Topaz paused. “I shouldn’t be telling you this. I’m gabbing at you. Sorry. Saph tells me I do it all the time.”
“That’s all right. I don’t mind.”
“Tell me about your parents. What are they like?”
“I don’t have a father. But my mother.” Josh took a deep breath. “My mother is just great. I’m really lucky.”
“Will she be coming to Solferino?”
Topaz had been busy cooking the previous night; she must not have heard what Josh had told the others.
“I guess so,” Josh said slowly. “Yes, I guess she will.”
“When?”
“Well…”
Josh didn’t know how to answer that. While he was still hesitating, Rick Lasker came rushing through the gate at the other side of the clearing. He shouted excitedly the moment that he saw Topaz and Josh.
“Hey! Come over here, both of you. You’ll never guess what we found! Hurry up!”
Josh had never thought that he would be happy to have a personal conversation with Topaz interrupted by one of the Lasker twins. But he was.
Chapter Eight
It couldn’t be just another spangle. If Rick and his brothers had found one, they would be carrying it with them. Josh and Topaz ran side by side across the clearing. She was first through the open gate. Josh knew what to expect, but it was Topaz’s first time beyond the fence. She slowed at the sight of the thicket of umbrella plants, until Josh pushed her from behind. “Go on. You can look at them later.”
They could still see Rick, bobbing his way through the stems but turning now and again to make sure that they were following. He waved to them, ducked his head, and disappeared.
Following him, Topaz and Josh found themselves on a set of steps cut into a steep incline. The lush stalks had been removed, to reveal bare red soil. At the bottom, on a lower level, was an area cleared of the tall plants. Sig Lasker was on his knees there, while Hag and Rick stood by his side.
“What is it?” Josh called. But before anyone answered, he could see what had them so excited.
A rough lean-to had been made in the middle of the clearing, using the stalks and huge leaves of umbrella plants. One plant had been left standing like a tent pole, and a rope was tied around its thick stem. The other end of the rope stretched to the edge of the clearing where Sig was kneeling. It was attached to a harness around the chest and back of a huge gray animal. Sig was struggling to undo the rope. The creature lay as though it were dead.
Josh realized that there were no ground-cover plants here, either. Every one had been nibbled down to the roots. He stared at the animal sprawled on the ground. It was like a massive cousin of the spangle, with the same eyeless head and a beaded skin that was gray rather than silver. The iridescent winglike ears were unfurled, but they sagged limp along the sides of the head.
Sig was cursing and making no progress untying the thick knot. The animal had pulled it tight in its efforts to reach plants outside the circle that the rope allowed it to reach.
“Here,” Topaz said. “Let me.”
She pulled a wicked-looking knife out of a hidden sheath under her armpit. As she bent beside the animal she flashed a glance at Josh and the others. “Sapphire’s idea, not mine. Self-protection, she says. But for once it might come in useful.”
She sawed steadily, not at the twisted knot but at the rope a few inches away from it. Strand by strand gave way, until she could lift the knife and sever the last thread with a single vicious slash. The animal stirred feebly as the rope slackened. The great ears lifted a few inches and turned toward Topaz.
She looked up at Sig. “Now what?”
It was clear from the expression on his face that he had not gone any further in his thinking. Nor had anyone else. Josh realized that the freed animal must weigh several hundred pounds. There was no way that they could carry that great bulk anywhere, even though it was alive and needed attention.
“Food!” Sig said suddenly. “I bet it’s starving. Come on.”
His two brothers were ahead of him. The first word had been enough to stir them to action. They left the clearing. When they returned they carried handfuls of wormlike yellow stalks. They dropped them in front of the immobile animal.
Nothing happened.
“No good,” Sig said at last. “Let’s find something else.”
“No, wait.” Josh had seen a ripple of movement in the flaccid trunk. While they watched it slowly extended, wrapped around a bunch of stalks, and lifted them to a wide slit that opened where the eyes should have been in the blind head. They all cheered. The delicate ears turned toward them and spread all the way.
“Not sick,” Sig said triumphantly. “Hungry. Get some more—a lot more. I bet a superspangle needs a ton of food.”
They scattered to forage. Josh found a patch where the ground was wet and the plants seemed thicker and juicier than usual. He gathered a great armload. When he came back, the superspangle was balanced on four thick legs and a heavy tail. It ignored the stalks that were being dropped in front of it, turned, and headed ponderously across the clearing and down the slope on the far side. It managed about one pace every two seconds.
“Don’t let it go,” Hag cried. “We found it, it’s ours. Stop it!”
“Yeah, sure.” Sig put down the plants that he was holding. “Just tell us how.”
The superspangle was continuing in a leisurely but determined straight line, its tail making a furrow in the ground plants.
“It’s all right,” Josh had seen a gleam of water ahead. “It needs a drink. There’s juice in the plants, but I bet it’s even thirstier than it is hungry.”
It seemed at first sight that he was wrong. When the animal came to the little stagnant pool it did not stop, but went on walking. Only when the water was halfway up its legs did it halt, dip its head, and stick the trunk far below the surface. After a few seconds there was a sound like an enormous belch. Bubbles appeared alongside the spread ears. As they burst an awful rotting smell filled the air and the dark surface of the pool rippled.
“Needs a breath mint,” Hag said. “Big time.”
“It’s only swamp gas, you idiot,” said Rick. “And it doesn’t smell any worse than you.” The insult came from pure force of habit. Rick’s attention, like everyone else’s, was all on the half-submerged animal.
After another minute the superspangle came up for air. It lifted its head, snorted, and blew a trunkfull of spray high over everything. Rather than turning, it trundled backward out of the water. Then it did swing around, desperately slowly, and wandered toward the nearest clump of plants. It ate for a while, wheezed, and finally lay down.
“I think it’s gone as far as it intends to go,” Topaz said. “At least until it gets its strength back.”
“But we wanted to take it with us,” Rick objected. He went around behind the superspangle to push it, then changed his mind. It was too enormous to dream of moving it without a forklift.
“I think it’s earned a rest.” Sig stared back toward the clearing and the lean-to shelter. “What I want to know is, who tied it up and left it there? If we hadn’t found it, it would have died.”
“One of the people who went off to the medical center, I guess.” Josh started back on the path that led to the gate. “I wonder if Brewster knows about it.”
“You’re not going to leave it here, are you?” Hag asked.
“No, dummy.” Sig was following Josh and Topaz. “We’re going to let you bring it with you. It can sleep in your bed.”
“I’m staying with it.”
“Fine. Have fun outside when it gets dark.”