Behind them, several dozen dolls had broken loose from the scene and were marching toward the water. Toward the boat.

The kids paddled, but the boat didn’t move any faster. It was locked onto a track and moved mechanically.

Behind them, the loose dolls banged into each other and tumbled over, but then stood up again. More and more of them leaned and wiggled and stretched and broke free from the various platforms. They marched down through the panoramas, throwing their legs forward like little soldiers, and fell over face-first into the water like lemmings.

The boat dragged slowly forward. The kids could not steer it right or left, nor move it any faster. More wide-eyed dolls fell off the platforms and plunged into the shining water. Miraculously, their arms began to stroke freestyle, and their feet to flutter kick. They were swimming.

“They’re coming right at us!” Willa shouted.

Finn heard little thuds as the first dolls arrived and banged into the hull of the boat.

“This isn’t happening,” Maybeck said, trying to sound calm.

“Shut—up!” said Charlene. “Do something!”

There were more of the dolls now—maybe fifty or more, all swimming toward the boat, their national costumes reduced to wet rags. They converged on the boat, stacking one atop the next, higher and higher in a floating pile. One doll flopped over the rail and into the boat. Then another, and another.

The boat passed into the Asia scene. None of the kids was looking for clues now.

The dolls’ little singing mouths opened and shut, snapping viciously. A few more tumbled over and into the boat. They were climbing! As they landed, they rolled, crawled, and then pulled themselves up to standing.

One bit down onto Finn’s arm, locking its jaw. It drew blood. Finn knocked it off and back into the water.

Two other dolls attacked Philby. Maybeck pushed them off as if they were live lobsters, then picked one up and threw it. It struck the walland smashed into pieces.

The other kids cheered.

Charlene and Willa knocked the dolls off the edge of the boat before they could climb in. Finn tore a biting doll off Philby’s leg.

Maybe a hundred dolls were now swimming toward them. They were definitely losing the battle.

Finn glanced ahead through the next arch to the Americas scene. There he saw dozens of dolls, lined up and waiting for the boat.

Maybeck shouted, “We’re losing the war, in case anyone’s keeping track!” His leg was bleeding from a bite. Willa smacked a doll back into the water. It rose to the surface, turned, and swam again for the boat.

Legions of dolls closed in from all sides.

That chorus of singing screamed in Finn’s ears: “It’s a small world after all. It’s a small world after all. …”

Finn felt like he was being driven half-crazy by the sound.

“There’s a way out of this! We’re missing something,” he cried. “Think! Everyone think!”

“An automatic weapon?” Maybeck suggested.

“A baseball bat,” Willa said, grabbing several more dolls and tossing them over the side.

“Form a circle!” Finn ordered. “Back to back!”

Without argument the kids turned back to back, like the five points of a star.

“We must have whatever it is we need to beat them,” Finn said.

“Why?” asked the cynical Maybeck.

“Because good conquers evil,” Charlene announced. “This is the Magic Kingdom! Finn’s right.”

“We’re missing something,” Finn said.

“An outboard motor?” Maybeck quipped. “A stick of dynamite?”

Finn looked up. They were into the Americas scene now, and there on the wallwas the huge Mayan sun.

Finn caught himself humming along with the theme song.

Willa heard Finn humming. She joined in with the lyrics.

The dolls kept advancing. Every kid bore a bruise or an open wound. They swept the dolls off the edge of the boat, but it was clearly a losing battle. Dolls jumped for the boat and held on to its sides.

Maybeck banged their little hands with his fists.

Charlene joined in singing:

“There is just one moon and one golden sun—”

Sun! Finn thought. What were they missing?

“And a smile means friendship to ev’ryone—”

Smile! The sun had brought them here. The sun is often shown with a smile on its face.

Friendship, Finn thought.

“It’s all about friendship!” Finn declared. “The lyrics! Our ability to spread friendship like the rays of the sun!”

“You’re out of your mind!” Maybeck roared, smashing an encroaching doll.

“A smile means friendship to everyone!” Willa cried. She considered this a moment while still battling the dolls. “We have to smile at them!”

Finn hollered, “Try it!”

Maybeck complained, “You have got to be kidding!”

“Smile!” Willa and Finn hollered simultaneously.

And with that, all but Maybeck broke into massive fake smiles. They looked like jack-o-lanterns.

Finn watched as the effect of those smiles registered in the frozen glass eyes of the dolls.

The expressions on the small faces changed from blood lust to surprise, then curiosity, and then outright affection.

The effect quickly spread through the faces of other dolls. Some stopped swimming. Others turned around.

“Keep smiling!” Finn said, through clenched teeth, his fake smile never faltering.

As the swimming dolls encountered the smiles, they fell back over the side of the boat, back into the water.

Finn and the others began clearing dolls out of the bottom of the boat. Inside the vast room, the song continued, over and over, over and over. Within a few minutes, the boat was cleared.

Dozens of dolls floated, lying still in the water.

It’s a Small World was going to be closed for “restoration” for quite some time.

The boat passed the giant sun at the end of the Americas scene.

Finn studied it carefully. He saw nothing that even remotely resembled a clue.

17

Saturday midmorning found the sky without a cloud. A hot sun burned a yelow hole in the rich blue background, promising thunderstorms by late afternoon. The corner parking lot of Dangerous Dan’s Used Cars was marked by little red and yellow plastic flags on a string that ran from light pole to light pole, giving the school car wash the feel of a circus. A four-foot-long mock blimp and a big bunch of colorful balloons hovered fifty feet above the asphalt in an effort to draw attention.

That was also the job of the girls at the stoplight, who wore jean shorts over their bathing suits and held a sign proclaiming: GIRL SCOUT CAR WASH—$5.

Dan’s older-model Hyundais, Fords, and Buicks had been parked to the side, leaving a large area now covered with hoses, buckets, and lots of white foam, as skinny girls struggled to scrub, polish, and shine the cars that lined up for the five-dollar wash. Most of the time the process included a water fight, or a bucket brigade, the general chaos kept under control enough to be fun for all, even onlookers like Finn.

There was already a rumor going around that It’s a Small World had been vandalized the night before and would be closed for months. Police were investigating.

Finn stood away from all the water with his friend Dillard, who had taken the occasion to borrow one of his father’s Hawaiian shirts. Finn thought he looked pretty cool.

Finn spotted Jez as she left the collection table, where she’d been taking in the money. She kicked off her pair of shorts to reveal a dark purple one-piece Speedo and jumped into the middle of a water fight. Suds flew. The girls giggled and screamed. They hosed down a Volvo and sponged it clean. Now wet, with her hair slicked back, Jez looked over at Finn. She’d known he was there all along.