Hoot by Carl Hiaasen

Author:Carl Hiaasen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Fiction
ISBN: 9780375890277
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2002-09-10T07:00:00+00:00

THIRTEEN

While Roy took a shower, his mother made a pot of spaghetti. He ate three helpings, though the dinner gathering was as quiet as a chess match.

Setting down his fork, Roy turned to his father.

“I guess it’s the den, huh?”

“That’s correct.”

It had been years since Roy had gotten a spanking, and he doubted that he was in for one now. The den was where his father summoned him whenever there was serious explaining to be done. Tonight Roy was so tired that he wasn’t sure if anything he had to say would make sense.

His father was waiting, seated behind the broad walnut desk.

“What’ve you got there?” he asked Roy.

“A book.”

“Yes, I can see it’s a book. I was hoping for the particulars.”

Roy’s father could be sarcastic when he thought he wasn’t getting a full answer. Roy figured it came from years of interrogating shifty characters—gangsters or spies, or whoever it was that his father was in the business of investigating.

“I’m assuming,” he said to Roy, “that the book will cast some light on tonight’s strange events.”

Roy handed it across the desk. “You and Mom got it for me two Christmases ago.”

“I remember,” his father said, scanning the cover. “The Sibley Guide to Birds. Sure it wasn’t for your birthday?”

“I’m sure, Dad.”

Roy had put the book on his Christmas list after it had settled a friendly wager between him and his father. One afternoon they’d seen a large reddish brown raptor swoop down and snatch a ground squirrel off a cattle range in the Gallatin River valley. Roy’s father had bet him a milkshake that the bird was a young bald eagle whose crown feathers hadn’t yet turned white, but Roy had said it was a fully grown golden eagle, more common on the dry prairies. Later, after visiting the Bozeman library and consulting Sibley, Roy’s father conceded that Roy had been right.

Mr. Eberhardt held up the book and asked, “What does this have to do with that nonsense at the hospital?”

“Check out page 278,” Roy said. “I marked it for you.”

His father flipped the book open to that page.

“ ‘Burrowing owl,’ ” he read aloud from the text. “ ‘Athene cunicularia. Long-legged and short-tailed, with relatively long, narrow wings and flat head. Only small owl likely to be seen perched in the open in daylight.’ ” His father peered quizzically at him over the top of the book. “Is this connected to that ‘science project’ you were supposedly working on this afternoon?”

“There is no science project,” Roy admitted.

“And the hamburger meat that your mother gave you?”

“A snack for the owls.”

“Continue,” Mr. Eberhardt said.

“It’s a long story, Dad.”

“I’ve got nothing but time.”

“All right,” Roy said. In some ways, he thought wearily, a spanking might be easier.

“See, there’s this boy,” he began, “about the same age as me. ...”

Roy told his father everything—well, almost everything. He didn’t mention that the snakes distributed by Beatrice Leep’s stepbrother were highly poisonous and that the boy had actually taped their mouths shut. Such details might have alarmed Mr.

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