The Monster of Shiversands Cove (6 page)

 

For some reason, me saying that made Pearl's jaw drop and her eyes narrow. ‘Is that so?' she said. Then she leaned right in my face. ‘For your
further
information,' she hissed, ‘your trap was NOT a good trap. Your trap was a
beginner
trap. I could have done that trap way better.'

Now I could feel
my
jaw drop. The cheek of it! Pearl telling me, an expert trap builder, that my trap was a beginner trap.

She hadn't finished. She jabbed a finger at me. ‘And another thing,' she said. ‘Your den – it could be twice as good as it is. And disguised. IF you built it where
I
would build a den.'

I glared at her, as hard as I could.

‘And STOP glaring,' she snapped. ‘It makes you look like a gorilla.'

A gorilla?

Now, I like gorillas. In fact, they're probably my second favourite after whales. But I did
not
look like a gorilla.

So I stomped off to go exploring on my own and Pearl stomped off and started running around, exploring with Magnus and Claudia and helping them look for castle fairies.

I was miserable, all day long: fed up; lonely; missing Rory; hating this holiday and most of all,
worrying about the sea monster. Even if today was OK, what about all the other days?

But today
wasn't
OK because later that afternoon, the grown-ups decided on one final plan for the day. Back to Lightsands Bay for a swim.

* * *

The sun was low in the sky when we got to Lightsands Bay and the water looked dark. Very dark. ‘Dad,' I said. ‘I want to dig.' I got out the spade because I knew one thing; I was
not
swimming.

Magnus was swimming though and Dad and everyone else: everyone except Pearl. ‘Mum,' she said, ‘I want to read back at our apartment, out on the balcony.'

Pearl and her grown-ups had an apartment in a big building right on the promenade so Pearl got the keys and marched off, nose in the air as she walked past me. A minute later she appeared out on a second-floor balcony, looking straight over the beach. She had a book in her hand and she waved down at her mum.

Then Magnus and Claudia started waving too, but not at Pearl: at the cliff top. They
were jumping up and down, clapping their hands, waving and pointing. I turned. Oh no. There was Harry, a tiny shape with sparkly golden wings zooming over the cliff top from Shiversands Cove. Zooming towards Lightsands Bay.

‘Harry!' shouted Magnus, jumping up and down and waving. ‘Harry! Cooee! We're over here!'

‘We're going swimming, Harry,' bellowed Claudia. ‘You come too!'

All the grown-ups started making gooey faces, the sort grown-ups make when little kids do things they find enchanting, like pretending to have a fairy friend.

Then, Claudia wagged her finger at me. ‘Stan, don't be horrid to Harry today,' she said.

She turned to the grown-ups. ‘Stan doesn't like our fairy,' she told them. ‘Stan shouts at him.' And all the grown-ups looked at me: no gooey faces any more, just frowns.

* * *

I could
not
concentrate on my digging. My eyes kept straying down to the sea, scanning the horizon. Jittering. Staring at Magnus, splashing
about, holding on to his bodyboard, kicking his legs, while Dad pulled him through the water. Staring out over the water.

Here came Harry. He was zooming straight towards me, little nostrils flaring, sniffing all around my head. But I was ready for him. I had leftovers from the picnic in my hand: a big chunk of pepperoni. I wafted it right in front of his small sniffing nose.

Harry licked his lips and went to grab it but I was too quick. I ran off with it. I hurtled down the beach and then chucked the pepperoni out to sea, as far and as high as I could.

Off Harry went, swooping out over the water towards the pepperoni chunk. Then, just as he snapped it up, I spotted something. Something that was swimming round the end of Tide Island, swimming straight towards Lightsands Bay, swerving fast through the water. Swerving towards Dad and Magnus.

I got a cold, cold feeling. Dad and Magnus were right in its path, backs to the sea monster, splashing through the water

I ran. I hurled myself as fast as I could through the water, out towards Dad, towards Magnus. I grabbed hold of Magnus, dragged him off his
bodyboard and back towards the beach. Then I tumbled him on to the sand.

‘GET OUT OF THE WATER!' I shrieked at Dad. ‘The sea monster . . . it's heading this way!'

 

Chapter Nine

In the Shed

A silly thoughtless prank, that's what Dad yelled at me, among other things. As for Magnus, he stood on the beach, dripping and wagging his finger right in my face, telling me that scaring a little boy of four enjoying a splashabout was
actual
bullying.

Dad marched me home and I skulked off to the shed. I sat in there, panicking. My plan of finding things to do on land each day, it would
never
work. Of course it wouldn't.
Never
.

Magnus loves swimming. Magnus averages about three swims a day. I might stay on the beach but Magnus wouldn't and nor would Dad. And we had another eight days here. Eight days, with Magnus having three swims a day, was
twenty-four
chances for a sea monster to attack. Which
it would, I was sure it would. And this time, it might succeed.

I panicked all evening and most of the night. What could I do? One boy against a sea monster, a sea monster five times my size.
At least
.

And all on my own . . .

Except I
wasn't
all on my own because next morning, as I sat on the patio staring out to sea, some walkers arrived. Three walkers were coming over the cliff top. It was Pearl's mum, Pearl's dad and Pearl. They were walking down the path, towards the beach.

I expected Pearl to ignore me: to stick her nose in the air, stomp right past, and on to Claudia's house. But she didn't.

She said something to her mum, then came scrambling up the rocks, through the gate, and up our garden. She sat down next to me, pale and trembling.

‘I saw it too,' she said.

* * *

Weather changes fast by the sea. Big grey clouds started whooshing across the sky, the sun disappeared, then rain started falling.

I ran for the shed, Pearl right behind me, and we huddled inside, rain drumming down hard on the window. ‘Every monster story I have
ever
read,' I said, teeth clacking, ‘every single one – it's all about the kids being smarter than the monster is, and outwitting it in some way. So that's all we have to do: come up with a plan to outwit it.'

‘And there's two of us,' said Pearl, teeth also clacking. ‘It's two kids' brains against one monster brain so we'll be a
lot
smarter than it is. We'll come up with an outwitting plan easily. Probably before dinnertime.'

We didn't.

We sat. We thought. We panicked.

‘The sea monster,' I said, trying to think positive, ‘it doesn't seem to have
scary
skills. Nothing sneaky. No tricky magic skills, like turning kids to stone, or teleporting, or breathing fire. Nothing like that.'

‘No,' said Pearl, doing her best to nod and look confident. ‘Just a straightforward, ordinary sea monster, that's what we're dealing with.'

Then she bit her lip. ‘Although,' she said, and now she was gulping, ‘it's got very good
swimming skills. It's as fast as a speedboat and it is very
big
. And we'll need to keep away from its teeth. They're very sharp and there are
lots
of them.'

‘It has good leaping skills, too,' I said, also gulping. ‘It's a
huge
leaper. It leaps about the height of this cottage. And that tail, we'll have to watch out for that tailfin. One swish of that could probably knock a kid unconscious.'

We sat there, gulping more. Thinking more. Panicking more. But
still
nothing came. We had no plan, no way to outwit it.
Nothing
.

‘Maybe it has a weak spot,' I said. ‘Lots of monsters do, in the stories.'

Pearl started nodding, hard. ‘That'll be it,' she said, ‘a weak spot. We just need to find its weak spot, like story kids do. At least half of the story kids do.'

‘More I'd say,' I said, also nodding hard. ‘Sixty per cent, maybe even seventy.'

But I wondered.

Did
this sea monster have a weak spot? Or was it one of those monsters with no weak spot at all? Then I realised something.

Of
course
it had a weak spot. The sea monster, it could
not
live out of water.

I thought Pearl would be impressed when I told her, but she wasn't. She started biting her lip.

‘But how does that help us?' she said. ‘Two kids our size, we can't get a sea monster out of the water. How can we? We can't lift it, can't drag it. Nothing.'

Then, she jumped up and stared out of the window. ‘It's out there somewhere,' she said, and there was a big wobble in her voice now. ‘And there's
nothing
we can do.'

I stared too, out of the window, down the garden, all the way out to Tide Island.

Only Tide Island
wasn't
an island now, not now the tide was low, not now everywhere was sand. Tide Island was on the sand. Sand stretched all the way out of our cove, right over to Tide Island, right over to the creek.

That was when I turned and looked at Pearl. ‘Maybe there
is
something we can do,' I said slowly. ‘Maybe there
is
a way to get a sea monster out of the water.'

And there was: by using the tide.

* * *

‘So, the plan,' I said, ‘let's go over it one more time. High tide tonight, we bait the water in
the creek on Tide Island and wait for the sea monster.'

‘Then,' said Pearl, nodding, ‘when the sea monster arrives you lasso it, using the Mr Wizzywoz lasso.'

‘And you keep it distracted,' I said, ‘by throwing the netting, the big heavy fishing net, over its head.'

Keeping it distracted was important. Once it was lassoed I had to crouch down and tie the other end of the lasso to the big metal ring, but crouching down would make me
very
close to the sea monster's teeth.

‘And while I keep it distracted and struggling,' Pearl said, ‘you – quickly and safely – do the tying.'

‘Then,' I said, ‘all we have to do is go back home and wait for the tide to go out.'

‘And that will be it,' Pearl said. ‘The sea monster will be stranded. Beached on the sand. Despatched.'

Then we both started nodding.

‘It's a good plan: a safe plan,' said Pearl, trying
very
hard to look confident in our plan. ‘The sea monster can't get us. Not if we're on Tide Island and it's in the sea.'

I nodded. ‘The worst that can happen,' I said, ‘is that our plan fails. And then we'll just have to think of another plan.'

But I wondered. Was that really the worst that could happen?

 

Chapter Ten

The Plan Begins

There was one problem with our plan: a
big
problem. High tide that night was just before seven but the grown-ups had a plan for seven, a plan to watch the fireworks, over in Lightsands Bay.

By six o'clock we were all eating fish and chips on the balcony of Pearl's apartment, right above the seafront of Lightsands Bay. Crowds of people were milling about below us, all over the promenade. Excited kids were running around with painted faces, and there were stalls selling food and drinks. Grown-ups were stuffing down hot dogs, a brass band was playing and there were banners up everywhere.

FRIDAY NIGHT FIREWORKS AND FUN!
STARTS SEVEN O'CLOCK!

OPENING LIGHTSANDS BAY FESTIVAL WITH A BANG!

I sat on the balcony with Pearl, eating fast and feeling nervous. Tonight, for me and for Pearl, there would be no fireworks, no fun here in Lightsands Bay.

No. We
had
to get away. We had a sea monster to trap, back in Shiversands Cove and there was only one way to do it: with a big fat
lie
.

Now, I'm not a big fan of lying to dads and mums. For a start, I usually get found out. But with a sea monster on the loose, there was no choice.

Soon, the grown-ups were ready to go: standing up, chatting about how it was time to go, time to get a good spot on the beach for watching the fireworks.

And
that
was when we swung into action.

Pearl got the lie going first. She stuck her head on one side. ‘Mum,' she said. ‘Please,
please
can we stay here? Stan and me? We want to watch the fireworks from the balcony, on our own.'

I tugged on Dad's sleeve. ‘Can we, Dad?' I said. ‘Just us, not with you, not with the little kids. The balcony's got a brilliant view.'

‘And we'll be very responsible,' said Pearl, plastering this earnest, sensible look all over her face. ‘We won't use the cooker or do anything dangerous.'

The grown-ups did some discussing, on and on and
on
, using long words to each other like independence and responsibility and common sense.

I had my fingers crossed. This had to work.

And it
did
work.
Finally
.

The grown-ups came up with a long list of rules and we stood there, doing lots of nodding, looking as earnest and sensible as we could. In the end, they left us there, alone on the balcony. We watched them trooping on to the promenade, Magnus and Claudia skipping and waving, as they all disappeared down the steps, and on to the beach.

Then, off we shot, out of Pearl's apartment and down the stairs. We dodged through the crowds and headed for the cliff path. Headed back towards Shiversands Cove.

* * *

Shiversands Cove was dark and silent. There were big shadows all around us. The sun was sinking
low and the sea was stretching away, darker and darker and darker. Out there, Tide Island was a big dark shadow, looming out of the water.