by Duncan Ball
That afternoon, the ground shook again and again. Emily was very tired. She sat down and closed her eyes. But the moment she did, the ground shook with a terrible roar. A narrow crack opened up beside her and down below she could see something gleaming. She waited till the earth stopped shaking and looked down with her eyefinger.
‘Aunt Olympia!’ Emily exclaimed. ‘I think it’s her! Come quickly!’
Aunt Olympia looked up from the other side of the ruins.
‘What did you say, Emily?’
‘I think I’ve found the Sea Goddess!’
Emily took out her camera again and pointed it down at the statue. But before she could take a picture, Fussy grabbed the camera and darted away.
‘Fussy! This isn’t a game!’ Emily yelled. ‘Come back here!’
Emily chased Mr Fusspot around a boulder and, just then, the ground shook more violently than ever. A huge crack opened up and Fussy fell into it. Before Emily could grab him, the ground shook again and the crack slammed closed.
‘Fussy!’ Emily cried. ‘Where are you?!’
Aunt Olympia came running.
‘What happened?’ she cried. ‘Where’s Fussy?!’
‘He fell down a crack. He fell down into the ruins below!’
The ground shook again, this time knocking Emily and Aunt Olympia off their feet. And when they got up they were knocked down again. The earth was shaking all the time now.
‘We’ve got to get off the mountain!’ Aunt Olympia yelled. ‘It’s sinking again!’
‘But what about Fussy?’ Emily cried. ‘We can’t go without him!’
‘Emily! We have to! If we stay here we’ll be killed. Quick! Follow me!’
Emily and Aunt Olympia scrambled down the mountainside. Rocks rolled down around them as they ran, skidding and jumping, and jets of steam shot up high in the air. Towards the bottom of the mountain they just tumbled and slid till they landed in the water next to the plane.
‘We have to get away from the shore!’ Aunt Olympia said, as they climbed into the plane. ‘Quick before a rock hits us.’
They paddled as fast as they could. Rocks kept falling into the water, splashing noisily. As Aunt Olympia and Emily watched, the mountain got smaller and smaller, disappearing under the sea. Waves crashed against the plane. Emily hoped she’d see Fussy racing down the mountain.
But he didn’t appear.
‘We’ve got to get the plane into the air!’ Aunt Olympia yelled.
‘But what about Mr Fusspot?’ Emily said. ‘We can’t just leave him here.’
‘Have to,’ Aunt Olympia said. ‘Have no choice.’
Emily was crying now from all three eyes and she could see tears escaping from under Aunt Olympia’s flying goggles. Soon the two of them were in their seats and the engine was going. They watched as the last bit of the mountain sank beneath the sea.
Now a huge wave started moving out from where the mountain disappeared.
‘Hang on, Emily!’ Aunt Olympia yelled.
She turned up the engine and the plane raced over the water ahead of the giant wave. Just as the wave slammed against its tail, the tiny plane took to the air and the rest of the wave passed beneath them.
As they flew through the night Emily couldn’t sleep. She kept thinking about Fussy and the wonderful times she’d had with the mischievous monkey.
Finally they were safely home and Emily started unpacking the plane. It was then that she noticed something. She looked closely with her eyefinger into the back of the plane and there looking at her were two shiny eyes.
‘Fussy!’ she cried. ‘It’s you! We thought we’d lost you!’
The little monkey climbed out and looked around him.
‘Good old Mr Fusspot,’ Aunt Olympia said. ‘I knew you’d look after yourself.’
‘You’re safe now, Fussy,’ Emily said.
When Emily picked him up, she saw her camera hanging around his neck.
‘And you brought my camera back. You were very naughty to take it but I forgive you.’
Later, back at Aunt Olympia’s house, Aunt Olympia said that it had been the best and the worst trip of her life.
‘It was wonderful to see a whole city just appear like that,’ she said, ‘but I lost all the things I collected.’
‘At least we didn’t lose Fussy,’ Emily said, looking at the photos she’d taken. ‘And we have lots of pictures of the ruins. Hang on, what’s this? I didn’t take this last one. Fussy must have! Have a look!’
And there it was, a perfect photo of a beautiful sculpture — the statue of the Sea Goddess.
‘Fussy,’ Aunt Olympia said. ‘You’re such a clever boy.’
Emily looked up to the top of the bookcase and there was Mr Fusspot with his hands on his head smiling down at her.
Acknowledgements
Yet again the author would like to thank the talented team who not only make Emily Eyefinger possible but who keep her flying high in the charts: Craig Smith, Anne Reilly, Barbara Pepworth, Lisa Berryman, Shona Martyn, Yvonne Fillery, Graeme Jones, Barbara Mobbs, Jill Quin and a host of others slaving selflessly in the dank dungeons of HarperCollins Castle.
About the Author
Duncan Ball is the author of many popular children’s books including a series of books about Australia’s only talking dog, Selby. His books have won and been shortlisted for many prizes, most of them voted by children. In 2011, the Monkey Baa Theatre Company turned Emily Eyefinger into a play that was performed around Australia. The play will tour Australia again in 2013. He and his wife live in Sydney in a terrace house with their cat.
Duncan tells the following story: ‘Long ago in a second grade class at Coffs Harbour Primary School, a very clever teacher asked her class where they would like to have an extra eye. When they’d finished giving their answers, the teacher said, “Think of all you could do if you were born with an eye on the end of your finger. You could look behind you, and peek around corners, and there’s no end to the fun you could have.” The teacher’s name is now lost from memory but one of her second graders, Jill Quin, grew up and is now my wife. One day on a bushwalk she told me this story and that’s when Emily Eyefinger was born.’
By the Same Author
Emily Eyefinger
Emily Eyefinger, Secret Agent
Emily Eyefinger and the Lost Treasure
Emily Eyefinger and the Black Volcano
Emily Eyefinger’s Alien Adventure
Emily Eyefinger and the Devil Bones
Emily Eyefinger and the Balloon Bandits
Emily Eyefinger and the Ghost Ship
Emily Eyefinger and the Puzzle in the Jungle
Emily Eyefinger and the City in the Sky
Piggott Place • Piggotts in Peril
Selby’s Secret
Selby Speaks
Selby Screams
Selby Supersnoop
Selby Spacedog
Selby Snowbound
Selby Surfs
Selby Snaps!
Selby Splits
Selby’s Stardom
Selby Sorcerer
Selby Scrambled
Selby’s Shemozzle
Selby Shattered
Selby Santa
Selby Sprung
Selby’s Joke Book
Selby’s Selection
Selby’s Side-Splitting Joke Book
The Joke’s on Selby
The Case of the Graveyard Ghost and Other Mysteries
The Case of the Vampire’s Wire and Other Mysteries
My Sister has a Big Black Beard (poetry)
My Dog’s a Scaredy-cat (picture book)
Jeremy’s Tail (picture book)
For more information about Duncan’s books, see the website at:
www.duncanball.com.au
Copyright
Angus&Robertson
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, Australia
First published in Australia in 2012
This edition published in 2012
> by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia Pty Limited
ABN 36 009 913 517
harpercollins.com.au
Copyright © Duncan Ball 2012
Illustrations © Craig Smith 2012
The right of Duncan Ball and Craig Smith to be identified as the author/illustrator of this work has been asserted by them under the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.
This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
HarperCollinsPublishers
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National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication data:
Ball, Duncan
Emily Eyefinger and the secret from the sea /
Duncan Ball; illustrated by Craig Smith.
ISBN: 978 0 7322 9315 4 (pbk.)
ISBN: 978 0 7304 9719 6 (epub)
For primary school age.
Eye – Juvenile fiction.
Seas – Juvenile fiction.
Children’s stories, Australian.
Other Authors/Contributors: Smith, Craig, 1955-
A823.3
Cover design by Matt Stanton, HarperCollins Design Studio
Cover and internal illustrations by Craig Smith: www.craigsmithillustration.com
