CHAPTER NINE
Lost
Danny trudged back, kicking at loose stones. He stopped to glance at the barn. Then he almost jumped out of his skin, for a voice behind him said, “Hey, Dan!”
He whirled. “Joe!” he said. “Where—where’d you come from?”
Joe’s eyes were dancing. “Gosh! Why didn’t you tell me?” he cried.
“Tell you?” Danny said cautiously.
“About what’s in the barn.”
“What?”
“I followed you. I didn’t mean to spy on you—I thought you were running away from home. But when the Professor opened the barn door, I saw it.”
“Just what do you think you saw?” Danny asked.
“Aw, Dan, quit kidding around. I know a spaceship when I see one,” said Joe.
“Oh.” Danny rubbed his nose. Then he said, “You saw the ship? Gee, Joe, you’re in trouble. It’s a strict secret—a government secret.”
All Joe’s enthusiasm evaporated, and his face returned to its usual gloom. “Ooh. What do you think they’ll do to me? Shoot me at dawn, maybe?”
“No. I don’t think Professor Bullfinch would let them do that. Anyway, I don’t think anybody saw you. And I won’t say anything.” He pulled Joe further into the shadows of the woods. “Now listen. First of all, I’m glad I didn’t tell you anything about it. I’ve kept my mouth shut all this time, and now you’ll have to swear to do the same.”
Joe nodded.
“Raise your right hand,” Danny ordered.
Joe did so.
“Do you, Joseph Pearson, solemnly swear by your right hand and blood to keep this deadly secret and never say a word to anybody, so help you?”
“I swear,” Joe said in a voice that sounded as if it were coming from underground.
“O.K. But I sure hope nobody ever finds out. Honest, Joe, if you ever let anything slip, I may be shot at dawn.”
They began walking back through the woods.
“Why didn’t the Professor let you in?” Joe asked.
“Well, generally they let me hang around and watch them,” Danny said. “But the first trial flight of the ship is going to be sometime in the next twenty-four hours, so they made me leave. Mr. Willoughby, the head of the project, said that strict secrecy requires it.” As he said this, Danny imitated Willoughby’s voice.
“He’s never trusted me,” he went on. “He said a couple of times he doesn’t really think a kid can keep a secret as big as this. But the Professor told him I could. And I did, too.”
“You sure did,” Joe said. “I thought you were mad at me for some reason, or crazy, or something.”
They came to the road and found their bicycles.
Danny said, “I’ve got to get home. I want to get those sentences out of the way tonight so I can be free tomorrow to watch the ship take off.”
“Will they let you watch?”
“No, they don’t want me around. But I know a way to get to the barn without the guards’ seeing me. There are security guards from the government around the building, you know.”
“Yes, I saw one of them talk to you.”
“Well, I found an old culvert that runs right up under the barn, and I get in that way sometimes when I don’t want Willoughby to know.”
They pedaled along in silence for a few minutes, and then Joe said, “Listen. Suppose I come home with you and help you with the sentences?”
“Help me? How?”
“To write ’em. I can imitate your handwriting. Anyway, Miss Arnold won’t know the difference. You know teachers never read those sentences.”
“That doesn’t matter. It wouldn’t be honest,” Dan said.
“The whole thing isn’t honest,” said Joe. “Space flight is tomorrow, like you told her in the first place.”
“Hmm.” Dan thought that over. Then he said, “Well, yes. That’s true. Okay, let’s hurry.”
They whizzed along, and Danny shouted, “Rockets away! Ten, nine, eight—”
“Lay off, will you?” Joe panted. “Let’s not play spaceship now—”
“—three, two, one, zero! Fire!” Danny yelled. “Whoops! My starboard rockets are missing.”
He began to swerve his bike back and forth.
“Come on, Joe,” he called. “You’d better bring your ship alongside. There are meteors crashing against my hull.”
“I don’t want to—” Joe began.
Just then Danny’s bike hit a stone. His wheel wobbled and the bike skidded. Down he went by the side of the road.
“I knew it, I knew it, I knew it,” Joe groaned, coming to a halt. “What did you break?”
Danny got up and dusted himself off. “Not a thing.”
“Not even an arm?”
“Nope. Just bumped.”
“Well, maybe your bike is smashed up, then,” Joe said with dark satisfaction. “I told you—”
“Not a thing wrong with it,” Danny said cheerfully.
He jumped on again. “Okay, no more rocket ships for now. Meteors are too thick here. Let’s go—”
They reached home with no further accidents, and Danny asked his mother if Joe could stay to dinner. Mrs. Dunn called Mrs. Pearson and arranged matters, and the two boys went up to Danny’s room to work.
They kept at it furiously, doing twenty sentences to a page, using Mrs. Dunn’s vertical method. There were a few interruptions—dinner, for instance—but by eight o’clock they put down their pencils and looked wearily at each other over twenty-five pages of sentences.
“Boy!” Joe said. “I’ve got ‘a hundred years’ on the brain. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to listen to the words ‘space flight’ again.”
Danny gathered up the pages. “Now I know how Professor Bullfinch feels after he works on formulas,” he said. “It’s a good thing we’re both young and strong.”
Joe rolled over on the bed. “I feel old and weak,” he mumbled. “I don’t think I’m long for this world.”
Danny just laughed. “I’ve got an idea that’ll revive you, Joe. How about coming over first thing tomorrow?”
He lowered his voice. “How would you like to see the first spaceship leave Earth?”
“Oh, boy! Sure!” Joe said. “But how? You said they don’t want you around.”
“Yes. But you and I can watch from the edge of the woods. I’ll try to find out when they plan the take-off. Nobody will know we’re watching. What do you say?”
Joe sat up. “Great! Are you sure we can get away with it?”
“Oh, yes. You come as early as you can. Whistle like a robin for me under the window.”
Joe got up to go. Danny added, “Remember Joe—secrecy is our watchword.”
Joe nodded.
“And Joe—” Danny scratched his nose thoughtfully. “Thanks a million. I’d never have finished these sentences if it weren’t for you.”
“Ah, forget it,” Joe said, grinning. “What’s a friend for?”
* * * * *
Promptly the next morning, while the grass was still wet, Joe whistled secretly like a robin under Danny’s window. Mrs. Dunn stuck her head out of the kitchen window and said, “Come on in, Joe. Danny’s eating breakfast. I’m sure you can do with a pancake.”
“No, thank you, Mrs. Dunn,” Joe replied, wondering how she had guessed it was he. “I’m not hungry.”
He forced himself to be polite, however, and ate six pancakes, with butter and syrup, and drank a glass of milk.
After breakfast the boys went into the living room. Danny asked softly, “All set?”
“Yes.”
“Now you can imagine how I felt when Miss Arnold caught me in a daze yesterday.”
“I know. You were thinking about today.”
“Yep. And when she said I had to write, ‘Space flight—’ ”
“ ‘—is a hundred years away.’ Don’t ever say that sentence to me again.”
“Thank goodness it’s over and done with.”
Danny turned to the bookcase. “Twenty-five pages! Look at the size of the paper clip I had to put on—”
His voice trailed off.
“What’s the matter?” Joe asked.
Danny’s face was pale.
“The sentences!” he gasped. “I know I brought them downstairs! I put them right there on top of the bookcase! And now they’re gone!”