Confirming, to some extent, Spock’s opinion of him, Sam just continued to watch, idiotically, as he – Spock – started to dip down.
The guinea pig must have reached about six metres up, which was both impressive, if you are into watching small rodents take flight, and useful, because it gave Ruby, who chose not to just watch idiotically, time to squeeze through the railings and roll down the bank towards the edge of the river.
“Ruby!” shouted Sam, shaken out of his Spock-watching trance for fear of his little sister’s safety. “Don’t go too near the water!”
Ruby stood up. She was, in fact, standing right by the water. In quite a lot of mud.
“I’m just trying to catch— Oh!” she said.
She’d been about to say – and this may be obvious – “Spock”. She’d been leaning over the river, trying to catch Spock.
Unfortunately, Spock landed in the river away from her outstretched arms, with quite a strong sense of … PLOP!
“Spock! Spock!”
Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking: Oh my goodness, can guinea pigs swim?
Turns out, yes they can. But they don’t look very comfortable doing it. A lot less comfortable than fish. And even less comfortable than cats.
Spock, particularly, did not look comfortable in the river, in the middle of the night. His little face poked above the water, with, this time, a look that didn’t say anything strongly. Just … panic.
“Sam! Sam!” shouted Ruby. “What are we going to do?” She moved towards the water, as if about to dive in.
“Don’t!” shouted Sam from above. “OK! Let’s go!” He pushed the skateboat from behind, over the railings. It bumped and cracked as it went over, but got there, sliding down the grassy bank and coming to a halt in the mud right by Ruby.
Sam jumped over the railings and ran down the bank. He pushed the skateboat further into the river.
“Is it going to float, Sam? Is it?” said Ruby.
“Just believe, Ruby. Believe in the skateboat. Believe in the skateboat.” He put his hands on her shoulders. “And it will float.”
Ruby looked at him. “Really?” she said, raising an eyebrow.
“I dunno,” said Sam, taking his hands off her shoulders. “That’s the sort of thing people say in films.”
They both looked out to where Spock was treading water. The skateboat was at that point not visible. It seemed to have mainly submerged. It may, in fact, not have deserved the name boat, and would have been better described as just some-sinking-planks-of-wood.
“I don’t think the believing is working,” said Ruby.
“But we haven’t got anything else at this stage, I’m afraid,” said Sam.
“Yes,” said Ruby. “I get that. Shall we name it something?”
“What?”
“The skateboat.” She looked over at the dark water. “It might help.”
Sam shrugged. “What were you thinking?”
Ruby thought for a second, and then said: “Schrodinger.”
“Bless you,” said Sam.
“No. That’s what I want to call the skateboat. Schrodinger.”
Sam frowned. “Why?”
“He was a scientist. He wrote about physics. He did an experiment about a cat. About how sometimes a cat can be there and not there.”
“Right. Not sure we’ve really got time for this, Ruby, and poor Spock is—”
“I don’t really understand it, to be honest. But I know the skateboat is there, under the water, even though we can’t see it. So it’s as if the skateboat – like that cat – is sort of there and not there. So: Schrodinger.”
Sam took a deep breath. His sister was sometimes very confusing. But it wasn’t worth arguing.
“OK, that’s its name, Schropplingythingy—”
“Schrodinger …”
“Whatever.”
And, with that, they both shut their eyes, and believed: they both focused and concentrated. Sam and Ruby imagined Schrodinger the skateboat floating above the water, sailing easily like it was Noah’s ark.
And when they opened their eyes it was above the water. Schrodinger had come back up again!
“It worked, Sam! It worked!” said Ruby.
“Yes. To be honest, I prefer to think that’s because I designed Schrobangbang very cleverly to be seaworthy—”
“Who cares! Let’s get on! We need to rescue Spock.”