Midnight Dolphin (22 page)

‘
But where are
the Trinity Caves?’ asked Megan eagerly, ‘and what else does the
Reverend say about Mary Pewsey?’

‘
Well I
haven’t got that far yet’ grinned Rachel. ‘But I’ve no idea where
Trinity Caves are. None of us know I think?’ said Rachel
quizzically, looking up at Toby Smith and her mother. Rachel’s Mum
shook her head.

‘
Hang on!’
exclaimed Megan, remembering something. ‘I’ve got a book where the
caves are mentioned. In fact I bought it in your shop.’

‘
Well what
does it say?’ asked Rachel’s mum, smiling.

‘
Actually I
can’t remember’ answered Megan sheepishly. ‘But I’ve got it at the
cottage. I can check it when I get back.’

It had been
two days since Lucy dissolved back into the water and returned to
her father in the hospital. Spirit felt bereft and alone without
her, even though Dancer and the rest of the pod were there to keep
him company. He and Dancer had searched and searched for the Three
Green Caves, but without success.

‘
I’m sure we
can find the caves’ Spirit enthused to Dancer just after Lucy had
gone. ‘It’s just a matter of looking.’ Dancer was equally keen and
the two of them had made their way along the coastline, under the
shadow of the brooding cliffs.

‘
Do you think
we’ll find the entrance under water?’ asked Dancer as they made
their way along, using their echo location clicks to find any
openings.

‘
Well there
has to be an opening which dolphins can get in through’ replied
Spirit, ‘so it must be under the water line, somewhere hidden’ he
went on, ‘or we’d know about it already.’

They soon
found that their task was not as easy as they imagined. There were
any number of outcrops, jutting out under the waterline, that gave
the impression that there was a cave underneath. Closer inspection
though generally showed nothing but a wall of rock, occupied by
sullen crabs. Occasionally they would come across a rocky fissure
that gave the promise of something more. They would investigate
curiously, eagerly, in the hope that it would open out into some
larger space that looked like it might be a cave. Most of the time
though, the fissures narrowed into nothing more than a tight
crevice. Even the larger holes in the rock were too shallow to
justify being called a cave at all.

The two
dolphins found it to be dark and depressing work. The more they
searched, the more they both craved light and the open sea. A day
later they felt entirely dispirited.

‘
It’s
impossible’ complained Dancer after they had investigated yet
another crack in the rock. ‘We could be at this for the next two
moons and we still wouldn’t find the Three Green Caves.’ Spirit
sighed. He knew that Dancer was right. If it was a well hidden
entrance, they could swim right past it and still have no idea it
was there. What’s more it could be blocked off by a rock-fall. The
odds seemed stacked against them.

‘
Come on’ said
Spirit eventually. ‘Let’s get back to the rest of the pod. I’m
tired and hungry and I just want to rest.’ Spirit felt his dream of
easy success fading away. The aching sense of loss, now that Lucy
had gone away again, just seemed to get greater.

The woman sat
at her desk, idly re-reading her files. The lab was quiet and all
her colleagues had packed up and left for the day. A research
fellow called Ben was leaving and there were drinks arranged at the
Jolly Wagoner pub, just up the road. She’d promised to join them
all, but the woman lingered, lost in thought. Her files bulged with
notes, observations and recordings. Most of all though she couldn’t
help but turn back to the photographs she had accumulated over the
years which she had tucked under a flap at the back of one of the
files. There was a picture of Megan, taken so many years ago, her
freckled face tanned by the Cornish sun. There was a picture of
Lucy, her daughter, taken years later, holding her mothers’ hand.
They looked so much alike.

Standing at
the foot of the hospital bed, looking at the sleeping Lucy, the
woman had so wanted to wake her up and speak to her. There was so
much she had to tell Lucy. It was impossible though. Instead she
had hastened away down the brightly lit corridors of the hospital,
out into the cold December night. If only she could carry out
research on Lucy, now that Megan was gone. Yet she knew that all
too soon Lucy’s gift might be lost like the blossom from a cherry
tree. She wondered if the book she’d posted Lucy had reached her,
and what the young girl had made of it. Scientists, she knew,
should not influence their subjects in this way, but hers was more
than a merely professional interest.

She sighed,
and closing her file, glanced at her watch. It was ten to eight in
the evening. She supposed she’d better join the others at the pub
for a while at least before heading home. Just then her mobile
phone rang. It was just a brief conversation, but as she slid her
phone shut again, it felt as though a little part of her had
crumpled inside. Someone she knew well had died. The funeral was
the very next day.

‘
Well it may
be in your book Megan, but I’ve still never heard of the Trinity
Caves’ said Rachel the next day, ‘and I don’t know anyone who has.’
They were sitting on the stone wall outside the holiday cottage the
next morning. Rachel’s rusty old Citroen was parked outside. The
sun was already hot and the stones felt warm underneath
them.

‘
Look. It says
here that the Trinity Caves are known for their beautiful
stalactites and crystalline rock formation’ Megan exclaimed
excitedly.

‘
That’s all
very well’ said Rachel, ‘but where are they?’

‘
Well that
bit’s not so easy’ admitted Megan. ‘It says that the exact location
of the caves has been lost. It says that even cavers haven’t been
able to locate where they are.’

‘
Did you
say
caver
?’ asked
Rachel. ‘That’s another word for
potholer
. This guy Dave in my halls
of residence is the president of the Uni Potholing Society’ she
exclaimed. ‘And I happen to know that he’s exploring a cave system
a few miles from here. Let’s go and ask him.’

Megan felt
both nervous and curious as she climbed out of Rachel’s old Citroen
and they walked down the steep track between two fields. At the
bottom, in a cleft between two hills, a slow stream trickled down
into the gaping hole of a cave.

‘
Where is
everyone?’ she asked Rachel as they got closer. There were a couple
of rucksacks propped up against some rocks and a coil of rope next
to them, but other than that it was quiet and deserted.

‘
I guess they
must be down in the cave system somewhere’ replied Rachel
nonchalantly. ‘There’s nothing for it but to sit and wait.’ After
the brightness of the day the hard mouth of the cave seemed
particularly dark and uninviting. Megan imagined Dave and the other
potholers somewhere below them, tripping over rocks and crawling
through tight crevices in the inky darkness.

Rachel sat
down against an accommodating rock, put on her sunglasses and
stretched out in the sun. Megan ambled around the entrance to the
cave, trying unsuccessfully to find fossils amongst the rough
stones underfoot. Eventually she too sat down on a small boulder.
Glancing around she realised that Rachel had been silently watching
her all the while.

‘
So what’s it
like then Megan’ she asked softly. Just then it seemed as though
all the birds had stopped singing and there was a moment of
absolute quiet. ‘You know what I mean don’t you?’ Megan nodded.
Rachel knew that she was a Dolphin-Child but had never asked a
single question about it until now.

‘
It just feels
great’ Megan answered after thinking for a moment. ‘It feels like
belonging, like coming home. When I’m with them in the sea, I feel
as though I’m both lost and found, all at the same time. The ocean
is so vast. I…’ she broke off. ‘I don’t know what I’d do if I
couldn’t swim with Jet and the pod anymore.’ Rachel didn’t reply at
first and they both sat in the sunshine in quiet
contemplation.

‘
I’ve never
met one before you, you know’ said Rachel at last. ‘A Dolphin-Child
I mean. Of course I’ve heard stories about them and there’s always
supposed to be one or two born in each generation in Merwater, but
I thought it was just a myth, something that the fishermen used to
tell each other while they were mending their nets.’ Megan glanced
over at Rachel.

‘
Why do you
believe I’m one then? I might be making it all up.’ Rachel
smiled.

‘
I did wonder’
she admitted. ‘But if you’d been making it up you’d be talking
about dolphins all the time to prove that you are one. Instead you
haven’t said a word. It’s the quiet ones that I always keep my eye
on, not the ones that like to boast.’

‘
Why is it
that you’re helping me like this?’ asked Megan. She really wanted
to know.

‘
Well at first
it was just idle curiosity’ Rachel admitted. ‘After all, you’re a
living link to a mystery that goes back hundreds of years. And then
I saw this far-away look in your eyes when you glimpsed the blue
ocean and…’ She trailed off. ‘Well,’ Rachel smiled, ‘I just knew I
had to help you.’

Just then they
heard the sound of boots on rock from within the cave, and they
both looked over towards the entrance. Megan stood up and peered
in. She could see a flash of light approaching them. Eventually
Dave and his two friends emerged. They wore helmets with lights
mounted on top and each of them had a coil of rope hung over a
shoulder. Their clothes were dirty and Dave’s face was smeared with
something like mud. Megan had imagined Dave to be a tall and hearty
looking, but instead he was slight and sported a straggly beard.
The cavers slung their ropes on the ground, and sat down on the
rocks before taking long gulps from the water bottles they had with
them.

‘
Hey Dave’
said Rachel, almost shyly.

‘
Rachel! What
are you doing here?’ asked Dave, wiping drops of water from his
beard. One of his two potholing friends went off up to their van to
get something, while the other sat down on a rock and looked on
with interest.

‘
Well as a
matter of fact we’ve come to ask you something’ Rachel
replied.

‘
Oh? Fire away
then. How can I help you?’

‘
Trinity
Caves’ said Rachel. ‘Have you heard of them?’

‘
Of course I
have’ exclaimed Dave, ‘Every potholer around here knows about them
don’t they Jane?’ he said, asking his friend who Megan suddenly
realised, was actually a girl. Jane nodded her
agreement.

‘
Where are
they then? asked Megan excitedly. The potholers both
chuckled.

‘
Wouldn’t we
all like to know the answer to that question’ laughed Dave, putting
his bottle down on the ground. The Trinity Caves are a bit of a
legend, a
holy grail
, you might say to us potholers. They’re supposed to be full
of stalactites and crystalline formations that give off a strange
eerie glow. There’s some Victorian bloke who describes them, but no
one seems to know where they are now. Believe me, I’ve looked into
it. All I know is that they’re linked to the sea
somehow.’

‘
I’d love to
see the Trinity Caves, they’re supposed to be magical’ joined in
Jane from behind them.

‘
But if
they’re so fantastic, how come no one knows where they are?’ asked
Rachel.

‘
Ah, well’
exclaimed Dave. ‘Didn’t that Victorian chappy says that the locals
blocked off the entrance for some reason or other? Can’t think
why.’

‘
This
Victorian guy’ asked Megan, ‘Was he the Reverend Jeremiah Smith by
any chance?’

‘
Actually no’
replied Dave amiably, ‘thought I’ve heard of him too. The bloke I’m
thinking about was a geologist. Worked in the tin mines. Only
potholers like us have heard about him really. Welsh bloke. What’s
his name again Jane?’

‘
Davidson’
replied Jane. ‘Owen Davidson. He was a geologist. I’ve got a copy
of his article on the Trinity Caves back home’ she went on. ‘He
says they’re spectacular. I can lend it to you if you
like.’

‘
In fact there
were tin mines all round Merwater’ continued Dave. ‘Some of the
deeper seams extend out under the sea. You can still come across
the mine openings when you’re walking in the
countryside.’

‘
Oh yes that’s
right’ added Rachel. ‘In the local paper recently there was a story
about a man walking his dog in the woods who fell down a disused
mineshaft. They’d never have found him if it wasn’t for his spaniel
sitting at the top of the shaft barking away for twelve hours. His
leg was fractured in three places and it took three hours to winch
him out.’

‘
Do you think
one of the tin mines links up with the Trinity Caves?’ asked Megan
curiously.

‘
Oh no, don’t
even think about it!’ exclaimed Dave with a comic wag of his finger
in Megan’s direction. ‘They’re very dangerous. Even experienced
potholers like us two would think three times before we went poking
around down one of those old shafts.’