Back on board he was able to relax. The boat appeared to be exactly as they had left it. But Moses now introduced another source of stress. He and Jordan unlashed the dinghy and lifted it off the aft hatchway, then raised the hatch cover. Then he gestured inside and said, “You kids had better look at this diving gear we borrowed and check it out. It looked OK to us, but, as I said, we ain’t divers. The fella who loaned it, he say it good, but you make sure eh? If it ain’t we have to arrange for some more tomorrow, if we can.”
That really set Andrew’s heart a-flutter. In front of his father and two relative strangers he had to demonstrate that he really did know what he was doing!
Jordan climbed into the hatchway. “This is our fish freezer normally,” he explained as he passed up an air cylinder. Andrew gulped and took the cylinder, then carried it aft and laid it flat on the deck. Carmen took another and did likewise. Moses rigged a light on an extension lead from the end of the boom and their father helped lift things out.
Moses pointed to the wet suits and fins now spread on the deck. “These are the sizes you gave me. My mate Andy, he say you better take a few other sizes just in case, because gear that don’t fit, leaks or really hurts to wear.”
“You can say that again!” Andrew commented, remembering the fins he had worn during his pool training. He was feeling slightly better now because the gear was all so familiar and he had Carmen to help. To his own surprise he actually knew what to do to check it all. There were 10 air tanks and three regulator sets (‘In case one goes bung,’ Jordan commented). With very little hesitation Andrew screwed a regulator onto the tank valves, made sure the pressure gauge was face down for safety, then unscrewed the valve. Compressed air hissed gently in. On turning the gauge over Andrew saw that the air pressure showed 250psi, which was satisfactory.
Andrew next tested the smell of the air and then the actual regulator. It seemed to give air freely and the alternate worked as well. So did the inflator hose. While he did this Carmen tested a second regulator and air tank. Having checked the regulators Andrew and Carmen then tested each of the tanks and found them all to be satisfactory, all above 200psi at least.
Next Andrew tried on a BCD. Once having adjusted it, he partially inflated it and then deflated it. There did not seem to be any problems there but he was pleased to note a spare BCD on a clothes hanger. Carmen found hers to be satisfactory as well. Brother and sister then set to work making up their weight belts. Andrew knew what weights he needed and he threaded them on to the belt and then stood up and tried the belt for fit and for the working of the quick release catch.
That done he began the more mundane checks of face masks, fins and wet suits. As Andrew zipped a wet suit on his father nodded and said, “I am feeling a lot happier now. Watching you two has at least reassured me that you learnt something on those dive courses. You seem to know what you are doing.”
Moses nodded. “Like professionals,” he commented.
Andrew certainly did not feel like that. Now he felt scared. With the wet suit on and the face mask on his face and the water lapping alongside the fear of diving hit him with redoubled force. ‘I’ll be alright in the daylight,’ he tried to reassure himself. But he was pleased to have been able to show he was competent with the equipment. That was something.
Once everything was checked they hung the wet suits and BCDs up on coat hangers and then carefully re-stowed the other gear back in the fish freezer. The hatch cover was secured and the dinghy lifted back on top and lashed firmly in place. Jordan grunted with approval at the seamanlike way both Andrew and Carmen tightened the lashings and then tied them with the correct knots.
By then it was 9:50 pm and Andrew felt very tired. As he and Carmen followed the others into the brightly lit cabin their father held out the mobile phone.
“Your mother. Tell her the news and then come and have some supper.”
Andrew was glad to hear his mother’s voice. It was more comforting than he wanted to admit. He assured her that he was alright and that the diving gear was good. Then he gave the phone to Carmen and went and sat down. A cup of hot cocoa was placed in front of him, along with some powdered milk and a tin of sugar.
“There’s condensed milk there if you prefer,” Jordan said.
Not having real milk was a bit of a shock to Andrew. Only once before that he could remember had he had powdered milk. Aunt Phoebe used it in her tea, claiming she liked it. Andrew remembered it as having an odd, ‘squeaky’ feel to it in his mouth when eaten dry with a spoon. Now, rather than admit there was a problem, he cautiously scooped a spoonful into his cocoa and then tried to stir it in. In this he was only partly successful and he hoped that none of the adults noticed the lumps. Sugar was easier and he did some more vigorous stirring, hoping the lumps of powdered milk would dissolve.
They didn’t but he drank the cocoa anyway. Carmen joined them and handed the mobile phone to her father. She then set to work to make up her milk. Andrew watched enviously as she quickly whipped it into a cream which then dissolved completely in her drink. Seeing his interested look she said, “Guides. I learnt how to make powdered milk at guide camps.”
Moses took a big slurp of hot cocoa and then put his mug down. “Well, we ready I reckon,” he said. “We got the boat and a week’s provisions. And we got the chart showing us where.”
“We hope,” Jordan interjected.
Moses grinned and went on, “And we got the divers and their gear. So we get under way now and we be out on the reef by sunrise eh?”
Mr Collins agreed and Andrew felt his stomach turn over with apprehension. Once the launch left the wharf he was irrevocably committed. Now is the time, he told himself, to admit he could not do it. But his tongue would not function and when told to go and cast off the stern mooring he just meekly did so. There was even a moment’s temptation to stay up on the jetty but he told himself that would be even more humiliating as they would misunderstand and just come back in again.
So, without betraying any obvious signs of nervousness, Andrew tossed the stern line to Carmen, then ran forward and unhooked the bow line and threw it to Jordan. In three strides he was at the edge of the wharf and with one more he was on the foredeck. It was done- he was committed, whether he liked it or not.
His stomach churning with fear Andrew mechanically obeyed Jordan’s instructions to coil the line and then stow it neatly. That done he made his way aft and down the tiny companionway into the cabin, pulling the door shut behind him. By then the launch was already twenty metres from the wharf and under way. The cabin lights had been dimmed and the only light visible inside was a shaded lamp over the chart table and a dim light inside the compass housing.
Moses grinned as he spun the wheel and then pushed the throttle. “No fancy radar and stuff like that on this old tub,” he said.
“Only a GPS,” Carmen commented, pointing to the Global Position System Indicator resting on the shelf in front of the compass.
“And a sonar set,” Andrew added.
Moses laughed so loudly that his big belly quivered. “Yeah, well. That our fish finder. A man’s gotta move with the times eh?”
Mr Collins now said, “You children had better get to bed. It is well after ten.”
That was the last thing Andrew wanted to do, even though he felt quite exhausted. “Please Dad, not till we are out of harbour.”
“Oh, alright. But then no arguments. You need to be rested before you start diving. I know that much.”
Andrew promised he would. Carmen then asked if they were to share the watch during the night. Their father did not like that idea, shaking his head and insisting they sleep. “I can do that,” he replied.
By this time the launch was several hundred metres from the wharf and was puttering quite rapidly across the small waves. Andrew walked over to the chart table and looked around. To port were the lights of the town, then another cluster that marked the yacht marina. After that there was an area of darkness that the chart marked as a m
angrove swamp. Next the bulk of Flagstaff Hill stood up boldly. Lights twinkled from a building on top and there was a small cluster of lights indicating more buildings along the lower slopes leading out to Dalrymple Point.
For ten minutes the launch headed South East, almost directly towards a fairly large island. Andrew bent over the chart to check its name and noted several other islands as well. ‘That big one is Stone Island,’ he told himself. It had lights on it as well. ‘There should be a smaller island off to port, with a lighthouse on it,’ he noted.
Even as he turned to look Moses spun the wheel, bringing the launch around to port. Stone Island appeared to slide across the silvery sea and the small, rocky islet appeared. North Head he thought it was called, noting a South Head on the closest part Stone Island. The flash of a revolving light showed that there was indeed a lighthouse on the smaller island. ‘We are going out through the North Entrance,’ Andrew noted.
As the launch came out from the lee of Flagstaff Hill the size of the waves increased considerably. The bow began to pitch and punch. The first splatters of spray came rattling back onto the front windows. The movement became so pronounced that Andrew felt twinges of real alarm. Glances at Moses and Jordan, showing both chatting unconcernedly, helped to ease his worst fears but he still remained worried that the boat was much too small to go out on the open sea. But that was exactly where they were going and Andrew could only gulp and grip the bench as cold waves of fear swept through him.
The launch was turned even more to pass between Stone Island and North Head. It was then heading North East and the motion changed to a sickening and equally frightening rolling. Andrew watched the horizon slide up out of view, then roll quickly back down again. The waves appeared to be an endless succession of black crinkles sweeping towards them. Andrew felt sure that the launch was going to roll right over and he badly wanted to ask where the lifejackets were. But everyone else looked so calm he did not dare, for fear of looking foolish.
‘This thing is going to capsize any minute,’ he thought anxiously. For fear of being trapped in the cabin he walked aft onto the fish deck and pretended to be looking at the land. That did hold his interest well enough to dull the edge of the fear. He noted with some surprise that the small island with the lighthouse was actually quite a large island. Then, as the island slid past abeam, the launch altered course further to port and the motion again changed. Now they were taking the waves on the starboard quarter. That was very much easier, with only an occasional sickening yaw and sliding feeling as she went quickly down the face of a particularly big wave.
Carmen joined him and pointed back to starboard, indicating the long stretch of Kings Beach and then the rocky mass of Cape Edgecumbe. More lights twinkled there. “It looks nice even at night,” she commented. “I’ve heard it is a lovely place to visit.”
“We will,” Andrew said, as much for something to say. “We will bring the catamaran and sail to all those islands back there.”
“There are a lot, aren’t there?” Carmen replied. “I counted five or six on the chart.”
While they were discussing this their father came out. “Right you kids, into bed. It is after eleven.”
“Aye aye sir,” Andrew replied, thinking that was suitably nautical.
He and Carmen made their way forward, saying goodnight to Moses and Jordan as they passed through the cabin. Jordan was busy arranging bedding on the bench seat beside the galley. Down in the sleeping quarters Andrew was again assailed by anxiety. He almost had a bout of nausea at the smell. However there was nothing for it but to spread his unzipped sleeping bag and pillow and climb into the bunk. He did not change into pyjamas, instead staying in his shorts and shirt. Carmen did likewise so there was no embarrassment.
“Goodnight Sis. See you tomorrow,” he said.
“And the wreck of the Merinda,” Carmen answered.
At the mention of the wreck Andrew experienced a mix of emotions: strong desire to find it; anxiety about diving. He smiled at his sister and then rolled over. Carmen flicked off the light and Andrew stretched out and pretended he was asleep. But sleep was far away. Close to his face on the other hand was the grimy little porthole and he could see the moonlight glistening on the wave tops. From down near the waterline the waves looked enormous and spray continually flew past. Occasionally the launch rolled so that the porthole went under water. That was a mild source of anxiety as well but already Andrew was becoming used to the motion of the vessel and was less worried.
He did drift off into short snatches of broken sleep. The thing that brought him back to wakefulness was thinking about the course the launch was now on. She was now heading almost due north. A picture of the chart formed in Andrew’s mind and on it was his memory of the pencil line drawn by Moses. When Andrew had studied it earlier he had noted that the planned course ran relatively close to both Nares Rock and Holbourne Island. Now, lying in the darkness and knowing that the launch was pushing its way across the dark sea close to a place with such a tragic history, he conjured up images he had read in accounts of the wreck of the Gothenburg.
His imagination now took over and he wondered if they were on course. ‘If we aren’t careful we might hit that rock too,’ he told himself. So anxious did he become that he started to perspire. Unable to either sleep or set his mind at rest he rolled out of his bunk. For a few moments he studied Carmen in the darkness. She appeared to be sound asleep. So was his father. Tiptoeing so as not to disturb them Andrew made his way up the companionway to the cabin.
As Andrew came up Moses, who was at the wheel, smiled and said, “Can’t sleep eh?”
Andrew shook his head. “Strange bed, and unfamiliar noises,” he replied, by way of excuses. Moses just nodded to that and kept looking out through the cabin windows, steering easily and standing in a very relaxed stance.
On looking out the first thing Andrew saw was a distant flicker of light out to starboard. He stared for a minute or so, then pointed and said, “Is that a lighthouse?”
“Yep. Holbourne Island,” Moses answered.
That gave Andrew and idea of where they were. For a few more minutes he looked out, scanning the sea in all directions. Because the moon had moved higher in the sky the sea now looked much darker, the waves larger and more forbidding. His mind told him they were no larger than before, were only one or two metres, but his emotions made them seem much bigger. To help calm himself he went to the chart table and stared at the chart, then out of the starboard side. All he could see were seemingly endless wave tops.
“Nares Rock is somewhere around here isn’t it?” he asked, trying to sound casual.
Moses nodded and pointed off to the starboard bow. “Over that way a few miles. We won’t go anywhere near it.”
“Will we see it?”
“Nah! It’s always below the water. That’s why it’s such a bloody danger to shipping. You know it ripped the bottom out of a big passenger ship way back in the Nineteenth Century?”
Andrew nodded. “Yes. The Gothenburg. In 1875. I read about it in a book.”
“Yeah. I read an account of the diver’s finding her that fairly gave me the creeps,” Moses replied.
At that Andrew shuddered and images from the book he had read filled his anxious mind. Moses went on, “Yeah, I read that one of the divers who went down opened the door of a cabin and found two young girls who were drowned. He said they were holding each other and that their long hair was drifting backwards and forwards in the water. Fair gave me the shivers reading that.”
It was just such images that were tormenting Andrew. He felt a spasm of horror which made him swallow. “I read that,” he mumbled.
“Yeah,” Moses continued, obviously relishing the ghoulish details, “And in another cabin he found a woman lying on her bunk like she was asleep, and in another was a woman standing up, her arms waving up and down as the current moved her, and her hair all floating around her head like seaweed.”
For a few moments Andrew pictured
these scenes and then experienced an attack of panic as he wondered if he would meet such ghastly things if the found the Merinda. Then he shook his head and told himself not to be silly. ‘It was more than fifty years ago. There won’t be any remains left.’
He voiced this to Moses, who nodded and replied, “Too right. The fishes and the crabs would have long since eaten up anything that hadn’t rotted, other than a few bones maybe.”
That was an equally disturbing idea to Andrew and he cast around for a way to change the topic of conversation. The only one he could think of was the weather but it worked. Moses told him that the midnight radio forecast for the next day was winds easing to 10 to 12 knots. “Anyway, if we can tuck into the lee of the reef the waves shouldn’t be too bad,” he added.
Soon after they passed Holbourne Island Andrew took himself back to his bunk, sure that he would never sleep with his mind filled with ghastly images of drowned people. However exhaustion took over and he slipped into a deep, dreamless sleep. He was woken from it at 0530 by Carmen.
“Come on deck,” she said. “We are approaching the reef and there is another boat there.”
CHAPTER 32
UNDERWATER SEARCH
Andrew swallowed with anxiety and immediately rolled out of bed. Still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes he made his way up to the cabin. Jordan was at the wheel and Andrew’s father sat nearby, staring forward through binoculars. Moses lay asleep on the port side bench seat.
Carmen went back to the small stove where she was busy heating water. “Do you want some coffee or hot chocolate Andrew?” she asked.
“Hot chocolate,” Andrew answered then immediately transferred his attention to the view through the forward windows. It was just light enough to see, a hazy grey, with the waves looking like moving wrinkles of lead. They seemed smaller than when he had gone to bed and he hoped the forecast had been right. Right ahead of them, just visible on the rippling horizon was a tiny grey dot which also moved. The horrible thought that someone else had beaten them to the wreck made Andrew squirm inside.
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