by Lewis, Gill
‘FELIX!’ I scream.
He leans back in his seat and looks up at me. He gives the thumbs up, and grins. And this time it’s a wave of shouts and cheers that explodes all along the harbour walls.
CHAPTER 38
I open my eyes. Through the window, the sky is bright, bright blue. A slight breeze lifts the checked curtain edge bringing in the salt smell of the sea.
‘You’ve been asleep for ages, Kara.’
I turn my head. Daisy is sitting legs crossed on her bed, watching me. My neck is stiff and my body feels heavy. The memories of the day before wash over me.
‘What time is it?’ I say.
‘It’s four o’clock,’ she says. ‘You’ve missed breakfast and lunch and you’ve almost missed tea.’
I push myself up on my elbows. ‘It’s that late already?’
Daisy nods her head. But her eyes are shining bright and she’s grinning from ear to ear. She climbs down from her bed and takes my arm. ‘You’ve got to come with me, Kara,’ she says. ‘You’ve got to come and see.’
I swing my legs over the side of the camp bed. My whole body aches and my mouth feels dry and sore. I pull a T-shirt on and jeans.
‘Come on, there’s someone who wants to see you,’ says Daisy. ‘She arrived late last night.’
‘Who?’ I say.
‘Surprise,’ says Daisy. She’s at the door, impatient for me to follow. ‘She’s been waiting for you all day.’
‘I’m coming,’ I say. I stand up and the room spins around me. My head’s so thick and heavy, I can hardly think.
Daisy takes my arm again and leads me into her mum and dad’s bedroom. Uncle Tom is sitting on the side of the bed, and Aunt Bev is propped up on cushions, her back against the headboard.
Daisy squeezes my hand and grins. ‘I’ve got a sister.’
And then I see the baby wrapped up in Aunt Bev’s arms. She’s so small. Eyes closed, lips pouting. Aunt Bev’s face is soft and dreamlike. Her hair is loose and tumbles round her shoulders. Her hand is cupped around the baby’s head.
Mum must have held me like this once.
‘She’s beautiful,’ I say.
Aunt Bev looks up. ‘Kara,’ she says, and pats the duvet.
I sit down beside her and just stare at the small baby wrapped in pink.
‘Daisy told us what you did yesterday,’ says Aunt Bev.
I wait for the telling off. I know I shouldn’t have left Daisy alone to find Dad.
‘You were very brave,’ Aunt Bev says. I see tears well in her eyes. ‘But, Kara, you could have died.’
I reach out to touch the tiny hand that’s curled around the blanket edge.
‘You are your mother’s child,’ says Uncle Tom. ‘It’s what she would have done.’
I look at them and see something between sorrow and pity in their eyes. The baby’s hand grasps my finger and she squeezes it in her sleep.
‘What’s she called?’ I ask.
Daisy sits down next to me and takes my other hand. She smiles one of her biggest smiles at me. ‘I chose it,’ she says. ‘We’ve called her Mo, short for Moana. But she’ll be just Mo to us.’
I feel my eyes burn hot with tears. ‘Hello, Mo,’ I say.
I didn’t hear Dad come into the room, but when I look up I see him standing in the doorway.
‘Come on,’ he says. ‘Let’s give them some time alone. Uncle Tom’s going out to sea next week. Dougie Evans gave him back his old job and a pay rise too.’
I look at Uncle Tom, but he’s only got eyes for Daisy and Mo.
Dad slips his arm through mine and I walk with him down the stairs and out into the sunshine. The storm has cleared the air. The colours are brighter, sharper. A car door slams and Dougie Evans walks up the path, his face hidden behind a huge bunch of flowers. He stops when he sees Dad and me.
‘I brought these,’ he says. ‘For Bev and the baby.’
‘Go on up,’ says Dad.
But Dougie Evans doesn’t move. He scrunches the cellophane of the bouquet in his hand.
‘How’s Jake?’ Dad says.
Dougie Evans stares at the floor. ‘He’ll be just fine,’ he says. ‘A few stitches on his face, that’s all. Might remind him how stupid he was to go out to sea like that.’
I try to edge round him, but he’s not finished.
He turns to me. ‘If it weren’t for you, my boy would be dead.’
I look at Dad and then at Dougie. ‘It wasn’t just me,’ I mumble.
Dougie scrunches his face into a frown. ‘Jake said a funny thing too. He said the white dolphin saved him. He said it lifted him up, out of the water.’
I watch Dougie Evans wrestle with his thoughts. He twists his hands round and round the stems of the bouquet of flowers. His face is pulled into a tight knot. Pieces of flower stem fall to the floor, but Dougie doesn’t seem to notice.
‘The truth was staring me in the face all the time,’ he says. ‘I just chose not to see it.’
Dad puts his hand on Dougie’s shoulder. ‘It’s all right, Doug,’ he says.
But Dougie wants to get this off his chest. ‘It made me think, it did, that and what Miss Penluna said. If we go on ripping up the sea bed, hauling out all the fish, there’ll be nothing left worth saving. There’ll be nothing left for Jake.’ He clutches the flowers to his chest. ‘I want you to know, I’ve signed the petition to stop the dredging. Not just that, but I’ve signed up to test out new ways of fishing to stop dolphins drowning in our nets too.’
I glance at Dad. I can’t believe Dougie Evans has changed his mind.
Dad smiles. ‘Good on you, Dougie.’
We turn to walk away, but Dougie calls Dad back and puts out his hand.
‘There’s a job on one of my trawlers, Jim,’ he says. ‘It’s yours if you want it.’
Dad takes Dougie’s hand and shakes it. ‘Thanks,’ he says. ‘But I’ve got a job lined up already.’
I follow Dad down the path and out onto the coast road along the seafront.
‘I don’t want to move from here,’ I say.
Dad smiles and puts his arm around me. ‘We don’t have to,’ he says. ‘I didn’t find out until yesterday. I didn’t want to disappoint you if I didn’t get it.’
I stop and pull him round to face me. ‘Get what?’ I say.
Dad grins like I’ve not seen him grin for a long, long time. ‘I’ve been accepted on a boat-building course at the boatyard,’ he says. ‘I’ve been assessed and I’ll even have help with my dyslexia. It starts next month.’
I wrap my arms around and hug him tight. ‘That’s brilliant, Dad,’ I say.
Dad ruffles my hair. ‘I know. I think so too.’
We walk along the road to the far end of the beach and take the path that curls up the hill. I look out to sea, hoping to see a white dorsal fin. I can’t get Angel from my mind. She haunts my thoughts now, not my dreams. She’s alone out there, without her mother, and I don’t know how she will survive all on her own.
‘This way,’ says Dad.
I follow him along the sandy coast path that runs along the bottom of the campsite fields. ‘Where are we going?’
‘Can’t tell you,’ he smiles. ‘It’s a surprise.’
We pass one field of tents to another field of static caravans. The field slopes down to the dunes that back the beach. Beyond the dunes, the sea is calm and silvery blue. It’s hard to believe it was a mass of churning green and white last night.
‘There,’ says Dad.
The end caravan faces the sea. Bunting hangs across from the caravan to a line of gorse hedge and dry stone wall. A table is laid with plates and glasses, and a bright pink dolphin windsock is twirling in the breeze. I see shadows in the windows of the caravan.
The door bursts open and Felix tumbles out followed by his mum and dad and Miss Penluna. Carl and Greg and Sam the vet are here, and Chloe and Ella too.
Dad wraps his arms around me and pulls me close. ‘Welcome home, Kara,’ he says.
‘It’s not much, I know, but it’s a home for us, for now.’
The windows of the caravan face the sea. I’ll see and hear the ocean every day. ‘It’s perfect, Dad,’ I say, and hug him tight, ‘the best.’
Felix pokes me in the ribs. ‘What kept you?’
I grin. ‘Where’s your medal?’
Felix frowns. ‘Medal?’
‘You won the regatta race remember?’
Felix laughs. ‘Yeah, that’s right. First the regatta race, next the Olympics.’
‘Come on,’ says Felix’s dad, ‘you must all be starving and we’ve enough food in the caravan to feed an army.’
I smile and look back out across the fields along the stretch of headland. The sunlight slants, golden yellow. It’s the first day of September and the chill of autumn is in the air. I want a moment by myself, just me, before I join them.
‘Come on,’ calls Chloe.
‘I won’t be long,’ I say.
I leave them sitting in the sunshine and take the path through the dunes. My toes dig into the cool soft sand. The sea is turquoise, woven through with strands of silver. I climb up on the highest dune and sit sheltered by the dune grass, and stare out to sea.
‘Kara?’
I turn. I hadn’t heard Dad follow me. A stream of sand trickles down the dune as he sits beside me. I draw my knees up and fold my arms around them.
‘We mustn’t be too long,’ he says. ‘They’ve been waiting for you for ages, especially Felix.’
I look back at the small white caravan strung with bunting, and the people round the table. I see Felix stretched out on the lounger in the sun. ‘We’ve got some good friends, haven’t we?’
Dad nods. ‘If Mum were here, she’d be so proud of you,’ he says. He scoops up a handful of sand and lets it run through his fingers. ‘You did what she couldn’t do. You made Dougie Evans change his mind.’
‘Dougie Evans was right about one thing,’ I say.
Dad turns to me, his eyes crinkled in a smile. ‘I never thought I’d ever hear you say that.’
I frown and fix my eyes on the horizon. ‘Sometimes the truth does stare us in the face, but we just choose not to look.’
Dad sighs and wraps his arm around me. He holds me tight.
I pick a piece of dune grass and twist it in my fingers. ‘I used to think maybe Mum was too important for us. Maybe she had been chosen for special missions. I thought one day I’d find her in the Amazon jungle saving river dolphins or other animals. I even thought maybe she was an alien from another world sent to save our planet.’ My eyes blur with tears despite my smile. ‘But I know that’s not true now.’
I feel Dad’s arm pull me closer still.
A deep ache knots inside my chest. ‘We may never know what really happened the night she disappeared,’ I say. I press my fingers into the sand. ‘But I know Mum died that night.’
I sink my head onto my knees. It feels as if everything I’ve kept inside is draining out of me, through my fingertips into the cool, cool sand below. ‘If she had lived she would have found a way back. She’d be here with us now. She’d be here, because above everything else, she loved us, didn’t she?’
I look up at Dad and see his face is wet with tears. I lean into him and stare out to sea. The ocean is flat and calm. Turquoise blue. Small waves crest and run along the shoreline.
‘We’ll build a new boat, Kara,’ he says. He wipes the tears from his face. ‘You and me, we’ll build a new boat for us to sail in.’
I squeeze Dad’s hand and close my eyes. I feel the warm sun on my face. A sea breeze lifts my hair and whispers past me through the dry dune grasses. I hear the curl of surf unfurl along the sand. Above, a seagull cries. I open my eyes and watch it sail across, powder white against a deep blue sky. This whole place feels alive somehow. I feel part of it, as if it’s in me too. Maybe this is how Mum felt. Maybe this is how she always knew the dolphins would return. I feel it now. I feel in this moment of deep ocean stillness.
I feel them rising through the water.
‘Dolphins,’ I yell.
I slide down the dune to the beach and cross the high tide line of shells and seaweed. My feet slap on the hard wet sand until I am running in the furling waves along the shoreline. I am running alongside the dolphins, their blue-grey bodies arching through the water, the sunlight shining from their smooth wet backs. Their dorsal fins rise and curve above the water, a whole pod of dolphins cruising through the sea.
Then I see her. I see Angel leap from the centre. A flash of white, she somersaults in the sunlight and slaps the water with her tail, scattering diamond drops of spray.
‘Angel,’ I yell.
I wade out beyond the breaking waves.
‘Angel!’
She leaps again and I watch her twist and turn before she plunges back into the water. In this golden evening sunlight I feel chosen somehow, as if she’s given me the chance to see through into her world.
I know deep down inside, the white dolphin will never be alone.
The vast blue ocean is waiting for her, and this is only the beginning of her story.
TOP TWELVE FASCINATING DOLPHIN FACTS
1. Dolphins are mammals.
As all mammals, dolphins give birth to live young and the mothers nurse them with milk.
2. Dolphins eat fish and squid.
Dolphins swallow their food whole, despite having teeth in their mouths.
3. Like other mammals, dolphins have lungs and need to breathe air to survive.
They breathe through a blowhole on the top of the head and must rise to the surface frequently to inhale fresh air before diving again.
4. Dolphins use a technique called echolocation to navigate and find food.
Dolphins send out clicks that are returned from other objects in the water (just like an echo). This way a dolphin can locate food, other dolphins, predators or rocks.
5. Dolphins are social beings.
Dolphins live in groups called ‘pods’ and work together as a team to raise their young and find food.
6. There are thirty-seven different species of dolphin.
There are thirty-two species of ocean dolphins and five species of river dolphins.
7. The largest dolphin is the Orca, also known as ‘killer whale’.
Orcas are named as whales because of their size, but they really belong to the dolphin family.
8. The most popular dolphin is the ‘bottlenose dolphin’.
Bottlenose dolphins are the ones most often seen in TV series, movies and sea life centres.
9. Dolphins are warm-blooded.
They are surrounded by a thick layer of fat called ‘blubber’ just below the skin which helps them to stay warm.
10. Dolphins don’t sleep, they snooze!
Dolphins have to be conscious to breathe so only half their brain ever sleeps at one time.
11. Dolphins communicate efficiently.
Dolphins can make a unique signature whistle that may help individual dolphins recognize each other.
12. Dolphins are endangered.
Humans are the greatest threat to dolphins: environmental pollution, habitat destruction, and overfishing are the main reasons why so many dolphin species are endangered.
USEFUL WEBSITES
If you want to find out more about protecting our oceans, check out these websites:
World Wildlife Fund for Nature: www.wwf.org.uk
Blue Marine Foundation: www.bluemarinefoundation.com
Ocean Conservancy: www.oceanconservancy.org
Marine Conservation Society: www.mcsuk.org
Finding Sanctuary: finding-sanctuary.org
The Wildlife Trusts: www.wildlifetrusts.org
Marine Stewardship Council: www.msc.org and www.fishandkids.org
Born Free Foundation: www.bornfree.org.uk
Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society: www.wdcs.org
British Dive
rs Marine Life Rescue: www.bdmlr.org.uk
Save Lyme Bay Reefs: www.savelymebayreefs.org
WANT TO HELP?
Why don’t you . . .
1) Buy sustainable fish where you see the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) logo.
2) Write to your MP about sustainable fishing and cleaning up our seas.
3) Be a volunteer at your local Wildlife Trust and help to clean up your beaches.
4) Adopt a dolphin with the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society: www.wdcs.org/hych/adopt/dolphin/dolphin.php
5) Raise money for an organization that helps to support dolphins.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book couldn’t have been possible without the help of many people.
I’d like to thank James Barnett of British Divers Marine Life Rescue for information on dolphin strandings (www.bdmlr.org.uk), Dave Murphy of the Finding Sanctuary Project for his wealth of experience as a fisherman and his invaluable insight into providing a sustainable future for all who use the sea (www.finding-sanctuary.org), members of the RYA sailability for their inspiration and technical advice (www.ryasailability.org.uk), Mikey Jones for showing me that anything is possible, and Mylor Sailing School for teaching an old dog new tricks.
I’m indebted to my agent Victoria Birkett and to Liz Cross and all the staff at Oxford University Press for pulling this story out of the hat.
Biggest thanks as always to Roger, Georgie, Bethany, and Jemma.
My research about the effects of commercial scallop-dredging came from the Lyme Bay Project funded by the Wildlife Trusts (www.savelymebayreefs.org). Their twenty-year study of the reefs off the Dorset coast has shown not only the full impact of damaging fishing practices but also the potential for marine habitats to recover if given protection and sufficient time. Protection has to be the key to marine conservation, because at our current rate of plundering the oceans’ resources, time is running out.
