July Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  PREVIOUSLY…

  1 JULY

  2 JULY

  3 JULY

  5 JULY

  7 JULY

  8 JULY

  9 JULY

  13 JULY

  17 JULY

  18 JULY

  19 JULY

  20 JULY

  24 JULY

  25 JULY

  26 JULY

  30 JULY

  31 JULY

  Copyright

  To Amber, Cal, Holly, Jimmy and Matt

  I run away from the wreckage of the Ormond Orca, just as it explodes. I dodge my pursuers in the forest and make it to the town of Big River, where I hide in an empty scout hall.

  Finally back in the city, I dream about my dead great-uncle. He assures me I’ll find the answers I need. I hope he’s right.

  Boges sets me up in a mansion in Crystal Beach and tells me he’s found a guy who’ll give us Sligo’s new address for four hundred bucks.

  I am convinced Sligo has the Jewel, so I need money. I call Griff Kirby, who said he could help me earn quick cash. The work on offer ends up being a carjacking. I get myself beaten up while trying to stop it.

  Boges scores Sligo’s address, so I go to Repro’s to convince him to help me break into the safe and retrieve the Jewel. He thinks the job’s too dangerous.

  Winter offers to help us get inside Sligo’s place, which prompts me to try again for Repro’s help.

  It’s a race-against-time as Repro battles to find the correct combination to Sligo’s safe. Finally, he cracks the code and the door swings open to reveal the Ormond Jewel! I also spot a photo of Winter wearing it! Sligo returns and we speed away in a gardening truck. We’re chased to the edge of a cliff and forced out on foot. Repro disappears into the scrub, while I make use of an abandoned hang-glider and take off into the sky.

  Walking back to the city, cops pull me up and drag me in for questioning. They think I’m Ben Galloway, but I know that false ID won’t hold up for long.

  The cops want to transfer me to another station, but I intercept their keys and take off in a squad car. A high-speed chase leads all the way down to the sea. On foot, I run down a jetty, jump onto a jet ski and ride away. A fishing boat appears from nowhere, sending me crashing into the water. I’m entangled in a fishing net, trapped underwater …

  184 days to go …

  Tonnes of water swirled all around me as I thrashed and floundered, trying to claw my way out of the enclosing fishing net. I knew I couldn’t hold my breath much longer. My lungs were desperate for air, and already I could feel my mouth wanting to open, even though that would be a fatal move. The net tightened, crushing me against the trapped fish. Fins and prickly scales scored my face and hands like tiny razors.

  I struggled, panicked and frantic, feeling like my lungs were going to explode. Pull it up! I begged the fishing boat silently. Please pull the net up! Don’t let me drown down here!

  The pressure was unbearable. A ringing in my ears built into a crushing surge. My panic escalated. This is it!

  The pressure shifted as a sudden lurching, swinging motion moved us through the water. The net was lifting! If I could just hold on a few seconds longer! But my lungs suddenly convulsed out of my control, and I gulped … air! Wonderful, life-saving air!

  The net had broken through the surface of the dark sea, and a huge inhalation of oxygen rushed down my throat. I could breathe—just! Higher and higher the bulging net swung above the water, compressing my body even more with the weight of the huge catch surrounding me. Fish seethed, scraped and hopelessly flailed, pressed against my skin.

  The bottom of the net abruptly opened, giving way like the wet explosion of a burst water balloon. I was sent free-falling from about three metres, and dumped on the deck of the boat. The catch skidded out everywhere and I landed with a thud, flat on my back. I was stunned and still struggling for air as fish flapped desperately around me. My breath came in great sobbing gulps. I couldn’t do anything except suck in oxygen. I had survived, and that was all I knew or cared about just then.

  I pulled a small bream from my face, shook off strings of slimy seaweed from my hair, and spat sea water from my salty lips. The dim glow of the boat’s spotlights showed that my hands were bleeding from the tiny incisions made by hundreds of fins and spikes.

  ‘Hey! We’ve caught ourselves a mermaid!’ said a voice nearby. ‘Hey skipper! Look what we picked up!’

  Wet, black rubber boots stepped up close to my face. I strained my eyes, blinking under the torchlight that was suddenly on me. A young guy was bending over me, his sunburnt face peering out through thick, curly hair. He kicked me gently, like he was checking I was alive.

  ‘Jeez, she’s not the prettiest one I’ve ever seen!’ he said to another guy coming up behind him. ‘You’re pretty badly cut, kid,’ he said to me. ‘How did you get yourself into this mess?’

  A booming voice from a megaphone broke through my consciousness, the words loud and clear. ‘Callum Ormond! Stop! Police!’

  I struggled to get up. The silhouette of the second deckhand was turned away from me, watching the approaching police boat, Stingray.

  I looked around for a way out—a way of sneaking off the boat unnoticed. I checked for my backpack. It was still on my shoulders. I still had the Ormond Jewel, but had everything survived being underwater? There was no time to check. A brilliant light was sweeping the surface of the sea nearby, every second getting closer to the deck of the boat that I had landed on. I had to get away or hide! Think, Cal, think, shouted the voice in my mind.

  ‘Hey kid, you in trouble?’ asked the curly-haired deckhand, squatting down beside me.

  ‘Chuck him over the side!’ said the second deckhand, as he backed away from the approaching searchers. He stopped, hands on his hips, shaking his head. ‘We don’t want any trouble. We don’t want cops nosing around here.’

  I sure didn’t want the cops nosing around either! I scrambled to my feet, almost stacking it as I skidded in squid ink.

  ‘None of us can afford that,’ the second deckhand continued. ‘Everyone we’ve got on board is on the run from something or someone!’

  His voice seemed familiar, but before I could think any more about it, the skipper—an old guy with a beard and a black beanie pulled down around his face—appeared. He looked around, confused by all the unexpected commotion surrounding his boat.

  ‘What’s going on here?’ he demanded, in a thick Greek accent. ‘What’s with the police? What’s with the kid?’ he asked, pointing at me, before being interrupted by the megaphone threats from the police boat, which was coming closer every second. The searchlight pierced through the darkness, revealing the choppy surface of the surrounding sea, and the upturned jet ski, bobbing just a few metres away. The threats stopped for a moment, and the skipper stared down at me once more.

  ‘Where the in the world did you come from, boy?’

  My teeth chattered as I spat more water from my mouth. ‘I fell off my jet ski and got tangled up in your fishing net,’ I gasped to the skipper towering over me. ‘I’m being chased by the police, but I can’t let them catch me! I haven’t done anything wrong, I swear!’

  The police boat was pulling up alongside us now—the voices of the cops shouted above the noise of the engine. They were going to get me. What was I going to do to protect all my stuff? The drawings, the Riddle, the Jewel?

  The skipper swung round, yelling at his deckhands. ‘OK you two! What am I paying you for? Don’t just stand there! Start sorting the catch!’

  I finally hauled myself up, grabbing onto the sides of the fishing boat, thinking I’d have to jump overboard and take my chances in the darkness of the sea.

  ‘So,
you’re on the run,’ barked the skipper.

  I was afraid to speak again. I guessed what was going to happen next—he’d call out to the police, and I’d be handed in. Would I make it to my sixteenth birthday in prison?

  I could hear the police alongside us, preparing to board. The slapping sound of the water against the boat grew stronger, blending with the gaping gills and flapping fish that still encircled me.

  What was I going to do? I was so distracted, I barely heard the skipper when he spoke again.

  ‘So, you’re on the run,’ he repeated. ‘Big deal. All of my deckhands are on the run. They’re all crooks!’

  ‘Callum Ormond!’ roared the loudhailer. ‘Reveal your location! Hand yourself in!’

  ‘You’d better get out of sight, fast!’ hissed the Greek skipper, before dragging me to the cabin entrance and shoving me down it.

  I tumbled into darkness, and crouched quietly, straining to listen to what was happening on deck.

  ‘Seen a kid around here?’ demanded the officer’s voice from the police boat. ‘Fifteen to sixteen years of age? He must have come past around the point—he was on a jet ski. There it is, drifting over there, so he has to be around somewhere.’

  Please, I begged the skipper. Don’t change your mind and hand me over!

  ‘Haven’t seen anyone like that,’ the skipper’s distinct voice called back. ‘Didn’t see anyone on a jet ski. Maybe he went that way.’

  He covered for me! In the cramped cabin below, my limbs went weak with relief.

  But my relief didn’t last long.

  ‘We’re coming aboard,’ the officer continued, dismissively. ‘We need to take a look around.’

  ‘You’ve got no right to board my boat.’

  ‘Hiding something, are you?’

  While the argument continued above me, I tried to spot a place to hide. But in a few moments, I’d felt out all there was: four narrow bunk beds, strewn with clothes; two small cupboards; a toilet and shower, and, through a doorway, a tiny kitchen. Other than that, there was a humming fridge that reeked of blood and scales, and a couple of long freezers.

  The place was so small, there was nowhere to hide. I couldn’t even fit under the bunks. I listened intently through the hatch-opening again.

  ‘OK,’ I heard the skipper say. ‘I guess I can’t stop you from boarding my boat. But I’m not happy about it, officer. We’re just trying to do a night’s work here. We don’t have time to waste.’

  Someone thudded down the cabin steps without warning. It was the first deckhand, with the black boots and curly hair. He grabbed me and I thought for a moment he’d been ordered to throw me overboard. I resisted as hard as I could until I realised that he was dragging me towards another hatch, half the size of a normal door, cut low into the wall behind one of the freezers. He jerked the door open and pushed me through the hole. Heat and the stench of diesel fuel slammed me in the face.

  ‘The boss says you gotta get in there!’

  I could just make out two large diesel engines in the cramped, gloomy area, but couldn’t see anywhere to hide.

  ‘There’s some space underneath the diesels—where the mechanic works,’ he added, with a shove. ‘Get in!’

  I crawled deeper into the stinking, black hole. There was just enough room for me and my backpack to squeeze under the engines. Cold and wet, I flattened myself into the space.

  The hatch door slammed shut, and the freezer was dragged back into position.

  The cops started boarding. I heard their muffled voices, followed by their thudding steps down into the cabin. There were things being lifted and thrown about, doors opening and closing. The footsteps came closer and closer … I cowered, hoping they wouldn’t find the hatch I was in.

  ‘Where are the engines?’ a voice asked, dashing that hope instantly.

  I held my breath as the freezer was shifted once more, revealing the hatch door and my hiding place. The door opened and a beam of light shone in. I pressed myself against the floor, as the light played over the machinery that I hoped would obscure me.

  A sudden gush of heat rushed out.

  ‘Nothing here,’ someone said, before coughing and swearing. ‘Bloody fumes.’

  The door slammed shut.

  I barely breathed again until I heard the police disembark, and Stingray sped away to continue the search for me elsewhere.

  Cramped and sweating, I kicked a leg out at the hatch door—I’d waited long enough for the cops to move on—I needed to get out. But it wouldn’t budge. I kicked again, this time harder. Still nothing. They’d locked me in.

  Loud thumping woke me up. Despite everything, I must have slept, or passed out from the fumes.

  ‘You can come out of there now,’ said the skipper, opening the door. Soft light fell on my face, and I sucked up the fresh air.

  Awkwardly, I squeezed my stiff and stinging body out from under the engines and emerged. The skipper wasn’t smiling anymore. There were no jokes about his crew all being on the run. His face was stern and hard.

  ‘You must have done something real bad, boy,’ he said as I lifted myself up and leaned against the edge of the freezer. ‘You owe me.’

  ‘You saved me,’ I said. ‘But I haven’t done anything wrong,’ I added. ‘I’m innocent.’

  ‘Aren’t we all?’ he scoffed, sarcastically. ‘You work for me now.’

  ‘Work for you? For how long?’ I asked.

  He shrugged. ‘Until you’ve paid me back. Otherwise I give you to the police. Understand?’

  I nodded. I knew I had no option. I’d escaped the net but was still trapped.

  ‘I’ll send one of the boys down to get you started. Stay here until then.’

  He turned and vanished up the narrow steps.

  The curly-haired deckhand jumped down the steps into the cabin, his narrowed eyes watching me with curiosity. He didn’t seem hostile, but I was very wary of what he was going to tell me to do.

  ‘The Little Mer-boy,’ he joked. ‘I’m George,’ he said, his face grimacing with dislike at his name, ‘but everyone calls me Squid.’ He pulled a duffel bag down from a luggage rack. ‘We’ve just pulled in to the fish market wharf.’

  ‘OK,’ I said, expectantly.

  ‘So, Merboy, what’s your story?’

  ‘The name’s Tom, actually,’ I said, even though the police boat had been hollering out my real name, just hours ago.

  He considered this for a moment, before saying, ‘Nah, I like Merboy better. What’s in the bag?’ he asked, nodding towards my backpack.

  ‘Nothing much. What’s your story?’

  ‘Pretty much the same as the other guys. Most of us take this kind of work because there are no questions asked.’

  ‘But you’ve just asked me two of them,’ I pointed out.

  He laughed, dumping the duffel bag on one of the narrow bunks. ‘So I did, you’re right. And you just avoided answering both. Sounds like you’ll fit right in with our crew!’ He sat down beside his bag before continuing. ‘If you’ve done this type of work before you’ll know that casual deckhands on fishing boats are often on the run from something. Maybe it’s the law, maybe it’s the missus, and maybe they just want to get lost for a while. Whatever the case, there are a lot of crooks.’

  ‘And you’re not one of them?’ I asked, smiling.

  ‘Not really. Never done anything really bad.’

  ‘Same,’ I said. ‘I just need to lie low for a while.’ I shrugged. ‘Family stuff.’

  ‘Mate, I understand. But all the same, you’ll need to stay on your toes. The cops do a lot of lightning raids; they swoop down on the wharf, looking for people who might be trying to avoid them. We’re trying to catch fish, and the cops are trying to catch us!’

  He stood back up and stuck out his hand with a grin. It was grimy and scaly, but I shook it.

  ‘Welcome aboard, Merboy. Stick with me, keep your eyes peeled and you should be OK. I can show you the ropes.’ He frowned for a second, peering c
losely at me. ‘You sure you haven’t worked the boats before?’

  ‘Never,’ I said, before he backed away, wrinkling his nose in disgust.

  ‘No-one smells good round here, but you smell like the bottom of the bait tin! How ’bout you wash up a bit and I get you some dry gear?’ He rummaged through his bag and threw me a black shirt and a pair of work overalls. ‘Here. You can have these.’ He pulled a worn towel out of the cupboard and threw that at me as well.

  I followed Squid up to the deck and onto the wharf. The skipper and the other deckhand were busy sorting and stacking big plastic tubs of fish.

  The skipper looked up briefly as we passed. ‘Show him where to go,’ he ordered Squid. ‘When I’ve got time, I’ll show him how to clean and scale. Meantime, he can be a wheeler with you.’

  Squid nodded.

  ‘Wheeler?’ I asked, hurrying after him along the wharf.

  ‘After the fish are auctioned,’ he explained, ‘the wheelers stack and load the boxes onto trolleys and wheel them over to the loading areas where the pick-ups are waiting.’

  We’d reached a tiled shower area, and Squid nodded towards one of the open cubicle doors. I stepped into one and locked the door behind me, then quickly rummaged through my backpack to check how everything had held up. I peeled the tape off the package at the bottom of my bag, and tipped the Ormond Jewel out.

  I could hardly believe it. Somehow it had survived, just like me. I stared at it again, amazed at the emerald and precious stones. I turned it over and looked at the images on the back—a red rose and rosebud. Water had dampened the edges of the Riddle and the drawings, but they were OK. I re-wrapped everything tightly and stuck the tape down again, as best I could. My phone wasn’t so lucky—it had not survived the drenching. Water streaked across the dead screen.