Nanny X Returns (6 page)

I spotted a security guard near the fountain and ran straight up to her.

“What happens to the wishes on the Yoko Tree?” I said it really fast, Nanny X style.

“Well, they're harvested,” she said. “Like apples. And sent to Iceland, to the Yoko Ono Peace Tower.”

“How often do you harvest them?” That was the important part.

“Every day.”

That meant the wish had to have been written
in the last twenty-four hours
. The Angler was close.

“
Thank you
,” I shouted, and ran back to the others, with Stinky looking both ways as we crossed the street. Nanny X snapped a photo of the wish with her diaper phone, and
Boris used his modified iPod to scan the wish for fingerprints. Stinky said it played “Secret Agent Man” whenever he did that, but we couldn't hear it without the ear buds. If I solved the case, I would write a song called “Secret Agent Woman.”

Boris put the iPod away and started punching words into his phone. “Fish.” “President.” “Sculpture.” It may not have been connected to the same crime databases as Nanny X's computer, but a whole bunch of stories came up. There was one about a sculpture of a hogfish that had been given to President Kennedy by the president of Bermuda.

There were stories that didn't have anything to do with presidents, fish or sculptures. And then there was this story in
Artsy Bartsy
magazine: “Fish Art Overstays Welcome.”

The story was a review of a show by an artist named Ursula (no last name) that was appearing at a Georgetown gallery. Apparently most of her artwork had to do with fish.

“I am trying to capture the beauty of the ocean before it is destroyed by global warming,” she said, which made Stinky like her right off. But the magazine's reviewer, a guy named Bartholomew Huffleberger, didn't like her one bit.

“The problem with fish,” he wrote, “is that they stink after a relatively short time. We would be better off if this exhibit closed immediately.”

My homework for Monday was as good as done, because that art review had more reading-connection words than I've ever found in one place. It started like this:

An artist known by the moniker of Ursula opened her one-woman show at Gallery 24 in Georgetown last night, and I, for one, would have been in a more convivial mood had I been attending a closing instead. Ursula's work is didactic, shows no innovation, and is redundant besides. Her inspiration is the fish, and like the creature she so admires, I find her work malodorous. Her paintings appear realistic enough, but her fishes' sad eyes give them the twee appearance of Precious Moments figurines. Like Ursula's much-loved salmon, the artist will have to fight her way upstream. This reviewer was not hooked, and when he told the artist of his
disappointment, she smeared his suit with salmon pâté
.

Nanny X explained some of the words: “didactic” (which means you're being too lecture-y), “convivial” (which means pleasant and agreeable), “pâté” (which means ground-up meat or fish) and “moniker” (which I already figured out meant name). The part I didn't have to ask about came in the last paragraph, when he said that one of Ursula's fish sculptures looked like a turnip and she should go back to doing arts and crafts with the local Girl Scout troop. Plus, he said that the gallery should have installed a show by his eight-year-old niece instead.

Boris punched more words into his phone—“Ursula,” “fish” and “art”—so we could find a picture of her work. All he got was a bunch of pictures of the Sea Witch from
The Little Mermaid
.

But he also saw a breaking news story about the art world. Portrait of President Washington Disappears from National Gallery of Art,” the headline said.

Nanny X looked at her watch again. “Ten past noon,” she said. “This is it. The Angler has made the first move.”

Ali stared at the ground and looked like she'd been the one who was hit in the head with a giant thumb. It was a full minute before any of us said anything.

“A portrait of George Washington doesn't seem like much of a treasure,” I said, to make everybody feel better. “As long as it wasn't the one of him crossing the Delaware. There are loads of portraits of Washington. Aren't there?”

Boris shook his head. “It says here that this was a rare portrait painted by the artist Salvador Dali. He did not live in Washington's time, of course, but he's very famous. Nobody knew the portrait existed until three months ago
when it was discovered at a flea market. This article even hails it as ‘a new national treasure.' It's worth millions.”

I thought we would go straight to the gallery until Ali said, “We should go see Bartholomew Huffleberger. I'll bet he could give us a list of people who could have made the fish statue. He could tell us if one of them was Ursula.”

“How can he do that if he's never seen the fish statue?” I said. “
We
haven't even seen it.” I looked at Nanny X. “Do we have a picture?”

Nanny X lifted her hat. She took Mr. Ow off her head and put it back in the diaper bag. “I checked on that last night,” she said. “The statue was in transit to the White House. No photo was available.”

“I checked this morning,” Boris said, “and was told the same thing. But surely the statue must be there by now.”

“Then we should go see it,” Stinky said.

“Museum,” I said.

“Reviewer,” said Ali.

“We are a big team, no?” said Boris. “Perhaps we need to divide and conquer once more. I will take Ali to see this
Artsy Bartsy
.”

“I'll take Jake to the White House and get a visual,” said Nanny X. “We'll meet at the National Gallery.”

Of course they were doing my idea last. I pretended that was because it was the best, like when you're the cleanup batter in baseball. “Howard gets to come with us, though, right?” I said.

“Right.”

“We get Yeti,” said Ali.

“And me,” added Stinky. He turned a little reddish, probably because he'd just said we should be going to the White House. Or maybe because he liked my sister. It is amazing the things you can notice when you are working
on your powers of observation. I was ready for action, even if my shoes were still squishy.

Nanny X called the White House to let them know we were coming. Her diaper phone has a direct line there.

“You're sure you're okay?” Boris asked Nanny X.

“Fine,” she said, touching her hat.

“Okay, then.” Boris took off with my sister and Stinky. Nanny X reached into her diaper bag and pulled out her bunny slippers. At first I thought she was going to give them to me instead of my squishy shoes. But she took off her own shoes and slid them on. Then she whistled. A pedicab driver came biking toward us, pulling a chair like a chariot.

“Get in,” said Nanny X. “You too, Howard.”

Howard adjusted his bonnet and climbed from the stroller into the pedicab. “Sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue,” Nanny X told the driver.

“The White House?”

“Precisely.”

“What about you and Eliza?” I said. Nanny X had just gotten conked on the head. She needed to sit down. But the pedicab would be a little crowded with four of us, plus Eliza's stroller.

“Don't worry about me,” said Nanny X. She reached into the bag and pulled out an old-fashioned motorcycle helmet, the leather kind that matched her motorcycle jacket. Then she pushed the noses on her bunny slippers. Wheels popped out of the bottoms. She looked pretty spry as she skated over to the bike path, pushing Eliza in the stroller.

I leaned over to Howard. “She's being conspicuous again,” I said. “Very conspicuous.”

At least no one was looking at him anymore; they were looking at our nanny, who was skating expertly down Independence Avenue.

Howard and I settled back as our driver pedaled past a bus. He signaled right and turned onto Fourteenth Street. Howard signaled, too, like he knew just what it meant. He gave me a thumbs-up as the driver put on the brakes, right in front of the White House gate.

I was running ahead of Stinky even though he had longer legs and even though it wasn't supposed to be a race. Sometimes it felt like the only thing I was the best at was biting my fingernails. I wanted to be the best at something real and important, like solving our case so we could keep our jobs. Being faster than Stinky made me feel better.

But when I looked back over my shoulder and saw our nanny roller-skating in a blur of pink bunny slippers, I stopped running and started laughing.

“Are those bunny slippers?” Boris asked as Nanny X passed a line of people riding on Segways, which look like dollies, the kind the UPS man uses for moving heavy packages.

I nodded.

“State of the art!” he said. “This is the first time I've seen them in action.” I could tell he was wishing for bunny slippers,
too. But he'd been assigned the case first. Maybe he didn't need bunny slippers to get ahead.

“Why didn't the Secret Service just release a photo of the fish statue when they got the threat?” I asked. “It should have been in the news.”

“That is exactly what The Angler wanted,” Boris said. “Publicity.”

Stinky added: “If The Angler's fish was on the front page of the paper, everyone would be sending statues to the president.”

We started running again, a gentle jog this time, not a race (except that I was still in the lead). Soon we reached the
Artsy Bartsy
office.

I imagined Jake knocking on the door of the White House, but I wasn't jealous; I'd been on a field trip there just before Christmas. Ms. Bertram had spent half the time yelling at us because we'd tried to whistle for the president's dog.

I knocked on
Artsy Bartsy
's blue door. I was still knocking when I heard an “Ahem” behind me. It came from a tall man with black hair that stood up a little. He wore the tweedy jacket professors wear when they want to look like professors. He also had small, rectangular glasses, which were perched on a nose that was longish and kind of skinny.

“Were you looking for me?”

“Are you Bartholomew Huffleberger?” asked Boris.

“I am.”

“We'd like to ask some questions about an art exhibit you reviewed six months ago.”

“Which one?” the critic said.

“It featured an artist named Ursula.”

His skinny nose wrinkled.

“Was her show really that bad?” asked Boris.

“It depends on what you mean by ‘bad,' ” said the critic. “Did it make a statement? Perhaps. But what a disaster. It was as if she'd thrown her entire wardrobe of clothing onto the floor and said, ‘There. How do I look?' Some of the pieces were okay, but was it groundbreaking? No. Was it truly art?”

“I thought everything counted as art,” said Stinky. Our art teacher, Mrs. Bonawali, told us that even a can of soup could be art.

“The woman paints realistic fish with sad eyes,” Mr. Huffleberger said. “Excuse me while I faint from excitement.”

“Your review mentioned a sculpture,” I said.

“She created some sculptures, yes. So does a child with a can of Play-Doh. I saw Ursula's work once long ago at a county fair. Believe me, she hasn't improved.”

“Do you have any photographs of the artist's work?” Boris asked. “We're trying to see if there's a link between her and a certain sculpture we're researching.” He didn't mention the president.

“Is this a school project?” Mr. Huffleberger looked at me and Stinky. “No matter. I have one photo here.” He pulled out his phone and scrolled through until he found a photo of a painting of a sad-eyed fish. It looked pretty good from a distance.

“I noticed her website disappeared not long after my review,” Mr. Huffleberger continued. “But I have her original publicity prints inside, if you'd like to take a look.” He glanced at Yeti. “Wait here. I am a cat person.”