In the Bermuda Triangle
Pepper spent the next few hours below deck, clinging to the frame of
her bunk bed as tightly as she could. Maybe now would be a good
time to call her mother and confess that she had been the one
responsible for the explosion in their cellar because her test tube
stand had fallen over. Or maybe she should tell her father that the
reason all the saw blades in the shed were dull was that she wanted
to build a soapbox cart for the race that fall. But when Pepper
glanced at her phone, she noticed that it had stopped working.
“Peculiar,” thought Pepper, as it suddenly occurred to her that the
deep drone from the engine room had also stopped. All she could
hear was the sea outside and the various members of the expedition
party calling out every now and then. She pressed the light switch
but her cabin remained in darkness.
Struggling to remain upright, Pepper
made her way down the swaying
corridor to Mr. Eisenbart’s cabin. If
anyone understood what was going
on here, it was Mr. Eisenbart, the old
deep-sea researcher! He was sitting
at a folding table with a marine
chart spread out in front of him as
Pepper entered the cabin.
“Hello Pepper,” he said. “I hope our
little adventure isn’t upsetting
you. Countless sailors have recounted
strange stories about the Bermuda Triangle, stories about
machines and devices that have stopped working, bubbles of gas
that have risen up from the bottom of the ocean, or impenetrable
fog descending and causing sailors to lose their way …”
15
