that.”

  “I was wearing one of those top hats. We danced around the stage, Birdie! Everyone was cheering like crazy.”

  Birdie gazed at him. I got the feeling she was about to say something amazing, but at that point she caught a movement over Junior’s shoulder. A red convertible was pulling into the lot out front. Did I know this car?

  “Junior,” Birdie said. “Wait here.”

  “Huh?”

  “I have to deal with this … this customer.”

  Junior turned and looked out. “Cool ride.”

  “Yeah. I’ll be right back.”

  We headed for the door, me and Birdie.

  “What kind of customer?” Junior said, following us.

  Birdie raised her hand. “Stay.”

  I sat right down.

  “Not you,” Birdie said. “You, Junior. Stay here.”

  “What’s the deep dark secret?”

  “There is no … Just stay here. Please!”

  We went out, the door closing behind us. Right away I caught the strong scent of hair gel, and it all came back to me: The smiling dude now climbing out of the red convertible was Roone K. Knight, program manager at WSBY, Voice of Bayou Country.

  “Well hello there, the very appropriately named Birdie,” he said. “How you doin’ on this lovely day?”

  “Uh, good, thanks.”

  I was doing pretty good myself, although things would have been better if Roone had worn those beautiful two-toned leather shoes instead of the sneakers—no doubt very fancy—that he was sporting today.

  “Great to hear,” Roone said. “I was in the area and stopped by to see if you had a chance to think about my proposal.”

  “Yes, sir,” Birdie said.

  “And?”

  “Well, I—I guess what I think is I’d really like to go, especially if Nola and Junior are included.”

  Roone kept smiling, although his eyes stopped joining in the fun. “Haven’t we been through this? I’m afraid that’s just not in the cards. This particular opportunity is about you alone.”

  Then came a silence. Birdie looked down at her feet. “In that case …” she said, and stood up very straight. I could feel the effort of that! She looked Roone in the eye, or just about. Maybe more on nose level, to be more accurate. “In that case, the answer is no. No, thank you, sir.”

  Roone’s smile vanished completely. “Sure about that?”

  Birdie nodded—a slow sort of nod that didn’t look so sure to me.

  “Kind of an unusual decision,” Roone said. “Can I ask why?”

  “We’re a band,” said Birdie. “Nola, Junior, and me.”

  “Your call, kid,” Roone said. He got into the red convertible and drove off, not checking the rearview mirror even once.

  We went back inside the store. Junior was watching through the big front window.

  “What was all that about?”

  “Nothing,” Birdie said.

  First thing the next morning Grammy called the sheriff, putting him on speaker so I could hear. Well, maybe so Birdie could hear, too.

  “Any news?”

  “’Fraid not,” the sheriff said. “Didn’t get much out of Henry Longstreet and we ended up cutting him loose. But we’re keeping an eye on his movements, twenty-four-seven. We’ve also got a full investigation going on in Baie LaRouche—questioning all the charter and fishing captains, checking closed-circuit video from the docks in the past four days, monitoring radio traffic.”

  “So you’re taking it seriously now,” Grammy said.

  “I take every investigation seriously, ma’am. And especially this, since Mr. Kronik—” He broke off.

  “What about Mr. Kronik?”

  “Nothing. We wouldn’t want this bounty hunt to lead to any … let’s call it bad publicity.”

  “For Mr. Kronik?” Grammy said.

  “I was going to say for the parish.”

  “Were you?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the sheriff said. “Got the DA on another line. Good to talk to you.”

  Click.

  Grammy hung up, not gently. She glanced at Birdie. “Something you want to say?”

  “Me? Oh, no, not a thing.”

  “Looked like it there for a moment.”

  Not long after that, we opened up the shop. Wally Tebbets was the first person through the door. Had he ever bought anything from us? Not that I remembered. That had to mean he was bringing snacks, just out of the goodness of his heart. My mind told me that. My nose told me something different. Wally had no snacks on him, not a crumb. He did have chewing gum stuck to the bottom of one shoe, but I’ve had a difficult encounter or two with gum and didn’t want to go there.

  “Morning, everybody,” he said. “Lem around?”

  Grammy shook her head. “Down in Baie LaRouche, helping out with the search for Snoozy.”

  “Is he a good driver?”

  “Lately, yeah,” Grammy said. “Lookin’ for a driver?”

  “Planning on running a second truck.”

  “Nice to hear.”

  “Thanks, ma’am. Any chance Lem’s got some cooking skills?”

  “Nope.”

  “Rules him out. I need a driver who can cook.”

  “I’ll ask around.”

  “Much obliged,” Wally said. “I’d also like to rent that jon boat of yours, just for today.”

  “Nope. We don’t rent bareboat here, never have, never will.”

  “Fine with me. I was thinking maybe Birdie could drive. She old enough?”

  “Yes, sir—under ten horse is the rule, and we run a nine point nine on the jon boat.”

  “Happy to pay her a hundred bucks, plus the boat.”

  Grammy’s eyes narrowed, like maybe she thought Wally was up to something. “Driver compensation is included in the rental.”

  “Got ya,” said Wally.

  “Okay then,” Grammy said. “Where did you want he
r to take you?”

  “Not me, exactly. This food truck I’m talkin’ about’s gonna be for up in Betencourt Bridge, what with the construction, the call centers and all. Thought I might send Junior up there with some samples, sell ’em to the workers at cost, prime the pump. Junior on his own, of course, is one thing. Junior with Birdie along—well, that’s another.”

  They both turned to Birdie.

  “Well, Birdie?” Grammy said. “Up to you.”

  “You could start a whole food-boat business, Mr. Tebbets—to go with the truck!”

  “Right there is what I’m talking about,” said Mr. Tebbets.

  “Wanna make up another song on the ride?” Junior said.

  “No,” said Birdie.

  We were aboard the jon boat, Junior on the bench seat in the bow, Birdie steering in the stern, me beside her. In the center of the boat stood three big coolers, one packed with shrimp po’boys, one with Wally’s Secret Recipe po’boys, and one with drinks on ice. Birdie had the cash box between her feet.

  “Something about boat rides makes you want to make up songs,” Junior said. “Just gliding along, nice and peaceful.” He reached over the side, trailed his hand in the water. “How come they call it a jon boat?”

  “No idea.”

  Junior glanced around. “It’s not bumpy, like other boats.”

  “We’re on the bayou, Junior. And there’s no wind.” Birdie checked the sky. Hey! Hadn’t the sun been shining when we got up? Now it was wall-to-wall clouds, not the puffy white kind, but gray and flat. “Any kind of waves and it gets real bumpy on a jon boat.”

  “Yeah?”

  “On account of the flat bottom. It’s for calm waters.”

  “Calm waters,” Junior said. “That’s our title, right there.”

  “Title for what?”

  “The song we’re making up.”