Midnight Dolphin (15 page)

‘
You know that
there are local stories about one or two dolphin-children being
born every generation?’ Megan asked.

‘
Yes I seem to
remember something about that’ replied Toby Smith, taking a swig of
claret from his glass. ‘The Rev writes something about that in his
book doesn’t he? Forced to read it, I was, as a child. Deathly
boring stuff most of it.’

‘
Well the
thing is’ Rachel went on, ‘dolphin-children are supposed to lose
their gift by about the age of twelve or thirteen or so. In his
book, Jeremiah Smith says he wants to track down a real
dolphin-child. In my mother’s bookshop, she has one of his actual
journals. It must be written after he published his book. In it he
says that he found a young woman who had not lost the gift when she
turned thirteen. He says that she wouldn’t tell him anything and
then the journal just ends.’

‘
So you reckon
the Rev’s next journal might continue the story?’

‘
Exactly’
replied Megan and Rachel at the same time. Toby Smith turned his
gaze from Rachel to Megan.

‘
And you…?’ he
asked, leaving his question unfinished. Megan nodded shyly. ‘Oh I
see!’ he exclaimed. He stood up and strolled to the open window,
trailing a plume of cigar smoke as he went.

‘
So your
mother has one of the Rev’s journals does she? Owl Books would that
be? I wonder how she came across that?’

‘
I think it
was in a job lot of second hand books that she bought from someone
who died about a year ago.’ Rachel replied.

‘
Maybe my Aunt
Dorothea’ he speculated. She popped her clogs about a year ago.’ He
sucked in another mouthful of smoke before exhaling slowly. ‘Well
I’ve got a heap of the Rev’s things in a chest in the loft’ he
said. ‘Ghastly old reprobate. Never could stand that stuff myself.
Been there for years it has. I’ve been meaning to rummage through
it all but never got round to it.’

‘
That would be
fantastic’ exclaimed Megan, her eyes glinting with excitement. Toby
Smith regarded her with quiet amusement.

‘
I don’t give
access to this stuff to just anyone you know. Like that local
history woman I slung out. She’s not been the first one to come
knocking on my door asking about the Rev. I’d give you two the cold
shoulder as well if you didn’t intrigue me so much.’ He glanced at
Megan again.

‘
We’re very
grateful’ said Rachel.

‘
But you’ll
have to come back’ he continued. ‘Can’t be showing two young girls
round the house without a chaperone. Would your mother bring you
both back for a cup of coffee tomorrow?’ he asked. ‘I roast the
beans myself you know. She can bring that journal of hers and maybe
we can haggle over a price. I suppose I should try and keep the old
devil’s journals together if I can. You two can rummage in the loft
while I speak to your mother. How about that?’

‘
It’s a deal’
replied Rachel with a big smile. Before long they were back outside
the house. They stood on the wide pavement and from inside the
house they could hear jazz being turned up loud on the record
player again.

‘
Well that’s a
turn up for the books’ exclaimed Rachel, smiling at Megan with
satisfaction.

As the woman
walked briskly back down the corridor from Lucy’s hospital bed she
wondered how she could lie there so perfectly still. It was more
like looking at a photograph than a sleeping girl. She could barely
make out the gentle rising and falling of Lucy’s chest as she
breathed. It made her think of Sleeping Beauty, but Lucy was too
young to have a handsome prince to kiss her and wake her
up.

The woman had
felt awkward about coming to the hospital that evening, yet she’d
followed Lucy’s life from a distance ever since she’d been born.
She felt as though she knew the girl well, though they’d never
actually met. The woman wasn’t keen on bumping into Lucy’s father
though, and knew that if she did he’d have too many difficult
questions for her to answer. It was better all round if she could
slip in and out unnoticed. She’d had a feeling that he might be
near just before she slipped out again. Standing now in the chilly
dark hospital car park, the woman glanced up at the second floor
window where Lucy’s ward was. Her breathe condensed in a cloud in
the cold night air. She worried for the girl, she really did. Maybe
she shouldn’t have come to the hospital at all; it was a long
drive, but this unfinished business really troubled her.

‘
Mum, I need
to borrow the car to drive Megan home’ Rachel announced as they
walked into the shop. ‘And I’ve got some exciting news too. We’re
all going round to Toby Smith’s house tomorrow afternoon and he may
want to buy the Reverend Jeremiah Smith’s journal from
you.’

‘
Well you two
have worked fast’ exclaimed her mother. ‘I only told you about Toby
Smith this morning! It’s a good thing its half day closing tomorrow
so I can come along with you both. Will your parents be okay with
that Megan?’ she asked, turning to look at the younger girl
standing a little shyly by the book-shop door. Megan nodded. Rachel
seized the car keys from her mother’s outstretched hand.

‘
See you later
then!’ Rachel and Megan went back outside, the door bell clanging
noisily behind them. Parked at the curb a few yards away was a red
Citroen Deux Cheveaux. ‘It’s not much to look at’ said Rachel, ‘but
it does get you around.’ They climbed in and sat down on the hard
seats. Rachel pulled out the choke and turned the key in the
ignition several times before the car eventually spluttered into
life. They jerked forward a few inches and then the engine cut out
again. ‘Let’s have another go’ said Rachel patiently.

This time the
car was more responsive and they moved out into the busy streets of
the town, which was flooded with late afternoon sunshine. Just as
they did so a bundle of fur landed in Megan’s lap and she half
jumped out of her seat in surprise.

‘
Bilbo
Baggins! What are you doing here?’ laughed Rachel. She glanced at
Megan’s surprised face. ‘Oh this cat of ours is a real tear-away.
He loves going on car journeys. He even hitched a ride on the local
bus once. He must have slipped out of the shop behind us when he
saw me take the car keys.’ The cat looked out of the window from
his vantage point of Lucy’s lap with a look of haughty
indifference.

The car
strained its way up the hill out of Merwater and before long they
were driving through country lanes back to the holiday
cottage.

Mum, Dad and
Bethany were all sitting in the garden when the red Citroen pulled
up outside the cottage. Bethany ran up to the gate with
unrestrained curiosity as Megan and Rachel climbed out of the car.
For Megan it seemed like an eternity since Megan had swum out from
the beach towards the dolphin and then ran off in tears. So much
seemed to have happened since then. Bethany had been fretting
unhappily about it all afternoon though. Mum and Dad hadn’t seemed
at all their normal selves either.

Bilbo Baggins
wound himself around Rachel’s feet as they walked up the garden
path.

‘
Hello, I’m
Rachel’ she said, shaking Mum and Dad’s hand formally. They
exchanged greetings. ‘Megan came into my mother’s bookshop in
Merwater the other day and we got chatting. I bumped into her again
today and ended up giving her a lift home.’

‘
Mum?’ said
Megan. ‘Can I hang out with Rachel tomorrow?’ Mum and Dad exchanged
a quick glance. It seemed too good to be true that Megan had got
over her upset of that morning and had found herself a new, older
and more responsible friend to take her mind of all this dolphin
business.

‘
Well only if
you’re sure’ replied Dad cautiously. He wondered why Rachel would
be happy to spend time with a girl like Megan who was so much
younger than herself. They chatted for a short while before Rachel
and Bilbo Baggins made their way home in the red
Citroen.

Megan
experienced a strange mix of feelings as Rachel drove away. She
felt proud that she’d made friends with a student like Rachel, who
seemed so much more grown up than she felt. She was delighted to
have made so much progress in her research about the Reverend
Jeremiah Smith and his own enquiries into nineteenth century
dolphin-children. Yet despite all of that she still felt this
powerful and gnawing sense that she had lost her connection with
Jet and the other dolphins in the pod. Whatever they might find out
when they visited Toby Smith the next day, perhaps it was already
too late for her. Maybe they wouldn’t find out anything useful at
all. She glanced at her younger sister who was running excitedly
around the garden pretending to be an aeroplane.

It was Dad’s
turn to cook, which normally meant fish-fingers, peas and mashed
potato and he disappeared into the kitchen to clatter around
noisily with aluminium pots. He switched on a transistor radio and
the sound of crackly chatter wafted out of the window into the late
afternoon air.

‘
Darling, you
are feeling alright are you?’ Mum asked Megan with a concerned
expression on her face. ‘We got a bit worried about you earlier’
she went on. Megan didn’t know what to say. She felt so locked up
in her own private worries and concerns that she hardly knew where
to start.

‘
I suppose’
she replied noncommittally.

‘
You will tell
me anything that worries you?’ her mother continued. Megan nodded,
though she knew that she wouldn’t. ‘Rachel seems very nice.’ Megan
smiled and nodded. ‘I’m glad that you’ve made a friend, even if she
is so much older than you.’

After dinner
Megan helped wash up and then wandered outside again.

‘
I think I’ll
go for a stroll’ she said to Mum absently.

‘
Can I come
too?’ pleaded Bethany. Megan smiled.

‘
Why not?’ she
answered. They walked out onto the dunes together, kicking at the
sand and looking out for interesting bits of driftwood. Bethany
said she was looking for hidden treasure and Megan joined in with
the make-believe to keep her young sister entertained.

‘
If I was a
pirate I’d hide my treasure under that bush there’ she joked,
pointing at a scrubby plant a short distance away. Bethany went
over and started peering under it enthusiastically. ‘Well maybe
not
that
bush,
but one like it.’

There was a
smell of wood smoke in the air and when they came over the top of a
dune they could see that a mother, father and two kids had lit a
fire and were cooking sausages on sticks over the flames which
crackled from the fat dripping down from the meat. It would have
made Megan feel hungry if she hadn’t just eaten. She eyed the
family enviously. They seemed so happy and carefree. Even though
she was on holiday too, it didn’t feel like it. Every time she
started to enjoy herself, she remembered the anxiety gnawing away
at her inside.

Megan looked
out to sea. She couldn’t help but scan the waves for any tell-tale
signs of a dolphin swimming in the water, but of course there were
none. She wondered where Jet was now, and whether she would ever be
able to speak to him again.

‘
Are you
looking for the dolphins?’ asked Bethany brightly. Feeling suddenly
sad, Megan turned and strode away from her sister without
answering. Bethany ran to keep up with her. ‘It’ll be okay’ Bethany
said. ‘You’ll see.’ Megan turned to smile at her, but her heart
felt heavy and she wasn’t so sure.

Then Megan
thought about Rachel, Toby Smith, and the journals of the Reverend
Jeremiah Smith. She still had the battered edition of the
Reverend’s book in her pocket. Despite her despondency, she felt
that she had made progress. Something had to help her to get back
to Jet, it just had to. Looking back towards the sea, she could see
that the rosy-coloured sun was flecking the waves with red. It was
a beautiful view and despite everything, she was glad to be there.
Bethany came up next to her and together they looked at the
sunset.

‘
Come on’ said
Megan after a while, ‘we’d better head back’ she added, draping an
arm companionably across Bethany’s shoulders to walk back together
across the dunes as the sun sank below the horizon and tipped the
world into darkness.

Chapter
Ten
:

It was the
familiar chugging noise that stirred Lucy into consciousness the
next morning. She’d been worried about slipping away from Spirit
and the pod if she fell asleep, but she’d been able to doze
comfortably next to Spirit, lulled to sleep by the waves. She
caught glimpses as she slept of a Victorian girl in a bonnet again
in her restless dreams, but why, she had no idea. Lucy was still
with them all the next morning. The sound that she heard on waking
was of an engine. Its low rhythmic vibrations reverberated a long
way through the green water of the sea around her. The engine
spluttered occasionally but kept puttering on.

‘
I recognise
that engine noise’ said Lucy quietly. She couldn’t quite place it
though.

‘
Yes, it’s the
engine of the boat that brought the man who helped cut me free of
the steel rope’ answered Spirit. He knew all the sounds of the
ocean and the noise of an engine, once heard, was immediately
ingrained in his memory.