The Berenstain Bear Scouts and the Evil Eye (5 page)

Ralph was expected. No sooner had he entered Weaselworld than a troop of armed guards took him in charge and quick-marched him along the rubble-strewn tunnel. The heavy marching was shaking bits of dirt and rocks loose from the damaged tunnel roof. Signs of the earthquake were everywhere. There were cracked walls, roof props, and blocked-off tunnels. And they were miles from ground zero, where the earthquake had struck.

Ralph was gasping for breath when they finally arrived and the sergeant shouted, “Company, halt!” The troop stopped, but not before a final one-two stomp knocked loose a rock that damaged Ralph's straw hat. “Look what you've done to my hat!” he complained. “This is no way to treat an invited guest. I shall complain to the archweasel himself!”

The sergeant ignored Ralph and pushed him into McGreed's office, where the Big Three were waiting. The Big Three were McGreed; Dr. Boffins, his top scientist; and Stye, his tunnel-tough lieutenant. The room was poorly lit, but Ralph could make out a chair and a large video screen.

“I must protest,” said Ralph. “This is no way to treat a loyal friend. Look at this hat!”

“Siddown and shut up,” snarled Stye. Ralph sat down and shut up.

“Listen very carefully, Ralph,” said McGreed, his yellow eyes boring in and his needle-sharp teeth glinting. “We have spared no effort to find out who it was that foiled our earthquake scheme. At first we thought it might be those infernal Bear Scouts and perhaps that crazy grandfather of theirs. But that has not turned out to be the case. We believe we have found the culprit. It is a creature whose appearance, habits, and behavior are so strange that we can make no sense of it. But to plan a successful revenge we need to know more about this creature. Dr. Boffins, run the tape!”

The tape was fuzzy and brief and had poor sound. It showed Bigpaw. It showed him stretching, yawning, singing, and swatting mosquitoes. When the tape stopped, Ralph smiled and said, “That's no creature, that's Bigpaw. And you're right about him foiling your earthquake. When your earthquake surfaced, he simply grabbed a couple of trees, forced the split back together, and sent it back where it came from.”

“But that's impossible!” said Dr. Boffins. “That earthquake was a seven on the Richter scale! There's no way . . .”

“Maybe not,” said Ralph. “But it just so happens that I saw him do it with my own eyes.”

McGreed and the top brass looked at each other in disbelief.

“As for revenge—forget about it,” said Ralph. “I mean, this guy is bigger than a hundred-year-old oak and ten times stronger.”

“What about that awful roaring he does?” asked McGreed.

“That's not roaring,” said Ralph. “That's singing. Bigpaw loves to sing. That's his favorite thing to do in all the world.”

“What about that crazy part where he bashes himself in the nose?”

“Swatting mosquitoes,” explained Ralph. “Bigpaw hates mosquitoes. They can't get through his thick fur, but they drive his nose crazy.”

“It sounds like you actually know this guy,” said McGreed.

“I know him well,” said Ralph, feeling more and more in control. “Which brings me to a little plan I have in mind.”

“We're listening,” said McGreed.

“As I said, forget about revenge,” said Ralph. “Bigpaw could scoop up Weaselworld as if it were an anthill. Besides, why do things the hard way?”

“What's the easy way?” said McGreed.

“It's right here in this magazine.” He handed
Swindler's Magazine
to McGreed.

“Hmm,” said McGreed. “‘Try hypnotism! Gain power over others with the evil eye!' Very interesting.” McGreed called for the lights to be turned on and began reading the hypnotism article.

“Who's going to be doing all this hypnotizing?” asked Stye.

“You're looking at him,” said Ralph, puffing out his chest.

“You?” snarled Stye. “Since when are you a hypnotist?”

“Since about twenty minutes ago when I hypnotized one of Farmer Ben's cows. I put her under just like that,” said Ralph, snapping his fingers.

“A cow?” said Stye.

“Not to mention the fact that I was a carnival hypnotist years ago,” said Ralph, stretching the truth quite a bit.

“Hypnotizing a weak-minded cow is one thing,” said Stye. “Let's see you hypnotize me.”

“Happy to do so,” said Ralph, taking out his watch. “Or, better yet, I'll hypnotize McGreed himself. If that's okay, chief.”

“Okay,” said McGreed. “Hypnotize away.”

Ralph moved close to McGreed. Stye and Dr. Boffins looked on as Ralph began to swing his watch in front of the arch-weasel. “Observe my watch,” said Ralph in a low, spooky voice that he remembered from his carnival days. “Gently swinging . . . back and forth . . . gently swinging . . .”

But McGreed wasn't watching the watch. He was looking into Ralph's eyes.

“Your eyes are getting . . . heavy,” said Ralph.

But it wasn't McGreed's eyes that were getting heavy.

“You feel . . . you feel a great need to sleep,” said Ralph, his voice getting weaker and his eyes beginning to close.

McGreed reached out and gently took the watch from Ralph's hand. “Do you hear me, Ralph?” he said. “Do you hear me?”

Ralph nodded his head.

“When you wake up,” said McGreed, “you are no longer going to be Ralph. You are going to be Big Red Rooster, king of the barnyard, and it is your job to tell the world the sun has just come up.” Then McGreed snapped his fingers and said, “Wake up, Big Red Rooster.”

The effect was astounding. As soon as Ralph opened his eyes he began leaping around, flapping his arms, and screaming,
“COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO! COCK-A-DOODLE-DOO!”

“Amazing,” said Stye.

“Astonishing,” said Dr. Boffins.

McGreed let Ralph be Big Red Rooster for a while. Then he said, “When I snap my fingers, you will once again be Ralph.” He snapped his fingers and Ralph came to.

“Wha-what happened?” said Ralph, looking puzzled.

“Nothing to worry about,” said McGreed with a grin. “You and I just had an evil eye contest, and I won. Now, let's get on with Operation Revenge. You mentioned preparations. What sort of preparations did you have in mind?”

So it was that while the Bear Scouts were preparing a mountain expedition to conserve soil, Ralph and the archweasel were preparing a mountain expedition to take over Bear Country, lock, stock, and honeypot, and everything in between. The Bear Scouts' preparations included plants, plant food, potting soil, garden tools, and bottles of water, pictures of plant labels for hardy ivy, climbing ivy, creeping sedum, spreading sedum, and sprawling sedum. The Ralph/McGreed expedition included cardboard cutouts of the Bear Scouts, a portfolio of artwork, a slouch hat, an opera cape, and a giant tongue depressor.

It also happened that the Bear Scouts and the Ralph/McGreed team began climbing the Great Grizzly Mountains at about the same time. The scouts climbed up the mountain on the outside, while the Ralph/McGreed team climbed it from the inside.

McGreed led the way up the twisting, turning, secret passageway that led to a cave near the top of the mountain.

“I wondered how you got that tape of Bigpaw,” said Ralph. “He's very wary of strangers.”

One of the things the scouts liked about working in the mountains was that it gave them a chance to visit with their great and good friend Bigpaw. Naturally, they chose to start their soil conservation project on Mount Grizzly, where Bigpaw lived. Their plan was to plant the ivy and sedum about halfway up the mountain, then climb the rest of the way to visit Bigpaw.

As they climbed they could see what the professor was worried about. The higher they climbed the thinner and patchier the soil became. The scouts were expert climbers (they had long since earned the Rock-climbing Merit Badge).

It was mostly bare rock that they were climbing—bare rock with patches of tired-looking plants hanging on for dear life in the thin, gritty soil.