One Arrow on the Map

The map was higher up than it ought to have been. Noor could point to the bridge, but she had to stand on tiptoe to reach the lock. Sami held down the bottom edge to stop the paper curling out.

‘Can't we take it down for a minute?’

Farah looked up from the counter. ‘It's on a board, love. Behind that is the wall. That's staying where it is.’

She opened a drawer and took out a sheet of paper. Half an advert for a writing course was printed upside down on the back.

‘Here. This side's still good.’

Noor got out her pencil case. She usually brought pencils to the library. Sometimes she read about something that only made sense once she had drawn it. She had once tried drawing an otter's den, with an underwater entrance. Afterwards she had wanted to move the entrance to her bedroom. That had gone down less well at home.

She cleared the table beside the map. Bente moved the bookends, and Sami found a ruler in a tray. There was glue on one end. He rubbed it with his thumb until a little grey ball came off.

Noor drew the water first. A broad line from left to right, just like the map on the wall. The library went on their side of the bridge, on the south bank. She drew a little square round the building.

‘It's got a roof too,’ Bente said.

‘This is from above.’

Bente nodded. With her finger she drew on the table to show where the front door was. Noor added a mark. That helped. Now she could see on her own piece of paper where she had come out yesterday.

Wim was talking to Farah by the window. His coat was still unfastened. The long boat hook lay on a chair beside him, its end tucked beneath the table where nobody could walk into it.

‘How far's the lock?’ Sami asked.

‘About six hundred and fifty metres from the bridge,’ Wim said. ‘Along the path. The lock's fenced off, but you can walk beside the water from here.’

Noor drew a line to the right, with two little blocks at the end. She wrote lock beside them. The letters just fitted above the blocks. The windmill went on the left. It was much smaller on the wall map than the one she drew.

‘That's west,’ Sami said, pointing to the mill. ‘West's on the left on the map at school too.’

‘If north's at the top,’ Noor said.

She put an N at the top of her sheet and drew a pointed arrow beneath it. Now nobody could use the map upside down by mistake.

Wim came over and put on his glasses. He ran his finger along the blue water.

‘The water usually flows this way. Towards the lock.’

‘So the boat does too,’ Noor said.

‘It might.’

Noor drew a thick arrow in the river, pointing right. She went over the lines again to make it darker than the other marks. Underneath she was going to write boat.

‘Shouldn't that say water?’ Bente asked.

Noor looked at her pencil tip. ‘Yes. It could.’

She wrote water. She could add boat once they found it. At least the lock was in the right place. Whatever had seemed to be moving left yesterday could have gone round a bend further on. You couldn't see everything from the bridge.

Sami tapped the library square. ‘Mark where we're starting too. Or we'll end up at the football pitch.’

‘That isn't even on here.’

‘Exactly.’

He drew a small cross by the bridge. Noor left it, though its lines were not the same length.

Wim asked Farah where he could find an empty bin bag. If they were walking by the water, he could pick up the rubbish he had seen beside the path yesterday. Sami went to help find one. Bente stayed next to Noor.

She rubbed the blue mark on her sleeve with her thumb. The paint had dried. None of it came off now.

‘That string,’ she said quietly.

Noor looked up.

‘I put it round the post. I thought it was fastened.’ Bente looked across the table. ‘Then suddenly it was loose.’

‘The knot?’

‘I don't know. I hadn't tried pulling it to check. Grandad had to get the hook. And then the boat was gone.’

Noor moved her map further from the edge of the table. It was hard to think of anything useful to say. She wanted to promise they would find it, but she did not know that yet. She pointed at the white notice in the window.

‘At least lots of people know about it now.’

‘I don't want everyone feeling sorry for me.’

‘Who?’

‘Tomorrow. Saying what a shame it is, then going to look at the photographs. I want to show them the boat. I did the windows with a really tiny brush.’

Noor nodded. Bente had made the passengers too, the ones that could not even balance on a finger. People ought to talk about those.

‘If we find it, you can tell them.’

‘What if we don't?’

Noor pressed her rubber against the paper. It left a pale grey mark.

‘We can think of something else.’

Bente picked up the box of pencils Farah had left out. There were two red ones. Without explaining why, she put one beside Noor's map. Noor left it there. Perhaps they could use it to mark a route later.

Sami came back with a folded bin bag and an apple he had fetched from his pannier. He gave Wim the bin bag and put the apple in with the books.

‘Does everyone know where we're going?’ Wim asked.

Noor held up her sheet. She could point to the bridge without having to work it out first. The path followed their side of the water to the lock. They would look there first, then come back along the same path.

‘And we'll be back here before lunch,’ Wim said, checking the clock. ‘We've got time for a proper look.’

Noor folded the map in half, exactly between the mill and the bridge. The receipt stayed in her coat pocket. At least the things on the map had names beside them.

Outside, Sami pulled the book bag from beneath the elastic straps and slung it on his back. He was taking it because none of the lockers were free. Bente carried the empty crate with the towel. When Noor offered to swap, she drew it closer.

‘I've got it.’

Wim picked up the boat hook and waited at the start of the path. Noor stood beside Bente, holding the map with her thumb on the thick arrow.