William Johnston: And Loving It!

99 looked around. “It would be like finding a needle in a haystack.”

“Harder.”

“Harder?”

“If you sit down in a haystack often enough the law of averages will find the needle for you eventually. But sitting in this jungle won’t help us a bit.”

“Should we just strike out and hope for the best, Max?”

“We’ve already struck out, 99. Let’s try walking.”

They plunged into the jungle again, following the stream as before. Hours passed, but they found nothing that resembled a castle. The jungle was steamy hot. The vines lashed at their faces and the thickets tore at their clothes. Weak from hunger, they stumbled on.

“Max. . I can’t go on. .” 99 whimpered.

“Courage, 99. Remember, it’s always darkest just before the dawn.”

“Max, it’s the middle of the day and the sun is burning down on us.”

“99, don’t blame me if that old saying doesn’t make any sense. I didn’t make it up.”

“Max. . I have to rest. .”

He stopped. “All right. We’ll stay here until it gets dark. It will be easier to travel when the sun goes down.”

They collapsed on the ground. And seconds later they were both sound asleep.

Max was the first one to awaken. He shook 99. “99, we can go on, now.”

She opened her eyes. “Max!” she cried. “Where are you? I’ve gone blind from hunger!”

“You can’t go blind from hunger, 99.”

“I can’t see you!”

“It’s night.”

“Oh.”

“Can you walk, 99?”

“I think so.” She got to her feet. “Yes, that rest helped me a lot. Let’s go, Max.”

Once more, they proceeded. Then Max suddenly halted. He pushed aside a vine and peered into the darkness ahead. “99!” he said. “We’ve found- Oh, no, that’s not it.”

“What, Max?”

“I thought there for a second that we’d found the castle.”

“I can’t see-what is it?”

“Well, it certainly looks like the castle. But it couldn’t be.”

“Why not, Max?”

“Well, it isn’t white, and it doesn’t have a trunk.”

“Oh. . Max. .” 99 groaned weakly.

99 pushed the vine aside and peered into the dimness. “Max, it is the castle,” she said. “See the towers? And, look, there’s a light in a window. This is it, Max! This is the castle we’ve been looking for!”

“All right, 99, I’ll take your word for it. You know more about white elephants than I do. If you say they have towers and lights in the window, then- 99! Down!”

They sank into the underbrush. A moment later, a man in uniform marched past their hiding place. He was staring straight ahead, a vacant expression on his face.

“Max, did you see that?” 99 said, puzzled, raising up. “What a strange look.”

“It was almost no look at all,” Max said.

“He seemed to be under some kind of spell.”

“Maybe he just came from a movie,” Max suggested. “I sometimes look like that myself right after I step out of a dark movie theater into the light.”

“Max, it’s dark out here.”

“It was only a theory, 99. Not every theory- 99! Down!”

Again, they ducked down into the thickets. Another man in uniform strode past. This one had the same empty look on his face.

“Max-”

“Shhhh, 99.”

They moved back into the jungle where they could talk without being overheard.

“Max, those are guards,” 99 said. “They seem to be patrolling the grounds. How will we ever get into the castle?”

“I don’t think that’s going to be any problem at all, 99. Remember what you said about them looking as if they’re under a spell?”

“Yes?”

“Well, 99, this may come as a surprise to you, but I think those guards are under a spell. I think Guru Optimo has hypnotized them. Unless I miss my guess, we could march a brass band up to that castle and the guards would pay absolutely no attention to it.”

“But, Max, what good are they, then?”

“They’re for show, 99. Who would guess that they’re hypnotized? Only someone like myself with a very keen instinct for what is right and wrong. The instant you mentioned that those guards looked like they were under a spell, I said to myself, ‘Max-those guards are under a spell!’ But not many would notice that. And they’d stay away from the castle, thinking it was heavily guarded.”

“Max. . I don’t know. .”

“Believe me, 99. I can sense these things. All we have to do is wait for one guard to pass, then walk right up to the castle before the next guard arrives.”

“Then why aren’t we doing it, Max? Why are we still hiding?”

“Because we can’t just walk into that castle anywhere. We have to pick exactly the right doorway.”

“The doorway that will take us straight to Guru Optimo and Lucky Bucky Buckley, you mean? How can-”

“No, 99, the doorway that will take us straight to the kitchen. I’m starved.”

They crept back to the edge of the clearing. As they crouched in the underbrush again, a guard passed. Max looked at his watch. Then another guard passed.

“Three minutes between guards,” Max reported. “That will give us plenty of time.”

Another guard passed.

Max looked at his watch once more, then, a few seconds later, he said, “Now!”

They scrambled from the thickets and started quietly across the grounds toward the castle.

“Halt!” a voice shouted.

“99, was that you?” Max asked.

“No, Max.”

“And it wasn’t me,” he said. “So apparently-”

At that instant they were smothered under a pile-up of guards.

“Do you still think you could march a brass band up to the castle, Max?” 99 asked.

“99, if you were any kind of a pal, you’d pretend that I’d planned this this way and you’d be congratulating me.”

One by one, the guards peeled themselves from the pile. Then two of the guards pulled Max and 99 to their feet.

The head guard, his expression as vacant as ever, addressed them in a mechanical-sounding voice. “I-am-a-guard. You-are-intruders. See-the-guards-capture-the-intruders.”

“Yes, well, that’s very interesting,” Max said. “But-”

“The-guards-have-guns,” the head guard continued. “Do-the-intruders-have-guns?”

One of the other guards frisked Max, then took his pistol from him. Another guard took 99’s gun from her purse.

“The-intruders-do-not-have-guns,” the head guard said. “Oh-oh-what-will-they-do? Will-they-march-to-the-castle-as-the-guards-tell-them-to? Or-will-they-try-to-escape-and-get-clobbered?”

“Ah. . I think we’ll march to the castle,” Max replied.

“See-the-intruders-march-to-the-castle,” the guard said. “One-of-the-intruders-is-pigeon-toed.”

Max and 99, with the guards tramping behind them, reached the castle and entered. It had high, ornamented ceilings. The stone walls were hung with battle gear, swords and shields and lances, and portraits of noblemen in medieval dress.

“Isn’t it magnificent, Max!” 99 said breathlessly.

“Isn’t what magnificent, 99?”

“The castle.”

“Oh. I hadn’t noticed. I was watching how you walk. That guard is wrong, 99-you’re not pigeon-toed.”

“I don’t think he was referring to me, Max.”

“See-the-intruders-march-straight-ahead-to-the-great-hall,” the head guard said. “See-the-pigeon-toed-intruder-turn-red-in-the-face.”

“Yes, and see the head guard get a fistful of knuckles right in the mush if he doesn’t knock off the cracks!” Max snapped.

They reached a pair of huge, hand-carved double doors and one of the guards pushed them open. A large chamber was revealed. Gigantic crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling. Here, too, on the walls, were medieval weapons. And in the center of the hall was a long dining table. Seated at the table were a short, fat man, wearing a checkered suit, a pink-and-white striped shirt, and brown-and-white shoes, and a younger man, who was tall and thin and who was dressed in a loin cloth and a turban.