The Compass That Lied

On Monday morning, the class library received a letter with no stamp. It said: For the person who returns this letter, there is a treasure under the old banyan tree. Walk twenty steps toward the sunrise. So Aarav walked twenty steps toward the sunrise. He found the dustbin. The dustbin was not pleased. It had no treasure. Only one banana peel and a note that said: Nice try. The letter had lied. At the bottom, in very small writing, was one more clue: Do not trust the bright sky. Trust the quiet arrow that knows its way even when nobody tells it. That was not much help. The sky moves. The classroom has four corners. And the school watchman, asked for directions, said, “Go straight until you see the dog.” There are three dogs. Then Meera noticed something odd. A thin silver traveller, after being rubbed the right way, could float on a little raft and turn all by itself. Turn. Turn. Stop. No matter where the raft began, its point kept choosing the same far-away direction. The back of the letter had a cardboard maze too: turn only when the traveller points the right way. The wrong turns led to a drawing of the dustbin. Again. To find the real hiding place, the team needs that quiet arrow. Without it, the maze is just a very bossy piece of cardboard. Today, your team is going to build one.