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“And that’s valuable how?” Oscar said. He wasn’t trying to be a jerk. But it was a pair of underpants.

“Oh come ON!” Butterbean rolled her eyes at him. “People are CRAZY for underpants. They NEVER let you play with them. And they ALWAYS have them. These must be super valuable.”

“She has a point,” Walt agreed. “Mrs. Food never lets me NEAR her underpants.”

Oscar looked skeptical.“Noted. Is that all?”

“Isn’t that ENOUGH? I’ve got some great stuff here.” Butterbean looked offended.

“It’s great stuff, Bean. Except maybe not the underpants and the… um… toast.” Oscar looked queasy. “But…”

“But it’s not stuff that helps us out a lot right now,” Walt said. “Not like my credit card. And compression socks,” she finished, under her breath.

“So,” Oscar sighed. “It looks as though our hopes of becoming independently wealthy are over. Which is unfortunate, because I don’t think there are a lot of job opportunities for birds right now. But nevertheless, I will—” He stopped suddenly, cocking his head. He hopped forward and tilted it to the other side.

“Oscar?” Walt said. She hoped he wasn’t losing it. The stress was enough to make any bird crack.

“Butterbean?” Oscar said, taking another hop closer. “Butterbean, what is that?”

Butterbean looked around with a panicked expression on her face.“What is what? My soap?”

“Not your soap. Under your tail.” Oscar’s eyes glittered.

Butterbean leaned down and inspected her tail.“OH!” She laughed and scooted her butt an inch to the side. “That’s just my coin. I wondered what had happened to it!”

“You were sitting on it.” Oscar hopped over to the coin and eyed it with interest.

“Not on purpose. It’s small.” Butterbean looked offended.

“OOOOOhhhh,” Marco said.

“Shiny,” Polo said.

“It looks like gold, Butterbean,” Oscar said, picking it up and putting it down in front of Walt. “Walt, do you know what this is?”

Walt leaned forward. The coin was small, with a tiny antelope or gazelle on the front.“I know enough to know it’s worth a lot,” Walt said. “I’ll have to do some research to make sure. But it’s definitely valuable.”

“That’s what I thought.” Oscar fluffed up his feathers. “Butterbean, where did you get this? You need to tell us everything. Now.”

“I was in the lobby,” Butterbean started. “It was a while ago. Maybe a few weeks? Or days? I’m not sure. I was waiting to go up in the elevator, and Mrs. Food was talking to Mrs. Third Floor. Then the elevator opened, and Biscuit came out with her owner.”

“Haircut Biscuit?” Polo asked.

Butterbean shook her head.“Different Biscuit.”

Oscar narrowed his eyes.“Did Biscuit’s owner drop the coin?”

“No, it was the other person in the elevator. Some guy. No dog.”

“What do you remember about him?” Oscar wished he had a lamp that he could shine on Butterbean while he asked questions. He’d seen that technique on the Television, and it always seemed to work.

Butterbean shrugged.“Nothing. He dropped the coin. And I picked it up and brought it home and hid it with the rest of my stuff.”

“Any smells?” Walt said.

“Cologne. Lots of it. It made me sneeze.” Butterbean wrinkled her nose at the thought.

“Have you smelled it before?”

“Yes, in the elevator.”

“So he’s a resident of the building,” Oscar said slowly, tapping his wing against his beak thoughtfully.

“So? What do we care who the guy is?” Walt twitched her tail. If her memory was accurate, that coin was a South African Krugerrand, worth hundreds of dollars. Walt didn’t know anyone with hundreds of dollars.

“We care because now I know what we’re going to do,” Oscar said impatiently. “Reconnaissance begins tomorrow. Butterbean, get your sleep. You’ve got a big day ahead of you.”

“Okay…” Butterbean didn’t know what reconnaissance was, but she didn’t like the sound of it. It sounded hard.

“Reconnaissance? For what? We got the coin! We’re set!” Walt said.

“We are not, as you say, set,” Oscar said. “But if all goes as planned, we will be. We’ll never have to worry about money or our future again.”

Walt glared at him.

Oscar sighed.“Walt, if we sell this coin, the money will last us only a short time. But a coin like this, it’s not the sort of thing you just drop in a lobby. Not unless you have a lot of them. If I’m correct, the man who lost this coin has a lot of them.”

“So?”

“So we’ll take them. We’re going to pull off a heist.”

[Êàðòèíêà: img_3]

6

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

[Êàðòèíêà: img_15]

WHEN THE GIRL ARRIVED THE next morning, they were ready. Oscar had worked out their assignments late into the night, and they’d gone over their roles just as the sun was coming up.

“Butterbean, walk duty.”

“Check.” Butterbean’s tongue flopped out of the side of her mouth. Oscar ignored it.

“Polo, you’re with Butterbean. You know what you have to do. Marco, general surveillance.”

“Check!” Polo and Marco said at the same time. Then they giggled.

“Jinx!” they said at the same time.

“Jinx!”

“Jinx!”

Oscar frowned. This was no time for giggling. He cleared his throat. The jinxing stopped.“Walt, entrance and exit facilitation. Logistics.”

“Check.” Walt licked a paw.