Марк Брендел - The Mystery of the Kidnapped Whale

“Then how —?”

“Please don’t interrupt me, Mr. Slater. Just answer my questions. I need all the information you can give me. Okay?”

Slater stared at her for a moment. Jupe could see the anger in his eyes.

“More questions,” he said. “Okay. What do you want to know?”

“Where is it exactly? The metal case with those — those pocket calculators in it.”

“Well, the valuable stuff —” Slater was trying to meet her eyes. “The only stuff worth bothering about is under the bunk in the cabin.”

“Is it lashed down?”

“No.” Slater glanced uneasily away from her. “Your father was trying to launch the life raft. We were going to take the box with us. And then — there wasn’t time. The boat swamped —” He shrugged bitterly. “We had to leave it there.”

“Is the cabin door locked?”

“No. It’s fastened open. You know —”

Constance nodded. She had been going out fishing with her father since she was ten years old. She knew every detail of the charter boat.

“I know,” she said. “Those heavy brass hooks in the deck. Dad used them to keep the door swung back so he could nip down to the cabin from the wheelhouse to get a beer.”

“Yeah.” Slater met her eyes again.

“What does the box look like?”

“It’s dark green. Made of steel. About two feet long. A foot wide. Maybe nine inches deep.”

“Has it got a handle on it?”

“Yeah. Like… well, like a cashbox. It’s got a metal handle on the lid.”

“I’ll need a line.” Constance paused. Jupe guessed she was figuring the best way to get the box off that wreck. “A good, long, strong line and a metal clothes hanger.”

“Sure.”

Jupe took the wheel while Slater found what she needed. Constance pushed in the sides of the clothes hanger, bending it into a diamond shape. Then she twisted the hook until it was at a right angle to the frame.

She looped the strong nylon cord into a coil and knotted the end of it to the wire hanger.

“Okay,” she said. “I’m ready to go now.”

Pete stepped forward.

“If you like —” he began.

He didn’t want to go with Constance. After what had happened, he felt he had had enough scuba diving to last him a long time. But he had to offer. He knew, in some way he couldn’t explain, that he would feel wrong about himself if he didn’t.

“I’ll go with you, if you like,” he said.

Constance smiled at him.

“No, you stay here, Pete. I’d sooner have you on board in case anything goes wrong.”

Pete smiled back gratefully. She was probably letting him off easy. But the way she put it made him feel a lot better.

He watched her as she hung the coil of nylon cord over her shoulder, adjusted her mask, and let herself topple gently backward into the ocean.

Fluke had been dozing a few yards from the boat. He opened his eyes at once as Constance swam toward him. He went to meet her in his usual eager way. For a minute Constance stroked his back, pressing her face close to him.

Pete could see that she was talking to the little whale. But she was too far away for him to hear what she said.

When he thought about it later, he could never really figure out how Constance managed to explain to Fluke what she wanted him to do. Not in words. But perhaps they didn’t need words to understand each other.

He remembered what he had felt watching them play in Slater’s pool. The friendship and trust between them was so deep that they seemed to share a common will. Whatever Constance wanted was what Fluke wanted too.

He saw them submerge. Constance had her arm around Fluke. They appeared to dive together like two halves of the same person.

Jupe kept his eyes on the monitor in the cockpit.

He saw the circle of light appear on the screen as somewhere deep in the ocean Constance switched on the searchlight attached to Fluke’s head. He watched the light probing down and down through the cloudy water. A host of little fishes darted across the screen.

And then there was the floor of the ocean again. A round patch of sand and gravel, a barnacle-covered rock.

Slater was standing at the wheel behind him. Jupe felt him straighten with sudden excitement.

Fluke’s camera had picked out the stern of a boat.

“There it is.” Pete stepped up beside Jupe.

The stern of the boat was growing larger, filling the circle of light. It swept quickly past, like a sign on the freeway. The light was moving across a deck. Jupe glimpsed the spokes of a wheel. The circle clouded for an instant, then reappeared, brighter than before. Jupe could make out the shape of a chair, a porthole.

Fluke had swum right into the cabin.

For several seconds the images on the screen jerked back and forth so quickly it was impossible to make out what they were. Jupe could feel Slater grow rigid with impatience.

The dancing, flickering images gradually stilled. The camera held fast on a single object. It came slowly into sharper and sharper focus.

It was a metal box.

“That’s it.” Slater was leaning forward over the wheel as though trying to grab the box off the monitor screen.

The box grew larger and larger, filling the whole circle of light as the camera on Fluke’s head moved closer and closer to it.

It lurched abruptly downward, disappearing altogether. There was nothing to be seen on the screen but a blank circle of white.

It puzzled Jupe at first. Had something gone wrong with the camera? Then he realized that Fluke had his head under the bunk in the cabin. The camera lens was pointed at the white-painted bulkhead on the far side of the space under the bunk.

For a minute the camera held it, almost motionless. Then everything lurched into movement again. The images on the screen swept past so quickly it was impossible to distinguish them. Jupe thought he caught a blurred glimpse of the boat’s rail.

It vanished and the familiar circle of cloudy water replaced it. Fluke was surfacing.

“Stupid beast.” Slater was swearing softly, his hands gripping the wheel. “It didn’t even try to get that box out.” He turned angrily away, looking toward the shore.

Jupe paid no attention to him. He had just seen something on the screen that Slater had missed — a flash of Constance swimming forward. Now her hand reached out toward the lens. The light on the monitor shrank to a pinpoint. The screen went black. Constance had switched off the camera.

“Here. You take the wheel.” Slater grabbed Pete’s arm. “And try to hold her steady.”

Jupe watched Slater hurry over to the rail of the boat. He followed the man slowly as Pete took the wheel. But Jupe didn’t join Slater at the rail. He walked softly past him to the stern and stood by the locker there. He kept his eyes on the surface of the ocean, waiting.

He didn’t have to wait very long. Twenty yards away Constance’s head bobbed up. Jupe could see she no longer had the coil of nylon cord over her shoulder.

Fluke was swimming beside her. As the little whale raised his head, Jupe saw something else too. The camera and the searchlight were gone. In their place, bound to the canvas harness on Fluke’s head, was the flat green metal box.

Jupe opened the locker and snatched out the sealed plastic bag Pete had hidden there. He tore open the bag and took out the walkie-talkie. He pulled the antenna to its full length and switched the walkie-talkie on to Send.

“Bob,” he said urgently into the speaker of the walkie-talkie. “Bob. Start playing.”

He glanced at Slater. The bald man was leaning far out over the rail. He was shouting at Constance.

“Bring it in!” Slater yelled. “Bring that box in, you hear?” “Start playing, Bob!” Jupe repeated insistently. “Start playing Fluke’s song.”