The Mapmaker and the Ghost(22)
The thing was, if Tesla could come up with all those ideas in the late nineteenth century, surely Brains could solve the Gross-Out Gang’s problems with just a little bit of help from twenty-first century equipment.
Brains closed his eyes and listened for the faint sound of gurgling. That gurgling came from the underground hot springs that started below the lab and ran all the way to the giant lair. And that gurgling was the key to Brains’s plan to bring heat and electricity to the lair and to make the forest a permanent home for all of them.
He allowed himself a small smile.
A short while later, Brains was putting on a disguise in the form of a navy baseball cap attached to a blond mullet—probably a donation from Snotshot’s old theater department. He put his new, carefully prepared brown box underneath one arm, gave a final nod to Tesla, and set out to, as Spitbubble had said, make good on his nickname.
15
GOLDENROD’S FAN BASE
Goldenrod and Birch had been sitting side by side against the cavern wall for only a few seconds when Goldenrod had to ask, “How did you get here?” She whispered it to him, keeping an eye on Lint’s massive back, which was blocking their exit.
Birch looked guilty. “I followed you,” he finally whispered back.
“Why?”
“I dunno. I was bored. Whatever you were doing seemed like more fun than being at home … What were you doing, anyway?”
Goldenrod shrugged. Considering all that had happened, it now seemed silly to keep her mapmaking such a big, dark secret. “Oh, I was just drawing a map,” she finally said.
“A map?”
“Yeah, a really detailed map of all of Pilmilton. That’s why I was exploring the woods.”
“Is that why you’re all green and brown and stuff ?”
“Well, I was trying to blend in so they wouldn’t see me—” Goldenrod started.
“Cool!” Birch’s blotchy face suddenly brightened, and Goldenrod had to smile. If only everyone else in the world was as big a fan of hers as he was. For a moment, she thought about telling Birch all about Meriwether too. But when she looked into his eyes and saw dark pools of worry, she reconsidered. It seemed like Birch might have already had enough frights for one day and ghost stories were probably not going to help.
“How did you land in the middle of that clearing?” Goldenrod whispered instead.
“I lost you for a minute when you started running. And then I was just following the sound of your footsteps, and before I knew it—”
“Jonas and Charlie,” Goldenrod interjected.
“They call themselves Brains and Lint here,” Birch whispered. “And the girl is Snotshot. And then there’s No-Bone and Toe Jam.” Birch counted off on his fingers. “And, of course, Spitbubble.”
Goldenrod was impressed. “Looks like you’ve picked up a lot.”
“Yeah, well, I also happened to hear all about their plan to break into the museum tomorrow. Which is probably why they’re not going to let us go.” Birch looked sad again.
Goldenrod had gathered as much too, though she still couldn’t figure out what on earth they could want from the science museum. “Well, we’re here together now,” she said brightly to Birch. “Like Dad always says, two Morams are better than one!”
Birch gave a weak smile. He was silent for a minute before speaking again. “I did something kinda bad to get here,” he finally said.
“What do you mean?”
“Mom—she thinks I’m sick and in bed. She has to know by now that I’m gone. She’ll be so upset …” Birch’s voice trailed off.
Goldenrod put her arm around his shoulder and whispered even more softly, close in his ear, “We’ll find a way out of here. We have to.”
Mrs. Moram had spent a very satisfying morning in her garden, pruning and weeding. Her dahlias were coming along exceptionally well this summer, a particularly bright, purple one causing her an immense amount of cheer. She’d have to take a picture and send it in to the Dahlia Society. It definitely had a shot of ending up in next month’s newsletter.
She’d hardly noticed the time go by as she worked in the sun. It had been cool and breezy for July, one of those perfect gardening days, and she had so enjoyed her time outside that she all but forgot her other responsibilities.
It was only when she heard Mr. Chen, one of her neighbors, call in his son for lunch that she realized she was hungry. And goodness, Birch must be too.
Mrs. Moram first went into the kitchen and rummaged around in a cabinet. She found a can of chicken noodle soup in the very back. She popped it open and set about heating it up which, unlike Mr. Moram and his obsession with food creation, was about as complicated as her cooking skills ever got. While the soup was bubbling, she poured a glass of orange juice and toasted a piece of bread in the special “smiley-face” setting of their toaster. She smeared the toast with some strawberry jam, ladled the soup into Birch’s favorite bowl, and set up the whole meal on a little tray. Then she took out a small, skinny vase and filled it with a few of the budding goldenrods that she had plucked that morning.
She smiled as she artfully arranged the tall, bright yellow stalks. Mrs. Moram knew that goldenrods were an odd choice of favorite flower for a gardener. They weren’t necessarily the prettiest and, in fact, were often mistaken for weeds. But she found them beautiful and resilient. She loved their bold, unapologetic yellow color. She loved that they were wildflowers, not easily killed or intimidated like a lot of the other more traditionally cultivated species. They were strong instead of delicate, and she thought that every garden should have a good mixture of both.