Finders Keepers (8 page)

If you wanted in to our secret bar, you had to knock on the basement door and say the code words. If you said,
“Is this the bathroom?”
the door would open, and you could go drink booze downstairs. If you didn't know the code, the door wouldn't open.

Every time that door opened, Capone and my family made money. I don't know how much we raked in, but Capone had so much money here and in Chicago he could barely count it. Capone didn't want the government to know how much money he had, so he didn't use banks or accountants. He stashed it away. Capone was so tough, nobody was stupid enough to steal from him. The man was a killer.

Eventually Capone went crazy from a disease in his brain. He started seeing ghosts and yelling and acting like a lunatic. Ghosts weren't the only things after him. The cops were on his tail. Crazy Al knew he'd get busted. He worried constantly about his money. So he started hiding it. Some here, some there. He hid it in safes and walls. Hell, he even buried some of it! He gave it to his buddies to hide for him, but he expected them to hold on to it and give it back.

He gave some of his money to Pops.

Hell's bells, that's enough because who even cares anymore. Some things are best left alone, and all the talk about Capone and the Clarks is history and it's nuts to bring it up again.

*   *   *

That's how Grumpa stopped the story.

He picked up the remote and turned on his programs. With a wave of his hand, he told us to go outside. But we weren't ready to give up. He hadn't told us everything.

Alex said, “So all these people with Capone's money figured he'd never have a chance to claim it, right?”

“Finders keepers,” I said.

“Except the finders were all crooks, too,” Alex said. “Grandpa, will you please finish the story?”

Grumpa leaned toward us. “So you want to hear more?”

We nodded all eager.

“Alrighty. Come closer.” We wiggled toward his feet. “Little closer. That's good.” He bent his head down. “BOO!”

I shrieked, and Alex fell backward. Grumpa laughed so hard he coughed and thumped his chest.

We drank orange sodas in the kitchen, waiting for Grumpa to take his nap. When the snoring started, it was time for our plan. Grumpa had banned us from the basement after the pipes exploded, but we needed to conduct a full search. If Grumpa's mother left traces of money in the basement, then maybe she left clues, too.

Quietly we went downstairs. The basement smelled damp from the water-pipe explosion. A section of new pipes had been put in the ceiling, but the washtub hadn't been replaced. The tub was propped up on cement blocks to cover the hole. I walked to Grumpa's workbench where a new taxidermy project was underway. A raccoon had been nearly stuffed, but its eyes hadn't been glued in place. The thing stood on its back legs with its paws in the air.

Alex grabbed my arm as I reached out to touch it. “Stop! We'll get in trouble.”

“How's he going to know that I touched it? I just want to touch it, that's all. Not move it.”

“He'll know. He's got a nose for that. Just look for clues, okay? I'll start in the room where he turned off the water.”

Alex went around the stairs. Before I could move, he poked his head around the corner and said, “His mother taught him taxidermy and gave him his first tools. That's why he makes a big deal out of it. Don't touch his stuff.”

“His
mother
knew taxidermy?”

“Don't touch his stuff.”

“I heard you the first time.”

I so wanted to touch his stuff. He'd spread it all over the long table. Glue. Fake animal eyes. Gloves. Knives. Pins. Screws. Wood boards. Bottles and bottles of stuff like “flocking adhesive,” whatever that was. It just sat there, all alone, begging for someone to touch it.

But I didn't because I found something almost as good: boxes along the wall labeled
taxidermy
. Or, like Dad would say,
artifacts
.

Most of the boxes contained supplies like the ones on the table. One box wasn't cardboard, though. It was an old-fashioned wood trunk. Inside were taxidermy supplies—old taxidermy supplies. I could tell they were old because the metal tools were rusted, and the bottles were glass instead of plastic. Carefully I peeled back the cloth wrapped around objects in the box. They were small taxidermied birds, chipmunks, and squirrels. Each one was mounted on a wood board etched with the words
For My Edmund.
They must have been gifts from Mrs. Hillary Clark to Grumpa.

For almost an hour, Alex and I dug through boxes. He found a few
For My Edmund
animals, too, and one notebook. “I can hardly read what's in here,” he said, holding up the notebook. “Everything's in tiny cursive.”

“What's it say?”

“Just a bunch of dumb recipes and prayers and stuff about weather.”

The ceiling creaked. Footsteps. Grumpa's footsteps.

“I think Grumpa's awake!”

Alex whispered, “Put everything back.”

We made quick work of straightening boxes while he walked back and forth.

“How are we going to get upstairs without him seeing us?” I asked.

Alex shrugged.

“Stop shrugging and start coming up with ideas for a change! I can't always be the idea person.”

“Actually, I'm the idea person,” Alex said. “You just talk faster.”

Alex always tried to show me up. It was annoying. I said, “Here's an idea. We're going to tiptoe up the steps. Then we'll be ready to get out of here when he's in the bathroom or something.”

Ever so slowly we walked up the steps, which creaked but probably not loud enough for old ears to notice. I leaned against the door and listened for clues that Grumpa might be in the kitchen—water running, refrigerator opening and closing, microwave beeping. Nothing.

I whispered, “It's quiet, Alex. I think it's safe.”

I nudged the door open.

There he was. Grumpa. Arms crossed, staring at the door, waiting. Alex gasped.

“Out!” Grumpa pointed to the kitchen. We got out fast. Airplane fast. We stood next to the stove and looked very, very sorry. “Did you touch my taxidermy?”

“No,” I said.

“No,” Alex said.

“I told you to stay out of the basement. Do your ears need cleaning?”

“No,” I said.

“No,” Alex said.

“Around here we have consequences for not listening.”

Alex and I looked at each other. After we broke the pipes and sunk the canoe and trespassed in the basement, Grumpa might have something terrible in mind. Neil had told Alex that Grumpa had no patience. Grumpa's face squished together like he was thinking hard. He looked at Alex and then me and then Alex and then me. He waved his finger at us and said, “You break one more rule and you'll find out what those consequences are.”

I bit my lip to stop myself from smiling.

There were no consequences.

Grumpa was a real grandparent, clearly.

Grumpa sent us outside with a stack of cookies and more orange soda. I sat on the porch steps and drank from my can while Alex took off his shoes and socks. He tromped around in a circle on the grass.

He said, “The only good thing about living here is you can walk around outside and not worry about stepping on scorpions or tarantulas. In Arizona you either wear shoes or you die. There's nothing scary here.”

I was tired of hearing Alex talk about Arizona. Nothing scary in the Northwoods? Obviously he'd never read a book about Wisconsin. “Around here we don't need shoes, but we have tornadoes that will suck you into outer space.”

“We had tornadoes, too. Dust tornadoes. Those are worse because they will suck you into outer space, and your eyes will be scratched by dust.”

“When it rains in Wisconsin sometimes it rains so hard and so fast that it washes away entire towns. Who knows? There could be a town under Whitefish Lake from the olden days.”

“In Arizona—”

“It doesn't rain in Arizona, Alex.”

“There are black widow spiders in Arizona!”

“Stop it!” I shouted. “If you like Arizona more then you should just move back! You get to live here, and you're too stupid to care.”

My head felt full of flames. If Alex had flames in his head, he didn't act like it. He bent down and picked up a rock. He calmly said, “Maybe I will move back. When you leave I won't know anyone and I'll probably never know anyone. I'll just run away and live in Arizona so I'll have something to do.”

“Good. Then you can hang around with…” I couldn't remember the names of Alex's friends. “You can be with those guys! What are their stupid names?”

Alex looked blank.

“Their names? What are your friends' names?”

“Um … Billy. My friend is Billy.”

“Billy and who else?”

He threw the rock across the lawn, across the gravel driveway, toward Olivia Stanger's sign. He missed, and the rock landed on the edge of the grass by our driveway. He threw another rock and missed with that one, too. Finally he said, “Nobody else. It's just me and Billy. We don't play with other kids much. They're annoying and weird.”

I knew what Alex was really saying: The other kids didn't play with Alex and Billy. The other kids called
them
annoying and weird. I knew this because it's what happened to me at my school. The girls in my class traded bracelets made from rubber bands, and somehow I was the weird one. Playtime at school was messed up. The cabin was simple.

“Oh,” I said. “I know what that's like. Annoying and weird kids, I mean.”

“Who cares? I don't.”

“Me, either.”

I was glad Alex understood, but it also felt like one of those awkward moments. We'd admitted we were too weird to have lots of friends, basically. Who wants to admit that? So I changed the subject. “Alex, why won't Grumpa tell us the whole story? What happened after his father got the loot? How'd it end up in a wall?”

“He just doesn't talk much. Dad says he's been like that since my grandma died.”

“I don't understand why he wouldn't just finish the story. What's a few more words?”

“He must be extra tired. I can tell. He forgot a bunch of stuff today, like we were supposed to have carrots with our sandwiches. And he forgot we're supposed to stay inside and watch a movie this afternoon.”

“That's stupid. Why would we stay inside? We never stay inside unless it's storming.”

Alex's eyes got all big. I knew that big-eyed look. It's the look people get when they almost blow a secret.

“What? Why are we supposed to stay inside, Alex?”

Alex picked up another rock and threw it harder. Still, he missed Olivia Stanger's sign. “Pretend I didn't tell you, but people are coming to look at your cabin later today.”

I froze. My parents were keeping a secret from me, the most important secret of my life. The cabin sale was happening so fast. Grumpa hadn't even finished the whole Capone story. I needed that story. If there was gangster money hidden in Hayward and the gangsters were dead, then it was finders keepers. There might be enough money to pay my parents' bills and keep the cabin—maybe enough to do all that
and
buy Nan's Bait and Tackle. But the important thing was saving the cabin.

“When are they coming? Are you sure?”

“Even Grandpa doesn't want people looking at your cabin,” Alex said. “He thinks you're a pain, but he says new people will be worse. They'll probably be from a big city and so stupid they'll need expensive fishing radars to catch anything.”

I blinked away the eye sweats. “I hate that kids don't get to make any decisions. My parents decided all by themselves to sell the cabin. Didn't even ask what I thought. They aren't even sorry.”

“Parents are never sorry. They never apologize for nothing. They think they're right about everything. My parents didn't even ask if I wanted to move. They just announced it one day like it was the best thing in the world.”

“At least you got to move here,” I said. “And you get to have babysitting by a grandpa instead of a stupid summer program.”

“Well, he's an old grandpa and sometimes a scary one.”

“He gave you an ATV.”

“Yeah, and my dad took it away. Dad's being the mean one. Grandpa's not half as bad as he says.”

I stared at the cabin and wondered about Capone's fortune. Al Capone could have enough money hiding in northern Wisconsin to save hundreds of cabins, and Grumpa might be the only person still alive with information. I needed more time.

“Aren't you going to do something?” Alex asked.

I felt tired, so tired I could probably only run three miles. That was not like me at all.

Alex poked me. “Well?”

“I'm thinking! Here's your chance to be the idea person, Alex.”

He thought for a few minutes, then grinned. “What if they don't
want
to buy it? What if they don't like what they see?”

I was going to ask what he meant, but his grin turned into a wicked smile. If I read his mind correctly, Alex was the coolest friend in the world, pretty much.

 

THE FIASCO AND EAVESDROPPING

We did the job fast. No talking, no goofing. No time for Chase Truegood or Buck Punch. Then we hid behind Grumpa's shed and waited for the cabin shoppers.

There's nothing to do when you're hiding behind a shed. We caught bugs and put them in a big glass jar so we could see which bugs would eat the others. Believe it or not, the ladybug is the meanest bug. Ladybugs devour other bugs and then buzz around all classy.

Olivia Stanger was a ladybug.

Finally we heard car wheels on gravel, doors opening and closing, and voices. Happy voices. Alex and I peeked around the shed and saw Olivia Stanger with a man and a woman wearing neat city clothes, just like Grumpa predicted. The woman had high-heeled shoes, and the guy's hair was slicked up and tossed around like a model's.