The Boy Who Cried Fish (7 page)

‘Hmm,’ Wystan said, unconvinced.

‘No, really. They’re actually pretty good at it,’ Fizz went on, ‘it’s just most of them choose not to. It takes them ages to get their fur dry. It’s such good-quality fur, you see, and they’re a bit precious about it. Like to look their best all the time. Tigers though, they don’t care, they look good wet or dry, I guess. They
love
to swim. In fact, this book said that you’re more likely to get killed by a
tiger
when you’re swimming than by a
shark
. Although I suppose,’ he added as an afterthought, ‘it probably depends on where you’re doing the swimming.’

‘In the tiger enclosure at the zoo?’

‘More likely to be a tiger.’

‘In the shark tank at the Aquarium?’

‘More likely to be a shark.’

Wystan stopped walking. Fizz stopped too. (It only seemed polite.)

‘Fizz?’

‘Yes?’

‘Why did you have to say that about the shark? I’ve got pictures in my head now.’

‘Well, it was you that said about the shark tank and the Aquarium.’

‘Yeah, and it was
you
that said about sharks
eating people
.’

Now Fizz was getting pictures in his head too. He’d been concentrating on the tigers. He got on well with big cats (or at least with Charles, who was the only one he knew), and although they were dangerous he had a good idea of how to be safe around them (keep on the outside of the bars, for instance), but now he had a shark swimming round in his head in a huge tank at an Aquarium just like the one they were walking towards, and Fizz had never learnt to swim. In his mind’s eye he was splashing about desperately trying to learn (learning’s a good thing, you usually know more at the end of it) and that huge fin was heading his way.

‘They don’t have sharks here, do they?’ he said, trying to push the picture away with common sense and knowledge.

‘I don’t remember none,’ Wystan answered, ‘but that don’t mean nothing. It was pretty boring in there and I weren’t looking too close.’

‘No, me neither. But . . . well, they would’ve been in with all the grey fish, wouldn’t they? Right at the beginning?’

‘I suppose. You’re the one who knows stuff. You read books. Have you read what colour sharks might be?’

‘I think . . .’ said Fizz, racking his brains. ‘I
think
they’re all grey. Aren’t they?’

‘I guess we’re gonna find out,’ Wystan said glumly.

Just a minute or two later they were stood in front of the Aquarium. The glass doors at the front of the building were locked and, peering through them, they could see dim lights on inside. Grey shapes swam in tanks. Fizz hoped that none of them were sharks.

He hoped none of them were tigers either.

‘Now,’ he said, ‘let’s find a way in.’

Chapter Six

In which some boys attempt to break into an Aquarium and in which, eventually, they do so

The boys skirted round the outside edge of the Aquarium (not in real skirts, which flap about in the wind and get caught up in machinery, but in a metaphorical sense).

The plan was, instead of walking in through the front door (which was locked anyway), to sneak in round the side. When they were watching the show that morning Fizz had noticed that there was a place where the arena’s wall dipped down low. He could see over it from his seat and out to sea. If they could make their way round the outside of the Aquarium to there, they’d be able to climb over. Then, from the pool, they could slip through the curtain that led backstage and find a door. Maybe, if they were really lucky, Fish might be in the pool when they got there, and they could all just slip back over the wall and away. Easy.

‘Yeah, easy,’ Wystan had grumbled sarcastically. But since he couldn’t think of a better plan of his own, here he was, edging carefully.

To the seaward side of the Aquarium a path ran along beside the beach. Fizz had pointed at it, since it led the way they wanted to go, but as they’d rounded the corner it had narrowed. They had to walk in single file. Below them the waves splashed up and down the beach, crunching the hard shingle noisily.

They went as carefully as they could, the only light coming from the now vanished sun (which obviously didn’t give them much light at all), and from the pale glow which shone from some windows high above them.

The path grew wetter and more slippery in the dark.

The concrete on their right seemed rougher, harder and colder. It spiked their hands with tiny sharp edges, but they had to touch it to make sure they weren’t straying. They didn’t want to slip and fall. It was a long drop to the beach, and the idea of crashing onto those hundreds of hard pebbles wasn’t a happy one.

The spray from a big wave surrounded them like mist. The noise was deafening.

‘Stop, stop, stop, stop,’ whispered Fizz hurriedly.

Wystan bumped into his back.

Fizz wobbled, but didn’t fall, gripping onto the rough concrete with one hand.

He felt in front of him with his foot. He had been right to stop. The path stopped too.

‘Torch,’ he said.

Wystan scrabbled around in his rucksack and handed the torch to Fizz.

In the circle of white light they saw where the path stopped. Just under Fizz’s toes.

Shining the torch downwards, they could see the beach was further below them than they’d imagined. Ahead of them on their right the grey wall of the aquarium continued, rising up high above them like a castle wall. Some way in front, maybe twenty metres, maybe a bit more, the building got shorter, the wall lower.

‘There,’ said Fizz pointing into the distance. ‘That’s where we need to go, the wall comes right down. That’s our way in.’

Wystan squinted. At that distance the beam of light from the torch was lost in the general murk of the night, but Fizz was right, the wall was definitely getting lower. That must be the way to the pool.

‘The path runs out,’ he muttered through his beard. ‘How we gonna get there?’

Fizz shone the light around his feet again. He pointed the torch just beyond the end of the path. There were big rocks piled up along the bottom of the wall. The tops of them were level with the path.

‘Along there,’ Fizz said. ‘It’ll be easy.’

‘Easy?’

‘Well, easier than clinging to the wall or learning to fly.’

Wystan couldn’t argue with that. So he didn’t.

Fizz lived in a circus. The circus is a place full of special skills and admirable bravery. He hadn’t spent his whole life putting his head in a lion’s mouth every night. Sometimes he had had to help out with other acts too. He’d had a go at all sorts of things over the years.

He could juggle badly, he could ride a horse badly, he could make half- (but only half-) decent clown custard. He’d even done a bit of tightrope walking, though not on the high wire strung forty feet above the sawdust with no safety net. He’d learnt on the low wire, the one that wobbled a foot off the ground over an old mattress, that the acrobats used for practice.

He reckoned walking across the tops of those big boulders, piled up against the seawall of the Aquarium, would be a bit like that. Not so narrow of course, and with less sway underfoot and without anything to soften the fall, but still, a little bit like walking the tightrope. A wet, lumpy, rock-hard tightrope.

If only, he thought, he had been any good at tightrope-walking. It had been another one of those things he’d done badly.

Why didn’t the way into the Aquarium involve pouring custard into someone’s trousers? He could do that. He could do that pretty well. He knew just the right way to tip the bucket, so it flowed smoothly, didn’t just clump out in one great splurge, but took its time and luxuriated its way slowly down the trouser legs. He knew just where to pour it in so that both legs got filled evenly (there’s nothing worse than one custardy leg). He even had a good idea of just how to run away after you’d poured it: ideally at exactly the moment
before
the one whose trousers are full of custard notices.

But, try as he might, he couldn’t think how custard pouring could be of any use in this situation. Tricky tiptoe tightrope-like walking across the great dark wet sea boulders it was.

Fizz waited a few moments, listening to the constant repetitive surge and crash of the waves somewhere below him. The roar of them no longer reminded him of Charles, but of tigers and sharks (even though he knew they (sharks, I mean) don’t roar), and his mind’s eyes filled in the darkness with pictures of hungry beasts swimming round the foot of the rocks.
Oh, thank you, mind’s eye
, he thought sarcastically.

Gathering his courage up in one super-sized bundle, he sat down on the edge of the path and lowered himself towards the first of the huge rocks. He touched it with his toe, gingerly (which considering the colour of his hair (red) was the way he touched most things), and then pushed himself upright.

He was standing on the stone. It curved under his feet and, although this may have been his imagination, it felt cold through the soles of his shoes.

Beneath him the vast dark sea crashed up the beach and round the rocks. It seemed even louder now. A mist of spray whooshed up at him, and then the crunching shuckling sound roared to itself as the waves dragged the shingle backwards, back towards the deep water.

Nevertheless, Fizz stood firm. He stood strong. He stood brave. He was coming to find his friend, he had goodness on his side, how could he fail?

He waved the torch in front of him, trying to work out his next move, how to get to the next rock, how to pick his way, boulder by boulder, along to the Aquarium’s arena and their only way in.

The top of the next rock looked miles away. He gathered himself up to make the jump . . .

Now, I feel I must interject here, just briefly. Normally, as you know, I sit quiet in the corner over there (imagine me pointing into a corner), typing the words out, telling Fizz’s story as best I can and keeping all my opinions to myself. You know I don’t like to get involved or get in the way of the story; that’s not my job. My job is just to share Fizzlebert’s adventures with you as straightforwardly as I can. I don’t meddle. I don’t fiddle. I don’t make stuff up. I don’t tell you what I think or ramble on about biscuits and suchlike; I simply recount what happened. Just the facts, ma’am. That’s all.

However, I can’t keep quiet any more.

I must speak up.

I have to say this.

If I don’t, then I won’t be able to sleep at night, worrying what might happen.

Here goes.

What Fizz and Wystan are doing is
utterly stupid
. It’s crazy. It’s ridiculous. But more than that, it’s dangerous.

Climbing over giant sea rocks is bad enough under normal circumstances. They’re damp, they’re covered in slime, they’re hard and slippery. You could fall and break your leg, your arm, your neck even. You could drown in a poorly placed rockpool with a faceful of angry sea anemones. You will almost certainly be attacked by crabs.

It’s dangerous even when you’ve got people nearby looking out for you. At least they can ring for the coastguard and the air ambulance when you slip. But nobody knows where Fizz and Wystan are, they’re on a
secret
mission. If they fall, they’ll be stuck, alone, damp, and nipped by crabs. Possibly nipped to death.

Not only that, but what if they fell and got swept out to sea by the surging incoming tide with its treacherous undertows and ensnaring weeds? There are still crabs under the water, you know.

I can only ask, ‘What on earth is he thinking?’

Add to all that the fact that they’re doing this mountaineering nonsense
in the dark
, and this really is not a Good Thing.

It’s an adventure, for sure. And this book wouldn’t be very interesting if there wasn’t
some
sort of adventure in it. But it’s a
stupid
adventure.

I’m not saying Fizz is stupid, because he’s not. He’s a good kid and his heart’s in the right place. He’s doing this all to save his best friend, Fish, and that’s a Good Thing, it shows he’s listening to the commands of his heart, and that’s important. But what I
am
saying is that sometimes the heart disagrees with the head, and at those times it’s important to remember that your head is the more sensible of the two, being the one that has a brain in it. Your heart is just a squishy pump that moves blood around your body, and it only works if you keep the blood on the inside. So, please, please, please: listen to your head.