The Boy Who Could Fly. Laura RubyЧитать онлайн книгу.
could be convinced to give that information up. It was a small chance, but it was one that must be taken.
But the children would be difficult to get to. Freelancers, unfortunately, would have to be hired. Mr Fuss could not afford to be associated with the plan until the mission was completed.
Mr Fuss refolded the articles and clipped them into the planner. The planner then went back into the coat pocket. Suddenly, Mr Fuss was very tired. And in addition to formulating some sort of plan to find the pen, he still had four other unfinished tasks on his list for today. Ah well. He could go get himself a “magic” pretzel first. And he would take the subway uptown. Unlike most people who lived in the city, Mr Fuss enjoyed the subway. It was quiet and gloomy and most of the idiots who thought they could fly didn’t bother with it. He didn’t even mind the alligators. Sweet, really, when you got to know them. Mr Fuss took a moment to admire his own alligator-skin boots.
Mr Fuss stood up from the bench, walked over to the Bleecker Street subway station and trudged down the steps.
There, at the bottom of the steps, was a leather-clad, Mohawk-haired, combat boot–wearing Punk spray-painting a message on the wall: SID WAS HERE. Next to this, the Punk had painted something that looked like a beetle or maybe a happy face with a birthday hat. It was difficult to tell. Still, the Punk was concentrating on this bit of nonsense as if it were the finest work of art that had ever been painted.
Hmmm, thought Mr Fuss. This could work.
After about ten minutes, the Punk noticed Mr Fuss. “Whatcha lookin’ at?” he snarled, his wolfish eyes black as, er, black.
Mr Fuss smiled politely. “You’re quite the artist.”
The Punk blinked. “Not that anyone appreciates it.”
“Oh,” said Mr Fuss, “I am a great appreciator of art like yours. Outsider art – art produced by those people outside the traditional art establishment.”
“I’m not in any tradition,” the Punk barked. “I’m not in any establishment.”
“Of course you’re not,” said Mr Fuss smoothly. “You know, I believe you could make a lot of money. If you knew the right people.”
“I could?”
“Oh, absolutely.”
The Punk set his spray can on the ground. “Are you the right people?”
Mr Fuss smiled. “I am exactly the right people.”
The Saddest Little Rich Girl in the Universe
Her given name was Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington, and she was, literally, The Richest Girl in the Universe. Most people would find this to be a pleasant situation involving lots of shopping and diamonds and yachting around the Mediterranean, but not Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington. She didn’t care much about having more money than everyone else.
But other people cared.
A lot.
People like Roma Radisson.
Roma Radisson was officially The Second-richest Girl in the Universe. And she was not happy about it. Roma was doing her very best to make sure that everybody, especially Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington, knew it.
“I hope you all found the dinosaurs as fascinating as I did! Next up is the Hall of Primitive Mammals,” said Ms Storia as she led the girls of the Prince School through the American Museum of Natural History.
“Primitive Mammals,” Roma repeated. “Well, Georgetta Bloomington should be right at home.”
As the other girls snickered, Georgetta, or Georgie, as her parents called her, flushed angrily and looked down at the floor. She had been at the Prince School for just three weeks, but she had already spent many days flushing angrily and staring at the floors. And now here she was, on her very first school trip, counting dots in the tiles while she tried to follow her parents’ advice. Just ignore it. But just ignoring it wasn’t going so well.
“I hear that those ancient mammals were giants, too,” Roma said. “Maybe there’s a giant monkey in there. Maybe it’s your long-lost aunt.”
You’re the monkey, thought Georgie. Except that was too stupid to say. Also, an insult to monkeys. Dunkleosteus, a vicious sea predator with jaws so sharp they could cut through bone – now that was more like Roma. Georgie almost said so, but she knew that just saying the word Dunkleosteus would get her labelled the worst sort of egghead-nerd-freak. At the Prince School, it was not cool to know things.
“That’s enough, Roma,” said Ms Storia, as if that was going to stop Roma. Roma had been keeping up a steady stream of insults since they came to the museum. Georgie was related to the walrus. Georgie was related to the squid (which Roma had wrongly called an octopus. Georgie made the mistake of pointing out the obvious differences between a squid and an octopus, something that Roma said only proved her point).
But this time Roma shrugged and flounced into the Hall of Primitive Mammals, her fire-red hair a beacon for the others. Wherever Roma went, the other girls of the Prince School quickly followed. The only one who didn’t was the senior girl acting as a chaperone, who seemed to prefer the long-dead animals on display to the pack of princesses she was supposed to be chaperoning.
Georgie tried to hide in the middle of the pack, tuning out Ms Storia’s talk about how the platypus had so many primitive features it was called a “living fossil” and wasn’t that just fascinating? Georgie wished she were back at home with her parents, discussing their plans for the day, the way they had all winter and into the spring. Some days, they went to one of the city’s many museums. Most days, they went to the library and picked out books for Georgie to read. Even though The Richest Girl in the Universe could have purchased every book in the city and still have enough left over to buy a few planets, Georgie thought it was lovely to be able to borrow any book you wanted, and then bring it back and exchange it for another.
Before you think Georgie a skull short of a full skeleton, you must understand that there were very good reasons for Georgie’s lack of interest in the truly mind-boggling amount of money she had. You see, Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington wasn’t always The Richest Girl in the Universe. As a matter of fact, she wasn’t always known as Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington. Just six months before, Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington was a girl named Gurl who lived in a miserable orphanage. There, she spent much of her time daydreaming about a happy life, a real life, without ever expecting to live one. But reality turned out to be more mind-boggling than any daydream. Half a year ago, she learned a lot of things about her life, among them:
1 That she had been kidnapped by the gangster Sweetcheeks Grabowski when she was just a baby.
2 That she was subsequently lost by the gangster Sweetcheeks Grabowski because of a special power she had, the power to turn herself invisible.
3 That she was found by a homeless woman and given to an orphanage called Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless.
4 That Georgie escaped Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless with the help of her good friend Bug, who turned out to be none other than the son of the gangster Sweetcheeks Grabowski.
5 That her real parents were The Richest Couple in the Universe. And finally:
6 That this was an awful lot for a person to take in and still remain sane.
But Georgie was doing her best to adjust to her new life as well as she could, and that included trying to ignore the snotty second-, third-and fourth-richest girls in the universe and paying attention on school trips. Up ahead, Ms Storia was