Scat (25 page)

"Oh, I know," Mrs. Starch said ruefully. "Duane gave me a full report on Wendell. I sent Mr. Spree to chat with him, and he took ill shortly thereafter. Anyway, the new substitute, Mrs. Robertson, is a very able teacher-"

"Wait a minute. How does Duane fit into this whole picture?" Nick asked.

"I'm getting to that part. Be patient."

"The police are after him! They think he set the fire to get back at you for what happened in school, but he told me he didn't do it. Somebody stole his book bag and planted it out here to get him in trouble."

Mrs. Starch took a long, leisurely drink from the water bottle. She said, "According to the newspaper, a butane torch was also found. That looks mighty suspicious."

Nick heard his voice rise. "But I know Duane's telling the truth about his backpack getting ripped off because he came over to borrow my biology book-"

"Yeah, to study for an imaginary test," Marta cut in skeptically.

Mrs. Starch raised a hand. "It wasn't imaginary-I wrote up a test especially for Duane. I've been privately tutoring him in several subjects, academic and otherwise. You might have noticed a change in his punctuality and neatness at school. Even his acne has improved, thanks to good old-fashioned soap and water."

Nick thought:
That explains Smoke's mysterious transformation.
It was Mrs. Starch who created the new Duane Scrod Jr.

"And by the way," she added, "you're right: the young man
is
completely innocent of that arson. Now please don't interrupt me again."

Her tone was one that Nick and Marta remembered all too well from class. They fell silent and listened.

"It might seem strange that Duane and I are part of the same 'team,' " said Mrs. Starch, "but we've got more in common than you think."

Nick couldn't imagine what that could be.

"For one thing, we both love the wilderness," she went on. "Duane is happiest when he's out fishing or camping, or scouting for bears and deer. My own interest is endangered wildlife, as you surely figured out after sneaking into my house. Each of those mounted birds and reptiles and mammals that you saw was killed on the highway or in a storm, or shot."

"The young panther, too?" Nick asked.

"Sadly, yes. Struck by a car on the Tamiami Trail. I saw the body one afternoon while driving home from Miami, and I brought it to a taxidermist here in town, an old friend."

With her usual bluntness, Marta said, "There's more dead animals in your house than I ever saw before, except in a museum."

Mrs. Starch explained that she'd had the mounts made because she believed she would never get a glimpse of those species free in the wild: "Tragically, there are too few left." the went to check on the panther cub and returned with a bag of trail mix.

Nick and Marta weren't hungry; they were too caught up in her story.

Munching away, Mrs. Starch continued: "Here's something else that Duane and I share: we both know what it's like to be abandoned. 'Dumped,' in the current jargon. One day, Duane's mother just lit out for France without even telling him. My husband did the same thing-not to Paris, but to Piano, Texas, which is more his speed. I don't know why he walked out on me, but it hurt. Still does."

Marta squirmed, which meant she'd thought of something else to ask. Nick knew what was coming.

"There's a rumor that something bad happened to Mr. Starch," Marta said. "That he's, like, dead and stuffed like a moose."

"It would be better than he deserves," Mrs. Starch remarked dryly. "No, Stanley Starch is very much alive and kicking. Every April I get a birthday card telling me about his latest girlfriend. Is there any other ugly gossip I should know about?"

"Snakes-they say you keep poisonous snakes in your basement, rattlers and moccasins and copperheads." Marta was on a roll, and Nick couldn't do anything about it.

"Also untrue," Mrs. Starch said. "For a while I was lucky enough to have a pair of eastern indigo snakes, which were rescued from a construction site by one of my students. The indigo is absolutely gorgeous, totally harmless, and nearly extinct. I released mine far out in the Fakahatchee, where I hope they found true snake love and made lots of babies. Anything else?"

"No," said Nick quickly.

"Yes," said Marta.
"That."
She touched a finger to her chin.

"Ah. The scar." Far from annoyed, Mrs. Starch seemed amused by Marta's boldness.

Apologetically, Nick said, "It's none of our business."

"That's right, but I'll tell you anyway," Mrs. Starch said "It happened when I was about your age. An osprey chick fell out of its nest, and being young and fearless, I decided to climb all the way up and put the little fella back with his brother and sister. The nest was high on a utility pole and lie wind was howling, but somehow I made it to the top."

Marta asked, "So what happened-did the birds bite your face or something?"

"Heavens, no! They were timid as they could be. Half-way down the pole, one of my sandals slipped off the pegs and I dropped about twenty feet-I believe the term is 'face-plant'-onto a glass soda bottle that a litterbug had tossed by the side of the road." Mrs. Starch tapped her scar. "Some people say it's the shape of an anvil, some say an hourglass. But no, Marta, it's
not
the mark of the devil. It's the mark of the Pepsi-Cola company."

"How many stitches?"

"Foolishly, I refused to go to the hospital. Thus the unsightly result." Mrs. Starch stretched her arms. She said she was tired and needed a nap. "Wait here for Mr. Spree. He'll drive you back to town. And remember, you're both sworn to secrecy."

"You haven't gone home since the fire?" Nick asked.

"No, I've stayed right here, day and night. Mr. Spree has been good enough to run all my errands, beginning with the return of Libby's asthma medicine. He even got the tires rotated on my car."

Marta sat upright. "Listen!"

It was the faraway whine of a high-pitched engine, gears shifting.

Mrs. Starch looked anything but worried. "A friendly," she said. "One of us."

"Is it Duane?" Nick asked.

"Correct."

"Here's what I don't understand: How did you get him to help? That day he bit your pencil in half-he was seriously ticked off about the pimple paper," Nick said.

"Oh, I never asked Duane to get involved in this project. Wouldn't have dreamed of it!" Mrs. Starch asserted. "Believe me, that boy was
numero uno
on my list of troublemakers. It was Mr. Spree who recruited him. They knew each other from a past adventure."

Marta said, "That figures."

"Yes, it's a small world. Imagine my shock when Duane strolled into camp one morning."

Imagine
his
shock,
thought Nick.

The motorcycle, much closer and noisier than before, suddenly spluttered to a stop. "He'll hide the bike in the woods and hike in from the south," Mrs. Starch explained. "Usually takes him another half hour or so."

Nick's head was pounding as he struggled to absorb everything the teacher had told them. "But how did Twilly meet Duane?" he asked. "What kind of adventure are you talking about?"

"That I cannot answer. Speak to Mr. Spree." Mrs. Starch yawned and said, "Marta, may I have a word with Nick privately in my tent?"

Marta looked around dubiously. "What'm I supposed to do out here all by myself?"

"Listen to the birds."

Nick got down and followed Mrs. Starch into the tent, crawling wasn't easy with his right arm bound; he hopped like a three-legged dog. He managed to fit himself cross-legged on the ground beside her sleeping bag. Arranged neatly on a square of cardboard were a few basic items: flashlight, toothbrush, mouthwash, hairbrush, a bottle of aspirin, bar of soap, and some note-sized lavender envelopes, here was also a small manual typewriter. Nick felt uneasy in her personal space.

"Here." She handed him the straw hat, which he held in the crook of his left arm.

The kitten was dozing in the shape of a fuzzy, plump comma. Its padded paws covered its face, muffling a muscular snore.

Mrs. Starch dropped her voice. "Nick, do you want to be part of this-and help your friend Duane at the same time?"

Nick couldn't take his eyes off the cat. It was astonishing to think that he was holding one of the last panthers on earth.

"Are you in, or out?" Mrs. Starch asked.

"In."

"You must be certain."

"I am."

"Excellent." She took the hat with the kitten and Positioned it carefully on the soft flannel flap of her sleeping bag. "Nick, I'm going to ask you to do something."

"Sure."

"Take off that sling."

He was caught by surprise. "How come?"

Mrs. Starch said, "I know why you're wearing it-Duane told us what happened to your father, and I admire your devotion. But here's the present situation in the Black Vine Swamp: for what lies ahead, each of us will require a strong heart and two good arms. We need one hundred percent of you."

Nick hesitated.

"Your dad would understand," she said.

He removed his shirt and she helped unwrap the Ace bandage from his shoulder and armpit. Once his right arm was unbound, he flexed his elbow and made a fist with his hand to get the circulation flowing.

"What if Twilly can't find the mother panther?" he asked Mrs. Starch. "Or what if she won't take back her cub?"

"Hope springs eternal, Nick."

Again they heard an engine in the distance. Mrs. Starch frowned, tilting an ear toward the sound.

"That's not a motorcycle," she said. "That's a helicopter."

"Friendly?"

"I seriously doubt it."

TWENTY-ONE

Jimmy Lee Bayliss held the gun across his lap, which made the chopper pilot nervous.

"Relax. I know what I'm doin'," Jimmy Lee Bayliss said, which wasn't altogether true.

He'd never been a very good shot. Any target, moving or nonmoving, presented a challenge. His buddies back in Texas invited him along on hunting trips mostly out of pity. The deer rifle in his hands had never killed a deer, or even come close, though it had frightened many. That's all Jimmy Lee Bayliss aimed to do if he came across the trespassers who were hassling Melton and messing with Red Diamond's gear-scare 'em off by firing a couple of rounds over their sneaky heads.

Same as he'd done to that panther.

The pilot said, "You got the safety on, right?"

"Gimme a break." Jimmy Lee Bayliss peeked at the safety button above the trigger. He was relieved to see that it was, in fact, on.

"Got any Tums?" he asked the pilot.

"No, I don't."

"Rolaids?"

"Sorry."

"Maalox?"

"Do you want me to set her down so you can make a potty stop?"

"Naw."

Jimmy Lee Bayliss wondered if his boss was feeling better. The nurses had been taping Drake McBride's ribs when Jimmy Lee Bayliss had left him at the hospital, cussing and whining and making a nuisance of himself.

The pilot said, "How low do you want to go?"

"Two hundred feet, give or take."

They circled Section 21 for fifteen minutes and saw no life on the ground except for a pair of wild boars. Jimmy Lee Bayliss decided to shoot at them for target practice. However, the pilot took his sweet time setting the helicopter in a hover, and the pigs trotted safely into the scrub.

"Nice work," Jimmy Lee Bayliss grumbled.

"Where to now?"

"The usual."

Section 22 appeared quiet, too. Jimmy Lee Bayliss ordered the pilot to take an extra-slow pass to make sure that Red Diamond's pirate well was still invisible from the air. A person looking hard enough might have noticed ATV tracks at the off-loading site, but the natural suspects would be deer poachers, not oil drillers.

As the chopper climbed to five hundred feet and angled slowly back toward the coast, the pilot pointed out his window and said, "Hey, check it out!"

At first Jimmy Lee Bayliss couldn't see what he was talking about. Then, as the nose of the aircraft tipped, the scene came into full view. His mouth went dry and his ears got hot.

"Hold it here!" he barked at the pilot. "Now!"

"Ten-four."

"Why are you laughin'?"

"Because it's funny," the pilot said.

"Not to me, it ain't. Not to Mr. McBride, either, the man who's payin' for this whirlybird!"

"Okay, fine. It's not funny."

"Damn right it's not." Jimmy Lee Bayliss was steaming mad.

All the pink flags-once laid out so precisely with the eye of a surveyor, marking the future path of the illegal pipeline from Section 22 to Section 21-had been yanked from their holes, uprooted by an unknown hand.

A criminal's hand it was, too: some warped outlaw, some lame excuse for a comedian who had replanted them on their stems, all those little pink flags, brightening a patch of parched prairie like candles on cornbread.

Rearranged in such an obvious way that anyone flying low enough in a helicopter couldn't help but see the double-edged insult.

"S-C-A-T," the flags sneered in fluttering capital letters, as cheery as confetti. SCAT.

"Either he's telling you to go away," the pilot mused, "or he's calling you a name."

Or both, thought Jimmy Lee Bayliss with disgust.

Still shading a grin, the pilot said, "You want me to land so you can look around?"

"No, sir," Jimmy Lee Bayliss said gravely. "I want you to find out where I can rent me some bloodhounds."

They heard Smoke's motorcycle crank up and speed off.

Mrs. Starch said, "The helicopter must've spooked him."

Nick peered up through the thick branches at a blue pane of sky. "Was it the sheriff?"

"I don't believe so."

Marta was dejectedly examining her waterlogged sneakers. "We need to go," she said. "Is it safe yet?"

"Not without Mr. Spree." Mrs. Starch opened the second pizza box. "Anybody care for a slice?"

Nick said, "So, what exactly is the master plan?"

Marta jerked on his right sleeve. "If I don't get home soon, I'm gonna be grounded until I'm, like, a hundred. Hey, your arm grew back!"