The Mystery of the Kidnapped Whale - Marc Brandel [2]
Even if he wasn’t saying anything, Jupiter Jones was obviously thinking hard. He was pinching his lower lip between his thumb and forefinger the way he often did when he was pondering something.
“If Mohammed can’t come to the mountain,” he said, “the mountain will just have to come to Mohammed.”
“Talk English, will you?” Pete begged him. “What mountain?”
Jupe did have a habit sometimes of using long words or of speaking in riddles that made it difficult for the other two Investigators to understand what he was getting at.
“That mountain,” Jupiter explained. “The ocean out there. If we had a spade. And let me see – a tarpaulin. And that old hand pump Uncle Titus bought for the junkyard last month, and a good long hose –”
“We could dig a pit,” Bob interrupted him.
“And line it with the tarp,” Pete added.
“And pump it full of water,” Jupe finished. “We could make a sort of swimming pool where the whale could survive until the tide comes back in.”
After a short discussion it was decided that Bob and Pete should cycle back to The Jones Salvage Yard for the supplies while Jupe stayed with the stranded whale.
After the other two had gone, Jupiter searched the flotsam on the beach until he found a battered plastic bucket that would still hold water. For the next half hour, while he waited for his friends, he spent his time trudging out to the edge of the sea, filling the bucket, then trudging back and emptying it over the stranded whale.
The First Investigator had never much enjoyed physical work. He preferred to use his brain. “About time,” he said crossly when the other two Investigators came back, although as a matter of fact they had been surprisingly quick.
They had brought all the things he had asked for – a long roll of tarpaulin, the hand pump, a good sharp spade, and a hose.
“Let’s dig as close to the whale as we can,” Jupe directed. “Then maybe we’ll be able to roll it over into the pool.”
Pete, who was the strongest of the three, did most of the digging. Luckily the damp sand under the surface was quite soft. In less than an hour they had made a trench about ten feet long, two feet wide, and almost two feet deep.
They lined the trench with the tarpaulin to make it watertight. Then Pete worked the pump from the edge of the sea while Bob and Jupe stretched the long hose to the pool. It was a good pump that had probably once belonged aboard a fishing boat. They soon had almost two feet of water in the trench.
“Now comes the hard part,” Jupiter said.
“Thanks a lot,” Pete told him. “I hope that means you’ll do your share of the work this time.”
Jupe didn’t bother to answer him. It seemed to him he had already done more than his share. The whole plan had been his idea.
After they had rested a moment, the Three Investigators gathered on the side of the whale away from the pool. They leaned forward and rested their hands against the animal. It lay there without moving, its eyes closed. Bob patted its head. It opened its eyes at once, and Bob could have sworn it smiled at him.
“Now, when I say ‘heave,’” the First Investigator said. “Are you ready? All together –”
He never finished his command. As the three boys strained, ready to heave, the whale seemed to be straining, too, gathering itself. With a sudden convulsive movement of its body it flipped itself up, turning, spinning in the air, and landed on its back in the pool.
“Wow!” Bob exclaimed. Jupe and Pete were excited too.
Once in the water the whale righted itself. It submerged for a minute, wallowing in the pleasure of being in its own element again, then floated slowly to the surface and spouted up a single jet of water from its blowhole. It was exactly as though the whale were thanking them.
“Now, when the tide comes in –” Jupiter began.
“Never mind the tide,” Pete interrupted him. “It must be nine o’clock now! We promised to work at the junkyard this morning. And I haven’t even had my breakfast yet.”
Jupiter’s uncle Titus Jones and his aunt Mathilda, with whom he lived, ran The Jones Salvage Yard on the outskirts