“But don’t you think it kind of is?” asked Sebastian, tipping his chair backward farther into the shadows.
“No. No, I don’t think so. Catherine cares about him, and maybe Benedict was unsure, but…” She could hear his voice in her head, back on Newish Isle: “It’s the right thing to do.” She’d thought it was because the right thing to do was helping someone you cared about, but maybe…“The Kid! The Kid likes Alistair!”
“He likes adventure,” said Sebastian.
“No, he likes him. I mean, yes, he does like adventure, but also…He said I reminded him of Alistair!” Even before she’d said it, she could hear Sebastian’s argument: That didn’t mean that the Kid liked Alistair.
“Well, that doesn’t mean—”
“I know it doesn’t mean.” Evie sat down hard. And Doris was so unsure. So unsure. And that was weird, really, because from the little she’d seen of the woman, Doris seemed so confident and happy.
“It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t rescue him. It means maybe you’re making the wrong argument to convince them.” She could hear the worry in his voice. He was so slow and tentative in how he spoke. He didn’t want to hurt her feelings, but he kept saying this stuff. That was because he was trying to help her. Even if he did hurt her.
Like when he’d thrown the key into the fire at the Explorers Society headquarters. That had hurt so much—but he had done it to save her. He’d had another plan.
Another plan.
“What do you think we should do?” she asked him.
Sebastian seemed to relax and even smiled. He leaned forward into the light. “Did you notice how much Doris looked at Catherine?”
“Yeah. That was odd,” replied Evie.
“It was. But also interesting. I think that when it comes to caring about people, Catherine and Doris were really close back in the day.”
Evie nodded. She remembered what the Kid had told her on the plane.
“Doris cares what Catherine thinks,” said Evie.
“Yes. So I bet that Catherine…”
“Can convince Doris to come along!” Evie was feeling so much better. It was amazing how quickly Sebastian could do that for her. “Come on. We have to talk to her!”
Sebastian laughed as they both stood. Orson, who was sleeping at his feet, yawned and stretched.
“What’s so funny?” asked Evie.
“You’re always so ready to do the next thing,” he said.
“Well, I mean…yeah.” What was wrong with that?
“Let’s talk to her in the morning. Adults really like their sleep. And I think today has been a weird day for more than just us,” he added.
Evie nodded. “You know, for someone who claims he has trouble reading people, you’re pretty great at it.”
Sebastian rolled his eyes but kept his smile. “Well, I’ve had a pretty great teacher.”
And finally Evie smiled too.
The hardest part about convincing Catherine to convince Doris was not actually the logic of the situation. Sebastian was relieved about that, as he could never really understand why people would listen to facts and logic and then just say no, as if those things didn’t matter. But it was equally confusing that someone who had agreed and said yes to the logic of helping Alistair was still not sure about what they were doing.
“I don’t know,” said Catherine. The three of them were sitting cross-legged on the twin bed in what looked like a storage room of some kind, which had been Catherine’s room for the evening. The morning sun was streaming through the small window above a shelving unit. It was hard not to get distracted by the odds and ends, and ends and odds. At another time Sebastian could have spent hours examining everything. But this wasn’t that time.
“But why don’t you know?” asked Evie, sounding exasperated. “She’s your friend. She’ll listen to you!”
“And that’s why I don’t know,” replied Catherine.
“That makes no sense,” said Sebastian, more to himself than to the animal expert.
“It does.” Catherine turned to him. “I don’t want to make her do anything that she doesn’t want to do. And because it’s me, she would.”
“Why is that bad, though?” asked Evie.
“It’s bad because…” Catherine’s face wore an expression that Sebastian hadn’t seen before on her. It almost…It almost seemed like sadness. But that didn’t make sense.
“Are you wondering, what if something happens and then it’s all your fault?” asked Evie.
Catherine turned to her so that now Sebastian could just see her profile. She made a little nod.
“Is that what this is about? The earthquake?” asked Evie slowly.
Catherine nodded again.
“The earthquake?” asked Sebastian.
Evie looked at him. “You know, the one they set off, that made the tsunami, that destroyed that island. That made them outcasts in the first place.”
That was the one he’d thought she’d been talking about, but he still didn’t understand. “I don’t get it. What does Doris’s decision about helping Alistair have to do with an earthquake?” he asked.
Evie made to answer, but Catherine cut her off. “It’s my fault. It’s my fault. I didn’t want them to harm the creature that was attacking us. It didn’t know any better. It was scared, that’s all. We didn’t know what it was, if it was endangered. I asked them to come up with a better solution than hurting it. Alistair didn’t want to. The Kid—well, he was busy driving. Benedict was okay with any choice. It was Doris I convinced. It was Doris I asked for a solution. She came up with the idea of burying it under rocks, with the hope that it would still be alive and eventually dig its way out. But it was me asking her, knowing she wouldn’t say no to me. It was all me.”
Sebastian stared at the animal expert. She had said it so plainly, but he’d never heard her sound so full of sadness and regret. So full of pain.
“Oh, Catherine, I’m so sorry,” said Evie.
“And it’s not true,” said Sebastian. “It wasn’t all you. It was the team. It was the decision to go down there in the first place; it was everything. And Doris is a grown-up. She can make her own choices.”
Both Evie and Catherine stared at him.
“Can’t she?” asked Sebastian, now feeling unsure. After all, he didn’t know Doris well.
“It feels like my fault,” said Catherine after a moment.
“I get that,” said Evie. “But feeling a thing doesn’t necessarily make it true.”
“Exactly,” said Sebastian.
“Also, I mean, if you think about it, wouldn’t convincing her to come along help undo the badness of before?” asked Evie. “You can’t take back what happened, but you can do a good deed together, as a team.”
Sebastian thought that sounded like a solid idea, even though it wasn’t really true. Nothing could undo the bad that had happened. That wasn’t how time worked.
Catherine sat very still. Sebastian wondered how many times she’d sat that way, trying not to frighten a skittish animal. She’d probably had a lot of practice at it. Then, finally, she nodded. Even though not much changed in her face, there was a sense that her mood had shifted.
“Okay. I’ll talk to Doris.” She stood with purpose. Then stopped. Then turned to look at them. “Thank you,” she said. “I didn’t realize children could be so resourceful.”
“Really?” asked Sebastian.
“Baby animals are,” added Evie.
“True.” Catherine pondered this. “But, well, you know. Humans.”
She said it like they should know, and so Sebastian simply nodded as if he did.
Because, well, he sort of did.
Humans.
Catherine and Doris spoke privately, and when they reemerged into the cozy kitchen, now bathed in the war
m glow of the morning sun filtering in from the garden, Evie knew she was on board. Even before Doris nodded her head and said, “Okay. I’m in.”
This was it. The moment Evie had been waiting for. And as Doris joined them and presented her piece of the map and her letter, placing them gingerly on the tree table in front of them, Evie tried to take it all in. To remember this feeling.
Only a few weeks before, she had been totally alone, escaping the Andersons’ burning house, no family, just confusion and fear. And here she was with four different people she’d traveled around the world to find. And a fifth about to be found—who was family.
She grinned at Sebastian, who nodded at her, and she realized he was probably in problem-solving mode. Time to figure out what the four letters had to say when laid on top of each other, each pointing in a different direction of the compass. And it wasn’t like she wasn’t ready too. But realizing that it was because of her that the Filipendulous Five had come back together was a big thing.
“So let’s figure out where he is!” said the Kid, clapping his hands and making both Evie and Orson jump a bit in their seats.
“Let’s look at the letters,” Evie said. “Doris, do you have anything we could put them on that would light them up from below?” She was excited. That was an understatement. She was so excited that she wanted to be onstage in an opera right now so that she could sing out her feelings. Thinking that made her feel strange. She hadn’t sung in a very long time. She used to sing with her parents a lot but hadn’t since they’d passed. Maybe it was knowing that she’d be with her grandfather soon that made her think that way. Maybe it was a good thing.
Doris grinned and left the room. There was some scrambling as the explorers produced their letters and Doris returned carrying an old overhead projector almost the same size as she was. She placed it in the center of the table.
“Now what?” she asked.
“Put the letters on top of each other and face them in the direction that Alistair has indicated in each,” said Evie, leaning in close.
“Not the actual direction,” said Sebastian quickly. “More like when you look at a drawing of a compass and north is facing up, east is on the right, and so on.”
Evie shook her head. Surely it wasn’t necessary to be so specific. But who knew? It certainly didn’t hurt.
One by one, starting with Catherine, the explorers placed their letters on the projector. When the letters were aligned with each other, Doris flipped a switch, and the bright light beneath them shone up. Everyone leaned in close so that they could all see.
“Uh, guys?” said Sebastian.
They looked at him. He pointed at the white wall behind them. Everyone turned. Sure enough the projector was doing its job, and a large version of the letters was glowing on the wall. Everyone pulled back and stared.
The darker letters shone through. What the group had assumed to be Ws turned out to be Es. And Zs were Ns. It was impressive to behold, and impressive to think of Alistair putting this much work into sending a message. Sebastian read it aloud.
“ ‘NANNIE DEE WADES AT ZERO.’ ”
Ah.
Okay, then.
“What does that mean?” asked the Kid.
“I’m not sure,” replied Catherine, squinting at the wall as if maybe that would help the message make more sense.
“Nannie Dee…,” said Evie.
“Who’s that?” asked Sebastian.
“Is it even a who?” asked Evie.
The room fell silent. She noticed Sebastian get up and wander away, lost in thought.
“You mean…,” said the Kid.
“Well, is it a name or a job? There are a lot of nannies out there. Maybe this is someone whose last name is Dee?” Evie said.
“Could be,” said Doris. “Though I’m not sure that helps us at all.”
“Why is the word ‘nanny’ spelled wrong?” asked Catherine.
“Is it?” asked the Kid.
“Well, either it’s spelled wrong or he forgot the s to make it plural. Which then would spell ‘Nannies Dee,’ but that doesn’t make sense either.”
“No, it doesn’t,” said Benedict.
“Hey, guys,” said Sebastian.
Evie turned. He’d figured it out. He’d used that problem-solving brain of his and photographic memory, and somewhere inside he’d dug out a recollection of a Nannie Dee who…She stared. He was sitting in front of a glowing computer screen.
“Evidently, Nannie Dee is the name of a witch from a Robbie Burns poem.”
“Oh. You looked it up,” said Evie, standing and walking to him. He could do that. Any of them could have simply done that.
Benedict stood and leaned over Sebastian’s shoulder to see the screen too. “Ah,” he said, a smile crossing his face.
“What is it?” asked Sebastian.
Benedict pointed at the screen. “Her nickname is ‘Cutty Sark.’ ”
Evie wasn’t sure what that had to do with anything.
Without anyone having to ask him, Benedict explained: “The Cutty Sark is a historic British ship from the 1800s.”
“Okay?” said Evie, still confused.
“That explains what ‘wades at zero’ means,” he said, standing upright and turning to the rest of them. He waited, but none of them seemed to understand his meaning. “The ship is now a nautical museum. In London, England. Actually, Greenwich, to be precise.”
“Greenwich mean time!” said Doris, snapping her fingers.
“ ‘Greenwich’ means ‘time’?” asked Evie. She’d never heard the word “Greenwich” before, nor that it evidently had that meaning.
“Mean time,” explained the Kid. “Time zones. You know how the time changes depending on where on the earth you are? Plus an hour here, minus an hour there?”
Evie nodded. She could sense Sebastian nodding in unison with her.
“Greenwich, which is a borough of London, is where the zero time zone is. It’s the starting point, where we start adding hours if we go east of it and subtracting time if we go west of it.”
“Ah,” said Evie.
“What happens when you meet in the middle on the other side?” asked Sebastian.
“Well, that answers that, then!” said Doris. She was smiling broadly. “Alistair wants us to go to the Cutty Sark. We can do that.”
“I don’t get it, though,” said Sebastian. “Is he being held in the boat?”
“I’m not sure it matters,” said Evie. “He’s got to be somewhere around there. Maybe there’s another clue in the boat, even. We can figure things out when we arrive. But we need to leave immediately!” She was up on her feet like she was just going to run there. And right then, with adrenaline pumping through her body, she felt like she pretty much could. That she could run so fast, she could run across water.
“Well, we aren’t going there by foot. Please sit down, Evie,” said Catherine, ever practical.
Evie sat down hard on the bench, a little too hard. She said “Ow” to herself quietly, a bit embarrassed. “Okay. Let’s book flights and get taxis and everything.”
For the first time, well, ever, Evie saw Catherine make a sneaky kind of smile. It was so surprising to see the animal expert do that that Evie wasn’t actually sure she had seen it. But Catherine’s quick glance to Doris, and then the same smile growing on Doris’s face, confirmed that indeed Evie had.
“What’s going on?” asked Evie.
“Wait a minute,” said the Kid, pointing at Doris, his mouth agape. “Wait. A. Minute.”
“It’s not still…That is to say, I thought it was destroyed.” Benedict furrowed his eyebrows mildly.
Doris made a slight shrug and winked at him.
“Okay. Come on, you guys,” said Evie. “This isn’t fair. Tell us what’s up.”
Catherine’s smile grew a bit, and even though Evie was now annoyed with her, she also had to admit that she was getting excited. About what, she had no idea. “Doris still has the submarine,” said the animal expert.
Evie’s eyes got wide then, so wide that she had to blink them hard because she’d made herself dizzy. “The submarine. You mean the submarine? The one from your previous adventures?”
“Yes,” said Doris.
“But…,” Sebastian interrupted. “But no. No, it doesn’t work. Don’t the men in black have the EM-7056?” Evie nodded, remembering that horrible day when Mr. K had held her hostage in the society headquarters.
“Good memory,” said Catherine.
“It doesn’t matter,” said the Kid, leaning back.
“It doesn’t?” asked Evie.
“Nah, the sub runs fine. We just need the EM-7056 to dive really deep into the trench. But we’re not doing that. We’re just traveling in it.” He looked at Doris. “You are one clever lady.”
She laughed.
Well, that was happy news. With the submarine they could find and rescue her grandfather faster. This was amazing.
“Okay, so where is it?” she asked.
“I was always told as a child to hide things in plain sight,” replied Doris.
“Smart,” said Sebastian.
“Does that mean…Have we seen it already?” Evie was in awe. She knew the answer was yes even if she didn’t understand how it could be yes.
Doris laughed again. Now that she was on board with the team and she had relaxed so much, her laughter was infectious and very calming. “You have.”
“The stage,” Sebastian said suddenly.
“Yes!” said the Kid, now pointing at him. “Is he right? Is it the stage?”
Doris looked at them all thoughtfully for a moment, and then with a big grin said, “You know what they say: all the world’s a stage. Or sometimes…a submarine is.”
“The good news is that tonight is closing night,” said Doris.
“The bad news is that we have to wait for the end of the show to get the submarine, so as not to raise suspicions or alert the thugs to where we are,” concluded Catherine.
The Quest for the Kid Page 17
