by Dan Elish
Cynthia smiled. “The competition is in a few hours.”
Daphna felt a shiver. Did her rhapsody stand a chance? Who knew? But there was no turning back now. In the distance stood the Statue of Liberty.
“That lady’s a sight for sore eyes,” Daphna said.
Harkin directed the flying car over the last stretch of water. In moments, they were gliding easily over the city streets, headed uptown.
“A lot different from the valley, huh?” Cynthia said.
“One thing you can say about New York,” Daphna said. “It never really changes. Buildings, people, taxis, and buses.”
The New York they left was the New York they returned to—at least at first glance. Rush-hour traffic filled the morning streets. Busy people, bustling to work, crowded the sidewalks. But with another look or two, Daphna noticed something strange. Though it was only eight in the morning, a long line of people wended its way out the front door of a store and halfway down the block.
“I wonder why they’re open so early,” Daphna said.
“Or what they’re selling,” Cynthia added.
Harkin shrugged. “Maybe some hot new book has been released?”
“Or a shoe store is having a big sale?” Daphna said.
“It could be a church giving out free breakfast?” Cynthia said.
Under normal circumstances, any of those ideas might have been correct. But Daphna soon learned that things were anything but normal. Two short blocks later, a similar line of people wound out of another store. And that still wasn’t all. A block after that, there was another—this line ran all the way down the street.
“I think we need to take a closer look,” Daphna said.
Harkin pulled a series of levers and brought the Thunkmobile closer to the ground. Down below, a fourth line of people wound out of yet another store—this line meandering down the street to a bus stop.
“They aren’t waiting for the bus, are they?” Cynthia said.
“Don’t think so,” Daphna said. Then she saw something. Her skin went cold. “Look!”
“What?”
“The sign!” Daphna said.
By that point, it had come into sharp focus. It read: MEET GUM-TOP!
Daphna was stunned. For once in his life, Harkin was speechless, trying to comprehend what had happened.
“Gum-Top?” he sputtered. “Do you mean . . . ?”
“He stole it!” Daphna said.
If there had been any doubt about Billy’s version of past events, they were swept aside now. It was official: Ignatious was a fraud.
“I know who did his dirty work,” Cynthia said. “Myron!”
Harkin hit his steering wheel with his open palm. “It had to be!”
It made sense. Ignatious had put his under-achieving son to work snooping around the school, looking for the best student work to steal as his own.
“We’ll turn him in,” Daphna said. “Tell the press about Billy.”
“But Ignatious is world famous,” Harkin wailed. “And who’s Billy B. Brilliant? A nobody who no one has ever heard of. Who would believe us?”
“But—” Daphna began.
“But what?” Harkin went on. “I don’t even have proof that I developed Gum-Top. Don’t forget, I kept it so secret, no one else even knew it existed.”
For the next few moments, Daphna and her friends rode in stunned silence. Harkin glided the car over store after store, with line after line of people waiting to buy their very own packs of Gum-Top. Some of the lines weren’t even stretching out of computer stores. One line was coming down the block outside a candy shop; another was outside a pet store; another wound out of a bank. Every proprietor, no matter what they sold, was getting in on the action.
What was even more unusual than the hordes of people standing in line was their behavior when they exited the stores. Directly beneath the Thunkmobile, a young woman walked right into a lamppost. A man barely missed being run down by a grocery truck.
“They’re totally out of it,” Daphna said.
Fortunately, the people of New York were too focused on the websites taking form before their eyes to notice the strange car flying overhead. Harkin dropped even closer to the ground.
“It’s a new era,” Cynthia said.
“Generation Gum-Top,” Daphna said.
If she was amazed by what was happening on the average New York street, she was flabbergasted by what had become of Times Square. As Harkin guided the Thunkmobile up Seventh Avenue, Daphna’s jaw dropped. In the past two days, Ignatious had bought up every single piece of advertising space in the square. Gone were the billboards promoting movies, musicals, and plays. Gone were the signs advertising cars, computers, and shaving cream. Now every single one of them was a tribute to the glories of Gum-Top.
“I’ve seen actors with smaller egos,” Cynthia said.
The signs were as much a testament to Ignatious himself as to the product he purported to have developed. At 42nd Street was a giant billboard that featured a photo of Ignatious holding out a piece of chewing gum. The words below read:
Up a street, a billboard showed Ignatious placing a piece of gum in his mouth with a caption saying:
Gone was the giant billboard of Ignatious that Daphna had admired the night she had seen The Dancing Doberman. In its place was an even bigger billboard, an absolutely enormous picture of Ignatious’s face, his mouth open wide in hysterical laughter. The text read:
“I can’t believe that a week ago I would’ve been cheering that bum on,” Harkin said. “Now he makes me so mad, I want to make him a special pair of rocket-engine sneakers and blast him to the Andromeda galaxy.” He turned to the window and screamed down, “I made the Gum-Top! It’s my idea! Mine!”
“Watch it!” Daphna cried.
Harkin was so furious, he had come inches from crashing his car into yet another billboard of the not-so-great Blatt.
“Let’s get over to school,” Cynthia said. “Maybe there’s a way to expose Ignatious yet. Like they say about opera, it ain’t over until the fat lady sings.”
Harkin pulled on the green lever. The little car gained altitude for the short trip uptown. Straight ahead was a blimp. On one side was a giant picture of Ignatious’s face. On the other it read in gold lettering:
Harkin shook his head. “The next day or two is going to be really tough around here.”
Chapter 21
Showdown Outside the School
Three blocks down the street from school, Daphna could see that life at her beloved school had been drastically changed. The police had set up a barricade to control the enormous crowd that had swarmed to the old Brackerton grounds. Reporters strolled the sidewalk peppering passersby with questions, hoping all the while for the grand prize: a shot at an interview with Ignatious himself.
“All this for a lousy crook,” Harkin muttered.
He slammed on the brakes by a narrow parking spot between two SUVs. Once Daphna and Cynthia were out, Harkin flipped a switch on his wristwatch computer. The car collapsed and with its telltale scrinch! rolled into the space. As the three friends headed the final blocks toward the main school gate, Daphna saw that the mob was even bigger than she had first thought. Along with the police and the press, vendors had set up carts, selling anything they could.
“Get your Gum-Top dental floss!” one man called. “Cleaner teeth mean clearer websites!”
“Special sunglasses here!” another yelled. “See your Gum-Top websites in three D!”
“I’ll paint your eyetooth silver, then dye your sideburns red!” an enterprising artist cried, waving a paintbrush. “Look like the Great Blatt in fifteen seconds!”
A few steps closer to the school, a man was selling life-size posters of Ignatious along with a limited supply of Ignatious masks. A woman was offering to tutor nursery school students for the yearly Blatt admissions tests.
“You think your child is only extremely gifted?” a sign outside her booth read. “In three sessions Joanna
C. Jasper will turn extremely into insanely!”
“What a scene,” Harkin said.
“People’ll think of anything,” Cynthia said.
“Look on the bright side,” Daphna said. “All these people might make it easier for us to sneak in unnoticed.”
A sensible enough thought, but Daphna had forgotten a critical fact. Yes, Ignatious was famous, but in her own smaller way so was Cynthia. Her disappearance from The Dancing Doberman had been well reported on theater websites and papers. All it took was one reporter to recognize her for the floodgates to open.
“There she is! Cynthia Trustwell!”
A wave of information-starved reporters sprinted toward the children.
“Remind anyone of Billy’s monkeys?” Cynthia asked.
“Tell me, Cynthia,” a reporter cried, “are you back to do The Dancing Doberman?”
Cynthia adjusted her glasses. “Absolutely. I’ll go on tomorrow night.”
“Was your disappearance linked to Gum-Top?” another asked.
“Not at all. We were at a conference in Madrid.”
One reporter nodded toward Harkin.
“What about your tiny friend? Isn’t that Barkin Ruckenheiser, inventor of the exploding sneakers?”
“The name is Harkin Thunkenreiser!” the boy thundered. “And while I may seem short to you, I am in the low-to-normal height range for my age group.”
“All right! All right!” the reporter said, scribbling notes. “Not born too short.”
“Furthermore, my sneakers don’t explode. They fly!”
“Got it,” another reporter said. “It’s your car that explodes, am I right?”
That was all Harkin could stand. He puffed out his chest and stood to his full height. “The Thunkmobile does not explode. In fact, we just flew it all the way back from Africa!”
“You heard it here, folks!” a reporter shouted into his mic. “The kids flew in from Africa to try out Ignatious Blatt’s Gum-Top!”
At the mention of his beloved Gum-Top, Harkin’s face turned bright red. His upper lip twitched.
“Ignatious’s Gum-Top?” the boy shouted.
“Careful,” Daphna whispered. “Remember—we need proof before we say anything.”
“Not now,” Cynthia said.
But it was a lost cause.
“Ignatious Peabody Blatt is a fraud!” Harkin exploded. “A fraud! He didn’t develop any of his ideas! Not Blatt-Global! Not Peabody-Pitch! Not the Hat-Top computer!”
The ridicule was everything Daphna had feared. Just like that, she found herself staring into a sea of befuddled faces. Then came the rapid-fire reactions.
“Ignatious didn’t create his products?” a man cried. “The boy is crazy.”
“It’s like saying George Washington was a British spy!”
“Or Abraham Lincoln didn’t free the slaves!”
“Every knows that Ignatious is a genius. The greatest of all time!”
“And a humanitarian too. He just gave twenty million dollars to build refreshment stands in the Sahara Desert!”
“And another fifteen to fight gorilla dandruff!”
Everyone was shouting at once, individual voices blending together to create a huge, frightening din. Then the fervent cries turned on a dime to laughter—wild guffaws, hearty chuckles, and delighted giggles echoed up and down the street.
To Daphna’s dismay, it got worse. Once the crowd had laughed itself dry, it turned on Harkin.
“Hey, kid. Take your sneakers and fly to the moon!”
“Cut your ponytail, little man. It’s corroding your brain!”
It was all too much for Daphna to take.
“Harkin’s telling the truth!” she shouted. “He is. I promise.”
“All right then, girlie,” a reporter said. “Give it to us. If Ignatious Peabody Blatt didn’t create the Hat-Top computer, who did?”
“Who created the Hat-Top computer?” Harkin said. “Billy B. Brilliant, that’s who!”
All was still. Even the pigeons perched on the Indian restaurant took a momentary break from their pecking and cooing and cocked their ears toward the street. Vendors stopped hawking their wares and leaned close as twenty or more microphones were shoved toward Harkin.
“What?” a reporter asked.
“You heard him,” Daphna said. “Billy B. Brilliant!”
“Billy B. Brilliant?” someone shouted.
“Who’s that?” a vendor called to Daphna. “The name of your pet rock?”
“No, it’s a new cartoon character!” someone else yelled. “I saw him on the Disney Channel.”
The street exploded once more in a cacophony of shouts and laughter. Daphna had suspected that Ignatious’s reputation would hold him safely above any accusations, but she hadn’t thought the reaction would be so utterly dismissive. Most people in the area were laughing so hard, they were having trouble standing up.
Daphna felt Harkin tense beside her. She wouldn’t have been surprised if she had seen steam come out of his ears.
“You don’t believe me?” he called. “Billy B. Brilliant is the real genius behind Ignatious’s inventions. We saw all his inventions in Africa. He’s made Cook-Top! Frog-Top! Joke-Top!”
“Joke-Top?” a reporter cried.
“The kid is cracking,” a vendor called out. “Get him a nurse!”
“No, take him into custody!”
No sooner were the words spoken than two policemen grabbed Harkin under the armpits and began to drag him toward the school.
It was then that a voice echoed across the school grounds. A familiar voice.
“A moment, if you please!”
The crowd’s attention turned to the door. Could it be? Was it . . . ?
It was!
Standing at the main entryway to the school was none other than the famous founder himself, Ignatious Peabody Blatt. His suit was yellow, his tie emerald green, and his shoes a bright plum. The officers let Harkin shake himself free as reporters pushed and shoved up to the school fence, holding out their microphones.
“We can all question the grace of Mr. Thunkenreiser’s delivery,” Ignatious said, moving to the top step of the school entranceway. “But our esteemed student brings up a fair point.” He paused. “You see, once upon a time there was a Billy B. Brilliant!”
What? Daphna looked at Harkin. Could it be? Was Ignatious coming to their defense? About to admit his crimes? In public? Though he appeared outwardly calm, Daphna noticed that Ignatious’s right eyebrow was arched at a slightly steeper angle than usual. Everyone pushed closer.
“It’s time to set the record straight, dear friends,” Ignatious said above the whir of television cameras. “This is not a story for the faint of heart. How sad it is! Years ago, Mr. Brilliant and I were classmates together at the College for the Extraordinarily Talented. Such good friends we were. But one night I discovered him riffling through my prized notebooks. Imagine my horror when I discovered that Mr. Brilliant was no more than a common criminal, attempting to steal my greatest ideas.”
A collective gasp filled the school grounds. Daphna noticed Myron standing beside his father. As always, his hair was perfectly parted down the middle. On his feet, he wore his trademark yellow loafers.
“Steal from you?” he called. “I’ll kill him!”
Ignatious smiled at his son, who was now clenching his fists. “Such a good boy, but murder is hardly necessary. Here’s the truly sad part, my friends. Even though I forgave him—that’s right, I told Billy that I wouldn’t report him to the school authorities—he felt so terrible about what he had done that the poor fellow disappeared. Last I heard, he was living in a hut in western Peru, making ends meet by hosing down giraffes for a local circus. So tragic!”
Ignatious pulled a sky blue handkerchief from his coat pocket and dabbed his eyes. When he continued, his voice trembled with feeling.
“Let us all take a moment to remember the Blatt School creed. ‘Be insanely gifted! Work insanely hard!’ B
ut most important of all: ‘Be insanely good!’ Poor Billy B. Brilliant had the first two qualities in spades, but he didn’t have the last. That’s why this tale has such relevance today. I implore my students—all students at all schools the world over—not to let the same thing happen to you. Be gifted, yes, but above all, be honest.”
The crowd broke into a wave of spontaneous applause. Ignatious bowed deeply, blew a kiss, then disappeared inside his school. As for Harkin, he continued to press his case.
“He’s lying,” he called. “Billy B. Brilliant isn’t in western Peru. He’s in Africa. Furthermore, I developed Gum-Top. Me! Right here in my lab. Myron stole it!”
Daphna watched in shock; her heart sank like a stone. It was one thing to be laughed at but almost worse to be ignored. Harkin was shouting at the top of his lungs, but now no one was listening.
“Cool it,” Cynthia said.
“She’s right,” Daphna said. “We have to plan our next move.”
“Gum-Top is mine!” Harkin said. “It’s mine! It’s—”
Daphna did something she’d never even considered in six years of friendship. She yanked Harkin’s ponytail.
Doubled over, the boy grabbed the back of his hair.
“You touched my hair!” he cried.
“Quiet,” Daphna hissed. “Here’s what we have to do. First we find Myron and grill him about how he stole Gum-Top. Then we check your office, Thunk. Ignatious probably cleaned it out, but you never know. Maybe Blatt left a clue when he stole your idea.”
“I can help too,” Cynthia said. “When I visited Ignatious before we left on our trip, he asked me to drop by his office today to confirm the night he’s going to see The Dancing Doberman. I’ll go now and see what I can find out.”
“We’ll meet back at the theater just before the assembly,” Daphna said. “Sound good?”
Harkin nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Good.”
Plan in place, Daphna led Harkin and Cynthia through the maze of reporters, onlookers, and vendors and slipped through the front gate into their school.
