Petronella Saves Nearly Everyone (3 page)

However, I could not betray him to the Yard. Several alternatives to producing Uncle to the detectives presented themselves to my mind. I could faint, but I was quite sure that James would take sadistic pleasure in waving a burned feather under my nose if I did, and burned feathers are immensely unpleasant. No, fainting would not do. I could make up some story about Uncle having gone missing at the same time as Dame Carruthers and Generalissimo Reyes-Cardoza,
but Uncle was not mentioned in the note, and James and Jane might let it slip that they had seen him since. The other ideas were equally worthless. Instead, I decided to tell the truth ... of a sort.

"I'm sure my uncle Augustus will be with us shortly. He is currently searching the grounds," I said. Indeed, the hawthorn bushes at the entrance to the maze moved suspiciously, and I caught a glimpse of a formally attired leg disappearing behind them. I moved slightly to one side so that the inspector would have his back to the hawthorns in order to look at me.

"He's more'n likely in cahoots wiv them kidnappers, thet's wot I fink," said Sergeant Crumple.

The inspector stiffened and bent a look of disapproval on his junior officer. "You will keep such thoughts to yourself, Crumple."

"I think the intrepid Sergeant Crumple has come up with a most intriguing idea. Please do not reprimand the man for doing his duty, dear Inspector Higginbotham," Jane simpered as she fluttered her eyelashes at the superior officer and then at the junior. "Don't you think so, James?"

Both James and I stared in surprise at Jane's sally into the fray.

James seemed at a loss. His majestic brow furrowed in
that endearing way he has when he is puzzled. Even in my extremity, I could not help but notice his charms.

Inspector Higginbotham harrumphed a few times and muttered something about "dear Miss Sinclair" under his breath, but he was clearly pleased by Jane's attentions. Sergeant Crumple turned crimson and could only stare at his much worn shoes, which appeared to have been tied with packing twine.

"My darling sister, surely you jest," James said.

"Not in the slightest, dear brother." Jane continued, "You do mean, of course, that Miss Arbuthnot and her uncle staged the coming-out party entirely for the purpose of kidnapping Dame Carruthers and Generalissimo Reyes-Cardoza, did you not, Sergeant Crumple?"

James was more bewildered than ever. "But Dame Carruthers and Generalissimo Reyes-Cardoza were not even on the guest list. How could it have been planned?"

"Yes, not only were they not on the guest list, I wonder how they heard about my party," I said as I nervously paced back to where Jane was standing so that Inspector Higginbotham must turn to attend to us. Uncle was now on his hands and knees following some repulsive creature along the garden path near the fountain, not far from the collapsed tent directly behind the inspector. Fortunately, Crumple was
busy staring at Jane with a look of dismay. It was obvious, even to him, that Jane's explanation and therefore his accusation were absolutely ridiculous.

"Exactly," said Jane.

"Ahem."

We all focused on James, who had gone nearly as red as Sergeant Crumple.

"I'm afraid I must confess that I invited them," said James, ruining his hirsute splendor as he clasped his hair in both hands. "My superiors at the Home Office put me in charge of entertaining the generalissimo and ensuring his safety, and I thought he would be safe at Miss Arbuthnot's party. I will be in terrible trouble at the news that he and Dame Carruthers have disappeared."

Sergeant Crumple grabbed James by the arm. "Oi've got im, Inspector. No need to look furver. E probly as gambling debts and needs the ransom money. Wot have ye done wiv 'em?" He gave James's arm a shake.

"Here, here. Give off, man," said James as he disengaged himself from the overzealous officer. "Because I invited Dame Carruthers and Generalissimo Reyes-Cardoza to the party does not mean I am the one responsible for their kidnapping. Rather, it means that one of them must have mentioned their attendance at the event to the perpetrators, thereby presenting the perfect opportunity for them to be
snatched away. Besides, I have no gambling debts. That would be most reprehensible."

But the good sergeant was not to be done out of a suspect so easily. "And wot, may I ast, would be the motiff for them to be snatched, as you say?"

"Yes, just what would be the motive for kidnapping, if it were not for ransom?" asked Inspector Higginbotham.

With an air of disdain, James dusted off the sleeve that had been crumpled by Crumple. "Actually, if you had been following the rumblings of current affairs, you would know of the problems over the Suez Canal that could halt British trade by sea with our colonies in the East."

I furrowed my brow in incomprehension. "What does the Suez Canal have to do with Panama's rebellion against Colombia? And what does dear England have to do with either?" The inspector, sergeant, and Jane looked equally befuddled.

James answered, "Because of trouble with the Suez Canal, we have need of the construction of the Panama Canal by the Americans to ensure British dominance of the high seas, and that won't happen unless the Panamanians win their independence from Colombia. There, I fear, is your motive. We are dealing with a tangled web of international intrigue."

IT IS AN ESPECIALLY PAINFUL
experience to explain to one's dearest friends that one's uncle has become an aberration. Jane did not easily come to terms with Uncle Augustus's propensity for devouring disgusting creatures, but James was immensely helpful. Once the Yard detectives left, he offered to help me capture Uncle Augustus, who had been flitting happily in the shrubberies all night and morning gorging himself on who knew what.

James dashed to his home and soon returned with an old straitjacket he said came from his Eton days. "Straitjackets were all the rage at the time," he told me, although I could not imagine what use they would have been for schoolboys. But perhaps it was better that I could not imagine it, considering what I do know of boys, James in particular.

"Whatever the case, I am grateful you have it now. I last heard Uncle Augustus crashing about in the arboretum. Let us hope he is still there so we might apprehend him," I said, following a trail of broken twigs among the privet hedges, evidence of Uncle's nocturnal depredations. I carried a pillow slip, which I hoped to sling over my unfortunate relative's head while James garbed him in the straitjacket.

"I must say you've held up rather well, old potato." James smiled at me. My traitorous heart flip-flopped, and I wondered if I should ever be free of my obsession with him.

A clatter, as if small pebbles were being dislodged, sounded on the other side of a hydrangea, followed by a most vulgar belch.

"Shh." I held my finger to my lips. James and I nodded to each other, and we went our separate ways. I crept around one side of the hydrangea while James skulked around the other.

Uncle Augustus was in the act of jovially breakfasting on an anthill, a look of complete contentment on his countenance. "Aaargh!" he shouted as I threw the pillow slip over his head. A shower of ants flew from his fingers and scurried away. I hoped they were cognizant of the fragility of their fate and suitably grateful at being freed.

James leaped forward, deftly slipped the straitjacket onto Uncle's arms, and had him trussed up in a moment.

My opinion of James was further improved when he picked up Uncle Augustus as if he were light as a feather and carted him off to the morning room, where Jane was partaking of some dry toast and weak tea to steady her nerves.

James deposited Uncle on the sofa and sat on him, ignoring his protests. In reality, Uncle Augustus was no lightweight, so for James to heft him about so easily made me wish I had gone to Brighton last summer with the Sinclairs when they had invited me. Then I could have watched James cavorting in the sea using those estimable muscles. If they invited me again this summer, I would be sure to go.

"I do thank you both for aiding us in our time of need," I said to James and Jane. I mournfully observed my dear relative as he struggled with his bonds. "I don't quite know what to do, what with the dame and generalissimo kidnapped and Uncle in such a state. I have no faith in the Yard solving this mystery. The detectives who came to investigate seemed like veritable simpletons. And poor Uncle..." I waved my hand feebly in his direction. There really was no need to explain further.

Jane put down her teacup with a tiny clink that bespoke a certain resoluteness. "I have been thinking of a solution. It is quite possible that we can gain assistance with both problems at the same source. James, did you not have a profes
sor of entomology who was something of a world-famous authority?"

"Brilliant idea," said James. "For a sister, you are not half shabby. Professor Lepworthy would be just the ticket."

***

"
PREPOSTEROUS!" SHOUTED PROFESSOR
Lepworthy, his toupee sliding to one side of his monstrously shiny bald head. He swung around in his desk chair to retrieve a book from the case behind him, and the toupee slid back, coming to rest only slightly askew.

"Of course Uncle Augustus's condition is preposterous," I said rather acerbically, and James and Jane agreed with me.

"Not your uncle Augustus. He is not what is preposterous," retorted Professor Lepworthy, rapidly thumbing through the volume he had just retrieved and tossing it aside. His toupee dipped over his left eye as he twirled in his chair and reached for another book. When he swung back toward his desk, the hairpiece settled in place once more. I wondered if he'd had the hairy mop specially trained.

"Not Uncle Augustus?" Jane and James and I chimed together.

Professor Lepworthy stopped thumbing and shouted, "Aha!" Then he stuck his nose quite close to the book and stared intently. "No, indeed. Your uncle's condition is quite common in the outer marshes of Tou-eh-mah-mah Island, off the coast of Panama. The antidote is simple, actually. He must steep one of those beetles in a mixture of crocodile dung and the juice of the anaphtile plant and then drink the whole concoction while rotating on his rump and singing "Kwop-a-phah-mee" in twelve-tone the entire time. The only real difficulty is in finding a suitable anaphtile plant. It has to be one with flowers shaped like the Egyptian god Anubis, or the antidote will not work. It is my contention that the presence of a flower in the shape of Anubis is definitive proof that the Egyptians settled parts of the Americas."

I stared at James and Jane and they stared back. My high opinion of the idea of going to see the professor was starting to sink, even if he was reputed to know every insect on our planet like members of his own family. To my eye the professor was as batty as my uncle.

James must have noticed my incredulous expression, for he whispered, "Patience. You are witnessing a genius at work."

The aforementioned Uncle Augustus struggled under James, who was sitting on him on the professor's settee. "I
will not drink any such concoction." Uncle Augustus seethed. "I feel perfectly fine."

Then his voice turned into peevish whining. "Speaking of perfectly fine, there are several rather fine specimens of insect over there on that wall. You wouldn't consider moving me a tad closer, would you, and unwrapping just one hand?"

For the first time I realized that Uncle Augustus might see the cases full of carefully labeled insects on pins as several courses of supper. I joined James on the settee and took hold of one of Uncle's legs so he could not get a good purchase on the floor, heave James from his straitjacketed body, and wriggle into proximity of one of those cases. Jane took hold of the other leg. We should have thought of a way of binding his enormous mouth, which could do as much damage as his hands.

I patted Uncle's head. "There, there, Uncle. The anthill will still be there when we get home, and Moriarty saw some termites in one of the cottages in the village. The tenants will be ever so grateful to you if you could rid their homes of the pests."

Uncle Augustus brightened and stopped struggling. "Do you think so? I hadn't thought of termites. There might be thousands of them. Millions, even. And if they are in one cottage, they might be in others. I was beginning to fear that
I would run out of delicacies on your estate in short order and I should be forced to search farther afield. But termites..." He hummed happily to himself, going off into what I could only think of as a termite-infested trance.

James bit off a chuckle, but Jane looked away politely. She always did have more delicate sensibilities than her brother.

"Yes, yes! Here it is! But it is preposterous." Professor Lepworthy shook the book before us, pages flapping within an eighth of an inch of his toupee, which had jerked up to the top of his head, leaving a great deal of gleaming skin between it and his eyebrows. "Look here. There can be no mistake."

We rushed to his desk and looked, forgetting Uncle Augustus. That is, we forgot him until we heard a peculiar thumping coming from the direction of the nearest glass case. Uncle Augustus was throwing himself at the case, evidently in an attempt to break the glass.

James sighed and picked Uncle Augustus up from the floor. He deposited my uncle in a chair, to which he tied him with the ends of the straps from the straitjacket.
I really must go to Brighton with the Sinclairs. Such muscles.
But duty intruded on my ruminations. Accordingly, I turned my attention back to the professor's book.

There, on the page in front of us, was an exact replica of the insect we had seen slightly squashed on the ransom note before Uncle Augustus ate it—the insect, not the paper. The insect was a butterfly of some sort, with wings that had a purple background and bright yellow and turquoise markings that spelled "Phui!"

Jane cleared her throat. "Ahem. It really is quite preposterous. Imagine having a word spelled out on a butterfly."

Professor Lepworthy looked at Jane as if she were an imbecile. "That is not what is preposterous. There is an entire genus of butterflies with words spelled out on their wings. Why, the Tanzanian novella butterfly has entire chapters written in Hindi. Of course, you have to read them with a magnifying glass, but they are well worth the trouble—very action packed. Sometimes the stories continue for generations. I have heard of entomologists, though, who have gone crazy because the last novella generation in an area died out before the end of the story—"