The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin (13 page)

I keep my Crony
under my pillow, set to vibrate, in case Melody needs to contact me for “police business.” Or if maybe my guerrilla toilet love letter inspires a desperate e-mail from one L.P. She might just need someone to talk with?

So when the Crony goes off at about midnight, my heart jumps a little bit. I leap up, check the screen, and see that it is not an e-mail but an instant message.

I wake up
very early the next morning. It is the second weekend morning I am up before noon—an unprecedented streak. I get dressed in a daze and go outside to wait for Devon. I am kicking stones in the driveway as he pulls up and parks his car, a beat-up former police cruiser, on my mom’s flower bed. He does not seem to notice the damage to the mums. Instead, he hops out wearing a happy Hardy grin and clutching a file folder on which he has written “TOP SECRET” in big black letters. I roll my eyes. He laughs, waggles his eyebrows, and then hands me the folder. Inside is a typed note:

I look up and meet Devon’s eyes so he knows I am finished reading. He looks at me expectantly, like he wants … something? I nod, even though it really doesn’t seem to be the correct gesture. What am I agreeing with? Why would Porkrinds possibly want to kill Pat? Unless … Pat’s death really was a warning to Pat Senior, and someone offered him a wad of cash, and … Probably not. But, then again, who knows? What are we going to do? Break into J.P.’s house? And what are we going to find that could possibly prove anything? A list taped to his mirror?

Is Devon just going to go up and knock on his door? Is this all Hardy hijinks to him? Are there fake mustaches and wigs in our future?

Devon takes a fake beard and dark glasses out of his backpack. I give him my most skeptical look. But when he snaps on the beard and glasses—voilà!—a perfect blind rabbi. I give him the universal look that says “Are you freaking serious?” He hands me a pair of glasses and my very own beard. I sign a very simple no. He shrugs and gestures for me to get in the car.

Driving to Happy Memory brings back disturbing feelings. The fact that Devon drives worse than a blind rabbi is also contributing to my shaky mood. It feels like so long ago that we took this same route. My mind goes fuzzy as I remember the scene: Pat handing out his cards, Mindy beaming, Escapone climbing over seats, A.J. looking fierce, and Miss Prefontaine blushing. It all seemed so important, and then, just as quickly, none of it matters at all. Death always seems like something that happens to someone else. I’ve never known it firsthand,
except for toilet funerals for childhood fish. Thinking about how I cried back then makes me feel stupid when worse—so much worse—could be lurking around any corner.

As Devon points his cruiser up the mountain, we pass old miners’ homes stained gray from years of coal dust. I see a strange little man sitting on a bench. Is he waiting for a bus? Or just waiting? For what? He has a shell-shocked look in his wrinkled eyes, and he seems as lost as anyone, as me, in this world. I think about what lies beneath the road we’re on. Men died down there. We could be right on top of the spot where old Dummy himself took his last breath. I think of the pain he must have been in as his chest was crushed and his lungs filled with dust as black as death itself. I want to ask Devon to pull over so I can say a little prayer or whatever. But I just wait until we finally arrive at something called Gun Club Road and pull to the shoulder. Devon takes a deep breath and starts typing on his Crony.

Devon yanks his beard back up and fixes it over his mouth like an old-timey robber readying his bandanna before a train heist. Then he snaps the glasses onto his face and checks himself out in the rearview mirror. And here’s the thing: he does look sort of awesome. I pull out my own beard and glasses, put them on, and check the mirror. I look just like my dad. I furrow my brow and fold my arms, making Dad faces at myself.

Devon’s reasoning behind parking the car a few hundred yards from Porkrinds’s shady château is to “secure our cover,” a move he probably learned in
The Hardy Boys in The Case of the Two Dorks Spying on Their Bus Driver
. This means a long walk up a steep hill to his house. My beard keeps tickling my nose. I’m sneezing, coughing, breathing heavily, and sweating buckets. My hair is a soggy mass of perspiration like I just got out of the pool.

I send Devon a message:

Up close, Porkrinds’s house looks like a fortress. And, unless I am mistaken, all the windows are barred with homemade guards constructed of rebar. The front entrance is a heavy steel door, and the garage is protected by an intricate series of … booby traps?

Like a moat ringing a castle, a host of homemade alarms encircles the house. There are boxes balanced precariously on wooden sawhorses, strings rigged to door handles and windows, a blinking electronic eye. Devon looks at this crazy setup and then gapes back at me.

Is Porkrinds keeping a prisoner in there? Does he torture children who break the rules of bus etiquette? And then it hits me. Not only is there no way to get out of his garage, there is no way in. Unless …

But before I can further explain what I’ve figured out, Devon suddenly dives to the ground, pulling me with him. Then he forms his hand into the shape of a gun (coincidentally, the actual sign for “gun”). Someone is firing at us! I feel it too—the sound vibrations from the shots bouncing off my skin. He gestures that we should try to hide, as if I wasn’t already thinking that. We scurry alongside the garage, the only place that offers any cover. This means knocking down dozens of the little booby traps, sending buckets and strings and nails flying everywhere. The red eye of the alarm blinks in double time.

Devon motions for me to lie flat on the ground. My whole life flashes before my eyes—sort of a sad show. I will make a better go of everything if I get out of here alive! Lose some pounds! Take a photography class! Sign up for yearbook! After staring up at the sky and making this pact with God, I look over at Devon. He is gesturing with his left hand that I should follow him. Then, with his right hand, he reaches into his belt and pulls out that old-timey pistol.

Devon points the barrel skyward and calmly squeezes the trigger. We start sprinting toward the car as he fires several more shots wildly into the air. In just a few seconds, I am down
the hill, my feet kicking up dirt and gravel, my damn sunglasses sliding down my nose, beard flying into my eyes. Even though I can’t hear anything and can hardly see, it is clear that imminent death is nipping at our heels, or butts.

Devon is much faster than I am, but he stays just a step ahead or so, running in a drunken zigzag pattern. I try to keep up, zigging when he zags. The strategy seems to be working—we are almost back at the car and are still not dead! After one final sprint, I am pawing at the car door handle. Devon strains to unlock the passenger side while aiming the gun with one hand, wildly scanning the sky for our would-be assassin. I dive into the car, and he jams the key in the ignition and peels away down Gun Club Road with a look on his reddened face that can only be described as … deranged happiness?

What the fudge!

We are back at my house
. I am pacing like a maniac, trying to calm down. Ace paces along with me, and Devon seems more excited than ever.

“Don’t you think we should have called the cops?” I write on my little pad.

“Didn’t I tell you? They were already coming. I heard sirens. Somebody must have called them about the shooting.”

“Holy crap! You think they will bust Porkrinds for drugs? I read his lips on the bus. He’s mumbled stuff about smoking before, and about digging holes. There must be an underground entrance to his stash.”

“I guess. But, well, I really wish we had solved the murder. Who cares if the bus driver is a pothead? They all are. It’s a well-known fact.”

“Even Cupcake?”

“An exceptional exception. But, hey, we still have another task: hacking Pat’s ChamberMaids page.”