Leon and the Spitting Image (23 page)

Napoleon spotted Miss Hagmeyer and he stepped on the gas.

“Don’t get too close,” Lily-Matisse warned. “The Hag’s got super-sensitive hearing.”

Napoleon lifted his foot off the pedal and trailed from a safe distance. Twice he almost lost her. Once when a large van cut him off. The second time because some tourists—all sporting leather shorts, green felt hats, and open-toed sandals with thick white socks—blocked the taxi at an intersection. Fortunately, Miss Hagmeyer’s hunched silhouette was easy to relocate.

Eight blocks from the school, she pushed through the side entrance of a dilapidated warehouse.

Leon grabbed for the taxi’s door handle.

“Wait!” said Napoleon.

“But we’ll lose her!” said Leon.

“We promise to stick together, Monsieur Napoleon,” Lily-Matisse said, in her most responsible-sounding voice.

“And we’ll return straightaway,” said P.W.

“How soon is straightaway?” Napoleon demanded.

“Ten minutes,” said Leon. “Fifteen, tops.”

P.W. made a show of pushing some buttons on his fancy wristwatch. “See. I’ve set my alarm.”

“If you are not back in—”

But the backseat of the taxi was empty before Napoleon could finish his threat.

Leon was first through the warehouse door. P.W. followed. Lily-Matisse brought up the rear. They tracked Miss Hagmeyer to an elevator. A sign that said
OUT OF ORDER
forced her to take the stairs, so they did the same.

And so began the game of cat and mouse—a very quiet game of cat and mouse since the mouse (Miss Hagmeyer) had hearing that more closely resembled a bat’s.

On the third floor, she stopped to catch her breath.

One flight below, Leon bent over the banister and peered up through the open stairwell. As he did, his sneaker made a faint squeak.

“Who’s down there?” Miss Hagmeyer barked.

Leon flattened himself against the stairwell wall and waited until the clack of boot heels confirmed that Miss Hagmeyer had continued her climb.

She paused again, on the fourth floor. This time Leon was more cautious when he leaned out. He observed her boots, the hem of her cape, and the bottom of the garbage bag.

“Do you have a shot?” P.W. whispered.

“I think so,” Leon whispered back. “But I want to wait until she’s with the toy thief.”

“I’d test the doll now—while she’s resting,” P.W. said in a low voice. “You don’t want any nasty surprises when you’re face-to- face with her and that slimeball.”

“It makes sense,” Lily-Matisse whispered.

Leon leaned over the banister and lined up a shot. He gave a couple of yanks on the doll. Nothing happened.

“Can’t get the right angle,” he said.

P.W. grabbed on to Leon’s jacket so that he could lean out further. “Try now.”

Leon stretched over the banister and extended his view: boots, body, bag … hand.

Bingo!
With her bony fingers now visible, Leon hoped he could make Miss Hagmeyer release the bag of animiles.

But it wasn’t Miss Hagmeyer who lost her grip. It was P.W.

Leon stumbled forward—over the open stairwell. To catch his balance, he had to grab the banister, and to grab the banister he had to let go of the doll.

It plummeted down the stairwell.

For a terrifying moment Leon waited to see if Miss Hagmeyer would hurtle herself down to the bottom of the stairs, forced to a grisly death by the accidental release of the magic master piece.

“I’m warning you,” Miss Hagmeyer yelled moments later—from above—“Whoever’s following me, I’m armed.” It was clear from the the eerie shadow on the wall that she was gripping her instructional needle like a dagger.

“You stay here,” Leon whispered to Lily-Matisse and P.W. “I’ll go get the master piece.” In the time it took for him to rush to the bottom the stairwell, retrieve the doll, and return, Miss Hagmeyer had continued on to the fifth floor, where she pushed through a fire door.

Though winded, Leon followed close behind. When he poked his head onto the landing, he found himself in the middle of an ill-lit hallway with countless doors running off in both directions.

Miss Hagmeyer was nowhere to be seen.

“Think … we should … split up?” he asked, still breathing heavily.

“Negative,” P.W. said.

“Not happening,” said Lily-Matisse.

“So … then … which way … do we go?”

“Left,” said Lily-Matisse.

“Right,” said P.W.

“Shoot … for it,” Leon told them.

They did rock paper scissors. P.W. won, so they turned right, inspecting every door they passed. None of the nameplates suggested a company that dealt in stolen stuffed toys.

At the end of the long, grim corridor, Leon peeked around the corner and discovered another corridor, just as long and just as grim as the first. The hunt continued, door by door, corridor by corridor. There was no trace of Miss Hagmeyer.

Then, some twenty feet from the spot where the floor search had first started, they hit pay dirt.

“Ohmigosh!” Lily-Matisse blurted out. “I
knew
we should have taken a left!” The door that prompted her I-told-you-so had the names of four businesses stenciled on the frosted glass.

Taped below the last of those names was a hand-lettered sign written in an all-too-familiar script.

P.W. pressed himself against the door frame and grabbed hold of the knob. “Cover me,” he whispered.

Leon positioned himself ten feet away, with Lily-Matisse directly behind his back. He gave the thumbs-up to P.W. and aimed.

P.W. tried to turn the knob. “Locked,” he mouthed silently.

Leon motioned to check again. P.W. gave the knob a more vigorous twist, then rapped his knuckles against the glass.

No one answered.

“We blew it!” Lily-Matisse cried, once it was clear whispering was no longer necessary. “The Hag must have made her delivery while we were going in the
wrong
direction!”

“At least we’ve found out what SOV stands for,” said Leon.

“What do you mean?” said P.W.

“Look at the door,” said Lily-Matisse. “Stitches. Of. Virtue. S-O-V.”

“Oh,” P.W. said, annoyed he hadn’t made the connection on his own.

Lily-Matisse kicked the door in frustration. “We’ll
never
get the animiles back.”

“Sure we will,” said P.W.

“How?” asked Leon.

P.W.’s wristwatch started beeping. It was time to return to the taxi. “I’ll show you back at my place,” he said.

“Show us how?” asked Leon.

P.W. smiled. “You’ll see.”

P
W. lived in a five-story walk-up that housed his family’s Thai restaurant on the ground floor and their apartment at the top. The restaurant was a cozy mom-and-pop operation called the Curried Elephant. It smelled of spices and orange peels and offered fourteen different kinds of curry, though none contained actual elephant.

“What took you so long?” said Ms. Dhabanandana, glancing up from a napkin she was folding into the shape of a tulip.

“We were doing something with Miss H,” P.W. told his mother. She gave him a suspicious look, but before she could ask another question, P.W. said, “We’re going upstairs.”

Once inside the apartment, he guided Lily-Matisse and Leon straight to his bedroom.

“So what’s this thing you want to show us?” Leon asked.

“Close my door,” said P.W.

As Leon shut the door, P.W. cleared a path through the action figures, trading cards, and game cartridges scattered over the floor. He disappeared under his bed. Moments later, dirty clothes (T-shirts and socks
mostly) started flying into the middle of the room.

“I had to hide this,” P.W. called out between flings. “My sister is always messing with my stuff.” Eventually he reemerged, legs first, grasping an object draped in a towel. “Ladies and gentleman,” he announced. “Your attention, please.”

“Can we get on with it?” Lily-Matisse said impatiently.

“Fine,” said P.W. “Without further ado, I give you …” He whipped off the towel. “Plan B.”

“The Hagapult!” Leon cried, his eyes widening at the sight of the actual Lego-and-rubber-band contraption proposed, in sketch form, the day of the food fight.

“Care to do the honors?” P.W. asked.

“That’s a roger!” Leon said eagerly. He clamped the ankles and wrists of the master piece into the adjustable cuffs of the machine’s launching arm. “Fits perfectly,” he said. “Let’s test her out.”

“As soon as I recalibrate the counterweight,” said P.W.

“Is all this really necessary?” said Lily-Matisse. “I
still
don’t understand why you need a gizmo to get the Hag to fling stuff.”

“I told you before,” said P.W. “This is
way
cooler. Plus it
gives Leon pinpoint accuracy.” He began filling a small crate at the front of the device with pennies.

“Why the coins?” Leon asked.

“It prevents tipping when we’re in launch mode,” P.W. explained.

“You guys are totally nuts!” Lily-Matisse exclaimed, retreating to the bed. “What are you two planning to do when the Hag
catapults
Leon’s doll into the finished bin?”

“What are you talking about?” said Leon.

“I’m
talking
about final inspection,” Lily-Matisse said. “You do remember that it’s this Monday, right? How are you going to use that gizmo if the most important part—the doll—gets tossed into a garbage bag and taken to that warehouse where we should have turned left!”

“Can you give it a rest?” said P.W. angrily. He cocked the launching arm so that the doll bowed backward, head over heels. “Leon has all the ammunition he needs to take care of the Hag—speaking of which … ” P.W. got up off the floor.

“Where are you going?” Leon asked.

“To get the ammo,” he said. “I left it in the kitchen.”

The moment P.W. left the bedroom, Lily-Matisse turned to Leon. “You’re sure this is a good idea?”

“Why are you so worried?”

“I just told you. Final inspection is coming up.
Plus, there’s Birdwhistle we’ve got to think about. What if she sees that thingy?”

“It’s not a thingy, it’s a trebuchet,” said P.W., returning from the kitchen in time to catch the tail end of the warning. “And when did you get a brain swap with Antoinette?”

Lily-Matisse persisted. “All I’m saying is, strapping Miss Hagmeyer into a harness is risky.”

“No, it’s not,” said P.W. “Not if it’s properly loaded. I’ll show you.” He dumped a collection of small objects on the bedroom carpet. “We’ve got Legos in two-, four-, and six-notch varieties. We’ve got one of my dad’s famous spring rolls and a fried dumpling—I stuck with the fried because they don’t fall apart like the steamed ones.”

Lily-Matisse picked up a small plastic doll’s head by its long, golden blond hair. “What are you planning to do with this?” she asked.

“What do you think?” said P.W.

“You want to use the head of a Totally Hair Barbie for a
cannonball?”

“Why not?” P.W. said matter-of-factly.

“Where’s the rest of her?” Leon asked.