Big Game (14 page)

“So, you and your pal vandalized the place. That's still a crime.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because you're trouble. Like I said.”

“You think that, after all the commotion last night, I came back here and called Xavier, then had him come down to the park so we could trash the ice cream place, and then we both went home and pretended to go to sleep?”

“Maybe you decided to make it look like a bunch of vandals to cover up the fact that you really wanted all the ice cream.”

“Or maybe someone else did it besides me. An adult. Someone who could actually lift that giant trash can and throw it.”

“And why would an adult do that?”

“I don't know.”

Marge snorted in disgust, then returned to searching my room, opening the cabinets of my dresser, as if I might have actually hidden sixteen gallons of ice cream there.

I was annoyed at myself for not having a better answer for her. It felt like there was something important I was overlooking about the thefts, something that would help make sense of them, but to my frustration, I couldn't figure out what it was. I wondered if I was still tired from the events of the day before.

“Why don't you check the video from the park?” I asked.

“I already told you, there weren't any cameras aimed at the concessions.”

“But there's cameras everywhere else, right? There are thousands in the park. If you look through the footage from around the ice cream place, you ought to be able to find someone heading there in the middle of the night.”

“You think it didn't occur to me to check the other cameras?” Marge demanded. “I'm not an idiot.”

That's news to me,
I thought, but I didn't say it. I'd already antagonized Marge enough. Instead, I asked, “So why haven't you done it?”

“Because I don't have the authority, thanks to you. Now that I'm not in charge of security anymore, I have to file a requisition for someone to comb through the footage—and right now everyone's focused on this whole rhino thing instead. They're checking all the camera feeds for any sign of the hunter from last night, so I have to wait in line. Apparently, these rhinos are higher priority than my case.”

“Well, someone
is
trying to kill them,” I pointed out.

“And I'm dealing with the theft and destruction of official FunJungle property. Rest assured, though, when my time comes, I'm gonna give that footage a good, hard look. And if I find you anywhere even
close
to that ice cream shop around the time of the crime, I'm gonna have you in juvenile hall so fast, it'll make your head spin.”

“And if you see someone else instead?”

Marge rolled her eyes. “That'll be the day.”

Obviously, I wasn't going to talk any sense into her. And I didn't feel like waiting around for her to search the whole trailer. Our home wasn't big, but if Marge wanted to be thorough, she could still end up wasting a lot of my time. So when she got down on her hands and knees to search under my bed, I quietly backed out of my room and slipped out of the trailer.

The keys to Marge's golf cart were dangling in the ignition. I removed them and flung them into the woods. It was antagonistic and immature, but, I figured, you had to fight back against bullies any way you could. Besides, Marge could use more exercise.

I was twenty yards away from the house before Marge even noticed I was gone. Her voice suddenly boomed through Lakeside Estates, loud enough to startle birds into flight. “Teddy! Get back here! I'm not done with you yet!”

I didn't even look back. Instead, I picked up my pace, ducking through the woods toward FunJungle.

Behind me, I could hear the door bang as Marge stormed out of our trailer. “This isn't over, Teddy!” she yelled after me. “I'll get you if it's the last thing I ever do!”

Mom wasn't at her office
at Monkey Mountain. Kyle Reims, a young primatologist, was there instead. Kyle was still in college at the University of Texas, taking a semester off to do research on baboons; Mom was letting him use a spare desk in her office. He was tall and gangly, with hair that flopped down over his eyes. “Your mom's ankle was bothering her,” he told me. “So she went to have Doc check it out.”

Doc Deakin was FunJungle's head veterinarian. FunJungle had an actual doctor on staff—and a full medical clinic, given that the closest hospital was forty-five minutes away—but Mom and Dad both thought the doctor wasn't nearly as qualified as Doc. After all, Doc was one of the best vets in the world, while FunJungle's doctor had barely graduated from medical school.

“How long ago did she leave?” I asked.

Kyle checked his watch. “An hour at most. She's probably still there. Her ankle was looking pretty bad.”

“Like how?”

“All purple and swollen. Hey, if you see Doc while you're there, could you tell him to call me? I think Bababoonie needs to see him.”

Bababoonie was the alpha male gelada baboon. He was pretty scary as far as monkeys went. Baboons have serious fangs, and Bababoonie was always baring his at people, like he was a monkey vampire.

“Is that what Doc was here about last night?” I asked.

“No. He was here for one of the orangutans. Pancake, I think. He wasn't feeling good.”

I glanced at Mom's desk. Her computer could access the security system, allowing Mom to bring up the feeds from any camera at Monkey Mountain. This meant she could watch any primate she wanted to without the animal knowing it was being watched. The feed for the backstage area of the orangutan exhibit was on her screen. I figured Mom must have been using it to check on Pancake before she decided to go see Doc.

Pancake was the only orangutan in the backstage area. It was easy to recognize him because he had a shock of orange hair that always stood up on top of his head, making him look like a perpetually frightened cartoon character. The rest of the orangs were on display in their exhibit. FunJungle went to a lot of effort to make sure this happened, because guests didn't like looking at empty exhibits. (“It's like paying for a museum and seeing only blank walls,” J.J. had groused. “So make sure it doesn't happen.”) All the exhibits at Monkey Mountain had been designed to be extremely comfortable and stimulating, with plenty of things to play on and the heat cranked up to tropical rain forest temperatures. The orangutan habitat had tons of plants, a waterfall, and a jungle gym of fake trees. The backstage area wasn't quite as nice to look at, but there was a great deal to stimulate the apes there, too: ropes to climb, cardboard boxes to shred, big plastic balls to throw around. Pancake wasn't playing with any of it, which was unusual. He was only eight years old and was normally a whirlwind of energy, bouncing off the walls. Today, however, he was merely lolling on a pile of burlap bags.

“What's wrong with him?” I asked.

Kyle shrugged. “I don't deal with orangs. I'm the baboon guy.”

I got the impression that he wanted to do other things besides talk to me, so I said good-bye and headed across FunJungle to find my mother.

It was now nine thirty, only half an hour until FunJungle opened for the day. There were lots of employees out now, making sure the park looked perfect.

I passed the wreckage of the Gorilla Grill. Pete Thwacker was there, watching a small bulldozer knock over the remaining walls.

“Getting ready to build the new restaurant?” I asked.

“No,” Pete replied. “I'm only having this knocked down.”

“Wait. You're making the mess
worse
?”

“We're enhancing the viewer experience,” Pete corrected. “According to an exit survey we conducted yesterday, some of our guests were disappointed by the stampede scene. Apparently, there wasn't as much destruction as they'd hoped for.”

“Half the restaurant was destroyed!”

“Yes. You'd think that a herd of elephants would have trampled the
whole
thing. But they didn't. It only looked damaged, rather than totaled. And if you don't meet the guests' expectations, that's a problem.”

“So the elephant stampede wreckage didn't look enough like elephant stampede wreckage?”

“Exactly! Frankly, I would have preferred to do this more authentically. But J.J. is simply refusing to let me stampede the elephants again. In fact, he wouldn't even let them do their morning walk today. Apparently, he thinks it could be dangerous.” Pete sighed and shook his head sadly.

“I would have thought you'd approve of that,” I said.

“Well, I certainly don't want anyone getting hurt, but at the same time, you have to give the public what they want.” Pete scratched his chin thoughtfully. “There must be some way to convince him to do this.”

“Convince J.J. to let a herd of elephants destroy more of his park?”

“Well, not a lot more of it, of course. But some. He's never liked the Cajun restaurant here. Maybe I could convince him to let the elephants trample that. That'd be a win-win for everyone.”

I shook my head. “If the elephants can't walk around the park in the morning, how are they supposed to get enough exercise?”

Pete's trademark grin spread across his face. “Hey, that's a great angle. The elephants' own health and well-being! I'll use that to get them out here again . . . and who knows? Maybe some more magic will happen.”

I winced, afraid I'd just given Pete a good argument that would lead to more trouble.

“Hey,” he said. “How's Lakeside Estates?”

“It's terrible.”

Pete's smile faltered. “Oh, come now. It's much better than the last place you lived.”

“It's exactly the same as the last place we lived. Only now we have a big mud pit beside the house, no neighbors, and no running water.”

“They haven't hooked up your water yet?”

“No.”

“Well, I'm sure they will soon. In the meantime, it could be fun. You guys all lived in a tent when you were in Africa, right? You didn't have water then. So now it's kind of like a trip down memory lane.”

“We had to poop in the bushes in Africa. You want us to start doing that here?”

Pete made a face of disgust. “Er . . . no. Come to think of it, scratch the whole memory lane thing. I'll make sure someone from plumbing gets out there today.” There was a crash nearby as a wall collapsed. Pete turned to the bulldozer driver and desperately signaled him to stop. “Whoa! That's too much! I need this to look like elephants did it, not a wrecking crew!” He ran over to explain his artistic vision, and I continued on my way.

We hadn't really pooped in the bushes in Africa. We'd had a solar-powered composting pit toilet, but Pete didn't have to know that.

I stopped at Eleanor Elephant's Ice Cream Eatery next. Unlike the stampeded Gorilla Grill, this site had been cleaned up quickly. (I'd heard Carly Cougar's Candy Counter had been cleaned up too.) Either Pete Thwacker didn't know this was happening, or he'd decided that a smash-and-grab robbery site wasn't nearly as good for luring tourists as stampede wreckage. A crew of workmen was already fitting the windows with replacement glass. By the time the park opened, the shop would look good as new. It was ruined as a crime scene, however. All evidence had been swept away. FunJungle's sanitation crew was loading the last of the debris onto a flatbed truck; there were dozens of trash bags full of it. Two men were struggling to lift the trash can that had been thrown through the window on board.

I stared at them, struck by a thought. The trash can was even heavier than I'd realized. The sanitation guys were big and strong and they were having trouble moving it
together
. A new one had already been placed where the old one had been taken from. With the built-in solar compactor, it was a big, blocky object. I shoved against it and found I could barely budge the thing.

Suddenly, I had an idea who might have trashed the ice cream shop. And the candy store.

I ran the rest of the way to the veterinary hospital. Normally, I wouldn't have been allowed past the lobby, but the moment I entered, Roz, the receptionist, greeted me by saying, “Hi, Teddy. Here to see your mom?”

“I heard she's with Doc,” I said.

“They're in operating room two. I'm sure she'd love to see you.” Roz pressed a buzzer under her desk, and the door to the hospital clicked open. I stepped in the tub of disinfectant to get any contaminants off my shoes and then passed through.

I couldn't help but peek through the windows in operating room one as I passed. Two vets and a nurse had an unconscious kangaroo on the operating table. I couldn't tell what they were doing, but I figured it wasn't an emergency, because if it had been, then Doc probably would have been in there with them.

Sure enough, Mom and Doc were in operating room two. The operating rooms looked very much like regular human operating rooms, only much bigger. Even the doors were enormous, so that something as big as a water buffalo could get through them. Mom sat on the operating table in the middle of the room, while Doc perched on a low stool, wrapping plaster around her ankle. Athmani was there as well, although it was evident his presence had nothing to do with Mom's ankle. He was talking to Doc.