a coupon for a free movie at the Buttonville Cinema
a bag of nails from the Buttonville Hardware Store
a refrigerator magnet that read YOU GET MORE AT THE DOLLAR STORE
a red baseball cap with the words WELCOME WAGON
twelve ketchup packets from the Buttonville Diner
a big chocolate button from the Buttonville Candy Store
“Thanks,” Ben said again.
Mrs. Mulberry stepped close to Ben. “It’s my job as president of the Welcome Wagon to know everything about everybody. I understand that your parents sent you here for the summer. Why did they do that?”
Mrs. Mulberry was a busybody, just like Grandpa Abe had said. Ben hoped she didn’t have too many questions. He turned away and looked out the window. Pearl was pacing along the sidewalk, her blond hair swishing with each step. She must have finished her chores.
“Grandpa? Can I—”
“I see Pearl Petal is waiting for you,” Mrs. Mulberry said. “I noticed the two of you walking together yesterday. Are you friends?”
“I guess so,” Ben said. Seeing as he and Pearl shared some pretty big secrets, it looked like they’d become friends.
“I don’t like Pearl Petal,” Victoria said. Her blue braces sparkled. “I never play with her.”
“A wise choice.” Mrs. Mulberry patted the top of her daughter’s baseball cap. “That Pearl Petal is a troublemaker. You would be wise, Abe, to keep your grandson from playing with her.”
“Ben’s no dummy. He can choose his friends.” Grandpa Abe winked encouragingly at Ben. Then he opened the front door. “So nice of you to stop by, Martha,” he said with a forced smile. “I’m sure you have other things to do today.”
“Yes, indeed I do.” Mrs. Mulberry adjusted her baseball cap. “Someone has moved into the old button factory, and it’s my job to find out who that someone is. Even if I have to wait outside the gate all day, I must know what’s going on over there.”
“I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” Grandpa Abe said. “After all, it’s your job to know everything about everybody.”
Victoria grabbed the wagon’s handle and followed her mother out the door. The wagon thumped down the porch steps. Victoria glared at Pearl as she passed by. Pearl glared back. Then Victoria and Mrs. Mulberry made their way along Pine Street, the wagon wheels squeaking.
“I thought they’d never leave,” Grandpa Abe said. He grabbed his cane and plopped a canvas hat onto his head. “Well, you and Pearl have fun. I’m off to the senior center to help set up the tables. Pudding day is our busiest day.” And off he went, tipping his hat at Pearl as he drove away.
After tucking the kit under his arm and closing the bedroom door, Ben joined Pearl outside. The cloudless sky glowed with summer sunshine. Barnaby sat on the sidewalk, pawing at a trail of ants. He’d squashed a bunch of them, and they lay as lifeless as beads. Ben hissed a warning. “Stay away from my hamster or…” He leaned close. “Or I’ll feed you to the sasquatch.”
Barnaby ignored Ben. He flicked his black tail, then pounced on another ant.
“I don’t think sasquatches eat cats,” Pearl said. She glanced up and down the sidewalk. “I did my chores as fast as I could so I could get over here. Guess what I found out.” She looked around again. “I found out that the sasquatch broke into the diner last night and ate all the ketchup packets and chocolate syrup. It left a big footprint near the door.”
“And it got into a bunch of garbage cans and sorted the garbage by color,” Ben told her.
Pearl took a rubber band off her wrist and pulled her hair into a ponytail. “This is serious stuff. We need to catch it before anyone sees it. Where do you think we should start looking?”
“I’m not sure.” Ben shrugged. And that’s when a scream filled the air. “But that sounds like a good place to start.”
15
A short way down the block they found the source of the scream—an elderly lady who was leaning on the handles of her walker, her eyes staring into space as if they were made of glass.
“That’s Mrs. Froot,” Pearl told Ben as they ran toward her. “She’s the oldest person in Buttonville. She doesn’t like me because I broke her garden gnome.”
“How’d you do that?” Ben asked. The contents of the Sasquatch Catching Kit jiggled with his frantic steps. He was a bit worried the motion might activate the fog bomb.
“It was an accident,” Pearl explained. “I wanted to get a nest that was in Mrs. Froot’s tree to add to my nest collection, but it was way up in the top branch. So I climbed the tree, but then the branch broke and I fell right on top of the gnome. Its head came off.”
Mrs. Froot stood in her front yard next to her white picket fence. Dozens of colorfully painted gnomes dotted her yard as if they’d sprouted like weeds. The headless one still sat beneath the tree. Mrs. Froot’s bony fingers gripped the handles of her walker as she stared down the sidewalk.
“Hello, Mrs. Froot,” Pearl said. “We heard a scream.”
A strangled sound emerged from Mrs. Froot’s mouth, as if a word was trying to form deep down inside her. “Ssssss.”
Pearl poked the lady’s arm. “Are you okay?”
The sound got louder. “SSSSSS.”
“I bet she’s trying to say ‘sasquatch,’ ” Ben whispered to Pearl. “She must know where it is.”
“Mrs. Froot? What did you see?” Pearl poked her again.
“Did you see something big and hairy?” Ben asked.
“Yes. Yes,” Mrs. Froot said with trembling lips. “I saw a ssssss…a ssssss…a sloth.”
“A sloth?” Pearl and Ben said at the same time.
Mrs. Froot finally blinked. Then she took a long, wheezy breath, and her eyes went wild, spinning around like they might fly right out of her head. “A terrible, enormous, hairy sloth right here in Buttonville. It tried to eat me.”
“Are you sure it was a sloth?” Ben asked. He was pretty sure that sloths didn’t live in North America, and he was doubly sure that if Mrs. Froot had seen something terrible, enormous, and hairy, it was most likely the escaped sasquatch. But events had been so strange lately, he couldn’t be one hundred percent certain of anything.
“Tell us what happened,” Pearl said.
Mrs. Froot looked up at a tree branch that loomed overhead. “I was on my way to the senior center. It’s pudding day, and I wanted to get some butterscotch before Maybell ate it all. She’s always hogging the butterscotch. But I heard a strange sound, and there it was, sitting in that tree.”
Ben walked around the tree, where he found a big footprint pressed into the matted grass. And there, dangling from a low branch, a tuft of brown fur. He fluffed up the grass, then grabbed the fur to hide the evidence.
“The sloth jumped out of the tree and snatched my sunbonnet right off my head. Then it ran toward Fir Street.” Mrs. Froot patted her white hair. “That was my favorite sunbonnet.”
Ben didn’t point out to Mrs. Froot that sloths are famous for moving very slowly, not for jumping or running. If she wanted to believe that a sloth had taken her sunbonnet, then so be it. At least she didn’t think it was a sasquatch.
Mrs. Froot squinted at Pearl. “Pearl Petal? Is that you? Did you do this?”
“Do what?” Pearl asked.
“Did you put a sloth in my tree?” Mrs. Froot wagged a finger at Pearl. “You have a reputation for trouble, young lady. You should stop messing around in people’s trees.”
“I didn’t,” Pearl insisted. “Really, I didn’t.”
“I’d better call the police,” Mrs. Froot said. “They should know that there’s a sloth on the loose in Buttonville!” She turned her walker and began shuffling toward her house.
“Shouldn’t we stop her?” Ben asked.
“Don’t worry about it,” Pearl said as she started down the sidewalk. “The police will never believe her. Would you believe it if the oldest person in Buttonville told you that a sloth had jumped out of a tree and stolen her
sunbonnet?”
“No,” Ben said as he followed. “It kinda sounds like one of my stories.”
“You write stories?” Pearl asked.
“I tell stories. I don’t write them.”
“Oh. You mean you lie?”
“I don’t lie,” Ben insisted. “I tell stories. There’s a difference.” But his mother and father had both warned him that if he kept telling his “stories” instead of telling the truth, people would stop believing anything he said.
“Look,” Pearl said. She collected a tuft of brown fur that clung to a fire hydrant. They found another stuck on a rosebush. “We’re on the right track.”
A horn sounded, and a blue-and-white police car pulled up to the curb. The words BUTTONVILLE POLICE FORCE were painted on the side. “Crud. It’s Aunt Milly. Act natural,” Pearl told Ben.
How do you act natural when you’re looking for a sasquatch? Ben wondered.
The window rolled down, and the police officer stuck out her head. “Hiya, Pearl. Who’s your friend?”
“Hi, Aunt Milly.” Pearl shuffled in place. “This is Ben Silverstein. He’s visiting his grandpa for the summer.”
“Hi,” Ben said.
Officer Milly removed her dark glasses and smiled at Ben. She had the kind of smile that showed all her teeth, even the bottom ones. “Nice to meet you, Ben. Your grandpa’s a swell guy. He made matzo ball soup for me when I had the flu. So, what are you two doing? You’re not getting into trouble, are you?”
“No,” Pearl said, hiding the sasquatch fur behind her back. “We’re just…walking around.”
Officer Milly eyed the metal box in Ben’s hands. “You sure you’re not getting into trouble?”
“I’m sure,” Pearl said.
“No trouble,” Ben confirmed.
“Well, okay.” Officer Milly slid her glasses back on. “Hey, I got a call a few minutes ago that there’s an enormous dog running around without a leash. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you, Pearl?”
“Why would I know anything about an enormous dog running around without a leash?” Pearl asked innocently. “I didn’t do anything.”
“Well, maybe you didn’t do anything this time.” Then Officer Milly shook her head and mumbled, “My niece, the troublemaker.” And off she drove.
“How come everyone calls you a troublemaker?” Ben asked.
Pearl kicked a rock, then tucked her T-shirt into her shiny blue basketball shorts. “I don’t get in trouble on purpose. I put food coloring in Mr. Mutt’s koi pond because I thought it would look pretty. How was I supposed to know that it would dye the fish, too? And I set that windup rat loose during the parade because I was bored. No one ever told me that ponies are afraid of rats.”
Pearl and Ben stopped at an empty intersection. Ben looked around for footprints and tufts of fur but found none. His gaze traveled up and down the street. Buttonville had to be the quietest place on Earth. No honking cars, no blaring music, no air traffic. The only sign of life was a man sweeping the sidewalk in front of the Buttonville Clothing Barn. “Hey, watch it!” the man yelled as a grocery cart rumbled past, nearly knocking him over. The rumbling grew louder as the cart rolled toward Pearl and Ben.
“That’s one of our Dollar Store carts,” Pearl said. “Someone’s taking a ride.”
“Ugh, what’s that smell?” Ben asked.
The kids jumped out of the way as the cart whizzed past. A pair of hairy arms hung over the edge. A pair of hairy kneecaps and a sunbonnet peeked out the top. Thanks to the slight incline of the sidewalk, the cart picked up speed.
“The sasquatch,” Ben said.
But Pearl wasn’t there to hear him. She was already in pursuit.
16
The Dollar Store cart lay overturned on the steps of the Buttonville Senior Center, the sunbonnet at its side. The center’s front door stood wide open. A tuft of brown fur hung from the doorknob. “Do you have the chocolate bar?” Pearl asked.
Ben, who’d been holding the Sasquatch Catching Kit the entire time, nodded. “Should we open it now?”
“Yeah. If we open it, maybe the sasquatch will smell it.” Pearl unlocked the kit. Then she grabbed the chocolate bar. After tearing off the top wrapper, she folded back the foil inner wrapper. A dark, shiny rectangle peeked out. Ben wanted to take a bite.
Pearl held out the bar and quietly called, “Here, sasquatchy. Here, sasquatchy.” But nothing big and hairy appeared. Only Ben’s grandfather stepped out of the senior center, and he had almost no hair at all.
“Ben!” he called with a wave. “Why are you standing out there? Come in and eat some pudding.”
Even though it was a nice summer morning, the senior center heat was turned on full blast. The warmth made Ben want to curl up and take a nap. He fought a yawn. This was no time to get sleepy. He and Pearl were on an important sasquatch-finding mission.
Three tables had been placed end to end, each covered with pudding cups. Some of the cups were stacked almost to the ceiling; others were displayed on cake stands. Vanilla, banana, chocolate, butterscotch, and swirl were squeezed onto every square inch of the tables. Between the cups stood cans of whipped cream and tubs of sprinkles.
“Wow,” Ben said to his grandfather. “That’s a lot of pudding.”
“That’s a lot of pudding?” Grandpa Abe chuckled. “You should see how much pudding we had before Maybell got here.” He nodded toward a rather beefy woman who was seated at the back of the room. She peeled the top off her butterscotch pudding. Dozens of empty cups littered the floor around her.
Tables and chairs crowded the rest of the room. In each chair sat a very old person. Many had hearing aids in their ears; most wore thick eyeglasses. Each had a pudding cup or two. Some of the seniors looked older than Ben’s grandfather by dozens of years, their faces wrinkled like pieces of fabric.
“Do you see it?” Pearl whispered in Ben’s ear.
“No,” Ben whispered back. “But I can smell it.” The sour odor of wet dog hung in the air, mixed with the sweet scents of banana and vanilla. Where was the hairy beast?
Because the room was buzzing with conversation, Grandpa Abe had to clap his hands to get attention. “Look, everyone!” he called. “It’s my grandson, Ben.”
Plastic spoons were lowered and heads turned, causing a ripple in the sea of white and silver hair. A chorus of “Hello, Ben” filled the room, along with a chorus of “What did he say?”
“And you all know Pearl,” Grandpa Abe said.
A chorus of “Hello, Pearl” filled the room, along with a chorus of “What did he say?”
“Most everyone here used to work at the old button factory,” Grandpa Abe told Ben. Then he pointed to the metal box in Ben’s arms. “Whatcha got there?” He read the label. “Sasquatch Catching Kit. What are you two up to?”
“Uh…” Ben thought about making up a story, but even if he’d had an hour or two to come up with something fantastic, it wouldn’t have been better than the truth. “We’re hunting sasquatch,” he said.
“And why is Pearl holding that chocolate bar in the air?”
“Because sasquatches like chocolate,” Ben said.
“We’re supposed to keep it a secret,” Pearl hissed in Ben’s ear. “Why did you tell him?”
“Don’t worry. He’ll think it’s just one of my stories,” Ben whispered.
And sure enough, Grandpa Abe rubbed his shiny head and chuckled. “I should live so long to see a sasquatch. My grandson, the storyteller.” Then he gave Ben a gentle shove toward the pudding tables. “Go on. Eat.”
Once again, the room filled with conversation as the seniors began to discuss matters of importance, such as hip surgery, pigeon-feeding, and napping. Pearl grabbed a banana pudding cup, ripped off the top, and started eating. “I love these things,” she said as she looked around. Then she nudged Ben. “You look on that side of the room, and I’ll look on this side of the room.”
Ben took a cup of vanilla pudding, but he didn’t
eat it. Instead, he sniffed the air. The wet dog scent grew stronger as he walked to the back of the room.
“Hey,” an old man said. “There’s a clump of hair in my pudding.” Ben hurried to the man’s side. Sure enough, it was a big brown clump.
Another old man, who was seated next to Maybell, opened a cup of chocolate pudding and held it under the table. “This doggy sure likes pudding,” the man said.
“I don’t know why you’re wasting perfectly good pudding on a dog,” Maybell said as she opened a new cup. “Dogs should eat dog food, not people food. And pudding is people food.”
“But it’s a nice doggy,” the man said.
Doggy?
Squatting, Ben lifted the hem of the tablecloth and peered under the table. The stench nearly knocked him over, as if he’d been smacked by a sweat-drenched sock. There, right next to a pile of empty pudding cups, was a pair of enormous, hairy feet.
17
Ben’s gaze traveled up a pair of hairy legs and up a hairy torso, and came to a rest on a pair of brown eyes. The eyes themselves were not hairy, but they were surrounded by hair. The sasquatch was wedged tight beneath the table. It looked at Ben. It blinked. Ben’s heart nearly stopped beating. He was face-to-face with a living, breathing bigfoot—a creature that was supposed to exist only in stories!
It looked half ape, half caveman. Its brown fur was thick and matted with sticks and leaves. Its feet were so big they could easily fit into clown shoes. Looking at its low, sloping forehead and unibrow, Ben could see why others might think it wasn’t very smart. He stiffened, expecting it to growl or show its teeth, but instead it held out a smooth brown palm and grunted. It wanted something.
“What do…?” Then Ben remembered the warning from Dr. Woo’s guidebook about not asking a sasquatch questions. His heart pounding like a kettledrum, he cautiously reached out and handed the sasquatch his vanilla pudding cup.
It snatched the cup and, with two quick sweeps of its tongue, licked it clean. Just like Dr. Woo had written in her guidebook, the creature seemed to love sweet things.