“Of course it doesn’t,” Xtelle said. “You have no culture. Just look at the trousers you’re wearing. The main event,” she trotted over to the rock and stump and greenery, “is my acting debut. Yes, you may applaud.”
She set one hoof on the rock and lifted her head, striking a pose.
“The murder mystery?” I asked.
“In which I am thestar,” she said.
“Does Bertie know you are the star?” Than asked.
“I have sent her a memo,” Xtelle sniffed. “I am the star. Let me give you a sample of my greatness. Neigh, neigh. Nicker, nicker.” She flounced around between the greenery, throwing what were either suggestive glances or expressions of indigestion our way.
“I don’t think you’re supposed to say the words,” I said. “Ponies don’t say ‘nicker.’”
“Line!” she yelled.
Avnas produced pages of a script from some pocket he must have in his bull shape. I really didn’t want to know where that pocket might be. “One lonely pony…”
“One lonely pony,” Xtelle repeated, “stands in a field. Nibbling the greenery.” Xtelle lowered her head to the uprooted rhododendron and made fake eating motions. “Nibble, nibble.”
“You’re not supposed to say—” I said.
“Nibble, nibble!” she repeated louder.
“If the pony had heard the murderer, she showed no signs,” Avnas said.
Xtelle lifted her head and widened her eyes, giving a silly vacuous look, as if she didn’t have a single brain in all the world.
“And scene,” Avnas said softly, as if he were afraid to disturb her moment.
“For the love of—” I began.
Than clapped his hands twice. “Adequate,” he judged.
“Adequate?” Xtelle lifted her nose. “You may leave.”
Than did not leave.
“Okay, this is what we’re going to do,” I said. “I’m going to charge you both with trespassing and destruction of property. You will donate five hundred dollars to the Heritage Garden, so they can replace what you took.”
“Five!”
“Which will not be stolen funds, but money you have earned here in Ordinary.”
She made an offended sound.
“And if you do so in the next three months, I will not throw you in jail for what you did. Do you understand what you’ve done is wrong?”
Xtelle kicked at one of the plants. “If you say so.”
“I say so. Do you understand, Avnas?”
“I do.”
“You also owe five hundred dollars to the Heritage Garden. Money you’ve earned.”
“Very well,” he said.
“You stink,” Xtelle said.
