The Case of the Monkey Burglar Read online

  The Case of the Monkey Burglar

  John R. Erickson

  Illustrations by Gerald L. Holmes

  Maverick Books, Inc.

  Publication Information

  MAVERICK BOOKS

  Published by Maverick Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 549, Perryton, TX 79070

  Phone: 806.435.7611

  www.hankthecowdog.com

  First published in the United States of America by Viking Children’s Books and Puffin Books, members of Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers, 2006.

  Currently published by Maverick Books, Inc., 2012

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  Copyright © John R. Erickson, 2006

  All rights reserved

  Maverick Books, Inc. Paperback ISBN: 978-1-59188-148-3

  Hank the Cowdog® is a registered trademark of John R. Erickson.

  Printed in the United States of America

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  Dedication

  For John and Jane Graves

  Contents

  Chapter One An Interesting Visitor

  Chapter Two Loper and Sally May Go on a Vacation

  Chapter Three An Important Lesson in Poetry

  Chapter Four Naptime on the Prairie

  Chapter Five The Guppy Invasion

  Chapter Six An Official Inspection

  Chapter Seven My Beloved Comes Calling

  Chapter Eight Drover and I Figure It Out

  Chapter Nine We Prepare for the Worst

  Chapter Ten The Moment of Truth Draws Near

  Chapter Eleven Lucy’s Heartrending Story

  Chapter Twelve Ruined, Disgraced, a Dismal Failure

  Chapter One: An Interesting Visitor

  It’s me again, Hank the Cowdog. At first glance there was nothing about the vehicle that made it stand out. It was a red Chevy car with . . . I don’t know, four doors and four tires. No big deal, except that it had come onto my ranch without permission, so Drover and I gave it the usual treatment.

  We shifted into the Launch All Dogs Procedure, went ripping up the hill, and barked the car all the way down to the machine shed.

  There, I waited to see if the driver would dare to step out. Sometimes they don’t, you know. After they’ve seen all the amassed forces of the ranch’s Security Division, sometimes they just sit in the car, afraid to move. But this guy seemed pretty brave, and when he climbed out of the car, I understood why.

  He was a deputy sheriff. On his belt he carried a pistol, two sets of handcuffs, and all that other stuff they load onto their belts. And you know what else? I knew the guy: Chief Deputy Kile of the Ochiltree County Sheriff’s Department.

  Do you remember Deputy Kile? He helped me solve the Case of the Saddle House Robbery . . . or I helped him. I don’t remember all the details, but we worked the case together and sent a sneaking little saddle thief to the slammer.

  Are you familiar with the word “slammer”? Maybe not, because it’s one of the technical words we use in the Security Business. It means “jailhouse,” and we call it “slammer” because . . . well, because every jailhouse has a big iron door, and when you throw a crook in jail, you close the door behind him and it SLAMS.

  So instead of calling it a jailhouse, we call it the slammer.

  Maybe this is obvious, but the point is that Deputy Kile and I were in the same line of work, right? He happened to work for the sheriff’s department and I happened to be Head of Ranch Security, but both of us enforced the law and were the sworn enemies of all crooks, crinimals, spies, snakes, scorpions, and night monsters.

  I was very interested in finding out why he had come to the ranch. He wasn’t the kind of fellow who made social calls or engaged in idle chatter, so when Slim came out of the machine shed to greet him, I stationed myself nearby and listened to their conversation.

  After exchanging pleasantries and thoughts about the weather and pasture conditions, Deputy Kile said, “Slim, I need to borrow some air. I’ve got a slow leak in that right front tire.”

  A slow leak in his tire? That was all? What a bum deal. I had hoped for something more exciting. I mean, let’s face it, in August things get a little dull around here.

  Slim looked at the tire. “I can fix it with a plug, if you’ve got a few minutes.”

  Deputy Kile said he had time, so Slim jacked up the car, pulled off the tire, and found the source of the problem: a mesquite thorn.

  He pulled it out with a pair of needle-nose pliers and held it up. “Where’d you find a mesquite thorn? There ain’t a mesquite tree within twenty miles of here.”

  The deputy smiled. “That’s pretty good detective work. The other day, I was working a case in the south part of the county—more than twenty miles from here. It was kind of interesting.”

  “Tell me about it while I fix your tire.”

  Deputy Kile sat down on a five-gallon bucket in the shade. “We got a call from a farmer, said he was missing some tools from his shop. I drove down and checked it out. In front of the shop, I found some good clear footprints in the dust.”

  “So did you catch the man?”

  “That was the funny part. The robber was barefooted, and the prints weren’t human.”

  Slim looked up from the tire. “What do you mean? He was from outer space?”

  The deputy laughed. “No, probably from a zoo or a circus. They were monkey tracks.”

  “Monkey tracks! Now hold on a second. You think some feller trained a monkey to rob and steal?”

  “That’s the way it looks. There was a clear path of monkey prints all the way from the shop to some tire tracks about a hundred yards away, and no sign that the man ever got out of his vehicle. You’ve got to admit that’s pretty smart.”

  Slim laughed and shoved a rubber plug into the hole in the tire. “Well, that beats it all.”

  “It’s got us scratching our heads, I can tell you that. The first thing I asked the farmer was—‘Where were your dogs while all of this was going on?’”

  Slim frowned, then his eyes prowled around until they found . . . well, ME, you might say. “I hadn’t thought of that. I mean, Hank and Drover are about ten cards short of a full deck, but I do believe they’d bark their heads off if a monkey ever walked onto the place. Where were the farmer’s dogs?”

  “Three dogs, and they were all asleep . . . or knocked out might be more like it. I think somebody slipped ’em a mickey.”

  “A tranquilizer?”

  The deputy nodded. “The farmer said when they woke up, they acted goofier than Cooter Brown.”

  “Well, I’ve never heard of such a thing, and I’ve been to three county fairs and four rodeos.”

  Slim finished plugging the tire, filled it with air, and mounted it on the car. Deputy Kile thanked him and offered to pay him for his trouble, but Slim wouldn’t hear of it, so they shook hands and the deputy got back in his car.

  “Slim, these thieves might still be in the area, so keep your eyes open for anything suspicious. Are you and Loper going to be around the place?”

  “Heck yeah. I’m too broke to go anywhere, and Loper’s too cheap.”

  “Good. Let me know if you see anything.”
r />   The car pulled away, and Slim stood there for a moment, shaking his head. “Well, if that don’t beat it all, a monkey burglar.” He laughed to himself and went back to his welding job in the machine shed.

  When he had gone, I turned to Drover, who was gazing up at the clouds. “Did you hear that?”

  His eyes drifted down, and he gave me a grin. “Oh, hi. Did somebody just drive away?”

  “Drover, that was the deputy sheriff and he was here for thirty minutes. You didn’t hear anything he said?”

  “Well, let’s see. I heard something about . . . a tire. Did he have a tire on his car?”

  I let out a groan. “Of course he had a car on his tire! He had four of them.”

  “He had four cars?”

  “He had one car, four tires. Every car has four tires.”

  “How come?”

  “Because every car has four wheels.”

  “Oh. What if one fell off?”

  I gave him a withering glare. “Don’t start this, Drover, I’m not in the mood for one of your loony conversations. Deputy Kile gave us a very interesting report about a gang of burglars, but it’s obvious that you didn’t hear any of it.”

  “They steal tires?”

  “No, they don’t steal tires. They steal tools. If you see a strange vehicle driving around, let me know at once.”

  “A vehicle with four tires?”

  “Exactly.”

  “That wouldn’t be strange. You said they all had four tires.”

  “Stop talking about tires! What’s wrong with you?”

  He grinned. “I don’t know. All at once, I’m just . . . thinking about tires.”

  “Oh, brother. One last thing. If you see any unauthorized monkeys lurking around, I want to know about it.” He let out a giggle. “What’s so funny?”

  “It’s a joke, right? Tee hee. We don’t have monkeys around here.”

  “Drover, it’s no joke. This particular monkey is a burglar. If he shows up, we’ve got problems. Any more questions?”

  “What does he look like?”

  “Who?”

  “The monkey.”

  “How should I know? He looks like a monkey. If you see a monkey that looks like a monkey, it’ll be a monkey. At that point, you come and tell me you’ve seen a monkey.”

  He stared at the ground and gnawed on his lip. “Let’s see here . . . if I see a monkey that looks like a monkey . . . I think I’ve got it.”

  “Good. And in the future, I hope you’ll try to . . .”

  I had planned to give Drover a lecture on goofing off and not paying attention, but just then I heard footsteps approaching from the direction of the house. I turned and saw Loper plodding up the hill. Even at a distance, I could see that he was in a bad mood.

  Since he owned the ranch and was more or less in charge of things, this wasn’t particularly good news.

  Chapter Two: Loper and Sally May Go on a Vacation

  When Our People are feeling angry or depressed, we dogs notice it right away, and a lot of times we can fix the problem.

  When I saw Loper coming my way, with doom and gloom written all over his face, I trotted over to him. Flinging my tail back and forth in Happy Wags, I gave him a big smile that said, “Hey, Loper, great news. I’m here!”

  With his eyes fixed on the ground, he walked right past and didn’t even look at me. I mean, no “good morning” or “great to see you, Hank.” Nothing. What a grouch.

  He and his cloud of gloom disappeared inside the machine shed, and a moment later I heard the following conversation.

  Loper: “I’ve got some bad news. Sally May wants to take a vacation.”

  Slim: “What’s so bad about that?”

  Loper: “Well, it’s ridiculous. When you’re in the ranching business, you can’t just go waltzing off to the mountains. She wants us to go for a whole three days! We’ve got hay in the field, yearlings in the sick pen, fence to fix, windmills to check . . .”

  Slim: “Did you explain all that to Sally May?”

  Loper: “Of course I did.”

  Slim: “What did she say?”

  Loper: “She said that we’ve never had a vacation.”

  Slim: “Huh. And what did you say to that?”

  Loper: “I said that being married to me should be all the vacation a woman needs.”

  Slim: “Heh. How did that go over?”

  Loper: “Like a snake in the bathtub.”

  They stepped out of the machine shed, and I could see that Slim was trying to bite back a smile. “Loper, I think you got it backwards. Any woman who’d stay married to you deserves a trip to the mountains. And a million bucks.”

  Loper gave him a sour look. “What do you know about women? The last time I checked, you were still a bachelor, and I haven’t noticed any ladies lined up at your gate, trying to get in.”

  “They come during work hours when you’re taking a nap.”

  “I mean, your life is so simple, it’s pathetic. The only difference between you and a grasshopper is that you wear socks.”

  “I can sing too. That’s a big difference.”

  “I’ve heard you sing. Even the dogs can’t stand it.”

  Slim pulled a toothpick out of his hatband and slid it through his teeth. “Loper, just think of all the fun things you can do on vacation. Why, you can take Alfred fishing.”

  “That’s fun? I’d rather clean out the septic tank.”

  “Well, go see a movie.”

  Loper rolled his eyes. “Do you know what it costs to take a family to a movie? A fortune, and they charge two bucks for a dinky little sack of popcorn.”

  “Take some sunflower seeds.”

  “I don’t like sunflower seeds.”

  “Then take the kids to one of them water parks.”

  Loper glared at him. “Water! Do I need to drive three hundred miles to play in the water? We’ve got stock tanks all over this ranch, and two miles of creek.”

  Slim shook his head. “Loper, you make a mule look reasonable. You do all this bellyaching, and what’s the point? Tomorrow morning, you’ll load up the car and drive to the mountains. You might as well be brave and have some fun.”

  Loper grunted. “I’ll be brave, I’ll load the car, I’ll drive halfway across the country, and when I get there, I won’t have fun.”

  “All right, don’t have fun. Go to the mountains and pout for three days.”

  “I will.”

  “Good. I hope you’re miserable, but I won’t be.” Slim flashed a smile. “When I get you off the place, I’m going to have a blast.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “That’s right. It’ll be like three days without a rotten tooth.”

  “You really think so?”

  Slim hitched up his jeans. “Yes sir, I know so.”

  Loper gazed off into the distance and was quiet for a moment. “You know, we’ve got eight hundred bales of hay in the alfalfa field.”

  Slim blinked. “Yeah, but...”

  “I just had a great idea.” Loper slid his gaze back to Slim. “While I’m gone, maybe you’d like to haul some hay.”

  Slim’s Adam’s apple jumped. “By myself?”

  “You can take the dogs.”

  “Now, Loper . . .”

  Loper flashed a grin. “See, that’s one thing about bosses, Slim. We don’t want the hired hands to be happy when we’re gone.”

  “This ain’t funny.”

  Loper let out a big laugh. “Sure it is. It’s hilarious. While I’m miserable having fun, you’ll be miserable hauling hay. It’ll help ease my pain.” Loper walked over to him and whispered, “Never let the boss know you’re glad to see him go. It’ll come back and bite you every time.”

  Chuckling to himself, Loper walked down to the house. Slim
glared after him for a long time, then turned to me. “Me and my big mouth.”

  Right, and I could have told him, but do these guys ever listen to their dogs? No, and that’s why we try to keep our opinions to ourselves.

  The next morning around nine o’clock, Loper loaded Sally May and the children into the family car, and off they went to the mountains. I led them all the way up to the mailbox on the county road and sent them on their way with Barks of Farewell. That done, I made my way back to headquarters and went looking for Slim.

  I had a feeling this was going to be a hard day, and he would need all the support we dogs could provide. I mean, he’d been tagged with a pretty tough assignment—hauling eight hundred bales of alfalfa hay all by himself.

  On any ranch with modern equipment, that wouldn’t have been such a difficult job, but our outfit did everything The Cowboy Way. That means we shunned all laborsaving devices and relied entirely on junk machinery.

  See, we had only thirty acres of irrigated alfalfa, and that wasn’t quite enough to justify the expense of good equipment. Loper bought all our machinery at farm auctions, and took considerable pride in getting what he called “good deals.”

  Ha. Those guys spent half their summers reading repair manuals, running to town for parts, turning wrenches, and screaming at gutted hay balers and swathers, whose parts lay scattered all over the floor of the machine shed.

  But every now and then the machinery held together long enough to put up some of the hay into bales, and at that point they had to be hauled out of the field and unloaded in the “stack lot,” an area that had been fenced off so that the cattle wouldn’t plunder the hay and scatter it over half the ranch.

  Under ordinary conditions, our hay-hauling involved the use of an old flatbed truck and three people: Sally May to drive the truck through the field; Slim to pitch the bales up on the truck; and Loper to stack the hay on the back of the truck.

  Do you see what Slim had done with his big mouth? He would have to do all three of those jobs by himself. I felt some pity for poor Slim. I mean, slaving in a hay field in the heat of summer wasn’t something I would wish on a friend, or even an enemy. On the other hand, he had walked into it with his mouth wide open and . . . well, what can you say?