“Not really,” I admitted. “Collars itch.”
“You have to get the ones with the velvet on the inside,” said Coco, who proved herself something of a collar aficionado. “Those are very pleasant to wear. In fact I love wearing my collars so much I feel completely naked without them, to be honest.”
“Don’t worry, Coco,” I said. “Uncle Alec is very good at what he does, and so are Chase and Odelia. They’ll catch these people, and then you’ll get your collars back.”
“Is it possible I’ve seen you onGeneral Hospital?” asked Dooley now.
“Yes, you might have,” said Coco diffidently.
“I thought I had! Gran and I are big, big fans. We watch every episode, and Mrs. Emerald Brown is our favorite character on the show.”
“She’s my favorite character, too,” said Coco, not surprisingly. “And she managed to get me included in some of the episodes. At first the screenwriter turned me into a vicious attack dog who goes nuts and attacks her human, but Katrina put her foot down and said over my dead body. And so they turned me into this really sweet and lovely dog who follows her human around everywhere she goes. I’m going to have a very important part in one of the future episodes. I actually save my human’s life, when her office is set on fire by her daughter’s mentally deranged husband who goes on a killing spree, but fortunately for her I smell the smoke and I wake her up and save her life that way.” She smiled. “That was a lot of fun to film, though I was really scared for a moment. They use actual fire, you know, though we were never in any real danger, thank God.”
“Thank God,” I echoed, wondering what life would be like for a famous dog like Coco, being on television and getting to save her human’s life. Plenty of fun, I imagined.
But just then, Uncle Alec’s phone chimed and when he picked it up and his face suddenly clouded, I knew our interview with Coco was at an end. And true enough, the moment he disconnected and said, “There’s been a fire at Franklin High School,” and both Odelia and Chase snapped to attention, I turned to Coco and said, “That’s our cue.”
Coco chuckled lightly, and said,“That’s what my director says every time I have to do a scene. ‘This is your cue, Coco. And… action!’ So funny.”
Dooley, hanging on Coco’s every word, looked a little sad to be leaving so soon.
“Would you like to have my autograph?” asked Coco.
Dooley nodded six times in quick succession, and Coco tripped off in the direction of the next room, and when she returned was carrying a piece of paper between her teeth. She then dropped it on the floor in front of us and true enough, it was a paw print.
“Oh, thank you so much!” said Dooley. “I’ll ask my human to frame it for me!”
“Well, Dooley and Max,” said Coco, already looking a lot less diffident, “I guess I’ll see you around. And if you want an invitation to visit me on set, just say the word and I’ll try to arrange it with Katrina. Maybe you can even play a small part in a future episode.”
And as we left the house, in Odelia’s wake, I’d never seen Dooley looking quite so enamored… and with a dog, to boot!
10
When Odelia arrived at the school, the fire had already been extinguished by the competent men and women of the fire department. As she rolled to a stop they were rolling up their hoses and being profusely thanked by the school principal for a job well done. Uncle Alec and Chase, driving up in their squad car, parked next to Odelia in the school parking lot and the small company headed over to talk to the principal.
“Oh, Chief Lip!” said the principal, who was a woman with a kindly demeanor. Her red hair was aflame as it caught some stray rays of sunlight, and it surprised Odelia that the fire department wasn’t aiming its hoses on her instead of the fire they’d just put out. “Odelia Poole!” said the woman when she recognized her former pupil. “Now isn’t this a nice surprise!” She cut a quick glance at Chase, then said warmly, “I never did congratulate you on your wedding, Odelia.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Doubtfire,” said Odelia, well pleased. Mrs. Doubtfire had been her English teacher back in the day she’d gone to this school herself in a not so distant past, and she had always had a great fondness for the woman. “So what happened here?”
Mrs. Doubtfire’s face clouded. “One of our more troubled girls set fire to a classroom. Luckily the janitor discovered it in time, or a lot more damage could have been done.”
“Where is the girl?” asked Uncle Alec, adopting the more formal tone of a police chief.
“In my office with her mother. And I do hope you talk her out of causing more trouble.”
“Has she done this kind of thing before?” asked Chase.
“Not set fire to the school thank God, but she did throw a water balloon at Mrs. Richards last month. The girl is a real handful and frankly I’m at my wits’ end.”
“We’ll have a chat with her,” Chase promised.
They arrived at the principal’s office, led by Odelia, and entered, finding a teenager of around seventeen or eighteen, sitting with her mother, who’d clearly been crying.
“Mrs. Pack?” asked Chase.
Mrs. Pack looked up in alarm, and when she saw the Chief, in his police uniform, and Odelia and Chase, her eyes widened.“You’re not going to arrest my daughter, are you?”
“That depends,” said the Chief curtly as he walked behind the principal’s desk and lowered his sizable bulk into Mrs. Doubtfire’s chair, which complained under the sudden onslaught. “Now tell me, young lady—why would you start a fire in a classroom?”
Ellie Pack didn’t look like your typical troubled youth, Odelia thought. In fact she looked like any girl her age: ragged jeans, designer T-shirt, Converse sneakers. Her blond curly hair was carefully swept to one side with an abundant application of hairspray, though she’d overdone it a little on the black eyeliner. She shrugged. “I just thought it was a good idea,” she said a little sullenly.
“You thought it was a good idea,” Uncle Alec echoed. “And why is that?”
The girl looked off into space and frowned.“Mrs. Doubtfire threatened to hold me back. She wants me to redo my senior year. Just because she hates me.”
“And why do you think Mrs. Doubtfire hates you?” asked Chase.
“Why don’t you ask her? I just know she does.”
“She told us that you threw a water balloon at one of your teachers?”
“That was just a joke. A girl bet I couldn’t hit Mrs. Richards from thirty feet.”
“A bet?” asked Uncle Alec. “Who did you bet with?”
The girl shrugged.“I’m not a snitch.”
“Admirable,” the Chief grumbled, “but misguided.”
“Please don’t arrest my daughter,” said Mrs. Pack. “She’s a little rambunctious from time to time, but she means well.”
“She set fire to a classroom, Mrs. Pack,” Chase pointed out. “That’s more than being a little rambunctious, wouldn’t you agree?”
“It was just a small fire,” Ellie muttered. “I had it under control. If that stupid janitor hadn’t shown up I would have put it out and nobody would have been any the wiser.”
“You didn’t want to burn down the school?” asked Odelia.
“Of course not! Why would I want to burn down the school? I was just showing off—goofing around.” She shrugged. “I guess things got out of hand.”
“Oh, Ellie,” her mother said, and broke into tears.
The girl seemed unimpressed by her mother’s tears. Instead she was looking at Odelia with interest. “You’re Odelia Poole, aren’t you? The reporter?”
“Yep, that’s me,” Odelia confirmed.
The girl smiled for the first time since they’d arrived. It was a smile that lit up her face, and suddenly made her look a lot younger—and less hostile. “I’m a big fan of yours, Miss Poole. I read all your articles, you know. I want to be a reporter like you one day.”