The Complete Screech Owls, Volume 1

by Roy MacGregor

  “Who do you think killed him?” Andy asked Nish when the boys in “Osprey” were supposed to be resting.

  “I have no idea,” said Nish. “Maybe he killed himself, for all we know. He could hardly have liked himself.”

  Travis shook his head. “There was no gun. Whoever shot him left with the gun.”

  “But there was a bullet,” said Nish.

  “Yeah, there was a shell.”

  “What kind?” asked Lars.

  “How should I know?” said Travis. He knew nothing about guns. He didn’t want to know anything about guns.

  “Do you think you could ask about my tape recorder?” Data asked.

  Nish threw his pillow at Data’s head.

  No one seemed to be organizing any activities, so the boys stood around with everyone else and watched the police at work. Men in suits went into the boathouse and came out carrying dozens of plastic bags, some seeming to hold nothing. There was a police boat drifting over the area between the island and the main camp, and two scuba divers were in the water.

  “They’re searching for evidence,” Nish announced.

  Travis shook his head. Anyone who’d ever turned on a TV set would know that, he thought.

  One by one, the police were taking everyone who had been at the camp into the camp office and interviewing them. Two police talked to each of them, and another policeman wrote down everything they said.

  Travis told the police his story exactly as he remembered it. He had no idea who might have wanted to hurt Buddy O’Reilly.

  “Did you see Mr. O’Reilly and anyone arguing or fighting in the past few days?” the older policeman asked.

  “No…”

  Muck! Suddenly the scene outside the arena, when Muck had slapped Buddy’s face, flashed through Travis’s brain. There had been a fight–well, almost a fight–and it had been Muck Munro, the Screech Owls’ coach, who’d been arguing with Buddy O’Reilly.

  Travis’s voice must have given him away. The older policeman looked up from his notes. He cocked an eyebrow over his reading glasses.

  “You’re sure of that, are you, Travis?”

  Travis squirmed. He felt sick to his stomach. He knew Muck hadn’t done it, but he also knew he had to tell the truth. He had to tell the policeman every single thing he knew.

  “Well…”

  Travis checked later with Nish. Nish had found himself telling the same story. He seemed almost ashamed, as if he’d let the coach down, but Travis assured him that they had to tell everything. It wouldn’t matter. The police would soon learn, if they didn’t already know, that Buddy O’Reilly was an ass and that all kinds of people had words with Buddy.

  “What about Roger?” Travis said suddenly.

  “Roger?” Nish asked, puzzled.

  “The caretaker who quit. He and Buddy fought over the gun, remember?”

  “Yeah…right!”

  They looked at each other, filled with confidence, then instantly filled with dread.

  “But Muck took the gun away from Roger,” Travis said.

  “I know,” said Nish. “I just remembered.”

  Travis decided he had better go and speak to the police again. They had to be told about Roger and the fight with Buddy. And if they had to be told about that, then they had to be told about the gun and where it had gone. But it couldn’t possibly have been that gun that shot Buddy, could it?

  The police already seemed to know everything that Travis could tell them about the incident with the gun.

  “The rifle Mr. Munro took is missing,” the older policemen told Travis.

  Missing?

  “Mr. Munro says he put it under the spare mattress in his cabin, but it’s gone now. Do you know what kind of rifle it was, Travis?” the older cop asked.

  “No.”

  “It was a .22.”

  It meant nothing to Travis. What was a .22?

  “The shell you found in the boathouse,” he continued, staring up at him over his reading glasses, “it was also a .22. Did you know that, Travis?”

  “No.”

  Travis really didn’t know what kind of rifle it had been, or what kind of shell he had found, but there was no doubt that the policeman was giving him this information in order to check his reaction. And what exactly was his reaction, Travis wondered, as the police excused him and thanked him for coming back with new information? He knew now that the gun Muck had taken away from Roger was a .22-calibre rifle. And he knew that a .22-calibre shell had been found in the boathouse. And as far as he knew, Muck had the only .22 around.

  Travis felt sick to his stomach for about the sixth time in less than a day.

  After he got back outside, Travis leaned against the side of the office building, catching his breath and waiting for his stomach to settle. A stand of pine and cedar grew close against the office, and Travis was hidden from the view of anyone approaching the door to the building.

  A policeman walked up the path, carrying a long plastic bag. Inside was a rifle!

  Travis stayed put. A window above his head was open, and he realized he could hear the voices of the men inside. The policeman carrying the rifle knocked.

  “Yes, come in.”

  “Travers here, sir. The divers found this off the far shoal.”

  “A .22-calibre?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did you speak to Mr. Munro about this?”

  “He just keeps saying he put it under the mattress in his room and that was the last he knew of it.”

  “What about the box of bullets?”

  “Mr. Munro says that he disposed of them.”

  “Disposed of them?”

  “He says he took them down to the dump the same day he took them from the caretaker.”

  “He says that, does he?”

  “Yes, sir, he does.”

  Travis could almost feel the grin grow on the older policeman’s face.

  “Well, that’s very convenient–but he may have forgotten one thing.”

  “What’s that, sir?”

  “We have a dozen witnesses who told us he ejected live bullets from that gun and then ground them into the earth with his heel. We find them, we don’t need the box of bullets to see if there’s a match.”

  “Yes, sir–I’ll put some men on that right away.”

  “Good work, Travers.”

  Everything began to move so fast that Travis’s head couldn’t keep up with his spinning stomach. The police investigative unit set up behind the shed where Roger had fired at the rabid fox, laying out a grid of stakes and string and beginning to dig with small shovels.

  Nish and Travis and Andy stayed and watched them search. They were there when the first policeman shouted that he had found something almost at the centre of the grid. With rubber gloves on, he picked up a bullet and dusted it off with a small brush. Another policeman brought a plastic bag over, the bullet was dropped in, and the bag sealed.

  “Silver casing on the shell, wasn’t it?” said Andy.

  “Looked like it,” said Travis.

  “Same colour as the one we found in the boathouse,” said Nish.

  “Doesn’t mean a thing,” countered Travis.

  But he knew exactly what it meant. He believed absolutely that Muck had tossed the box of bullets away. That would be just like Muck: they could have the rifle back eventually, but no bullets. He wouldn’t have done it to hide anything, because Muck had nothing to hide. But what if the bullet they had just found matched the shell found in the boathouse? Only Muck had had access to those bullets, and now the police would think Muck had hidden the rest on purpose.

  The boys watched the policeman dig up two more bullets. Each one was placed in its own plastic bag and carried away to the camp office.

  Travis decided to return on his own to his window and see if he could learn anything.

  “They’re from the same batch.”

  Travis could make out the voice of the older policeman. He could sense satisfaction in the man
’s voice.

  “The shell casing from the boathouse is an exact match with the three bullets we dug up. We’ll need full forensic confirmation, but this is good enough for me. We have a rifle that someone tried to dispose of, a rifle that has been fired recently. We have a match in the bullets now, even though Mr. Munro claims he threw the original box of shells away. And we have the gun hidden in Muck Munro’s cabin.

  “I think, gentlemen, it is time to pay a call on our Mr. Munro.”

  Muck was in handcuffs.

  The Screech Owls–Travis, Nish, Data, Lars, Andy, Gordie, all the others–and most of the Aeros, stood around the parking area as the police led Muck away, in handcuffs. Travis’s eyes stung. He looked at his friend Nish, and Nish was staring straight down at the ground, as if he was too embarrassed to look.

  It had to be embarrassment, Travis told himself. It couldn’t be shame. No one could possibly believe that Muck had shot Buddy O’Reilly, no matter how many clues seemed to point his way.

  With a policeman at his elbow, Muck marched straight ahead, chin held high. The policeman tried to ease him into the back-seat of the patrol car, but Muck stopped abruptly and turned.

  He scanned the crowd. He stared, sure and steady and confident: it was the look the kids knew from the dressing room just before a very important game. Muck full of confidence. Muck with faith. Muck knowing exactly how things would turn out. It couldn’t possibly be a bluff, Travis told himself. Could it?

  Muck’s eyes fell on Travis, and he stared.

  Then he smiled, once, very quickly, before getting into the patrol car.

  “He didn’t do it.”

  Travis tried to put all the confidence he felt into the statement. He was not talking to the police any more, but to his friends: Nish and Andy and Data and Jesse and Lars. He wanted them to feel what he felt. Muck had stared at Travis because he wanted him to know something. He had smiled because he wanted him to know that they had the wrong person.

  “Look,” said Andy, “I’m as upset as anybody about this–but it doesn’t exactly look good for Muck.”

  “He didn’t do it,” Travis repeated.

  “How can we know that for certain?” Andy asked. “We think that–but we don’t know it.”

  Travis had a thought. “But it was Muck who sent us to the boathouse. He wouldn’t have sent us if he knew Buddy was lying there, dead.”

  “Yeah,” said Nish, suddenly hopeful. “Right.”

  Andy shook his head. “Buddy’s body was hidden. Whoever did it obviously figured he wouldn’t be found so soon.”

  “He didn’t send us there, either,” added Nish, disheartened. “He just told Sarah she could take out a canoe. It was her idea to meet there.”

  Travis shook his head. “Muck didn’t do it.”

  “He had the gun,” Andy said, ticking off the points on his fingers, “and he knows how to use one. He had a fight with Buddy. He threatened him–there are at least four witnesses to that. And we all know Muck well enough to know that he must have hated Buddy O’Reilly.”

  “But not enough to kill him,” Data said. “Muck wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

  Andy paused. “Well, what would you think if you were a cop?”

  “I know what you’re getting at,” said Travis. “But he didn’t do it.”

  “Show me some evidence,” Andy nearly shouted. He sounded exasperated, upset.

  “There is none,” said a disheartened Nish. “None in Muck’s favour, anyway.”

  The boys fell silent for a while, each thinking his own private thoughts. Then Gordie Griffth, who hadn’t said anything, cleared his throat.

  “…There’s one thing,” he said.

  Travis pounced. “What?”

  Gordie cleared his throat again. “…Who was there when Muck took the gun off Roger?”

  “We all were,” said Nish impatiently. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “Muck took the gun and pumped out the remaining bullets, right?” Gordie said.

  “Yeah. So?”

  “So how many were left?”

  The boys all thought about it. Travis could see Muck wrestling the gun away. He remembered being startled at how familiar Muck had seemed with the gun. He remembered how Muck had aimed the barrel down, straight into the ground, before he pumped out the bullets. One…two…three…four…five.

  “Five,” said Travis.

  “Five,” said Data. “Exactly.”

  “Four or five,” said Andy.

  “Five,” said Lars.

  “I don’t remember,” said Nish.

  “Your point?” Andy asked Gordie.

  “Well,” Gordie answered, “if we all saw five, and the police only found three, what happened to the other two?”

  “Maybe the police just missed them,” said Nish.

  “Maybe they didn’t. Maybe someone else came back and dug up two of the bullets.”

  “We better check,” said Travis. He was trying to remain calm, but he couldn’t help but feel some excitement rising. No, it wasn’t excitement: it was hope. Finally.

  The police had taken down the grid lines, but it was clear where they had done the digging. The boys got shovels from the shed and Travis found a screen that Roger must have built to sift earth. If they threw the earth they dug into the screen and shook it through, any bullet should quickly show up.

  They dug for nearly an hour, but nothing.

  “So we now have two missing bullets,” said Data.

  “The police will just say Muck came back and got them to use on Buddy,” said Andy.

  “Why would he? He already had the box. But it could have been someone who wanted to make it look like Muck had done it,” said Gordie.

  “What if he threw away the box before he decided he needed a couple of bullets?” countered Andy. “Then he’d come back here.”

  Everyone looked at Andy.

  “Hey,” he protested, “I’m not saying he did it. I’m just saying what the police would say to us.”

  “Look,” said Travis, “we have to assume that Muck didn’t do it. We have to give him the benefit of the doubt.”

  “Nobody wants him innocent more than me,” said Andy, looking hurt.

  “Okay,” said Lars, “so what then?”

  “Then it means someone else had to come and take the two bullets out of the ground.”

  “Okay. But who?”

  “Who hated Buddy O’Reilly?”

  Three of them spoke at once: “Roger!”

  The cook knew where Roger lived: down the road and past the dump, then the first place on the left. A bit run-down, he told them.

  “Isn’t this something the police should be doing?” Data wanted to know when Travis had suggested they pay Roger a visit.

  “The police have already decided who did it.”

  “They must have talked to Roger by now,” said Nish. “What’re we going to ask him that they wouldn’t already know?”

  “I’ve no idea,” said Travis. “I just know for Muck’s sake we have to go down there and have a look around.”

  They took off after the morning practice–a listless, dull affair put on by Simon and Jason simply because there was nothing else to do. Escaping was simple. They just opened a back window in “Osprey” cabin, popped the screen, slipped out, and cut off through the nature trail.

  Travis appeared to be the leader. He knew they were all looking to him as captain, but he had no idea what they were seeing. A little boy desperate to prove Muck was innocent at all costs? Or a new Travis Lindsay, sure of himself and where he was going? Probably something in between, Travis thought.

  He didn’t have a clue where this road was leading them, apart from straight to Roger’s place. They passed the dump, the stink rising high, the seagulls loud, and they came to the first turn to the left. It led to an old, run-down home. Out front, the sun was falling on a patch of bright orange irises that had grown up through the open hood of an abandoned Plymouth.

  They thoug
ht about sneaking up on the place, but it was useless. The bush was too dense, for one thing, but there were also dogs in pens at the side, and already they were barking and jumping against the wire fencing at the scent and sounds of the boys coming along the road.

  “We’ll knock,” Travis decided. He didn’t really know why he’d said that. What alternative did they have? Turn and go back to the camp? Forget about the only lead they had?

  “You first,” said Nish.

  “Okay,” said Travis. He was captain, after all.

  The dogs went crazy as the boys moved slowly up the rough laneway. They walked past an old refrigerator, past two huge truck tires that had once been painted white but were now flaking, past an old pump, and came to a verandah.

  “Your idea,” Nish said. “We knock or we run?”

  Travis steeled himself. He stepped up to a wooden carving of a woodpecker hanging from the door, and saw that if he pulled the bird’s tail its beak would hammer on the door. He yanked.

  They waited a long time. A curtain moved slightly in the window closest to where they stood, and then the door opened.

  It was a girl–a blonde, pretty girl about their own age. She seemed as nervous as they were. But at least she was smiling.

  “Can I help you?” she said.

  “We’re looking for Mr….”–Travis remembered there had been a name on the mailbox–“…Sprott.”

  “That’s my father,” she said. “He’s out in the work shed. I’ll take you out there.”

  She led them around the corner of the house. The dogs were going frantic, trying to hammer their heads through the wire.