This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
and incidents are either products of the author’s
imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.
Copyright © 2015 by Stephan Pastis
Timmy Failure font copyright © 2012 by Stephan Pastis
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted,
or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means,
graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and
recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
First electronic edition 2015
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2015936916
This book was typeset in Nimrod.
The illustrations were done in pen and ink.
Candlewick Press
99 Dover Street
Somerville, Massachusetts 02144
visit us at www.candlewick.com
Visit www.timmyfailure.com
for games, downloadables, activities,
a blog, and more!
www.candlewick.com
www.timmyfailure.com
We’re all in trouble when we can’t tell the good
guys from the bad.
But tell that to the photographers that sur-
round the entrance to the hotel.
And tell it to the crowd of onlookers who
want a glimpse.
And tell it to the police who try in vain to
clear a path.
For the bad guy.
Who at precisely 9:07 p.m. is escorted out
of the revolving glass doors of the hotel to an
explosion of flashbulbs.
The lingering effect of which produces a
bright ball of light in the center of his gaze.
Making it impossible to see the faces of the
surging crowd.
As a cop shoves a photographer. And some-
one screams. And a woman faints.
And the bad guy is pushed through the
throng.
His hands now cuffed.
His shoes quite scuffed.
A world gone mad.
The good now bad.
It is a fireworks show like no other.
“Sit back, Timmy,” says my mom.
“But I want to watch.”
“There’s nothing to watch,” she says.
And as she says that, another large bug
explodes across the windshield of our car.
“Ooooh, that was a big one,” I say. “Very
colorful, too.”
“Timmy, we have hundreds of miles left
on this drive,” says my mother. “Now sit back
or I’m stopping the car.”
I sit back. But am hit in the arm by my
polar bear.
“Ow!” I yell.
“What now?” asks my mom.
“My polar bear hit me.”
It’s true. He does it every time he sees a
Volkswagen.
“That does it,” says my mom, who before I
know it is pulling our rental car into the park-
ing lot of an E-Z Daze Motel.
“You can’t stop here,” I tell my mother.
“We’re in the middle of nowhere.”
But she doesn’t answer. She just gets out of
the car and says something to Doorman Dave,
who has pulled his car in next to ours.
Doorman Dave is my mother’s boyfriend.
He’s called Doorman Dave because he used
to be the doorman in our apartment build-
ing. But now he got a job far away, so we’re
using my precious spring break to help him
move.
And it is tragic beyond comprehension.
Tragic because I have stared at nothing
but cornfields for hundreds of miles.
Tragic because it has all been to the tune
of my mother’s favorite country musician,
Slim Chitlins.
And tragic because of the effect it is hav-
ing on a boy a world away.
A boy named Yergi Plimkin.
Yergi Ismavitch Plimkin is from somewhere
that is not here.
And he has no books.
A fact discovered by my peace-loving,
world-saving classmate Toody Tululu when
she saw Yergi’s large face in a newspaper ad.
So Toody organized a charity, Yergi
Ismavitch Plimkin, You Are Poor. While the
name wasn’t flattering, the acronym was
catchy:
And so YIP YAP held bake sales and car
washes and bike races until it had raised
enough money to buy poor Yergi Plimkin
some books.
That amount being:
“Zero dollars and twelve cents,” read YIP
YAP’s vice president, Nunzio Benedici.
“What?” exclaimed a shocked Toody
Tululu at the monthly meeting of YIP YAP.
“Read that again, Madam Vice President.”
“I’m a boy,” replied Nunzio. “I can’t be a
Madam.”
“Read it again, anyway.”
So Nunzio read the amount again.
“That can’t be,” said Toody Tululu. “We
had one hundred and twenty dollars at our last
meeting and we haven’t spent a dime.”
“I don’t know what to tell you,” said
Nunzio, looking at the ledger. “It’s not there.”
And with that, peace-loving Toody made a
brief, yet cogent, statement.
When all your money’s
Been seized by a criminal,
Call Timmy Failure
And not Timmy Fiminal.
—
Timmy Failure jingle
1
To the best of my knowledge, everyone on
earth has now read the prior three volumes
about my life.
1.
Y
e
s, I am aware that there is no one named
T
immy
Fiminal. But there is no other word that rhymes with
criminal.
And besides, I’m a detective, not a poet.
If, however, you have spent the last few
years living under a rock:
Or at the bottom of the sea:
Or in a time warp:
Then let me fill you in.
My name is Failure. Timmy Failure.
I am the founder, president, and CEO of
Failure, Inc., the greatest detective agency in
town, probably in the state, perhaps in the
nation.
The name of the agency used to be
Total
Failure, Inc. The “Total” being my business
partner, Total.
But then I fired him.
And now he lies in bed eating bonbons.
The degree to which that bear has abused
our professional relationship is both astonish-
ing and embarrassing.
And will not be discussed here.
And besides, I want to get back to the story.
So let me sum up everything you need to
know as concisely as possible so we can get on
with things:
1. Me Timmy.
2. Timmy great.
3. Bear fat.
And with that under
stood, you now know
why it was that when YIP YAP got tip-tapped,
2
they called the one man who could help them.
And it wasn’t Timmy Fiminal.
2. Detective slang for “robbed.”
And no, I’m not making
up words.
“Start at the beginning,” I tell my best friend,
Rollo Tookus.
“YIP YAP’s money is gone,” says Rollo.
“I know
that,
Rollo. I mean, why are you
involved?”
“I’m the sergeant-at-arms. They said it was
my job to find out what happened.”
“What’s a sergeant-at-arms?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you join the military?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Are you armed?”
“No.”
“So what is it?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” answers Rollo. “All I know
is that it was the only elected office that YIP
YAP didn’t have filled. And holding an elected
does participation in band, speech tourna-
ments, civic organizations
—”
His head begins to shake.
It is something that happens whenever the
topic of grades, college, or his future arises.
So I do what only a friend can do.
I hit him with a tetherball.
“What’d you do that for?” asks Rollo.
“You were going to your unhappy place. I
was saving you.”
He tosses the tetherball back at me. It
strikes me in the cranium.
“Oh, God,” I exclaim as I fall to the pave-
ment. “I’ve been concussed. Someone call the
authorities.”
But Rollo does not call the authorities.
So we do what only good friends can do:
We spend the next five minutes hitting
each other with the tetherball.
“Well, that was productive,” I tell him.
“You started it,” Rollo answers.
“Yeah, well, you needed it.”
“And you assaulted a member of the mili-
tary,” Rollo replies, checking his corduroy
pants to see if he has split them open.
He gets up and walks off.
“I haven’t finished asking you questions,”
I call out to him.
“Do it later,” he shouts back over his
shoulder. “Some of us have to get ready for
the history test.”
“What history test?” I ask.
“I think I aced that,” I whisper to Rollo.
“Quiet,” replies Rollo. “I’m not finished.”
“Tell me more about YIP YAP. Like who
else is in the group.”
“Hush,”
says Rollo.
“I need to know,” I tell him. “Everyone’s a
suspect until proven otherwise.”
I feel a hand on my shoulder.
“There’s no talking during the test,
Timmy.”
It is Mr. Jenkins, our teacher.
“I finished early,” I tell Mr. Jenkins. “It
was one of your easier exams. And frankly, I
feel sorry for Meriwether.”
“I don’t know what that means, Timmy,
but if you’re done early, sit quietly at your
desk and read.”
I wait until Mr. Jenkins has walked back
to his desk and lower my voice.
“Who else is in the group, Rollo?”
He says nothing.
“I’ll just keep talking if you don’t tell me.”
He ignores me.
“At least tell me the name of the treasurer.”
Mr. Jenkins raises his head and looks in
our direction.
I wait until he looks away.
“Fine,”
I whisper to Rollo. “Don’t say a
thing. But it’s your fault if it takes me forever
to solve what might otherwise be an open-and-
shut case. And who will YIP YAP blame for
that? It won’t be me. I’m guessing it will be
their sergeant-at-arms.”
Rollo looks up at me.
“Don’t worry,” I tell him. “I’m sure colleges
won’t care if your application says, ‘Disgraced
sergeant-at-arms booted from office.’
”
Rollo frantically tears off a corner of his
exam and scribbles a name on it.
He checks to be sure Mr. Jenkins is not
watching and slides me the piece of paper.
“Here,”
he whispers between gritted teeth.
“It’s the treasurer’s name. Now . . . be . . . quiet.”
I glance at the torn piece of paper.
And am immediately aware.
It
is
an open-and-shut case.
Molly Moskins is the nation’s most wanted
criminal.
But you already know that if you have
read any of my prior works.
Molly has stolen shoes, globes, spoons,
nature reports, and the sacred honor of the
criminal justice system.
For while I have caught her red-handed,
she has yet to be criminally prosecuted.
It is a travesty of immense proportion.
tangerine.
Here. Smell for yourself:
She is a criminal without conscience. A
sinner without scruples. A hoodlum without
a hood.
She would steal the fur from a bear. The
scales from a fish. And a fish from a scale.
And given access to a charity’s hard-
earned funds, she would rob it not only blind
but deaf.
And deaf is what I will be when Molly
Moskins stops yelling.
“OH, TIMMY! THIS WILL BE THE MOST
SPLENDIFEROUS SPRING BREAK VACA-
TION I’VE EVER TAKEN!”
I am standing in the parking lot of the E-Z
Daze Motel, and the felon herself is jumping
up and down next to me.
You heard right.
My mother’s caravan-to-nowhere not
only involves moving Doorman Dave halfway
across the country. It also involves vacation-
ing with her new best friend.
Esther Moskins.
Esther is the mother of You-Know-Who:
Supposedly, we are all traveling to a city
called Chicago, where we will help Doorman
Dave move into his new apartment.
Then
Doorman Dave and I and my inconsiderate
mother and the tangerine-scented felon and
all of the felon’s family will vacation together
in Chicago.
Oh, did I fail to mention the rest of the
felon’s family?
Then here, meet them.
This is Mr. Moskins:
He is Molly’s dad. And I know only one
thing about him:
He likes maps.
And then there’s Molly’s little brother,
Micah. But she doesn’t call him Micah. She
calls him this:
I don’t want to know why she calls him
Snot. I just want to hide from Molly.
So I lock myself in the car.
“Don’t you want to come out and play?”
asks the tangerine-scented girl.
“We’re not stayin
g, Molly Moskins. My
mom just pulled the car over because I was
fighting with my business partner.”
Molly starts to ask me something but is
interrupted by the
CLICK-CLICK
of the car
doors unlocking.
“What are you doing?” I ask my mom as
she gets into the car.
“I’m unlocking the car. So I can get into it.
Which is how I drive.”
“Are we leaving?” I ask.
“Yes,” she says.
“Oh, thank God,” I answer.
She rolls down the front passenger window
and leans out toward Molly. “You better go
back with your parents, dear. We’re not stay-
ing here.”
Molly runs off.
“Oh, please,” I mutter to my mother. “The
girl hardly merits a ‘dear.’ Need I recite her
litany of crimes? She probably stole your car
stereo while you were yapping.”
My mother turns to me in the backseat.
“Seriously, Timmy. Behave. Or else I’m
going to pull over the car again and make you
go the rest of the way in Dave’s car.”
Dave’s car has no air-conditioning. And
that alone is perilous to an Arctic mammal. So
for Total’s sake, I behave.
Besides, my mother is stressed.
And soon to be more stressed.
“Oh, don’t tell me,” she says as she turns
the key in the ignition and hears nothing.
“No, no, no, don’t die on me now,” she tells
the rental car. “Not here. Not now.”
But the car doesn’t listen.
Then she says many words that cannot be
included here.
And soon all the adults are gathered out-
side our dead car.
“You guys go on,” my mother tells the
Moskins family. “Dave and I will wait for the
tow truck.”