Project Jackalope (14 page)

There was a collective gasp and stunned silence as everyone leaned forward and peered into the cage. Then the quiet murmuring began. And tittering.

Hortense stood up, bared her orange fangs, and raked her pipe cleaner antlers across the top of the cage. She looked very menacing.

Mrs. Marlowe the science teacher gave Agatha a pained look. She knew the signs of impending mental breakdown when she saw them. “Agatha, honey, that’s not a jackalope.”

Agatha rolled her eyes. “Okay, you’re right. It’s just an animal hybrid. We used the DNA from an axis deer for the traditional jackalope antler effect.”

“Agatha, honey…” Mrs. Marlowe started.

“I’ve got my notebook with my work right here. It’s all here—the whole procedure.” Agatha pulled the notebook from the night before out of her backpack. She’d even managed to get most of the bloodstains off of the cover. She opened it and held it up. It was filled with all kinds of numbers and gibberish. It looked convincing to me, but heck, a calculus notebook would’ve convinced me just as much.

Principal Turner made a mark on her clipboard. “I’m sorry, Agatha, but it’s clear that what you have here is just a rabbit with pipe cleaners on his head. It is not a jackalope. Not by any stretch of the imagination.” She turned to the other judges.

“Shall we move along?” She shooed Bitsy Perkins on to the next project and gave Mrs. Marlowe, who had taken Agatha’s notebook and was reading it carefully, a stern look.

Hortense spat at them in disgust and pooed in her cedar chips.

Principal Turner stopped momentarily in front of my planetary disaster. “Whose is this?”

I raised my hand. “Mine.”

“Pluto’s no longer a planet, son. Might want to change it before we get back to you.” They headed back to Brendan, whose hermit crab was now out of his shell and attempting to swing a tiny hammer hard enough to ring the bell at the top of a pole.

“Yeah, okay,” I muttered.

“So, you think you’re cute, do you?” Mr. Jones had my arm in a vise grip before I’d even turned back around.

I’ve used that expression “So-and-so has murder in his eyes” and I thought I knew what it looked like. Turns out, I’d never really seen it until I looked at Mr. Jones right then. We’d really played him for an idiot, and he knew it. And he was going to make us pay.

“We should’ve just been straight with you,” I said apologetically, trying not to look at the handcuffs Mr. Jones had taken out. “But we didn’t know how to tell you.”

“Twitchett isn’t an inventor, he’s a con artist. Hortense is all he ever had,” Agatha said. “She’s my bunny, and he stole her. I had some notes to make a jackalope, and Twitchett stole them. He was working some kind of online scam—I think he was trying to con some international buyers.”

I did my eye contact thing. “He never had what it takes to make an actual jackalope,” I said. Which if you think about it, was true. “And we sure don’t—we’re not even in high school yet.” I kept my eyes locked on Mr. Jones’s face. I didn’t want to see Agatha’s expression when I said that. “I don’t know if Bob and Mrs. Simmons were part of his con or whether he was conning them too, but when I came home the other night, he’d stashed Hortense in my room.”

“Besides,” Agatha said. “Even if he had done what he said, it wouldn’t have been a real jackalope anyway, just an animal hybrid. But if any rabbit has a jackalope temperament it’s Hortense, right, Hortense?” She poked a pencil between the bars of the cage and Hortense attacked it with gusto.

“And you expect me to believe this?” Mr. Jones stared into my eyes so hard that I half expected a photocopy of my brain to come out of his butt. “You’ve been running all over the city with this in your suitcase? Just an overgrown rabbit?”

He pointed a finger at Hortense, who looked offended at his tone.

“You didn’t even tell us who you were! We were just trying to get a minute to figure things out. We didn’t know who to trust.” I didn’t even try to put on the pathetic face—I was afraid one wrong move would be it for us.

“I’m not a fool.” Mr. Jones grabbed me by the shoulder and turned me around, pulling my hands behind my back. I could practically feel the steel on my wrists. “You two AND your jackalope are under—”

“Jones, you’ve got to see this.” Mr. Suit #2 hurried over and pointed to a nearby table where the judges were gathered. I gritted my teeth. Carter Oliver.

“You two don’t move,” Mr. Jones barked at us and followed Mr. Suit #2 over to the table. Naturally, me and Agatha followed them. It probably would’ve been a
good time for us to make our escape, but heck, I had to see what had just saved my hide (at least temporarily).

Carter’s table had a fish tank on it with a huge but otherwise normal-looking goldfish inside the middle of it. The fish was swimming around, doing regular goldfish things, when suddenly, without any warning, it disappeared. (Except for a little trail of nondisappearing goldfish poo. Apparently, even Carter couldn’t do everything.)

There was a collective “oooh” from the crowd gathered around the table. I rolled my eyes. Please. Like they’ve never seen a disappearing fish before.

Principal Turner put down her clipboard and leaned forward, getting so close to the tank that her nose was almost touching the glass. “Where’d he go?”

Carter Oliver smirked and snapped his fingers. The goldfish reappeared. The crowd, apparently working from a script, went with a collective “aaah.” Carter held up a remote control. “Want to see it again?”

What a suckup.

The crowd packed in tighter, but I’d seen enough. Besides, I could tell from the crowd’s lines what was happening.
Ooh
for disappearing fish,
aah
for reappearing. Terrific.

The Mr. Suit types had stopped watching and were all talking into their cuffs or on their earphone thingies. They were totally ignoring us. Which was fine by me, but still. Come on. Fake jackalope over here.

Agatha came up to me, holding Hortense’s headband. “Want to be a jackalope?” She held it out to me.

“No thanks. I don’t feel like going on the run again any time soon.”

Agatha grinned. I tried to smile back, but I didn’t want to get my hopes up. We weren’t in the clear yet. “And Jack?”

“In Hortense’s cage at home wearing a turban on his head. We’re good.”

I nodded and turned back to the Carter Show.

Carter had apparently finished his presentation, because the crowd around the table burst into a huge
round of applause. I threw up in my mouth a little. I think Agatha ground a couple of her back teeth into dust.

Guess we didn’t need to wonder who would take the big prize this year. I felt pretty bad for Dewey Childress, who was up for judging next. I don’t care how hopped-up on sugar water his rats were getting—that project was toast.

Mrs. Marlowe didn’t even bother to check out the hopped-up rats, though. She pushed her way out of the crowd and pulled Agatha aside.

“Your project isn’t going to win, Agatha,” she said apologetically. Well, duh. And yeah, I was eavesdropping. Big deal. “But I have to say, I’m very impressed with your calculations here.” She handed Agatha back her notebook.

“You are?” Agatha stopped trying to incinerate Carter’s hair with her eyes and perked up a little.

“I know you weren’t able to test your theories in the lab, but there is some solid reasoning here. I almost believe it would have worked!” Mrs. Marlowe laughed.

“Thanks!” Agatha looked much more cheery.

“Of course it would be completely unethical and possibly illegal to test it, so we’ll never be sure. But come talk to me before school tomorrow. We have some science scholarship programs, you know.” She patted Agatha on the shoulder. “And better luck next year.”

Mrs. Marlowe turned to leave and gave me a weak smile. “Nice…spray painting.”

She rejoined the other judges just in time to see Dewey’s rat guzzling what looked like Karo syrup.

“You’re sure the boy didn’t go anywhere but the craft store last night?” The voice was coming from somewhere over my shoulder. I did the bend-down-and-pretend-I’m-tying-my-shoe move and glanced back. It was Mr. Jones and Mr. Suit #2. They looked like they were having some kind of secret meeting. Naturally, I scooched closer.

Mr. Jones was frowning.

Mr. Suit #2 checked his notebook. “Home and back. No outside visitors, no other stops. And we swept the apartment earlier. No suspicious activity.”

“And the girl?”

“Didn’t leave the building until this morning. No visitors. Apartment swept earlier. And there was nothing in the Simmons place.”

Mr. Jones nodded thoughtfully. “Have they apprehended Twitchett yet?” He was watching Carter through narrowed eyes.

Mr. Suit #2 shook his head. “He gave them the slip in Caracas. But there’s still time. We’ll get him. So Project Jackalope?”

“Project Jackalope is dead. Mark it down as a fraudulent claim,” Mr. Jones said. “Now get on the phone with Washington. I want clearance for Project Goldfish and I want it now.”

“Got it.” Mr. Suit #2 hurried out of the gym as Mr. Jones strolled casually up to Carter.

“So, son, why don’t we have a little conversation? Tell me about your project. I have quite a proposal for you.”

From my crouch, I watched as Mr. Jones took Carter aside. It didn’t take a brain surgeon to know where that was headed. I almost felt sorry for Carter.
Or at least I would’ve, if he hadn’t been such a repulsive egomaniac.

I went back over to Agatha, who was still clutching her notebook and wearing her pipe cleaner antlers, and nudged her in the side.

“Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“Project Jackalope is officially closed.”

We high-fived as Principal Turner pinned a blue ribbon on Carter’s disappearing fish.