The Forgotten Map (10 page)

‘Did you see that, Whisker?' Horace exclaimed. ‘Your invention works!'

Whisker looked up from the wheel. He felt more relief than anything else. He dreaded to imagine what Pete would say if the pie did a full loop and crashed onto the deck. He also knew the pie needed some improvements before it reached its maximum distance.

‘What about adding a coned top?' he suggested. ‘It would reduce wind resistance and add a couple of metres for sure.'

Fred gave him a blank look.

Horace nodded and translated for Fred. ‘Whisker needs some dough. Enough to make a few pointy pie hats.'

With a grunt, Fred wandered off to the galley with Smudge. Pete continued to watch suspiciously from a distance.

‘So what do you think?' Horace called out to him.

‘Lucky shot,' Pete yawned. ‘Besides, you weren't aiming at anything. Hitting a random wave is hardly a conclusive result.'

Horace pointed his hook at Pete and fumed, ‘Alright then. You swim out there and I'll blast off your big bony nose!'

Pete stiffened at the thought. ‘Not on your life, Horace. But I do have a better idea … Can you see that rock?'

Whisker squinted into the distance and saw a small blurry shape between the waves. Like most rats, he had poor long distance vision and wasn't sure if it was a rock or just a large piece of driftwood.

‘Here's your challenge, Horace,' Pete said. ‘If you can hit that rock with a pie on your first attempt, I'll wear a newspaper hat for an entire week.'

‘You're on!' Horace shouted with a fierce grin. He loaded a pie into the cannon, adjusted the angle and struck a match. ‘… Okay. Wish me luck.'

Ruby lowered her sword, Whisker stopped turning and Pete held his breath as Horace lit the fuse.

‘Three … two … one …'
KABOOM!

The pie shot through the air. It went up, and then it came down. There was no splash. Just a faint thud as the pie hit its target.

Horace hook-pumped the air and cheered. Pete groaned in dismay and scribbled something rude on the deck. Ruby, clearly unimpressed with the whole performance, gave Whisker a hard prod in the back.

‘The halftime entertainment is over,' she hissed. ‘It's back to the grindstone.'

As the stone wheel finally ground to a halt and the sharpened blades glistened in the midday sun, the Captain emerged from the stairs.

‘ALL PAWS ON DECK!' he bellowed.

Like ants alerted to danger, the crew assembled in a line before their waiting Captain. Fred fiddled awkwardly with an enormous lump of dough in his paws.

‘Did I interrupt something?' the Captain asked. ‘A new pie perhaps?'

‘No. It's a hat for a pie,' Fred replied slowly. ‘It was Whisker's idea.'

‘Of course it was,' the Captain said with a smirk. He turned to Pete and enquired, ‘Is Whisker responsible for your hat too?'

Pete tried to hide the ridiculous newspaper hat covering his head, but his paws were much too small.

‘No, Captain,' he mumbled. ‘I was, err … trying to be sun smart … Being an Albino rat and all.'

‘Rubbish,' Horace coughed from further down the line.

The other rats tried to stop themselves from laughing.

‘If you are done playing dress ups,' the Captain said in a serious voice, ‘I suggest we get a move on. With a strong tail wind we should reach Sea Shanty Island in the heart of the Crescent Sea by tomorrow evening.'

Whisker had heard of Sea Shanty Island, but had never been there. It was a known haven for pirates, smugglers and other lawless thugs – not the usual circus audience. Although it was located close to the Isle of Aladrya, it was not under its control. To reach Sea Shanty Island meant sailing through the heavily patrolled Northern Passage.

‘On our way to the island,' the Captain continued, ‘we may be fortunate to cross paths with a trading ship or two.' He paused and mused to himself, ‘although the oceans have been extremely quiet of late …'

‘Dead quiet,' Horace whispered. ‘The only other ship out here is the
Silver Sardine,
and we don't want to see her again.'

Whisker hoped they didn't cross paths with any vessels. He was far from prepared to begin a life of robbing, stealing or worse.

‘These are your orders,' the Captain said. ‘Pete, I want you to plot a safe course around Pointer Island, heading into the Northern Passage. I'm not in the mood for a shipwreck. Smudge, you're on lookout duty. If you see anything at all, get Fred up there at once. The rest of you are to raise the anchor and hoist the sails.'

‘Aye aye, Captain!' cheered the crew.

Whisker felt as dead as a dried-up daffodil following the sword sharpening, but at least sailing involved tugging and tightening and not more turning, turning, turning.

The crew worked swiftly to harness the power of the strong wind and they were soon racing through the surf. They hadn't gone far, however, when Smudge buzzed anxiously down to Fred.

‘BOAT AHOY!' Fred cried, scrambling up the rigging. ‘Small boat, single sail. On the side … um, opposite the star.'

Whisker felt his tail straighten with a sudden rush of hope.
Could this really be? It had to be. Who else would be this far from land in a small boat?

He rushed over to the port side and stared out. Fred was right. Less than a hundred metres away, a small boat bobbed up and down in the waves: A boat with a single sail, a ripped sail.

‘Three passengers,' Fred cried, ‘blue boat.'

Whisker was overcome with joy. His family had survived. They were alive and they were only metres away in their bright blue boat. Then it dawned on him. As much as he desperately wanted this to be his family's boat, he knew it couldn't be. Their boat was red, not blue.

As Whisker's heart sank, the black flag of the Pie Rats began to rise. It was the first time Whisker had seen the
Jolly Rat
and for a moment he imagined the cheeky rat's skull was laughing at his misfortune.

‘Swords at the ready,' the Captain cried. ‘We will commence the attack with a rendition of our battle chant.'

Before Whisker had time to ask what a battle chant was, the Pie Rats began to sing:

We are the dreaded Pie Rats, and we sail the seven seas.

We're nasty and we're
f
ilthy and we smell like mouldy cheese!

We'd love a pie with lots of sauce but any pie will do.

So give us all you've got before we make one out of you!

At the end of the song the Pie Rat crew pulled scary faces and yelled insults. Despite their polished performance, Whisker's attention was fixed on the three passengers in the blue boat. Something was dreadfully wrong.

A middle aged grey mouse stood at the stern of the boat, fumbling with a pair of thick glasses. Hiding behind him were two small mice: a boy and a girl, standing knee deep in water with buckets in their paws.

‘Do not fear, children,' the grey mouse said calmly, ‘a ship of opera singers has come to save us. Did you not hear their rousing tune?'

‘M-m-mister Tribble,' the girl stammered, ‘p-p-put on your g-g-glasses.'

The grey mouse awkwardly positioned the spectacles on his nose and blinked at the
Apple Pie
. His calm expression quickly changed.

‘OOO-AHH! WE'RE DONE FOR!' he yelled, throwing his paws in the air. ‘It's a pirate ship. Swim for your lives!'

In his panic, he lost his footing and tumbled backwards into the bottom of the boat, taking the children with him. The three mice splashed around in the water, before steadying themselves on the side of the boat.

‘What kind of trick are you trying to pull?' the Captain boomed. ‘Hand over your gold, silver and particularly nice pastries and we'll let you go.'

‘Oh. I'm afraid they're gone,' the grey mouse quivered.

‘Gone?' Pete hissed. ‘Gone where?'

‘Down there,' the grey mouse said, pointing to the bottom of the boat.

‘Well, start fishing,' Pete snapped. ‘We want all the gold. You can keep your soggy supplies.'

‘You don't understand,' the grey mouse trembled. ‘The gold's not in the boat. It fell through the hole.'

‘What hole?' Fred asked.

‘The hole made by the flying thing that crashed through our sail,' the grey mouse replied.

Whisker looked at the sail. The grey mouse was right. There was a circular hole in the centre.

‘This had better not be another trick,' the Captain said angrily.

The grey mouse and the children didn't respond. They simply huddled in fear as the water continued to rise.

‘He's telling the truth,' Whisker said quietly.

‘What did you say?' the Captain hissed.

Whisker knew his news wasn't going to make the Captain any happier, but he said it anyway.

‘I know what made the hole in the boat,' he said slowly. ‘It was one of our pies – one of our new and improved pies.'

Victims of Tragic Circumstance

There was an exchange of glances as the news sunk in. Whisker hadn't shot the pie but he still felt responsible. It was his design and he should have insisted that Fred confirm the mysterious object before they fired.

The Captain stared accusingly at Whisker. Ruby stared at Horace. Horace stared at the ground.

‘Tell me who shot the pie,' the Captain demanded.

Horace raised his hook without speaking.

‘And why would you do a thing like that?' the Captain asked between clenched teeth.

‘Because Pete challenged me to,' Horace mumbled.

‘He challenged you to?' the Captain repeated. ‘Is this true, Pete?'

‘I-I honestly thought the boat was a rock,' Pete blabbered. ‘And besides, I never thought Horace would actually hit it.'

‘THAT DOESN'T MATTER!' the Captain roared. ‘Pick up a telescope next time. Why doesn't anyone check before they fire anymore? First I get blasted off the ship by a trigger-happy recruit and the next minute the rest of you are taking pot shots at small boats.' He looked at each crew member in disgust, even Ruby.

‘You're responsible for the deck,' he said to her crossly. ‘Make sure this never happens again.'

‘Yoo-hoo. Excuse me for interrupting,' the grey mouse whistled. ‘But what's going to happen to us?' The children were bailing once more, but fighting a losing battle.

‘We'll give you some wood to patch up your boat, and you can go on your way,' the Captain mumbled with a dismissive wave of his paw.

‘But …' pleaded the grey mouse, ‘How can we fix this? I'm just a teacher and these two orphans are my students. We're not carpenters.'

‘No more tricks,' the Captain snorted, ‘Save your stories for the fish!' He turned his back and strode towards the helm.

Whisker could see the desperate look on the children's faces and knew he couldn't just stand there while their boat sank.

‘You can't do this,' he yelled.

The Captain froze.

‘What did you say?' he said in a low growl.

‘I said you can't let them drown,' Whisker replied. ‘They haven't done anything wrong. We destroyed their boat. So it's our responsibility to help them.'

The Captain slowly turned. ‘The last time I looked, Whisker, I was the Captain and you were the apprentice. I make the orders and you follow them. Is that clear?'

‘No.'

‘What do you mean, ‘No
'
?'

‘No, Captain,' Whisker said feebly. ‘I'm not going to follow your order. It's wrong and you know it.'

‘HOW DARE YOU DEFY ME, YOU DISOBEDIENT BRAT!'

The rest of the crew looked away as the Captain exploded like one of Horace's cannons.

‘IF I HADN'T MADE A PROMISE TO YOUR DEARLY DEPARTED FAMILY, YOU WOULD BE JOINING THE MICE ON THAT SINKING BOAT!'

Whisker felt a volcano of anger erupting in his body. At the mention of his family, the Captain had crossed a line. But Whisker wasn't the Captain and he knew that fighting anger with anger would get him nowhere. He took a deep breath, calmed his writhing tail, and did the only thing he believed would work. He lied.