Molly Moon & the Morphing Mystery

“That’s what I love about you, Molly. Your optimism. You always trust that things will work out.”

“They will.” Molly said this far more surely than she felt it. But Petula felt Molly’s fear. It rose from her like electric smoke.

Twelve

Miss Hunroe was in her lavish rooms back at the museum. She sat in a white negligee and a sky blue dressing gown, having breakfast. Flipping her gold coin over and over the fingers of her left hand, she admired the table set before her. It was laid with a priceless Ming tea set of white-and-blue porcelain that she had stolen from the Victoria and Albert Museum. Her maid, Elspeth, who was dressed in a light blue uniform, had brought toast, scrambled eggs, and a dish of wild blueberries. A dark blue flute lay beside them, and Elspeth was pouring Miss Hunroe’s tea. The rhapsody of all the blues about her gave Miss Hunroe the greatest of pleasure. She reached for her cup. As she did so, a crack of lightning lit up the gray morning sky outside, giving Elspeth a shock. Her arm jolted, and the tea spilled. A few hot drops scalded Miss Hunroe’s outstretched hand.

“OW!” Miss Hunroe shrieked. “You clumsy fool!”

The hypnotized woman dropped her head in shame.

“I’m so sorry, madam,” she begged. “Can I get you some ice?”

“No, you certainly can’t,” Miss Hunroe snapped. She turned to the coin that moved over the fingers of her left hand and, with dexterity and a hard look in her eye, flipped it high into the air. She caught it in the palm of her right hand and smacked it down on the back of her left hand. “Heads you lose,” she declared. Then, slowly lifting her mascaraed eyes to Elspeth, she said, “For that, Elspeth, you will not eat for…hmm…for two days.”

“Yes, madam,” the maid said as though she’d simply been asked to make sure there were newspapers on the table every morning. She curtsied. “Is there anything else I can do for you now?”

“No.”

With that, Elspeth left Miss Hunroe to eat her breakfast. Miss Hunroe ate elegantly and hungrily, and finished by wiping her mouth on her blue napkin.

Then there was a knock at the door.

“Come in.”

Miss Oakkton entered. Behind her, uncertain whether to enter or not, cowered Miss Teriyaki and Miss Suzette.

“I said come in,” Miss Hunroe repeated. She picked up her flute, and as though speaking to it, said, “Miss Teriyaki and Miss Suzette! The two idiots who couldn’t follow a taxi. Have you managed to track Mr. Black down now?”

“Erm…well, not yet,” Miss Suzette stammered. “We spent de night outside the casino. We weren’t sure whezair he went there or to his hotel home, or—”

“Then get out of my sight.” Miss Hunroe’s voice was cutting and vicious. She looked up cruelly. “And don’t speak to me again until you know his exact location.”

The two women fled the room.

Miss Hunroe picked up her flute and began to play.

Miss Oakkton sat down. “Ahhhh,” she sighed, taking a pinch of tobacco from her ivory box and putting it in her mouth to chew. Then, as though the music had possessed her, she rose up again. The notes from Miss Hunroe’s flute floated to the roof of the museum, and Miss Oakkton began to dance. “Aah!” she exclaimed, doing a clumsy pirouette, dancing like an absurd cartoon elephant. “Very nice, very pretteee!”

Miss Hunroe stopped playing and clapped her hands crossly. “Do stop dancing around the room in that ridiculous way! You look unhinged! Stop it!”

Molly and Micky flew away from the hotel garden just as Lily Black came out onto her balcony. She peered down at the garden below. Then she started staring at the stone balcony ledge in front of her. “Bugs! So you’ve changed into bugs now, have you, nosy boy and nosy girl? You’re going to wish you never learned to morph!” With a nasty viciousness, she slapped the stone. “There, you’re dead bugs now!”

For a moment she seemed calm. Then, realizing that the dead bugs in front of her might easily be just that— dead bugs—her temper rose again. She threw her angry gaze about the garden.

There were two thrushes now on the lawn. Lily disappeared inside her bedroom and returned with three glass bottles. These she hurled at the innocent birds, laughing as they flew off.

“I’ll get you!” she shouted. She turned to two squirrels in a tree. “And if it’s you, I’ll get you, you Squirrel Nutkins.” Her sharp blue eyes shone nastily. A window nearby opened, and an elderly man leaned out.

“Young lady, would you shut up? Some people are trying to sleep. If you don’t, I’ll complain to the hotel.” Lily narrowed her eyes and wrinkled her nose and stuck out her tongue.

“Could even be you and your missus, Grandpa,” she muttered. Then, looking up at the heavy, water-laden sky, she went back inside her room.

Molly and Micky as blackbirds found Buckingham Palace easily. They flew higher and higher into the rainy sky and landed on the edge of a skyscraper. From here the London traffic looked like a metallic-colored river, and the twiggy tops of trees seemed the size of footballs. They saw the Thames River and the big wheel, the London Eye, that was for tourists to ride. Micky knew that Buckingham Palace would be fairly near to that, and sure enough, there it was, up a long, wide road.

After a smooth, wet, downhill glide, they arrived at the palace’s grand gardens, landing on one of its gravel paths. Scores of windows on the rear facade of the building flashed in the dull, cloudy morning sunshine. On top of the roof, a flag flew.

“She’s in,” Molly twittered as a low, booming bell chimed a quarter to eleven. At the same time, a flash of lightning lit up the sky.