paddles.”
Quickly, Max broke the two capsules. A fully-inflated rubber boat and two paddles popped out. He and 99 leaped aboard, grasping the paddles, just as the wall of water reached them. The boat was swept up by a huge wave, and moments later they found themselves bounding downstream, carried along by the irresistible force of the flood.
“Max! Do something!” 99 squealed, struggling to stay aboard the boat. “We’re going to be carried out to sea!”
“99, I
“It isn’t helping, Max!”
“I didn’t say I was doing something constructive, I just said I was doing something.”
The boat was hit by another huge wave. With Max and 99 still clinging to it, it submerged. When it bobbed to the surface again a few seconds later, both Max and 99 were paddling furiously. Then 99 stopped.
“Max-the island, where is it?” 99 cried.
“I’m having trouble enough as it is, 99. Let the island find its own boat.”
“Max, it’s gone. We were swept out to sea!”
“Good riddance!” Max said. “It was nothing but trouble, anyway.”
“But, Max, we’re lost! Lost at sea!”
The boat had stopped pitching and tossing. Max sat up and looked around. “Well, we’re at sea, 99, I’ll go along with you that far,” he said. “But we’re hardly lost. After all, we’re intelligent beings, we can determine direction. And we know that the mainland lies to the east of us and the island lies to the west of us.”
99 sat up too. “From here, which direction is which, Max?”
“Offhand, I don’t know. But we can find out easily enough. We know that the sun rises in the west and sets in the east. So all we-”
“Max, it’s the other way around.”
“Oh. All right, then, we know that the sun sets in the east and rises in the west. So-”
“No, Max, when I said the other way around, I meant to transpose east and west, not rises and sets.”
“Skip it, 99. It’s the middle of the night and the sun isn’t out, anyway.” He looked up into the sky. “Maybe we can use the stars to guide us.”
99 peered up too. “Wliat are we looking for, Max?”
“A group of stars in the shape of an arrow that blink on and off and spell out ‘To the Mainland.’ ”
“To the mainland, Max? We want to get back to the island, don’t we?”
“99, we wouldn’t survive an hour on that island. We lost our survival kits. Our only chance is to reach the mainland, get new kits, then have that helicopter pilot fly us to the island again.”
“All right, Max, if you say so. But if the stars won’t point the way, how are we going to find the mainland?”
“Instinct, 99. How do the birds find the north after they’ve been down south all winter? Instinct, that’s how.” He pointed. “And my instinct tells me that the mainland is thataway.”
Max and 99 began paddling, steering in the direction that Max’s instinct told him would take them to the mainland. They paddled throughout the rest of the night, and then at the break of dawn they spied a shape on the horizon.
“The mainland!” Max said exultantly. “Score another victory for instinct!”
“Max. . it looks awfully small to be the west coast of the United States.”
“That’s because we’re still a long distance away, 99.”
“Then how come our boat is bumping on the beach?”
Max looked over the side and saw sand. The boat had beached on an island. “Well, at least I’ve learned something today, 99,” he said. “It isn’t instinct that guides those birds back from the South. I think they must follow the railroad tracks.”
They got out of the boat and pulled it up on dry land.
“Do you have any idea where we are, Max?” 99 said.
“On an island-that’s about as far out on a limb as I’m willing to go at this point. Let’s look around.”
“But, Max, it looks just like that other island we were on-it’s nothing but jungle. We’re really doomed this time, Max. No one will know where to look for us.”
“There’s a stream over there,” Max said. “Let’s follow it. We may be doomed, as you say, 99, but as long as we keep to the stream, at least we’ll have fresh water.”
They plunged into the jungle, staying close to the stream. Their clothing snagged on brambles. They had to fight their way past thick, low-hanging vines. But then soon, almost miraculously, they emerged into a small clearing.
“Look at those trees, 99!” Max said, appalled. “They must have been hit by some terrible disease.”
“Max. . I know where we are,” 99 said.
“Oh? Do you read sick trees, 99? That’s quite a talent.”
“Max, those trees aren’t sick. They were mowed down by a machine gun.”
“That’s terrible,” Max said sympathetically. “You can sometimes recover from an illness, but from getting mowed down by a machine gun, never. I wonder who- Oh. I think I’m beginning to see what you mean, 99. What you’re trying to say is that we’re back on the same island that we were washed off of last night.”
“I’m afraid so, Max,” 99 said gloomily. “All we managed to accomplish during the night was to lose our survival kit and everything that went with it.”
“Well, at least we weren’t idle,” Max said.
“What do you have in mind for today?” 99 inquired.
“I think that’s pretty obvious. First, we’ll find the castle. Then we’ll recapture Guru Optimo. Then we’ll contact the mainland and have them send the helicopter for us. Then we’ll take Guru Optimo back to headquarters and turn him over to the Chief.”
“Max, I’m hungry. I’m hungry and I’m tired.”
“But first we’ll have breakfast,” Max said. “Since we no longer have the survival kit, though, of course, we’ll have to depend on our wits to scare up some food. You look for some berries, 99. And, meanwhile, I’ll build a few traps and snare some small animals.”
“For what, Max?”
“To eat. This is a desperate situation, 99. We have to think of our tum-tums. By the time you collect a few berries, I’ll have a squirrel or a hedgehog roasting over the grill.”
“What grill, Max?”
“First things first. Go collect your berries and let me get at my trap-building.”
99 headed toward the bushes, and Max began gathering fallen branches. After he had collected a good number, he began stripping the bark from a few. “In times of crisis like this, the thing to do is keep your head,” he called out to 99. “As long as we don’t panic, we’re all right.”
“Max, what are you doing?” 99 asked, looking over.
“I’ll strip these strips into smaller strips and use them as cord,” he replied. “I’ll use the cord to tie together the parts of the trap.”
“Max, that’s brilliant!”
“Simply keeping my head,” Max said modestly.
He broke the branches into lengths of approximately equal size, then, using the strips of bark as binding, he began constructing the first trap. “This reminds me of last Christmas Eve,” he called over to 99.
She looked up into the sky.
“No, I don’t mean that it’s snowing. Last Christmas Eve, I was doing this same thing.”
“Building a trap to catch a squirrel?”
“No, no, putting something together. It was a tricycle.”
“Oh, yes, I remember. Your car was in the garage, wasn’t it?”
“99, it wasn’t a tricycle for me,” Max said. “It was supposed to be a gift for my nephew. But you know how you get things these days, all in parts, and you have to put them together yourself. Well, I was assembling this tricycle-just as I’m assembling this trap, now. Except that this is child’s play compared to that. Have you ever seen the instructions for assembling a tricycle, 99? It’s very complicated. They tell you to connect Part A to Part B, but
