Chapter 54 #2
Uncle Alec had arranged for her to join Father Reilly’s weekly addicts’ meetings, and she was now a regular there, along with many other fans of the band, who all had suffered a great disappointment and heartbreak when Daniel Bozek had been arrested.
“It was in the garden shed next door,” said Clarice. “I went in looking for rats but found a giant bumblebee instead. Not the edible kind, unfortunately. Turns out the Germinator is really Ted Trapper—which doesn’t surprise me one bit. I thought I recognized his voice.”
“The Germinator is Ted?” asked Marge as she clasped a hand to her face.
Murmurs of surprise and shock echoed through the small gathering, and all eyes turned to Ted, whose face had taken on a quite dark purplish hue.
I thought for a moment that the man might have a heart attack. Fortunately for him, there was a doctor nearby. Though judging from the look on Tex’s face, it wasn’t a given that he would go to the trouble of resuscitating his neighbor, should the latter collapse.
“You are the Germinator, Ted?” asked Tex as he held up the costume.
Ted nodded. “I’m afraid so, neighbor.”
“But… but why?”
Ted shrugged. “I mean, why not? Life as an accountant is pretty boring. I felt I needed some excitement. And when I saw a documentary about a guy who decided to become a superhero and had the time of his life, not to mention the admiration and the gratitude of his neighbors, I figured I might give it a shot. I hadn’t expected it to go this far, though. ”
“I don’t believe this,” Officer Bill Marvel murmured. He appeared quite crushed. Looked like his investigation hadn’t been as thorough as he had imagined.
“You are the Germinator?” asked Marcie. “But Ted!”
“I’m sorry, honey,” said Ted ruefully. “I wanted to tell you, but I thought you wouldn’t approve.”
“Of course I don’t approve! You put yourself in danger! You could have died!”
“I was very careful. I always used my germicide spray, and those crooks were always very nice about the whole thing. None of them tried to shoot me or anything.”
“Look at Tex’s face, you guys,” said Brutus. “I think he’s going to explode.”
He was right. The doctor looked pretty upset.
“I admired you, Ted!” he burst out. “I thought you were the bee’s knees!”
“Bee’s knees,” Gran giggled. “Funny.” When the others all gave her disapproving looks, she explained, “Because he’s a bumblebee? No? Oh, all right. I’ll shut up now.”
“I’m sorry, Tex,” said Ted. “But I couldn’t tell you, could I? You would have given the game away.”
“So that’s why you were so tired all the time!” said Marcie. “Because you were out all night, fighting crime!”
Ted hung his head in shame. “At first, I figured I’d just do it once or twice, but when people all reacted so nicely, I got carried away, and after a while, I wanted to don the costume each and every night. To get out there and fight crime. Like Chase does. Or Alec.”
“It is intoxicating to right wrongs,” Chase agreed.
“Oh, Ted,” said Marcie as she placed a hand on her husband’s arm. “I think you did a great job, honey. But maybe now it’s time to stop? Get your life back?”
“The whole thing did get away from me,” Ted admitted.
Tex’s face was working. “You fooled me,” he announced as he threw down the costume. “You made a fool of me!”
“That was never my intention,” said Ted. “I just didn’t want you to know. I have to say I found it very touching, the way you asked for my autograph last night, Tex. And I would have given it to you, but I couldn’t let you find out my true identity.”
Tex plunked himself down on a chair. He looked beat. “I thought you were the real deal.”
“I know, buddy,” said Ted. “And I’m sorry.”
“Are those… tears?” asked Brutus.
“I think so,” said Harriet, referring to the water that seemed to be leaking out of Tex’s eyes. “It’s either that or he has been too close to raw onions.”
And since we didn’t see any raw onions anywhere, it looked like Ted had finally done it: he had made his neighbor cry.
The rest of the meal was enjoyed in a slightly suppressed atmosphere, but then the human spirit eventually manifested its resilience, and things soon turned around. Especially when Ted decided to bring out a special wine he had been saving for the occasion and shared it with Tex.
Before long, the two men were engaged in a long and fruitful conversation, though I have to say that the more they drank, the louder they got.
It’s an odd thing about humans, isn’t it? But then I guess you can’t hold it against them. They simply aren’t equipped to handle their liquor well.
As the party dragged on into the night, the eight of us decided to leave and soon were on our way to the park for cat choir and dog choir.
Pippy, who had decided to join us for her first foray to dog choir, had been assured by Fifi and Rufus that she would enjoy it tremendously.
“Finally,” said Harriet. “Finally we are making our grand return to cat choir, you guys!”
She was right. What with one thing and another, it had been a while since we had managed to get to the park, and we were all glad for things to return to normal.
After all, what is life in Hampton Cove without our nightly routine of cat choir? Even though I can’t sing, I enjoy it tremendously, and so do all of my friends.
It had been a long and harrowing adventure. We had been locked up and set on fire, nearly been blown to pieces, and had driven around in a tank. We met a superhero who wasn’t a superhero but neighbor Ted, and had chased a vicious killer in the dead of night.
And now, at the end of it all, we were still standing.
We had deserved a nice treat, and cat choir was just what the doctor ordered.
“What is going to happen to our OBE, Max?” asked Dooley as we approached the park.
“What do you mean, Dooley?” I said.
“Well, we haven’t really got anything to show for it, have we? The queen told us that we had our OBEs, but she didn’t hand us any medals or anything.”
“Even if she had handed us our medals, they would have been so tiny that we wouldn’t have been able to see them,” I said. “So it’s probably better that we didn’t get them.”
“I guess,” he said dubiously. “I still would have liked to have received a nice medal. A genuine OBE, you know.”
I put a paw around his shoulders. “You know what? I’ll ask Odelia to order us a couple of nice medals online. Then you can wear yours whenever you like. How does that sound?”
His face lit up. “Max, you are a true friend.”
“Hey, that’s what friends are for, right?”
By then, Brutus and Harriet had overheard us, along with Rufus, Fifi, Pippy, and even Clarice. They all wanted in, claiming they’d missed out on something special.
It looked as if the ant queen would soon have to venture out of her colony again to hand out a few more OBEs.
I guess everyone wants an OBE in the end—even when it’s being bestowed by a queen of ants.
THE END
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