Everyone except Felix. He stayed put, and as soon as he was certain no one had noticed him, he tucked the compass into the pocket of his hoodie.
“Borders and names back then . . .” He shook his head. “It’s hard to make out some of the writing. . . .”
“Wait!” Maisie said, pointing to a particularly long line. “Right there. It says Nile River.”
“This might be the very thing . . . ,” Great-Uncle Thorne said.
With the compass safely in his pocket, Felix joined the others.
“I say we give it a try,” Hadley decided.
Great-Uncle Thorne studied the map, then studied the children’s faces, then studied the map again.
Finally, with a nod, he looked back up.
Maisie reached for the map, but Great-Uncle Thorne stopped her.
“Remember, I told you to be more thoughtful when you do this,” he said firmly. “You know that you are looking for Dr. Livingstone. You know the Congo is a dangerous place.”
Felix swallowed hard.
“You know that if you say lame demon, you will get out of any predicament.”
Great-Uncle Thorne paused.
“You know you may only use that three times.”
He held up three fingers and waved them in front of the children.
They all nodded.
“And by all means,” Great-Uncle Thorne said in his big voice, “stay together!”
A chill swept over Felix and he shivered. Maisie took his hand and squeezed it.
When Great-Uncle Thorne held the map out to them, a look of nostalgia crossed over his face.
“How I wish I could go with you,” he said with a sigh.
Maisie took the map. First Hadley, then Rayne, then Felix put their hands on it, too.
They lifted up, up, up.
The smells of Christmas trees and hot chocolate and flowers in bloom filled the air.
A breeze blew across them.
Great-Uncle Thorne’s upturned face grew smaller and smaller until he vanished altogether and they tumbled through time.
CHAPTER 4
SILVERBACK!
When Maisie looked up, all she saw was green. From somewhere way above her came a tiny pinprick of light. But otherwise, just green. She was looking up because she seemed to be tangled in something that prevented her from looking anywhere else. She wiggled and writhed, trying to free herself, but it seemed the more she moved, the more tangled she became.
Maisie squinted.
The green, she realized, was all leaves. A canopy of thick green leaves hung over her. Over everything, really. In fact, she realized as she struggled to free herself, she seemed to be caught up in foliage of some kind.
Maisie wiggled and writhed some more.
Not just leaves. Vines. She was caught up in vines so strong that she couldn’t bend or break them.
“Felix?” she called.
From the distance, she heard a grunt. Is Felix trapped, too? Maisie wondered.
“I’m stuck!” she yelled. “In vines and stuff!”
Another grunt.
Maisie tried to stay perfectly still and think. She knew that Felix could be an extraordinary hypochondriac, always thinking he was hurt worse than he was or worrying over getting a terrible deadly disease. But it was possible, she thought, glancing around as best she could, that he had gotten hurt. Vines and foliage, after all, belonged in a jungle. Which was exactly where they had wanted to land—a jungle along the Congo River. Maisie swallowed hard. She had been excited to come to Africa and find Amy Pickworth and Dr. Livingstone. But now that she was here, alone, tangled up in vines, with her brother maybe seriously hurt, she didn’t like the idea so much.
Plus, it was hot. A kind of hot she’d never felt before, almost as if the air was an electric blanket, laying on top of everything and generating heat. She started to sweat, and almost immediately she heard buzzing. And then flies circled her. And then they started to land on her and . . .
And? And what? Maisie tried to figure out, wriggling even more to make the flies fly away.
But they didn’t budge. In fact, it felt like they were biting her. No, not biting. Licking.
Gross! Maisie thought.
The flies were licking her sweat.
“Yuck!” Maisie shouted, trying to swat at them.
Birds cawed.
The ground beneath her trembled slightly.
“Felix?” Maisie said, softly at first, then louder: “Felix!”
Nothing but that grunting.
The flies nibbled her sweaty neck.