Arthur C Clarke - Dolphin Island

by Dolphin Island(lit)

  The day was hot and oppressive, without a breath of wind. It scarcely needed the picture on the television screen and the steady flow of weather reports from the east, to know that Nature was planning one of her big productions. Moreover, though the sky was clear and cloudless, the storm had sent its messages ahead of it. All day long, tremendous waves had been battering against the outer reef, until the whole island shook beneath their impact.

  When darkness fell, the sky was still clear and the stars seemed abnormally brilliant. Johnny was standing outside the Naurus' concrete-and-alurninium bungalow, taking a last look at the sky before turning in, when he became aware of a new sound above the thunder of the waves. It was a sound such as he had never heard before, as of a monstrous animal moaning in pain, and even on that hot, sultry evening, it seemed to chill his blood.

  And then he saw something to the east that broke his nerve completely. An unbroken wall of utter blackness was riding up the sky, climbing visibly even as he watched. He had heard and seen the onset of the hurricane, and he did not wait for more.

  "I was just coming to get you," said Mick, when Johnny closed the door thankfully behind him. Those were the last words that he heard for many hours. Seconds later, the whole house gave a shudder. Then came a noise which, despite its incredible violence, was startlingly familiar. For a moment it took Johnny back to the very beginning of his adventures; he remembered the thunder of the Santa Anna jets, only a few feet beneath him, as he climbed aboard the hovership, half a world away and a seeming lifetime ago.

  The roar of the hurricane had already made speech impossible. Yet now, unbelievably, the sound level became even higher, for such a deluge as Johnny had never imagined was descending upon the house. The feeble word "rain" could not begin to describe it. Judging by the sound that was coming through roof and walls, a man in the open would be drowned by the sheer mass of descending water-if he was not crushed first.

  Yet Mick's family was taking all this quite calmly. The younger children were even gathered around the television set, watching the pictures, though they could not hear a word of the sound. Mrs. Nauru was placidly knitting-a rare accomplishment which she had learned in her youth and which normally fascinated Johnny because he had never seen anyone doing it before. But now he was too disturbed to watch the intricate movement of the needles and the magical transformation of wool into sock or sweater.

  He tried to guess, from the uproar around him, what was happening outside. Surely, trees were being torn up by their roots; boats and eve'n houses scattered by the gale! But the howl of the wind and the deafening, unending crash of water masked all other sounds. Guns might be booming outside the door, and no one would ever hear them.

  Johnny looked at Mick for reassurance; he wanted some sign that everything was all right, that it would soon be over and everything would be normal. But Mick shrugged his shoulders, then made a pantomime of putting on a face mask and breathing from an Aqualung mouthpiece, which Johnny did not think at all funny in the circumstances.

  He wondered what was happening to the rest of the island, but somehow nothing seemed real except this one room and the people in it. It was as if they alone existed now, and the hurricane was launching its attack upon them personally. So might Noah and his family have waited for the flood to rise around them, the sole survivors of their world.

  Johnny had never thought that a storm on land could frighten him; after all, it was "only" wind and rain. But the demonic fury raving around the frail fortress in which he was sheltering was something beyond all his experience and imagination. If he had been told that the whole island was about to be blown into the sea, he would have believed it

  Suddenly, even above the roar of the storm, there came the sound of a mighty crash-though whether it was close at hand or far away it was impossible to tell. At the same instant, the lights went out.

  That moment of utter darkness, at the height of the storm, was one of the most terrifying that Johnny had ever experienced. As long as he had been able to see his friends, even if he could not talk with them, he had felt reasonably safe. Now he was alone in the screaming night, helpless before natural forces that he had never known existed.

  Luckily, the darkness lasted for only a few seconds. Mr. Nauru had been expecting the worst; he had an electric lantern ready, and when its light came on, showing everything quite unchanged, Johnny felt ashamed of his fright.

  Even in a hurricane, life continues. Now that they had lost the television, the younger children started to play with their toys or read picture books. Mrs. Nauru continued placidly knitting, while her husband began to plow through a thick World Food Organization report on Australian fisheries, full of charts, statistics, and maps. When Mick set up a game of checkers, Johnny did not feel much like challenging him, but he realized that it was the sensible thing to do.

  So the night dragged on. Sometimes the hurricane slackened for a moment, and the roar of the wind dropped to a level at which one could make oneself heard by shouting. But nobody made the effort, for there was nothing to say, and very quickly the noise returned to its former volume.

  Around midnight, Mrs. Nauru got up, disappeared into the kitchen, and came back a few minutes later with a jug of hot coffee, half a dozen tin mugs, and an assorted collection of cakes. Johnny wondered if this was the last snack he would ever eat; nevertheless, he enjoyed it, and then went on losing games to Mick.

  Not until four in the morning, a bare two hours before dawn, did the fury of the storm begin to abate. Slowly its strength ebbed, until presently it was no more than an ordinary howling gale. At the same time the rain slackened, so that they no longer seemed to be living beneath a waterfall. Around five, there were a few isolated gusts, as violent as anything that had gone before, but they were the hurricane's dying spasms. By the time the sun rose over the battered island, it was possible to venture out of doors.

  Johnny had expected disaster, and he was not disappointed. As he and Mick scrambled over the dozens of fallen trees that were blocking once familiar paths, they met the other islanders wandering around, like the dazed inhabitants of a bombed city. Many of them were injured, with heads bandaged or arms in slings, but by good planning and good luck, there had been no serious casualties.

  The real damage was to property. All the power lines were down, but they could be quickly replaced. Much more serious was the fact that the electric generating plant was ruined. It had been wrecked by a tree that had not merely fallen, but had walked end over end for a hundred yards and then smashed into the power building like a giant club. Even the stand-by Diesel plant had been involved in the catastrophe.

  There was worse to come. Sometime during the night, defying all predictions, the wind had shifted around to the west and attacked the island from its normally sheltered side. Of the fishing fleet, half had been sunk, while the other half had been hurled up on the beach and smashed into firewood. The Flying Fish lay on her side, partly submerged. She could be salvaged, but it would be weeks before she would sail again.

  Yet despite all the ruin and havoc, no one seemed too depressed. At first Johnny was astonished by this; then he slowly came to understand the reason. Hurricanes were one of the basic, unavoidable facts of life on the Great Barrier Reef. Anyone who chose to make his home here must be prepared to pay the price. If he couldn't take it, he had a simple remedy; he could always move somewhere else.

  Professor Kazan put it in a different way, when Johnny and Mick found him examining the blown-down fence around the dolphin pool.

  "Perhaps this has put us back six months," he said. "But we'll get over it. Equipment can always be replaced-men and knowledge can't. And we've lost neither of those."

  "What about OSCAR?" Mick asked.

  "Dead-until we get power again, but all his memory circuits are intact"

  That means no lessons for a while, thought Johnny. The ill wind had blown some good, after all.

  But it had also blown more harm than anyone yet appreciated-anyone exce
pt Nurse Tessie. That large and efficient woman was now looking, with utter dismay, at the soaking wreckage of her medical stores.

  Cuts, bruises, even broken limbs, she could deal with, as she had been doing ever since dawn. But anything more serious was now beyond her control; she did not have even an ampoule of penicillin that she could trust.

  In the cold and miserable aftermath of the storm, she could count on several chills and fevers and perhaps more serious complaints. Well, she had better waste no time radioing for fresh, supplies.

  Quickly she made a list of the drugs which, she knew from earlier experience, she would be needing in the next few days. Then she hurried to the Message Center, and received a second shock.

  Two disheartened electronics technicians were toasting their soldering irons on a Primus stove. Around them was a shambles of wires and broken instrument racks, impaled by the branch of a pandanus tree that had come straight through the roof.

  "Sorry, Tess," they said. "If we can raise the mainland by the end of the week, it'll be a miracle. We're back to smoke signals, as of now."

  Tessie thought that over.

  "I can't take any chances," she said. "Well have to send a boat across."

  Both technicians laughed bitterly.

  "Hadn't you heard!" said one. "Flying Fish is upside down, and all the other boats are in the middle of the island, parked in the trees."

  As Tessie absorbed this report-slightly, but only slightly, exaggerated-she felt more helpless than she had ever been since that time Matron had ticked her off as a raw probationer. She could only hope that everyone would keep healthy until communications were restored.

  But by evening she had attended to one injured foot that looked gangrenous; and then the Professor, pale and shaky, came to see her.

  "Tessie," he said, "you'd better take my temperature. I think I've got a fever."

  Before midnight, she was sure that it was pneumonia.

  Chapter 19

  The news that Professor Kazan was seriously ill, and that there was no way of treating him adequately, caused more dismay than all the damage wrought by the hurricane. And it hit no one harder than Johnny.

  Though he had never stopped to think about it, the island had become the home he had never known, and the Professor a replacement for the father he could scarcely remember. Here he had felt the security which he had longed for and unconsciously striven to find. Now that security was threatened because no one could get a message across a hundred miles of sea-in this age when moons and planets talked to one another.

  Only a hundred miles! Why, he himself had traveled a greater distance, when he first came to the island.

  And with that memory, he suddenly knew, beyond all doubt or argument, exactly what he had to do. Dolphins had brought him as far as Dolphin Island; now they could carry him the rest of the way to the mainland.

  He was sure that Susie and Sputnik, taking turns in pulling the surfboard, could get him across that hundred miles of water in less than twelve hours. This would be the pay-off for all the days they had spent together, hunting and exploring along the edge of the reef. With the two dolphins beside him, he felt absolutely safe in the sea; they knew all his wishes, even without the use of the communicator.

  Johnny looked back at some of the trips they had made together. With Susie towing Mick's large board, and Sputnik towing Johnny on a smaller one, they had once crossed to the adjacent reef on Wreck Island, which was about ten miles away. The journey had taken just over an hour-and the dolphins had not been hurrying.

  But how could he convince anyone that this was not a crazy, suicidal stunt? Only Mick would understand. The other islanders would certainly stop him if they had any idea what he was planning. Well, he would have to get away before they knew.

  Mick's reaction was just what he had expected. He took the plan perfectly seriously, but was not at all happy about it

  "I'm sure it can be done," he said. "But you can't go by yourself."

  Johnny shook his head.

  "I've thought of that," he answered. For the first time in his life, he felt glad that he was small. "Remember those races we've had? How many have you won? You're too big-you'd only slow us down."

  That was perfectly true, and Mick could not deny it. Even the more powerful Susie could not tow him as fast as Sputnik could tow Johnny.

  Defeated on this point, Mick tried a new argument

  "It's over twenty-four hours since we've been cut off from the mainland. Before long, someone's bound to fly over to see what's happened, since they've had no word from us. You may risk your neck for nothing."

  "That's true," admitted Johnny. "But whose neck is more important-mine or Professor Kazan's? If we keep on waiting, it may be too late. Besides, they'll be pretty busy on the mainland after that storm. It may be a week before they work around to us."

  "Tell you what" said Mick. "We'll get organized, and if there's no sign of help and the Professor's still bad by the time you're ready to go, then we'll talk it over again."

  "You won't speak to anyone?" said Johnny anxiously.

  "Of course not. By the way, where are Susie and Sputnik? Are you sure you can find them?"

  "Yes-they were around the jetty earlier this morning, looking for us. They'll come quickly enough when I push the HELP! button.""

  Mick began to count items off on his fingers.

  "You'll want a flask of water-one of those flat plastic ones-some concentrated food, a compass, your usual diving gear-I can't think of anything else. Oh, a flashlight-you won't be able to do'the whole trip in the daytime."

  "I was going to leave around midnight, then I'll have the Moon for the first half of the way, and I'll hit the coast during daylight."

  "You seem to have worked it out pretty well," said Mick with grudging admiration. He still hoped that the attempt would be unnecessary and that something would turn up. But if it did not, he would do all that he could to launch Johnny toward the distant mainland.

  Because both boys, like everyone else on the island, had to help with urgent repair work, they could do little until nightfall. Even after darkness came, there were some jobs that continued by the soft light of kerosene lanterns, and it was not until very late in the evening that Johnny and Mick were able to complete their arrangements.

  Luckily, no one saw them as they brought the little surfboard down to the harbor and launched it among the overturned and shattered boats. Equipment and harness were all attached. Only the dolphins were needed now- and the final, unavoidable reason for going.

  Johnny handed the communicator bracelet to Mick.

  "See if you can call them," he said. "I'm running up to the hospital. I won't be more than ten minutes."

  Mick took the bracelet and waded out into deeper water. The fluorescent letters were clearly visible on the tiny keyboard, but he did not need them, for, like Johnny, he could use the instrument blindfolded.

  He sank down into the warm, liquid darkness and lay on the coral sand. For a moment he hesitated; if he wished, there was still time to stop Johnny. Suppose he did nothing with the communicator and then said that the dolphins had never turned up? The chances were that they wouldn't come, anyway.

  No, he could not deceive his friend, even in a good cause, even to save him from risking his life. He could only hope that when Johnny called at the hospital he would hear that the Professor was now out of danger.

  Wondering if he would be sorry for this all his life, Mick pressed the HELP! button and heard the faint buzzing in the darkness. He waited fifteen seconds, then pressed it again-and again.

  For his part, Johnny had no doubts. As he followed the beam of his flashlight up the beach and along the path to the administration center, he knew that he might be setting foot on Dolphin Island for the very last time; that, indeed, he might not live to see another sunrise. This was a burden which few boys of his age had had to bear, but he accepted it willingly. He did not think of himself as a hero; he was merely doing his plain duty. He had
been happy here on the island and had found a way of life that gave him everything he needed. If he wanted to preserve that way of life, he would now have to fight for it-and, if necessary, risk losing it.

  The small hospital building, in which he himself had wakened as a sunburned castaway a year ago, was completely silent. Curtains were drawn on all the windows except one, from which streamed the yellow light of a kerosene lamp. Johnny could not help glancing into the brightly illuminated room; it was the office, and Nurse Tessie was sitting at her desk. She was writing in a large register, or diary, and she looked completely exhausted. Several times she put her hands to her eyes, and Johnny was shaken to realize that she had been crying. The knowledge that this huge, capable woman had been reduced to tears was proof enough that the situation was desperate. Perhaps, he thought with a sudden sinking of his heart, he was already too late.