I start back to the lobby, confident she’ll do it. But Meg stops me with a hand on my arm. “You call. I’ll go to him . . . it. I’m calmer.” She pushes me aside and darts past me.
I’m alone, alone and faced with the impossible knowledge that someone shot at me. Someone knew I was at the port and why. Someone wants to stop me from finding Prince Philippe, maybe enough to kill over it.
When I return to the lobby, the swans are awake, staring out the windows. They see me and swarm around, all speaking at once. I push through them and out the door. Meg cradles Harry in her arms, and for an instant, I’m sure he’s dead. But then, he raises his head and stares at me. Meg is applying pressure with a dish towel, though red still pools on the street. I hear a siren. It winds to a stop. Then, running steps.
“Where’s the victim?” It’s a paramedic.
I gesture toward Harry. The guy looks at Meg. “You hurt, miss?”
“Not her,” I say. “The bird.”
“A swan? I don’t resuscitate birds. I’m a trained professional. You need to call those Miami Animal Rescue guys on TV maybe.”
“But he’s dying!”
“Actually, he’s doing fine.” Meg removes the towel from the swan’s breast, and I see that the bloody spot on his white feathers seems smaller, barely a scrape. “Just a flesh wound.”
“But . . . it was huge.” I gape at it, then at Meg.
“I applied pressure.” To the paramedic, Meg says, “Look, it’s still bleeding. Do you think you could give me a bandage or something so I can put it in a cab to the animal hospital? The manager really does like these swans, and people will freak if they see blood.”
“But . . .” I gesture at the puddle on the ground. “He was bleeding to death.”
“He was probably just in shock,” the paramedic says.
I think, not for the first time, that Meg is like the type of shoe we never repair, a Bass Weejun or Birkenstock sandal, the sort of shoe that’s comfortable and lasts forever.
The paramedic finally gives Meg some bandages, and that’s when the police show up.
“There was a shooting here?” The officer looks around.
“Yeah,” I tell her. “This guy on a motorcycle. He shot a swan.”
“This is about a swan?”
“Yeah, a swan.”
“A swan?”
“That’s illegal, isn’t it? Can you go hunting on Collins Avenue that I don’t know about?”
The officer looks at her partner, who has just shown up. The partner shakes his head. “Most of the squad’s at the port. Someone heard gunshots.”
“Did they see the guy who did it?”
“Some of the dock workers saw a blond guy with black clothes.”
“That’s the guy who shot the swan! He would have shot me if the swan hadn’t been in front of me.”
I look at Harry. It’s true. I could be. Someone was aiming at me. The paramedic has bandaged Harry’s wound, and apparently, Meg has sweet-talked him into carrying the swan to a cab on a stretcher. I don’t even know why Meg’s here so early, but I’m glad she is.
“I could give you a description,” I say. “It might be related.”
I know it is, and the guy may still be after me.
* * *
After the cops leave, I return to the shop. The cloak is there, all bloody. It saved my life. I wash the blood off, then put the cloak on. I wish myself home.
At home, I pack a backpack with a few changes of clothing, a small tent, and a sleeping bag. Then, I find Mom at the shoe repair. “I have to leave right away,” I tell her.
I don’t tell her about the shooting. I have to get down to the Keys, the fox, before anyone else does. “Tell Meg I’m sorry I didn’t get to say good-bye.”
“Wait!” Mom stops me, grabbing my wrist. “The night manager says someone shot a swan in the lobby. Do you know something?”
I lie. “No. Really?” I know she’ll find out the truth, but by the time she does, I’ll be gone without even a place to charge my cell phone.
“What if it’s dangerous?” she asks.
I lie again. “There’s no danger. Probably some psycho bird-hater.”
And then I leave, taking Meg’s opal ring, the cloak, and what I can carry on my back.
I thought my life was boring. It isn’t anymore.
Chapter 16
The Fox said, “Do not shoot me, for I will give you good counsel.”
—“The Golden Bird”
Mom and I spend most of our vacations camping in Key Largo because that’s as far as we can afford to go. We always drive south on U.S. 1 with its endless fast-food joints, strip malls, and gas stations. After an hour, we reach the road with blue water on both sides.
This time, though, before anyone can talk me out of it, I throw the cloak over my shoulders. “I wish I was at the Underwater Hotel.”
And then, I’m there.
Or I’m someplace.
Someplace dark.
I was expecting a lobby. Or a restaurant. Even a room. Instead, it’s pitch-dark, darker than the Everglades at night. At least there, there are stars. I pull at the cloak to make sure it’s not over my head, then look up. No stars. The place is eerie, silent. My head feels full of pounding pressure, like being on the Mission Space ride at Disney World. Hands before me, I stumble forward. A wall, as smooth as glass. A window. I run my hand along it, feeling cold smoothness. I reach a wall. An inch farther, I feel a light switch.
I flip it on.
Sharp teeth gleam in the sudden light. A shark. A shark! I jump backward, then fall to the floor before realizing I’m not wet. The shark is. I turn, realizing it must be in some sort of tank. The shark proves this by swimming on, not noticing what he can’t smell. Am I in an aquarium? I peer through the window. No light above, no end.
I glance around the room. It’s furnished like a regular living room. In another window, the same shark swims by.
Underwater Hotel. Could I actually be underwater?
The pressure in my ears tells me I am. I stumble to the sofa, try to get my bearings. The silence is like nothing I’ve ever heard before.
Then, from another room is a sound. “Ha ha! We made it. How cool is this?”
Someone’s here!
A woman giggles. I hear wet footsteps approaching, the unmistakable sound of flippers meeting floor. “Someone left the light on in this room.”
I clutch the cloak around me. “I wish I was aboveground.”
“What was that?” I hear a voice say.
A Hummer is barreling toward me. It skids to a stop; the driver, leaning on its horn, is screaming something unintelligible. I jump out of his way, only to land in the path of a Smart car. At least they’re getting smaller.
“Crazy!” The driver honks as he swerves around me.
“I wish I was at Sally’s,” I say, running.
Then, I’m on a barstool in a smoke-filled room that’s dark even at eight in the morning. Elvis blares from a jukebox, half drowned out by drunken laughter and the cackling of a bedraggled-looking yellow bird. Two drunks stop talking when they see me.
“Hey, how’d you get here?” a guy with a neck beard says.