get in there now before I start nibbling my fingers!â
We crashed into the theater and hunted down the owner. We pleaded with him to let us into his show.
âI am an expert juggler!â said Passepartout.
âAnd Mr. Wexler says Iâm a clown,â said Frankie.
I nodded. âItâs true. She gets that all the time.â
The man looked us over, then stared at me.
âYou. Can you sing?â
âPeople canât believe it when I sing,â I said.
âAnd you wonât, either,â mumbled Frankie.
âAh, but can you sing standing on your head?â
âSome people say thatâs my softest part!â I told him.
âCan you sing on your head with a plate spinning on your left foot and a sword balanced on your right?â
I gulped. âA sword?â
âA nine-bladed sword!â said the man.
Frankie pulled the circus owner aside. âAs long as someone tells him which is right and left, he can do it!â
The guy made a noise, then nodded his head. âAll right. Iâll hire you. Be ready in five minutes!â
Before I knew it, I was singing âThe Star-Spangled Bannerâ while spinning a plate and balancing an ugly sword. Frankie, wearing a bright orange wig, ran around me honking a wacky horn, while Passepartout leaped about, juggling three apples.
At the end of the song, a bunch of real acrobats came tumbling onto the stage and the three of us instantly became the bottom row of a giant human pyramid!
The crowd went wild as each new acrobat climbed to the top. And it got heavier and heavier for us.
âI canât do this!â I grunted to Frankie.
âIf we collapse, everybody falls!â said Passepartout.
âMyâbackâhurtsââ groaned Frankie.
It was exactly at this moment, with about a thousand pounds of professional Japanese acrobats on top of us, that the theater door opened and two people entered.
I squinted through the crowd at them.
I couldnât believe my eyes.
I screamed with delight. âMr. Fogg! Aouda! Itâs us!â
Moving my lips wasnât so bad.
It was when I nudged Frankie and Passepartout to show them that our friends were here, that I realized I shouldnât have moved my arms.
The moment I did, all those acrobats came crashing down in a huge, squealing heap, spilling out into the first five rows of the audience in a mess that they are probably still talking about.
I say probably , because we didnât wait around to see.
In an instant, we were flying out of that theater and racing with Aouda and Fogg through the crowd and up the plank of the steamship General Grant , which had just started chugging its way across the Pacific Ocean.
To San Francisco.
California.
The United States of America.
Chapter 15
After all the welcome hugs, we sorted out what had happened after Frankie flipped the pages and zapped me to Yokohama.
Just as the storm pushed the Tankadere into Shanghai harbor, Captain Bunsby spotted the steamship General Grant making its way toward Yokohama.
They signaled to the steamer, it stopped, and Fogg and Aoudaâand unfortunately Fixâgot on board.
The General Grant then steamed to Yokohama. There, Fogg and Aouda learned that Frankie and Passepartout had been on the Carnatic when it stopped there, and went searching for them. When Aouda spotted the circus, she remembered that Passepartout had been a juggler. She and Fogg went straight into the theater.
âThe rest is history,â I said.
âAnd now to the future,â said Mr. Fogg as we gathered at the shipâs railing and looked ahead. âIf we make it across the sea in twenty-two days,â he said, âreaching San Francisco by December third, exactly sixty-two days into our tour of the world, we shall have gained two days. Then, if all goes mathematically, we shall reach New York by December eleventh, and London by the twentieth, well in time to accomplish our
We crashed into the theater and hunted down the owner. We pleaded with him to let us into his show.
âI am an expert juggler!â said Passepartout.
âAnd Mr. Wexler says Iâm a clown,â said Frankie.
I nodded. âItâs true. She gets that all the time.â
The man looked us over, then stared at me.
âYou. Can you sing?â
âPeople canât believe it when I sing,â I said.
âAnd you wonât, either,â mumbled Frankie.
âAh, but can you sing standing on your head?â
âSome people say thatâs my softest part!â I told him.
âCan you sing on your head with a plate spinning on your left foot and a sword balanced on your right?â
I gulped. âA sword?â
âA nine-bladed sword!â said the man.
Frankie pulled the circus owner aside. âAs long as someone tells him which is right and left, he can do it!â
The guy made a noise, then nodded his head. âAll right. Iâll hire you. Be ready in five minutes!â
Before I knew it, I was singing âThe Star-Spangled Bannerâ while spinning a plate and balancing an ugly sword. Frankie, wearing a bright orange wig, ran around me honking a wacky horn, while Passepartout leaped about, juggling three apples.
At the end of the song, a bunch of real acrobats came tumbling onto the stage and the three of us instantly became the bottom row of a giant human pyramid!
The crowd went wild as each new acrobat climbed to the top. And it got heavier and heavier for us.
âI canât do this!â I grunted to Frankie.
âIf we collapse, everybody falls!â said Passepartout.
âMyâbackâhurtsââ groaned Frankie.
It was exactly at this moment, with about a thousand pounds of professional Japanese acrobats on top of us, that the theater door opened and two people entered.
I squinted through the crowd at them.
I couldnât believe my eyes.
I screamed with delight. âMr. Fogg! Aouda! Itâs us!â
Moving my lips wasnât so bad.
It was when I nudged Frankie and Passepartout to show them that our friends were here, that I realized I shouldnât have moved my arms.
The moment I did, all those acrobats came crashing down in a huge, squealing heap, spilling out into the first five rows of the audience in a mess that they are probably still talking about.
I say probably , because we didnât wait around to see.
In an instant, we were flying out of that theater and racing with Aouda and Fogg through the crowd and up the plank of the steamship General Grant , which had just started chugging its way across the Pacific Ocean.
To San Francisco.
California.
The United States of America.
Chapter 15
After all the welcome hugs, we sorted out what had happened after Frankie flipped the pages and zapped me to Yokohama.
Just as the storm pushed the Tankadere into Shanghai harbor, Captain Bunsby spotted the steamship General Grant making its way toward Yokohama.
They signaled to the steamer, it stopped, and Fogg and Aoudaâand unfortunately Fixâgot on board.
The General Grant then steamed to Yokohama. There, Fogg and Aouda learned that Frankie and Passepartout had been on the Carnatic when it stopped there, and went searching for them. When Aouda spotted the circus, she remembered that Passepartout had been a juggler. She and Fogg went straight into the theater.
âThe rest is history,â I said.
âAnd now to the future,â said Mr. Fogg as we gathered at the shipâs railing and looked ahead. âIf we make it across the sea in twenty-two days,â he said, âreaching San Francisco by December third, exactly sixty-two days into our tour of the world, we shall have gained two days. Then, if all goes mathematically, we shall reach New York by December eleventh, and London by the twentieth, well in time to accomplish our
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