The Swiss Family RobinZOM (7 page)

“
Yes,” he said. “I
will.”

“
We’ll protect each
other,” Fritz said, “and we’ll all be here again tomorrow night.
You just wait and see.”

E
veryone went back to their activities. The atmosphere felt
a little more relaxed. Fritz looked at Beauty. Her eyes were
closed. Fritz’s smile faded. He put on the handling glove and
lifted Beauty off her perch. He spoke in a low whisper.

“
You have to go now,”
Fritz said. “You have to take care of yourself from now on. Go and
have lots of chicks and lead a good life. Do me a favour: name one
of them after me. Okay?”

H
e went to the window and raised his arm, but she wouldn’t
fly. Fritz pointed out the window.

“
Go!” he said.

Beauty cocked her head to the
side in confusion. Fritz thrust his arm forward, and Beauty took
flight out the window. He closed it behind her.

“
Where’s Beauty going?”
Francis said.

“
Home,” Fritz said,
wiping a tear from his eye. “She’s going home.”

S
eventeen

Bill finished writing his
journal entry and sat with his sons at the
breakfast table. Sunlight spilled through the porthole
windows and swing doors, but the space was still a little
dark.

“
I’m honestly not
hungry,” Fritz said, taking a seat at the breakfast table. “I’m
still full from last night.”

Liz stood at the oven frying
bacon in a pan.

“
Try to eat something,”
she said. “It’s going to be a long day. Where’s Jack and
Ernest?”

“
Probably still asleep,”
Fritz said. “You know what they’re like.”

Bill got up and moved to the
swing doors.

“
They need to get up
soon,” he said. “We’ve got a lot to do.”

Across the way in the
boys
’ treehouse, Ernest approached the
winch.

“
Ernest!” Bill
said.

“
What?” Ernest
said.

“
Can you wake Jack up? We
need to eat breakfast and get to work.”

Ernest disappeared inside the
treehouse. Liz spooned some crispy bacon onto a plate and put it in
the centre of the table. Francis reached over and took a few
slices.

“
You’re an animal,” Fritz
said.

Francis shrugged.

“
I’m hungry,” he
said.

Ernest appeared in the
doorway
across the way.

“
He’s not here,” Ernest
said.

“
What?” Bill said. “Then
where is he?”

Ernest shrugged.

“
I don’t know,” he
said.

Ernest strapped himself into
the winch and eased himself down to the ground. Bill turned to the
others.

“
Jack isn’t in his bed,”
he said.

“
What?” Fritz said. “Then
where is he?”

“
Think carefully,” Bill
said. “Did you see Jack go to bed last night?”

“
Yes,” Fritz said. “If
he’s not there now, he must have left early this
morning.”

Liz
and Bill shared a concerned expression. Ernest stepped off
the winch and into Falcon’s Nest.

“
He’s probably just out
climbing somewhere,” Ernest said. “You know what he’s
like.”

The winch creaked as
someone wound their way up.
Jack stepped
into the treehouse.

“
Jack!” Liz said. “Where
have you been?”

“
I went to go check on
the traps,” he said.

“
You
what
?” Liz
said.

“
Don’t worry,” he said.
“I kept to the trees, but I found-”

“
Jack, you are
never
ever
to go near the traps by yourself,” Bill said. “Do you
understand?”

“
Yes, but-”

“
You could have hurt
yourself!” Liz said.

“
Will you two be quiet
for a minute?” Ernest said. “Jack wants to say
something.”

Liz folded her arms and
turned to Jack.

“
Well?” she
said.

“
I woke up this morning
and couldn’t get back to sleep,” Jack said, “so I went to go check
up on the traps. And when I got there I saw two of them had been
set off.”

Liz
look
ed at Bill.

“
I thought they weren’t
supposed to be here until tomorrow?” she said.

“
They shouldn’t be,” Bill
said.

He turned to
J
ack.

“
Did you see what was
inside the traps?” he said.

Jack shook his head.

“
No,” he said. “I rushed
here as fast as I could to tell you.”

“
We’d best go take a look
then, hadn’t we?” Ernest said.

“
After breakfast,” Liz
said.

Besides Francis, nobody
ate.

Eigh
teen

Bill pushed the foliage
aside and
looked out at the open space. A
bird flittered to a tree and perched on a net full of coconuts. It
lifted its wing and groomed itself. One trap had been set off in
the middle of the assault course, another at the far
end.

“
Fritz, Ernest, with me,”
Bill said.

“
I’m coming too,” Jack
said. “I was the one who found it.”

“
I’m coming too,” Liz
said.

“
And me!” Francis
said.

“
All right,” Bill said.
“Everyone just watch your step.”

The Robinsons stepped out
into the clearing and edged their
way
around the covered holes. They got to the one uncovered in the
centre. They heard the frantic buzzing of flies before they saw
what was inside. It was a wild pig, the sharpened spikes jutting up
through its body. Francis’s stomach heaved.

“
I’m gonna be sick,” he
said. “I’ll never eat bacon again.”

“
We’d best cover the hole
over again,” Bill said.

“
No, wait,” Ernest said.
“I have an idea. Dad, give me your machete.”

He did.

“
Fritz,” Ernest said,
“lower me into the hole.”

“
What for?” Fritz
said.

“
Just do it, will
you.”

Fritz lowered
Ernest
into the hole. Ernest stepped with
his feet over the upraised spikes and batted away the flies with
his hand. He hacked at the joint of the pig’s back leg. Once it was
off he raised it up for Fritz to take.

“
Thanks, Ern,” Fritz
said. “But my birthday was a few months ago.”

“
Give it to Jack,” Ernest
said. “Jack, can you-?”

“
I know what to do,” Jack
said.

J
ack took off up a tree. Ernest watched and waited with a
smile on his face. Jack made it to a branch twenty feet up and
crawled along it.

“
Is anyone else
confused?” Liz said.

“
Categorically,” Fritz
said.

“
Watch,” Ernest
said.

Jack pulled a vine free
from the branch, held it taut, took the knife he kept in his back
pocket and cut the vine. Then he tied the pig leg to the vine and
lowered it down over the hole. A smile spread across Bill and Liz’s
faces.

“
Where do you want it,
Ern?” Jack said.

“
A little lower,” Ernest
said. “That’s it. Perfect. Well done, Jack.”

Ernest turned back
to the others.

“
Well?” he
said.

“‘
Well’ what?” Fritz
said. “What use is the meat up there?”

“
Think like a Lurcher,”
Ernest said. “The holes don’t have to kill them all, just hold them
in place.”

Fritz began to smile.

“
Ern,” he said, “if I’ve
never said it before, let me say it now: You’re a
genius.”

“
I think you might have
just given us the edge,” Bill said.

“
Don’t thank me,” Ernest
said. “Jack did all the hard work.”

“
Climbing’s easy,” Jack
said, making his way down the tree. “Thinking’s hard.”

They moved to the second
trap that had been set off. When Francis peered over the edge
and
looked inside it, he started crying.
There was a roar that shook everyone to their bones.

“
It’s a tiger!” Jack
said.

“
I didn’t even know there
was one on the island!” Ernest said.

Bill turned
pale.

“
After all these months,”
he said. “That beast could have fallen on us at any
moment…”

“
But it didn’t,” Liz
said. “Now it’s going to aid us against the undead.”

The tiger had knocked
most of the upturned stakes aside and now paced up and down inside
the hole
, as if impatient to be set
free.

“
Do you suppose he was
chasing the pig?” Jack said.

“
Most likely,” Bill
said.

“
What shall we do?” Fritz
said.

“
Nothing. We’ll just
cover the trap.”

Fritz rubbed his hands
together.

“
The Lurchers are in for
a surprise!” he said.

“
I’m not sure if they can
feel surprise,” Bill said, “but I’m certainly looking forward to
seeing what he does to them.”

They pulled some
fresh
leaves from the foliage and covered
the hole.

“
What shall we get
working on today, Dad?” Fritz said.

“
Fritz,” Bill said, “you
show Francis how to set snares, and set them up around the Falcon
and Robin’s Nest. They’ll be our last line of defence. And keep an
ear out for the bells. When they start ringing, you come
running.”

Fritz took Francis
by the hand and led him away.

“
Ernest,” Bill said, “you
use the machete and hack up the rest of the pig. Give the pieces to
Jack to attach to the vines. After you’ve finished, make more of
these coconut contraptions.”

“
Will do,” Ernest said.
“Come on, Jack.”

“
And what are we going to
do?” Liz said.

Bill’s eyes shone.

“
You’re going to help me
make the most devastating trap of all,” he said.

“
You big
romantic.”

Nine
teen

Bill and Liz
chopped down a narrow tree and stripped away all
the branches. Bill used the axe to make an indentation along the
log lengthways. Then they tied a vine around each end of the trunk.
Bill attached the vines to an arrow and then shot it over a tree
branch. He retrieved the vines and tied them to Lightfoot. Bill
eased the donkey forward. The trunk rose five and a half feet in
the air. Then they reattached the vines to the trunk. A gentle push
on it made it rock side to side like a pendulum.

“
Nice of you to make us a
swing,” Liz said. “What’s it for?”

“
It’s a beheader,” Bill
said. “My own design.”

He picked up a bag that
clattered like it was full of glass. He reached in and brought out
a black shiny rock. It had been shaped into a long, flat ruler with
a razor sharp edge.

“
It’s obsidian,” Bill
said. “I was shaping them into knives to give you as an anniversary
present. But needs must.”

Bill jammed the knife
blade lengthwise into the indentation, forming a blade.

“
The Lurchers come,” he
said, “we release the log, it severs their necks, crushes their
heads, or knocks them into a pit. And after it swings, we can pull
the vine back so the log can swing again.”

“
Wonderful,” Liz said.
“Fun for all the family.”

“
Come on,” Bill said.
“Give me a hand making another one.”

“
I need to go make
lunch,” Liz said. “I’ll get Fritz to help you.”

“
Don’t make anything too
heavy,” Bill said. “We’re going to see a lot of horrible things
today. Best if it doesn’t all come back up.”

Twenty

“
Good work, Francis,”
Fritz said, checking his snare.

Fritz
set it down on the ground and got to his feet. The
courtyard between the two treehouses was thick with snares and
traps.

“
No one’s getting through
this lot in one piece
,” Fritz
said.

“
Are the bad men really
bad?” Francis said with all the curiosity of an eight year
old.

“
Yes,” Fritz said. “And
no. You see, they’re not deliberately bad, they’re just bad by
nature. I’m sure if they could choose, most of them would be
good.”

“
But people aren’t always
good. Miss Anliker, the school principal, she wasn’t
good.”

“
True. Maybe she was a
bad man in disguise.”

Francis frowned with
thought.