Chapter 11 The Girl Detective, page 16 of 16

I had to go to the airport for some reason. It’s a long story. It was an important case. This wasn’t that long ago. I hadn’t been down out of the tree for very long. I was missing the tree.
I thought I saw the girl detective in the bar in Terminal B. She was sitting in one of the back booths, disguised as a fat old man. There was a napkin in front of her, folded into a giraffe. She was crying but there was the napkin folded into a giraffe—she had nothing to wipe her nose on. I would have gone over and given her my handkerchief, but someone sat down next to her. It was a kid about twelve years old. She had red hair. She was wearing overalls. She just sat next to him, and she put down another napkin. She didn’t say a word to him. The old man blew his nose on it and I realized that he wasn’t the girl detective at all.

The return of the girl detective.

I had to go to the airport for some reason. It’s a long story. It was an important case. This wasn’t that long ago. I hadn’t been down out of the tree for very long. I was missing the tree.
I thought I saw the girl detective in the bar in Terminal B. She was sitting in one of the back booths, disguised as a fat old man. There was a napkin in front of her, folded into a giraffe. She was crying but there was the napkin folded into a giraffe—she had nothing to wipe her nose on. I would have gone over and given her my handkerchief, but someone sat down next to her. It was a kid about twelve years old. She had red hair. She was wearing overalls. She just sat next to him, and she put down another napkin. She didn’t say a word to him. The old man blew his nose on it and I realized that he wasn’t the girl detective at all. He was just an old man. It was the kid in the overalls—what a great disguise! Then the waitress came over to take their order. I wasn’t sure about the waitress. Maybe she was the girl detective. But she gave me such a look—I had to get up and leave.

Why I got down out of the tree.

She came over and stood under the tree. She looked a lot like my mother. Get down out of that tree this instant! she said. Don’t you know it’s time for dinner?

---the end---

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Chapter 11 The Girl Detective, page 15 of 16

here is a nightclub on the other side, with a veranda and a big sign over the veranda. DANCE WITH BEAUTIFUL GIRLS. There is a woman standing on the veranda. People are dancing. There is music play­ing. Up in my tree, my feet are tapping air. Someone says, “Mom?” Someone embraces someone else. Everyone is dancing. “Where have you been?” someone says. “Spring cleaning,” someone says.
It is hard to see what is going on across the river. Chinese wait­ers in elegant tuxedos are dipping dancing princesses. There are a lot of sequins. They are dancing so fast, things get blurry. Things run together. I think I see alligators dancing. I see a fat old man dancing with the girl detective’s mother. Maybe even the housekeeper is danc­ing. It’s hard to tell if their feet are even touching the ground. There are sparks. Fireworks. The musicians are dancing, too, but they don’t stop playing. I’m dancing up in my tree. The leaves shake and the branch groans, but the branch doesn’t break.

There is a nightclub on the other side, with a veranda and a big sign over the veranda. DANCE WITH BEAUTIFUL GIRLS. There is a woman standing on the veranda. People are dancing. There is music play­ing. Up in my tree, my feet are tapping air. Someone says, “Mom?” Someone embraces someone else. Everyone is dancing. “Where have you been?” someone says. “Spring cleaning,” someone says.
It is hard to see what is going on across the river. Chinese wait­ers in elegant tuxedos are dipping dancing princesses. There are a lot of sequins. They are dancing so fast, things get blurry. Things run together. I think I see alligators dancing. I see a fat old man dancing with the girl detective’s mother. Maybe even the housekeeper is danc­ing. It’s hard to tell if their feet are even touching the ground. There are sparks. Fireworks. The musicians are dancing, too, but they don’t stop playing. I’m dancing up in my tree. The leaves shake and the branch groans, but the branch doesn’t break.
We dance for hours. Maybe for days. It’s hard to tell when it stays dark all the time. Then there is a line of dancers coming across the river. They skip across the backs of the white alligators, who snap at their heels. They are hand in hand, spinning and turning and falling back, and leaping forward. It’s hard to see them, they’re moving so fast. It’s so dark down here. Is that a dancing princess, or a bank robber? Is that a fat old man, or an alligator, or a housekeeper? I wish I knew. Is that the girl detective or is it her mother? One looks back at the other and smiles. She doesn’t say a thing, she just smiles.
I look, and in the mossy glow they all look like the girl detective. Or maybe the girl detective looks like all of them. They all look so happy. Passing in the opposite direction is a line of Chinese waiters. They swing the first line as they pass. They cut across and dosey-do. They clap hands. They clutch each other, across the breast and the back, and tango. But the girl detectives keep up towards the restau­rant and the bathroom and the secret staircase. The waiters keep on towards the water, towards the nightclub. Down in that nightclub, there’s a bathroom. In the bathroom, there’s another staircase. The waiters are going home to bed.
I’m exhausted. I can’t keep up with the girl detectives. “Wait!” I yell. “Hold it for just a second. I’m coming with you.”
They all turn and look back at me. I’m dizzy with all of that looking. I fall out of my tree. I hit the ground. Really, that’s all I remember.

When I woke up.

Someone had carried me back to my tree and tucked me in. I was snug as a bug. I was back in the tree across the street from the girl detective’s window. This time the blind was down. I couldn’t see a thing.

The end of the girl detective?

Some people say that she never came back from the underworld.
........(continou)

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