The Mystery of the Masked Marauder (Nate and Basset, PI: Pet Investigators Book 1)

by Peter Cox

  “Well that sounds interesting.”

  “What are we waiting for?” I asked. “Let’s find ourselves a terrifying spider and see if it will help us read an ID card.”

  Chapter 30

  SEARCHING FOR AN OGRE

  It was decided that the spiders would spread out over the entire forest and find their ogre-faced cousin while the rest of us waited at the fort.

  They figured spiders would draw a lot less attention than three “giants stomping through the leaves like elephants.” That’s how they said it at least.

  This was especially important since our enemy knew that I was on to him, and my parents were in danger if I was spotted poking around. I had to stay out of it until the last second.

  The spiders tried to be sympathetic, but they weren’t very good at it.

  “I’m terribly sorry for your loss,” one of them – who introduced himself as Frank – said to me. “I know it must be troubling for you. Well, I mean, I don’t know from experience. My father was crushed by a basketball and my mother was sucked up into a vacuum when I was still in my egg sack, but I didn’t really mind. It was back when we weren’t truly awake yet. It’s hard to care when you don’t have thoughts to care with.”

  “It’s also hard to care when your parents don’t pay much attention to you,” another interjected. “Not their fault. My mom had 2,132 babies. Hard to keep tabs on all of them, even with eight legs and eight eyes.”

  “True,” Frank said. “Still, it must be hard for you. I guess. Come to think of it, I’m actually not sure what my parents’ names were. Bertha and Sean? Santana? Shroom? Is that even a name?” He wandered off, quite distractedly muttering to himself as he went. “Smiley? No. Why would a spider be named Smiley?”

  It cheered me up, but not for the reason they hoped. They made me laugh.

  Sam and Basset and I returned to the fort, with a handful of spiders to “keep guard.” I wasn’t sure how much good a half-inch spider would be in a fight, but I was glad for the company.

  “Once we’re done defeating the darkness, what do you think we’ll do?” one of them asked while we walked.

  “Do? What do you mean? We’ll go back to eating and building webs I guess.”

  “But, I mean, you don’t think we’ll go back to sleep, do you? I like being able to think and being able to talk. I’ll miss it.”

  “How can you miss it if you aren’t smart enough to remember it?”

  “I don’t know. But I think I will.”

  “Me too,” another said. “And is that all we’ll do? Just eat and build?”

  “That’s all we’ve ever done before.”

  “Human, what do you do? When you’re not fighting mysterious dark forces, I mean? What’s the meaning of your life?”

  I opened my eyes wide as saucers and looked at Sam.

  “That might be the most important question each person has to ask,” Sam said, like she had thought of this already. I sure hadn’t. “We all have to figure out what we’re best at, what we like to do, what we’re here for. Then we have to use our skills to help others and make the world a better place. Some people say God put us here to learn that: how to help, how to care. Not everyone figures it out, mind you. Not everyone even thinks to ask, actually. But that’s one of the fun parts about being alive: figuring things out.”

  “Oh,” the first spider said. “Sounds hard.”

  I laughed. “You’ll get used to it.”

  “Assuming we don’t forget everything and turn back into mindless beasts.”

  “Yes, assuming that,” I said.

  We got back to the fort in short order, and Sam built the fire back up. It wasn’t particularly cold, but it gave her something to do. I just sat and thought. A dangerous thing to do when you’re worried.

  What was happening to my parents right now? Were they getting tortured for information? Were they locked in some kind of dungeon?

  Basset could always read me.

  “They’ll be okay buddy. Trust me. We’ll get them. We have allies now.”

  “Thanks boy,” I said, scratching him behind his ears.

  Sam could read both of us.

  “We’ve come a long way from this morning,” she said. “This morning all we had were puzzle pieces. Now we’ve put a lot of them together, and we have help for the rest.”

  While we made ourselves a hotdog lunch we talked over the remaining clues.

  It really was encouraging that we had figured out the phantom at the window. We had unraveled the riddles and come to the solution.

  That gave me a lot of hope.

  We talked about the glass and metal again, theorizing about what else it could be if it wasn’t a magnifying glass. We didn’t come up with a lot of alternatives.

  Sam wondered if all the Athena paintings meant anything, but I said the owners of the manor were probably just trying to class the place up with some classical art. It worked a lot better than my dad’s grandma-lamp, though I had to admit I was glad he kept it. We would’ve been lost without that key.

  “Look, I know you guys said you thought we talked in rhymes, but why did you call the lamp an upside down sun?” I asked the spiders.

  “You try learning all the words for everything in the world in a week,” one of them said. “I think we did pretty well.”

  I laughed. “Sorry. No, you did great. We figured it out in the end.”

  Sam had a look on her face like she was starting to figure something else out.

  “You guys have no idea who this ‘darkness’ is, right?” she asked the spiders.

  “None,” one of them said.

  “We just heard bits and pieces, mostly from birds perched on the roof or on the telephone wire outside. Once they disappeared we knew it was getting serious.”

  I told that to Sam, who nodded.

  “Tell me, are there evil spiders out there?”

  “Why do you ask that?” I asked.

  “Just curious.”

  “I don’t know,” one of them said like he’d never thought of it before. “I honestly don’t even know if there are other spiders out there who’ve awakened.”

  “I think William said there are,” I said.

  “Well there you have it.”

  “But evil ones?”

  “Maybe. I have no way of knowing. Are there bad humans?”

  “Oh yes. Lots I suppose. More good ones though. And there’s a lot of people caught somewhere in between.”

  The spider sounded thoughtful. “Well then I suspect it’s the same for spiders. Some good, some bad, and a lot in between.”

  “We’re the good ones though, right?” another asked

  “I think so,” the first said slowly. “I hope so. I don’t want to be evil. But how can you tell?”

  “By choosing not to be,” Sam said with a laugh when I relayed the question to her. “If you don’t want to be evil, then don’t be. It’s easy enough to tell the difference.”

  “How?”

  “Just listen to your heart,” I offered. It was terrible advice from lazy movies, but it was the only thing I could think of.

  “Mine just says ‘thump,’” one said. “That’s not very helpful.”

  “We use our hearts to help us walk,” another said. “Our legs fill up with blood like blood-balloons. How does that tell us what’s right and wrong?”

  “Oh boy,” I said.

  “I’ll explain it to you later,” Sam laughed. “But part of it is choosing not to be selfish. You can feel selfish, but you have to choose not to give in to it and choose to help others, even when it doesn’t help you. You’ve already got that covered.”

  We talked for hours like this, revisiting the clues occasionally but mostly chatting with the spiders. They were curious about so many things that their questions were practically endless.

  It was honestly kind of fun getting to know them and talking to someone who had such a unique, fresh perspective on everything. They didn’t even know what part of the w
orld they were in. Though I suppose spiders don’t have to worry about geography too much.

  Just as long as there’s plenty of flies where they are.

  And flies are everywhere.

  Time flew by as we talked, which was merciful, since my worry was tying knots tighter and tighter in my stomach.

  Before I even knew it, it was late in the evening, and Sam recommended we get some rest.

  Spider messengers came once or twice to update us. There really wasn’t any news.

  Like the night before, I was positive I wouldn’t get any sleep but I was out of it as soon as my head hit the pillow.

  Worry takes its toll on you.

  I had more dreams about my parents. This time they were trapped on a rock in the middle of the ocean, with Athena glaring at them from another rock, and Guster dressed in a toga and no shirt (an image I hope to never see again as long as I live, by the way) chucking tridents at them.

  Dreams are confusing.

  At some point in the dead of night I felt something tickling my arm. It woke me up slowly, but I figured it was just Basset’s tail brushing up against me.

  Until I felt the tickle move onto my shirt, up my neck, over my lips and onto my nose.

  Then my eyes snapped open and I screamed.

  Eight pitch-black eyes were staring at me.

  I sat bolt upright, and the spider on my nose slipped and fell onto my cheek, letting out a scream of his own, but he quickly scrambled back onto my nose.

  “Goodness, you can kill a spider jerking around like that,” he said while I struggled to focus on him. “You’re lucky my instincts didn’t kick in. We pack quite a bite.”

  It was William. He had returned.

  Sam and Basset were awake and alert now, both staring with wide eyes at the spider on my face.

  “I don’t usually wake up to arachnids gazing into my eyes,” I said. “It’s a bit startling.”

  “I suppose it could be,” he said in an offhand way, like he was shrugging. That would be ridiculous of course: spiders don’t have shoulders. “Anyway, I bring news.”

  I kept silent, holding my breath. Did he find my parents? Were they dead?

  “We found him. The ogre-face. He has asked to meet with you.”

  Chapter 31

  MEETING AFTER MIDNIGHT

  It was still a few hours before dawn and the air was so cold it was like it was sucking all the warmth out of me. I could barely even remember what it felt like to be warm.

  I kept following the spiders through the forest. I had to. If I was ever going to see my parents again and make this right, I had to.

  Basset trotted along somberly at my side, and Sam was next to him.

  “You can go back,” I said to Sam through chattering teeth. “It’s cold out here, and who knows what’s waiting for us out there in the dark? You don’t have to be here.”

  “Yes I do,” she said simply. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Me neither,” Basset said.

  I couldn’t convince them. If anything happened to either of them I knew I’d never be able to forgive myself, even if they did decide to come on their own. They were still out here because of me.

  Every once in a while I swore I could hear whispers in the breeze, little snippets of icy voices. Sam said she couldn’t hear anything. I kept telling myself it was just the wind, but I still felt like we were being watched. Something was out there in the deeper shadows.

  After about an hour we finally came to a massive fallen tree, the trunk almost as tall as I was. In the snow-white moonlight I could see that the tree was mottled with moss and lichen; all sorts of creepy crawly bugs probably lived in the rotted wood.

  It turns out only one did.

  And what a bug it was.

  From a small hole in the stump two long legs reached out into the moonlight, like two bony fingers. The spider slowly raised itself out of the hole, its huge black eyes fixing right on me.

  It was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen. The eyes seemed to glimmer in the light like black gems, so bulbous they looked like they were about to burst. The brown spider was completely hairless and had a hump on its back, and its legs were impossibly long, twitching with every step. Worst of all, it had two fangs jutting nastily out of its mouth.

  “The boy has come,” the spider said in a hungry-sounding voice. “We finally meet. The boy who can hear. Two creatures so far from their natural place in the world.”

  I wasn’t about to let my fear get the better of me.

  “Nice to meet you,” I said. I almost stuck out my hand for a handshake out of habit, but I held back. Spiders probably don’t like seeing a human hand reaching for them. That’s a good way to get an up close look at those fangs.

  “Oh the pleasure is all mine, believe me. My name is Barry.”

  Okay, his name was less scary than the rest of him, but he was still terrifying.

  He sighed, turning those black eyes to the moon thoughtfully. “It is a lonely life, living in solitude so far from home. But one learns a thing or two in years alone. Patience, for one. But most importantly one comes to appreciate what one has lost. And wishes to lose no more.”

  He snapped those eyes back on me so fast I almost jumped. I didn’t know what his game was, but I didn’t like it.

  “I’ve had plenty of gibberish the past few days, thanks. Can you help us?”

  He sighed again. “I understand your frustration, and your caution. But I am not toying with you. I’m trying to help, in the only way an old spider knows how. I must take my own pace.”

  I felt bad. “Sorry. I- I thought you were just being difficult.”

  He sounded amused, like he would have been smirking. You know, if he didn’t have fangs instead of a face. “Plenty of difficulty ahead, I’m afraid. But you won’t find any here. I have felt the darkness coming, heard the same whispers my brothers have. And I don’t wish for my life to change any more than it already has. This wood has become my home, and I will not have it ripped from me in my old age. Please, tell me how I may be of service.”

  I pulled out the ID card and laid it on the tree trunk. I didn’t care for the wet, slimy feel of the rotten wood, but I kept that to myself.

  He was fond of his home, after all. To each his own.

  “Do you need a light?” I asked, reaching for my flashlight.

  “No, thank you just the same. These eyes are not just for show, though they are certainly for that as well,” he chuckled.

  The spider crawled onto the card. I braced myself. Here was the moment of truth. He started to speak, and I knew, just knew he was going to say “Guster Cooper Liberman.”

  He didn’t.

  “Easy enough. It says ‘Grant County Library.’ A simple library card, it would seem.”

  I was dumbfounded. I could see Sam was too. All this time we had assumed the card was the key to everything, that it would unravel this whole web of mysteries. It seemed it was just another dead end.

  “A library card? That’s it?”

  “So it would seem. There’s more however. Fine print. Tiny.”

  “What does it say?” I held my breath in anticipation.

  “It says ‘Special Librarian Access.’”

  I stared dumbly at him.

  A librarian? What librarian? Guster wasn’t a librarian. He could barely read.

  “It’s coming back to me now,” William said. “The name. We tried to give you the name of the Masked Marauder the first night we visited you. Did you not receive the message?”

  “All I got was instructions to go to Baskertonn Manor, and some numbers.”

  “Numbers? What numbers?”

  I turned to Sam. She had a much better memory than I did.

  “They were 2 1 18 19 20 15 14.”

  William turned around slowly and slapped one of the other spiders upside the head with his leg.

  “Jeez Frank! I keep telling you, letters are on the right, numbers on the left. He’s got the brain of a fly,
that one. Look, we’ve been referring back to that book to learn your letters. But some of us,” all eight of his eyes glanced at Frank, “just can’t seem to get the hang of it. Sorry about that.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “The alphabet book. Frank was in charge of spelling the name. And he used the numbers instead of the letters.”

  “Sorry boss,” he said, glancing up at me embarrassed.

  “Oh, it’s okay. You just might have caused the fall of civilization as we know it. Simple mistake.” William smacked him upside the head again.

  “So what do those letters come out to?” I asked, starting to count through the alphabet.

  Once again, Sam was way faster. “B-A-R-S-T-O-N.”

  Chapter 32

  GETTING HELP

  There I went again. My mouth was hanging open so wide a crow could have made its nest in there. That’s a ridiculous metaphor, of course. There were no birds around.

  “Mr. Barston?!”

  “That’s the one,” William said. “A certain Ken Barston. County librarian I believe. The Masked Marauder.”

  I couldn’t believe it. I just couldn’t believe it.

  “He always seemed so nice, like he wouldn’t hurt a fly,” Sam said.

  “Maybe he wouldn’t,” William answered. “But he’d apparently hurt Nate’s parents.”

  “Yeah, and we hurt flies, but we’re okay,” Frank responded.

  William smacked him again. “Hardly the point.”

  I tried to compose myself. We had to move quickly, and this was no time for me to be out of commission with shock. I could detangle the mess in my head later.

  “So where do we go from here?”

  “Not Baskertonn Manor, I’m assuming,” Sam said, turning to William. “I’m sure we left enough signs of our visit there that he wouldn’t risk returning.”

  “Quite right,” William responded. “We haven’t seen any movement around that place since we came out here. We may not have Barry’s eyes, but we’re sharp enough.”

  I asked again. “So where do we go from here?”

  “The library?” Sam asked. “I mean, we know who we’re after now.”