August of the Zombies (Zombie Problems, Band 3) - Hardcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Keith G. Campbell was born in Kenya, but raised and educated in Scotland. He graduated with a master's degree in art history from the University of Edinburgh. After trying on several careers, Keith eventually returned to his early passion of writing and illustrating stories. He is the author-illustrator of several picture books and the winner of two Ezra Jack Keats Awards. A Small Zombie Problem is his first work for older readers, followed by The Zombie Stone and now, the exciting conslusion, August of the Zombies. Keith lives in Malibu, California. Learn more at kgcampbell.com and follow him at @artbykgcampbell.

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CHAPTER 1

The Ones Before

A ghostly band of morning mist hovered on the Continental River. From somewhere within the milky vapor advanced the sputter of a weary outboard motor. Soon a blurry shape emerged. And the shape appeared to be that of a garden shed roped to a listing pontoon: a houseboat . . . of sorts.

“Here comes Madame Marvell,” said August DuPont.

The boy had eyes of the palest gold, like late-summer marsh grass, unusually large and round and rendered even larger by large, round eyeglasses. Between those and his rather small mouth, he bore a distinct resemblance to a baby owl.

Swatting away some butterflies circling his head, the boy lifted a boatswain’s whistle to his lips and blew, closing and opening his fingers over the instrument’s holes to create a wavering warble. The dawn stillness should have resulted in the sound seeming piercing and conspicuous, but it was masked to some extent by the weak fog and the clamor of passing street sweepers.

The snail-paced vehicles edged along nearby Dolphin Street, their great circular brushes noisily swishing trash into their steel bellies: plastic cups and confetti and sequined masks and a million strings of colored beads--all the festive debris generated by two weeks of Carnival.

The whistle was loud enough, however, directed as it was across the water, to reach the approaching vessel, which shifted course slightly, clearly heading toward the high-pitched sound.

“Are you quite well enough to travel?” asked Belladonna Malveau. “It is not every day, after all, that a person gets walloped in the head by the paddle of a riverboat.”

“The paramedic came by first thing,” muttered August. “He said there’s no concussion, gave me the all-clear.”

Belladonna studied her cousin for a moment.

“Ah!” she said, as if in revelation. “That’s what’s missing: your beekeeper’s costume.”

“I lost the helmet in the river last night,” explained August. “Without it, the gloves seemed rather pointless.”

“Are you certain you are all right? You look, well, bluer than a day-old bruise.”

August threw the girl a dispirited glance.

“I’m doing fine, I guess,” he said dolefully, “considering I’m the person who ruined the Grand Parade, highlight of Croissant City’s world-famous Carnival, an event watched on television by millions of people.”

“Oh, quit being so hard on yourself,” said Belladonna consolingly. “It wasn’t your fault.”

She glanced discreetly at the gaggle of zombies nearby: a softly weeping showgirl, a small prince, and a well-dressed lady with only half a face. The bedraggled creatures swayed unsteadily on the boulders that formed the river’s embankment.

“Was it not your pirate zombie,” persisted Belladonna, “Jacques LeSalt, who truly caused the entire accident?”

“Your pirate zombie,” repeated August. “That, cousin, is precisely the problem. Let me ask you this. If the float had not collided with the fire hydrant, would the masts have collapsed, drenching everyone with bubble fluid and wrecking the TV presenters’ balcony, Yuko Yukiyama’s xylophone, and the entire sound system?”

“I guess not,” admitted Belladonna.

“And if celebrity cat Officer Claw had not flipped his lid and leaped, claws extended, onto the bald head of the driver, would the float have collided with the fire hydrant?”

“No,” said Belladonna more quietly.

“And if pirate zombie Jacques LeSalt had not been on the float, would he have mistaken foil-wrapped chocolate doubloons for his own treasure and lunged for them with a monstrous bellow, causing celebrity cat Officer Claw to flip his lid in the first place?”

Belladonna shook her head.

“And why was Jacques LeSalt on the float?”

Belladonna was silent.

“Because of me, Belladonna.” August gazed upon the lapping brown water with a bleak expression. “Because, like you said, he’s my zombie. Not that I can say why. I certainly didn’t set out to collect a bunch of undead groupies, who follow me everywhere.”

“Like ducklings,” observed Belladonna, “trail behind their mother.”

“If only they were ducklings! Ducklings don’t smell like moldy coffins. Ducklings don’t make people scream and panic, or cause havoc wherever they go. Ducklings don’t drool on your arm and offer you their eyeball.”

August looked down at the fourth undead member of this strange little riverside gathering, his great-great-aunt Claudette, who, blue-lipped and crooked, was drooling on her living relative’s arm and offering him her eyeball, as she often did.

“Ducklings,” continued August, “don’t get you blamed for things you didn’t do and make everyone hate you.”

“I don’t think everyone hates--”

“Margot Morgan Jordan called me a loser. Then a monster! The girl who plays TV’s beloved Stella Starz hates me.”

“Well, I’m sure--”

“This has to stop, Belladonna. I must retrieve the Zombie Stone. The thing, you see, is a Go-Between, a bridge between two worlds. It is the only thing that can force the zombies to return to the land of the dead, where they belong. It is the only thing that can set me free from”--August’s eyes drifted to Claudette’s pasty, adoring face--“all this undeadness.”

“And you’re sure the map can help, the one the undertaker found in Pepperville?”

August studied the newspaper in his hands, a copy of the Croissant City Crier.

“According to Octavia Motts,” he said, “the librarian at the Pepperville Public Library, there’s a mighty good chance it reveals the hiding place of Jacques LeSalt’s famous treasure. We know that’s where Professor Leech was headed with the zombie he stole. And the Zombie Stone. If I can figure out their route, maybe I can intercept them.”

“They have a healthy head start,” observed Belladonna. “Must you go to Pepperville first? Can’t you make out the map in the paper’s photograph of Mr. Goodnight?”

“It’s too small,” explained August. “And blurry. You can’t make out the details or read the place-names. I need to examine the original.”

“We’re headed home tomorrow,” said Belladonna. “Beauregard has some engagement in Pepperville, and Mama won’t permit me to remain here alone. You could come with us in the limousine; you’d arrive around the same time as you would if you left now in that.” She nodded at the approaching houseboat.

“I don’t think so,” said August. “Aunt Orchid has been asking some awkward questions about Madame Marvell, who for personal reasons chooses to remain incognito. Besides, do you really think your mother and brother would welcome all of us”--he jerked his head toward the zombies--“into the family vehicle?”

“Hmm,” grunted Belladonna. “You have a point.” She glanced at her cousin with good-natured, far-apart eyes of dark translucent brown, like breakfast tea.

Eyes that reminded August of a recent observation.

“The family portrait,” he said. “The one in the Funeral Street music room.”

Belladonna’s expression changed, became more guarded.

“What about...