Free Whale Pot Bay by Des Hunt Page A

thought that I might have been wrong; that was until I saw a black SUV turning around near the top of the cliff. It was Scatworm’s. He was back taking photographs again.
    From the height of the gulley, he would have had many opportunities to take the photos he wanted. The discovery of the stranded whale had made us forget the decisions we’d made earlier. I could picture at least three occasions where Milt and I were together alone. If Scatworm had wanted to shoot Milt down, he would now have plenty of ammunition.
    At some stage in the early morning, I was further disturbed by noises coming from the room alongside mine. It was Stephanie, and she was sobbing. This was the second time she’d slept in that room. On the first, she’d cried most of the night because of my stupidity. This time, Nature was the cause.
    My heart went out to her. She’d probably come here looking forward to a lovely summer next to the sea: sunbathing, swimming, lazing about…Instead, she’d met the very worst that our beach could dish up. Just as she was coping with things again, her life had been rocked by another death. I could understand why she felt so strongly about saving the mother whale—she’d already experienced more than enough death.
    When the sky showed the first signs of light, I heard scuffling next door, as if she was getting up. Soon afterwards, there was a light knock on my door.
    ‘Jake?’ she whispered. ‘Are you awake?’
    I felt like saying ‘I am now’, but there was an urgency to her whispers that stopped me being flippant. ‘Yes,’ I replied, clambering out of bed. ‘Wait a moment.’ I quickly pulled on some clothes before opening the door to find her already dressed.
    ‘What is it?’
    ‘We’ve got to go to her. She’s in trouble.’
    I didn’t ask who ‘she’ was, nor did I ask how Stephanie knew. ‘All right,’ I said, thinking quickly. ‘While I finish getting dressed, go to the kitchen and write a note on the whiteboard saying what we’re doing.’
    She nodded and moved off.
    A short time later, we were climbing into the jeep. She got in without comment; however, I’m sure she couldn’t help but remember the last time she’d been in it.
    The eastern sky was bright by the time we got to the top of the track. Even though the sun had not yet made an appearance, there was enough light to see into the bay, and what we saw there made my stomach sink, just as ithad the day before. The mother had stranded on the high tide. While she was not entirely out of the water, she was far enough up for it to be too shallow to swim.
    ‘I knew,’ said Stephanie, sadly. ‘Somehow I just knew.’
    ‘It’s going to be difficult saving her from there,’ I said.
    She turned and glared at me. ‘We’re going to do it, though, aren’t we?’
    I nodded slowly. ‘We can try.’
    ‘We’ll try and we’ll win,’ she said determinedly.
    ‘Then we’d better get down there and start,’ I said.
    The track was awkward for Stephanie. Her rebuilt hips had trouble with the steepness and the uneven surface. I had to support her for most of the journey. Yet she never complained, and nor did she seem to mind that I was holding her. I began to think that maybe this stranding could heal the rift between us.
    As we walked across the sand, the elevator began to move down from Tarquins. In it I could see Milt and the two people from the university.
    We reached the whale at the same time. Straight away, Colin pulled out a stethoscope and began to examine her: we watched and waited for the verdict.
    ‘Her heart rate’s not too bad,’ he said after a while. ‘A little too quick, but there’s still plenty of punch to it. I don’t think she’s been here too—’ He suddenly stopped talking and moved the stethoscope towards her tail, where he listened intently, before shifting it again.
    ‘Mmm,’ he said, lowering the instrument until it rested around his neck. ‘I don’t know whether this is good news or not.’ He