“Now I’m sure it’s Liz,” Thor said. “Ms. Delia always said she was the boss emu. She beat Louisa May Alcott in a knock-down, drag-out fight a year and a half ago, and poor Lou was still limping months later.”
“So you could probably recognize her, too, if she showed up,” I said. “Are there any other emus you would recognize?”
I didn’t really care if he could, actually, but I was fascinated by Cordelia’s system for naming the emus.
“Ella,” he said, after a few moments of thought. “She’s almost a white emu—not albino, but really, really pale.”
“Ella Fitzgerald?” I asked.
“No, Ella Wheeler Wilcox,” he said. “I think she was a poet.”
“Opinions on that differ,” I said. “Look, I could watch the emus all day, but maybe we should go back and tell my grandfather where they are.”
“Good idea.” Still staring at the emus, he fumbled in his pocket for the keys.
“Wait.” I pulled out my phone and clicked the button to start the camera app. “Before we go, let’s take a few pictures of me with the emus in the background. As proof that we’ve found them.”
Thor took my phone and took several pictures. About halfway through our photo session, one of the emus noticed us and began walking our way.
“Should we maybe get back into the truck?” I asked.
“They’re usually pretty friendly once they get used to us feeding them,” Thor said. “It’s when they raise their heads really high that you have to keep your eye on them.”
The emu raised its head really high.
“But they’re not used to you feeding them at this time of year,” I said, as I backed toward the truck. “And they’ve never seen me before.”
“Well, yeah.” He turned and headed for the truck as well.
We made it into the cab before the emu arrived. Emus. One of them came to my side of the truck, stuck its head right next to the window, and peered at me, cross-eyed, over its beak. Thor handed me back my phone and I snapped a photo of the emu. As if puzzled by the shutter noise the phone made when I took the picture, the emu cocked its head in curiosity. I snapped another shot of that.
The other two were peering in Thor’s side. He didn’t seem rattled by that, I realized with envy.
“Why are they staring at us?” I asked. I was trying to remember some of the emu lore Grandfather had been spouting so blithely for the past day or two. I didn’t recall any stories of trucks being savaged by flocks of emus, so we were probably safe enough. Then again, Grandfather seemed to like emus. He was taking all this trouble to rescue them. I should have remembered that his favorite birds and animals were invariably the ones that were fierce, dangerous, and highly photogenic.
“No idea,” Thor said. “They seem to like watching humans. If you like, I can start the truck moving. They’ll get out of the way if I move very slowly.”
“We probably should report back to Grandfather,” I said. “In fact, even better idea—let’s send him a couple of the photos. Oh, wait—the cell towers are probably still out. Back to camp, then.”
The trip back seemed even longer than the trip out, in part because I was worried that the emus would disappear while we were gone. Although Thor assured me that another sack or two of grain and a little work with his emu caller would lure them back again.
Just as we were turning onto the dirt road into Camp Emu, I spotted Dad, driving along in his SUV. I almost fell out the window of Thor’s uncle’s truck waving him to a stop.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
As I ran over to his SUV, I could see he was reaching into the back for his medical bag.
“Nothing’s wrong,” I said. “Look!”
I held up my phone with the picture of the emu staring through the truck window on its screen.
“You found them!”
Chapter 17
Dad immediately pulled out his radio and shared the news with Grandfather, who showed up half an hour later. Although I knew Grandfather was eager to start rounding up the emus, I’d assumed that he would congratulate me on my detective work and then we’d huddle over the map so Thor and I could show him precisely where the emus were, and he and Caroline and the Valkyrie would start planning for tomorrow’s expedition.
But he practically didn’t wait for Caroline to bring the Jeep to a stop before leaping out of it.
“About time someone showed some initiative!” He scrambled into the passenger side of Thor’s truck, taking the place I’d just vacated. “Let’s go!”
“We’re not waiting for the camera crew?” I asked. “And where did you ditch your bodyguards?”