Hunt for the Panther 3 (9781101610923) by Gerald (ILT) Rachelle; Guerlais Delaney Page B

of hair around his finger. “You think I should go to port?”
    “Yes.” Jem sighed. “You should. Go test your plants on the pirates.”
Maybe that will keep them away from Island X for a while longer,
he thought. He suddenly felt very, very tired.
    “Hmph.” Uncle Finn tossed his hair over his shoulder. “Well, all right then. From now on, I’ll test on pirates. Happy?” he asked Ronagh, who ignored him.
    Uncle Finn marched back to the clearing, and the other Lost Souls began to wander off, leaving Jem and Kapu alone again.
    “If only all problems could resolve themselves so easily,” Jem said.
    Kapu nodded and bared his teeth.
    “Right, like the panther.” Jem sighed.
    Kapu pretended to unsheathe a cutlass and wave it around.
    “And Lucas.” Jem sighed again. “Don’t remind me. If only there were some way to protect ourselves from both at once.” He leaned back to look up at the trees, as if the answer might fall down from them into his lap.
    Kapu yelped and tugged on Jem’s sleeve.
    “What?” Jem looked back down, into the boy’s excited eyes. “You have an idea?”
    Kapu nodded, throwing himself down on all fours again. He began to crawl across the jungle floor, then made a big show of stepping on something with his right hand.
    “Another trap?” Jem asked. “I don’t think—”
    Kapu shook his head and raised a finger. Then he went back to being the panther, stepping on something with his right hand. Suddenly, he sprang to his feet.
“Crash! Clang! Aaaa!”
he yelled.
    Jem jumped back. For a moment he wondered if Kapu had gone off the deep end. Then it occurred to him. “A trap that sets off noise!” he cried. “A trap that doesn’t hurt the panther, but scares it off and wakes everyone up!”
    Kapu nodded, dancing a joyful jig.
    “I like it!” Jem jabbed a finger in the air. “Good thinking.”
    Kapu took a small bow, then ran off into the trees.
    “This is great!” Jem said, heading back to the centerof the clearing, where he’d left most of his tools. “A noisemaker trap. We’ll need some rope. And wire. And maybe some tin plates from the
Hop
? And… and hollow sticks that knock together.” The possibilities for noisemakers were endless.
    About fifteen minutes later, Kapu appeared, holding three small gourds, which must have come from Sina’s garden. He held a finger up to his lips and wiggled his eyebrows as if to say, “Don’t tell.” Then he grabbed Jem’s knife, cut the top off one, and proceeded to hollow it out.
    “Oh, I see,” said Jem. “You’re going to make a big rattle. Will you fill it with rocks? Or seeds?”
    Kapu nodded, concentrating on his handiwork. Jem grabbed another gourd and followed his lead.
    They worked for over an hour, constructing all the noisemakers they could think of, while Jem praised Kapu’s idea at least a half dozen more times.
    “If this works, maybe we can make more than one of these traps,” he mused. “And what do you think of—”
    “Jeeeeem!”
    “Not again!” Jem dropped his gourd and turned to see Tim running toward him, his face roughly the same grapefruit color as Ronagh’s had been. “What
now
?”
    “It’s Uncle Finn!” Tim yelled, skidding to a stop near their workstation.
    “Swig, it’s okay,” Jem said. “It’s all been solved. He and Thomas are going to go to port and—”
    “Exactly!” Tim wrung his hands. “He
went
to port!”
    “So? What’s wrong with that? I thought it was a good idea.”
    “You
told
him and Thomas to go?”
    “Well… yes.” Jem stared up at the quartermaster. “What on earth is the matter, Swig?”
    “I’ll tell you what’s the matter!” Tim pulled at his dirty hair with both hands. “They took the
Hop
!”

“Can you imagine, Josephine, how impressed your schoolmates will be when you tell them about your trip?” Uncle Daniel said as they strolled through Port Aberhard toward the docks. “The tropics are just so fascinating. So…” He took a deep breath of