The Boy, the Boat, and the Beast by Samantha M. Clark

Author:Samantha M. Clark
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books

FOUND

A BOAT. WHERE COULD HE find a boat?

The boy had walked over most of the island, and he hadn’t seen any boats. But there must be one somewhere. His dream had told him so. Hadn’t it?

The lighthouse keeper probably had a boat. Where would it be? Not in the lighthouse. The boy would have seen it.

He ran to the edge of the cliff. The water was calmer now, but there was no boat. He followed the coast south, the only part he hadn’t explored yet. A small crop of trees sat at the edge of the cliff, and behind them, the land curved back toward the Green Wall. But it wasn’t just a curve. The boy gazed out farther and could see that he was on one side of a gorge. It looked as though a giant had carved out a handful of earth from the edge of the island, and at the bottom was left a tiny gravel beach. Water crept up to it, then back, to and fro. On his hands and knees, the boy peered all around the gorge, but it didn’t store a boat.

Gritting his teeth, he trod back toward the lighthouse. Did the keeper hide his boat? Where?

Something red by the trunk of one of the trees caught the boy’s eye. He reached through the branches and pulled out a squashed Coke can. Crumpled next to it was an empty potato chip bag. Someone else had been here.

More trash was close to the lighthouse. A bottle of Sprite. A ripped Kit Kat packet. A ball of aluminum foil with what looked like green fur. Another chips bag: Nacho Cheese Doritos. He peered inside. Empty too.

The thought of food made his stomach grumble. But he’d eaten all his sea grapes. He wasn’t supposed to need them anymore. He was supposed to be with his family already. “Arrrrgghh!”

The boy unraveled an edge from the ball of foil. A tiny insect poked its head out and scurried onto the boy’s finger. He shook it violently. Eww.

“Stupid trash.” He threw the foil. It landed a few feet from the Green Wall and then rolled into the darkness.

Into the trees.

The boy narrowed his eyes, and a bud of a memory sprouted. Yes, he remembered! He’d read a book where someone built a raft . . . Robinson Crusoe! The boy smiled. If it worked for them, maybe it could work for him. He could make a raft out of logs and finally get off this island and go home and have all the food he wanted.

He strode up to the Green Wall—and fear poked him in the stomach. The last time he had seen the Wolf was in the forest. That was a while ago, but the beast had followed him from the beach. It might have followed him here, too.

The boy stepped back. The trees stretched into the sky above him.

“This is a bad idea.”

The bully might be right. He might be devoured by the beast. But a raft was his only chance.

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