Nim's Island Read online

  Nim and Fred ran up and slid down until it was time for lunch. Then Nim picked up a tomato and an avocado that had fallen off in the wind, and weeded quickly around the peas.

  ‘They’ll be ready tomorrow,’ she told Fred.

  But Fred didn’t like peas, and he was getting bored. He started chewing leaves and spitting them out.

  ‘I won’t bring you up to the garden again!’ Nim said sternly. Fred spat out the last bit of pea leaf and crawled into the wagon for a wild ride down the hill.

  THAT NIGHT, when she sat on the rocks with the phone and watched the sun sink red into the waters, Jack didn’t call. She pressed his number but his phone didn’t ring and he didn’t answer.

  She checked the email and there was nothing there either.

  Nightmare pictures sneaked into Nim’s head: upside-down boats, sinking boats, boats sailing off into the distance with fallen-off people swimming behind . . .

  She pushed the scenes away angrily. Jack was busy. He was concentrating on his plankton and didn’t know what time it was—like when he was doing science things at home and forgot to eat.

  She picked up her book, and soon she wasn’t Nim any more, she was a strong brave Hero scrambling up a cliff, she was swinging across a chasm, reaching for the other side . . . and rubbing her aching eyes, looking up to see that the hut was dark and her torch beam was fading into the night. But she stayed being a Hero till she went to sleep, because tonight she liked it better than being Nim.

  WHEN THE SUN rose pink over Fire Mountain, Nim phoned Jack again, but there was still no answer; no ring; nothing at all.

  Nim checked the phone . . . the satellite dish . . . the connections between the solar panel and the phone’s battery charger . . .

  But everything looked the way it should.

  She checked her email, even though she knew he didn’t have a computer on his boat.

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Date: Tuesday 30 March, 22:21

  Dear Jack Rusoe

  Your article ‘The Life Cycle of the Coconut Palm’ was as fascinating as a feature film and as fact-filled as a documentary! But I still have a couple of questions . . .

  1) How long do coconuts float?

  2) Do they float well enough to make a raft?

  3) How could I build one?

  Thank you, Alex Rover

  ‘A letter!’ said Nim.

  She knew it wasn’t hers; she knew that Alex Rover was just asking Jack a science question—but it was still a letter. It was as if someone, somewhere in the world, knew she was alone and was saying hello.

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Date: Wednesday 31 March, 6:45

  Dear Alex Rover

  Jack is busy doing science. I hope he will answer your questions tomorrow or maybe the day after.

  From Nim

  She had heaps to do, and that was good because she didn’t want time to worry about Jack.

  She made banana-and-coconut mush and snuggled warmly with Selkie to eat it for breakfast. Fred always forgot that he didn’t like bananas, so he snitched a bit from her bowl and spat it out across the rock.

  ‘Yuck, Fred!’ said Nim. She didn’t feel much like eating now, either.

  She watered her garden with bamboo pipes trickling coolly from the pool. She towed wagonloads of seaweed to spread around the plants. She picked ten ripe strawberries and a handful of peas.

  Jack loved strawberries.

  She made a new broom with a fallen-down palm branch and swept the hut again. She filled in Jack’s charts with a big NO across the space for rain, and the numbers for barometric pressure and sea temperature, and EAST for where the wind was coming from. She wished it would turn around and blow Jack home, and she climbed the tall palm tree just in case she could see the white sails.

  And when she couldn’t, her stomach tied itself into a hard, tight knot, and she went on being busy. She mixed up dough to make some bread.

  It grew swollen and puffy and she punched it hard in the middle, oofing the air out of the puffiness and the knot out of her. She punched and rolled it, over and over, till her arms were floppy and the dough-ball was smooth.

  Then she wrapped it in a fresh banana leaf and carried it to the Hissing Stones, where Fire Mountain met the rocks of Keyhole Cove and fountains of steamy water sometimes shot high and wild into the air.

  Today there was just the small yellow pool splattering slimy bubbles, and the rocks around, too hot to touch, hissing steam from every crack. And the smell, like a rotten frigate-bird’s egg smashed on the beach.

  Nim squatted at the edge, out of the way of the wind and stink. She shaped her dough into eight flat pancakes and flicked them one by one onto the hot rock.

  What Nim liked best about cooking bread was watching the dough she’d mixed from dry flour, yeast and water puff into warm fresh bread. ‘Science,’ Jack said, but Nim thought it was magic.

  Today it was nothing.

  Today, when the bread bubbled and puffed in the middle, it didn’t even make her smile. When she flipped it over with her bamboo flipping stick and then neatly back into her banana leaf, it was just bread, because cooking bread was what she had to do today. And if she did everything that she was supposed to, then Jack would come home tonight and everything would be all right.

  So she went on doing jobs, busy busy busy all day. She heaped fallen branches into a bonfire; beach-combed from the Black Rocks of Keyhole Cove to Shell Beach in front of the hut, and then from the sands of Turtle Beach right to the Frigate-bird Cliffs at the end. (And she found three giant seeds shaped like hearts, ten new sea-shells and half a wooden paddle that made her think, Oh, no! But it wasn’t Jack’s.)

  Suddenly she was too tired to do anything more. She made a banana sandwich and curled up on the rock between Selkie and Fred to read the last chapter of her book.

  When she finished she felt happy and sad at the same time, because the ending was warm and smiley but she didn’t want to say goodbye to the people in the book.

  ‘I’ll read it again!’ Nim decided, and read the title out loud, as if she’d never seen it before: ‘Mountain Madness, by Alex Rover.’

  ‘Alex Rover!’ she shouted.

  Fred fell off the rock and Selkie honked crossly at being woken from her nap. ‘Sorry,’ said Nim.

  She opened the book again and unfolded the newspaper bookmark.

  ALEX ROVER – AUTHOR OR HERO?

  The most famous writer in the world has written a new book: Mountain Madness (Papyrus Publishing, $15.95).

  Cliff-hanging adventure; romantic love story—read it and you’ll think you’re living it! You’ll feel the cold rush of wind as you jump out of a plane; the sweat on your palms as you abseil down a cliff.

  So is Alex Rover the author—or the Hero?

  He couldn’t describe these adventures if he hadn’t lived them. But Alex Rover is not a typical macho action-man.

  Anyone lucky enough to meet him will find a very special human being—a mountain climber who finds poetry on the peak; an explorer who sings the glories of the stars.

  Unfortunately, meeting him is not easy to do. He refuses to give interviews or photographs. Delia Defoe, his editor at Papyrus Publishing, claims that she has never met him—or even spoken to him on the phone!

  ‘We correspond by email,’ she says.

  ‘We correspond by email,’ Nim repeated. It sounded important and funny. ‘I correspond with Alex Rover by email.’

  ‘Selkie,’ she said, ‘Alex Rover’s a Hero.’

  ‘Fred,’ she added, ‘I correspond with a Hero.’

  Selkie and Fred looked confused. They liked it when Nim used words they knew, like coconut and fish, swimming and Keyhole Cove.

  But Nim was happy. If Alex Rover could survive all those wonderful adventures, so could Jack. He’d be home tomorrow, just like he said.

  From: [email protected]
/>   To: [email protected]

  Date: Wednesday 31 March, 18:27

  Dear Alex Rover

  Jack is still away but I hope he’ll be home soon. I’m glad you’re a Hero because Mountain Madness is the best book I’ve ever read. It’s like real life except more exciting and everyone is so brave. And because it has a happy ending when the Hero and the lady find each other and fall in love.

  From Nim

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Date: Wednesday 31 March, 13:32

  Dear Nim

  Aren’t time differences funny? When it’s night-time where I live, the sun’s coming up for you. You’re living in my tomorrow!

  The other funny thought is me being a Hero—I’m as un-Hero as anyone can be!

  I can climb mountains if they’re made out of paper, and swim rivers if they’re in my bathtub (with lots of bubble bath) . . .

  I’m not even brave enough to talk to reporters. That’s why they make up stories about me—one reporter even made up my name, and called me Alexander!!

  Yours, Alex (Alexandra!) Rover

  Nim had never heard the name Alexandra.

  Alex Rover had never thought that anyone could be all alone on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean.

  And so Nim went on thinking that Alex Rover was a man, and Alex went on thinking that Nim was a girl at home with her mother and maybe brothers and sisters, cousins and friends. And they both thought that they understood each other perfectly.

  FAR, FAR OUT in the ocean, a sail-boat drifted. On its deck, a man lay sprawled like a boxer who’d lost a fight.

  A frigate-bird, his dark wings as wide as the man was tall, swooped curiously.

  Jack opened his eyes. He was hot, thirsty and sore all over. When he scratched his beard, his hand came back rusty with dry blood.

  He sat up and remembered.

  He’d been sitting on the deck, watching the plankton glow on the night-time waves. Suddenly a storm had come roaring, and he’d pulled down the sails, but the wind didn’t care. It threw the boat sideways and he’d reached for the satellite dish as it smashed to the deck.

  Now there was a cut on his head and the satellite dish was gone. And if the satellite dish was gone, his phone wouldn’t work, and he must go home to Nim.

  Jack’s head hurt and his legs wobbled, but he staggered to the tiller. He pushed the tiller and then he pulled it, but it swung loose and empty in his hand and he knew his rudder was broken. If his rudder was broken, then he couldn’t steer.

  And if he couldn’t steer, his boat was just a big piece of driftwood.

  AT KEYHOLE COVE, the reef met the rocks in a huge ring. On one side were the worn grey rocks where the sea lions sat, and on the other the harsh black rocks of the wild east coast.

  Inside the ring, the water was calm and a light, clear blue. The sea shushed in and out through a hole in the reef, but only the biggest waves could break over the top.

  It was a perfect place for swimming. You could float on your back because if you started to daydream you’d bump your head on the reef before you floated out to sea. When you rolled over you could watch seahorses and shells and the open jaws of the giant clams with polka-dot fish racing through them.

  It was the perfect place to do a Coconut Experiment and find out how to make a raft for Alex Rover.

  So early next morning, Nim loaded up her wagon with coconuts. Fred climbed on top and she towed them across the grasslands (because it was easier than towing a wagon across sand and rocks) to Keyhole Cove.

  Selkie swam around to Sea Lion Point, and sat and barked for Nim to hurry up.

  But Nim got another load and then another, till she had twenty fat coconuts heaped on the rocks, and then she hurled them into the water one by one.

  The coconuts bombed in and bobbed up. Selkie barked louder and louder. Fred got so excited he dived in with the last one.

  Nim and Selkie jumped in too. There was still lots of room in the cove, even with twenty floating coconuts. Lots of room for Nim to float and somersault and stand on her hands, and for Fred to dash and dive and Selkie to swish splash the water through the Keyhole Rock.

  When Selkie was bored with splashing she grabbed Fred by the tail. It was Selkie’s favourite game, but she was so big and Fred was so little that it really wasn’t fair. Fred’s legs whirred; he paddled faster and faster, harder and harder—but he couldn’t get anywhere.

  ‘Leave him alone, Selkie!’ Nim shouted, but it was hard not to laugh, and Fred sulked at the bottom of the cove when Selkie finally let him go.

  JUST BEFORE SUNSET, Nim tried to phone Jack again—just in case he’d forgotten; just in case his phone had been broken and now it was fixed—but there was no answer.

  It was two days since he’d phoned. If he didn’t come home tomorrow she could send an SOS: Go and Find Jack! But Jack wouldn’t want help and she didn’t want to send it.

  She walked up to the pool to fill her water bottle and pick more peas for dinner. He’ll be home in the morning, she thought. Something will happen!

  And something did.

  A frigate-bird dived to scoop a drink from the pool. Sticking out from his leg-band was a rolled-up piece of paper.

  It was easy to call Galileo if you had a fish, but Nim didn’t. ‘Come here,’ she coaxed. ‘Come to me.’

  The big bird teased and soared, turned and dived. He swooped over Nim, so low that his wings brushed her hair, and so slowly that she could pull the letter out of the band.

  Dear Nim

  I figure if I offer Galileo a fish he’ll let me post this letter to you.

  Had a fight with a freak storm. Storm won. Took my satellite dish, a bit of my rudder and a chunk of my forehead.

  Can’t figure out if I’ve slept for one day or two. Don’t send an SOS—it’ll take more than a broken rudder to stop me from getting home!

  Love (as much as a frigate-bird loves fish),

  Jack

  Nim ran all the way down the hill, waving the letter in one hand and the water bottle in the other. ‘Jack’s okay!’ she sang, and swung Fred in a crazy jig around Selkie. ‘He’ll be home soon!’

  Then she wrote two letters.

  Dear Jack

  I was SO HAPPY when Galileo gave me your letter. I didn’t really think you’d forget to come home but I liked that better than some of the other ideas.

  I’ve been very busy doing an Experiment but I’ll tell you about it when you get home because I have to write an email now.

  Love (as much as Fred loves coconut),

  Nim

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Date: Thursday 1 April, 18:30

  Dear Alex Rover

  Today I started an Experiment to find out how you could build your raft.

  I dropped twenty coconuts into Keyhole Cove to see how long they’ll float. They won’t escape unless there’s a bad storm with really big waves.

  I hope there won’t be.

  From Nim

  She peeled a banana, dropped it onto a piece of bread and sprinkled it with fresh seaweed.

  ‘1 message,’ said the email box on the screen.

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Date: Thursday 1 April, 13:37

  Dear Nim

  My Hero would be devastated, annihilated, depressed and soggy if his raft didn’t float!

  What does Keyhole Cove look like?

  I picture a ring of black rocks jutting out from the shore, stark against the blue sea—and bobbing ridiculously around in this idyllic pool, twenty coconuts waiting to be a raft.

  The Coconuts of Keyhole Cove—sounds like a title! Hmm . . .

  With a thousand thanks, Alex

  Nim read the letter three times. It made her feel warm and smiley, like finishing Mountain Madness—and when Alex Rover described Keyhole Cove, it was as if he knew the island, and Nim too.

&nb
sp; NIM STOOD IN the doorway, looking out to sea one last time before the sun set, just in case Jack got home faster than he thought, because no matter how much she liked reading letters from Alex Rover, she’d like to see Jack’s sails even more.

  Through the shadows she could see, not a boat, but a browny-green dot floating in on the waves.

  ‘Chica’s coming!’ Nim shouted, but Selkie and Fred had settled down for the night; Selkie grumble-barked but neither of them moved.

  In a few minutes it would be completely dark. Nim pulled on her jumper and grabbed the torch.

  Its light shone pale in the dusk as she jumped down the rocks to Turtle Beach. Walking slowly on the cold night sand, she turned off the torch and waited.

  The turtle paddled steadily towards her, a hump of shell glooming dark in the grey waves, and heaved herself onto the sand.

  Nim crept closer. ‘Welcome home, Chica!’

  Chica was too busy to answer. She dragged her huge body up above the reach of the highest tide, and started scooping out sand with her strong front flippers. It was hard, grunting work.

  Nim squatted beside her, watching quietly in the darkness and wiping away sand from the turtle’s watery eyes, until the hole was just as deep and wide as it needed to be.

  The stars scattered brightly and were mirrored in the sea; a fat crescent moon rose amongst them; and egg after round white egg rolled into the bottom of the nest.

  ‘Ninety-nine!’ Nim whispered as Chica pushed sand back into the hole, rocking her heavy body back and forth till the sand was thumped hard and smooth. She didn’t want anyone else to know where her precious babies were hidden.

  ‘Maybe in a few years,’ Nim told her, ‘ninety-nine turtles will come back and lay their eggs here too!’