Molly Moon & the Monster Music

by Georgia Byng

  Ten

  As they were all jet-lagged, everyone grabbed a few hours’ sleep.

  When Molly wandered out of her room, Chokichi was already up, practicing his karate. Molly watched as he went through his routine. He moved elegantly back and forth in front of the large apartment windows, cutting shapes with his body. When he had finished he bowed solemnly to Molly before going upstairs to change.

  When everyone was up, the boys’ grandmother wheeled herself into the middle of the sitting room and switched on her hearing aid so that she could hear her grandsons. Without acknowledging Molly, she kissed the three boys and they lavished presents from Ecuador upon her.

  After this, Molly was given a new T-shirt with a smiling skull on the front, and Gerry a yellow leather jacket that Toka had recently grown out of. The mice were put away, and then, ready for their supper with Mr. Proila, the brothers and Molly, Gerry, and Petula left the apartment.

  As the glass elevator descended, they saw Mr. Proila and Miss Sny below. He had donned a white silk suit and was pacing up and down the lobby area, gesticulating madly.

  As they drew level with him, they saw that he was talking on the phone and that his face was twisted with fury. The elevator doors opened and they heard his gravelly voice shouting in a language Molly didn’t recognize. Miss Sny was listening in on an extra handset so that she could tell Mr. Proila in sign language what the person on the other end of the line was saying.

  Mr. Proila raised his eyes and, without pausing, looked away from Gerry, Molly, and Petula, giving them as much attention as he might a stack of chairs.

  Molly noticed that the top of the little finger on his right hand was missing. All that was left was a stump that twitched as he talked. And when he pulled his jacket sleeve back in exasperation at his stormy conversation, Molly saw that his arm was black as ink. In the next second she realized that this blackness was a tattoo. She wondered how far up his body it went. She saw a flash of tattoo on the skin under the collar of his shirt as well. He was obviously covered in them.

  Beyond the door of the building a large chauffeur-driven limousine stood waiting. The usual crowds filled the sidewalk, and six bodyguards stood there like pillars.

  When Mr. Proila’s phone call was over, he swaggered over to the children.

  “So,” he began, addressing Hiroyuki disdainfully in his thick Russian accent. His voice was slightly loud even when he wasn’t shouting; presumably his deafness meant he couldn’t hear himself. “These are your little friends”—an odd thing to say as he was so short himself. He pointed at Gerry. “A hobo, a scruffball, a stinkball. Your old jacket, Toka, doesn’t disguise that.” Turning to Molly he commented, “This one can have her nose operated on as soon as she’s fully grown. The surgeons can work wonders. But the eyes, too closely set. Nothing to be done about them, I’m afraid.”

  Molly was momentarily stunned. No one had insulted her like this in a very long time. What with the mean grandmother and now with this rude man, Tokyo was beginning to feel hostile. But before she had time to think to turn her green eyes upon Mr. Proila and let them ensnare him with hypnotism, he had put on his dark sunglasses and turned away.

  “Sorry about his manners,” Chokichi said. “He is perhaps the rudest person you will ever meet. Don’t take it to heart. He is sick.”

  “The good thing,” said Toka, “is that you can talk behind his back and he can’t hear what you say. Look!” Toka stepped up toward Mr. Proila and said loudly, “You are an ugly, stupid, rude toad, Proila . . . See?” He turned back to Molly.

  But in the same instant, Mr. Proila’s hand came slamming down on Toka’s shoulder. “Not insulting me, I hope, Toka. I felt your step. Felt your breath, boy. Watch it!”

  Toka shrank back toward his brothers.

  Mr. Proila and Miss Sny sat in the middle section of the limousine, partitioned from both the driver in the front and the children in the back as they drove to the restaurant, followed by two of the bodyguards in a car behind them.

  “You’re going to love this,” Chokichi said to Molly as they stopped.

  Inside the triangular front door of the restaurant, three kimono-wearing hostesses greeted them, bowing low. Their lips were red, their cheeks were pink, and each of them had their dark hair gathered in a bun decorated with sticks. Behind them was a giant fish tank. It covered the whole back wall, as high as the upper floor, where the restaurant’s clients sat. Inside the tank was a rock garden with bright weeds and colorful water flowers. Freshwater fish of all sorts—salmon, trout, carp, and ayu—swam about in there, glooping and gliding. The hostesses presented them all with slippers.

  All the children changed their shoes, as did Miss Sny. But Mr. Proila ignored the slippers that were offered to him.

  “Pah!” he spat, and, straightening his white jacket, he marched up the stairs.

  The upstairs room was unbelievable. Most of the floor consisted of the surface of the fish tank Molly had seen downstairs, so it was like a large pond. It had five big wooden boats in it. The boats were fixed so that they were completely stable. Inside each was a long table, with enough space around it to seat twelve.

  Chattering people sat at these, enjoying fish suppers—cooked or as sashimi (raw slices of fish, beautifully presented). Little flasks of Japanese sake wine and spouted bottles of soy sauce stood on the tables, and the people ate with wooden chopsticks. Everyone was relishing the novelty of the restaurant and this is why:

  Fish swam in the water around the boats, and customers fished for their own supper. Once a fish had been caught, waiters took it to the chef, who killed, gutted, and prepared it for eating.

  At the farthest table, a young boy had just caught one. He was shielding his face as it struggled and flipped on the end of his line, splashing him. His family laughed as he grappled with the net.

  “Horrid!” said Gerry disgustedly. “Molly, you know I’m a vegetarian, don’t you? I . . . I don’t like killin’ things and I ’specially don’t like eating them.”

  Molly put her hand to her mouth. “Oh dear. Sorry, Gerry. Can you handle it? Maybe they have a vegetar—” But before she could ask for a vegetarian menu, Mr. Proila had distracted her. He had started to shout at the restaurant’s maître d’.

  “NO! NO! I BOOKED TWO WHOLE TABLES! Who are these peasants on my table? Get them off it. If you don’t get rid of them now, I will close this place down. And what’s more, you will find yourself swimming around in that tank and being eaten for supper.”

  The maître d’ looked terrified. Cowering and obedient, he followed Mr. Proila’s orders.

  “Mr. Proila”—Hiroyuki stepped in front of his manager so that he could read his lips—“we don’t need two tables. Come on . . .” But Mr. Proila flapped his hand irritatedly at Hiroyuki to shoo him away.

  Once the table had been cleared, Mr. Proila, like a horrid schoolboy who had just bullied a class full of kindergarten children, pushed his way to the best seat in the restaurant, at the end of one boat. Another big boat now sat empty beside it.

  Riffling through the fishing rods there, Mr. Proila chose what he obviously thought was the nicest for himself, dropping the others on the floor. Laughing in a show-off way, as though everyone must surely be wanting to watch him have fun, he began casting his line.

  “Come on!” he shouted to the band boys. “COME ON, ZAGGER!”

  The rest of the people in the restaurant now realized who the boys were. Silly fans that they were, they now thought it quite appropriate that they should all clear the way for Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka and their party.

  Embarrassed to have caused such a commotion, the boys found places to sit on the boats. Molly and Gerry and Petula sat down, too. And everyone (except Gerry) found themselves a rod to use.

  “COME ON, YOU SLIMY HORRORS!” Mr. Proila roared. “LET’S SEE YOU!” He stood up and peered frustratedly into the pond. “Where the hell are they? YOU HAVEN’T STOCKED YOUR POOL!” he yelled to the maître d’.

  �
�Sir, we have,” the man replied, making sure Mr. Proila could read his lips. “You must be more quiet, then they will come.”

  “Quiet?! What are you talking about? If this was my restaurant I’d keep the fish so hungry that they’d be eating each other! I’d keep them so hungry that they’d come up and take the bait even if a rock concert was going on in here.”

  “If we kept them that hungry,” the maître d’ explained gently, “there wouldn’t be much flesh on them for you to eat when you caught them.”

  Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka quietly got on with their fishing, ashamed of Mr. Proila and the fuss he was making.

  “Ridiculous!” Mr. Proila spat. Then his phone, vibrating in his pocket, distracted him. He passed it to Miss Sny to take the call, then, turning to one of his bodyguards, said, “Go to Fongi’s. Get me some bluefin tuna. Don’t want any of this boggy pond fish anyway.”

  The bodyguard nodded and left at once. Mr. Proila then got off the boat to march up and down the platform part of the restaurant, speaking with fierce intensity to Miss Sny, who translated what he was saying to the person on the other end of the telephone line.

  Molly, Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka each caught themselves a silvery fish and gave it to the waiter to prepare. Gerry looked very uncomfortable.

  “Have you got any vegetarian food?” he asked a waiter.

  “Certainly,” the man said. “Sushi rolls with cucumber and vegetable tempura—that’s vegetables fried in batter.”

  “That sounds nice.” Gerry was relieved.

  “Do you always eat out?” Molly asked Chokichi as they waited for their food.

  “It depends on Mr. Proila,” Chokichi replied. “Sometimes he goes out on his own, but if he wants us there we have to jump to it.”

  “Like a controlling parent,” said Molly, thinking of Lucy and Primo.

  “No, he’s not like a parent at all,” Chokichi replied. “He doesn’t love us. He just loves the money we make for him.”

  Molly nodded. For some reason, the way she felt at the moment, this didn’t seem a bad arrangement at all. Then she asked curiously, “How did he get to the top? I mean, everyone seems scared stiff of him. Even though he’s so small, and deaf. People could just pick him up and throw him over their shoulder, or his enemies could say things behind his back. It’s amazing he’s as powerful as he is.”

  Chokichi nodded. “Being small doesn’t matter. He’s got four very loyal and very big bodyguards. He pays them lot of money. And with deafness—Mr. Proila not always deaf. He was in a shootout.”

  “A shootout? Really?”

  “Yes. To save Mr. Proila’s life his bodyguard fired some gunshots, but guard’s gun was very close to Mr. Proila’s ears. Burst his eardrums. Three years ago.”

  “What happened to that bodyguard?” Molly asked.

  Chokichi checked to see that Mr. Proila wasn’t lip-reading him. “Nobody know,” he said. “He disappear. Mr. Proila say he move away, but nobody know for sure.”

  Molly nodded, her hand on her coin. Strangely, she was beginning to admire Mr. Proila.

  Petula watched her mistress. Again that acrid, bitter-lemon smell was coming from Molly. It was a smell that made Petula feel queasy and very uneasy. Petula sidled closer to Gerry. She was scared by whatever was happening to Molly, but most of all she was saddened. Saddened because her instinct was to keep away from Molly, and this felt unnatural, for Petula still loved her mistress. She didn’t know what to do.

  The waiter brought miso soup for everyone. Mr. Proila returned to the table, grunted, sat down heavily on the end of the bench, and started slurping his soup.

  When his bodyguard returned, he was carrying a very smart red paper bag with gold lines around its edges. Without thanking him, Mr. Proila took the bag and peered inside. He pulled out a red box and flipped its lid open. Snapping apart the chopsticks that had come in the bag too, he began pincering out pieces of pale pink marbled flesh from the red box and eating them.

  “Otoro! My favorite!” he said with a full mouth. “Best, most delicious fish in the world!” he said, gobbling up his supper. Then he saw that Gerry was glaring at him. “What ya staring at, boy?”

  Gerry looked furious. Molly wondered what could have caused his anger.

  Gerry stood up and pointed at Mr. Proila’s meal box. “How can you eat that?” he said coldly.

  Mr. Proila squinted as he read Gerry’s lips. “With great pleasure, that’s how!” He laughed, showing a mouthful of half-chewed fish.

  “But that fish . . . bluefin tuna—is rare. It is endangered. Eating bluefin tuna is like eating tiger meat or rhino!”

  “Wouldn’t mind a tiger steak!” came Mr. Proila’s amused reply.

  He scrutinized Gerry, so small and opinionated and cross at the end of the table, and he guffawed and then bellowed with laughter. But as his mouth was still full of chewed fish, a bit went down his windpipe. This sent him into spasms of coughing. For a moment the coughing was still accompanied by laughter, then as he grew purple in the face and his bodyguard patted him on the back, he grew more serious. When he had finally rid himself of the cough and his breathing had leveled out, his sense of humor had vanished. As though the coughing fit had been all Gerry’s doing, he gave him a nasty look and pointed his chopsticks at him.

  “Listen, Tadpole,” he said, “and listen good. First of all, what I do is no business of anyone’s except mine. If you ever talk to me like that again, I’ll sushi you. And as for the tuna, I don’t care if it’s the absolute last bluefin in the sea. I get what I want, and if I want bluefin tuna, I’ll eat it.”

  Gerry looked stunned. He sat down, shaken. Petula jumped up on his knee to comfort him. Hiroyuki, Chokichi, and Toka patted his back reassuringly. Molly went to sit beside him. She put a hand on his shoulder. Half of her knew she ought to stick up for Gerry, but the other half didn’t care enough to.

  “Don’t worry about it, Gerry,” she said under her breath. “But you shouldn’t have wound him up.”

  Gerry stood up. “I’m going to the toilet,” he announced. “To be sick!” he added.

  “I come with you,” Toka said.

  Eleven

  Molly watched Gerry and Toka go, then turned her attention back to Mr. Proila. Her hand strayed into her pocket. She touched her gold coin, and as she did, a curious impulse overwhelmed her—to take her harmonica from her other pocket and play it. Molly pressed the instrument to her lips and with a deep breath began to play. Only a small part of her wondered why she was doing this.

  Hiroyuki and Chokichi looked up. The notes from Molly’s harmonica danced through the air. Molly could certainly play the small instrument. As its metallic melody filled the restaurant, Hiroyuki and Chokichi became immersed in the sound. Miss Sny tipped her head to listen, too. People at other tables looked up. The waiters halted what they were doing. Even the bodyguards gazed at Molly, as the marvelous sound rippled into the air. The music she was making was fantastic, like something heaven-sent. And, Molly noticed, the more she played, the more in awe her audience was.

  Petula sat on the second table boat, away from Molly. Molly was smelling ever stronger—now of sharp thorns and poisonous flowers. Petula knew that normally Molly had no musical skills. Yet here she was, as though she had been born playing a harmonica—as though she had been taught to play it by the angels.

  As Petula looked about, she saw the effect the music was having on the humans in the restaurant. They seemed hypnotized by the sound. Petula squeezed her eyes and checked herself. No, she was definitely not hypnotized. But it was clear to her that everyone in the restaurant, except for Mr. Proila, who was eating a chocolate dessert, was. This music Molly was making, Petula thought, was hypnotic, and in a way more powerful than Molly’s hypnotic eyes could ever be. For this hypnotism was effective en masse. If there had been a thousand people in the room, Petula knew that they all would have been affected by Molly’s music.

  Petula knew this sudden musical ability, and Molly’s new
meanness, were both connected to the coin. The foul-smelling, evil-feeling coin that Petula could sense right now in Molly’s pocket.

  When Molly finished her piece the customers and the waiters let out cheers of appreciation. Everyone was smitten. Everyone that is bar Mr. Proila, who was wiping his mouth with a napkin.

  Chokichi shook Mr. Proila’s arm.

  “Mr. Proila,” he said, making sure his manager could read his lips, “Molly’s an amazing musician!”

  Mr. Proila looked up from his dessert and saw the enthused faces about him. He studied the waiters’ gleeful expressions and he saw that the object of everyone’s enthusiasm was the plain-looking girl with the scruffy hair, who held a harmonica in her hand. Mr. Proila had never cared for music, even when he had been able to hear, but he was very interested in the money he could make from it.

  “I’ve an idea, Mr. Proila,” Chokichi said. “Why doesn’t she play with us at the concert tomorrow night? She’s great. The audience will love her.”

  Mr. Proila had been in the music business long enough to know a hot thing when it sizzled in front of him. Regardless of what the potato-nosed girl looked like, it was quite obvious from the faces of the people in the restaurant that whatever she did on her harmonica was hot. He shrugged his shoulders and nodded.

  “Of course,” he said nonchalantly. “Good idea.”

  Then, deciding that one pudding hadn’t been enough, he waved at the waiter to bring him the dessert menu.

  When Gerry and Toka returned to the table, Petula could tell they hadn’t heard any of Molly’s music—and they hadn’t been hypnotized. Did Molly know what she had done to the others? She must, Petula thought, for Molly was experienced enough to know what hypnotized people looked like. Then Petula wondered whether Molly had even registered that Gerry and Toka had been absent. Petula began to shiver with worry. Somehow she must protect Gerry and Toka from this new Molly and her dangerous music.

  She thought of the coin that sat like an evil imp in Molly’s pocket. Petula knew what she must do. She must get the coin off Molly.