“Nik!” Jenna emerged from the cabin and laughed. “What are you doing here?”
“Been sent out collecting Rupert's blasted paddleboats. Someone broke into his store last night and he figures he's lost loads. But I've only found one so far.” Nicko indicated a small pink paddleboat that he was towing. “Waste of time if you ask me.”
Jenna noticed Snorri's look of confusion. “It's Nicko. He's my brother,” she explained.
“Your brother?” asked Snorri, who felt that the brother tally was stacking up a little too fast. “The one who fell through the Glass?”
“What glass?” asked Nicko.
“Oh,” said Jenna, her feelings of excitement at seeing Nicko draining away, as if she had suddenly sprung a leak. “You don't know about Sep, do you?”
Nicko saw the tears now welling in Jenna's eyes. With a heavy heart, he clambered aboard the Alfrun.
Wolf Boy left Jenna and Nicko together and slipped away. There was someone he wanted to check up on. He found Lucy Gringe where he had left her, sitting on the riverbank under a willow tree.
“You again?” she said, grumpily. “I told you to leave me alone. I don't need the stupid paddleboat anyway.” Lucy sat with her blue cloak wrapped around her, arms hugging her knees, her pink ribbon bootlaces soggy with the wet grass. She was holding a crumpled and much-folded and -unfolded piece of paper, her lips moving slowly as she read the words that she knew inside out and upside down. It was a note from Simon Heap, and she had found it in the hem of her blue cloak that Jenna had returned to her. It was headed simply with the words The Observatory, and it read: My own Lucy, This cloak is for you. I will be back soon and we will be together at the top of the Tower. I shall make you proud of me. Wait for me.
Your only,
Simon But Lucy was tired of waiting, and she now knew that Simon could never return to the Castle, so she had set out to find him. And so far all she had done was fall asleep and wake up to find her boat gone. It was not a good start. Wolf Boy's voice broke into her thoughts.
“I found your boat,” he said, breathless.
“Where?” asked Lucy, hastily folding the precious note and jumping to her feet.
“Nicko's got it.”
“Nicko Heap? Simon's brother?”
“Yeah. Suppose he is. He can't help that though.” Wolf Boy, who had been on the receiving end of one of Simon's StunFlashes, had a poor opinion of Simon Heap.
“What do you mean he can't help that, you rude boy!” Lucy's brown eyes flashed angrily.
“Nothing,” said Wolf Boy, who could see that Lucy was trouble. He was beginning to wish that he hadn't bothered to ask her if she was all right earlier, when he had seen her tearfully searching the riverbank.
“So where is Nicko Heap?” demanded Lucy. "I shall go ask him just what he thinks he's doing stealing my boat. The nerve of it.
Knowing that he probably shouldn't, Wolf Boy waved an arm in the general direction of the Alfrun and watched Lucy stomp off along the riverbank toward the Trader barge. He followed at a safe distance, which, with Lucy Gringe, was a long one.
As Wolf Boy neared the Alfrun he heard the sound of raised voices.
“Give me back my boat!”
“It's Rupert's boat, not yours.”
“Rupert says I can use his boats anytime, so there.”
“Well, I—”
“And I'm using it now, Nicko Heap—got that?”
“But...”
“Excuse me. Get out of my way, will you! ”
Wolf Boy arrived just in time to see Lucy Gringe running across the deck of the Alfrun and tripping over the sleeping Spit Fyre's tail. But nothing put Lucy Gringe off her stride for long. She picked herself up, held her nose as another bubble of gas erupted from Spit Fyre and lowered herself over the side of the Alfrun.
Nicko followed her. “Where are you going in that?” he asked, concerned.
“None of your business, nosy boy. Are all Simon's brothers such irritating busybodies?”
Snorri added Simon to the brother count. How many did Jenna have?
“That paddleboat is not safe on the river,” Nicko persisted. "It's no better than a toy.
They're only meant for fun on the Moat."
Lucy jumped into the paddleboat, which rocked alarmingly. “It got me this far and it'll get me to the Port, just you see.”
“You can't go to the Port in that!” said Nicko, aghast. “Have you any idea what the tide race is like at the mouth of the river? It will spin you around and drag you out to sea—and that's only if you haven't already been sunk by the waves that run in off the Great Sandbar. You're crazy.”
“Maybe. I don't care,” said Lucy sulkily. “I'm going anyway.” She untied the rope, took up the paddle handles and began turning them furiously.
Nicko watched the little pink boat wobble its way out into the river until he could stand it no more. “Lucy!” he yelled. “Take my boat!”
“What?” Lucy shouted above the clattering din of the paddles.
“Take my boat— please!”
Lucy felt relieved, although she was not going to show it. She had a terrible feeling that Nicko was right about the paddleboat. With some difficulty—and only by rapidly turning one paddle and then another for at least five minutes—Lucy steered the boat around and arrived back at the Alfrun, breathless and hot and still in a bad mood.
Jenna, Snorri, Wolf Boy and Nicko watched Lucy Gringe set off once again, this time in Nicko's deep and seaworthy rowboat.
“But how are you going to get back now?” Jenna asked Nicko. “You're not going in that paddleboat, are you?”
Nicko snorted. “You must be joking. I wouldn't be seen dead in one of those, especially one that stupid color. I'm coming with you to find Sep, silly.”
Jenna smiled for the first time since Septimus had disappeared. Nicko would make everything all right. She knew he would.
25
The I, Marcellus
From the Diary of Marcellus Pye:
SunnDay. Equinox.
Today has been a Wondrousyet most Fearfull day.
Though I didst Forecast this Happening in mine Almanac (which will be the Laste Parte of my Booke, the I, Marcellus). Truly, I did not believe that it would come to Pass.