Pyro Watson and the Hidden Treasure

NETTE HILTON is an established author of children's literature and has won several awards for her books, which range from early childhood to novels for older readers. Her work includes the forever popular A
Proper Little Lady
and
The Web
, both of which have won awards and have been translated into many languages.
Sprite Downberry
, Nette's recent novel for older readers, was shortlisted for the 2009 NSW Premier's Literary Awards. Her work beyond teaching and writing includes regular workshops and author talks at many writing venues, including literature festivals around the country.

 

GREGORY ROGERS studied fine art at the Queensland College of Art. In 1995, Gregory won the Kate Greenaway Medal for his illustrations in
Way Home
. He was the first Australian illustrator to win this prestigious British award. His first wordless picture book
The Boy, The Bear, The Baron, The Bard
was selected as one of the Ten Best Illustrated Picture Books of 2004 by
The New York Times
and shortlisted for the CBCA Book of the Year Awards for Younger Readers in 2005.

Cover

About the Author and Illustrator

Title Page

Copyright Page

Imprint Page

Dedication

Day One - Wednesday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Day Two - Thursday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Day Three - Friday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Day Four - Saturday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Day Five - Sunday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Day Six - Monday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Day Seven - Tuesday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Day Eight - Wednesday

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Day Nine - Thursday

Chapter One, Two, Three and Four

Day Ten - Friday

Chapter One, Two, Three and Four

Pyro Watson clutched his blanket tightly to him. It wasn't going to change anything, no matter how hard he held on. The old camper still swayed and rocked in the night wind. The ocean still hissed and roared and slugged its waves to the beach. The rocks still shone as darkly and the moon still lurked behind dark clouds.

Auntie Mor and Mr Stig still snored at the back of the van.

And Mum, who said Auntie Maureen could have made things easier if she'd just stopped tripping around for ten days so they could all get better organised, was still all the way across the Nullarbor looking after Nan.

Dad had his hands full of the banking business and couldn't possibly, he said, take another week off to look after Pyro and Boa. Boa, whose real name is Beatrice, went to stay with Auntie Cos and that would have been all right because Auntie Cos lived next door to a video shop.

But here he was, with Auntie Mor, don't-call-me-Maureen, and Mr Stig who was Auntie Mor's newest best friend and had not been around long enough to be called Uncle anything.

And not a video shop in sight.

‘You can call me Charles,' Mr Stig had said when Pyro turned up at the caravan park with his sleeping bag and his backpack full of treasures and the newest book on pirates that Dad had bought him to while away the hours until Mum came back. ‘Or Chas. My other friends call me Chas sometimes.'

Pyro tried. He even managed to get it right while they were having dinner but now, in the middle of the night in a van that swayed like a ship at sea, he was Mr Stig again.

Mr Stig with a round belly that was not at all unlike Smee's who sailed with Captain Hook.

Pyro leaned up on one elbow. His head was close to the ceiling in the little pocket that had been especially cleared out for him. It sat above the cabin part of the camper and had a long sideways window across the front. He peered out into the dark night.

Waves.

Moonshadows on the water.

And the horizon way, way ahead of him.

It was a pirate sort of a night. A night when a ship could sail closer and closer and closer to another and then, with one mighty leap, pirates could clash swords with their enemies and take treasures to hide in secret places. Pirates, Pyro knew, weren't too particular about who was an enemy. They even attacked other pirate ships. The way Pyro figured it, pirates probably didn't have too many friends, especially ones on other ships.

Pyro searched along the horizon.

He could easily imagine the outline of a galleon silhouetted against the paler dark of the sky.

It was a night when San Simeon, the greatest seafarer of them all, would have taken his good ship
Olga
out of its hidden cove and into the great unknown of the Tropical Sea. He wasn't afraid of falling off the edge of the world, or of the great serpents that lay in wait beneath the rolling rips of top heavy waves. No … he was the bravest of them all and had promised to spend his days, his entire life, clearing the world of pirates and other evildoers.

‘Stand clear!' San Simeon cried. ‘Stand clear or I'll have you walking the plank!'

Pirates, armed to the teeth with daggers and swords, swung aloft on the sails and ropes.

‘It'll be you who's walking the plank, me hearty!' Their Pirate Chief, the truly dreadful Roaring Roy Bistro, stood his ground. ‘Come aboard, I dare ye!'

San Simeon turned his back and walked across the deck. His men smiled at each other. They knew that he'd never ever walk away from a dare like that.

‘Scaredy cat!' cried the dreadful Bistro. ‘Look at that, me lads! He's a'walking away!'

But Simeon didn't walk away.

As quick as a flea on a fat dog's belly, he jumped up and grabbed the longest rope. He hauled it back and then sprang. His feet skimmed the deck as he sailed forward, the rope in one hand, his sword in the other and his dagger in his teeth. At the last moment Simeon was flung out, out, out over the surging waves. Higher he flew and higher. He ruffled the feathers of a passing pelican and then began his descent.

‘Prepare to meet your doom!' he sang as he landed on the shoulders of the dreadful Bistro.

Roy Bistro slashed at the air with his sword. He roared his rage into the night and spun around trying to rid himself of the brave Simeon.

‘Ah ha!' sang Simeon. He slipped his arm around Bistro's fat neck and held tight. ‘I think, me laddie, it's the cold steel of me dagger you'll be feeling.'

He lifted his dagger but was stopped by a sound he never expected to hear on this awful, stinking pirate ship.

‘Don't!' A fair maiden with long hair that reached down to her bottom held up her arms. ‘Stop!'

San Simeon looked up.

It was a truly desperate sight.

 

‘Pyro?' Auntie Mor was holding up a cup of tea. The sun was shining and the waves on the beach whispered to the shore. ‘Get up, lazy bones. There's a whole day waiting.'

As Pyro Watson stood in the doorway of his aunt's old camper and looked out at the sea – all sparkling and daytime-bright and ready, and the rocks, slippery but littered with shiny splashes of little pools that begged
to be explored – he thought how marvellous this would be if he wasn't alone.

If Geezer Smith was with him.

Or Jenna.

But he was alone and even pools with the promise of sucky-up anemones and little fish and maybe a sea-slug or two weren't quite so thrilling if there was no one with you. Sucky-up things were a little bit scary if there was no one to make you do it. Dare you. Laugh at you. Test it out first. Or go and get a jar while you kept an eye on a particular little fish that would look good on the window ledge at home.

A fish in a jar would die before he even got it home.

There was no window ledge in the upstairs pocket of the camper that was his bedroom for a whole ten days.

And rock pools were just plain dangerous anyway.

‘Back that way, ' Auntie Mor was saying over the rim of her coffee cup, ‘there's the inlet and a cove and it's really neat. But if you go this way –' and she pointed behind her, ‘the inlet sweeps around and it's quiet and still over there. There's even a little boat tied up that we can use, if we want.' She fixed her eyes right on him. ‘You can swim, can't you?'

Pyro nodded.

Of course he could swim, sort of. You didn't get to be nine-and-a-bit if you couldn't swim. Every year at school since kindergarten, teachers had been walking them a zillion miles to the pool and making them learn. He still wasn't all that good at it, though.

‘Put your face in and blow bubbles. Like this!' His dad tried hard but the water always seemed to suck up Pyro's nose instead of bubbling out his mouth. Then he'd choke and that's not a good thing to do under the water. Eventually he'd have to shoot out of the water gasping and gagging and trying to get his hair out of his eyes so he could see.

‘Maybe if you got a haircut,' Dad had suggested. ‘When I was kid we used to all surf out off the rocks. You need to be a good swimmer for that.'

Pyro had seen the water out around those rocks. He'd seen the swish and dark blue swirls that lurked under the bright foam. He'd heard that back-breaking slam of waves against the rocks. Even if he could swim the entire coastline of Australia, nothing would ever make him want to swim in that.

‘You used to have long hair back then.' His mother was good at reminding Dad about things that he had forgotten. ‘What'd you do with it? Wear a bathing cap?'

Pyro would have giggled but it hadn't been the right time. Not by the look on his dad's face. It was the same look he'd worn when the swimming carnival was on and Pyro and Geezer came equal last. Or they would have except they had to be pulled out of the pool before they got to the deepest end. Pyro wasn't too thrilled about deep, deep water.

‘He'll get there in the end, won't you,' his mother always said. ‘Leave him be.'

Dad said that Mum was too soft and if she didn't watch out Pyro would turn into a proper sook. Pyro wasn't sure what a sook was, but he didn't care too much. Just as long as it kept him out of the deep end of the pool.

But they did decide to get his hair cut. It didn't make all that much difference, except it made his ears feel bigger than they really were. It was probably something to do with the water slapping away at the flappy outside bits.

‘I'm not very good, though,' he explained to Auntie Mor in case she was deciding to send him off to swim the English Channel or something. Even if he was brilliant he wasn't going to swim
alone
in a place where bull-sharks and catfish and eels and probably great big man-eating morays were likely to be lurking.

It'd be different if Geezer was here. The sun was getting warmer by the second and the inlet had taken on a lovely pale blue sparkly colour. Aqua, Pyro remembered from his pencil collection. The colour of water.

‘It's a nice aqua colour, isn't it?' Pyro said.

‘I reckon.' Auntie Mor shaded her eyes and looked across the grass at the top of the caravan clifftop to the inlet beyond. ‘Aqua means water. Clever, eh! It's the colour and a name. So, what d'you think, Chas? You ready or not?'

Mr Stig looked like he was sinking down in his chair, which was a bit strange because he was already pretty short to begin with and the chair wasn't the sort that would let him sink too far. ‘I think it would be better if we waited for a little while.'

Auntie Mor stood up and stretched out wide. Her mouth opened in an enormous yawn and she didn't cover it up. His mother would be less than thrilled if Pyro had yawned like that. He was sure of it. And then she burped.

Loudly.

The burp twirled around the table and in and out of the breakfast jam and bread and crumbs and cereal and then sank happily onto the prickly beach grasses.

‘Ahhhh,' she said. ‘Better out than in. And no, Chas, later is not the answer I wanted. Come on. You can't put it off forever!'

Pyro moved from the bottom step of the camper. It was a bit of a stretch, especially with a cup of tea in his hand.

But he couldn't help wondering what couldn't be put off any longer. The question must have been written all over his face, which would have been a bit strange but no stranger than Mr Stig who answered it.

‘I can't swim,' he said. ‘Your Auntie Mor is teaching me.'

Pyro would have suggested having a haircut to make him feel better but as Mr Stig didn't have a lot of hair left, perhaps he would need more help than a quick snip with a pair of scissors.

‘You have to blow bubbles,' Pyro said.

And was very happy that he wasn't the one who was going to have to do it. The shallow, sandy pools along the side were going to be enough to blob around in.

They'd be perfect if Geezer was here.

But he wasn't.

Day Number One was only beginning. There were a whole nine-and-a-half to go.