The Secret of the Lonely Isles

by Joanne Van Os

  ‘What is it?’ Maddy, Zac and Tyler leaned across the table, staring at the box. Ella found a chart pin on the nav table and handed it to Jem. He carefully inserted the sharp end into the hole, and felt something click faintly. The false bottom slid out to one side. Jem pulled it the rest of the way, and looked inside the box. There was a cavity below the false bottom, and inside it was a piece of heavy, yellowed parchment.

  It was a map.

  Jem carefully lifted the parchment out and laid it on the table. It was a very faded map of two islands separated by a narrow strait. Ella peered at it through her glasses, and a magnifying glass as well. Jem squinted at the words on it. ‘What language is that?’

  ‘It’s Latin.’ Ella took off her glasses and rubbed the bridge of her nose.

  ‘Latin? Well that’s gunna be a big help,’ said Tyler. ‘Who speaks Latin?’

  ‘Well actually, I do,’ said Ella. ‘Not speak it exactly, but I can read it. We had to learn it at school, and many books were written in it in the olden days. It pays to know Latin if you’re an historian, Tyler.’ She frowned at the map again, and said haltingly, ‘“Beware the rocks at the western entrance. Approach from the northwest and make of one the twin pyramids …” Umm, can’t make out the next bit … “to find sanctuary inside the island …” The rest of the writing has faded too much. I can’t read it.’

  ‘Sounds like a secret code or something,’ said Zac.

  ‘It means you have to line up two features in order to find a safe passage into that entrance from the western side, to avoid the rocks. It’s a common direction in sailing, lining up two posts, or two palm trees and so on. That gives you the right angle to sail in on to avoid rocks or some other obstruction.’ Ella squinted at the tattered paper again.

  ‘Are they the Lonely Isles?’ asked Maddy. ‘This map only shows two islands, not five. I mean, there could be lots of islands separated like that, couldn’t there?’

  ‘You’re quite right,’ murmured Ella, still studying the map with the magnifying glass. ‘One shouldn’t jump to conclusions. However, look at this …’ and she held the magnifying glass while Maddy peered through it at a title on the bottom of the map.

  ‘I can see it – what does it mean?’

  ‘It’s Latin for “The Twins”. If you look at the map of the Lonely Isles on our chart, it calls the two islands “Castor” and “Pollux”. They were famous twins in Roman mythology, the brothers of Helen of Troy. I think that answers your question, Maddy.’

  She bent over the map again. ‘Here’s a bit more. It says here “safe passage inside … shelter …” and then what looks like a signature – Captain Maarten van Delft, 1705.’ She blinked in amazement. ‘Maarten van Delft landed on the Tiwi Islands in that year. He and his ship must have sailed into the passage and sheltered from a storm, or perhaps they landed to get fresh water … I wonder how this map ended up in that box?’

  It took two days to sail to the islands, and Jem was sick the whole way. He had never felt so bad, not even when he and Tyler had eaten a whole chocolate mud cake once, or when he had gastro at school camp. This was the kind of sick that made you want to swim back to shore, even if you couldn’t see it. His head was pounding, and he felt like throwing up all the time. He lost count how many times he spewed over the side. He clung onto the rail and stared at the water rushing past the hull and wished he was anywhere but on this yacht. Even at home with his dad yelling at him, or in school facing fifteen exams, or locked up with Neenie and her snakes and ladders for ever. Just not on this boat. He didn’t know it was possible to feel this awful. When he wasn’t chucking up over the side of the boat, he stood in the cockpit, holding onto the top of the cabin roof, and stared at the line where the sea met the sky.

  ‘It helps if you watch the horizon,’ Ella had said. But it didn’t seem to be working. Jem wouldn’t have felt quite so bad if he wasn’t the only person who was seasick. The others were fine. Zac and Tyler played a board game in the saloon, occasionally checking the fishing lines towed behind the boat. Maddy listened to music on her iPod, while Ella read, and spent a lot of time apparently just thinking. Jem imagined she must have done a lot of thinking, sailing around the world on her own.

  As well as feeling sick, he was also sleeping badly. He had drawn the bottom bunk, which was just as well, considering he had a bucket jammed next to it. At least he stopped vomiting when he was lying down, but sleep was elusive. That night, when he did manage to drift off, he had vivid dreams about shipwrecks, storms, and a disturbing one about an island and a dark-haired boy who stood on a cliff top, in a torn coat, staring out to sea. Maddy was staring at him when he woke.

  ‘You were yelling in your sleep last night.’ She frowned at the floor before glancing at Jem briefly. ‘You okay?’

  ‘Just a bad dream – seasickness I reckon. S’nothin’.’

  She nodded and went out, leaving Jem rubbing his face and trying to remember the dream. All he could remember was that the boy had been trying to tell him something important, something … but it was gone.

  From the time they left Port Essington, Ella insisted they all take their turn at steering, and before long each of them felt comfortable handling the yacht. The task of concentrating on keeping Freya on course, and making allowances for wind and current, meant that Jem forgot about feeling sick for at least some of the day.

  Late afternoon on the second day after leaving Port Essington, they arrived at the Lonely Isles. There were five islands in the group, three of them only a few hectares each in size and huddled close together. Past them, a little further east, lay Castor and Pollux. A wall of white water foamed across the gap between them.

  ‘There it is – the Hole in the Wall,’ said Ella, as she turned Freya into the wind and stopped her. Jem could see how it had earned the odd name. Sheer cliffs rose up either side of the passage, almost touching each other at the top. From a distance, it would be hard to tell whether there was one island or two. He looked at the churning white water, and felt the bottom drop out of his stomach.

  Pollux, the smaller of the two islands, was the southernmost. It was higher in the south, and sloped gently northwards till it dropped sharply into the sea along the strait. Castor was larger. Jem stared at it, all feelings of seasickness forgotten. He remembered this. It was in his dream. The sheer cliffs rising out of the sea, the dark passage along the base, with no sign of a safe haven. His neck prickled uncomfortably.

  There were no safe anchorages anywhere near the Hole in the Wall. The two islands were surrounded by fringing reef that dropped sharply away into water too deep for the anchor, so Ella took the yacht back to one of the smaller islands, and found a sheltered spot out of the wind and current. After dinner that night they studied the old map again, comparing it with the modern chart.

  ‘That’s a really narrow passage,’ said Jem. ‘Are you sure Freya can fit inside it?’

  ‘Yeah, and what about that wall of water? It looked like a surf beach,’ said Maddy.

  ‘That’s only a tide variation. Tomorrow morning when it’s slack water, or just starting to turn, we’ll be able to get into it without any problems. I’ve sailed through places like this in other parts of the world.’ She smiled encouragingly at them. ‘And, more importantly, we know that it’s been done before. Van Delft’s boat was bigger than Freya,’ said Ella, ‘and it would have had a much deeper draft. The strait looks narrower than it is.’ She sipped her mug of tea, gazing at the map, and then said, ‘Do you know the story of the Clashing Rocks?’

  Everyone looked at her blankly, so she went on. ‘In Ancient Greece, Jason was sent on a mission to find the Golden Fleece, in his ship, the Argo. He had to pass through the Clashing Rocks, which were two huge moving rocks at the entrance to a long narrow passage between the Black Sea and the Aegean. When a ship was passing between them, they would smash together and crush the boat. Jason was warned about them, and told to release a white dove first. The dove flew through, causing the rocks to smash to
gether, and only lost a couple of tail feathers. As soon as the dove got through safely, Jason and his men rowed as fast as they could and passed through, losing only a couple of inches of the stern decoration when the rocks moved on them. After that the rocks moved apart and stayed frozen forever.’ She smiled at them. ‘The Hole in the Wall reminds me of the Clashing Rocks. But at least these ones don’t move.’

  As soon as it was light, they ate a quick breakfast and readied the boat. Jem had woken up with a headache, and a strange heavy feeling. He’d slept badly, dreaming again about the dark-headed boy in the torn coat, and giant rocks chasing him around a stormy sea. He sat hunched and bleary-eyed in the cockpit as Ella started the engine.

  ‘We’ll motor into the strait,’ she announced. ‘We need to have maximum control over the steering, and the wind will be unpredictable going into that entrance. Just to be on the safe side, I want everyone to put on a life jacket.’

  ‘Which rocks do we have to line up?’ asked Jem. ‘How do we know which ones they are? The whole island’s made of rocks!’

  ‘The map says, “Beware the rocks at the western entrance. Approach from the northwest and make of one the twin pyramids.” Can you make out those two peaks on the left side of the strait?’

  Everyone stared at the cliffs in front of them. ‘There!’ said Zac, pointing. ‘Just above that brown mark over there, and the other one’s way over to the right.’

  ‘Well spotted. Now we steer southeast until they line up. See them becoming like pyramids as we move?’

  In a few moments, the two triangular shapes merged into a single pyramid.

  ‘Maddy, what’s the compass heading now?’ said Ella as she held the yacht steady. Maddy read out the figure. ‘Good. Jem, write that down. Tyler and Zac, can you go up into the bow and watch for underwater rocks in front of us? Your eyes are very sharp.’

  It was a very tricky approach. Jem could feel the boat being pushed by the current, and as they drew nearer, jagged black rocks were visible on either side. The current was pulling them into the narrow entrance, like water going down a plug hole, Jem thought. Ella backed off the engine but they were caught in the current, and all she could do was steer them between the rocks.

  The sound of the waves smashing against the base of the cliffs was getting louder. Jem gripped tightly onto the side of the cockpit. No one said a word. Ella’s face was grim with concentration, and suddenly the light dimmed, and they were dragged into the entrance. The narrow passage stretched away in front of them, appearing to turn a corner in the distance, but it was hard to tell in the poor light. Everyone was staring straight ahead, concentrating on the water in front of them, but something caught Jem’s eye. A flash of white against the dark walls.

  ‘Up ahead! What’s that in the water?’ said Tyler suddenly.

  Ella peered into the gloom. ‘Oh dear,’ she said softly, ‘it looks like a whirlpool. Zac, Tyler – come back at once! Everybody hold on!’

  The back of Jem’s neck prickled alarmingly, and he felt very strange, like he was moving in slow motion. He shook his head. He felt very odd.

  ‘Sit down low and hold on!’ yelled Ella as they were drawn closer to the swelling surging water. The edge of the whirlpool caught the little yacht, and tossed it like driftwood, tipping the bow of the boat up into the air. Jem saw Zac slide across the cockpit, and Ella reaching to grab him. Just as she did, the helm spun out of her grip and she fell. Gear was being thrown around inside the cabin. Everyone else was screaming, but for Jem everything was eerily quiet, and the voices sounded far away. The white flash caught his eye again, and he realised it was a bird. It flew down low past the yacht, and veered suddenly into the left-hand wall, and vanished.

  Without understanding what he was doing, he grabbed hold of the helm, and spun the wheel to the left. Freya fought the surge of water and swung her bow slowly and heavily around.

  They were aiming straight for the base of the cliff. Jem pushed the throttle of the engine to full power, and Freya shuddered and shook. With a sudden lurch, she broke free of the clutch of the whirlpool and careered across the churning water.

  ‘What are you doing?’ yelled Maddy. ‘We’re going to hit the wall!’

  Jem dropped the throttle back and Freya slowed as she neared the cliff base. They were going to hit it – there was nothing Jem could do. He hauled on the wheel as hard as he could and succeeded in bringing the bow around further to the left so that she hit the cliff wall broadside, scraping with a sickening screech and a crunch. Just as Jem thought they were all going to die, the wall seemed to open up in front of him, and Freya slid out of the churning strait and into a still, calm little cove.

  He slowed the engine, pushed the gear lever into neutral, and stood at the helm, shaking as the enormity of what had happened – or had nearly happened to them – flooded over him.

  ‘Where are we?’ breathed Maddy.

  Zac hauled himself up from the cockpit floor, and Tyler climbed back up the stairway rubbing his head, having tumbled down the stairs during the boat’s wild ride. Jem shook his head, and blinked a few times.

  ‘I dunno – I saw a bird fly into the wall, and something made me follow it. I didn’t even know this was here.’

  ‘Where –?’ Tyler was cut off by Maddy’s cry.

  ‘Oh no! Ella!’

  Ella was lying on the cockpit floor behind Jem’s feet, blood oozing from a gash in her head. She was unconscious. They rushed to her, and knelt around her body.

  ‘Is she dead?’ whispered Zac nervously.

  Jem felt for a pulse. It was there, on the side of her neck, fluttering feebly. ‘She’s alive, but I think she might be in shock. Um, we have to, we have to …’ He searched his brain vainly for the first aid knowledge he knew was there somewhere, but he felt groggy and disoriented.

  ‘Warm – we have to keep her warm, and check her breathing. Now I remember – check her breathing, put her in the coma position, and cover her up,’ Maddy muttered to herself. ‘She’s breathing okay, so we’ll turn her a bit, like this –’ and they rolled Ella into a prone position. ‘Now, get a sheet and cover her, and we’ll look at that cut.’

  ‘I’ll get the first aid kit,’ said Tyler, and leapt down the stairs.

  The gash didn’t look too severe, and the bleeding had stopped by the time they disinfected it and wrapped a bandage around her head. They made her as comfortable as they could in the cramped space. There was no way they could get her downstairs and onto one of the bunks.

  Jem looked around, and realised with a jolt that they weren’t out of trouble yet. They had escaped out of the boiling strait with its deadly whirlpool, and into a sheltered cove, but Freya was now drifting slowly towards the shore, and a grating noise made him realise they were about to run aground. Zac figured this out at the same time, and he knocked the gear lever into reverse, and revved the engine. Freya hesitated a few long moments, and then with another grating sound, slipped backwards again. Tyler checked the depth sounder, and when he judged they had enough water under the keel, raced forward and let the anchor go. It hit the bottom in a few seconds, and he let out a bit more chain the way Ella had showed them, and then locked it off. Zac shut down the engine.

  Jem gazed around the little cove. The silence after the roaring of the water and the boat motor was almost painful, and his ears rang. The cove was a rough oval shape, maybe the size of two football fields. Looking back, it was hard to make out where they had entered. The cliff walls kind of overlapped each other, and from this angle it was impossible to say where the gap in the wall actually was. Opposite the cliff walls, in the direction Freya was facing, was a little beach of black sand at the foot of steep bushy slopes. At one end of the beach was a densely vegetated gully, and at the other a steep cliff, similar to what they had just come through.

  ‘How’d we get here?’ asked Tyler, finally. ‘I thought we were dead for sure, especially when you aimed straight for the cliff!’

  ‘Yeah! How’d you know to go t
hat way?’ said Zac. ‘I didn’t see anything.’

  Maddy said nothing, just kept stroking Ella’s hair, and rocking herself gently to and fro.

  Jem frowned. ‘I dunno. I saw this bird, a white bird, just before the whirlpool, and it disappeared into the cliff face, and I just thought – well, I didn’t think, really. I just kinda knew that we could follow it,’ he ended lamely. He shook his head – how could he have gambled their lives like that? He’d had no idea what he was doing. What if the bird had just disappeared into a crack in a rock, a nesting spot or something? They would have smashed into the cliff and they all would probably have drowned. The same thought obviously occurred to Tyler and Zac too. They both shook their heads, and Tyler whistled.

  ‘Dude, we are so-o-o lucky.’ He looked around. ‘Well, I think we are. What are we gunna do now?’

  Maddy stirred, and looked up at them. ‘Get on the radio and call for help of course!’

  The boys stared at her stupidly for a few seconds, and then jumped up.

  ‘I’ll do it!’ said Tyler. He leapt down into the cabin, to where the radio sat in the nav area, closely followed by Jem and Zac. Gear was thrown around the cabin, and the contents of several cupboards decorated the floor and the seats in the saloon. But the radio seemed to be undamaged, and Tyler switched the set on, and pressed the call button.

  ‘Hello, hello? This is the Freya. We’re in trouble, can anyone hear us? Over.’

  There was no sound but the crackle of static. He tried again several times, but it seemed as if they were the only people on the planet.

  ‘Look,’ said Zac. ‘There’s a sign here saying how you’re supposed to call. You gotta say it that way …’

  Tyler pressed the microphone button again, and copied the words from the sign beside the radio.

  ‘Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! This is sailing yacht Freya. This is sailing yacht Freya. This is sailing yacht Freya. We need assistance. We are …’ He clicked off. ‘Where are we? I’m supposed to say where we are?’