‘You let go of the one piece of evidence that might make me believe this whole fairy tale?’
‘It happened, OK? I’m sorry, but you might do the same if you were surrounded by a whole mob of sharks.’ Ruby was feeling the anger rise up in her. Sooner or later she was going to say something everyone would regret.
‘The collective noun is a school or shoal, or if you must be dramatic, a shiver,’ said LB.
‘Well, a mob is what it felt like to me,’ said Ruby, her voice loud and firm. She was on the very verge of telling LB where she might want to stick it. But fortunately, Hitch stepped in.
‘Look LB.’ His voice was calm and steady. ‘I wouldn’t have taken a risk like this if I hadn’t thought there was something sound in the kid’s thinking. Ruby’s a smart kid, we all appreciate that. More importantly, I trust her instincts – maybe these guys already plundered the wreck; maybe we were just too darned late.’
‘Acting on instincts is all very well. Acting on instincts without getting permission from your senior agent is reckless. Let me remind you both that you are not the ones who have to call up Agent Trent-Kobie at Sea Division and explain the actions of their renegade staff.’
‘I’ll give you that,’ said Hitch. ‘But what if the kid had been right? What if the kid is right? Shouldn’t we be trying to track these guys down?’
‘Have you ever paused to consider why anyone would go to all this effort for something as corny as treasure? Is it really worth it?’
‘No,’ said Ruby. ‘It isn’t worth it.’
LB turned to look at her, speechless. She waved for Ruby to continue.
‘Either the mastermind behind this is a madman or the treasure is only a part of it. To my mind, there has to be something more.’
‘Now I’m interested,’ said LB. ‘Continue.’
‘I don’t know,’ said Ruby. She didn’t want to mention her theory to LB yet – that someone was after the rubies in a cave that a four-year-old girl had insisted was real exactly 200 years ago. It would sound too crazy. Too ‘fairy tale’, as LB had put it.
LB stared at her for the longest fifteen seconds ever recorded and then said, ‘Well, come back when you do.’ She picked up the phone, dialled a number and launched right into a whole ’nother conversation.
Meeting over.
Hitch closed the door behind them. ‘Well, I think that went well kid.’
‘She doesn’t give a person a whole lot of slack, huh?’ said Ruby.
‘Never has, never will.’ He patted her on the back. ‘Come on, let’s get out of here. You need to take some time off; you’re growing dark circles around your eyes.’
Ruby sighed. They had found nothing, but that didn’t mean there had been nothing to find. Maybe, like Hitch said, they were just too darned late. Perhaps it was also too late to catch these particular sea bandits; perhaps they had found exactly what they wanted and were now miles and miles away…
Or perhaps not.
Wherever they were though, they had managed to find a pretty secret hiding place. There had been absolutely no sign of them today, neither below the sea nor above.
Ruby was right back at square one. And worse still, she’d managed to get Kekoa pretty badly injured and really annoy the powerful woman who ran the secret agency she worked for.
A great day’s work, thought Ruby. Nice going Redfort.
THE HOUSE WAS QUIET – Ruby’s parents must be out at their tennis club, unaware that their daughter had almost been swallowed by a whole batch, shiver or mob of murderous sharks.
It had been a sobering experience and it made Ruby want to talk to one person above all. She dialled the number, but it went straight to voicemail.
‘Look Clance, sorry for what I said, OK? Sorry for being a complete pain in the behind and a total duh brain. No excuses, just sorry. Call me.’ She replaced the receiver and went to change her clothes. Before she had made it four steps across the room, the telephone rang. She picked up the donut phone.
‘Hey Rube, you’re forgiven, wanna hang out?’
‘Sure I do Clance my old pal. What have you got in mind?’
It was Elliot’s idea. Cycle out to Far-West beach and spend the night telling ghoulish stories under the stars. No one took a whole lot of persuading, but it was Elliot who was the true campfire kid – he liked nothing better than collecting driftwood and frying things out in the open.
Elliot, Mouse, Red and Del were already there by the time Clancy and Ruby arrived. It had been a last-minute sort of plan, but like all the best last-minute plans it had come together easily. There was no danger of running out of supplies since Mrs Digby had packed them off with way too many home-made burgers, ingredients for hot chocolate, marshmallows and everything else that made an evening cookout satisfying.
It was a pretty perfect night for such a plan and once they had got themselves settled, they rolled out their sleeping bags and sat warming their hands by the fire’s glow. Gradually, the talk moved from school to current Twinford events, the fleeing crabs, the dangerous dolphins, the confused sharks and the sea strangler that had killed the fisherman. All of Twinford had read about it in the papers – it was big news.
‘Who do you think he is?’ asked Elliot.
‘Or she,’ said Mouse.
‘Yeah, that’s right,’ agreed Del. ‘It could be a female strangler.’
‘How do you think she does it?’ asked Red.
‘Or he,’ added Clancy.
‘I reckon she or he climbs aboard the boat while the victim is looking the other way and takes the poor old fisherman by surprise,’ said Del.
‘I don’t think so,’ said Elliot, shaking his head. ‘It’s just not realistic. The strangler’s already in the boat – hiding under a tarpaulin or nets or something.’
‘So what’s the perpetrator’s motive?’ said Mouse, finally asking the question no one had got around to asking.
‘He’s a psychopath,’ said Clancy firmly.
‘Or she’s a psychopath,’ said Red.
‘Did anyone ever think,’ said Ruby, the merest hint of drama in her voice. ‘Did anyone ever think that this he or she might be an it?’
Her words hung in the air. No one had thought this thought because it didn’t really seem possible.
‘What,’ said Clancy, ‘like you mean some kind of creature?’
‘What kind of creature?’ asked Del.
‘I get it,’ said Mouse. ‘I see where you’re coming from, like maybe this creature they talk about in the legends of Twinford.’
‘That kinda thing,’ said Ruby.
‘Wow!’ said Red. ‘You really mean there’s an actual sea-strangling monster!’
A short grunting snort came from Elliot’s nose, then silence. His face was contorted, his eyes shut tight. There was a twenty-second pause before Elliot Finch finally erupted into uncontrollable giggles, barely audible at first but gathering volume.
‘You mean…’ He was almost unable to string the words together as he gulped in air. ‘You mean you think…