“Not yet . . . So, they might not be locked out for days?”

“I’m cerrrtain that Marrrcus has thought of that since many of ourrr rrresidents come and go now. Likely the ladies at the gate will hearrr them knock and someone’perrrhaps even you’will have to let them in. Did Marrrcus give you the spell forrr the gate?”

Alex hesitated. “Well, yes. I guess so. He did it with me standing there, anyway.”

“Therrre,” Simber said. “You see? Now you must think like the leaderrr, not wait for him to give you instrrructions.”

Alex stared at Simber.

Simber, suddenly patient, continued. “So, at this point, what you might be thinking about all on yourrr own would be to go down to the gate and tell the girrrinos to summon you if any of ourrr fine Arrrtiméans need to be let in.”

Alex blinked. “Oh. Right. Of course.” He stood a moment longer, then, with a slight nudge from the cheetah’s stone paw, he stumbled outside and ran to the gate to do what a leader might do.

» » « «

When Alex returned to Simber, he started chattering excitedly about how, when he got there, someone was already waiting to come back in, and so he let them in and it all worked perfectly. But then he noticed Ms. Morning walking up, her forehead wrinkled into a worried frown, looking up at Simber, and he stopped talking immediately and started listening.

“The boat is missing,” she said to Simber. “Have you seen it or heard of anyone’s plans to use it today? I’d like to load it up for Father’s trip.”

“No, I haven’t. You’rrre surrre it hasn’t been swept away?”

Ms. Morning shook her head. “Even the biggest storm couldn’t overpower the anchor spell. Someone must have borrowed it. What awful timing!”

Alex’s lips parted. And just as the wheels in his head started to turn, Simber looked straight at him.

“Have yourrr missing frrriends been found? Orrr arrre they playing hooky today, perrrhaps?”

Alex opened his mouth to deny it, but then he closed it again and slapped his hand to his forehead. “Ugh. I bet they did it. They said this morning that they were going to go have an adventure, but I had a meeting instead so I couldn’t . . .” He trailed off, thinking, remembering now just how much he’d wanted to be with them.

Simber looked pointedly at Alex and tapped a paw. “Well?”

Alex startled. “Well what? I didn’t do it.” It was nice not to be the one in trouble for once.

Simber sighed. “I know that. What arrre you, as leaderrr, going to do about it?”

“Oh!” Alex said. Sheesh, this whole leadership thing isn’t coming very easily, he thought. “Um . . . okay,” he said, stalling. “Okay, well, Claire’” He blushed furiously. “I mean, Ms. Morning, will you stay on the island and watch over things while Simber and I go find the boat? Because he can, like, fly and stuff, so we should be able to . . . find it. Pretty easily. Yeah.” He felt very proud to have thought of that so quickly.

Ms. Morning, who had raised an eyebrow at Alex’s familiarity, was secretly pleased that Simber was helping Alex in a way that her father hadn’t thought to do. “That sounds like a great plan. If Father and I are gone to the peace meeting before you get back, just have some of the students help you load things up. You can leave it anchored out front overnight. Sound good?”

Alex nodded. “Whew,” he said under his breath. “I mean, okay Simber, are you ready? That is, is that okay with you? I know you wanted a nap.”

“Nap schmap,” grumbled the giant cat. He leaped from his pedestal, causing the entire mansion to shake when he landed. “Nobody takes that boat out forrr months, and now all of a sudden everrrybody needs it.”

Alex smiled, knowing that sometimes Simber just needed to get his crankies out, and it was better simply to listen than try to argue.

» » « «

A few minutes later, on the shore, Alex hoisted himself onto Simber’s back. “Any idea wherrre they may have gone?” Simber asked.

Alex had been trying desperately to set his brain to “leader” mode, thinking ahead to what Simber might be asking, and this time he’d succeeded. “They’re probably either going around our island to see what things look like on the other side, or they’ve struck out to the west.”

Immediately Simber took a powerful running leap and flew nearly straight up into the sky and over the center of Quill, leaving Alex dangling by his arms from Simber’s neck. “Whoa! Whoa!” Alex shouted.

“Sorrry,” Simber muttered as he straightened out again, but Alex thought he could hear the big cat chuckling. “Therrre, we can see all the way arrround. Do you see them?”

Alex scanned all the way around. “No,” he said.

“Neitherrr do I. All rrright. To the west, then.”

Alex nodded and shifted on the cat’s slippery back. “To the west!”

Paradise . . . Lost

Lani awoke to the sound of someone screaming. It was Meghan. And that made Lani almost start screaming too.

Her first thought was to jump to her feet and stop whatever it was that was making her friend scream. But instinctively Lani knew that would be foolish despite the enormous rush of panic inside her, so she remained deathly still. She squinted through mostly closed eyelids, remembering the beach but nothing else since then, trying to get an idea of where she was and what was happening. Her brain felt too groggy to make sense of everything.