Island of the Aunts

by Eva Ibbotson

  “I don’t know,” whispered poor Queenie. “It’s just stories. People say they can turn into humans if someone drops seven tears into the water or if they’re touched with cold steel.”

  Mr Sprott’s eyes glittered. He saw the circus ring…a seal on a tub…then a sharp pronged fork in its backside and lo, a woman jumps down. A transformation scene, better than a pantomime.

  “Go on—what else is there? What else?”

  But though he threatened her again with the hairdryer Queenie kept silent about the little kraken. For she knew that the end of the kraken meant the end of the sea as she knew it—and thus the end of her world—and Mr Sprott did not dare to hurt her any more or she wouldn’t be worth putting on show.

  “I’ll speak to you again tomorrow,” he said, turning the water on again. “Don’t think I’ve finished with you, because I haven’t.”

  But as he gave his orders—the hold to be cleared, reinforced nets and lifting gear to be got ready, and harpoon guns to stun the beasts before they were hauled aboard—he did not realize that the greatest prize on the Island was still unknown to him. Neither Queenie nor Lambert had mentioned the kraken’s son.

  Chapter 18

  The great kraken had reached the warmer southern seas. The fishes who joined him were brilliantly coloured, with fan tails and exotic spikes, and from the islands flashing birds with crests of crimson and orange came to welcome him and perch on his back. The water was clear and calm and the corals on the sea bed were of every colour under the sun.

  As he swam the great kraken hummed his Healing Hum, and the turtles who had lumbered out of the sea to lay their eggs on the sandbanks were left in peace, and the rich men who had come to slaughter the porpoises pulled in their harpoons as the swell made by the kraken’s passing reached their boats.

  Yet the kraken was not happy. The dolphins and seals that swam round him felt this and were puzzled. He was smiling less; his golden eyes sometimes had a clouded look.

  But why? He did not know—only that somehow he felt uneasy. He was missing his son of course, but there could have been no safer place to leave him than the Island of Aunts.

  “I must pull myself together,” thought the kraken. “I do not belong to myself; I belong to the sea.”

  And he put aside his vague and troubled thoughts and swam on. Two days after Boo-Boo and the Little One came to the Island, Old Ursula disappeared. She had swum out to say goodbye to Herbert’s mother and never came back.

  The other mermaids were frantic.

  “I should have been nicer to her,” wailed Loreen. “I shouldn’t have said her tail smelt. It did smell but I shouldn’t have said it.” And Oona wept because time and again she’d left the old creature flapping in the sink instead of helping her.

  As for the aunts, they now knew once and for all how great was the danger they were in. Great-grandmothers do fall in love but they aren’t often silly about it when they do. Old Ursula could not have eloped, she must have been snatched—and that meant that Queenie too had been taken by force. And sure enough, when they searched the bay, they found a net stretched between two rocks.

  “We must have a Council of War,” said Etta, and made everybody do thirty press-ups so as to make the blood go to their heads and help them to think.

  But even with all the blood in their heads, they knew that fighting off Sprott and his men would be almost impossible and that their only hope would be to get the animals to hide.

  “The stoorworm must stay at the bottom of the loch—no coming up for chats,” said Coral.

  “And Herbert and his mother should come closer to the house,” said Myrtle. “They could have the pond in the vegetable garden.”

  Art offered to guard the mermaid shed with the Captain’s blunderbuss—secretly he still hoped he might have a chance to kill someone after all—and they decided that the Sybil must be brought indoors; she was far too loopy to be left on her own.

  But it was easier to decide what should be done about the creatures than to get them to do it. The stoorworm pointed out that he was after all a wingless dragon and should be helping to guard the Island, not skulking about in the bottom of lakes, and Herbert wouldn’t bring his mother any closer because she wanted to die beside the sea and not in somebody’s Brussels sprouts.

  But of course it was the kraken that they worried about most of all, and it was now that the aunts wished from the bottom of their hearts that they had never kidnapped Fabio and Minette.

  They knew exactly where the little beast could be hidden. In a large underwater cave, a kind of grotto on the North Shore with only the smallest opening on to the strand. It was a beautiful place, with a pool of clear, deep water surrounded by gently shelving rock, and at the back of the grotto was an opening to the cliff which gave enough light to see by. The opening came out by Ethelgonda’s burial ground and the naak had promised to keep watch up there.

  But to keep the kraken in a cave when he was used to the freedom of the sea would not be easy. He would need people all the time. And people, to the kraken, were Fabio and Minette.

  “There is no question of you staying alone with him through the night,” said Etta firmly. “My sisters and I will take shifts.”

  “Yes there is. We’ll take a blanket and lots of food—but we’re going to do it. It’s our job,” said Minette.

  “It’s not your job to risk that kind of danger.”

  But something odd was happening to Fabio and Minette. Perhaps it was from living on the Island among creatures that did not need to speak very much, but they seemed to know each other’s thoughts.

  “If you didn’t want us to do our work you shouldn’t have kidnapped us,” said Minette.

  And Fabio, between gritted teeth, said, “Nothing is going to stop us being with the kraken. Nothing.”

  By nightfall, everyone was at their posts: Art guarding the mermaids, Coral crouched by the boobrie’s nest, which they had ringed with barbed wire; the Sybil zooming round the house muttering about wind-chill factors and burning the Captain’s semolina.

  And the kraken hidden in his secret place beneath the cliff.

  The children had lit candles and put them on the ledges, and the flames flickering on the stone lit up the colours of the rock.

  “It’s like Merlin’s crystal cave,” said Minette dreamily, and she was right. Because the kraken was his father’s son, all sorts of creatures came to be near him in the water: crimson crabs and clusters of pipefish and families of sea mice…But if it was beautiful in the cave, keeping the kraken quiet and happy was hard work. Fortunately he was learning English so fast that they could sing to him and tell him stories.

  “More Snow White,” he would command, or “More Puss in Boots.”

  But the stories he liked best were the ones they made up about his father—about the great kraken and his adventures as he swam though the oceans of the world.

  Where the sides of the grotto sloped to the water there was one place which was almost flat and it was there that the children had made a kind of camp. They had brought sleeping bags and plenty of food and of course the tin of boobrie buns. If the kraken got restless and swam too near the opening of the cave, they only had to bang with a wooden spoon on the tin and he would hurry back, his mouth already open for his treat.

  Even so, the aunts were worried about them and, sometime in the small hours, Etta and Dorothy stopped patrolling the Island and went down to the grotto again, determined to make the children come up to the house and go to bed.

  The kraken was asleep, his head just out of the water. And on either side of him, curled up on the ledge so that their arms were almost touching him, slept Fabio and Minette.

  And the aunts turned back and said nothing, for it was clear that these three lived in a circle of friendship that nothing now could break.

  There was no attack from Sprott’s people that night, but just before dawn something did happen.

  Down on the point, Herbert’s mother slipped quietly from l
ife. Her eyes filmed over; she sighed deeply, her whiskers trembled…Then she spoke her son’s name once—not in the selkie language but in proper human speech so that Myrtle too could understand.

  “Herbert,” said Herbert’s mother. She didn’t say anything more but from the way she said it they knew that she thought Herbert had been a good son and she was thanking him. Then she hoisted herself slowly to the very edge of the rock, lifted her head once towards the sky—and gave herself to the sea.

  It was a beautiful death—exactly the kind of death the old seal had chosen—but of course for Herbert it was a moment of great sadness, and when it was over, Myrtle would not leave him even to get her meals.

  Her sisters were worried about this. Myrtle had always felt things too much. When she was small she had tried to bring a tin of sardines back to life by floating the headless fishes in a wash basin, and they did not think she should be out on the point on a night when there might be danger.

  But Myrtle in her own way was obstinate.

  “I can’t leave Herbert alone with his sorrow,” she said—and she wrapped her legs in an old grey blanket and settled down beside her friend.

  There was a time when Queenie would have hated sharing a bath with old Ursula but now she was touchingly glad of her company. The old mermaid was as tough as old boots and she didn’t give a fig for Mr Sprott’s threats.

  “He can’t do anything to me. I’m old and I don’t care,” she said.

  Mr Sprott hated her. She spat at him and cursed him and tried to bite him with her single tooth, and when Des came anywhere near she screeched at him.

  “Don’t you dare ogle my great-granddaughter you plug-ugly,” she yelled.

  “You can’t put that old horror on show,” said Des. “Nobody’ll pay to see the likes of her!”

  Mr Sprott shrugged. “Maybe I’ll sell her to medical science to be cut up,” he said. “No one knows how a mermaid’s tail is joined to her body.”

  Seeing Ursula so angry and unafraid did Queenie good. But of course they both knew what danger they were in. And sure enough, later that evening Boris and Casimir came in with blindfolds which they tied roughly round the mermaids’ eyes. Then they were wrapped in coarse sacking and felt themselves raised up, swaying on steel hooks, and then lowered, still swaying horribly, into some deep cold place.

  When they could see again, they found that they were sitting in a crude, rusty tank filled with water. The tank was in the corner of a large, dark, empty space, stuffy and evil-smelling. There were no windows and no lamps, and all they could hear was the slap of the water against the ship’s sides.

  They were in the hold of the Hurricane which Sprott had prepared, like a slave ship of old, for his prisoners.

  “Don’t worry, you won’t be by yourselves much longer,” jeered Des. “Lots of your little friends will be along soon.”

  Then he climbed up the steel ladder, pulled it up after him, and shut the trapdoor, leaving them alone in the foul-smelling darkness.

  There were five men in the launch: Stanley Sprott himself, Boris and Casimir, and the bodyguard, Des. Lambert had been left behind with the skipper—the poor boy was definitely going crazy—but Sprott had forced the mate of the Hurricane to come too.

  The launch was towing two large inflatable rafts loaded with equipment, with which to net the creatures and stun them before they were floated out to the Hurricane.

  All the men had guns and knives and whistles to blow if they wanted extra help and their orders were clear.

  “Now remember, if you have to shoot, shoot the aunts, not the creatures. You can’t get money for aunts. But don’t shoot at all if you can help it. We want silence and we want speed.”

  The launch slid on to the sand. The men got out.

  Boris and Casimir set off up the hill; they were going for the boobrie and the stoorworm. Sprott himself and the mate made their way to the mermaid shed: Sprott liked the idea of carrying the wriggling, struggling mermaids over his shoulder.

  And Des was to capture the selkies.

  Des had grumbled about this. “What do you want a couple of old seals for?” he asked Mr Sprott.

  Sprott had not told anyone what Queenie had said about selkies; it was probably rubbish anyway. “They’re supposed to be able to sing,” was all he said.

  So Des was not in a good mood as he climbed up the rocks towards the sleeping seals. Even if they could sing it didn’t seem very exciting—lots of animals made noises in their throats—and how the devil was he supposed to pick out the selkies from the others?

  “There’s two of them, lying apart from the rest,”

  Lambert had said. “They’ve got funny eyes.” And then he’d started to snivel and go on again about how they weren’t really there.

  But as he got closer, Des saw that Lambert was right. There were two seals lying apart from the rest. A big bull seal and a smaller one; a cow probably. He’d tackle the smaller one first and if things went wrong he could always skin the brutes. Sealskins fetched a good price.

  Des crept closer. The big seal opened his eyes, and even in the dim moonlight, Des could see that his eyes were not quite like those of an ordinary seal.

  But it was the smaller one he was after. She’d been asleep but now she stirred…

  Really it was uncanny how human she looked. Her body was just a grey splodge and he couldn’t see her flippers, but as she yawned and opened her eyes you could almost forget she was a seal.

  Des shook himself. He was getting fanciful. Better get her netted and dragged away. It shouldn’t be a problem; she was only half grown—he probably wouldn’t even need the stunner.

  He crept the last few metres, got to his feet—and threw the net.

  And the selkie screamed. He had never heard such a scream coming from the throat of an animal. It was a completely human scream and it was all Des could do not to drop the net and run back to the ship.

  But he didn’t. He cursed and tried to tighten the net while the seal struggled and kicked—and then suddenly the screams had words to them! Proper human words.

  “Leave me alone,” shrieked the selkie in her high-pitched voice. “Let me go at once, you brute. Help! Oh, help!”

  Up by the boobrie’s nest, Coral got to her feet, vaulted over the barbed wire—all sixteen stone of her—and began to run towards the point. Etta, who had been helping Art to guard the mermaid shed, seized the blunderbuss and did the same. Going to rescue Myrtle was something they did as naturally as they breathed.

  But someone else was coming to Myrtle’s rescue.

  As Des straightened himself to pull the net tighter, something came at him: an enormous wet wall of grey muscle…a tank of solid blubber which sent him sprawling. He tried to get to his feet but the bull seal threw back his head and roared and then he opened his mouth and Des saw the evil-looking teeth and felt his hot breath. The creature was going for his throat…in a moment it would be all up with him.

  Choking, struggling, Des tried to reach his knife but every time it was in his grasp, the seal charged again. Helpless, sprawled on the ground, he tried to cover his face, but the awful teeth were closing on his flesh…

  Then when he thought his last moment had come, he found the knife, and lunged. The seal reared back and he almost missed…almost but not quite. He’d made a nick in the animal’s shoulder, nothing more…but, my God, what was happening now? It wasn’t teeth that were fastening round his throat, it was hands, it was fingers…

  With a blood-curdling shriek, Des managed to struggle to his feet—and then he ran…ran and ran, almost mad with horror…ran, with the spittle running out of his mouth, away and away across the Island, trying to escape from what he’d seen. Ran until he stumbled over a gorse bush, and found himself falling…falling down towards a pool of dark water far below.

  Chapter 19

  The stoorworm had always been worried about his thoughts getting stuck halfway down his body.

  Now he didn’t worry any more. The terrible
sadness he felt as he lay curled up in the hold of the Hurricane had not got stuck anywhere. It went right down through every single segment to the tip of his tail. He was just a long tube of wretchedness and despair and shame.

  It had all happened in a moment. He had heard the boobrie squawk in terror and come up from the bottom of the lake to see if he could help, and a man had shot something into his throat—a red hot needle it felt like…and then he remembered nothing more till he woke in a kind of snake pit in this ghastly place.

  “I have failed my friends,” he thought, “and I have failed myself.” And he felt so sad that he wanted to die.

  From the rusty tank in the corner where the mermaids sat, came the sound of sobbing. Oona was sobbing because men kept coming down below to peer and pry—men that were worse even than Lord Brasenott—and she was terribly afraid. But the noisiest and most terrible tears came from Loreen.

  “My baby!” she kept hiccuping. “My little darling, where is he?”

  When Sprott had overcome Art and broken open the door of the mermaid shed Walter had been asleep in his washing-up bowl and there had been no time for Loreen to grab him before she was thrown over Sprott’s shoulder and carried towards the boat.

  “Will someone find him?” gulped Loreen. And old Ursula said of course they would—but the trouble was, no one knew what was happening on the Island and who was left.

  Perhaps the most heart-rending sight in that ghastly place were the boobrie chicks, penned in a wire cage, their yellow beaks bruised and bloodstained…and lying down, with her great yellow legs in the air like an outsize chicken ready for the pot, their mother. Lowering the struggling giant bird through the trapdoor had been so difficult that they had given her another injection and now the chicks climbed over her, peeping in bewilderment, not understanding why their mother was so still.

  But Sprott’s greatest prize was not in the hold. The kraken lay on the deck, tethered by ropes which bit so hard that he could not even turn his head, and every few minutes Sprott came up to look at him and rub his hands and gloat. He had no idea what it was that he had caught, only that it would make him very, very rich. For it could speak, this thing which they had caught when Des fell into its cave. It had said “Father” once, when they nailed it down on to the deck, but now its eyes were closed and it spoke no more.