Molly Moon Stops the World (22 page)

Molly and Rocky waited.

“Until you’re what?” asked Molly.

“I think he’s gone,” whispered Rocky.

“He’s meditating,” said Sinclair.

“How long does he stay like that?” asked Molly.

“An hour. A day. I wish I could do it, but I can’t. Sometimes Forest travels long distances in his head. It’s called Astral Projection. He can go on a trip to his friends in India, and if they’re meditating too, they have a kind of astral meeting.”

“Sounds like a good excuse for a quick, I mean long, nap,” said Molly.

Sinclair ignored her.

“Sometimes,” he said, “Forest focuses his mind so that he can walk on fire.”

“Or water?” asked Molly.

“Or air?” suggested Rocky. Sinclair didn’t register their cynicism.

“I’m hoping,” he went on, “that Forest will help you focus your mind and relax so that you are in the best possible state to surf the cosmic airwaves and telepathically extract Primo’s passwords.”

“Are you really?” said Molly, as if Sinclair had just asked her to flap her arms and fly. She’d heard about Californian new-age spiritualism, and as far as she could see, it was complete nonsense.

“Don’t be negative,” said Sinclair. “Forest will put you in touch with your instinct. You wait. You’ll be amazed at yourself.”

Sinclair left Molly and Rocky to study the knottedup man on the floor. Forest let out a squeaky fart. Rocky and Molly found themselves stifling mouthfuls of giggles.

“Don’t know about getting in touch with my instinct,” said Molly quietly, “but his
in
stink is going to be unavoidable.”

The next few days were quiet ones. Sinclair left for Washington, D.C., where Primo was organizing his new team of government advisors. It was very important for Sinclair to keep up the pretense of being Primo’s loyal son and right-hand man, so he had to help when he was asked. But it also suited his plans to be near to Primo, as he needed to know his movements.

Back in the Hollywood Hills house, as far as Molly could make out, Forest wasn’t teaching her anything that would help her extract passwords from Cell’s mind. Still, she enjoyed spending time with him.

Next to his studio apartment, Forest had a lovely flower-filled garden. It was a kaleidoscope of color with mosaics underfoot and trellises of herbs along its
walls. He introduced Molly and Rocky to his chickens and fed them each a home-laid egg. He showed them how to blow glass. He put a cold lump of it onto a long metal pipe, heated it up on a fierce flame, and carefully blew through the pipe until the hot glass blistered into a bubble.

Forest also taught them to meditate. Rocky tried to concentrate, but he found throwing a Frisbee for Petula was much more fun than sitting with eyes shut beside Forest. Molly, on the other hand, found it was very relaxing. She had always been able to switch off her mind and float up into space, so she was very good at it.

As her mind drifted up like a cloud, bobbing above the Hollywood sign, and climbed farther until Sinclair’s house was too small to be visible and Los Angeles disappeared beneath her, Molly pondered on how minuscule she was. Twelve and a half million people lived in Los Angeles, and she was only
one
person in that vast population. As she floated higher in her imaginary universe and considered the
six billion
people in the world, Molly felt even tinier.

For a moment she let herself believe in Forest. If she
could
discover Cell’s passwords, if she
could
stop Cell from being sworn in as president, stop him from becoming the most powerful man in the world, then her action would be huge. Huger than huge.

As she floated, Molly felt microscopic and at the same time massive—a giddy combination. But it was good, because the small feeling stopped the big feeling from making Molly believe she was some sort of important, superhuman being.

“How do very famous people feel when they know that so many people in the world know them? Do they think they’re superhuman?” she asked Forest as she sat on the floor one day, sorting out good lumps of colored glass from bad ones.

“The stupid ones do,” said Forest. “The smart ones realize that they’ve been lucky to be born who they are—with talents, and lucky to have gotten into situations that catapult them to the top. They know fame doesn’t make a well-known person any better than an unknown person. Fame is like a pyramid, with really famous people at the top, less famous people underneath, and completely unknown people at the bottom, but happiness is like an
egg.
You can say that the happiest people are at the top of the egg, the middling happy ones are in the middle, and the unhappy ones at the bottom. There are lots of famous people who are unhappy, at the bottom of that egg. I’d rather be at the top of that egg than the top of the pyramid.”

“So,” Molly persisted, “why do people think fame is so special?”

“Maybe, wrongly, they think fame is the key to happiness.”

“I know lots of people who are always reading about the lives of the stars, and they wish they were famous too.”

“Those magazines are full of chicken dung. After a while, readers of those magazines start to feel that their
own
lives are chicken dung. And that’s not good, to think that your own life is chicken dung. Chicken dung stinks. I should know.”

Molly looked outside at a bantam that seemed to be laying an egg in one of Forest’s walking boots.

“Life’s like a summer vacation, Molly. It’s over in a flash. We’re all made of carbon molecules from stars and, in a flash, when we die, we’ll be that same stardust again.”

“So we may not all be stars,” said Molly, “but we
are
all stardust.”

“You got it.” Forest shut his eyes. “There’s power to be found when you discover the dust in yourself. Often, then, you find the big side of yourself too.”

Molly doubted that these life-probing conversations with Forest were going to lead her to Primo Cell’s passwords, but Forest didn’t seem to have any specific lessons for this telepathy that Sinclair had talked about.

“I feel your energy is good, Molly,” Forest continued.
“You must look for the nanu of small …”

“Who’s the Nanu of Small?” Molly asked, thinking the Nanu sounded like a wrinkled, billion-year-old person.

“It’s not a person. Nanu just means the smallest. If you look for the smallest of small in yourself, Molly, there you will find your true power.”

“Er, thanks,” said Molly. “I’ll remember that.” Sometimes, she thought, Forest was bang-out-there weird.

T
he few days of relaxing came to an abrupt end. Primo Cell had decided that his Washington headquarters were now under control. With his new presidential power, all sorts of money-making opportunities had opened up, and he was organizing a big conference for foreign businesspeople back in Los Angeles.

Sinclair arrived home one morning looking rattled. As he put his case down and the elevator door shut behind him, he said to Molly and Rocky, “I told Primo I had to go home to do some meditation with Forest, but he didn’t like it.”

His countenance was as gloomy as the gray weather outside. It was getting difficult, he explained, for him
to escape from Primo Cell at all. Primo wanted him to move into his mansion so that he could be on call day and night. Sinclair didn’t know how much longer he could keep up his act. He was finding it more and more of a strain to do what Primo told him. He was sure that Cell would soon smell a rotten haddock, and then, he knew, he’d finally get a dose of Cell’s eyes.

Molly and Rocky had been allowed to go for swims in Sinclair’s lap pool and for walks in the garden, but now, with his new paranoia, he forbade them to go out at all. Sinclair was worried that Cell might be spying on his house—he had often employed spies in the past, he said. Molly and Rocky had to stay hidden.

A fog descended. Molly wished she could get out of the house. She began a game of chess with Rocky, while Sinclair paced the room, occasionally gazing out at the view, lost in thought. Eventually he spoke.

“There is only one way of dealing with Primo.”

“You don’t mean kill him?” Molly glanced up from the chessboard. “We can’t. We’re not murderers.”

“How about a good hypnotist?”

Molly put down the pawn she was about to move and shook her head in disbelief. She knew what was going on in Sinclair’s mind. “Have you ever managed to hypnotize Cell, Sinclair?”

“I tried once,” said Sinclair. “When I was younger.
Primo thought it was funny. He knows I could never hypnotize him. My power is nothing to his. He’s got that extra something. There’s only one other person I’ve ever met who has it too.”

Petula whined. She felt Molly beginning to get agitated.

“Molly, you do have that extra something. You must know you do.” Sinclair plowed on. “When I saved you from the magpie, the only reason I was able to hypnotize you was because your strength had been exhausted. Otherwise you would have been able to resist me. When I saw those ads you did in New York, I recognized your true power. Your eyes are as powerful as Cell’s.”

Molly got up and walked to the far end of the window.

“Don’t make me try and hypnotize him, Sinclair,” she said, looking out. “Please don’t. I wouldn’t stand a chance. Not a chicken of a chance.”

“You would,” insisted Sinclair. “I really believe you could do it.”

“You have to say that,” Molly said sadly. “Because I’m your last hope.” She thought of Primo Cell sucking the memories out of her head and leaving her as empty as a dead packet of ketchup.

“This is so stupid,” she said. “There must be someone
other than
me
who can do this. A grown-up hypnotist. I don’t
want
to do it.”

“All the others have been overcome by Primo,” said Sinclair.

“Exactly, so what chance do I have?” cried Molly desperately.

“Sorry, sorry. I’m sorry,” said Sinclair. “You don’t have to do it. Of course you don’t.” He put his hands up against the glass of the window and leaned against it. “But please, think about it. It is your decision and I will completely understand if you decide not to risk it.” Sinclair swung around. “But listen, Molly, I can get
access
to Primo. He trusts me. We can get him when he’s off guard, when he’s just woken up or is tired at the end of the day. Just imagine, Molly.” Sinclair looked at his watch. “Drat, I have to go now or he’ll be wondering where I am. I’ve got to help him host a dinner. He’s got the head of the FBI and the deputy prime minister of Japan coming to meet Suky and Gloria.” Sinclair gave Molly and Rocky a grim smile. “I hope tonight’s not my last.”

Then he patted Petula, took a deep breath, and went off to find his coat.

Molly, Petula, and Rocky were left sitting looking out of the panoramic window.

Great big tears rolled down Molly’s cheeks.

“Sorry, Rocky,” she managed to say, through sniffs and hiccuping sobs, “but—but I don’t know what to do.”

Rocky took off a scarf that he’d wrapped around his wrist and gave it to her to wipe her nose on. He watched as his best friend shook with tears, and he felt terrible.

“There’s got to be another way,” said Molly at last. “I don’t want to end up with guacamole for a brain.”

“I think there is another way,” said Rocky thoughtfully. “And I think I know what it is.”

H
ow, you might ask, could a person of Primo Cell’s position and with his immense power be brought down without Molly having to hypnotize him? The answer was, by attacking him from a completely unexpected direction.

The best form of attack is always surprise, and Rocky’s solution relied on this. He said that a head-on collision with Cell would never work. When Molly found out what his idea was, she refused to let Rocky risk his life alone and insisted on being the one who carried out the plan. Someone still had to face Cell, but it was in such a surprising way that Molly wanted to be that someone.

Two days later, Sinclair left to oversee the final arrangements for Primo’s conference for foreign
business leaders. The conference was being held at the Cell Center, but it began with a formal reception and lunch at Primo’s house.

Early that morning, a top Hollywood makeup artist and costumer arrived at Sinclair’s home. Of course, they had been hypnotized.

The two professionals set to work, and Molly watched with fascination as the tall, long-fingered master of disguise turned Rocky into somebody else.

From eight to nine, he worked on a new nose for him. Using special prosthetic rubber, he molded a majestic, chiseled nose onto his face. From nine to ten, he worked on wrinkles and hair, giving Rocky dense black eyebrows and a short, dark beard. Rocky was put in padded underwear to make him look rotund, and then he was dressed in a black, embroidered robe called a
dishdasha
and a red-and-white head covering tied about with a band. The finished result was fantastic. Rocky looked like an authentic Arab.

“It’s hot in here,” he complained to Sinclair. “What’s my name again?”

“Sheikh Yalaweet. You’re one of the richest oil magnates in Saudi Arabia.”

“And you’re sure the real Yalaweet’s not going to turn up?”

“Absolutely sure. I told him the meeting was postponed.”

“How about his size? Are you sure he’s as small as me?”

“Once you get these platform shoes on,” promised the costumer, “you’ll be exactly five foot three, and that’s how tall the sheikh is.”

“Well, I might get away with it as long as I don’t have to say anything,” said Rocky nervously.

While the finishing touches were being made on Rocky, Molly paid a visit to Forest’s workshop. He was dipping a piece of glass into a bowl of chemicals.

“It’s nearly ready,” he said. Molly thought how she’d love to stay there all day with him. As if reading her mind, he patted her head and said, “The nanu of small will protect you, Molly, don’t you worry.” Even though this didn’t make sense, for some reason it did make Molly feel better.

Upstairs, Molly took her turn to be transformed. She was dressed as Sheikha Yalaweet, the sheikh’s wife. Like Rocky, she had padding to make her bigger, a flowing robe called an
abaya
—Molly’s was purple—and platform shoes for height. But she didn’t need much makeup, as her head was covered in a veil and her face, except for her eyes, was hidden by a black silk
niqab.
Around her eyes, her skin was tinted a darker hue.