Peter and the Starcatchers (34 page)

“Ammm happy see Mol y,” he said.

With the formalities concluded, Mol y took a breath and frowned in concentration, not wanting to make any mistakes as she got to the critical question:

“Mol y father come?”

Ammm paused for several moments, during which Mol y did not breathe. Then Ammm said, “Yes. Mol y father come.” Mol y exhaled, and, in English, said, “Thank heaven.”

“What?” said Peter.

“He says my father is coming,” said Mol y.

“When?” said Peter.

“I don’t know,” said Mol y. Switching back to Porpoise, she said, “When Mol y father come?”

“Day,” said Ammm.

Mol y frowned. “What day?”

Ammm hesitated, as if confused by the question, then repeated: “Day.”

“Day,” said Mol y.

“Day,” said Ammm.

“What’s he saying?” said Peter.

“I’m not actual y sure,” said Mol y. “I think he’s saying ’day,’ but my Porpoise is not very good, and the Porpoise language is vague about time. If he
is
saying day, he could mean my father is coming tomorrow, but I think he also could be saying it wil be more days.”

“I hope he means tomorrow,” said Peter.

“Yes,” said Mol y, “but even that might be too late, if the pirates have the trunk. We must…”

She was interrupted by more chittering from Ammm. Mol y listened, struggling to fol ow the sounds. The only part she caught was “bad man.”

“Again, please,” she said.

Ammm spoke again, more deliberately. This time Mol y caught “bad man” again, and “light.”

Mol y pondered that. Light.
What could he mean by…

“Oh, no,” she said.

“What?” said Peter.

“I think he’s saying the pirates have the trunk,” said Mol y.

“Does he know where they are?” said Peter.

“Where bad man?” Mol y asked Ammm. “Where light?”

“Mol y come,” said Ammm. He darted a few yards to the left, toward the rocky, wave-lashed point at the left end of the cove, then repeated: “Mol y come.”

“He wants us to fol ow,” said Mol y. To Ammm, she said, “Mol y come.”

Ammm whirled and plunged into the water, surfacing just moments later twenty-five yards farther along the beach toward the point of land, chittering “Come!” Peter and James trotted diagonal y back to the beach, then on a paral el course with the porpoise, who kept popping up to make sure they were with him. Alf and the other boys, thoroughly mystified, trotted along behind.

“What’re we doin’, lad?” panted Alf.

“Fol owing the porpoise,” said Peter.

“But
why
?” shouted Tubby Ted, bringing up the rear.

“It’s a talking porpoise!” shouted James. “It’s taking us to the treasure!”

“It’s what?” said Alf and Tubby Ted, at the same time.

“He’s right,” said Peter, over his shoulder.

“But
who
has the treasure? It’s them pirates, is that it, lad?” Alf questioned.

“Yes, we think so,” Peter admitted. “And we…I mean, Mol y, has to get the trunk back from them.”

“Wel , then! Why didn’t ya says so? I wouldn’t miss it!” said Alf.

“Same!” said James.

Thomas and Prentiss said nothing, but—not wanting to be left alone on this increasingly strange island—trotted along with the group, as did the panting, incessantly complaining Tubby Ted.

They trotted for a hundred yards, at which point the beach curved sharply to the right, along a steeply rising lava slope. At the end lay the point, where huge ocean rol ers—

having traveled, unhampered, across thousands of miles of open ocean—slammed, thunderingly, into massive lava formations, sending spray high into the air. Ammm continued to fol ow the coast, heading out toward the end of the point.

On shore, the little band of humans fol owed, but as the hard-packed beach sand gave way to sharp, treacherously hole-ridden lava, the footing instantly became near-impossible, and the going very slow. Peter stopped for a moment, and studied the slope.

“Look,” he said to Mol y. “Ammm has to swim ’round that point. He can’t use the land. But we can. It would be a lot quicker for us to just climb this hil and meet him at the water on the other side.”

Mol y considered the hil , then shook her head.

“We don’t know what’s on the other side of this hil . It might be another cove, but it might also be more island. We could be back in the jungle, and lost. Besides, Ammm may be leading us to the end of this point.”

“But we can’t keep up with him, not on these rocks,” said Peter. He gestured toward the others, who were picking their way over the dark lava rock by rock, with agonizing slowness. Ammm was far ahead now, an intermittent speck of light gray in the dark roiling water.

“I’ve got to try to stay with him,” said Mol y. “I don’t dare lose him.”

“Al right, then,” said Peter. “I’l climb this hil , and see what I see. Water or land, either way I’l come back and tel you.” Mol y looked doubtful.

“You’l come right back?” she said.

“I’l find you,” he said.

Their eyes met for a moment.

“Al right,” she said.

And with that, Peter was gone, clambering up the steep, rocky hil side, leaving the others to struggle along in pursuit of Ammm, wherever he was leading them.

TOO BIG FOR A BIRD

B
ARELY RIPPLING THE SURFACE, the trunk glided toward the waterfal at the mouth of the lagoon. The brackish water grew clear, so that from above, long, powerful green tails could be seen propel ing the trunk as the mermaids triumphantly bore their prize back to their lair.

Feeling safe now, they raised their heads from the water. The one in the lead—the others cal ed her, in their strange, throaty language,
Teacher
—turned and smiled at her school. Her long, thick hair was blond. Her teeth, white and even, were human now, exposure to the trunk having completed her transformation from fish to mermaid. The other mermaids smiled back at her. Human teeth, al .

So elated were they by their triumph, so absorbed with their prize—their
creator
—that only one of them, a young mermaid in the back of the school, happened to see the thing that flew across the face of the moon, too quick for a cloud, too big for a bird. She grunted an alarm and slapped her tail twice on the water surface.

The other mermaids responded instantly, diving in fright. Al but Teacher, who would not leave the
creator.
She wrapped her arms around the trunk defiantly, and looked up at the blackened silhouette swooping toward her.

She recognized it at once, and snarled.

“Lean forward!” shouted Slank from the bow of the flying longboat. He was stil getting the feel of it, his ability to steer shaky and imprecise. In the bright moonlight he could clearly see his target below, as wel as the blond-haired she-fish hissing up at him. At the stern, Little Richard, gripping both sides in terror, shifted his weight slightly forward as the longboat dove.

Slank leaned to port, lining up the bow with his target. “Steady…Steady…” The boat hurtled downward. The mermaid did not move.

She’s
brave, I’ll give her that….

As the boat was about to hit the water, Slank leaned back. The bow lifted slightly, avoiding a direct col ision with the trunk, but striking the defiant mermaid. Slank felt the thud in his feet.

That’s one less to worry about.
The longboat splashed down into the lagoon, its sharp bow sending up waves on each side. Slank and Little Richard tumbled to the bottom of the boat, which rocked violently for a moment, but did not capsize.

“The trunk!” Slank shouted, struggling to his feet.

“There!” said Little Richard, pointing.

The trunk bobbed in the water astern. Slank thought about diving in after it, but quickly changed his mind.

She-fish.

There were a dozen or more of them, between the boat and the trunk, diving and surfacing frantical y, apparently searching for something. It took Slank a moment, but then he understood:
They’re looking for the one I hit.

Whirling, Slank lunged to the bow and looked into the water.

There she is.

Her body was wedged under the prow, floating motionless. Slank grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into the boat. Her face was covered with blood. She was breathing, but barely.

Suddenly there was a wail from the water, and then more. The mermaids had caught sight of their wounded sister, and were surrounding the boat, snarling.

“Throw her back!” shouted Little Richard. “They’l capsize us again!”

“No!” shouted Slank, drawing his knife. “She’s our barter!” He grabbed the unconscious mermaid and hauled her upright, holding the knife at her neck. The mermaids wailed and keened in horror.

“LISTEN!” shouted Slank. “I give her to you”—he made a gesture of throwing her over the side—“and you give me that”—he pointed at the trunk. “You understand?” The mermaids showed no sign of comprehending. Instead, responding to some signal neither man heard or saw, the mermaids flashed their tails and disappeared, leaving only ripples.

Five seconds passed. Ten.

“I don’t like this,” said Little Richard.

“Get your whip,” said Slank, dropping the unconscious mermaid at the bow.

Little Richard uncoiled the bul whip he kept wrapped around his waist.

“Here they come,” he said.

The two men crouched, watching the water. Suddenly, the dark shifting shapes shot up at them through the moonlit water.

“Here they come!” Slank said.

In a flash of tails, the mermaids slammed the boat, rocking it violently. Slank stabbed blindly down into the water. Little Richard’s whip cracked once, twice, but he, too, was having trouble drawing a bead on the swiftly moving creatures. The boat rocked again; again Slank stabbed at the water, this time driving several of the creatures back.

But only for a moment. The mermaids came at them again, then again. Slank and Little Richard lunged frantical y back and forth in the boat, grunting, shouting, trying to keep them at bay, trying to keep the wildly gyrating boat from going over. From time to time the knife cut, or the whip connected, each time drawing a scream. The water around the longboat grew cloudy with blood. But the mermaids kept coming, coming, frothing the water around the unsteady longboat.

“THERE!” Slank shouted, pointing, as the mermaids, working together, massed for an attack at the stern, their goal being to pul the transom underwater with their weight. A lash from Little Richard’s whip drove them off, sent the bow splashing down, and caused Slank to fal . Rising, he looked behind him to see that the wounded mermaid was…

Gone.

She had either slipped or fal en back into the water. The other mermaids, stil battling Little Richard at the stern, apparently had not noticed. Slank searched the blood-clouded water around the bow but saw no sign of her.

Meanwhile, as Slank peered into the water at the bow, and Little Richard battled the mermaids at the stern, the trunk, momentarily forgotten by al of them, drifted farther and farther from the longboat, into the night.