Digger Doyle's Real Book of Monsters Page 3

  Mrs. Doyle nodded her head. “Yes, that’s why I brought the envelope over here yesterday. Digger, I hoped that one of your uncle’s inventions could shine some special light on the envelope—to reveal any hidden words.”

  Digger was dumbfounded. What on Earth were they going on about? The drawing of Kappas was as visible as the page itself. Surely this was all some big joke Corliss had come up with, though Digger had no idea how his cousin had gotten everyone to go along with it.

  “Excuse us, Digger,” Mr. Happer said apologetically. “It’s hard for us to accept the existence of what we are not able to see.”

  Pam snatched the page from her brother for her own up-close inspection.

  “Pam, give that back, please.” Mr. Happer was not in the mood for any funny business. “If you wouldn’t mind, Digger, would you read that to us? It may help convince the nonbelievers among us that something is written there.”

  As he read, Digger remembered many things. Kappas smell like fish. They’re hard to find. They have monkey-sized bodies. Their yellowish-green, scaly flesh is like a lizard’s. Smooth parts. Rough parts. Hunchbacked. A round black tuft of hair crowning their heads. Their webbed feet allow them to run across and climb over slimy surfaces at vigorous speeds. There is a sunken spot on the top of their heads . . .

  Other parts he couldn’t recall, such as rumors about Kappas liking cucumbers, more so than any other food, and their incredible strength, in spite of their relatively small size. Digger read that Kappas had been known to lead farmers and woodsmen into the darkest, forgotten parts of forests—something his father might have mentioned. But his dad left out the detail that those people never returned to their villages. And that they were probably killed by the creatures. Sometimes bones were discovered. But more often nothing.

  These fierce little sprites drag goats and cows into rivers, drown them, and eat the meat, according to mountain folk . . .

  Digger stopped reading. Everyone was trying to make sense of what they had just heard.

  “Dad sent this.” He looked at his mother.

  “Oh, Digger, your father wouldn’t do anything so mysterious,” Mrs. Doyle told him. “If he’s still alive . . . Well, I can’t imagine him not putting his name on the envelope. He’d know it would make us worry more. Unless, of course . . .” She shook her head, completely stressed out and doing her best not to cry. “. . . unless he had no choice, or . . . Oh, it’s all too much for me!”

  “It’s certainly a lot to take in at once,” Mr. Happer said. “Whoever sent that, Digger, may have information about your father. They may even want to help us find him.”

  Right then Mr. Happer pulled out of his pocket a slightly wider envelope.

  Pam gasped. “Two pages for Digger.”

  “No, no,” Mr. Happer said. “This was sent to me from a former colleague and friend of Digger’s father. It’s a letter from Professor Susumu Satori.”

  “The postman brought it yesterday,” Mrs. Happer said.

  “A day after Digger’s mail arrived,” Mrs. Doyle added.

  “According to the professor, Daryus Doyle had taken an interest in whatever animal wears this shell.”

  “But why would my dad’s friend send a letter to you?” Digger asked.

  “Because I built the Plastron-Zetetic for your father. This one here is an experimental prototype. The one I gave your dad, right before he left Westwood, is much more powerful.”

  Pam reached over the picnic table to press the shiny green button on the control panel, but Mr. Happer caught her hand before it got that far.

  “Not now, Pam,” he said. “I can assure you that it still works. I tested it late last night. It makes a rocket of a racket—just a hum at first, but then howling sounds—so let’s leave it off while we’re talking.”

  “What does it do? It’s got no wings or tail,” Corliss joked.

  “It works like a metal detector. But instead of detecting metal, it detects shells, like this long one here.”

  “Cool,” Pam burst out.

  Next, Mr. Happer rotated the globe and let the tip of his finger rest against Honshu, Japan’s biggest island. Then, tapping his finger on the very top of that island, he said, “In two days, the professor will be here.”

  “Aomori,” Digger said quietly.

  Mr. Happer then unfolded the letter from the professor and began reading. It started with news that the professor had received a box.

  Professor Satori then explained that Doctor Doyle had called him before disappearing three years ago. Doctor Doyle told the professor that he was in Australia, with a group of scientists who were tracking a Bunyip. He’d asked the professor what he knew about Bunyips, and the professor told him to watch out, that they were constantly hungry for human flesh, with grotesque, horse-shaped heads and fearsome fangs.

  The professor wished his friend a safe journey. But before the call ended, Doctor Doyle asked one last question. He wanted to know if any Kappas had recently been spotted in the northern mountains of Japan.

  The professor hadn’t heard of any sightings, and Doctor Doyle didn’t say anything else about Kappas. At the time, Professor Satori guessed that the Kappa question had merely stemmed from curiosity. He never thought that question had anything to do with his friend’s disappearance. Daryus Doyle was chomped up in Australia by a Bunyip in a buggy swamp, the professor secretly believed.

  Until he opened the box.

  Inside was a large shell. He instantly recognized it from old Kappa drawings. And as he lifted it, he remembered a photograph of Doctor Doyle’s shell.

  Both shells were similar enough to be one and the same.

  The professor didn’t find a letter or note, there was only the shell. But on the box were two addresses: his own, and someone else’s in Aomori.

  Eager to find out who had mailed the shell, he called the owner of the mountainside house from which the box had been sent. But Mrs. Matsushita, the woman who answered, told the professor she no longer lived there, nor did anyone else.

  She had not sent anyone a parcel for ages, except for a knitted sweater she’d mailed to her grandson for his eighth birthday.

  She’d never liked that house, which was in a mountainside forest. And for a while, she let travelers stay there. But many left without paying. They even left their luggage behind, and the windows and doors open.

  Professor Satori asked her if she had ever seen a shell like the one he’d received. She couldn’t recall anything bigger than the shells of river turtles. But she could remember that a man had once asked her the same question. He had stayed at her old house years before. And he, too, had left without paying. What’s more, he’d left a bunch of things behind, including an odd device that she couldn’t name.

  He had a moustache. And when he visited her for the house key, she offered to drive him down the path to the old place. Politely he declined her offer, saying that he’d rather exercise his legs after such a long flight and train ride.

  Mrs. Matsushita last saw that man on the mountain path, strolling down to her old house with his bag and the device.

  Mr. Happer stopped reading and folded the letter. Digger was now sitting on the very edge of the bench. “Well? Was it my dad?”

  “We’re not sure,” Mrs. Doyle said gloomily.

  “Professor Satori gave us his telephone number,” Mr. Happer said. “I called him. And he’s decided to go to that old house. He wants to have a look around, to see what the man with the moustache might have left behind.” Mr. Happer turned toward Mrs. Doyle and gave her a gentle, reassuring nod. He then glanced down at the globe. “I told him we’ll be going there with him.”

  “Who’s we?” Corliss asked.

  “All of us,” Mrs. Happer replied.

  Digger couldn’t believe it. A page that only he could read. A shell-detecting device. A letter from his father’s friend. A box from who knows who. Two shells. And a man that might be his dad.

  Had his father gone to Japan for real? Were they
really going too?

  “Wait, wait . . . What about summer camp?” Corliss asked with a hint of frustration.

  “Well, we’ll have to spend time in the Aomori forest,” Mr. Happer told him. “If your uncle went searching in the woods for shells like this one, we’ll need to look there ourselves. So you will be doing some camping.”

  Pam’s excitement was spreading like wildfire inside her. She was bouncing, with her hands against the table.

  Mrs. Doyle breathlessly listed chores out loud. “We have to water the plants, tidy up, dust, mow the lawn, wash the—”

  “Right. There’s nooooo time to waste,” Mr. Happer said. “If the person who sent that page—or the shell to the professor—is still in Aomori, they may not be there for long.”

  Digger carefully folded the page and slipped it back into the envelope. He looked up at Mr. Happer. “When do we go, Uncle Buddy?”

  “Tomorrow.” Mr. Happer squinted in the direction of the cliff, beyond which waited the vast, deep ocean. “We leave tomorrow.”

  Chapter 4—Wendy Windsplitter

  Among all of Buddy Happer’s many creations, Wendy was by far the most magnificent. The schooner had once belonged to a ninety-nine-year-old fisherman by the name of McCray—a sea-hardened sailor who now lived in the town’s boathouse, on which he’d nailed dozens upon dozens of trophy fish to the walls, both inside and out. His weathervanes, made to look like seabirds in flight, spun crazily on the boathouse roof. And the surrounding pier and jetties were lopsided but held on to the ropes of a bunch of boats that somehow seemed bored.

  Buddy Happer and McCray had spent years transforming the schooner into a masterpiece invention. She had once been sail-powered, long ago. Now, fitted with ultra-modern gadgetry, she was surely the fastest ship on the coast.

  Carved into the schooner’s prow, at the very front of her hull, was the figurehead of a fearless-faced mermaid. When Pam saw this impressive carving for the first time, she immediately named it “Wendy.” This stuck, and The Windy Schooner became known as Wendy Schooner, and then later, after all of Mr. Happer and McCray’s handiwork, Wendy Windsplitter, or just Wendy for short.

  But what made Wendy truly unique from all other ships were her seventy-seven propellers, which from a distance looked like silvery-blue daisies.

  Most of these had been positioned in rows from bow to stern along her port and starboard sides. Others were high above the deck and rigging, fixed to the towering foremast and even taller mainmast, which rose up out of Wendy like an enormous flowered cross. Bigger than ceiling fans, these blue-bladed Wind-Makers were wired to what Mr. Happer called the Gust Lever—a long, baseball-bat-sized handle of wood that stuck out of the deck planking right next to a massive eight-spoke wheel.

  Pushing the lever forward would set in motion a series of mechanisms to get the Wind-Makers spinning, much like the whirling blades on an old airplane. Seconds later, Wendy would be skipping through the waves so fast that the view of the boathouse and WolfsWhispers’ hills would quickly shrink, and then vanish altogether.

  Wendy’s deck had been smoothened by decades of rain and wind, but her timeworn planks also showed cracks, protruding knots, and holes like ears. From these grew plants, some stubby, some broad-leaved, others long and tangled. And tiny wildflowers bloomed on more than a few. Even a cluster of mushrooms had sprouted out from a shady nook in the stern. Though what got plenty more stares were Wendy’s leafy green vines. As thick as mooring ropes they climbed along her sides. They’d even woven themselves into a stiff grasp, not much different from that of a wicker basket’s interlacing strands. They stretched all the way up Wendy’s masts too, scenting the salty sea air with their red flowers.

  Of course, Mr. Happer could have hacked away all those tight vines with an axe or hatchet, but because they’d covered Wendy’s sides so snugly for so long, he was sure the schooner would come apart if he removed them. In short, they were doing more to hold Wendy together in one piece than her rusty old nails.

  Pam’s favorite place was Wendy, and Corliss loved being on board too, in part because Mr. Happer almost always insisted that he stay ashore. “Heaven help him,” Mr. Happer said time and again, “if he ever leaned against the Gust Lever and dashed Wendy out to sea.” “Imagine the mess if he got tangled up in her vines and had to be chopped free.”

  On the few occasions Corliss had been aboard, he was told to stay put below deck in either of the cabins or in the kitchenette. Being on deck while at sea was an absolute no-no.

  Also out of bounds, even for Pam, was the machinery closet—a tight space between the cabins. There, Mr. Happer had pieced together the pulleys, switches, chains, and sprockets that controlled the Wind-Makers.

  As for Digger, Mrs. Doyle never let him go anywhere on Wendy.

  “Oh, you’d only get dreadfully seasick—you’d turn green.” She’d make him believe the worst each time the Happers invited him along for a boat ride. “Besides, the ocean is far too dangerous,” she’d say, shaking her head. “You can slip overboard easily, or be blown over. You’d be gone. The sea swallows people up, don’t you know?” And so he’d stay at home.

  But the day had finally come for Digger’s first voyage, and on the morning of their departure, he was as eager to set sail and see the sea as he was excited to get to where they were going. Green or not, and no matter what dangers lay ahead, he would keep his chin up—at least that’s what he told himself. He wanted to take on the quest just as bravely as Corliss no doubt would. Anyway, there is nothing out there to be afraid of, he tried so hard to believe.

  One quick trip in the pick-up truck was enough for Mr. Happer to take all their luggage, food, water, and supplies down to the boathouse. As soon as he came back, as dawn cracked, all six of them crammed into the truck, and down to the docks they went.

  McCray greeted them at the boathouse with a nod and raised mug of coffee.

  Digger figured the old man’s face had a thousand wrinkles. Despite his age, though, he had no trouble hauling their bags all the way up the gangplank to Wendy’s deck.

  Mr. Happer raced about getting the schooner ready. He was determined to cross the ocean in under a day. Luckily, the weather was on their side. Bright fat clouds drifted lazily. The sea was calm. But even so, a sense of urgency had been in the air since their stew lunch the day before, and Mrs. Doyle was more nerve-wracked than she’d ever been before. After boarding Wendy, she tried taking her mind off the trip by busying herself. In the kitchenette she sorted food, dishes, and pots, in preparation for brunch, and then started wiping things clean, all the while muttering the names of each item she touched.

  Mrs. Happer arranged the cots and bedding and made sure their bags and rucksacks were secure in the cabins. She hummed a joyful tune, as if they were about to set off on a holiday tour.

  Up on deck, Digger watched Pam get chased in figure eights by Corliss, who hadn’t stopped tormenting her for the workshop incident. Mr. Happer’s head popped up out of the hatchway. After turning dials, flicking switches and adjusting apparatuses in the machinery closet, his cheeks and forehead were now streaked with grease.

  “Digger! Since you have more sense than those two, check if we got all our stuff off the dock. And let McCray know we’re ready, too, if you would.”

  Digger leaned over the railing and gave McCray a thumbs up. The old sailor put down his mug again and ambled over to a post with a rope around it.

  “Aye, Digger,” he called up hoarsely. “Tell yer uncle I’m set to set ’er free.”

  “Corliss!” Mr. Happer barked while pulling himself up on the deck. “For goodness sake, leave your sister be. Stop horsing around, you two, and find a vine to grab hold of. And before we reach maximum speed, get yourselves below deck.”

  He shouted down to Mrs. Doyle and Mrs. Happer, “We’re letting her go soon. Hold on.”

  Digger watched a rope fly up and over the side rail. Mr. Happer caught it and coiled it neatly by his feet. Another came up and over, then anot
her, and another. And all of a sudden Wendy felt like a huge restless animal that had just noticed its cage door was open.

  Mr. Happer hurried to the helm. “All set?”

  Digger gulped some sea air and sat down beside his cousins, backs against the bulwark.

  “Full speed ahead,” Corliss hollered.

  But the slight forward tilt of the Gust Lever did nothing more than separate Wendy from the dock. She bobbed sideways for a bit on the little waves. After that she let out a deep, painful-sounding belly groan and went still and silent. Digger wondered if Wendy would ever move on her own again, let alone cross the ocean.

  “Broken,” Corliss said disappointedly.

  “Nah—she’s done this before,” Pam told him. “‘Rusty bolts,’ Dad says. You’ll see. In a minute Wendy’ll be surfing.”

  But a minute went by, then another, and a few more, and on each wave, Wendy slowly drifted toward the shoreline.

  Again Mr. Happer went below deck to the machinery closet, where his clanging ratchet and pounding hammer sounded angrier and more demanding. The loudest strike of all made Wendy lurch by some means or other, and she belted out what sounded like the screech of rusty brakes on an old locomotive.

  Digger clutched another vine, though he didn’t have to, since Wendy instantly fell back to sleep. This time he was sure she’d conked out for good.

  Then from somewhere deep inside came that screeching again, the sound of metal grinding against itself, followed by a heavy thud.

  Ever so slightly, the deck vibrated—a quiver that gradually thickened into a tremble, which Digger felt right down to and through his bones. The leaves and flowers shivered, and he gripped the vines more tightly.

  CLICK!

  Digger looked up. The Wind-Maker at the top of the foremast was turning. At first it rotated with some effort. Then it spun as smoothly as a swirling whirlpool. And then the others began to turn on—three or four at a time.

  Digger’s hair blew back. He felt the cool currents of sea air streaming through his shirt.