Science Fair (19 page)

Toby made up his mind: he’d go to Jungle Norman’s. As soon as SecretAgentMan revealed himself, Toby would press the sunglasses icon on the iPhone to summon Sternabite. If there was trouble, he’d also press the wand icon and disappear. And as a precaution, he’d let somebody know—somebody other than Sternabite—where he was going to be, so if worse came to worst they could tel his parents. Toby started to dial Micah’s cel phone but then changed his mind; Tamara was more levelheaded. She answered on the first ring.

“Are you cal ing to see if I stil hate you?” she said. “Okay, since you ask, yes.”

Toby winced. “That’s not why I’m cal ing,” he whispered.

“Why are you whispering?”

“I don’t want my mom to hear. I need to tel you something.”

“Wel , whatever it is, make it quick, so I can get back to doing nothing for the rest of my entire life except be grounded.” Toby winced again. “Listen,” he said. “I’m going to Jungle Norman’s.”

“Is that why you cal ed? I’m afraid I can’t join you, because, as I believe I mentioned, I’m grounded for the rest of my entire—”

“No,” interrupted Toby. “I just want somebody to know where I am, in case.”

“In case what?” said Tamara, her voice suddenly serious.

“In case…something happens,” said Toby.

“Like what?”

Toby briefly summarized Sternabite’s plan to draw the enemy out, Toby’s failure to get into the school, and his IM exchange with SecretAgentMan about the meeting at Jungle Norman’s.

“You’re not actual y going to
meet
him, are you?” said Tamara.

“Yes, I am,” said Toby. “What if he can help us?”

“You can’t possibly think that’s for real! He’s obviously planning to do something bad to you!”

“Maybe,” said Toby. “But there’l be tons of people around at Jungle Norman’s. And Sternabite’s gonna back me up.”

“Sternabite’s insane,” noted Tamara.

“Insane,” agreed Toby, “but smart. He gave me this device.”

“What device?”

“A device that makes me invisible.”

“What?”

“For real. It uses an iPhone.”

There was a pause, then Tamara said, “Have you been experimenting with your parents’ vitamin supplements?”

“Tamara, I swear, this thing is amazing! People can’t see you! Unless they’re wearing polarized sunglasses.”

“Sunglasses?” said Tamara.

“Real y!” Toby looked at his watch. “Listen, I gotta go. If anything happens, remember I was going to Jungle Norman’s, okay?”

“Toby—”

“Gotta go.” Toby disconnected. The phone rang again almost immediately. Toby looked at the screen and saw it was Tamara cal ing back. He ignored it and went back out the window. He looked at his watch again: he had to be at Jungle Norman’s in twenty minutes. No way he’d make it on foot. He grabbed his bike, which was leaning against the side of the house, and hopped on. He was about to start pedaling when he realized that his mom might see him out the kitchen window. He decided he had no choice but to become invisible, even though this meant somebody might see the bike apparently riding by itself. He tapped the wand on the iPhone.

Next door, the Harbingers’ neighbor, Mrs. Penin, was having a glass of wine and watching the TV news. She glanced out the window and saw a bicycle pedaling furiously out of Milkwort Court.

She didn’t see anybody riding the bicycle.

Mrs. Penin rose, walked to the kitchen sink, and poured her wine down the drain.

I
NSIDE THE WHITE
, government-issue Ford sedan parked across the street from the Shady Inn Motor Court, the mood was less than perky. The aroma wasn’t so great, either. The two FBI agents—Iles and Turow—had been living in the car for two days now, watching Room 17 and surviving mainly on Red Bul and Cheez-Its, food purchased from a nearby convenience store. They were tired, grumpy, and increasingly smel y.

They were also bored. Almost nothing had happened since they’d begun the stakeout. The only action had been the delivery of two boxes to the suspects’ motel room. Iles and Turow had reported this to their supervisor, hoping he would tel them to arrest the suspects or question the delivery man, or
something
. But he had ordered them to continue the stakeout. And so they had, taking turns sleeping and watching the door to Room 17, while their white shirts and dark suits slowly turned orange from Cheez-It dust.

Currently, Agent Turow was on duty, staring dul y out the window and listening to Agent Iles snore. Turow wondered how his partner could sleep through the racket he was making; the man sounded like a defective chain saw.

Then the door to Room 17 opened.

“Hey,” said Turow, nudging Iles.

Iles sputtered awake. “What?”

Turow pointed at the door. Drmtsi and Vrsk were coming out of their room, surrounded by a bil owing white cloud.

“Is that
smoke
?” asked Iles.

“Steam,” said Turow. “I hope.”

“What are they doing in there?” said Iles.

“No idea,” said Turow.

The agents slouched low in their car as Drmtsi and Vrsk headed across the parking lot in their direction. At the sidewalk, they turned toward the main street. When they reached it they hesitated, then turned right and set off at a brisk pace. Iles started the Ford and eased it away from the curb. Turow flipped his cel phone open and hit the speed dial.

“They’re moving on foot,” he said. “North on Fenster, toward downtown. Right. Okay.” He closed the phone, turned to Iles, and said, “He said to stay with them.”

“Duh,” said Iles. He turned right on the main street, staying about twenty-five yards behind Drmtsi and Vrsk, who were stil walking fast.

“You snore, you know,” said Turow.

“That’s what my wife says,” said Iles. “I don’t hear it.”

“I think people in Baltimore could hear it.”

“It’s that bad? Real y?”

Turow was about to answer when his phone chirped. He flipped it open. “Hel o?”

Turow listened for a few moments, then said, “Stil northbound on Fenster Avenue. Uh-huh.” He said “Uhhuh” a few more times, then “Okay,” and he flipped the phone closed.

“Whoa,” he said.

“What?” said Iles.

“The bureau got a cal ,” said Turow. “Anonymous, from a pay phone around here. The cal er says these two”—he pointed at Drmtsi and Vrsk—“are trafficking in classified technology.
Highly
classified. Cal er says they’re on their way to an exchange right now.” Iles snorted. “Classified technology?
These
clowns? It has to be a hoax.”

“That’s what they thought at the Bureau,” said Turow. “Except the cal er gave them the name and serial number of some kind of highly specialized computer chip. So the Bureau checked it out with the Defense Department. And guess what.”

“It’s real?”

“It’s not only real, but it’s supposed to be top secret. And guess what else?”

Iles opened his mouth to speak, but Turow answered his own question. “The chip with that particular serial number is missing. Nobody is supposed to know that. So Defense is very interested in this.
Very.
”

“Whoa,” said Iles. “So what do we do now?”

“First,” said Turow, “we do
not
lose these guys.”

Iles drove the Ford a little faster.

“Easy,” said Turow. “We also don’t want to spook them. If there’s gonna be an exchange, we let it happen.”

“Then we take them down?” said Iles hopeful y. A high-profile espionage arrest could do a lot of good for an FBI agent’s career.

“Dream on,” said Turow. “Everyone wants a piece of this. Half the Bureau’s gonna be here in five minutes, not to mention about nineteen other agencies.”

“Oh, man,” said Iles, looking down at his Cheez-It-colored suit. “Al that brass coming, and we look like traffic cones.”

“We don’t smel so great either,” said Turow.

“Look,” said Iles. “They’re stopping.”

Drmtsi and Vrsk had stopped in front of a strip shopping center in the middle of which was a large building whose wal s were covered with mucus-colored fiberglass panels.

Apparently, the panels were supposed to look like grass, so that the building resembled a giant mutant grass hut. A fiberglass giraffe poked its long neck through the roof, its grinning giraffe head hovering over a huge neon sign that read, JUNGLE NORMAN’S PIZZA PARTY PLACE.

Drmtsi and Vrsk studied the building for a moment, then crossed the parking lot and went inside. Turow grabbed his cel phone and hit the speed dial again.

“It’s Turow,” he said. “Hey, we just observed the suspects entering twenty-thirty-eight North Fenster. An establishment cal ed Jungle Norman’s. Yes. J-u-n-g-l-e.” He listened for a moment, nodded, then said, “Copy that.” He closed the phone.

“Copy what?” said Iles.

“We’re going to cover the exits,” said Turow. “I’l take the back. We are not to enter the premises, not to engage the suspects until directed.” Iles said a bad word.

Turow said, “There’s an insertion team in a chopper on its way.” As he spoke, they heard the
whup-whup-whup
of an approaching helicopter.

“That was fast,” said Iles, yanking the Ford over to the curb. The two agents quickly climbed out. Turow headed around back of the shopping center; Iles jogged toward the front door of Jungle Norman’s. As they ran, both men brushed their dark suits, trying, without much success, to get rid of the Cheez-It dust.

I
T WAS A TYPICAL FRIDAY EVENING
at Jungle Norman’s Pizza Party Place, meaning it was a cross between a school recess and a prison riot. There were fourteen birthday parties going on simultaneously, and the huge room echoed with the earsplitting din of dozens of sugar-crazed children running, shoving, laughing, shouting, shrieking, crying, and fighting for turns on the various video games, at least half of which were out of order.

Toby, having made himself visible again, covered his ears as he picked his way through the chaos toward a group of long tables swarming with more shrieking kids and tended by harried waiters wearing safari outfits. The tables were littered with pizza crusts, fries, ketchup blobs, spil ed drinks, and giant gooey smears that had once been birthday cakes. An air war had erupted between two of the tables, with a party of eight-year-old boys hurling chicken nuggets at a party of seven-year-old boys, who retaliated by throwing cupcakes, one of which had just knocked the princess tiara off the head of a sobbing five-year-old birthday girl at a third table. Parents at al three of these tables were shouting at their children, at other people’s children, and at the parents of other people’s children. None of this shouting had any effect on anybody.

The tables were grouped around a low stage, on which was Toby’s objective, the centerpiece attraction of the Jungle Norman experience: the Jivin’ Jungle Jammers. This was a band made up of five large, brightly colored robot animals: Ernest Elephant on drums, Harriet Hippo on keyboards, Gina Giraffe on guitar, Leon Lion on saxophone, and Gordon Goril a, the MC and lead singer, who wore a purple top hat. Every few minutes the band would come to life and go through its computerized routine. First, Gordon Goril a told some stunningly unfunny jungle jokes. (“Why are bananas never lonely? Because they hang around in bunches!”) Then the band performed “Happy Birthday,” fol owed by some songs that had been popular, or at least vaguely familiar, several decades earlier, when Jungle Norman’s had first opened.

As Toby neared the stage, the Jivin’ Jungle Jammers were performing an anemic version of the Pointer Sisters’ “Jump (For My Love).” A wedge of pepperoni pizza soared graceful y over three party tables and landed on Harriet Hippo’s nose. Toby, remembering SecretAgentMan’s instruction, got as close as he could to Gordon Goril a. He turned and quickly ducked as a cupcake whizzed past. Then, with his back to the stage, he scanned the crowd, not sure what or who he was looking for. He glanced down to make sure he had the iPhone clipped to his belt; he hoped the fragile fiber-optic filaments hadn’t been damaged as he pushed his way through the crowd. He resumed scanning, watching, waiting.

“Toby!”

Toby, startled, turned and saw Tamara and Micah working their way through the crowd toward him.

“What are
you
doing here?” he said, as they reached the stage.