Remarkable (8 page)

F
or the next several weeks, Mayor Kate Chu sat in her office and stared at the phone, hoping against hope that Dr. Pike would call in reply to her letter. In her more optimistic moments, she gleefully allowed herself to anticipate Mayor Doe’s reaction when she discovered the lengths that she, the mayor of Munch, was willing to go to in order to defend the honor of her town’s jelly. She’d make Mayor Doe admit what everyone in Munch already knew—that their jelly was better than any jelly ever produced in Remarkable.

Meanwhile, Grandmama Julietta Augustina had no reason at all to suspect that Mayor Chu was plotting against her. Everything in her fair town was
running as smoothly as ever. The citizens were happy and thriving, construction on the bell-tower addition was ahead of schedule and below budget, and most importantly, Remarkable’s School for the Remarkably Gifted was nearly back to being as excellent as ever. Every inch of the building, playground, and parking lot had been scrubbed thoroughly, and the school was mostly school-colored again instead of blue.

The students were almost back to being student-colored as well. Jane had watched as Anderson Brigby Bright Doe III and Penelope Hope Adelaide Catalina’s hair and skin gradually faded from dark blue to light blue, and then to lilac, then lavender, then to pale cerulean, until they were finally back to looking like their remarkable selves again. It was a good thing, too, since the Science Fair Dance was only a few weeks away, and they wanted to look their best for it.

Jane wished she were going to the Science Fair Dance, but she didn’t mind being in the public school nearly as much as she had before. School was exciting now. The Grimlet twins were up to something nearly every minute, and when they weren’t up to something, they were plotting something, and when they weren’t plotting something, they were writing down
their latest crime in The Book of Dangerous Deeds and Dastardly Intentions. One day, the Grimlet twins turned all the desks upside down and glued them to the floor when Ms. Schnabel’s back was turned. Another day they disorganized the periodic table, de-alphabetized the dictionary, and renumbered the rulers, all before lunchtime.

Then there was the time that Ms. Schnabel left the room for just a quick minute to check her fantasy football standings. In that minute, the Grimlet twins managed to build a small volcano out of modeling clay, poured sixteen different colors of paint down into its cone, and then filled it full of baking soda, vinegar, and a secret ingredient Melissa claimed would give it more
oomph
. The volcano erupted just as Ms. Schnabel came back. Big globs of multicolored paint splattered in all directions.

“Hooray!” the Grimlet twins shouted as they skipped around the room. “Huzzah! It worked!”

Jane thought the room looked rather pretty with bright paint splatters all over it, but Ms. Schnabel was not pleased at all. She thought about sending the Grimlet twins to the principal. She thought about making them stand in the corner. She thought
about making them write “I will not build volcanoes out of clay and load them with paint, vinegar, baking soda, and a secret ingredient to give it more
oomph
when Ms. Schnabel steps out of the room for a quick minute.” four thousand times each on the blackboard. But she knew none of these punishments would work. The Grimlet twins were impervious to punishment.

“Incorrigible! You two are incorrigible!” she finally shouted at them.

Melissa Grimlet stopped skipping in midstride.

“You really think so?” she asked.

“You are the most incorrigible students I’ve ever met!” Ms. Schnabel yelled.

The Grimlet twins were so pleased by this that they behaved themselves two whole days just to show Ms. Schnabel their appreciation. But by Thursday, they were back to their old tricks.

“A dog ate my homework,” Eddie Grimlet said when he came into the classroom.

“Mine too,” Melissa said.

“A dog, huh?” Ms. Schnabel said. “You expect me to believe that?”

They did expect Ms. Schnabel to believe it, but they had guessed she wouldn’t, so they had taken the
precaution of bringing the dog to school and feeding her Jane’s homework while Ms. Schnabel watched.

“Hey!” Jane said indignantly. As much as she liked dogs, she didn’t want her homework gobbled up by one—not even by this particular dog, which was a prizewinning basset hound named Asta Magnifica.

Ms. Schnabel longed to go to the teachers’ lounge and soothe her nerves with a nice cup of coffee, but she didn’t dare leave the Grimlets alone in the classroom again. She spent the rest of the day glaring at them; the twins spent the rest of the day looking innocent, and Asta Magnifica spent the rest of the day at the back of the classroom eating blackboard erasers.

When the school bell rang at the end of the day, the Grimlets raced outside to the playground. As soon as they were gone, Ms. Schnabel let her head sink down onto the top of her desk. She wished it were Friday. Then she wouldn’t have to face being a teacher again for two whole days.

“Um…Ms. Schnabel?”

She lifted her head and saw that Jane was still there. With the commotion that the Grimlet twins had been causing all week, she’d completely forgotten about Jane.

“Yes?”

“Um…do you want me to take Asta Magnifica home? I bet Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain is worried about her.”

“Who?”

“Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain. She’s Asta Magnifica’s owner.”

Ms. Schnabel looked across the classroom and saw that Asta Magnifica was now eating a wall map of South America. She’d already chewed through most of Chile and Argentina and was just starting on Uruguay.

“I don’t mind,” Jane continued. “I really like dogs, you see. I asked for one for my birthday, but my parents forgot about it.”

“Your parents forgot your birthday?”

“No, not this year,” Jane said. “They just forgot I wanted a dog. Anyway, I’d really enjoy walking Asta Magnifica back to Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain.”

Ms. Schnabel didn’t say anything for a moment. She just stared out the window with that faraway look in her eyes she sometimes got. And just when Jane started to think Ms. Schnabel wasn’t going to answer, she said, “I’d appreciate it, Jane. Thank you.”

* * * * *

As Jane led Asta Magnifica out to the playground, she saw Melissa and Eddie huddled under the swing set, making a list in The Book of Dangerous Deeds and Dastardly Intentions.

“Copper tubing,” said Eddie.

“How much, do you think?” Melissa asked.

“Oh, at least five feet.”

“Did you write down the canister of carbon dioxide?”

Eddie scanned the list.

“I’m not sure,” he said. “It’s one of the disadvantages of using invisible ink.”

“How about dry ice?”

They didn’t notice Jane until she’d cleared her throat several times. And once they did notice her, they slammed the book shut and tried to act like they hadn’t been up to anything.

“What are you doing?” Jane asked.

“Oh, nothing,” they said in unison, each trying to sound more innocent than the other.

“Really?”

The twins looked at each other and shrugged.

“It would be okay to tell her, wouldn’t it?” Melissa asked.

“She is our most trusted comrade,” Eddie answered.

“We’re working on our weather machine,” Melissa told her. “We’re trying to finish it in time for the science fair.”

Jane was surprised. “You’re going to enter a project in the science fair? That’s fantastic. Ms. Schnabel will be so pleased.”

Eddie and Melissa gave her identical, disparaging looks.

“We’re not going to enter our weather machine in the science fair,” Eddie said. “What a revolting idea. What we’re going to do is—”

Melissa kicked him hard in the shins to keep him from saying more.

“Are you busy this afternoon?” Melissa asked Jane, changing the subject. “We have grand plans. Did you know that a villainous pirate has recently moved to town?”

“Oh,” Jane said. “You mean Captain Rojo Herring?”

“You know him?” Eddie asked.

“Sure. He lives in the Mansion at the Top of Remarkable Hill. Only he’s not very villainous. He’s really very nice.”

“Don’t be naive,” Melissa said. “All pirates are villainous. That’s why we’re so excited to go meet him. Do you want to come with us?”

“I can’t,” Jane answered. “I’d told Ms. Schnabel that I’d take Asta Magnifica home. You could come with me, since it’s your fault she’s here in the first place.”

“Sorry,” Eddie said. “But that would involve returning to the scene of our crime, and no self-respecting criminal mastermind ever does that.”

Jane told them good-bye and started walking Asta Magnifica back to Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain’s house. There was nothing like taking a dog for a walk to make a person feel important. Maybe when she got home, she would remind her parents that she still wanted a dog of her own.

When she’d asked before, they hadn’t told her no. Her mom had simply looked through her planner and said, “Well, Jane, I don’t believe we’ve scheduled getting a dog this year. I can check the schedule for next year if you’d like.”

“Maybe we could add it to this year’s schedule,” Jane pleaded. “That wouldn’t be too hard, would it?”

“But aren’t dogs…I don’t know…a little messy?” her mom asked worriedly. Messiness would make it harder to stay organized, and it was already hard enough since she was married to a man who lost or forgot everything.

“Maybe at first, when they’re still puppies. But they outgrow it. At least I think they do.”

“And any dog who came to live here would need a doghouse—right? And not just any doghouse, but a really spectacular and well-designed doghouse…” Jane’s mother’s voice trailed off as she started making preliminary doghouse sketches, and Jane’s heart soared with hope.

But several months later, Jane still hadn’t gotten her dog. Her mother, however, had been featured in several prestigious architectural magazines for her pioneering doghouse design and had won a trophy for developing the most innovative pet product of the decade.

When Jane had asked her dad, all he had said was “You know who really needs a dog? One of the characters in my new literary masterpiece.”

“But can I get a real dog, Dad? I promise I’ll take care of it. I was thinking we could name it Shep or Tip, or maybe Rover…”

“Hmmm.” He was lost in deep thought. “But I wonder what the dog in my novel should symbolize…” Then he’d gone back into his office and closed the door behind him without answering her question.

W
hen Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain discovered that Asta Magnifica was missing, she immediately hired Detective Burton Sly to find her. He was the greatest detective of all time, and naturally, he lived in Remarkable.

Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain suspected that Asta Magnifica had been dognapped by one of her many rivals from the dog-show circuit. She could easily imagine that Mrs. Drimm of the nearby town of Ditch might want Asta Magnifica out of the way so that her drippy-looking teacup poodle Chamomile would have a chance at winning “Best in Show” in the upcoming regional championships. Or maybe it
was Mr. Tully of the town of Shrub, whose own basset hound Dribbles almost always came in second in the “Best of Breed” competition behind Asta Magnifica. And then there was Mrs. Jeeter, who lived in Squint and had a fleet of Afghan hounds that she unjustifiably thought should win more prizes than they did.

Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain did not hear the doorbell when Jane arrived with Asta Magnifica. This was because she was completely engrossed in choosing the perfect photograph of Asta Magnifica for a “Lost Pet” poster she was making. But the noise did not escape Detective Burton Sly, who’d been monitoring the phone in case the dognappers called to demand a ransom.

“Ma’am,” he said. “I heard your doorbell. I believe you will find that someone has rung it.”

Mrs. Belphonia-Champlain, suitably impressed with the detective’s powers of deduction, went to answer the door. She was so overwhelmed with joy when she saw Asta Magnifica on her doorstep that she didn’t even notice Jane.

“Oh, my poor little poopsie!” she shrieked. “How did you escape those bad dognappers? Oh, you clever pup!”