Monkey Trouble (3 page)

“I didn’t take your camera,” Annika replied. “I only have this one.” She held up her camera.

Mr. Newton began to break the students into small groups. “Jessie and Violet will go with Sophie and Nico back to the giraffe exhibit.” He pointed in the direction of the giraffes.

“I’ll go with Benny and Blake to the butterflies,” Henry suggested. “That was our first stop after lunch.”

“I’ll go with you, Henry,” Annika said. “Even though Blake accused me of being a thief, I’ll still help look around.” Annika huffed. “I’ll prove I am innocent.”

“Fine. That’s the second group. Blake, Henry, Benny, and Annika,” said Mr. Newton.

“Where do we go?” the Cho twins asked at the same time.

“You two can come along with me,” Mr. Newton said. He gathered everyone else into his group, too. Then he took the flag from Benny. “My team is heading back to the hummingbirds and then to the alligators.” Mr. Newton checked his watch. “We are going to meet in half an hour under the big banner announcing the baby monkeys.” He pointed at a nearby sign with a picture of little monkeys hanging from a tree. “It’s not very far from here. If you don’t see me, look for the flag.”

Mr. Newton wished the students good luck, and everyone went on their separate ways.

“Come on,” Henry told Blake and his group. They began to head off to the butterfly pavilion. “We’re going to find that camera.”

“I hope so,” Blake said. “But I’m sure we won’t. I know it was stolen.”

“How do we get to the giraffes?” Violet asked Jessie as they headed in a different direction.

Pushing his shaggy hair out of his eyes, Nico looked closely at the sign that Mr. Newton had shown them. “That way is the monkeys,” he said. “I see the signs for hippos and elephants. But there isn’t a picture of giraffes.”

“Forget it,” Sophie said. “Let’s skip the giraffes. There’s no way that Blake lost the camera there. It would be a huge waste of time to walk all the way back to the giraffes.”

“We told Mr. Newton and Henry we’d go to the giraffes. We better do what we said.” Jessie hurried over to a man in a zoo uniform selling balloons and asked for directions.

The man took a map out of his pocket. He said, “We are here.” He pointed to the jaguar exhibit. “You need to head that way.”

“Okay, thanks,” Jessie said, taking the map from the man. “Let’s hurry. We only have half an hour.”

Nico took off toward the giraffes, saying, “Long-neck friends, here we come!”

Nico got there first. Jessie and Violet were right behind him. They started looking around for the camera. But moments later, Jessie realized that Sophie wasn’t with them.

“Oh no,” Jessie said. “Not again. This is just like when Benny thought she was missing the last time we were here.”

Jessie and Violet stopped looking for the camera and searched for Sophie instead. They searched for a tall girl with blond hair in the zoo crowds, but couldn’t find her.

Giving up for the moment, they went to get Nico instead.

“I can’t find the camera anywhere,” Nico told the girls the instant they approached. “I even looked down there.” He pointed over the fence to where the baby giraffe was eating leaves from a low bush. “But there’s no camera on the ground of the habitat.”

“No camera,” Jessie said. “And, no Sophie either.”

“What do you mean?” Nico asked, peering over Jessie’s shoulder. “She’s behind you.”

Jessie swung her head around. Sophie was a little ways back from the giraffe cage, close to where they’d stopped to eat lunch.

“What? How?” Violet was confused. “I am sure she wasn’t over there a second ago.”

Jessie walked over to the picnic area. “Where were you?” she asked.

Sophie pointed at the tables. “I was checking the lunch area.” She looked at Nico. “Any luck?”

“Nah,” Nico said. “You?”

“Nope,” Sophie said, glancing over at the giraffes with a shiver. “Let’s get out of here.”

As they walked away, Jessie put her hand on Violet’s arm, a silent sign to hang back. Jessie was still holding her notebook in her hand. “I think if no one finds the camera, Sophie should be our first suspect.”

“I thought we weren’t accusing anyone yet,” Violet said to her sister.

“I’m just thinking,” Jessie said. She then jotted down Sophie’s name in her book. “Sophie didn’t want to look for the camera, and then, once we got here, she disappeared. Maybe she doesn’t want to look because she’s the one who took it.”

“Why would Sophie take it?” Violet asked.

“She wanted a camera and couldn’t afford one, right?” Jessie answered.

“But if she suddenly had a new camera this afternoon, everyone would know it wasn’t hers,” Violet said.

“You’re right,” Jessie said. “But, she’s acting so strangely, it makes me wonder what’s going on.”

Violet pressed her lips together, considering Jessie’s words. “She does keep on disappearing. Hmmm.” Violet paused. “Okay,” she said at last. “If no one finds the camera by the time we all meet at the monkeys, Sophie Webb will be suspect number one in Blake’s missing camera mystery.”

B
enny, Henry, Annika, and Blake didn’t find the camera at the butterfly exhibit, so they hurried on to catch up with the rest of the group.

“There! That’s where we’re supposed to meet Mr. Newton.” Benny rushed up to a cage where little monkeys were swinging from trees and playing with ropes. “Those are the baby monkeys.”

“Where is the banner that Mr. Newton mentioned?” Henry looked all around. “I don’t see him or the rest of the group.”

Pushing through a crowd of tourists, Henry looked closely at the monkeys. “Those aren’t babies,” Henry told Benny. “They are capuchins. From—” He leaned in to see the sign. “—South America. It says here that the average capuchin weighs no more than six pounds.”

“They’re not babies?” Benny asked. “Hmm. They sure look like babies to me.”

“Figures,” Blake said, pressing in next to Henry and Benny. “We’re in the wrong place.”

“But we can’t be far,” Benny told him. “This whole area is full of monkeys. We just need to find the baby ones. Ack!” Benny jumped back, surprised, when one of the little capuchins swung onto a branch right in front of him. “Oooh, oooh!” the monkey squawked at him.

“He’s trying to play with you,” Henry told Benny.

The little monkey pointed at Benny’s backpack.

“You want my snacks, don’t you?” Benny asked. “Sorry. I’m just an assistant zoologist, so I don’t know what monkeys eat. And I only have people food in my pack.” Benny waved at the monkey.

The monkey waved back, then pointed at Benny’s pack again.

It was like a game. The monkey would point and Benny would wave, and the monkey always waved back.

Finally, Blake said, “We better find the rest of the group. It’s already been half an hour.”

“When we find them, I hope they have your camera,” Annika added, shaking her head. “I really wish we’d found it.” She looked at Blake. “Stop staring at me,” she said. “I can tell you still think I took it.”

“Well, who else would it be?” Blake asked her. “Do you think Benny took it?”

“Me?” Benny asked, eyes wide. “I didn’t steal any cameras!”

His red hair glittered in the sunlight as Blake gave a little smile. “I know. You had no reason to steal it. The only person who had a reason is Annika.”

At that, Annika turned and dumped her purse onto a nearby bench. She emptied her coat pockets. She even turned her jeans pockets inside out. “See?!” she told Blake. “No camera except this one.” She held up her camera. “Mine. Not yours.”

“I still think—” Blake started, but Henry cut him off.

“Maybe one of the other groups found your camera, Blake,” Henry said.

“Let’s try going this way.” Benny pointed around the back of the capuchin cage. “See ya,” he told his new little friend.

And just then, the little monkey fiddled with the cage door. To everyone’s surprise, the door opened.

The next thing Benny knew, the monkey was sitting on his shoulder, trying to get into Benny’s pack.

“Oh no!” Benny said, trying to pull his pack away. “Help! A monkey broke out of his cage!”

“Hold still,” a voice echoed through the crowd. A zookeeper had been feeding the chimpanzees their lunch in a cage across the way. He heard Benny’s call for help. “I’m on my way,” the zookeeper called.

A tourist holding an ice cream cone was surprised as the little capuchin leapt off Benny’s backpack and made a grab for his dessert. “Get away!” the man shouted.

The man’s wife waved her arms wildly to chase the monkey away. “Don’t let the monkey near any children!” she cried.

The monkey gave up on the ice cream cone and jumped through the crowd.

In the short minute it took for the zookeeper to arrive, the little monkey had stolen a pretzel from a girl and an apple from a boy in a stroller.

The little boy’s mother started yelling. “Help! The monkey’s after my kids!”

The monkey dashed around. The zookeeper was now after him, shouting to the people in the crowd, “Don’t panic. Simio is not dangerous. Stay still and I’ll catch him.”

“There you are!” Mr. Newton came up to where Henry, Annika, Blake, and Benny were standing, watching the zookeeper chase the monkey. The rest of the tour group was with him.

“What is going on?!” Mr. Newton said. He shoved his glasses back up his nose and looked around. “Seems like we have monkey trouble. I can’t believe Simio escaped
again.
Zookeeper Frank told me that they found him over by the butterflies earlier today. We keep changing the cage door lock, but he opens it every time. Simio is a clever capuchin.”

“And a hungry monkey, too,” Benny said. He watched Simio take a bite of a little girl’s cotton candy. The monkey now wore a pink fuzzy beard.

“Maybe you should change his name to Houdini,” Henry suggested.

“Who-di-ni?” Benny asked.

“Harry Houdini was a famous escape artist and magician,” Jessie told him. “He could get out of any cage.”

“Funny,” Mr. Newton said with a small laugh. “That’s definitely a more fitting name than Simio.
Simio
is a scientific name for monkeys in Spanish.” Then Mr. Newton heard a shout behind him. “I better go help Zookeeper Frank,” he said.

Zookeeper Frank had Simio cornered by a rock. The zookeeper reached forward, but like lightning, Simio jumped up and scampered away. Frustrated, Zookeeper Frank told Mr. Newton to call the security office. “We need a tranquilizer gun,” he said.

“Oh no! You can’t shoot him,” Violet put her hands on her cheeks. “That would be terrible. Monkeys are my favorite! I don’t want to see one hurt!”

“It’s not so bad, Violet,” Henry said to his sister. “They’ll shoot him with a dart that has medicine on the tip. It’ll make Simio go to sleep. Once he’s sleeping, they can carry him back to his cage.”

“I don’t like that plan,” Violet said, shaking her head. “There must be something else we can do!”

They rushed over to Zookeeper Frank and Mr. Newton. All the other kids in the tour group followed them. When they got close, the children heard a woman’s voice over Mr. Newton’s walkie-talkie speaker. “Security,” a woman answered. “What’s the situation?”

While Mr. Newton explained to the security officer what was going on at the monkey habitat, Benny pulled off his backpack and set it down. “Zookeeper Frank? Do capuchins like fruit?”

“Yes, they do. Capuchin monkeys eat a lot of fruit. They also eat nuts, seeds, and even insects,” the zookeeper answered.

Benny pulled an apple out of his pack. He gave an orange to Henry and Jessie. Then passed a banana to Violet. “Maybe Simio will follow a fruit trail to his cage?”

“Great idea!” Zookeeper Frank told Benny. “If we can get him back into the cage, then we won’t have to tranquilize him.” He agreed to help the Alden children try their plan.

Henry unpeeled the orange and took a bite. He let the juice drip a little on his chin. “Yummmm,” he said in a clear, loud voice.

Jessie stepped closer to the cage. She opened her orange, too, and waved part of the peel. “Come and get it,” she said.

The monkey glanced from Henry to Jessie and back again. Then, slowly, very slowly, he stepped forward. Just a little.

“I’ll open the cage,” Zookeeper Frank told Benny in a whispered voice. When the door was open, he told Benny to stand next to the entry. Zookeeper Frank blocked the door so none of the other monkeys in the habitat could escape. They were all high up in the trees, swinging from limb to limb.

Simio took a bite of the orange Henry held in his hand and then jumped over the heads of Griffin and Matthew to where Jessie stood. Griffin took a quick photo of the little monkey.

“If he gets a hold of the orange, he’ll jump into a tree to eat it,” Zookeeper Frank told the children. “Don’t let him have the whole thing.”

Simio licked at the orange tightly held in Jessie’s hand. “He likes it,” she whispered.

Violet stood a little closer to the cage door, eating a bite of banana.

Bored with Jessie’s orange, Simio leapt toward Violet. His sudden move surprised her, and she very nearly dropped the banana.

“Just hold tight,” Zookeeper Frank told her. “Simio might be very energetic, but he’s also very friendly.”