Shadows under the Sea

by Sally Grindley

  At last, he came to the place where they had dropped down to the water’s edge. His camera was still hanging from the branch where he had left it, alongside Dario’s rucksack. He grabbed them both, stuffing the camera into the rucksack and slinging the rucksack over his shoulders, and set off again.

  With every step he grew more fearful that he might not reach his friend, that Dario might have thought he was going home. What if something’s happened to him? Eventually, to his relief, he saw Dario in the distance, gesturing at him to hurry up.

  ‘You scare me,’ Dario said, when Joe caught up with him. ‘I think you get lost and then Ma’am Angela and your parents will not be happy with me. Stay with me now.’

  They pushed their way through dense, low-growing shrubs that took them nearer and nearer to the place where the two men would be likely to come ashore.

  ‘I thought I could photograph the men as soon as they’re close enough,’ Joe tried to explain again.

  ‘Then they will be too close,’ said Dario. ‘I have a better idea, I think.’

  They came to the edge of a small clearing. In front of them, leaning against a clump of shrubs, was a motorbike. Joe’s heart skipped a beat.

  ‘I was right!’ he said excitedly. ‘It was those men we saw!’

  Dario nodded. ‘So now we catch them.’ He grinned at Joe. ‘You ever ride motorbike?’

  Joe was amazed at the question. He shook his head. ‘I’m too young,’ he said.

  ‘Not in front,’ Dario explained. ‘You sit behind, I sit in front. I know what to do. They leave the key in the engine. I can make it go.’

  The full import of what Dario was suggesting hit him. All at once Joe felt exhilarated – and scared stiff.

  Chapter 14

  Dario positioned himself behind a large tree trunk and peered round it towards the sea. ‘Keep by me,’ he said to Joe. ‘Be ready.’

  Joe did as he was told. He couldn’t see anything; being shorter, there were bushes obscuring his view. He was reliant upon Dario telling him what was going on.

  ‘We wait until they don’t face this way, then we run – quick – to the motorbike. We ride – very quick – to the village and we tell the village captain what we see so they come here and catch the men.’

  Joe’s heart was pounding now. Dario’s only thirteen. Am I really going to get on a motorbike with him? Has he ridden one before? Joe didn’t think he had any choice. He was likely to get lost if he tried to walk back on his own, and the men might catch him, even though they would have no reason to concern themselves with him if they were unaware that he knew what they had been doing.

  Dario grabbed his elbow. ‘Now. We go now. Run!’

  He sprinted over to the motorbike and pulled it away from the bushes. Joe dashed after him. Dario held it upright and told Joe to get on. As he obeyed, they heard shouts. Dario clambered on in front and tried to start the engine. Joe looked out to sea. The men were standing in their banca, waving furiously at them, but they were too far away to do anything. Joe turned back, feeling rather smug for a moment. He caught sight of a flash of red behind the trees. Before he could think what it might be, and as the motorbike engine roared into life, a man broke through the trees and came tearing towards them. Joe could see straight away that the man was angry. He must be an accomplice!

  ‘Hurry!’ he yelled.

  Dario turned and saw the danger. He put his foot down on the accelerator and revved it hard. It spluttered and died, then spluttered again.

  ‘He’s closing on us!’ Joe cried.

  They began to move – too slowly on the soft ground, it seemed to Joe. He held on tight to his friend and prayed that they were out of reach of the man, whose voice seemed to come from right next to them.

  At last the motorbike picked up speed. Joe looked round and saw the man running back through the trees, away from them. Out at sea the two men on the banca were frantically collecting the fish they had killed with the blast. Joe felt like waving tauntingly at them, but was too scared to let go of Dario, who was weaving precariously along the slippery unmade road.

  ‘They’ll never be able to catch us now!’ he cried, in the hope that the older boy would slow down.

  Dario couldn’t hear him above the engine noise and kept his foot pressed hard on the accelerator. Joe looked round again. Just then, he saw the man reappear – on another motorbike. He dug Dario in the back.

  ‘He’s coming after us!’ he yelled at the top of his voice.

  Dario caught sight of the motorbike in his mirror. He leant forward, urging their motorbike to go faster, but it wasn’t very powerful. The other motorbike was gaining ground on them with every turn of its wheels. Now Joe was really terrified. What’s he going to do to us? He could almost feel the man breathing down his neck as the other motorbike rumbled up behind them. Dario turned to look. At that moment, their motorbike hit a pothole.

  Joe found himself being thrown through the air. There was a screech of tyres and a sickening crunch of metal. Joe landed some distance away, his fall broken by scrubby plants. He lay there for a moment, winded, trying to make sense of what had happened. A bird was chirping somewhere close by, but otherwise it was strangely quiet – until he heard footsteps scrabbling towards him. He sat bolt upright, fear hitting him like a blast from a shotgun.

  ‘Are you all right, Joe?’ His friend was there, a trickle of blood running down his face from a cut above his eye.

  Joe nodded. ‘I think so.’

  ‘We must run,’ Dario urged, pulling him to his feet.

  The man shouted something incomprehensible and Joe saw their pursuer waving his fist at them.

  ‘Quick!’ said Dario. He shoved Joe in the direction of the woodland that lined the road.

  Joe didn’t need to be told twice. He ran as fast as his legs would let him, until he reached the first line of trees and slowed to look round. The man must have set off after them, but had stopped and was making his way back to the wreckage on the road. Only then did Joe realise that after they had been thrown from their motorbike, the other motorbike had ploughed into it. It made him feel faint and he had to steady himself against the trunk of a tree. Dario stood beside him, breathing heavily, and Joe noticed that he had a deep gash in one of his shins.

  ‘You’re injured.’ Joe pointed at Dario’s leg.

  ‘Now they have time to get away,’ Dario said unhappily. ‘Now they can do it again.’

  ‘We did our best,’ replied Joe. We could have died! he realised.

  They watched ruefully as the man struggled to separate the two motorbikes. Joe fiddled absent-mindedly with the strap of Dario’s rucksack and suddenly remembered what his father was always telling him: ‘One of the secrets of being a successful photographer is being ready to snap when the unexpected happens.’ He didn’t even know if his camera would still work after the treatment it had received, but it was worth a try.

  Joe quickly removed the camera from the rucksack, pointed the lens at the man and took one shot after another. He even dared to creep a few steps closer, squatting down behind a bush, because he was worried the zoom might not be powerful enough for the photographs to be clear.

  ‘Now let’s go – quick,’ said Dario. ‘The village captain can still catch up with them.’

  Joe put his camera away and hurried after Dario. As they raced along, he imagined how he would feel if it turned out that his camera contained the evidence to convict the rogues who were destroying the coral reef. That would be so cool!

  Chapter 15

  As luck would have it, when they felt safe enough to follow the road, a man from the village came by on his bike. Dario waved his arms, ran into the road and shouted at him to stop. He explained about the dynamite fishermen and begged the man to cycle on ahead of them, as fast as possible, to alert the people at the seahorse project to what had happened and to let them know that they were unharmed. The man agreed and set off again, pedalling earnestly. Joe was disappointed. He had been looking forward to breakin
g the news with Dario and seeing everyone’s reaction, but he understood that speed was of the essence if there were to be any chance of catching the men red-handed.

  ‘What do you think those men are doing now?’ he asked Dario.

  ‘They are not happy because those motorbikes will not work.’ He grinned at Joe.

  ‘They were a bit of a mess,’ Joe said soberly. ‘Is your head all right, and your leg?’

  Dario looked down. ‘They will mend,’ he replied. ‘Those men not like to leave the fish behind. I think the village captain will catch them with the fish.’

  Joe wished he could be there to watch, though a small part of him wanted the men to escape so that the evidence his camera held would be crucial. He was keen to tell his father about everything they had been through and how he had been ready to snap the unexpected. At the same time, he was worried about how his mother would react. She would be appalled that he had been in such danger – that he might have been killed. She would never want to let him out of her sight if she thought he was going to get himself into such trouble. He hoped he might be able to speak to Peter alone first and ask him to play the danger down to Binti.

  ‘What will your mother say when she sees you?’ he asked Dario.

  Dario shrugged. ‘She knows I can look after myself.’

  Joe was sure Dario wouldn’t tell his mother he nearly went under the wheels of a motorbike. She wouldn’t think he could look after himself if she knew that!

  The rain was becoming torrential again. They could scarcely see ahead, but some lights were shining through the trees and Joe was delighted to discover they had arrived back at Handumon. A wave of relief almost overwhelmed him. He felt his knees buckling at the thought that in a few minutes he would be safe with his family and someone else would be taking charge. He had wanted adventure, but what they had experienced was almost an adventure too far and he was exhausted. It seemed like a lifetime ago that they had set out along the road to the mangrove forests.

  ‘Tired, Joe?’ Dario asked, as though able to read his thoughts.

  Joe nodded.

  ‘I think you sleep like a baby tonight, and me too.’

  They reached the staff house and entered the communal room. Everyone was gathered there. Joe could see from the look on Binti’s face that she had been worried stiff about him.

  ‘Two drowned rats!’ Peter exclaimed, before spotting that Dario was bleeding.

  Joe felt a desperate urge to cry, but bit his lip hard and resisted running to his mother for comfort.

  ‘Go and fetch some towels,’ Binti ordered Aesha, while Angela produced a first-aid kit and went to work on Dario’s wounds.

  ‘What on earth happened?’ Peter asked.

  ‘We got your message about the blast fishing,’ said Angela. ‘The wardens are on their way and the village captain has been informed.’

  Dario began to explain the sequence of events. Joe piped up every so often to add details that his friend had missed. He didn’t want to frighten his mother, but at the same time, and now that they were safe, he was eager for the adults to understand how heroic he and Dario had been.

  ‘And guess what, Dad,’ he said finally. ‘I took photos of the man who chased after us.’

  Joe was pleased with the reaction. Even when he admitted that his camera had got very wet and could have been damaged and that the man hadn’t been very close to them, he could tell his father was impressed, and Angela was hopeful it might contain crucial evidence.

  ‘Shall we have a look now?’ she suggested. ‘I might recognise him.’

  Joe took the camera out of the rucksack. He was concerned to see how wet it was and looked doubtfully at Peter. He opened up the screen and pressed to enter the image gallery. Nothing happened. He pressed again. This time a row of photographs appeared. He scrolled through the shots he had taken since they had arrived in the Philippines, until he came to the last few. It was impossible to disguise his dismay.

  ‘It’s too dark,’ he said, scowling. ‘You can’t see anything.’

  ‘Let me see,’ said Peter.

  Joe handed the camera over and went to sit with Binti. His father studied the photographs and announced that when the final shot was blown up, and with a few tweaks, they might well be able to make out the man’s features.

  ‘I’ll do it tomorrow if I can borrow one of your computers,’ he said to Angela.

  Angela agreed that there was nothing else to be done until the morning, and thought they should wait until they had news from the wardens and the village captain.

  ‘It’s been a very long day for all of us,’ concluded Binti. ‘I think we should eat and have an early night.’

  They said their farewells to Dario, who turned to Joe as he parted and said, ‘Next time you say you see strange men, I listen to you.’

  Chapter 16

  Joe slept soundly that night, just as Dario had predicted, even though the minute he relaxed on to his sleeping mat he discovered a number of bruises around his ribs that must have been caused by his fall from the motorbike. He dozed off trying to count them and wasn’t aware of anything else, until his father gently shook his shoulder and asked if he was planning to stay in bed all day.

  ‘We thought you might like to hear the news,’ Peter said. ‘It seems two of your strange men have been caught.’

  Joe struggled up off the sleeping mat. ‘What happened, Dad? How did they get caught?’

  ‘Come and have breakfast and we’ll tell you.’

  Joe clambered awkwardly into his clothes. His body felt as if it had been used as a punchbag. He made his way to the pavilion, where everyone else had already gathered. Dario was there and Joe was shocked to see how his face had swollen up overnight.

  ‘Hello, Joe. How are you feeling?’ his mother asked, concerned.

  ‘OK,’ he said, sitting down next to her.

  ‘Well, thanks to our two heroes here,’ Angela announced, ‘two of the men who carried out the dynamite fishing have been caught and are in custody.’

  Joe was eager to know every detail and joined in the laughter when he heard what had transpired. It seemed that the two men in the banca had gone ashore to wait for their friend to return. When he failed to reappear, and determined that they were not going to lose their catch, they had had no option but to get back into the banca and try to make their escape by sea. It wasn’t long before they ran out of fuel, and the wardens had no trouble rounding them up.

  ‘But what about the other man?’ Joe asked.

  ‘It seems he’s done a runner,’ Angela replied. ‘The motorbikes were found abandoned, and he may well have left the island by now.’

  Joe was dismayed. ‘So my photo won’t be any help.’

  ‘Oh yes it will,’ said Angela.

  ‘We’re going to work on it,’ Peter explained. ‘If we can sharpen it up enough to provide an identifiable image, it can be sent to all the wardens and the authorities, not just here but on the neighbouring islands as well, and they’ll add him to their files and keep a lookout for him.’

  Joe was thrilled. ‘Cool!’ he said. ‘My photo might be used to catch a criminal!’

  ‘I think you might just want to look at the photos I took yesterday,’ Peter added, ‘but I’m obviously going to have to watch out, or you’ll soon be taking over from me!’

  In all the events of the day before, Joe had completely forgotten that his father had gone out photographing seahorses. He was eager to see the results. He followed him into the communal room and sat down next to him at the computer.

  ‘I’ll show you my videos and photos first,’ said Peter, ‘and then we’ll get to work on your man.’

  The world that opened up to them as he moved from one frame to the next was even more beautiful and extraordinary than Joe remembered it from the snorkelling trip. In an ever-changing landscape of smooth-domed rocks and intricately shaped corals, the creatures of the sea seemed to dance and sail and sway as if to the strains of music from an unseen piper. The
n there were shots of seahorses taken from all angles, some of them clinging to coral with their tails, others peeping out from behind coral stems as though playing hide-and-seek. Joe was enchanted.

  ‘All of this will have been destroyed in the area where those men set off their dynamite, and it won’t recover for a very, very long time,’ Angela observed sadly.

  ‘Before we leave tomorrow, I’d like to photograph what they’ve done so that I can show it to the world alongside these photos,’ said Peter. ‘I’m sure the magazine I’m working for will agree that this should be publicised.’

  He turned his attention to Joe’s photograph of the man with the motorbike. Joe watched as he uploaded the image and zeroed in on the man’s face.

  ‘Nobody will be able to recognise him from that,’ Aesha said rather dismissively.

  ‘You wait and see,’ said Peter. ‘You’ll be surprised what you can do with the right software.’

  They watched intently as he manipulated the photograph. Gradually, a sharper image began to appear, whose features became more obvious by the minute, until at last Joe was able to say, ‘That’s him! That’s absolutely him! I can see his big nose!’ He looked to Dario to confirm that the likeness was now obvious.

  ‘We don’t like this man,’ Dario said grimly. ‘He is not a nice man.’

  ‘The most important thing that I’ve spotted is that he has a very large ring on the little finger of his left hand,’ said Peter.

  ‘And a gap between his front teeth!’ cried Joe. ‘I remember it from when he shouted at us.’

  ‘I’m horrified at the thought of what might have happened to you both,’ said Binti, squeezing Joe’s arm. ‘You had a very lucky escape.’

  Joe was glad that Angela stopped his mother from dwelling on what could have happened by sharing her thoughts.

  ‘There’s nothing the man can be charged with if we do come across him because we don’t have enough evidence of his involvement, but at least now he’ll know that we’re on to him and it might make him think twice about a repeat performance. We’ll be posting his mugshot far and wide, not just in the hope that someone will recognise him, but also as a warning that we’ll be hot on the heels of anyone who tries the same thing.’