It stays light pretty late during the summer, so it was a clear ride to Dusty Muleman's marina. By the time we reached the channel markers, the waves had gotten choppy. I nosed the dinghy into some mangroves, cut the engine, and hopped out, balancing in my skateboard shoes on the slick rubbery roots. My sister dug through her backpack and took out a bottle of Gatorade, some bug spray, a Lemony Snicket book, and a flashlight. Then she handed the backpack to me.
“Sure you're okay with this?” I asked. “I'll be gone awhile.”
“Oh, gimme a break,” Abbey said. “'Course I'm okay.”
“Stay right here until you hear me yell ‘Geronimo!' Then you know what to do.”
“Why ‘Geronimo'?” she asked.
“Because I saw somebody do that in a movie once.”
“What the heck does it mean?”
“It means ‘Hurry up and rescue me before I get my butt kicked by Dusty's big ugly goon,'” I said. “No more questions, okay? Keep out of sight and I'll see you later.”
As I began working my way toward the docks, I heard Abbey call out, “Be careful, Noah!”
I waved over my shoulder, but I didn't look back.
By the time I broke free of the mangroves, my shoes were soaking wet and my shins were scraped from the barnacle-covered roots. Crouching low, I dashed across a clearing and ducked behind Dusty Muleman's ticket shed. There on the ground, side by side, were the two large crates that Shelly had told me to look for.
Peeking around a corner of the shack, I saw that the parking area was filling up with cars. Customers were already lined up to board the Coral Queen. There weren't any kids in the crowd because kids weren't allowed on the casino boat; that's why I had to be so careful.
Using the sharp edge of a rock, I pried the lid off the first wooden crate. It was full of liquor bottles-rum from Haiti, according to the labels. Silently I replaced the cover and moved to the other crate.
As Shelly had promised, it was empty. I squeezed inside and dragged the heavy lid back into place. In order to fit I had to lie flat and pull my knees to my chest. Abbey's backpack, stuffed with containers of food dye, served as a lumpy pillow under my head. I was so cramped it felt like I was hiding in one of those magician's boxes, pretending to be disappeared.
The crate was dark and musty inside. At first I was afraid I couldn't breathe, but soon I felt whispers of air seeping under the lid. I took a few gulps, closed my eyes, and began to wait.
Before long I heard the scuff of footsteps and then the low sounds of men talking. The first voice I didn't recognize, but the thick accent of the second one was unmistakable: It was Dusty's bald gorilla, Luno.
The men grunted as they hoisted the first crate and hauled it off to the Coral Queen. By the time they returned, my heart was thumping like a jackhammer. Luno lifted one end of my crate while his companion grabbed the other. I went rigid and held my breath. I could hear them swearing and complaining about the weight.
With every step, the crate tipped and lurched and bounced. I knew I'd be dead meat if the lid fell off, so I dug my fingernails into the wooden slats to keep it in place.
Finally, the goons set me down with a jolting thud, and I knew I was on the boat. Once they were gone, I seriously thought about kicking my way out of that miserable wooden tomb. I could have done it, no problem, except that I'd promised Shelly to stay put until she got there.
So I waited some more.
And waited. And waited.
The Coral Queen was getting noisy as the customers piled aboard. Nobody else came near the crate, though, so I figured I must be in a storage area behind a wall or a door. Wherever it was, there was definitely no air-conditioning.
Before long I was sweating like a horse, and my throat was as dry as sawdust. I wondered how much longer I could stand it inside that moldy old box.
It seemed like I was cooped up for hours, but it probably wasn't even twenty minutes before Shelly tapped three times on the side. She helped me climb out and handed me a cold bottle of water-nothing in my whole life had ever tasted so good. I hugged her, tangerine perfume and all. That's how grateful I was.
She put a finger to her lips and motioned for me to follow. It was impossible not to notice that she was wearing those wild fishnet stockings and tippy high-heeled shoes that made her about five inches taller than normal. She led me along a dim corridor that opened onto one of the busy casino decks. The noise hit me like a roar-the slot machines clanging, people laughing and hooting, some lame calypso band mangling a Jimmy Buffett song.
“There it is, Noah.” Shelly pointed to a door. On it hung a hand-carved sign that spelled out the word “Mermaids.”
“Don't move,” she told me, and promptly disappeared into the stall. Seconds later the door cracked open, and Shelly's blond head poked out. She looked around warily, then signaled for me to join her.
Inside the ladies' restroom.
So I did. The two of us could barely fit.
“Where's the stuff?” she whispered.
I patted Abbey's backpack. The day before, Shelly and I had divided the stash of food coloring: seventeen bottles for me, seventeen for her.
“You got the sign?” I asked.
She smiled and held it up for me to see: a square piece of cardboard on which she had printed in capital letters with a jet-black marker: OUT OF ORDER.
“Guaranteed privacy,” she assured me.
“But what about you?” I was worried that she wouldn't have a safe place to flush her supply of the dye.
“There's another Mermaids' john up front. I'll use that one for my potty breaks.”
“But what if somebody's already in there?” I asked.
“Then I'll crash the Mermen's.”
“The men's room? You serious?”
Shelly shrugged. “Hey, who's gonna stop me?”
She had a point. “I gotta get back to the bar,” she said. “Billy Babcock's waitin' on me all moony-eyed. Poor sap thinks he's in love.” She gave my shoulder a friendly tweak. “Good luck, young Underwood.”
“You, too, Shelly.”
I locked the door the instant it closed. As soon as I heard her tack up the OUT OF ORDER sign, I unzipped Abbey's backpack and removed the dye bottles.
The head on a boat is basically a glorified closet, with barely enough room to sit and do your business. This one smelled like a mixture of stale beer, Clorox bleach, and Shelly's fruity perfume, but it was still less obnoxious than most public commodes.
And as uncomfortable as it was, it was way better than being sealed up inside a liquor crate.
For a moment I wondered what my father would have thought if he could see me there, locked in the Mermaids' head on the Coral Queen. The parent part of him would have been mad at me for sneaking aboard, while the nature-loving part of him would have been proud of me for trying to nail Dusty Muleman.
Knowing Dad, he would've had one firm piece of advice: Don't get caught!
When I opened the first bottle of food coloring, I saw that Shelly was right. The gel oozed out like molasses. Carefully I squeezed the plastic container until every gooey purple drop landed in the toilet hole.
Then I gave a good hard flush to make sure the dye went where it was supposed to go. Shelly had warned me that the stuff could get gummy pretty quick. If it stuck in the plumbing pipes, our plan would be ruined.
There was only one way to check it out. I knelt down, pinched my nose, and peered into the nasty depths of the head. Not a speck of fuchsia could be seen.
So far, so good.
One bottle down, sixteen to go.
Time passes incredibly slowly when you're trapped in a restroom.
Whenever I got ready to make a break, people would stop in loud groups outside the door-talking, laughing, singing along to the music.