Brass Monkeys (40 page)

The unloading turned out to be fairly easy. The kids and teachers got off on their own—minus their fur and tails, which must have blown out on the ride up—and walked like robots into the basement, then up the stairs into the school. They were still dazed, but I could see a faint light in their eyes: the Grotto water was working.

Earlier, I had spotted Harriet, Alvin, and Weeser just going up the stairs with a crowd of kids, but I couldn’t get to them. I made one last trip into the tunnel to make sure everyone was out, then I went upstairs and slammed the basement door shut. I happened to glance up at a hall clock, and just as that heavy door closed, the hands, which had been frozen on nine o’clock, started to move again! I’m not kidding! It was like nothing had happened and we were back where we started.

“Oh yeah,” I muttered. “This is way weird.” But it was exactly the way Webster had described it. It made no sense, but there it was. We had stepped through some kind of goofy time warp and now we were back. Presto pasta, meatballs and sauce!

Almost immediately after the clock started, I heard a faint rumble and I knew the Big Monkey had gone back home. Two janitors came by, chatting and relaxed looking. One of them opened an exit door and shook out his broom. Wow, the doors were unlocked again.

Some of the teachers were scurrying about, picking up the books and papers that had been scattered around when we were kidnapped. They didn’t appear to think anything was odd about it. I heard one say, “Strobe’s class must have gotten out of hand again.”

I went into Plumly’s office, thinking I’d try to get to a phone and call Mom, but the secretaries and some of the teachers were milling about in confusion because they couldn’t find Plumly. I saw one of the secretaries pick up a phone, listen, then put it down. “The line is still dead,” I heard her say to the others.

A glance out the window told me why the phone wasn’t working. Outside it was snowing so hard you couldn’t see across the road. Then I thought, What the heck were you going to tell Mom anyway? She doesn’t even know you’ve been gone. And which part of your story would she believe? Yeah, right. Duwang!

I went back into the hall and that’s when I spotted Harriet, Weeser, and Alvin again. They had evidently been in the library and were just coming out. There was a fourth person with them, a boy who was leaning toward Harriet and whispering to her. I hurried to catch up to them. By the way they acted, I felt sure they were back to normal. Without the memory secret, I doubted if they remembered anything, but I was still hopeful. Surely Harriet would remember something.

“Hey, you guys,” I called out. When they stopped and turned, I looked eagerly for the tiniest sign, but right away my heart sank. I could tell the black wave had gotten to them. Weeser gave me a cool, green-eyed stare and Alvin scowled. When I saw Harriet’s troubled eyes I sighed and gave it up. I knew I was truly back in Grindsville. I could tell immediately all they remembered was how I had “kissed butt” in Ming’s class. This morning. In this school. In this world.

The boy who had been whispering to Harriet gave me a cool, unfriendly look. He was a tall kid with curly brown hair and a smooth, tanned face. I had never seen him before.

“Who’s this?” he said, gesturing at me. He wrinkled his nose like I was some kind of camel dung that had accidentally rolled into the hall.

“This is Mr. Wussy,” said Alvin. He eyed my trumpet. “What the fardex are you carrying that around for, and on that dumb cord?”

“And where did you get that ridiculous shirt?” said Weeser.

Still holding onto a dim hope, I turned to Harriet. Her golden-brown eyes had looked cool and remote when I’d first walked up, but now something began changing. I could see a softening in those misty depths.

“Eugene, I want you to meet Barry Branson,” she said, nodding at the tall, curly-haired kid. “He’s … well, he’s the real B.B. in the note.” She gave me an apologetic look. “He was late arriving in town, but he’s here now and he knows all about our situation at school. He has some letters from a man named Webster that explain everything.”

I stared at her, my mouth hanging open.

“Wait a second,” snapped the tall boy. He had been rolling his eyes and sighing as if Harriet were the biggest dolt in the world. “Should you be telling this kid anything? I mean, this is dangerous business.”

“It’s all right,” said Harriet. “Eugene understands what we’re talking about.”

The tall boy sniffed. “Oh, I sincerely doubt that. Really.”

I took one last look at them Harriet, Alvin, and Weeser my once-upon-a-time golden friends, then started down the hall. The whole idea was having trouble penetrating my thick head, but now it came thundering in like an express train and I smiled, probably looking like the emperor when he first discovered he didn’t have any clothes on: I wasn’t the great B.B., and I never had been.

I started giggling softly, then I let loose with a burst of laughter you could have heard all the way to South America, a terrific laugh that started in my belly, then roared out into the world. I stumbled along the hallway, laughing so hard I thought I might sprain something. “Billy Bumpus,” I gurgled.

I staggered over and leaned against a locker to get my breath. “Brave and resourceful,” I sputtered, then whooped insanely.

Just then a knot of teachers hurried past and I heard one of them say, “It looks like Merci and the others just up and quit. They’re gone!” Right on the heels of that, some kids came running down the hall shouting, “She’s gone! Ming’s gone!”

“And so are Strobe and Fundabore,” I said, talking mostly to myself.

A couple of the teachers paused and stared at me.

“You won’t see Principal Plumly again, either,” I added boldly.

The two frowned at me, then hurried on, whispering to each other.

I continued on, ignoring a confused voice on the intercom telling us to move along to our next class. I searched around the library where I remembered dropping my trumpet, but I couldn’t find it. Oh well, at least I still had Todd Lemons’ss horn. I glanced down at the scratched and dented bell and sighed. Lilah had been right. The trumpet had been my inspiration, and it had gotten me through the most perilous adventure of my life, but what had I accomplished? Sure, I had helped destroy Ming’s school and helped save Harriet, Weeser, Alvin, and the others. They hadn’t lost their Amberlight, and that counted for something. But in the end what had changed?

I had come back to a bad school with its ugly black and yellow halls, back to kids who would never be my friends. I had come back to find Harriet, the girl who meant more to me than anything, still stuck in the Grindsville world. Even worse was the fact that no one knew the truth. I was truly and depressingly alone.

I sighed wearily and headed to my locker to get my coat and hat. Frankly, at that moment I didn’t care about anything, and that included the last part of Adjana’s mission. All I wanted to do was go home and sleep for a hundred years.

I slipped into my coat and pulled on my stocking cap. I caught sight of Harriet and the others grouped around her locker. They looked like such a happy bunch.

I opened the door and stepped out into a blast of winter wind. After the heat of the underworld, that rattled me good. But what I saw next made me forget the cold. Totally.

A tall, gaunt man dressed in a butterscotch-colored coat strode across the parking lot, headed right for me. His long gray hair blew wildly in the wind. For a moment I stood there, my eyes bugging out. The guy was the spitting image of … Haggerty.

Just behind this guy, I saw three more people. Lilah, Teddy, and … Jack!

I could tell it was them even though they were wearing winter clothes I’d never seen before. Jack had on his white sport coat because I could see it peeking from under his overcoat. It was them. There was no doubt about it.

I grinned excitedly as Haggerty approached. Wait until he sees me, I thought.

Haggerty was calling back to the others, “I’ll just go on in and get the lay of the land. No sense standing around out here like a herd of goats.”

My grin got bigger and I did a little goofy ta-dah gesture with my hands. Haggerty merely glanced my way and kept on going. I figured he didn’t recognize me because of the blowing snow, so I turned. Yelling like an idiot, I ran toward the others. I think I shouted something crazy like, “The Wild Bunch forever!” I was so wound up, I was going to hug everyone. Luckily, I pulled up and stopped. I’ll never forget their looks of blank amazement and embarrassment.

“Did you want something, son?” asked Teddy. He and Lilah were looking at me with kindly but puzzled smiles.

I knew right then they didn’t know me, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. “Wow,” I said. “I thought all this time you guys were hurt bad, but you’re okay.”

Jack gave me a flinty look out of those blue eyes. “I hope you’re not showing off for your buddies inside, kid.” He turned and went on after Haggerty. Lilah and Teddy hovered behind for a moment. I believe they thought I was some kind of deranged student.

“Are you in the school band?” Lilah asked me in her sweet, even-toned voice.

“Oh yeah,” I said weakly, “I am.” Then I repeated it, mouthing it larger.

She gave me a surprised look at this.

“Well, isn’t that wonderful,” said Teddy, nodding happily and signing it for Lilah. “He’s in the band.”

Lilah patted me on the arm. “I hope I see you in class.”

She and Teddy hurried on toward the entrance.

I stood there in stunned silence and watched them go into the building. That’s when I heard another familiar voice.

“Bumpus-man.”

I snapped around and I think my eyes almost shot straight out of my head. “Raymondo …”

Ray was dressed in jeans and had on a bulky winter coat, and he was minus his tatoos, but it was him. He was grinning and slapping his knee in amusement. “Sorry, Bumpus-man, but listening to you trying to talk to them was hilarious.”

In the next instant we were giving each other big bear hugs.

“Oh man,” I said, “Am I glad to see you. Someone who knows. I’m going nuts!”

He nodded. “Tell me about it. See, bringing those guys back up here was the special mission Adjana wanted me for. But hey, dragging them up here ain’t been no picnic I can tell you, mainly because I made a big fat mistake.” He grimaced. “Gotta get out of this wind, man, it’s killing me.”

We hurried to the school entrance and went into the warm entryway.

My head was whirling. “I don’t understand anything,” I began. “What’s going on? Why did you bring them up here? I thought they were hurt bad and needed the Grotto water?”

“They were and they did,” put in Ray. “But they’ve had plenty of water. And what’s going on is simple. They came back here to teach school.”

I stared at him. “Ray, don’t joke around, man. I can’t take it.”

“No joke, Bumpus-man.” Ray laughed. “And if that ain’t the greatest idea in the entire universe, I’m your Aunt Petunia!”

“It’s a fabulous idea,” I said, “But I thought they were hurt so bad they’d need plenty of time down in the Grotto.” I shook my head. “How did Adjana have time to do all that? I’ve only been gone—”

“Hey, you’ve been back here for probably a good twenty minutes,” said Ray. “Shoot, that’s like days down below. We’ve had plenty of time to set this up.”

I took a couple of steps away and then came back. “Holy Crow, I’m starting to see it,” I said. “Adjana must have had this planned right from the beginning.”

Ray grinned. “I don’t doubt it, man. She’s a smart cookie. She figured Haggerty would be a good bet to replace old Plum Butt. And I think she had Jack, Lilah, and Teddy penciled in for Ming, Fundabore, and Strobe right from the start.”

I made a little face. “Yeah, but there’s one detail I think she missed.”

Ray smacked me on the arm. “Nope, she didn’t miss it, ‘cause I know what detail you’re talking about. You think she didn’t know you weren’t the real hotshot B.B., right?”

“Right, she didn’t know.”

Ray fixed me with a look. “Bull! She knew right from the minute she met you, cause you didn’t look like the right kid. He was supposed to have curly hair and be good looking and all that. But you know what she told Perkins and the others? I heard her myself. She said after she met you she knew you were absolutely right for the job. It didn’t matter about the other kid at all. She said you were the one, and the only one who could have done the job!”

“Really?”

“Absoltootly, man. It was like you were the coolest kid she’d ever met.”

I flushed with embarrassment, and to cover myself, I jumped to something else. “How come Adjana didn’t give Jack and the others the memory secret?”

Now it was Ray’s turn to get red. “Actually she did. She gave it to me anyway, and I was supposed to tell them. And that’s the big mistake I mentioned. I told them right at the beginning of the trip to sing a dumb song. But they figured I didn’t know what I was talking about. Haggerty started saying, ‘It can’t be that simple!’ I swear, sometimes adults really tick me off. Anyway—get this—they started arguing among themselves about what it was, and the next thing I know, whoops, off we go like a rocket heading straight up. And man, I don’t think they sang a note!”

I laughed; I couldn’t help it. “So what did you tell them when you got up here?”

Ray grinned. “I hauled them up the same stairs you guys just climbed and out into the parking lot. They were still dazed and loopy. I told them I was from the high school and I’d just driven them in from the airport. I said they were to go in and be interviewed for jobs right here at Grindsville Middle School. Heck, Adjana had that all planned, so I went with it and they believed every word of it!”

I just shook my head in happiness. “This is so fantastic! They’ll be the best teachers in the world. We’ll start having fun and we’ll even learn something!”

“You got it. Adjana worked with them and they’re Master Teachers now.”

“So what about you, Raymondo?” I was so excited, I could hardly stand still. “Listen, you gotta live with me. Okay? I’ll get Mom to adopt you. It’ll be great.”