Zoobreak

  “Ben — you’re okay!”

  “Cleo!” Savannah made a run for the door, but Ben held her back.

  “I’m not okay! None of us are! Klaus is on the loose!” Gulping air, Ben wheezed out the story of how he’d fallen from the ceiling onto the sleeping security guard.

  “Wait a minute!” Griffin interrupted. “Klaus followed you into the duct?” He put his finger to his lips and listened. The shouts and threats were much less frequent now, replaced by the reverberating sound of pounding against metal.

  “He’s … stuck?” Logan concluded in amazement.

  “I barely fit up there myself!” Ben put in breathlessly.

  “Let’s get Cleo!” exclaimed Savannah.

  The sudden presence of six intruders waving flashlights in the dark zoo boat put the animals’ agitation level over the top. Furry bodies bounced off the sides of their small enclosures. The hen flapped its wings; the beaver splashed what was left of its water. Feral noises filled the air.

  At the sight of Savannah, Cleopatra tried to blast clear through the bars of her cage.

  “I’m here, sweetie. Everything’s okay …” the girl soothed in a flowery tone that bore little resemblance to her urgency the moment before.

  While Savannah spoke, Griffin went to work on the cage with the wire cutters. He squeezed with all his might, but the metal resisted. An instant of panic — had they gone through all this only to fail at freeing the monkey?

  There was a snap as the bar gave way. Relieved, he cut through the others until Savannah could draw her beloved capuchin out of the enclosure into an ecstatic embrace.

  Yet even in this joyful reunion, Cleopatra did not calm down. The furry head jerked around relentlessly, scanning the exhibit for some unseen danger.

  Savannah was mystified. “I thought she’d be okay once we sprang her, but she’s even more rattled than before.”

  “Maybe she’s freaked out by all the yelling,” Pitch suggested.

  Savannah shook her head. “I think she’s trying to tell me something.”

  An otherworldly screech cut the air.

  16

  A murky shadow swooped down on Cleopatra. Terrified, the monkey buried her face in Savannah’s chest. In a flash of sharp claws, the attacker swiped at the capuchin’s back, not missing by much. The team felt rather than saw two powerful wing beats as the creature disappeared into the blackness.

  “What was that?” breathed Logan in awe.

  To Ben, the incident was all too familiar. “The monster that ate Melissa’s webcam!”

  Flashlight beams panned the compartment from top to bottom.

  “Where did it go?” squeaked Melissa.

  “Who cares?” Pitch was impatient. “We’ve got Cleo. Let’s blow this Popsicle stand!”

  “Not yet,” said Savannah in an angry tone. “I’ve got a feeling about this ‘monster.’ ”

  She marched into the exhibit’s main compartment and shone her torch on the owl cage. It was empty, the door wide.

  “That jerk, Mr. Nasty,” she seethed. “That low-down, animal-abusing criminal. As if it wasn’t bad enough that he runs his zoo like a prison — he turns the owl loose at night to terrorize the poor little creatures so they’ll be too scared to try to get out of their cages!” Her voice rose in volume until she was drowning out the cries of Klaus in the ductwork.

  “All the more proof that we’re doing the right thing,” Griffin decided. “Luckily, we had the perfect plan.”

  “Perfect?” Pitch exploded. “Darren never showed! Ben practically died tonight! There’s a guy trapped in the ceiling! And now we’ve got to row a million miles on the world’s slowest boat and pray we can find Cedarville again!”

  “There were a couple of hiccups,” Griffin admitted. “But now we’re in good shape. Keep hold of Cleo and let’s get out of here before Hoo over there comes back for another dive-bombing run.”

  “We can’t,” Savannah said.

  Griffin was taken aback. “What are you talking about? This whole operation is for you — to save your monkey!”

  “And I’m grateful,” she told him. “But if we take Cleo and go, we’ll be leaving all these other animals in the hands of a cruel man who mistreats them. We have to rescue everybody.”

  The protests bubbled up from all sides:

  “Are you nuts?”

  “There are too many of them!”

  “We need a bigger boat!”

  “Like Noah’s Ark!”

  “It’s not part of the plan,” Griffin concluded.

  Savannah was adamant. “I don’t care about the plan. If it’s right for Cleo, it’s right for the whole zoo.”

  “No, it isn’t,” Ben argued. “The monkey is yours. But you don’t own the chipmunks and the beaver and the ferret. And you definitely don’t own that bloodthirsty raptor!”

  “We’re all members of the animal kingdom. We have to stand up for our brothers and sisters.”

  Behind them, the piglet oinked in agreement.

  Griffin sighed. “Look, Savannah. I know this must be hard. But it won’t work.”

  Still hugging Cleopatra, Savannah sat down on a stool. “You guys go. Cleo and I are staying.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” Griffin snapped. “You’ll get caught.”

  “That’s what I want. If I can’t rescue everybody, the next best thing is to get arrested. Then there will be so much publicity that this so-called zoo will be exposed as the chamber of horrors that it is.”

  Pitch blew her stack. “You’re crazy! And the worst part is we’re going to have to do it just to keep you out of jail!”

  Melissa’s eyes emerged from her curtain of hair. “It’s possible, you know,” she said softly. “They’re just little animals. There aren’t any elephants.”

  “Even if we could get them all out of here, what would we do with them?” Griffin challenged Savannah. “Even you can’t have fifty pets.”

  “Maybe we should set them free,” Logan suggested. “Then we’d just have to cut them out of their cages and open the door.”

  Savannah was horrified. “Absolutely not! Mr. Nasty trained that owl to attack! Half of them won’t make it thirty feet from the boat.”

  “But isn’t that the whole nature thing?” Ben asked. “Survival of the fittest?”

  She shook her head. “Not for animals living in captivity. These poor little guys don’t have the tools to compete in the wild. We have to take them with us.”

  “And keep them where?” Griffin demanded.

  “In the shed in my backyard,” Savannah replied readily. “It’ll only be for one night. First thing tomorrow, I’ll call Dr. Alford. She finds places for animals all the time.”

  “That’ll be an interesting conversation,” Pitch predicted. “ ‘Oh, hi. I knocked off a zoo boat last night, so my shed’s full of critters. What’s new with you?’ ”

  “Dr. Alford doesn’t judge. She just wants what’s best for the animals. And she has contacts at every zoo and wildlife preserve in the country. I know she’ll help.”

  Griffin heaved a sigh of resignation. “Fine, we’ll take them all. But we’re going to have to get Hoo under control before we crack open these cages.”

  “Can I make a suggestion?” Pitch flicked the switch on the bulkhead, and the lights came on in the exhibit.

  Even Cleopatra shielded her eyes against the harsh fluorescent glare. A chorus of complaint rose from the animals. The owl’s cry was the most angry of all. Hoo flew in erratic circles above their heads, hooting anxiously.

  The disturbance even reached the ears of the paddleboat’s forgotten inhabitant. “Hey!” Klaus’s muffled voice rumbled through the ventilation system. “What’s going on down there?”

  The team exchanged uneasy glances. They had no great love for the security guard, but no one had anticipated leaving him in such a tight situation.

  Logan felt especially guilty. “Klaus?” he called into a grating. “We’re going to phone somebody to get you o
ut. Just as soon as we — uh — finish.”

  There was a long pause. Then: “Ferris? Is that you?”

  “Just relax,” Logan soothed. “The sooner we load up these animals, the sooner we can send help.”

  A cry of outrage erupted from the vent, followed by more struggling and banging.

  The roundup began. They chased Hoo all through the boat in a series of collisions and near misses until Savannah tossed a tarpaulin over the swooping owl. Grateful for the return of darkness, Hoo allowed himself to be captured. Griffin got busy with the wire cutters, snipping through bars and opening cages. A large cardboard carton became home to the meerkat, prairie dog, chipmunks, squirrels, and beaver. The chicken and piglet were swaddled in Melissa’s hoodie. A battered suitcase with a broken fastener became the reptile room, housing the frogs, turtles, salamanders, garter snakes, and chuckwalla. The rabbits fit in an old shopping bag, but the ferret could not be trusted with them, so Ben had to stick it inside his sweater. The duck and the loon fought and had to be stashed in separate boxes. And the hamsters, gerbils, and mice were spread out among everybody’s pockets.

  “When we get to the boat, we can wrap them in the fishing nets,” Savannah told the others. “That’ll be more secure.”

  They carried the whole menagerie outside and moved around the outer deck to starboard, where they had moored the rowboat.

  Pitch drew in a deep breath. “Fresh air! I’ve got to admit — I never thought we’d make it this far!”

  They reached the starboard gunwale and peered over the rail. The ratline of fishing nets hung loosely down, stirring with the movement of the waves.

  The dory was gone.

  17

  “Where’s the boat?” Logan wailed.

  Savannah was mystified. “Did it sink?”

  Pitch shook her head. “Then it would still be bobbing at the end of the net.” She wheeled on Griffin, furious. “Some idiot tied up the boat with a knot he learned in Balloon Animals 101!”

  In a frenzy, Griffin panned his flashlight over the surrounding waters.

  “What’s the point?” groaned Ben. “Even if you spot it, we can’t swim for it. Face it, Griffin, we’re so dead that even dead people would be amazed how dead we are.”

  “Not yet!” Griffin exclaimed, stuffing an errant gerbil back in his pocket.

  “Give it up!” Pitch snapped. “Even The Man With The Plan can’t make a boat out of no boat!”

  Griffin ran to the stern and returned dragging the bright yellow suitcase he’d used as a stepstool while boosting Ben up to the vent. “Stand back, everybody!” he cried, pulling the cord.

  There was an explosion of compressed gas, and the suitcase began to grow and unfold, morphing into a giant life raft, complete with outboard motor and sun canopy.

  Pitch goggled. “I take it all back. You can make a boat out of no boat!”

  The cruise back to Cedarville was a lot faster than the first trip, mostly because of the life raft’s outboard. In fact, in many ways the craft was ideal for a zoobreak. It was meant for a shipwreck and was stocked with food, water, a compass, rain gear, and medical supplies. None of this was of great importance to the team, except that all the gear came in dozens of pouches, packets, and containers. These turned out to be just the right size for stashing small furry animals, some of whom seemed determined to wriggle overboard and/or eat their fellow travelers.

  Griffin manned the rudder, his eyes darting from the map to the compass to the approaching coastline. All things considered, he was pretty pleased with the way the operation had worked out. True, there had been a few unexpected twists. But a truly great plan was always able to adapt. And the end result — the rescue of Cleopatra — was a total success. The forty hitchhikers were Savannah’s problem — and her friend Dr. Alford’s.

  Beside him, Melissa worked at her BlackBerry, e-mailing the police department of Rutherford Point to rescue Klaus from the zoo boat ceiling. She knew a way to send the message via a dummy server in Hong Kong. That way, it could never be traced to her.

  Pitch was the first to spot the lights of the Cedarville Marina. “When we get off this raft,” she vowed, “I’m going to drop to my knees and kiss the ground.”

  “You guys were fantastic tonight,” said Savannah, her voice quavering with emotion. “I’ll never forget this.”

  “Me, neither,” Ben assured her. “If I ever get on TV and they ask, ‘What’s the worst thing that ever happened to you?’ this is going to be it.”

  The shore gradually grew more distinct, and the moored boats loomed out of the darkness. At last, Griffin cut the engine, and the raft ran aground on the beach. The time was 3:35 a.m.

  “I see Darren isn’t here yet,” said Pitch sarcastically, stepping out onto the sand.

  Now all that remained was to unload the animals in their pouches and boxes and bike them over to Savannah’s shed.

  “What about the boat?” Melissa asked, frowning. “If it’s found in Cedarville, Mr. Nasty might be able to connect it to us.”

  Once again, The Man With The Plan had an answer. Together, the team engaged the engine, turned the raft around, and sent it putt-putting toward distant Connecticut.

  The bicycle parade started slowly, its riders overburdened by the former inhabitants of the floating zoo. Savannah was in the lead, with Cleopatra sitting piggyback and the tarpaulin containing Hoo in the front basket.

  It seemed grossly unfair that this final effort was required of them after all they’d endured tonight. Perhaps a team pushing to the summit of Mount Everest would be more exhausted, but it seemed unlikely.

  They rode in silence to avoid waking anyone in the sleeping town. Discovery was unthinkable. Not so close to the finish line.

  When they turned the corner and the Drysdale house came into view, a cry of recognition escaped Cleopatra.

  “Sweetie — shhh,” Savannah said, hushing her.

  The sound reached no human ears, but that didn’t mean it reached no ears at all. A large, dark shape sailed through an open first-floor window and hit the ground at a full gallop. Luthor closed the gap in seconds, his meaty paws barely touching the pavement. The leap began ten feet away.

  Ecstatic, Cleopatra vaulted over Savannah’s shoulder and met her best friend in midair.

  Savannah dived off her bike just in time. The wipeout was spectacular. She hit the grass and rolled as the bike careened wildly, steering itself into a telephone pole. The collision bounced the tarp out of the basket and sent it spinning and unwrapping along the road.

  With a hoot that shattered the quiet of the wee hours, a bundle of brown feathers shot out of the basket like a Tomahawk missile. Hoo circled once and then soared off, vanishing into the night.

  Five pairs of eyes stared at Savannah, waiting for her reaction.

  She waved, a blissful expression on her face. “He’s free,” she announced happily.

  “I thought animals from captivity can’t compete in the wild,” Ben reminded her.

  “He’s the only one who can,” she said serenely. “He’ll be fine. And all the others will be, too — starting tomorrow.”

  A contented Cleopatra climbed aboard Luthor for the short trot home.

  Hoo circled high above them, exploring this strange new world.

  18

  The music room faded around Griffin, and the trombone slipped from his nerveless fingers. His head slid backward into the bell of the tuba behind him. The tuba player, Darren Vader, delivered a blast that knocked Griffin out of his chair and into the clarinet section on the riser below.

  It didn’t sound much like the theme from Rocky, but at least it woke him up.

  “Griffin Bing!” Mr. Hoberman, the bandleader, exclaimed in exasperation. “Could I trouble you to stay awake?”

  It was morning, a few hours after they’d returned, and Operation Zoobreak was taking its toll on Griffin. He believed in planning 100 percent. But no plan could ever account for going to school on eighty-three minutes of sleep.
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  “Sorry,” he mumbled, retrieving his instrument. “It won’t happen again.” Now he knew how Ben felt when the irresistible sleepiness stole over him — stunned and helpless.

  The bandleader sighed. “Go to the boys’ room and splash some water on your face. And don’t come back until you’re ready to be a part of this orchestra.”

  “Late night, Bing?” Darren snickered behind him.

  “No,” Griffin hissed. “We had to call it off because some traitor didn’t show!”

  Darren reddened. “I told you — my uncle came over, and the guy wouldn’t leave! I couldn’t get out of the house.”

  “Sure, sure,” Griffin muttered, setting the trombone on its stand and staggering toward the door. He’d already warned the zoobreak team not to tell Darren anything. He couldn’t be trusted to keep his big mouth shut any more than he could be trusted to follow through on a promise.

  The blast of Darren’s tuba still ringing in his ears, Griffin headed for the boys’ room. He never got there. The door to the girls’ room was flung open, and a small arm reached out and pulled him inside. There stood Savannah, her face white, her eyes wild.

  “What’s the big idea?” Griffin complained. “If I get caught in here —”

  “That’s the least of our problems!” Savannah shrilled. She punched a number into a small cell phone and held it to his ear. It rang once before going straight to voicemail:

  “You’ve reached Dr. Kathleen Alford, Curator for the Long Island Zoo. I’m presently in equatorial Africa, supervising the transport of three rain-forest baboons to the United States. I’ll be back in the office on Wednesday, April twenty-second. Please leave a message at the tone.”

  There was a beep, followed by a different voice: “Mailbox full.”

  In an instant, Griffin’s complexion matched Savannah’s. “April twenty-second — that’s two weeks away! You’re going to have to find another zoo!”

  “I don’t know anybody else who works in a zoo!” Savannah wailed. “Dr. Alford’s the only person who could find homes for all those animals!”