We head back down to the jetty and Marta’s boat. Behind us old Jacob is having a whispered conversation with the younger man and looking back at us like we’re about to be grilled over his campfire for supper. ‘Tyrell Weatherman!’ Jacob lifts his voice, frustrated. Then he reaches out and slaps the younger man right across the head. The younger man ducks and runs down towards us.
‘Can’t wait to get home, Marta!’ I yell, and run and jump in the boat, getting it untied and holding it for her while she’s saying goodbye to all the old ladies.
We take off, and the younger man is already down at the jetty untying a boat too.
‘Head for home, Marta, fast as anything!’ I say. I twist the sail to catch as much of the wind as I can.
‘What’s the hurry?’ Marta asks.
‘Something ain’t right,’ I say, all hushed.
Then I grin big and wave to the people on the jetty. ‘There’s a guy following us, and din’t you see the top of their hill was part bald on the way in, like the siblings already started here?’
Marta’s looking at me, and looking back to the jetty. She gives a smile and a wave. ‘Go gently, my friends!’ she calls and then turns and hoists a jib to get the wind to really work us along.
No way our headstart will get swallowed up now.
‘Maybe he’s launching to make sure we’re headed home and not onward to ask more questions,’ I say.
‘These are our people. They don’t have any more clue about the siblings than we did,’ Marta says.
‘Then why they acting so weird?’ I ask. ‘The siblings were there yesterday, and now they’re gone, without setting a machine up or nothing. Why? They din’t take no notice of our protesting!’
‘They got a bad reaction at the jetty and so they left. We need to go on and ask someone else.’
‘First we have to make that guy think we’re headed home,’ I say.
‘He’s just fishing or something,’ Marta says.
I stare back at the boat leaving the jetty behind us. He din’t even grab a bait bucket. ‘Well, I don’t wanna be caught and grilled!’
‘Neoma!’ Marta complains.
This is the problem with adults. They’re too busy thinking they know stuff to see what’s going on in front of their faces. If Jag was here, he’d be hanging on my every detail of strange happenings.
‘Why’d they lock up their kids, then?’ I mumble.
‘What?’ Marta asks.
‘Where were the kids?’ I ask.
‘Off playing somewhere?’ Marta says. ‘There was that one boy.’
‘That one boy who took the croc and got into trouble for talking to me, and got told to stay home like the rest of the kids, coz they might say something by accident, like littlies do. I seen them peeping down at us sitting round the fire. And did you see when I stood up to go looking for them? And anyway, how’d that old Uncle Jacob know the siblings wanted to install tech on their hill, when he told them no? How did they tell him? You’re way smarter and you din’t hardly know what the siblings was talking about!’ I fold my arms in a huff. I ain’t even gonna tell her nothing no more.
Marta nods, frowns. Finally she says, ‘Maybe you’re right.’
I grin.
‘We should head home,’ Marta says, and checks the sky and all around. ‘Will be dark before we get there.’
‘We can’t sail in the dark, there’ll be tree trunks and bits of old buildings that’ll snag our boat!’ I say.
Marta looks back at the guy following. ‘We’ll see how far we get.’
The guy falls further behind coz we’re going flat out, tacking to catch the best wind. But we’re taking a pretty direct path home, and the guy maybe figures he ain’t never gonna catch up to us, so he swings about and heads back to his village.
Once he’s out of sight we sail into the marshes and tie up to a good tree branch to sleep. Marta gives me cakes for dinner, which my stomach is super happy about, and we wrap in blankets in the bottom of the boat. Me with a fishing knife in my hand on account of the crocs that might live here and jump on me while I’m sleeping.
It should only take a couple of hours to get to our island when the earth turns back towards the sun and shows us a safe path, so we’ll have fish stew for breakfast at home. I’ll have to wake Jag to show him the fish I caught, before we add it to the stew. He’s gonna be super jelly about that and cakes for dinner!
