They began to hear the booming crash of waves hitting the reef up ahead and the sea around the boat was becoming choppier as the deep ocean swells suddenly came up against a steeply rising sea bed.
Paulo looked over at Alex and the whites of his eyes shone in the moonlight.
'Now?' he asked. Alex nodded. Paulo moved over to the stern and took a firm grip on the sculling-oar.
'In a minute, Paulo's going to try to steer us in over the reef,' said Alex to the others. 'It's going to get pretty rough, so we need to hunker down low in the boat and hang onto the safety line I rigged up earlier. Even better, anchor it around your waist or your arm if you can.'
'Couldn't we try to find a beach without a reef in front of it?' asked Li, sending a nervous sideways glance at the pounding surf.
Alex shook his head. 'It's too risky. We don't know how well we can handle the boat with only one oar. If we tried to get round the eastern tip of the island, the current might be too strong for us. We might get carried away from the island.'
The four of them got down into the bottom of the boat and each grabbed their own section of the safety line. Paulo began moving the oar back and forth with a smooth, powerful rhythm which made the muscles in his arms stand out in the moonlight. The boat turned sluggishly and started heading slowly towards the reef.
'One more thing,' shouted Alex, over the growing roar of the surf. 'If the boat doesn't make it over the reef, try to use a breaker to body-surf into the lagoon. Don't wait for anyone else. Don't try to turn back. If you get caught on the reef, it'll cut you to ribbons. Just get clear of it as fast as you can.'
The boat began to pitch and roll as the peaks and troughs of the ocean swells became sharper and deeper. They braced their feet against the hull and tightened their grip on the rope. In the stern, Paulo hung onto the oar, sometimes sculling it back and forth, sometimes letting the sea do the work. All the while he was watching the surf ahead and then turning to look at the moonlit swells behind him, trying to judge which one might carry the boat safely over the reef and into the lagoon.
At last, Paulo looked behind him one more time, then began sculling furiously. The boat caught the growing breaker just at the right moment. The bows tilted upwards as it rode the sloping crest of the wave, climbing higher and higher. Seawater poured in on them and the roar of the surf grew deafening.
The breaker, with the boat caught up in it, reached its peak and began to curl over. With a sickening, roller-coaster lurch, the boat turned its nose down-wards and fell with the breaking wave.
Paulo abandoned the oar and crashed down into the bottom of the boat beside Hex, frantically grabbing for a handful of the safety line. The breaker smashed the boat down into the surf and they were lifted helplessly into the air, then flung back down onto the floor of the boat with an impact that knocked all the breath out of their lungs. Before they had the chance to take another breath, they were swamped by the foaming, churning water. Then they were out in the air again, as the bows of the little boat miraculously rose out of the surf.
Alex choked the seawater out of his throat and took a painful breath as the boat lurched forward. He had been totally unprepared for the power of the breaker but, unbelievably, it seemed that the boat was going to clear the reef. Then his hope turned to horror as the boat slowed, stopped and began to slide back towards the reef, caught up in the pull of the retreating breaker.
'Hang on!' he yelled.
The boat hit hard. It juddered backwards across the reef with a splintering scraping noise. A jagged spur of coral punched through the bottom of the boat, missing Li's thigh by a few centimetres. The boat came to a sudden halt and, for a few seconds, it see-sawed back and forth, impaled on the reef with the surf crashing down on top of it. Then, with a crack like a rifle shot, the spine of the boat broke in two and the last thing Alex remembered was being thrown into the tumbling, roaring water.
EIGHT
'There's always a fuse,' croaked Alex, waving his arms weakly as he tried to swim back up to the surface. 'Don't light the fuse…'
Someone took hold of his hands and gently lowered them to his chest. Someone else leaned in so close to his head that he could feel warm breath tickling his ear.
'It's all right,' whispered the voice. 'You're on the island. We all are.'
'Li…?' Alex opened his eyes and bright daylight burned into his retinas, sending drum-beats of pain through his head. He groaned, squeezed his eyes into slits and peered up at the four grinning faces above him.
'Good to have you back,' said Li.
'Are you OK?' asked Paulo. Alex made the mistake of nodding and the drum-beats in his head exploded into dizzying pain. He turned on his side and vomited up seawater.
'Eeeuuwww!' shrieked Amber, taking a step back. 'Gross!'
Alex had to agree with her. He had never felt so gross. Every inch of his body felt battered and bruised, but the back of his head and his left wrist hurt most of all. He lifted his arm up to his face and squinted at his wrist, trying to work out why it hurt so much. His first impression was that he was wearing some sort of tight, red bracelet, then he realized that the bracelet was a strip of raw flesh.
'What…?' he croaked, holding up his arm.
'What happened?' guessed Paulo. Alex nodded again and immediately wished he hadn't.
'It is a bad rope burn,' explained Paulo. 'But it probably saved your life. We think part of the boat must have hit you on the head and made you – what is the word – not awake, yes?'
'Yes,' agreed Alex, remembering the stunning blow to the back of his head as he struggled to swim ashore.
'You would have drowned, I think,' continued Paulo. 'Except your wrist got caught in the safety line, which was still tied to the broken boat. So you were washed ashore. We found you-'
'And I gave you CPR!' announced Amber, proudly. 'You know, the kiss of life and all that stuff? See, I know how to do that, because of the sailing-'
'Shut up, Amber,' said Hex.
'But I saved his life-'
'Then I guess that makes you even, doesn't it?' said Li.
Alex felt much better now that he was rid of a stomach full of seawater. His head was clearing and the thudding pain was subsiding. With the help of Paulo and Hex, he sat up and took his first look around. They were at the top of the beach leading from the lagoon to the rainforest. All around them, above the high-tide line, were strewn bits of wreckage from the boat. He tried to see whether there was anything useful amongst the wreckage, but Paulo moved in front of him and held up three fingers.
'How many?' he demanded.
'Twenty-three,' said Alex with a deadpan expression.
Paulo grinned but persisted with his questioning. 'What is your name?' he asked.
'Barbara,' replied Alex, still playing it straight.
Paulo laughed out loud. 'OK, joker. No concussion. Your skull must be made of steel.'
Alex put his fingers to the back of his head and gently explored. He could feel a crusted-over gash about two inches long. The flesh surrounding the wound was swollen and bruised, but the damage was less than he was expecting to find.
'I'll live,' he said with a relieved grin. His eyes sharpened and he scanned the others, looking for signs of injury. Like him, they were liberally covered with scrapes and bruises, but that seemed to be all. 'Look's like we'll all live,' he concluded.
'That's the second time you've promised me that,' drawled Hex. He was trying to appear casual, but kept sending wary glances into the jungle at the top of the beach. 'Do you always keep your word, Alex?'
'Always,' said Alex, firmly. 'We're going to be fine. My dad's been in rainforest like this before. He taught me all about it. It's not too hard to survive if you know what you're doing.'