Ruby Redfort by Lauren Child

Ruby Redfort by Lauren Child

Author:Lauren Child
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2013-11-11T05:00:00+00:00


SOMETHING CRASHED INTO THE WATER and white bubbles fizzed up to the surface. And just like that, the menacing grey shapes were gone.

Ruby was suspended in the deep blue ocean. She turned to check her back and there behind her was Hitch. He was not in dive gear – there had not been time for that. He was treading water, a knife in his hand. He looked around for Kekoa and then made a gesture, pointing up, and Ruby followed him to the surface.

They clambered onto the small boat, both spluttering seawater, Ruby dizzy to be alive.

‘Wh… what did you do?’ she stammered from where she had collapsed on the deck.

‘All I did was jump in the water,’ said Hitch. ‘Ruby, what happened to Kekoa?’

‘I came to get you,’ wheezed Ruby. ‘She’s trapped!’

‘What do you mean trapped?’

‘Inside the wreck – something fell on her. She looks in bad shape.’

Hitch turned the radar dial on his Spectrum watch, tuning into Kekoa’s signal – it wasn’t there.

‘Darn it,’ he said. ‘You’re going to have to give me a pretty accurate description of Kekoa’s location kid.’

Kekoa had taught Ruby well and she described the place where they had entered the wreck and the direction they had swum through it. Finding Kekoa would be easy – getting her out would be the tricky part.

Hitch grabbed a rope and toolpack. He was already reaching for goggles and air tank as Ruby described the cut to Kekoa’s head and the leg wound, the fallen beam. Three minutes later and Ruby was alone. She looked out to sea, staring across to the Sibling Islands. She thought about the lost sisters, and as she thought of them, she saw that tiny glint of light flash once more on the smaller of the two rocks. Just for a second and then it was gone. She stood stock-still and unblinking, waiting for it to reappear, but it didn’t.

An agonising nineteen minutes and five seconds passed before Hitch reappeared and deposited an injured Kekoa on the warm wood of the deck. She looked pale and the blood continued to seep from her calf.

‘It’s not as bad as it looks,’ Hitch reassured her. But Ruby could see that it was. She grabbed the first-aid kit and handed it over. Hitch bound the leg wound as well as he could and then examined the cut to the head.

‘Gotta stitch this,’ he said.

Kekoa nodded and didn’t flinch once throughout the whole painful procedure.

‘Kid, get the boat started. We need to make it to shore quick and there’s no chance of radioing for assistance out here – all signals are blocked.’

Ruby got the engine started and began very slowly to steer the boat in the direction of Little Bay beach. She had to move at a snail’s pace because Hitch needed the boat steady.

As he worked, Hitch talked to Kekoa. ‘Those were some sharks down there, you shoulda seen them. They were more than curious.’

‘What was so special about them?’ she replied weakly.

‘There were a lot of them and they were interested, not afraid.



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