Journey to the River Sea

‘They must know by now that I don’t want to come to England. That I’m trying to hide until they’ve gone. So I will hide. Somewhere near the docks. But my hiding place will be betrayed. They’ll hear that a boy is hiding and come to grab him in the night. Only it won’t be me; it’ll be Clovis. If Maia gets the timing right they’ll find him just before the boat sails and take him straight on board.’

‘If I do what?’

‘Betray me. Give me away by mistake. It’s no good going to the police – they’re on my side. You must let it slip to someone who is sure to go to the crows. Someone who’ll do anything for money.’

‘Who?’

‘Oh, for goodness sake, surely it’s obvious.’

Maia nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said sadly. ‘The twins.’

‘I’ll explain it all properly. It’ll work, I promise you.’

‘Yes, but what will happen when they find out I’m not you?’ said poor Clovis, who had turned pale.

‘They won’t. Not till you get to England. Not even then if you don’t want them to. I’ll give you a sealed letter saying I bullied you into taking my place. That I threatened you with torture. It takes six weeks to get to England – if you can hold out for another week or two at Westwood that will give me plenty of time to get away. By the time they find out, I’ll be with the Xanti and you can go to your foster mother.’

‘Where is Clovis going to hide?’ asked Maia.

‘I’ve got a good place near the harbour, and absolutely safe. You will have to set it up because Clovis and I must stay here out of sight.’

But Clovis was looking very doubtful. ‘What was the food like?’

‘Where?’ asked Finn.

‘At Westwood. Did your father say?’

Finn shrugged impatiently. ‘No. But it’ll be the usual British stodge, I expect,’ he said, looking at the bowl of fresh fruit he had picked that morning. ‘Steak and kidney pies and suet pudding and dumplings.’

‘Really? Suet puddings do you think?’ said Clovis wistfully. ‘My foster mother used to make them with treacle.’ He thought of the Goodleys, off to Columbia and Peru, if they weren’t thrown in jail. ‘And it wouldn’t be hot?’ he said.

‘No, it certainly wouldn’t be hot. Westwood’s in the north of England. They get a lot of snow.’

‘Snow,’ said Clovis, his eyes dreamy. ‘Not that I’d be staying.’ And then: ‘All right. I’ll give it a try.’

Chapter Ten

The Manaus Museum of Natural History was very quiet this weekday morning. The boy who swept the floors was outside, weeding the flower beds, the porter dozed in his cubicle, and there were no visitors.

But in his lab behind the office, Professor Glastonberry was worrying about the giant sloth.

He often worried about the sloth. For the past year he had been putting the skeleton of the great beast together and it was going to make a most impressive exhibit.

At least it should have done.

For the truth was the skeleton was not complete. It was nearly complete but not quite. One rib was missing. The third rib on the left hand side.

Professor Glastonberry had made a false rib out of plaster of Paris and now he fitted it carefully into the breastbone, and it looked fine.

At least it did if you didn’t know...

The trouble was that the professor did know.

He stood looking at his handiwork. The sloth on its metal stand seemed to fill the whole room.

He took the rib out. He put it in again. He sighed. A false rib was cheating.

But a missing rib was untidy.

At that moment he heard the creaking of the revolving doors and peering out, realized that two people had come into the museum whom he recognized. The tall, thin woman who had been interested in Bernard Taverner’s collection and the schoolgirl who had been with her: a girl with a lot of dark hair and intelligent eyes.

He came out of his office and said, ‘Good morning.’

The tall woman smiled and at once looked less alarming. ‘This is Maia,’ she said. ‘She has come to make some drawings of bird’s wings. May I leave her here to work on her own? I’ll fetch her at three o’clock. I don’t think she’ll be any trouble.’

‘I’m sure she won’t,’ said the professor. He was still holding the false rib and looked distracted.

‘What a large rib,’ said Miss Minton.

‘Yes.’ He took a deep breath and poured out the problem of the missing bone. ‘No one would know it was not the real one,’ he said.

Miss Minton looked severe. ‘You would know,’ she said.

The professor sighed. ‘That’s what Taverner used to say.’

‘May we see it? The sloth?’ asked Maia.

‘Certainly.’

He led them through his office and into the lab.

‘It’s not upside down,’ said Maia. ‘I thought sloths always hung from trees?’

‘Not the giant sloths. They’d have splintered any tree they tried to hang from. This one would have weighed about three tonnes when it was alive, but they’ve been extinct for thousands of years.’

Once again the professor put the rib in and once again he took it out.

‘What do you think?’

‘I think you should go and find the missing bone,’ said Miss Minton.

The professor stared at her. Was she serious? Surely not...