“Anything?” Walt said finally. She had spent her time pacing back and forth across the living room, hoping inspiration would strike. But it hadn’t given her a single idea.
“Nothing,” Oscar said, his feathers drooping. “What are we going to do?”
“Maybe it’s not that big a deal,” Butterbean said, spitting out a piece of cotton fluff. (Her mission was turning out to be a complete success.) “You told those rats to stay in the vents, right? I’m sure they’ll listen to you.”
“Maybe you’re right,” Oscar sighed. “They did seem to respect my natural leadership qualities.”
“I hope so, because HOOOBOY is Biscuit mad,” Marco said, crawling out from behind the sofa and brushing himself off. “We succeeded in our mission. We told him all about the raccoon situation.”
“And we explained that you had a plan and it would be fixed in no time,” Polo added, climbing out after Marco.
“But he’s having a hard time keeping it together. He really wants to bark,” Marco finished. “I mean, a LOT. He’s just barely holding it in.”
“He looked like he was going to explode,” Polo said, making big explosion motions.
“I think his exact words were ‘I can take them, let me at them, I’ll rip them all to shreds,’ ” Marco said. “Then he shrieked into a couch pillow for five minutes straight.”
“We had to help him take some deep cleansing breaths,” Polo said. “He couldn’t find a paper bag, though.”
“I give him maybe a day before he snaps and starts barking again,” Marco said.
“Totally.” Polo nodded in agreement.
“Maybe I could talk to him again,” Butterbean said, blowing a piece of fluff off her nose. “It helped last time.”
“Maybe,” Walt said, watching. She hated the idea of going back down to that apartment, but they might not have a choice. Butterbean may have totally misunderstood what therapy dogs did, but Walt had to admit she did have a calming effect on Second Floor Biscuit.
“Thanks for the report,” Oscar said, watching Butterbean spit out another mouthful of fluff. (Butterbean’s mission was maybe a little too successful. Someone was going to have a lot of cleaning up to do.)
“Did you happen to see Wallace while you were in the vents?” Walt asked.
“Yeah, he was right behind us.” Marco leaned back toward the couch. “HEY WALLACE, TIME TO REPORT!” he yelled. “I think he had a rough time. He looked kind of messed up.”
Wallace staggered out from behind the couch. Marco hadn’t been kidding. Wallace’s hair was sticking up in weird places, and he had a dazed expression on his face. He also had something orange and powdery on his hands and cheek that Butterbean was itching to sniff. She restrained herself.
“What happened to you?” Butterbean’s nose quivered.
“That rat. Ken. That’s what happened,” Wallace said.
“You couldn’t get the sailor shirt back?” Polo said sympathetically.
“No, I got it.” Wallace grimaced. “He wasn’t happy about it, but I got it.”
“Did you have to go for the eyes?” Walt asked. (It was her number one recommended move.)
“No, nothing like that,” Wallace said. “He’d just gotten some kind of powdery cheese dust all over the sleeve. I had to lick it off. It took a while.”
“Erm. Good work,” Oscar said, trying to ignore the way his stomach turned over. He was not a fan of cheese dust. “Did you put the shirt back in Mrs. Power Walker’s apartment?” He wasn’t sure how clean it would look after having cheese dust licked off, but he wasn’t going to be critical. It wasn’t like Wallace had access to laundry facilities.
Wallace nodded.“I put it on the floor behind one of the chairs. It’ll look like it fell off.”
“Wow, that must’ve been a lot of licking,” Marco said, eyeing the orange patch on Wallace’s cheek. He loved powdery cheese dust. “Is that what you’ve been doing this whole time?”
“Not exactly.” Wallace stared at the floor. “I, um. Well, I also moved out.”
“Moved out?” Marco gasped. “From Mrs. Power Walker’s apartment? But you just moved in!”
“You love Mrs. Power Walker’s place!” Polo said.
“Think of the brownies!” Butterbean yelped.
Wallace shrugged.“I know, you’re right. But I don’t trust those rats not to come back. So I screwed the vent cover back on so they can’t get in.” Wallace looked pained. “It’s just temporary. But I don’t want to risk them sneaking in and messing things up for me.”
“That’s probably smart,” Walt said, patting Wallace awkwardly on the head with one paw. She wasn’t sure she trusted those loading dock rats either.
“You can stay with us, if you need to,” Polo offered.
“Thanks. I checked all the vent openings to the other apartments,” Wallace said. “Just to be sure. That’s why I took so long. The basement vent’s still open, but as far as I know, there’s only one other apartment that’s accessible by vent besides this one. And I don’t think any rat would be stupid enough to sneak into that one.”
“Oh really?” the white cat emerged from behind the sofa with a scrawny wriggling rat in her mouth. “Ptttppheewww!” She spit the rat out onto the floor. It looked around wildly for a minute before spotting Walt and bolting back behind the sofa without a word. They could hear its footsteps echoing as it made its escape down the vent.
“I found that guy peeking into my living room while I was doing my warm-up dance routine,” the white cat grumbled. “Groupies. My concentration was ruined.”
“Who was THAT?” Butterbean gasped. “Did we know that one?”
Wallace shook his head.“I think that was Pocky? She’s always been a snoop.”
“Well, that’s not good,” Oscar said.
“No, it’s not,” the white cat said. “But trust me, we’ve got bigger problems now. Or rather, I have bigger problems right now.” She sat down and took a deep breath. “Look, I hate to do this. But I need your help. I’m desperate.”
Oscar blinked. He’d never seen the white cat look that way. “Of course. What’s happened?” It had to be something bad if the white cat was asking for help. He braced himself. He didn’t think he could take more terrible news right now. He was feeling a little overwhelmed, to be honest.
“Okay, thank you.” The white cat looked relieved. “Wait here.” She ducked behind the sofa and came out again carrying the bag of caviar treats she’d tried to give to Chad earlier.
“Now watch carefully,” the white cat said.
Walt shot a skeptical look at Oscar, who shrugged.
“This is so exciting!” Butterbean whispered, watching the white cat intently. She had no idea what was going to happen.
The white cat slowly pawed a treat out of the bag, bent down, and popped it in her mouth. Then she started to chew.
Slowly her face contorted into a twisted grimace. Tears popped up in her eyes, and one eyelid started to twitch. Her nose started to dribble. She smacked her lips and then plastered a painful-looking smile on her face.“MMMMMMM,” she purred. Then she turned and hacked violently behind the couch.
The animals looked at her in stunned silence.
“Um, what?” Walt finally said as the white cat reemerged, her eyes still watering. “What were we supposed to be watching, exactly?”
“THAT WAS SO EXCITING!” Butterbean barked. “WHAT DID YOU EAT?”
The white cat sat down nervously and cleared her throat.“So. Give me your thoughts. Did I give the impression that the treats tasted…”
“Like vomit?” Polo said. “Yes, absolutely.”
“Terrible? Horrible? What’s the word I’m looking for?” Marco tapped on his chin thoughtfully. “Repulsive? That one. Repulsive.”
“Was it POISON?” Butterbean squealed. “Did I guess right?”
“GOOD! I was going for GOOD!” the white cat wailed. “It was supposed to look like a tasty treat.”