Mr. and Mrs. Bunny—Detectives Extraordinaire! (2 page)

“Come look at this luminary,” called Flo from the porch as Madeline made her way up their driftwood-lined walkway.
“I've been working on it all day. See, it's got this lacework picture of sheep.”

“Nice,” said Madeline, and sat with a thump.

“So—school's out. Hallelujah,” said Flo. He waited for Madeline to say something else about his luminaries. Usually she was supportive of his artwork. When she didn't praise them further, he eyed her warily.

“Of course, there's still the graduation ceremony,” said Madeline. She paused. “Did you hear Prince Charles was coming to Vancouver Island?”

Flo laughed. “Yeah? You planning to lead the ticker-tape parade?”

“No,” said Madeline. “But he's coming to our school. He's coming to our graduation ceremony!”

“Oh, for heaven's sakes,” said Flo. “That. You don't really want to go to
that
, do you? You know I never even went to my college grad. Pointless thing. What does it mean, really? And the monarchy! Please! What a bunch of crap. Queen of Canada. Come on, Madeline. You can't say it's anything but a bunch of nonsense. Look at all her money. Richest woman in the world. They ought to split her money up among the poor in England. Do you know what their unemployment rate is
like? Instead, they send this silly man around Canada to attend children's silly graduation ceremonies. Get real.”

“I couldn't go if I wanted to. I need white shoes,” said Madeline.

“They can't make you wear white shoes!” said Flo. “Wear the shoes you have. That'll show them.”

“No, my teacher said we have to wear white shoes to go with our white tissue paper gowns. We
have
to.”

“Nonsense. Sending people out to buy white shoes when they have perfectly good brown ones! Bunch of crap. You see how our consumer culture has infiltrated everything? God, I wouldn't go to some ceremony given by people whose
raison d'être
is to pressure children into buying shoes they
don't need
to stand in front of some pointless outdated symbol of colonialism.”

Flo started to go back into the house, shaking his head.

“I DO need them,” muttered Madeline, watching his retreating back.

“You
do
need them?” said Flo, turning back to face her.

“Prince Charles is giving out the awards himself. I won three,” said Madeline. “I can't go up there in brown shoes.”

“I'll tell you what, Madeline,” said Flo. “If you can tell me what makes him so special that you have to put on white shoes for him; if you can
explain
it in a way that makes sense, then I will attend the ceremony. But I would bet you a pair of white shoes that you cannot. This goes against everything we have tried to teach you.”

Madeline frowned. Flo nodded, triumphant at her silence, and went inside.

Madeline went down to the garden, where her mother was stringing luminaries between the beans.

“Hi,” said Madeline.

“Happy Luminara!”

“Prince Charles is coming to our school.”

“Oh, for heaven's sake. Better not tell Flo. Aren't these luminaries pretty? Oh, and Danika has made some giant animal-shaped ones. Giant deer and strange Martianlike figures and
salamanders
. I just love salamanders, don't you? They always look so magical.”

“Yeah, they're okay,” said Madeline, eating a bean. “Next week at graduation, he's coming. It's kind of once-in-a-lifetime.”

“Speaking of once-in-a-lifetime, Danika says the paper is so thin you can only use them once. She says they're thaumaturgic when lit. She's going to bring them early because they
take a while to set up. We're going to scatter them through the woods for people to happen on when we do our midnight lantern walk.”

“How many candles do they take?”

“Lots. I think they're the biggest luminaries anyone's made yet. One of them is ten feet.”

“All those candles drip drip drip, gone by morning. I don't suppose there's any waitressing money left?” asked Madeline.

“Not a penny. I had to buy more art supplies. Flo needed paper to make some new luminaries and we had to fix some of the ones that got torn last year.”

“And tomorrow all those luminaries will be done with. Dollars' and dollars' worth.”

“We can recycle most of them for next year.”

“But not the candles. We'll have just burnt up all that money. I thought we were supposed to be conserving resources and living green. How green is it to use a bunch of candles on one night of fun?”

“That's true, but think, Madeline, it's like the Zen sand mandalas. Remember when the monks came and spent all day meticulously making a detailed picture on the beach with colored sand and then at the end of the day this great and detailed
creation was borne away by the tides? Nothing lasts. Besides, Luminara is part of our great cultural heritage.”

“Luminara was invented by Zanky Marsala one night when she was in a hyperspiritual state.”

“Hyperspiritual state? What do we, uh, mean by that?” asked Mildred, looking a little nervous.

“KatyD told me that. So clearly it's just a made-up holiday.”

“Luminara is a lovely tradition. And all holidays are made up. And lots of things of enduring mysticism come from people being in, well, more-than-average spiritual states. Look at Stonehenge.”

“I need shoes.”

“No, you don't,” said Mildred, surprised at the sudden change of subject and looking down at Madeline's feet. “You only have one tiny hole in that one.” She pointed.

“I need white shoes for graduation.”

“Oh, those things they dream up at the end of the year. God, that's why I didn't want you to go to school. All this business of grading and this person is better than that person. And we all have to dress alike. It's so meaningless, Madeline. And graduation is just a silly artificial rite.”

“Well, you could say that about anything. You could say that about Luminara.”

Mildred sighed again, stopped threading the luminaries among the bean strings, and leaned down to look Madeline in the eye.

“Luminara celebrates light and our connection to Mother Earth. What is a graduation? It's just another way of brainwashing you into believing that achievement is the answer. Of course you must make your own choices, but I wouldn't go if I were you.”

Then she straightened up and went back to stringing lights.

“Prince Charles thinks it's important enough to come!” said Madeline as a parting shot.

“Don't get me started on the monarchy!” warned Mildred as Madeline headed to the house. “Sometimes I wonder where you came from. You're not like anyone in the family except Uncle Runyon.”

“I LIKE Uncle Runyon!” called Madeline over her shoulder.

“So do I,” said her mother, shaking her head. “But I don't understand either of you.”

Uncle Runyon was the only relative living on Vancouver Island one hundred percent legally and with consistently
covered toes. He worked as a secret decoder scientist for the Canadian government. No one was supposed to know where he lived because it was top-secret, but he had the family over for Easter every year anyway and he attended what celebrations of theirs he could stand. He always said all this hush-hush business concerning him was just a lot of hooey. No enemy spies were interested in
him
. His job was really very boring.

Or so he had always told Madeline. But out there on Vancouver Island somewhere there was suddenly a group becoming very, very interested in him indeed.

 THE SURPRISE 

M
r. and Mrs. Bunny had a problem. The winter on Mount Washington had been hard. Mr. Bunny had had to shovel snow from the doorway of their hutch nearly every day. On top of that, their whole litter of twelve rabbits had grown up and moved far away. The closest one was in Australia. Not only was the hutch too big, but its large empty rooms depressed Mrs. Bunny. And there weren't any other bunny neighbors, particularly female ones, for Mrs. Bunny to cavort with and form clubs with. But it was the snow that they had found so unsettling. It had damaged their roof and left them stranded for two weeks in January. Although it had long ago melted,
Mrs. Bunny still spent a lot of time remembering it. Remembering snow was not how she liked to occupy her bunny brain.

“After all,” said Mrs. Bunny, “we are not arctic hares! We do not snow-proof our hutches. We do not keep snowshoes in our cupboards!”

“Yes,” said Mr. Bunny. “It has occurred to me,
more than once
, Mrs. Bunny, that perhaps it was time to move!”

“Oh, Mr. Bunny, my idea exactly!” said Mrs. Bunny.

“All right then. Let's find a smaller hutch.”

“In a valley,” said Mrs. Bunny.

“In a valley.”

“With lots of vegetables.”

“Or vegetable-growing potential.”

It was Mr. Bunny's harebrained idea, which surfaced now and again, that he and Mrs. Bunny should grow all their own food. Mrs. Bunny, who had seen Mr. Bunny's experiments with roses, dahlias and the ever-hardy lavender plant, had great misgivings.

“A good growing climate,” said Mrs. Bunny tactfully.

“And no marmots,” said Mr. Bunny.

“Definitely no marmots,” said Mrs. Bunny.

Marmots, of course, were the bane of many a bunny's
existence. With their constant whining and tendency to matted fur, no one wanted to live around a marmot. Except perhaps another marmot. And sometimes not even they.

“Well, then, I think we have a reasonable list of wants and needs. I shall roller-skate down the mountain and find a bunny realtor and see what's what.” Mr. Bunny often invented things and just that morning had invented some roller skates for hopping. He had not yet had a chance to try them out.

“Yes, you do that,” said Mrs. Bunny, who wanted to get back to her fitness routine. She didn't like Mr. Bunny around for this. He tended to make remarks.

Mr. Bunny put on his rollerhoppers, as he called them, and hopskated right down the mountain. You can imagine how difficult that must be, rollerhopping, but Mr. Bunny was grace personified. He didn't return until dinner.

“Well, Mrs. Bunny,” he said, coming in all pink-cheeked and proud of himself. “I have a great surprise for you.”

“You have found a realtor,” said Mrs. Bunny, dishing him up a nice steaming bowl of carrot stew, then joining him at the table.

“Better! I have bought us a new hutch!” said Mr. Bunny. “The deed is done! We can move in next week!”