“Very rainy,” said Mrs. Sneepbunny.
It was hard to tell if they were all agreeable or just unoriginal. It hardly mattered to Mrs. Bunny, of course. She was having a marvelous time. She even told them about her lint art, and they exclaimed that she must bring some in to show them for sure.
So she was feeling elated, until Mr. Bunny picked her up. One look at his face and she forgot her happy morning in a trice. “Why, Mr. Bunny,” she said as they pulled away from the curb, “whatever is the matter?”
“We must hurry and get back on the case. Madeline and I built a cottage for her, and I brought in a team of plumber bunnies, who installed a small bathroom. I’m afraid to even look at the bill.”
“Oh, money,” said Mrs. Bunny. If Mr. Bunny was merely having a conniption over expenses, she need not be concerned.
“Let us not be so cavalier about the bills. But that’s not the problem. Madeline is just in a state about these parents of hers. We must rescue them now, she keeps saying. We are taking too long. She has been practically hysterical. And what parents they turn out to be! While we built the cottage, Madeline told me dreadful tales. As you already know, she is made to waitress for shoe money. But wait! It gets worse! Her parents won’t even come to her parent-teacher conferences. She goes in their place. They completely refuse to attend her Christmas concerts and graduation ceremonies. She is the one who changes the lightbulbs in her house! It sounds to me like she takes care of them.”
“Oh, Mr. Bunny!” sobbed Mrs. Bunny.
“Yes,” said Mr. Bunny with satisfaction. You could always tell when you’d told a heartrending tale well because Mrs. Bunny could not control the waterworks. There were damp puddles on the seat already. You could water crops with Mrs. Bunny’s tears once she got going. Indeed, Mr. Bunny had often thought of holding her over the lettuces.
They drove a bit in silence and then Mrs. Bunny said, “You know, Mr. Bunny, maybe we could … uh …”
“We could what?” asked Mr. Bunny, still thinking about how well he had handled it all.
“Keep her,” said Mrs. Bunny in high, strangulated tones.
“Oh, Mrs. Bunny, we’re not supposed to befriend humans, let alone adopt them.”
“No? Then I think we must steal her,” said Mrs. Bunny, mulling it over.
“Mrs. Bunny, get ahold of yourself.”
Mrs. Bunny said no more, but she still thought it was a good idea.
In the meantime, Madeline was pacing.
When she saw the Bunnys’ car pull up, she ran to it.
“Finally!” she said. “Let’s go find Flo and Mildred.”
“Let’s have some soup first,” said Mrs. Bunny reasonably. “It’s no good detecting on an empty stomach.”
Mrs. Bunny had vowed to herself that from now on somebody was going to take care of Madeline. This was going to be her priority. Even before finding Flo and Mildred and closing down the evil factory.
“I can’t help feeling everything is taking too long. You said you had things under control, but we haven’t done anything! Maybe we should see if we can get a doctor to force Uncle out of his coma. Do you think that would be possible?”
“Not if he is enjoying himself,” said Mr. Bunny. “People can be very stubborn about remaining comatose. No, the first thing to do is to try to decode the note ourselves. Let us have the soup while we do it. No one can decode with a malnourished brain.”
Madeline set the outside table, and Mrs. Bunny heated up some soup, and the three of them slurped soup and worked on the note.
They read it frontways and backways and upside down. Mrs. Bunny suggested they try reading it while standing on their heads, and though that didn’t seem to make any sense, they tried that too. It didn’t help.
Mrs. Bunny said that inspiration was sure to strike at any second. Mr. Bunny then remembered his secret decoder ring that had come in a box of Carrotloop cereal. He went inside to get it. But that didn’t work either.
“Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear,” said Madeline.
“Would you like some more soup, dear?” asked Mrs. Bunny.
“She doesn’t want more soup, she wants her note decoded,” said Mr. Bunny. “There’s only one thing to do, and I had hoped to avoid it.”
“Oh no,” said Mrs. Bunny. “Don’t even think it.”
“What?” asked Madeline.
Mr. Bunny sighed. “We shall have to visit a marmot.”
THE MARMOT
“No!” said Mrs. Bunny. “NOT MARMOTS!”
“What’s so terrible about that?” asked Madeline.
Mr. and Mrs. Bunny laughed and laughed.
“What’s so funny?” asked Madeline. They didn’t look as if they were having fun, they looked hysterical.
“Nothing,” choked out Mr. Bunny between guffaws. “It’s just too terrible to think about.”
“What do they do that is so awful?” asked Madeline.
“When they come to visit, they don’t bring cake,” said Mr. Bunny.
“I came for a visit and I didn’t bring cake,” said Madeline.
There was an awkward silence.
“But you’re family. You need never bring cake,” Mrs. Bunny said hastily.
Madeline felt a faint glow. Then she thought, my adopted family are rabbits. I finally fit in somewhere and it is with a whole different species. Naturally.
“But there is one marmot talent that, while usually pretty useless, is of the greatest value to us right now.”
“They can decode,” said Mr. Bunny. “They can decode like sons-of-guns.”
“Virtual Rosetta Stones, every one of them,” said Mrs. Bunny. “And the greatest one of them all, the one who has never been stumped, is The Marmot.”
“The marmot? Which marmot?”
“That’s his name. His parents named him The, and of course his last name is Marmot. So he is The Marmot. And that should tell you all you need to know about marmots, even if you didn’t already know about the cake thing,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“But we have to find Flo and Mildred!” said Madeline. “So can’t we forget about the cake thing temporarily?”
“Temporarily,” said Mr. Bunny.
“Because it really is so rude,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“Yes,” said Madeline. “Now, where do we find The Marmot?”
“Well, that’s another thing,” said Mr. Bunny. “You never know about marmots.”
“They keep changing their houses. One day they’re here. One day they’re there.”
“They’re very transient,” said Mr. Bunny.
“And they don’t bring cake,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“Yes, yes, we’ve covered that,” said Madeline impatiently. “Well, how do we find out where The Marmot lives, then?”
Mr. and Mrs. Bunny looked at each other.
“We thought all children knew how to find things,” said Mr. Bunny.
“Google,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“I didn’t know you could Google marmots,” said Madeline.
“You can Google anything, dear,” said Mrs. Bunny patronizingly. “I just learned how to use the computer this year. Mr. Bunny taught me.”
“And I’m never teaching you anything again,” said Mr. Bunny.
“You got that straight,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“Well, what are we waiting for?” said Madeline, so Mr. Bunny hopped inside to his computer and Googled The Marmot.
He came out waving a piece of paper with the address, and the three of them set off over hill and dale to a “particularly ugly part of the countryside,” as Mrs. Bunny loftily put it. They pulled up in front of a pile of dirt.
“Look at that hole he lives in,” said Mrs. Bunny scathingly.
“Shhh,” said Madeline. “That’s not nice.”
“Not nice?” said Mr. Bunny. “It’s just accurate. Marmots live in holes.”
“Mr. Bunny,” Madeline began. They were there begging favors. He needed to be tactful.
“Yes? For so I am called,” sa
id Mr. Bunny.
“But there are holes and holes,” interrupted Mrs. Bunny, sniffing.
“They don’t even plaster. They don’t put floors down. They don’t paint. Dirt floors, dirt walls, that’s good enough for them,” said Mr. Bunny.
They got out, getting rather muddy in the process, for it had started to rain and marmots also don’t keep proper lawns or gardens, drives or walkways, so the Bunnys were up to their furry knees in mud.
“There’s not even any place to knock,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“If it were me, I’d install a nice ground-level doorbell,” said Mr. Bunny speculatively.
“Hello, Mr. Marmot!” Madeline called down the hole.
“Mr. indeed,” said Mr. Bunny. “Hey, you big marmot head, answer your door, why don’t you!”
“Be nice,” said Madeline. “Or he won’t want to come out.”
Just then a furry face with teeth that protruded a bit too much to be attractive poked out.
“Well? What do you want?” asked The Marmot. “It’s not often we get bunnies in these parts. Not visiting us. Not often. And humans? Humans who speak Marmot? Never.”
“You see,” whispered Mrs. Bunny to Madeline. “Can’t even make intelligent conversation.”
“Mr. Marmot, I’m pleased to meet you,” said Madeline. Then she stopped. “Are we speaking Marmot or Bunny now?”
“A little bit of each, dear,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“I understand both?” said Madeline. An exciting thought was occurring to her. Was she one of the people scientists were looking for who could speak all animal languages? She knew she was smart. She had, after all, read Pride and Prejudice. Twice.
But she didn’t know she was that smart. No, smart wasn’t really the word for it. It was a gift. Was she so gifted?
“She doesn’t even know what languages she is speaking? What a dummy,” said The Marmot.
“Shut up,” said Mr. Bunny.
“This is Madeline,” interjected Mrs. Bunny hastily. “And she is certainly no dummy. You remember me and Mr. Bunny. We’ve come on an errand of grave importance.”
“You need help digging a grave, is that it?” asked The Marmot. “Someone told you marmots were good diggers, did they? Well, we are, we are, we are. Look at this lovely hole I’ve dug. Come to the right place, you have. Cost you a million dollars, but I’ll take the job!”
“A million dollars! You idiot marmot!” roared Mr. Bunny, but Madeline put a restraining hand on his shoulder.
“No, it’s your superior intelligence we’re after,” she said soothingly.
“Oh, that, oh, that, oh, that,” said The Marmot. He closed his eyes a minute to let the meaning of this come to him. Then he said, “Okay, I don’t know what you mean. Better come in and explain. Talk slowly and repeat things several times.”
The Marmot turned and went back into the hole. Mr. and Mrs. Bunny looked at Madeline and rolled their eyes.
“Mrs. Bunny and I can come in,” called Mr. Bunny down The Marmot’s long echoey hole.
Come in come in come in echoed back.
“He must have a very long hallway leading down to his living room,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“But Madeline can’t!” shouted Mr. Bunny. CAN’T CAN’T CAN’T echoed back up the hole. “Because she’s got such a gigantic bottom!” GIGANTIC BOTTOM, GIGANTIC BOTTOM, GIGANTIC BOTTOM.
“Please don’t,” whispered Madeline. It was one thing to have this said about you and another to have it echoing back from the earth like a fundamental truth.
“Yes, that’s enough of that,” said Mrs. Bunny, pushing Mr. Bunny back from the hole’s edge. “You’re going to traumatize her. Now listen, Marmot, get back up here. We can’t stand in the rain and we can’t come down the hole, so we’re going to have to find a tea shoppe or someplace Madeline can fit into to have our chat. We don’t want to go to a human one, though. We’d end up being on the menu.”
“Even if you weren’t,” said Madeline, “I can’t bring two rabbits and a marmot into a tea shoppe.”
“Well, then we’ll have to go to Rabbitville and find a restaurant large enough to accommodate you,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“The Olde Spaghetti Factory!” said Mr. Bunny.
“Oh, Mr. Bunny, you are a smart rabbit!” said Mrs. Bunny.
“Oh, I love The Olde Spaghetti Factory,” said Madeline.
Once, on a mad gay vacation, her parents had taken her to a real motel and The Olde Spaghetti Factory. Everyone was having a marvelous time until Flo found out that the restaurant was using nonunion lettuce. They had to leave in the middle of their meal, but Madeline had never forgotten it. It was the only vacation they had ever been able to afford and it had been just wonderful until the salad course. “I didn’t know that rabbits had one.”
“Rabbits have everything,” said Mr. Bunny.
“And everyone has The Olde Spaghetti Factory,” said Mrs. Bunny.
The Marmot poked his head out of the hole. “Did I hear someone say The Olde Spaghetti Factory?”
So Mr. Bunny hopped back into the driver’s seat, Madeline put both The Marmot and Mrs. Bunny on her lap and they rode into town with Mrs. Bunny holding her nose the whole way.
“Why, your Olde Spaghetti Factory is exactly the same size as our human one!” said Madeline in surprise when they pulled into the parking lot.
“They’re exactly the same all over the world. It is part of their charm,” said Mr. Bunny. “Now listen, Marmot, we’re going to have to disguise you. We can’t, obviously, bring a marmot in here. They might possibly tolerate a human, but no one is going to let in a marmot.”
“Meatballs, cannelloni, garlic bread,” said The Marmot, drooling and licking his lips.
“Right,” said Mr. Bunny, clamping his fedora on The Marmot’s head. Mrs. Bunny found a spare pair of sunglasses in her purse, and Madeline took off the scarf she had around her neck. It was too big, of course, but they wound it six or seven times around The Marmot’s neck until even his own mother wouldn’t have known him.
“Mr. Bunny, you are a master of disguise,” said Mrs. Bunny admiringly.
“Yes, it is one of my many talents,” said Mr. Bunny with satisfaction. “Come!” And he led the way into The Olde Spaghetti Factory.
The Marmot tripped six or seven times due to his dark glasses and the restaurant’s dim lighting.
“Stop calling attention to yourself,” said Mr. Bunny.
“I can’t help it,” said The Marmot. “Get a booth. Oh! And get some crayons and menus to color with.”
“Can I have a children’s menu and some crayons?” said Madeline when the waiter came. Madeline took up four chairs, but Mr. Bunny, with great self-restraint, didn’t mention it.
The waiter placed a child’s menu and crayons in front of Madeline. The Marmot nudged Mr. Bunny in the ribs.
“And another set for my marmot,” said Mr. Bunny, almost giving away the show.
But Madeline and Mrs. Bunny agreed that this remark had gone right over the waiter’s head. After the waiter brought the crayons, The Marmot began scribbling away for all he was worth.
“Look, I can stay in the lines!” he said to the waiter.
“Shut up,” whispered Mr. Bunny.
Then The Marmot ordered the most expensive thing on the menu.
“What did I tell you?” said Mrs. Bunny to Madeline, raising her eyebrows.
“Let’s get down to business,” said Madeline, clearing her throat.
She handed The Marmot the coded file card. At first, he put it on the table and picked up a crayon. He was about to use it when Mr. and Mrs. Bunny and Madeline all shouted “NO!”
“Just decode it, please,” said Mr. Bunny when they had all calmed down.
“Hmmmm,” said The Marmot, looking at the file card. “Very interesting. Very interesting indeed. I wonder what rabbit by-products are.” He looked pensive.
“Would you just decode, please?” said Mr. Bunny through clenched teeth.
The marmot
sat and studied the code as they made their way through gigantic plates of pasta. The Marmot ate all the garlic bread in the basket and called for three refills.
“We’re going to have to pay for that, you know,” said Mr. Bunny to Mrs. Bunny.
“It’s for a good cause, dear,” said Mrs. Bunny.
“It doesn’t even occur to him that others might like a little garlic bread,” said Mr. Bunny, sniffing.
“Well?” asked Madeline as the waiter took the plates away and brought them dessert menus.
The Marmot ordered the most expensive dessert, which was baked Alaska, and then he ordered Irish coffee too.
“You know Irish coffee is a dessert,” said Mr. Bunny. “So you’ve just ordered two desserts. And did you know there is whiskey in Irish coffee? And this is lunchtime. I’m just saying.”
“It helps me think,” said The Marmot, going back to studying the coded card, and no one said anything after that.
The Marmot grabbed all four after dinner mints that the waiter brought, and still no one said anything.
“WELL?” said Mr. Bunny finally, when he was paying the bill and The Marmot was loading his pockets with free toothpicks from the container by the cash register.
“I’ll tell you what I think,” said The Marmot.
“YES?” they all cried.
“I think that this card is in code,” said The Marmot. “And … by the way, where’s the restroom?”
Mrs. Bunny pointed down the hall to the doors with restroom signs. One showed a bunny in trousers and the other showed a bunny in a skirt.
“Which one do I use?” asked The Marmot.
“This is who we have decoding for us?” said Mr. Bunny.
Mrs. Bunny pointed to the sign with the bunny in trousers and The Marmot scurried in.
The Bunnys and Madeline sat on a bench by the restaurant door and waited for The Marmot to return. They waited and waited. Finally Mr. Bunny hopped down the hall to the restroom to see what was keeping him. When Mr. Bunny returned he looked flummoxed.
“Well? Has he fallen into the toilet? This sometimes happens with marmots,” Mrs. Bunny said, turning to Madeline.
“No,” said Mr. Bunny. “Worse.”
Mr. and Mrs. Bunny—Detectives Extraordinaire! Page 7
