The Dog Squad

there are cats on that front wall.
But behind that wall I see reinforcements—good ones, too. I can see Corner Boy, Michael Beard, Rupert Beard, and the Dog Lady with all four remaining members of her Dog Squad.
They’re looking through the window. They’re seeing me (with the vacuum cleaner) . . . Shaza (with the skateboard) . . . and Bizmo, who’s trying to shake off Nicki Minaj and Ed Sheeran, who’ve got him by the ears. (It looks like he’s wearing a hat that’s made entirely from dog.)
“THESE ARE THE THIEVES!” I shout.
And the Beards don’t need telling twice to join a fight. Those jockeys leap, screaming, across the front wall.
All the dogs are barking. And I am happy to say that THIS gets the attention of . . .
Stephen Maysmith, the police detective.
He is around the corner taking photographs of the lamppost where the furry crocodile was stolen. He doesn’t think anything of the noise at first.
Then he does.
By now the noise is louder. The Beards are kicking in the front window: SMASH. The Dog Lady, seeing her Yorkshire terriers, is screaming, “Oh, my poor babies!” And Nicki Minaj and Ed Sheeran—leaping out of the window—are being reunited with their owner and they’re howling, and I swear . . . those dogs can SING!
Maysmith comes running.
Inside, Shaza sees the battle’s turned. She sprints off down the corridor. Bizmo follows.
I follow too. And I’ve chased them as far as the kitchen before I remember my very badly sprained leg, and I suddenly have an EXPLOSION OF PAIN . . .
. . . which feels like the Battle of Waterloo is happening inside my foot.
At that moment Stephen Maysmith enters the scene. He’s charging up the corridor like a hippo behind me.
“Just WHAT is going on in here?” he is shouting.
Not much, big feller, I’m thinking. The main fighters have left.
I’m thinking: I should follow.
I hurry out.
In the garden, Dale is being pinned against the wall by Gordon and the St. Bernard, and they’re barking.
Bizmo is on the floor, dazed. And Wilkins Welkin has him by the tail, and he is SHAKING that tail, going rrrr-rrrr-rrrrr, as if to say: “I said I’d take you down, and I’ve taken you DOWN, Bizmo. You are DOWN!”
Shaza dodges around the barking dogs. Leaping up onto her garden wall, she thinks she’s about to run off.
She doesn’t know this is the moment Mrs. Welkin has been waiting for.
Mrs .Welkin has been waiting by the trampoline like a flamingo by a pond.
“You dirty THIEF!” she calls, then she leaps like a ninja across the trampoline. She bounces, then comes down with her slipper going SLAP.
And I could not say what happens next. (I don’t want to get Mrs. Welkin in trouble with the police.) But over the next minute Shaza certainly FINDS OUT what Mrs. Welkin can do with a slipper.
And then I turn and see Stephen Maysmith coming out into the garden, and I see he’s about to get the baddies. I also look over Cat’s garden wall and see something very important. It’s Mom appearing in the car.
I think: If I go NOW, I might make it back to bed before she knows I’m gone.
I leave the battlefield like I’m a World Rally champion.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN Back at the Base
I am back in my room before Mom enters the house. I am in time to see the police arrest Dale and Shaza in the garden. As they do she looks up at me.
I think: We took you DOWN!
I see Cat walking along her own garden wall holding Wilkins in her arms. He’s loving it! His head’s tipped back and he’s smiling.
I open my window. “Guys,” I whisper.
They both smile up at me.
“You were EPIC!” I tell them.
“I wouldn’t use that word,” says Mrs. Welkin. “I’d say we were boomtastic!”
“I’d just say we were deadly,” says Cat. “And I was proud to be on our side.”
“I’d say the same,” I tell them. “But would you mind not telling anyone I was there?”
“All right,” says Mrs. Welkin.
“All right, Mr. Detective,” says Cat. Then she smiles. Then she winks. Then she goes.
One second later, I hear my mom coming, and I shut the window just in time.
I can see right away Mom is in a very good mood.
“Rory,” she says, “what have you been doing?”
As I look back at her I think: I’d love to tell her everything I’ve done, especially since it proves I do think of other people, and I do understand about Napoleon, and I am a real detective (who can collect evidence and plan). But I don’t.
“Well,” I tell her, “I don’t want to tell you some story!”
My mom gives me a smile that’s as wide as the sea.
“Are you OK?” she says.
“Oh,” I tell her, “I’m great!”
“I’m your mother,” she says. “I LOVE you. That’s all you ever need to know.”
Then she just LOOKS at me.
I know what that look means. I see she wants to hug me. I see there’s nothing I can do about it.
I just let her. She hugs me, and I lie back like I’m bobbing on a raft on the sea, and I relax.
“You’re a good boy,” she says. “Unlike your brother!”
His BIG HEAD appears.
“I heard that!” he says. He’s got shaving foam on his top lip so it looks like he’s got a little white mustache. Mom and I both crack up.
“What?” says my brother. “Are you laughing just because I’m shaving? SO WHAT if I’m shaving?”
My mum is shaking as she laughs, but I can tell she doesn’t want my brother to see.
“I was only joking!” she calls to my brother.
“Huh!” he says.
“I’d better go and speak to him!” she whispers to me (giving me a kiss). “Bye!”
Next Mrs. Welkin appears.