The Artsy Mistake Mystery

by Sylvia McNicoll

  For anyone who’s ever created a masterpiece artwork for the fridge, especially my grands, Hunter, Fletcher, Finley, William, Jadzia, Violet, Desmond, and Scarlett

  While the settings and some of the mistakes may be real, the kids, dogs, professors, crossing guards, and neighbours are all made up. If you recognize yourself or anyone else, you’ve clearly made a mistake. Good for you!

  Table of Contents

  The Artsy Mistake Mystery

  dedication

  day one

  day two

  day three

  the aftermath

  Copyright

  day one

  DAY ONE, MISTAKE ONE

  Renée and I have an arrangement. In the mornings when I walk my clients Ping and Pong, I swing round to her place and pick her up. She then takes charge of Ping, the hyperactive Jack Russell, a former pound puppy Mrs. Bennett pays me to exercise. I continue with Pong, the taller, quieter greyhound she rescued from Florida.

  Renée doesn’t like to hang around her house alone, so she doesn’t mind leaving way early, the moment her older brother, Attila, takes off for class — he goes to Champlain High. If I were her, I’d want to leave even earlier.

  He’s scary. His name suits him: Attila, like the Hun. Renée says it’s a popular name in Hungary, where her parents were born.

  Right now I’m wondering if the arrangement with Renée isn’t a mistake. If it is, it’ll be the first one I make today, though, and not a big one. It’s important to make mistakes, my father tells me all the time. It means we’re trying new things, sometimes outside our comfort zone. Being friends with a girl is, for sure, outside my comfort zone, and Renée forces people to pay attention to her. From her sequined hair barrettes, through to her sparkly glasses, and all the way down to her light-up sneakers, everything she wears catches your eye. She’s also yappy, like Ping, always with one more thing to add or bark about. I’m more like Pong, tall and quiet.

  Just not quite as calm.

  Both Ping and Pong are white with black markings on the head and a black spot on the body. (Greyhounds aren’t always grey. Renée can explain all that to you.) They scramble ahead of me like mismatched horses pulling a carriage: Ping, a scruffy pony; Pong, a smooth-coated stallion.

  This morning I can handle them by myself. It’s a great fall day, leaves swish as we walk, the sunshine feels warm. Even the hundred-year-old jogger, all bent over at the shoulders and back, wears shorts as he runs past us. The dogs give him a friendly bark of encouragement. Neither makes a lunge for him.

  “Good boys!” I tell them.

  Today, though, I think the route to Renée’s is all wrong for us. Usually, I make the dogs walk to the left of me so that when they go to the bathroom, it’s not on someone’s lawn. But today is junk pickup day. Once a month the neighbourhood gets to put out any objects, large or small, that they don’t want alongside their garbage and recycling, and the city picks them up. Dad calls it redecorating day. He is out walking his five Yorkie clients right now, scouting for a previously enjoyed bookshelf.

  This junk slows us down, the large objects attracting the dogs’ attention. Sometimes, they bark at them; always, they like to pee on them. First Pong — with his long legs, he trots in the lead — then Ping. Brant Hills Park would be so much better for Ping and Pong’s exercise this morning.

  “Stop that!” I yank Pong back from someone’s recycling bin just as he raises his leg to salute its contents.

  Good thing. A banged-up white van pulls up beside us and a dad from our school jumps out to rummage through the recycling.

  I want to call out, “Hi, Mr. Jirad.” I don’t know his son, Reuven, super well, but I helped deliver his paper route last week with Renée. Mr. Jirad concentrates on pulling out liquor bottles from the box and doesn’t notice us.

  Maybe this is embarrassing for him. I’m going to pretend I don’t notice him, either, then. As he drives away, I see the big dent in the back of his van all caulked in with some kind of filler. A home repair that doesn’t quite work. Over the painted filler, wobbly black letters spell Pay the artist.

  “I didn’t know Mr. Jirad was an artist,” I tell the dogs.

  Ping growls, eyes intent on a teenager in a black hoodie and bright, flowered leggings. The sunlight glints off the diamond stud in her nose as she pulls the ugliest wall plaque I’ve ever seen from someone’s pile of junk. It’s a large grey fish, mouth open, pointy teeth drawn, mounted on a flat slab of glossy wood. Maybe Ping is growling at the fish, not the girl. In any case, I strain to hold on to both dogs.

  She smiles as she admires the fish.

  “It looks real,” I can’t help commenting as we get closer to the pile. The fish is bent as though it’s wriggling in a stream.

  “It is real! Taxidermy.”

  I wince. “And you like it?”

  “It’s perfect!” She looks from the fish to me. “Oh, not for me. The plaque is for my prof. They’re redecorating the staff lounge.”

  “Perfect,” I repeat, wondering about her professor.

  She nods and grins as she walks away with her prize.

  “Good dogs,” I tell Ping and Pong as we continue on. So far so good, anyway. Although, it’s not just the busyness of the route to Renée’s house that makes me wonder if our arrangement is a mistake. Does she expect me to share the money I’ve earned? I officially work for Dad’s company, Noble Dog Walking. Noble is our last name.

  Also, if she wasn’t hanging around me so much, would I have a chance to make a real friend? Like Jessie. We used to have sleepovers in his pool house before he moved away last summer. Dad’s never going to let me bunk in the same room as a girl.

  Ping and Pong pull hard now, Ping wagging his stub of tail like crazy.

  A couple houses ahead, I see Mrs.Whittingham loading up all the children in her shiny black van. She operates a home daycare and it seems like she stuffs about ten kids in that van. She slides the door closed and then gives a friendly honk as she drives past us. The kids point and wave at the dogs. The dogs wag back.

  That distracts me for a minute, and when Pong yanks toward the house near us, toward Mr. Rupert’s wishing well, I nearly miss what he’s up to.

  “Oh, no you don’t! Your wishes won’t come true that way.” I pull him back. Mr. Rupert is the neighbourhood grouch and he got scary mad when Pong went number two in his flower bed last walk, even though I was cleaning it up before he started yelling.

  Ping doesn’t like me scolding Pong and starts barking, sharp and loud. Ping, even though he’s a quarter of Pong’s size, likes to defend Pong when he’s not fighting with him himself.

  “Don’t worry, I’m not mad at Pong.”

  Apparently defending his bigger pal is not what Ping is up to today because he’s not looking my way. Instead, he strains at his leash toward Mrs. Whittingham’s house on the corner. When I don’t move quickly enough toward it, he bounces up and down on his hind legs like they’re bedsprings.

  “What’s up, boy?” I ask. “Do you see something?” He can get excited about the slightest thing. A small black bag of dog doo sitting in a tree set him off a week ago. I thought that was kind of weird, myself. As we draw closer to Mrs. Whittingham’s house, Pong pulls, too, and I see what they want to investigate.

  From the tree in Mrs. Whittingham’s yard, a yellow plastic swing moves slightly in the breeze.

  It looks like there’s something sitting in it, too big for a bird or squirrel, bigger than a raccoon … oh, no … she’s left a kid behind in the swing!

  The little boy looks paper white with purple circles under his eyes …
like he’s, like he’s … but he can’t be; she only left a minute ago.

  I run with the dogs to her house, dash up her lawn, bashing my knee on some stupid bird ornament. Ow. Then I grab for the boy in the swing. I think I’ve seen enough rescue videos that I can use CPR to bring him back to life if I have to.

  That is … if it’s not too late.

  “Hey, you! What the heck are you doing!” A voice blasts from behind me.

  “What …”

  “I know it’s butt ugly, but you leave that Halloween display just the way you found it.”

  Okay, this is definitely mistake number one of the day, and it’s a doozy. Mr. Rupert catches me rescuing some kind of creepy lifelike doll.

  DAY ONE, MISTAKE TWO

  Halloween display? Mrs. Whittingham must have just set it up — early bird of the neighbourhood — no one else has so much as a black cat up. I drop the corpse-like doll back in its seat.

  Mr. Rupert’s face wrinkles into a full frown reaching from his eyebrows down to his chin. His yellow hair sticks up like short lightning bolts. He folds his arms across his chest and squints at me. “Were you the one who stole my mailbox?”

  “No, no! Of course not.”

  He has a “Support Our Troops” sticker on his car’s bumper, a bright green Cadillac, and Renée swears she saw him in camouflage combat fatigues last Sunday. Even by the way he stands — back straight, legs apart — you know he’s a military man. Who would be crazy enough to take anything from him?

  “Then why are you trespassing on private property?” he shouts in a cannon-shot voice.

  “I thought the baby was real.” As I stop to look around now, I realize the bird ornament I knocked over is a large black plastic raven with blood painted down its beak. Styrofoam grave markers zigzag in a straggly pattern across the lawn. They have cutesy sayings: “Here rests Eddie, he died in beddy.” Pong is peeing on that tombstone right now.

  I’m usually so much more observant than this.

  Mr. Rupert shakes his head. “What exactly do you take me for?”

  A grump. Not like I’m going to tell him that. I heard he’s a gun collector. Instead I try to explain. “Well, Mrs. Whittingham just drove off. I thought maybe with all those kids, she may have left one behind.” What I didn’t say is that she has been known to make crazy mistakes, too. She locked the keys and a couple of the littler kids in the car one day, and I let her use my cellphone to call the cops. Her phone was locked in the car with the kids. She was so embarrassed. I know how that feels, so I never told anyone.

  Still, would she leave a child in a swing? I move the dogs out of the way and straighten up the raven.

  “That’s better!” Mr. Rupert calls. “Now I’m going to check my surveillance camera. I better not catch you on it.”

  Surveillance camera, gah! As I said, last week I helped Renée deliver newspapers for Reuven, the kid in the house next door to her. Mr. Rupert gets the paper. Of course I’m going to be on that camera.

  “My wife made that mailbox,” Mr. Rupert continues, staring into my eyes, “and you better believe I’ll find out who stole it.” His eyes are large, anime-sized blobs of dark brown quicksand. He tries to drown me with his stare.

  I blink first.

  Then he jabs his finger in Ping and Pong’s direction. “Don’t let me catch those animals defecating on my lawn.”

  “No, sir!”

  “On your way!” He points and watches as we move toward the sidewalk. Then he marches back into the house.

  Phew! My heart keeps pounding double time.

  The dogs and I turn the corner to Renée’s house. Up the walkway, the dogs crowd together in front of me as I reach to ring the doorbell.

  Renée answers before I finish ringing. She’s wearing a pink sweater with a rainbow-striped vest and red pants. Flashy and clashy all at the same time. “You’re two minutes late. Step in for a moment while I get my things.”

  If I’m two minutes late, why doesn’t she have her stuff together already?

  In the small foyer, Ping sniffs around a large duffle bag. “Stop that.” I pull him back. While I focus on him, Pong nuzzles into the bag and pulls out a wooden shape. Before I can snatch it out from his long snout, he slumps down and gnaws at it.

  Renée comes back in that moment. “Oh, no! Don’t let him chew Attila’s fish!”

  “Well, I didn’t let him …” We both kneel down to wrestle his new wooden chew toy away from him. “I thought Attila was finished his community service!”

  “No. He has to cut out the wooden fish for all the schools signed up for Stream of Dreams, not just Brant Hills. These are for Bruce T. Lindley.”

  I pinch the corners of Pong’s mouth between my thumb and pointer finger and press gently. “Oh, man. He complained enough when he delivered ours.”

  “Yeah.” Renée scrunches her mouth. “Well, it was tons of work for him.” Renée tugs at the wooden shark shape. Ping barks. “Got it,” Renée says. “Sit, Ping, quiet!” She raises her finger at the little dog and instantly he drops his haunches, waiting for a treat. Renée holds up the rescued hammerhead shark. “Oh, great, there are teeth marks on this one.”

  “It’s a shark that’s been in a battle. Stuff it back in the bag.” I hold it open for her. “Attila probably made extra.”

  “This is his last batch. He should be in a better mood after this.”

  “Wasn’t he a little happy to do something for the environment?” I reach into my pocket and give Ping and Pong each one of Dad’s legendary homemade liver bites. The fish were a lot of fun for us. Not so much knowing that real fish are poisoned by garbage dumped in the stream — which is why the project started — but painting the wooden models.

  Renée nods. “Except Attila complained that the tank he spray-painted on Champlain High’s wall had an important environmental message, too.”

  “It was a nice tank. I loved the 3D effect; it looked like it was crashing out of the school.” Definitely was a bit scary, too, though I don’t tell her that.

  “Your whale is terrific, too,” Renée said. “A Green Lantern whale, so creative.”

  “Green and white are my favourite colours.” Green Lantern is also my nickname at school ’cause Bruno and Tyson saw my superhero boxers once when I changed for gym back in grade four.

  Renée stares at the duffle bag. “I wonder why the fish are still here. The Bruce T. Lindley kids are done the environmental part of the project. They’re supposed to paint these today.”

  “Maybe Attila forgot to deliver them.” I smile. A big mistake on Attila’s part.

  Renée sighs. “Imagine all the kindergarteners standing around in their smocks with nothing to paint.”

  It’s comforting to know that even tough Attila can forget something as important as this. The idea makes me feel generous. “I know, why don’t we bring them to the school for him?”

  “Are you sure? It’s a fifteen-minute walk between Bruce T. and Brant Hills. We’ll have to take Ping and Pong with us or we’ll be late.”

  “Absolutely.” Brant Hills is where we go to school, grade seven. Bruce T. Lindley only goes to grade six. I pick up the duffle bag, then drop it again on my feet.

  Ow, ow, ow! My second mistake of the day. I’ve raised Renée’s hopes — now I’m going to have to let her down. “These fish weigh a ton. There’s no way I can carry them all the way to Bruce T.”

  DAY ONE, MISTAKE THREE

  Compared to Attila forgetting the wooden fish blanks in the first place, trying to lift them all at once is a just a weensy error in judgment. Attila is bigger and pumps iron, so he can probably do it with one hand.

  Renée crumples her eyebrows. “Attila will get in so much trouble if the school doesn’t get these this morning.”

  “Well, then, maybe we can divide them up.”

  “Okay, except … there’s
another bag in the hall. Let me check. OMG, yes, this one is full of fish, too.” Renée drags a second, larger hockey bag from the other end of the hall.

  “No way.” I shake my head. “Okay, wait, maybe … what about a wagon? Do you have one?”

  “No.” Renée snaps her fingers. “But Reuven does.”

  “Right, that red metal number. The one we used to deliver the Post.”

  “He’ll let us borrow it for sure.”

  “All right then!”

  Ping yips his excitement.

  Stepping around Ping and Pong, we drag the bags to the front door. Then Renée runs to ring Reuven’s doorbell while I hold on to the dogs.

  No answer, but I see his wagon at the side of the house. Just sitting there, waiting. Ping ruffs and Pong raises one tall ear when Renée rings the bell a second time.

  “We’re going to be late,” I call to her.

  She nods, looks around hopefully, then just grabs the wagon. “We’ll return it before he even notices it’s gone. He won’t mind.” She races it back to the front of her house.

  “Does he have a surveillance camera?” I ask as she approaches.

  “I don’t think so. Why?”

  “’Cause Mr. Rupert has one and his mailbox got stolen.” In my mind, I can picture Mr. Rupert dressed in a camouflage uniform, stalking someone with a rifle in his arms. I turn to look at Renée’s face. “You don’t think Attila took it, do you?”

  “Not his style. Now, if someone had spray-painted a war scene on his walls, I would be suspicious …”

  “Mr. Rupert would probably like a war scene on his walls.”

  “You’ve got a point, there.” Renée lifts one end of the hockey bag and I the other, in order to hoist it on to the wagon. The bag completely fills it. Then I sit the duffle bag on top. The sides are really low on this wagon, not like those tall plastic ones with built-in comfy seats for kids. Still, there’s no way we’re making two trips.

  We start to walk slowly, the duffle bag shifting with every crack and bump in the sidewalk. Holding Pong’s leash makes it even more awkward to pull the overloaded wagon.