Boat!

Gerhardt was gone. Mirabelle grabbed the net, kicked out of Adolphus’ grip, and leaned over the edge to look for him. She expected to see him bobbing in the current downstream with only the hope of catching onto Claire’s rope to save him, but Claire’s rope was no longer stretching into the blackness downstream. Instead, here was Claire herself, standing in a perfectly round boat with a surprised Gerhardt sitting beside her.

Mirabelle turned back and leaped at her siblings. Adolphus and Annabelle caught her. She grabbed Gerhardt’s shoe and reassured her horrified twin.

“He’s safe! Claire’s back; it’s time to go.”

There was little left on the ship worth taking. They loaded up the rope, the last of the food and tools, the algae lamp and their sodden winter clothing, and last of all the yeti, dragged onto the raft with considerable heaving and ho-ing.

Claire’s raft was white and perfectly smooth on the outside. The floor of it was concave, and soft ridges stood up in rays from the center to the edge. The ridges crushed under foot, giving off an earthy smell. She had a long pole and two oars. Adolphus commandeered the pole and was singing a lullaby, the only Italian song he knew, and pretending to be a gondolier. Unfortunately, he had forgotten most of the words, and substituted the Italian curses he had learned from the Count. The result was quite obscene.

“Language, Adolphus,” said Claire, employing an oar to keep them away from the cave wall.

“Where did you get this boat?” Mirabelle asked. “Are there natives to trade with?”

Annabelle was tying Gerhardt’s shoe back on rather sternly, as though she could keep a hold of him with tighter laces. Gerhardt was examining the crushed ridges of the boat’s floor.

“No one built this,” he said. “It’s a mushroom.”

“Correct!” Claire beamed. “You’re a promising mycologist!”

Gerhardt’s eyes shone with fanatical gleam. “Monsieur Verne was right! These are the giant mushrooms from the center of the earth. This river must flow into the central sea!” He was a bit over-excited, having just plunged to his almost-certain-death.

“I didn’t reach any sea,” Claire said. “I let the current take me downstream, just to reconnoiter.”

“Without telling anyone!”

“Well, I didn’t think I’d be gone so long. Anyway -”

“You released our prisoner,” Adolphus admonished.

“I needed the rope.”

“He was my prisoner, too,” Adolphus said. “What gives you the right to release my prisoner without asking?”

“I needed the rope! Besides, what were you going to do with him? He’s an evil botanist, not a collectible.”

“But now he’s loose in the center of the earth,” Gerhardt protested. “He may lie in wait for us. He may enslave dinosaurs the way he enslaved the yeti.”

“It wasn’t right to leave him tied up in a cupboard,” Claire said. “It was morally wrong and it made the cupboard smell bad. Any anyway, I needed the rope to explore and discover how we could best survive our predicament.”

“Well no one put you in charge and you’ve no right to release the prisoner and commandeer all the line,” Adolphus said. He was glaring at his sister, and she stood up to glare back. Mirabelle sighed and took her oar while Annabelle took up the other.

“Your crazy ideas weren’t going to solve any problems! If you’d let the balloons go we all would have drowned.”

“If you hadn’t taken the line, we’d be floating right now.”

“We are floating right now!”

“Not in the air where we belong!” Adolphus’ face was turning red. “We had to abandon the monkey’s ship because of you, and we almost died doing it. That is not leadership!”

“I don’t want leadership!” Claire shouted, “I never asked to be in charge.”

“Good! I’m the next oldest, I’m in charge.”

The twins booed this heartily, their protests echoing through the gloom.

“I’d put Bettina in charge before you!”

“Good,” said Bettina.

This discussion quickly degenerated into unfounded accusations and name calling, and if no oar was raised in anger (and none was), there was deliberate splashing, and the occasional Italian curse.

Finally Gerhardt snatched Annabelle’s oar and shoved hard on the cave wall. The mushroom boat jerked and Claire and Adolphus sat down with a thump. He returned Annabelle’s oar, thanking her, then turned to his older sister.

“What did you find, Claire?”

.

.

This story began with On Grandmothers. The last episode was Into the Drink! and the next is Mushroom Trip.