Alice was asleep in the car when they returned to Jacks Bay. She did not look well. They let her sleep while they played on the beach for a while. Tyler stripped and took a quick dip in the water to get rid of the mud.
He was standing by the car drying himself when he heard the growl of an approaching vehicle. It was the black ute. He felt a touch of fear at the sound: nothing good ever happened when it was around.
Only when it pulled alongside did he notice an empty boat trailer on the back. It backed over the grass onto the sand, stopping short of the water. The door opened and a blondhaired man got out. It was neither Shifty nor Grunty. This was a new member of the gang: Blondy.
Blondy barely glanced in their direction before lighting a smoke and pulling himself onto the cab. He peered out to sea, plainly expecting something to happen.
Before his cigarette was half smoked a boat appeared at the entrance to the bay. He hopped down and backed the trailer into the water. Hine moved alongside Tyler. ‘I know what type of boat that is,’ she said proudly. ‘It’s an Aqua-air 50. We have one and I’m allowed to drive it.’
Tyler looked sideways at her. She was talking like a boy. There were boys at school who were always skiting about cars and boats they’d been in. Never the girls: to them cars went on land and boats on water.
He turned to the boat. ‘It looks funny. As if it’s sinking or something.’
‘It’s an inflatable on an aluminium frame. They’re specially designed for diving. I bet they’ve been out diving for stuff.’
‘Illegally, I bet.’
‘Let’s find out. My dare is to find something for the police.’ She called Mandy over. ‘We’re going to do some detective work. Something to tell the police. I’m going to get the serial number of the boat.’
Tyler spoke up quickly. ‘I’ll get the number plate.’ Hine gave a little smile, causing Tyler to think she’d intended him to get the easy job. For a moment he was annoyed. He didn’t need looking after. He could stay in the game without her help.
Mandy stood thinking for a moment. ‘I know. I’ll chat them up and get their names.’
Hine looked at her doubtfully. ‘That won’t be easy.’
‘I can do it,’ she said brightly. ‘I’ve never been turned down before.’
They agreed the rules would have to be changed so Hine didn’t have to go first, or the others wouldn’t have time to do theirs. Tyler moved towards the ute. Blondy was around the back removing the canvas cover. This was going to be dead easy. He crouched by the front of the vehicle and wiped the number plate with a handful of wet sand, expecting the number to be instantly revealed.
It wasn’t. The plate had been painted with something that made mud and dust stick to it. He tried several times without success. The only way was to trace the letters with his fingers. It was slow work. There were six letters or numbers. By the time he had the third he’d forgotten the first. Fishing a pen from his pocket he wrote what he could remember on the back of his hand. Soon he had all but the last number.
‘Hey kid! What you doing down there?’
It was Blondy. Tyler dropped the pen in fright. ‘Um, I lost something.’ He scratched in the sand for a moment. ‘Ah! Here it is.’ He held up his pen.
Blondy looked at him suspiciously. ‘You’d better get away from there, kid, or you’ll get run over.’ He stood for a moment before moving to the back of the vehicle. Tyler quickly traced the last number and moved away. He decided to keep away from Shifty and Grunty as they would probably get suspicious if they saw him hanging around again.
Hine and Mandy were in the water near the boat watching the gang load it onto the trailer. Blondy was lifting sacks into the back of the ute. Mandy was talking but Tyler couldn’t hear anything because of the noise of the boat motor. Then suddenly all was silent.
‘…caught so much,’ Mandy was saying. ‘You must be very good fishermen.’
Grunty grunted something that Tyler couldn’t catch. Hine was leaning over the side of the trailer peering into the boat.
‘Is it dangerous out there?’ asked Mandy. ‘The beach we saw yesterday had huge waves. You must be real brave to go out in that.’ Grunty gave a bit of a nod. Encouraged, Mandy went on: ‘My name’s Mandy Parker. What’s yours?’
Grunty gave a sound that could have been a laugh. ‘Terminator Two. And if you don’t shift I’ll terminate you.’ He laughed again. Mandy stepped back quickly.
Meanwhile, Hine had moved away from the boat towards the back of the ute. She gave Tyler the thumbs up, then indicated she was going to look in the sacks.
The men were plainly annoyed by the kids, but also in a hurry to get out of the place. There was a moment when all three were fixing the boat to the trailer. Hine opened a sack and peered inside. A puzzled look crossed her face. She opened another and looked even more puzzled. Unfortunately she tried the next just as the men finished. When Shifty saw her, his face twisted in a mix of fear and anger. Swearing loudly he strode forward and grabbed her by the arm, swinging her roughly to the ground. He stared down at her, screaming more foul words. When he looked up he saw Tyler. He paused, took a couple of steps towards the boy, mumbled something and then turned back to the ute.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ he yelled to the others as he climbed into the driver’s seat. ‘These kids are getting to me.’ The others joined him and soon the boat was bouncing off down the road.
Hine got to her feet. ‘You okay?’ asked Tyler.
‘Yeah. He just hurt my arm, the big bully.’
Mandy asked, ‘Did you get the number of the boat?’ Hine nodded and reeled off a string of numbers.
‘I got the number plate,’ said Tyler.
‘What is it?’ asked Mandy suspiciously.
Tyler held out his hand. ‘Here, I wrote it down.’
Mandy looked at his hand. ‘There’s nothing there.’
Tyler smiled, then breathed heavily on the back of his hand. Slowly the letters and numbers became visible in pink. ‘It’s invisible ink,’ he said.
Hine laughed. ‘Inspector Gadget strikes again.’
‘And what did you get, Mandy?’
‘Nothing,’ she said lightly. ‘But I’ve still got two lives and you’ve only got one.’
Tyler ignored her and turned to Hine. ‘What was in the sack? You looked puzzled.’
‘It was meat,’ replied Hine. ‘They were full of red meat. It must be that stuff they took from the farm.’
‘Why would they take that fishing? That doesn’t make any sense.’
‘I don’t know. But unless they came ashore and killed something, where else would they get it? It smelled a bit fishy but it wasn’t fish meat.’
‘Perhaps they killed a seal,’ suggested Mandy.
Then Tyler had a terrible thought. ‘Or maybe a dolphin,’ he said quietly.
‘No!’ cried Hine. But from her face Tyler knew she believed it could be true.