Chapter 12 THE SECOND PIECE OF THE MAP

　　Chapter 12 THE SECOND PIECE OF THE MAP
　　IT was true — the beautiful little carved ship was no longer in its place of honour on the shelf. It wasgone.
　　The four children stared at one another in exasperation¹. Blow Mr. Eppy! What right had he to"borrow" things like this? Would he give it back?
　　"What's he borrowed it for, anyway?" wondered Dinah. "If he goes so far as to suspect that we foundthe paper there, I still don't see why he should borrow it. He's got the paper, anyway!""A bit of it, only — and he knows it," corrected Jack². "He probably thinks the rest of it is still in thelittle carved ship — either that we haven't noticed it, or that we have kept it there. And he's borrowedit to see."
　　"Stolen it, you mean," said Lucy-Ann scornfully. "Horrid³ man! I think he's awful.""Shall I go and ask him if he's got it?" said Philip. He was feeling very angry — quite ready to beardany lion in its den⁴!
　　The others considered this. "Suppose he didn't take it?" said Jack. "It would be jolly awkward,accusing him of it."
　　"Who else would have taken it?" demanded Philip. "Nobody!""Look — let's go and have a swim in the pool and forget it for a bit," said Dinah. "If you still feel likebearding the lion afterwards, you can go. It's so awfully⁵ hot. I'd love a swim.""All right," said Philip reluctantly. "But I might not feel so keen on going after Mr. Eppy afterwards."However, he was still of the same mind after his swim. The others couldn't help admiring him —they really thought it was a brave thing to do, to go and tackle Mr. Eppy and accuse him of"borrowing" their ship!
　　He went off to find Mr. Eppy. He wasn't in his cabin. He wasn't in his deck-chair. Where could he be?
　　Philip began to hunt over the ship for him, determined⁶ to find him. He saw him at last coming out ofthe radio office.
　　"Mr. Eppy," said Philip, marching boldly up to him. "What have you done with our ship?"Mr. Eppy stopped. Philip wished to goodness he didn't wear those dark glasses. He had no idea if Mr.
　　Eppy was surprised, angry or what.
　　He soon knew. Mr. Eppy spoke⁷ in a very snappy voice indeed. "What do you mean, boy? What shipdo you speak of?"
　　"The little carved ship we showed you — the one in the bottle — called Andra," said Philip, wishingmore than ever that he could see Mr. Eppy's eyes, and read what was in them. "What have you donewith it?"
　　"I think you are mad," said Mr. Eppy coldly. "Quite mad. As mad as Lucian, who comes to me with afairy-tale about a little girl, a gull⁸ and a piece of paper. What nonsense, what fiddlesticks! And nowyou come to me with a question about a toy ship! You think I have taken it to float in my bath,perhaps?"
　　"Did you take it, Mr. Eppy?" persisted Philip.
　　"No! And do not dare to insult me with your fairy- tales and your crazy questions any more!"thundered Mr. Eppy.
　　He strode off, his mouth very grim. Philip was a little shaken. Well — he hadn't got much change outof Mr. Eppy, that was certain. Blow the man! Philip felt absolutely certain he had got the ship. Hewent down to meet the others in his cabin. They would be waiting for him there.
　　He opened the cabin door and went in. "Well," he said, "it's no go. He says he hasn't got the ship —but I bet he has. I feel it in my bones!""Then your bones tell you wrong," said Jack, and he pointed⁹ across the room to the shelf on the wall.
　　"Look there."
　　Philip looked, and gasped¹¹. The little carved Ship of Adventure was back in its place again!
　　"Where was it?" he asked. "Gosh, what an idiot I've made of myself, accusing Mr. Eppy of having it.
　　Where on earth was it?"
　　"We don't know," answered Dinah. "We all came in here a few minutes ago after we left you on yourway to tackle Mr. Eppy — and the first thing we saw was the ship!""There it was, on the shelf — just where we left it this morning," said Lucy-Ann.
　　"Who put it back?" asked Philip.
　　"Aha — if we knew that we'd know who took it," said Jack. "I still think it was Mr. Eppy. If youremember, he came in to lunch after we did — he could easily have slipped down here, and taken theship then. And he could just as easily have put it back whilst we were having our swim. If he saw usin the pool, which was quite likely, he'd know that he had plenty of time to slip down here andreplace it."
　　"The knob's a bit loose," said Dinah. "We think he found how it worked all right, and removed thatwooden section, and examined the inside of the ship thoroughly¹².""I see. And when he found there was nothing there he generously brought it back!" said Philip. "Idon't like that man. He'll be hunting round all our cabins looking for our other bits of paper, if wedon't look out."
　　Lucy-Ann felt alarmed. "Oh dear — will he find them, do you think?""He might," admitted Philip. "They seem jolly good hiding-places to us, but they probably would beeasy enough for him to discover."
　　"I say — are we going to get the other bits deciphered now?" said Dinah suddenly. "You know, wethought we'd ask the little Greek woman who keeps the shop on the ship, and the deck steward¹³.
　　Suppose Mr. Eppy gets to hear we've been showing other people more bits of paper. He'll soon beafter them."
　　"Yes, that's a point," said Jack. "But if we don't get them deciphered, we're no better off than wewere. Hidden treasure is no use to anyone if they don't know in the least where it is. Anyway, wedon't even know if the plan does show hidden treasure — all we know is that it is a genuine olddocument, and that Mr. Eppy is distinctly interested.""I think we could trust the little shop-woman not to say a word," said Lucy-Ann. "She's nice, and shelikes us. If we told her it was a secret, wouldn't she keep it? After all, we've got to ask somebody!"They debated whether the shop-woman was trustworthy or not. They decided¹⁴ that on the whole shewas.
　　"She said she'd show me some photographs of her children," said Lucy-Ann. "She's got three onsome little island or other. She leaves them with her grandmother when she goes on the ship. Couldn'twe all go and see the photographs, and then ask her about the parchment?""Trust Lucy-Ann for knowing everyone's life-history," grinned Philip. "It beats me how she does it!
　　She already knows the names of the second officer's children, and she knows everything about thestewardess's old mother and what illnesses she suffers from, and she even knows how many dogs thecaptain himself has kept during his whole life!""I don't," said Lucy-Ann indignantly. "I simply wouldn't dare to ask him about dogs. Anyway, hecan't have had any on board ship."
　　"I'm only pulling your leg, Lucy-Ann," said Philip. "Actually I think your idea of looking at the shop-woman's photos, and then springing our parchment on her — or a bit of it — is a good one.""Let's go now, then," said Lucy-Ann, looking at the clock. "Everyone always has a sleep in theafternoon at this time — no-one is ever in the shop. She'll be alone."They went off together. Philip had the idea of first finding out where Mr. Eppy was — just in case heshould be snooping round!
　　He came back and reported. "He's asleep in his deck-chair on the promenade¹⁵ deck. His head's wellback, and he's not reading or anything."
　　"How do you know he's asleep?" demanded Jack. "You can't tell if his eyes are open or shut behindthose awful dark sun-glasses."
　　"Well — he looked asleep," said Philip. "Sort of limp and relaxed. Come on — we'll go to the shopnow."
　　They went to the little shop. The Greek woman who kept it showed all her white teeth in a pleasedsmile when she saw the children with Kiki and Micky.
　　"Ah, Kiki, Micky, and what mischief¹⁶ have you done?" she asked, tickling¹⁷ the little monkey andpoking Kiki in the chest. "One, two, three, GO!"Kiki immediately made a noise like a pistol-shot, which was just what the little Greek woman meanther to do. She was quite familiar with Kiki's ways, and always screamed with laughter when theparrot hiccupped, coughed or sneezed.
　　"Tell him to snizz," she begged. "I like when he snizzes."So Kiki obliged with a fine variety of "snizzes," much to Micky's amazement¹⁸. Then out came thephotographs and the children were treated to a life- history of each of the three little girls shepossessed. Dinah thought that surely never in this world had there lived such children before — sosweet, so good, so loving, so religious, so incredibly beautiful — and so extraordinarily¹⁹ boring!
　　Then Jack thought it was their turn to talk. He nudged Philip, who at once brought out his piece ofthe map. "Look," he said to the shop-woman. "Can you make head or tail of this for us? It's an old olddocument we found. What does it say — and what does it show?"The Greek woman looked at it sharply with her bright black eyes. "It is a plan of some sort," she said.
　　"But you have not got the whole of it here — what a pity! It shows part of an island called Thamis orThemis, I cannot tell which. See, here is its name, in Greek — but you will not understand the letters,of course. Your alphabet is different. Yes, it is part of an island, but where it is I do not know.""Can't you tell anything else from the map?" asked Dinah.
　　"There is something of importance on the island," said the woman. "Perhaps a temple? I do not know.
　　There is a building marked here — or maybe it is meant to be a city. Again I do not know. I could tellyou more if I had the whole of the map."
　　The children had been so engrossed²⁰ in all this that they had not heard the soft footsteps of someonecoming. A shadow fell across them. They looked up and Lucy-Ann gave a gasp¹⁰. It was Mr. Eppy, hisdark glasses hiding his eyes as usual.
　　"Ah — something interesting. Let me see," said Mr. Eppy coolly, and before anyone could stop himhe had twisted the parchment out of the Greek woman's fingers and was looking at it himself!
　　Philip tried to twist it out of his fingers, but Mr. Eppy was on his guard. He held it aloft and pretendedto joke.
　　"He won't let Mr. Eppy see! Bad boy!"
　　"Bad, naughty boy!" echoed Kiki at once. Micky, thinking it was a game of snatch, suddenly leapt upin the air, and lunged out at the paper. He got it in his little paw, fell back to Philip's shoulder — andthen, still with the parchment in his hand, leapt to the top of the shop and sat there, out of reach,chattering excitedly.
　　Mr. Eppy knew when he was beaten. "What a funny little creature!" he said, in an amiable²¹ voice thatmanaged to sound quite angry too. "Well, well — we'll have a look at the paper another time!"And with that, he left the dumbfounded children, walking off rapidly, back to his deck-chair.

1 exasperation   

n.愤慨

参考例句：

• He snorted with exasperation.他愤怒地哼了一声。
• She rolled her eyes in sheer exasperation.她气急败坏地转动着眼珠。

2 jack   

n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克

参考例句：

• I am looking for the headphone jack.我正在找寻头戴式耳机插孔。
• He lifted the car with a jack to change the flat tyre.他用千斤顶把车顶起来换下瘪轮胎。

3 horrid   

adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的

参考例句：

• I'm not going to the horrid dinner party.我不打算去参加这次讨厌的宴会。
• The medicine is horrid and she couldn't get it down.这种药很难吃，她咽不下去。

4 den   

n.兽穴；秘密地方；安静的小房间，私室

参考例句：

• There is a big fox den on the back hill.后山有一个很大的狐狸窝。
• The only way to catch tiger cubs is to go into tiger's den.不入虎穴焉得虎子。

5 awfully   

adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地

参考例句：

• Agriculture was awfully neglected in the past.过去农业遭到严重忽视。
• I've been feeling awfully bad about it.对这我一直感到很难受。

6 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

7 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

8 gull   

n.鸥；受骗的人；v.欺诈

参考例句：

• The ivory gull often follows polar bears to feed on the remains of seal kills.象牙海鸥经常跟在北极熊的后面吃剩下的海豹尸体。
• You are not supposed to gull your friends.你不应该欺骗你的朋友。

9 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

10 gasp   

n.喘息，气喘；v.喘息；气吁吁他说

参考例句：

• She gave a gasp of surprise.她吃惊得大口喘气。
• The enemy are at their last gasp.敌人在做垂死的挣扎。

11 gasped   

v.喘气( gasp的过去式和过去分词 )；喘息；倒抽气；很想要

参考例句：

• She gasped at the wonderful view. 如此美景使她惊讶得屏住了呼吸。
• People gasped with admiration at the superb skill of the gymnasts. 体操运动员的高超技艺令人赞叹。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

12 thoroughly   

adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地

参考例句：

• The soil must be thoroughly turned over before planting.一定要先把土地深翻一遍再下种。
• The soldiers have been thoroughly instructed in the care of their weapons.士兵们都系统地接受过保护武器的训练。

13 steward   

n.乘务员，服务员；看管人；膳食管理员

参考例句：

• He's the steward of the club.他是这家俱乐部的管理员。
• He went around the world as a ship's steward.他当客船服务员，到过世界各地。

14 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

15 promenade   

n./v.散步

参考例句：

• People came out in smarter clothes to promenade along the front.人们穿上更加时髦漂亮的衣服，沿着海滨散步。
• We took a promenade along the canal after Sunday dinner.星期天晚饭后我们沿着运河散步。

16 mischief   

n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹

参考例句：

• Nobody took notice of the mischief of the matter. 没有人注意到这件事情所带来的危害。
• He seems to intend mischief.看来他想捣蛋。

17 tickling   

反馈，回授，自旋挠痒法

参考例句：

• Was It'spring tickling her senses? 是不是春意撩人呢？
• Its origin is in tickling and rough-and-tumble play, he says. 他说，笑的起源来自于挠痒痒以及杂乱无章的游戏。

18 amazement   

n.惊奇，惊讶

参考例句：

• All those around him looked at him with amazement.周围的人都对他投射出惊异的眼光。
• He looked at me in blank amazement.他带着迷茫惊诧的神情望着我。

19 extraordinarily   

adv.格外地；极端地

参考例句：

• She is an extraordinarily beautiful girl.她是个美丽非凡的姑娘。
• The sea was extraordinarily calm that morning.那天清晨，大海出奇地宁静。

20 engrossed   

adj.全神贯注的

参考例句：

• The student is engrossed in his book.这名学生正在专心致志地看书。
• No one had ever been quite so engrossed in an evening paper.没人会对一份晚报如此全神贯注。

21 amiable   

adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的

参考例句：

• She was a very kind and amiable old woman.她是个善良和气的老太太。
• We have a very amiable companionship.我们之间存在一种友好的关系。