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The Wrong Boat

They climbed onto the dock and reported their success to their jubilant friends, everyone crowding round, ensuring they had makeshift weapons to hand – gathering on a whaling dock had supplied some interesting flensing knives and almost medieval tools of mayhem! Tepic asked if Miss Bookworm of the Militia had been sent for, as it was important to hand the miscreants over for proper trial before they were hung!
“aaaah no!” exclaimed Myrtil, then, looking along the path saw a familiar figure approaching, “Miss Book! Over here!”

They quickly explained that the boat had been found, the one with the men doing the bombing around the City. Miss Henrichs straightened up, frowning as she squinted towards the setting sun and the outline of the boat, then started as Jimmy proudly told her it was the one about to explode.
“We put a bomb under it, gonna blow any time, an then they’ll swim fer safety an we got em!” Tepic explained.
“A what?!” she blurted out, aghast.
Cody smiled up at her and said “A bomb!”
“It’s just a little one Miss.” Jimmy expanded, picking up the idea that maybe Miss Henrichs was a little unsure about their course of action, “shouldn’t hurt stonework at awl…”
“Yep, it were easy, some of Mr Footman’s chemicals he left behind, an a water fuse, should go anytime now..” Tepic added, and all the urchins leant forward in anticipation.

At that moment there was a terrific boom, a flash of light, bits of boat flying through the air, along with barrels, crates and assorted rubbish, to cries of delight from the throng.
“OH!” yelled Myrtil, “IT EXPLODED!”
As the others celebrated, Tepic stood still, mouth open, gaping.
“errrrrrrr……” he said.
“All right!!!!” Cody exclaimed, punching the air, while Jimmy slapped Tepic on the back, saying “Cor, thet wos a good one, Tep!”
“errrrrrr…….” replied the fox boy, backing away from the dock.
Mrtil suddenly realised something was not quite right, and looked at her friend, then asked “That was the RIGHT boat, wasn’t it??”
As silence fell on them, little zaida pointed to the now garbage covered vessel floating beside the wreckage and said “i thought it was dat boat.”

By the time the explanations had been given, the mix up of having two paddle wheeled boats next to each other, the murkiness underwater, abd the rush to catch the villains, the other boat had slipped anchor and vanished into the gathering gloom. Miss Henrichs had put paid to the idea of finding another bomb to try again, and had made them promise to go to the Militia first when the boat was next spotted. The urchins all looked rather sheepish, having blown up the City’s Garbage Scow, but were secretly pleased with having scared the bombers off. It had been a good explosion, even if the wrong boat got sunk, and at least the garbage men had already gone home for the night, so no one had been hurt. They were sent on their way, with strict instructions to stay out of trouble. Tepic was worried Mr Tenk would find out what he had done, and though Miss Henrichs assured him she might just forget it was him, he knew, in the depths of his soul, that there would be a reckoning sometime in the future…..

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