Butler considered it for several moments.
“Can’t be done,” he pronounced eventually. “Not without the blueprints.”
“D’Arvit,” swore the commander. “I never thought I’d say this, but there’s only one fairy for a job like this . . .”
Holly nodded. “Mulch Diggums.”
“Diggums?”
“A dwarf. Career criminal. The only fairy ever to break into Koboi Laboratories and live. Unfortunately, we lost him last year. Tunneling out of your manor, as it happens.”
“I remember him,” said Butler. “Nearly took my head off. A slippery character.”
Root laughed softly. “Eight times I nabbed old Mulch. The last one was for the Koboi Labs job. As I recall, Mulch and his cousin set up as building contractors. A way to get plans for secure facilities. They got the Koboi contract. Mulch left himself a back door. Typical Diggums, he breaks into the most secure facility under the planet, then tries to sell an alchemy vat to one of my squeals.”
Artemis sat up. “Alchemy? You have alchemy vats?”
“Stop drooling, Mud Boy. They’re experimental. The ancient warlocks used to be able to turn lead into gold, according to the Book, but the secret was lost. Even Opal Koboi hasn’t managed it yet.”
“Oh,” said Artemis, disappointed.
“Believe it or not, I almost miss that criminal. He had a way of insulting a person.” Root glanced toward the heavens. “I wonder if he’s up there now, looking down on us.”
“In a manner of speaking,” said Holly guiltily. “Actually, Commander, Mulch Diggums is in Los Angeles.”
CHAPTER 11
MULCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
Los Angeles
Mulch Diggums was, in fact, outside the apartment of an Oscar-winning actress. Of course, she didn’t know he was there. And naturally he was up to no good. Once a thief, always a thief.
Not that Mulch needed the money. He’d done very well out of the Artemis Fowl siege. Well enough to take out a lease on a penthouse apartment in Beverly Hills. He’d stocked the apartment with a Pioneer entertainment system, a full DVD library, and enough beef jerky to last a lifetime. Time for a decade of rest and relaxation.
But life is not like that. It refuses to curl up and sit quietly in a corner. The habits of several centuries would not go away. Halfway through the James Bond Collection, Mulch realized that he missed the bad old days. Soon the penthouse suite’s reclusive occupant was taking midnight strolls. These strolls generally ended up inside other people’s homes.
Initially, Mulch just visited, savoring the thrill of defeating sophisticated Mud Man security systems. Then he began to take trophies. Small things—a crystal goblet, an ashtray, or a cat, if he was peckish. But soon Mulch Diggums began to crave the old notoriety, and his pilferings grew larger. Gold bars, goose-egg diamonds, or pit bull terriers, if he was really famished.
The Oscar thing began quite by accident. He nabbed one as a curiosity on a midweek break to New York. Best Original Screenplay. The following morning he was front page news coast to coast. You’d think he’d ripped off a medical convoy instead of a gilded statuette. Mulch, of course, was delighted. He’d found his new nocturnal pastime.
In the next two weeks, Mulch filched Best Soundtrack and Best Special Effects Academy Awards. The tabloids went crazy. They even gave him a nickname: the Grouch, after another well-known Oscar. When Mulch read that one, his toes wriggled for joy. And dwarf toes wriggling are quite a sight. They are nimble as fingers, double-jointed, and the less said about the smell, the better. Mulch’s mission became clear. He had to assemble an entire set.
Over the next six months, the Grouch struck all across the United States. He even made a trip to Italy to collect a Best Foreign Language Film award. He had a special cabinet made with tinted glass that could be blacked out at the touch of a button. Mulch Diggums felt alive again.
Of course, Oscar winners all over the planet tripled their security, which was just the way Mulch liked it. There was no challenge in breaking into a shack on the beach. High rise and high tech. That’s what the public wanted. So that’s what the Grouch gave them. The papers ate it up. He was a hero. During the daylight hours, when he couldn’t venture outside, Mulch busied himself writing the screenplay of his own exploits.
Tonight was a big night. The last statuette. He was going for a Best Actress Award. And not just any old best actress, tonight’s target was the tempestuous Jamaican beauty Maggie V. This year’s winner for her portrayal of Precious, a tempestuous Jamaican beauty. Maggie V had stated publicly that if the Grouch tried anything in her apartment, he would get a lot more than he bargained for. How could Mulch resist a challenge like that?
The building itself was easy to locate, a ten-story block of glass and steel just off Sunset Boulevard, a midnight stroll south of Mulch’s own home. So the intrepid dwarf packed his tools, preparing to burglarize his way into the history books.
Maggie V was on the top floor. There was no question of going up the stairs, elevator, or shaft. It would have to be an outside job.
In preparation for the climb, Mulch had not had anything to drink in two days. Dwarf pores are not just for sweating; they can take in moisture too. Very handy when you are trapped in a cave-in for days on end. Even if you can’t get your mouth to a drink, every inch of skin can leech water from the surrounding earth. When a dwarf was thirsty, as Mulch was now, his pores opened to the size of pinholes, and began to suck like crazy. This could be extremely useful, if say, you had to climb up the side of a tall building.
Mulch took off his shoes and gloves, donned a stolen LEP helmet, and began to climb.
Chute E37
Holly could feel the commander’s glare crisping the hairs on the back of her neck. She tried to ignore it, concentrating on not dashing the Atlantean ambassador’s shuttle against the walls of the Arctic chute.
“So, all this time, you knew Mulch Diggums was alive?”
Holly nudged the starboard thruster to avoid a missile of half-melted rock.
“Not for sure. Foaly just had this theory.”
The commander wrung an imaginary neck. “Foaly! Why am I not surprised?”
Artemis smirked from his seat in the passenger area. “Now, you two, we need to work together as a team.”
“So tell me about Foaly’s theory, Captain,” ordered Root, belting himself into the copilot’s seat.
Holly activated a static wash on the shuttle’s ex
ternal cameras. Positive and negative charges dislodged the sheets of dust from the lenses.
“Foaly thought Mulch’s death a bit suspicious, given that he was the best tunnel fairy in the business.”
“So why didn’t he come to me?”
“It was just a hunch. With respect, you know what you’re like with hunches, Commander.”
Root nodded grudgingly. It was true, he didn’t have time for hunches. It was hard evidence, or get out of my office until you’ve got some.
“The centaur did a bit of investigating on his own time. The first thing he realized was that the gold recovered was a bit light. I negotiated for the return of half the ransom, and by Foaly’s reckoning the cart was about two dozen bars short.”
The commander lit one of his trademark fungus cigars. He had to admit it sounded promising: gold missing, Mulch Diggums within a hundred miles. Two and two make four.
“As you know, it’s standard procedure to spray any LEP property with solinium-based tracker, including the ransom gold. So, Foaly runs a scan for solinium, and he picks up hot spots all over Los Angeles. Particularly at the Crowley Hotel in Beverly Hills. When he hacks into the building computer, he finds the penthouse resident is listed as one Lance Digger.”
Root’s pointy ears quivered. “Digger?”
“Exactly,” nodded Holly. “A bit more than coincidence. Foaly came to me at that point, and I advised him to get some satellite photos before taking the file to you. Except .. .”
“Except Mister Digger is proving very elusive. Am I right?”
“Dead on.”
Root’s coloring went from rose to tomato. “Mulch, that rascal. How did he do it?”
Holly shrugged. “We’re guessing he transferred his iris-cam to some local wildlife, maybe a rabbit. Then collapsed the tunnel.”
“So the life signs we were reading belonged to some rabbit.”
“Exactly. In theory.”