We Dine With Cannibals (24 page)

IT WAS NEARLY
a perfect takeoff in the single-engine seaplane. Celia did everything just as she remembered it from her show, except for one small thing. When she lifted the nose and the plane rose off the river at sixty miles per hour, she screamed long and loud, and so did everyone else on board. That didn't usually happen on
Love at 30,000 Feet.

By the time they were done screaming they were airborne, rising over the twisting tributary of the Amazon. After a few wobbles and dips, Celia got the hang of flying. It wasn't so hard. She mostly just had to hold on to the controls and try not to move too much. All they had to do was stay close to the river and use it like a road to guide them.

“This will lead us right to where your parents
are,” the llama girl said. “I do hope they are safe. Those loggers are a dangerous bunch.”

“You guys are pretty dangerous too,” said Celia.

“We're not dangerous at all!” the girl objected.

“Remember that little game of dodgeball?” Celia glared at her.

“Oh, that …” The girl scratched the back of her neck. “We don't get many visitors. Sorry.”

“What's your name, by the way?” Celia asked. “I keep thinking of you as llama girl.”

“Quinuama,” she said. “It's an Inca name. You can just call me Qui.”

“Qui,” Celia said. “That's nice.”

They flew for hours without saying much. Qui was enjoying the view from the sky. She had never been in an airplane before. Celia was getting kind of bored. She had spent too much time in airplanes.

The warriors in the back of the plane fell asleep and Oliver found himself being used as a pillow. They snored. There was no in-flight movie, which was the only thing Oliver liked about flying. He couldn't wait for this flight to be over.

And soon enough, it was.

“Over there,” said Qui, pointing at a clearing on the banks of the river.

Two speedboats were tied up at the edge of a pier. There were a few buildings by the water, most of them ruined and overgrown with vines. An old factory had a tree growing through its roof. There was a rusty water tower and a narrow path through the jungle to another clearing on a hill. That's where they saw the rows and rows of ruined houses, and a main street with abandoned shops and a movie theater.

They also saw people outside one of the houses, burly loggers keeping watch over the street. There was a black Mercedes parked on the street too, which they immediately knew belonged to the mayor of Benjamin Constant.

The men scurried around on the ground and pointed up into the sky.

“They know we're here,” Qui said. “We should have come at night.”

“Too late now,” said Celia, lining up the plane with the river below. “Prepare for landing.” The warriors woke up and wiped drool from their faces. Oliver wiped it from his hair and glared up at them.

Celia pushed a lever forward and the plane dipped to the side.

“Ahhh!” everyone screamed.

She yanked the lever back into place and the plane went straight again. She tried another lever.

“Ahhh!” The plane dropped a hundred feet toward the water.

“Celia!” Oliver shouted. “Do you have any idea how to land this?”

“Don't bother me,” she yelled back. “I'm trying to remember the right episode!” She stared at the gauges in front of her. “And make sure your tray tables are in the upright and locked position,” she added. “Prepare for landing.”

No one had any idea what she was talking about or how they were supposed to prepare for landing, but it did sound just like something a pilot would say.

As the plane shot over the river and streaked lower and lower toward the ruined town of Snack Cakeville, Oliver had the horrible realization that there were some things you couldn't learn from TV, and landing a plane was probably one of them.

THE FIRST PHASE
of the Zanzibar Gambit was complete. Professor Rasmali-Greenberg and Dr. and Dr. Navel were able to sneak around the house collecting supplies without attracting the attention of the guards. They saw Sir Edmund and Principal Deaver walk off toward the old factory with the mayor of Benjamin Constant.

“Her hair looks just like Teddy Roosevelt's,” Dr. Navel whispered.

“Shh,” his wife told him.

They huddled together in the bedroom of the house before making their next move.

“Everyone understand what happens next?” Claire Navel asked.

“Not really,” said the professor.

“Not really,” said Dr. Navel.

“Just stick to the plan.” She waved off their
worries with a casual flick of her wrist. “The Zanzibar Gambit never fails.”

“All right,” said Dr. Navel. “Let's do it.”

Patrick the monkey dragged the sack of flour into the closet and shut the door. The professor squeezed his massive body into the steamer trunk.

“I do hope this works,” he said. “It is terribly uncomfortable for a man of my size to travel like this. And I believe I have stained my tie.”

“Don't worry, Professor, we'll have you out of there in no time. You can enjoy some snack cakes while you wait.” She shut the lid on him and sat down on the trunk.

“We're going to keep Oliver and Celia safe,” she said. “I swear.”

“I trust you, Claire. I always have.”

They were about to kiss when they were interrupted by the professor's muffled objections from inside the trunk.

“Can we stick to the plan, please? It's rather hot in here.”

“Okay, here we go.” Dr. Navel took the garden spade and tossed it through the window, shattering the glass. He and his wife stood against the wall on either side of the window so the guards
couldn't see them from the outside. In the closet, the monkey screeched.

“Go around! Look inside!” one of the guards called from the yard. Once the guards had run around the house to come in through the front door, the Navels climbed outside and ducked below the windowsill.

“Phase two,” Claire said, handing her husband a pile of rubber bands. They waited.

The Navels heard the front door open and the clomping of heavy boots. Three of the loggers burst into the bedroom. They saw the unconscious body of the man who had been guarding the closet. They saw the large trunk sitting in the middle of the room.

They heard another screech from the closet.

“Quiet in there!” one of them shouted, and pounded on the door.

Another screech.

He went to open the closet door.

“I wouldn't do that if I were you,” said Principal Deaver as she strolled into the room. Sir Edmund leaned on the door frame and crossed his arms as if he were bored. Beverly scurried up next to him on her leash.

“Why don't you two stand up and drop the rubber bands,” said the mayor of Benjamin Constant, standing behind the Navels in the yard outside and pointing a pistol at their backs.

“I assume the professor is in the trunk,” called Sir Edmund.

“And a monkey with a sack of flour in the closet, yes?” sneered Principal Deaver as the Navels stood.

“His name is Patrick,” stammered Claire Navel. “How did you—?”

“I spent my schoolgirl years in Zanzibar,” answered Principal Deaver. “It'll take more than the old Gambit to get one over on us. Now, if you wouldn't mind putting your hands up in the air, it seems we will have to restrain you again until your children arrive. You are making this much more difficult than it needs to be.”

“They'll never take you to El Dorado,” said Claire Navel. “Never.”

“They'll do what we ask in order to protect their parents. If they do not, you will be eliminated.”

“You monsters!” the professor shouted from inside the trunk.

“Oh, Professor. After all my generosity to the Explorers Club over the years, you try to spear me
in South America with that trap and now you are working with my enemy. Perhaps it's time for me to start my own club, with a more selective membership policy.” Sir Edmund sat down on top of the trunk and snapped a padlock on it.

“We'll have to separate you two,” he said. “Mr. Mayor, why don't you take Ogden over to the water tower and toss him in. We'll keep his wife here with us. Maybe we'll have a little chat with her. When the time comes, we'll … what is that?”

“What?” said Principal Deaver.

“What?” said the mayor of Benjamin Constant.

“
Qué
?” said the loggers.

They all followed Sir Edmund's gaze out the window to the sky above the tree line. A small airplane was flying straight at them, dropping lower and faster every second.

“What the—?” said the mayor. The high-pitched buzz of the engine grew louder and louder.

“Let's try the Tibetan Trick,” Claire Navel whispered to her husband while everyone was distracted.

“What's that?”

“Push!” she shouted, and shoved the mayor while his back was turned. “Now run!”

The Navels split off in opposite directions, sprinting around the sides of the house.

“After them!” Sir Edmund shouted, but by then no one could hear him over the sound of the plane only a hundred feet away.

“Duck!” the principal yelled.

The plane smashed into the roof of the house, tearing a large gash in it and sending Sir Edmund, Principal Deaver, and the loggers diving away from falling debris. Beverly hissed and bolted out of the house. Patrick abandoned his sack of flour and scurried out of the wide-open roof.

The plane streaked across the row of houses and came down in the middle of the main street, though it didn't exactly land. Its pontoons tore off, and then it bounced back into the air once, twice, three times, showering the street with sparks with each bounce.

Finally on the ground, it was still racing forward. It slid past the empty shell of the drugstore and it shed a wing on the corner of the abandoned ice cream parlor. When the wing tore off, the plane spun like a top, racing toward the old movie theater at the end of the street.

It crashed right under the marquee, which had
lost almost all of the letters advertising the last movie ever shown there. Only
T
and
L
remained, improbably next to each other. There would be no time to ponder what word these letters might have once made, as the plane smashed through the ticket booth and slid a hundred feet into the theater, coming to a grinding halt amid a tangle of movie theater seats, individually packaged snack cakes, splintered wood, and broken glass. A thousand bats awoke from the ceiling of the theater, screeched wildly, and took flight. After the last bat flapped out, the plane's engine spluttered to a stop. Outside, the last letters on the marquee clanged to the ground. The dark theater was silent once more.

Inside the wrecked airplane, all was still.

OLIVER'S VISION WOBBLED.
Images faded in and out. He saw a window of a house growing larger and larger. His parents stood just outside it. He saw a street in a quiet neighborhood. He saw a drugstore and a movie theater. Was he going to see a movie? He felt like napping. He wondered who all these painted men piled on top of him were. He needed to rest. He'd ask Celia what had happened after he got some rest.

Celia's head was throbbing. She was staring at a torn movie screen. She was upside down. She was upside down on a seat in a movie theater. She sat upright and shook her head. There was daylight behind her. She turned and saw the terrible wreckage where the airplane had crashed into the theater. She remembered everything: she missed the
river, she saw her parents being held at gunpoint, she smashed into the street beyond them and skidded right into this theater. She had crashed the plane. And her brother was inside!

She jumped out of her seat and scrambled toward the wreckage. When she reached the cockpit, she saw the girl, Qui, still strapped into the cockpit, looking wide-eyed ahead of her. There was a hole in the cockpit glass where Celia had flown right through when she'd slipped out of her seat belt. She had no idea why she wasn't cut to shreds.