Mr. and Mrs. Bunny—Detectives Extraordinaire! Read Online Free

for shoes.
    It was gloaming when she left the café, but by the time she came to the path in the woods it was full dark. The giant moon glimmered as if it were a luminary itself, awash in orange candlelight. Stars twinkled. The woods, lit from within, glowed with a faint green phosphorus light. She bet if you could look at the earth from space, it would be glittering too, a giant planetary luminary.
    She sat right down for a second in the middle of the woods to enjoy it all.
    Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Madeline, back at her house, sinister forces were at work. A car had just pulled into the driveway and four foxes dressed in trench coats, scarves and sunglasses had gotten out. The fox in the center, the Grand Poobah, as he was known, carried a small file card box. The other foxes surrounded him as he walked straight up to Floand Mildred, who were busy reassembling a giant luminary that had toppled over.
    â€œHail, humans!” said the Grand Poobah. Actually what he said was “Hail, hoomans!” He had just learned English, and he insisted that all the foxes do likewise, as humans would inevitably be too stupid to understand Fox. But his reading vocabulary was larger than his speaking vocabulary, so that he made the occasional pronunciation mistake.
    â€œOh, look,” said Mildred, grabbing Flo’s arm. “One of the families has dressed up in fox costumes. Isn’t that adorable?”
    â€œCool, man,” said Flo, going up to greet them and pulling gently at one of the foxes’ fur. “Where’d you get the duds, man?”
    â€œOUCH!” screamed the fox. “Poobah, make him stop.”
    â€œNow, now, be nice. We come in peace. Ahem! Ladies and gentlemen,” began the Grand Poobah, for this was how he had heard humans address each other on TV. “Ladies and gentlemen, we are in need of assistance. You see, we are opening a factory soon. Fanny Fox’s Canned Rabbit Products and By-products. Fanny Fox, perhaps the greatest chef of all time, finally gave consent for us to mass-produce all her rabbit recipes. We have here her full collection on handy-dandy filecards.” He pointed to the box he was carrying. “Unfortunately, last night Fanny died.”
    â€œTough break, dude, but at least you’ve got the recipes,” said Flo. He turned to Mildred. “Man,
what
was in those cheese straws? These can’t be people dressed in fox costumes. Unless they’re, like, little people.”
    â€œTough break indeed,” said the Grand Poobah, ignoring Flo’s last comment. “Fanny loved the idea of becoming famous. She was so proud of having the factory named after her that she had recipe cards and stationery engraved with the factory name and logo at the top. And because she planned to sell to you hoomans, she had the factory name done in English as well as Fox. Very considerate, we foxes are.”
    â€œMaybe,” said Flo. “But what the heck is a hooman?”
    â€œShe had the logo tattooed on her paws,” piped up one of the bodyguards. “She was, like, nuts when it came to that logo.”
    â€œSpeak when you are spoken to, Filbert,” said the Grand Poobah. “And try not to adopt the hooman’s verbal tics. Flo, a hooman is you, man, mwa-haha!”
    â€œI didn’t know that foxes were, like, so commercial,” said Flo.
    â€œFoxes are titans of industry. Have you never heard of FoxStudios? Fox Television? You didn’t think it was owned by hoomans, did you? I myself could have been a movie star. As you see, I have the exceedingly good looks and overweening ego, but, alas, someone had to stay and take care of the den.”
    The Grand Poobah stopped and batted his long eyelashes. Then he realized they couldn’t be seen behind his sunglasses, so he took them off and batted his eyelashes again, first at Flo and then at Mildred. They continued to stare blankly.
    â€œBut back to matters at hand,”