The Pacific Giants

First American Edition published in 2014 by Darby Creek, an imprint of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

Copyright © 2012 by Jean Flitcroft

First published in Dublin, Ireland in 2012 by Little Island as The Cryptid Files:
Pacific Giants
by Jean Flitcroft

All rights reserved. International copyright secured. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc., except for the inclusion of brief quotations in an acknowledged review.

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Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA

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www.lernerbooks.com
.

Front cover: © Dale O'Dell/Alamy.

Main body text set in Janson Text LT Std 12/17.

Typeface provided by Linotype AG.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Flitcroft, Jean.

The Pacific giants / by Jean Flitcroft.

pages cm. — (The cryptid files ; #3)

Summary: “Vanessa discovers another beast, cadborosaurus willsi, or Caddy for short, off the west coast of Canada”— Provided by publisher.

ISBN 978–1–4677–3266–6 (lib. bdg. : alk. paper)

ISBN 978–1–4677–3486–8 (eBook)

[1. Sea monsters—Fiction. 2. Canada—Fiction. 3. Horror stories.] I. Title.

PZ7.F65785Pac 2014

[Fic]—dc23

2013024086

Manufactured in the United States of America
1 – SB – 12/31/13

eISBN: 978-1-4677-3486-8 (pdf)
eISBN: 978-1-4677-5115-5 (ePub)
eISBN: 978-1-4677-5114-8 (mobi)

For Mers and Als

CRYPT
O
ZOOLOGY

Cryptozoology is the study of strange creatures that some people believe they have seen but for which there is no scientific proof. These creatures are called cryptids. It comes from the Greek word
kryptos
, meaning hidden. Those who study these animals are called cryptozoologists.

The first book in the Cryptid Files series,
The Loch Ness Monster,
is about the most famous cryptid. The second,
The Chupacabra,
features a creature that drains the blood of other animals and whose Spanish name means “goatsucker.”

This book is an adventure set off the west coast of Canada, where Vanessa comes face-to-face with an extraordinary sea creature. This huge beast is part of local mythology but has been seen by so many people that it has been given a scientific name,
Cadborosaurus willsi
.

The creature rose out of the water just in front of her, as though commanded by her thoughts. Vanessa froze, too terrified to swim. She clutched the red-and-white lifesaving ring, and prayed feverishly that the beast wouldn't notice her.

But the large, ugly head pivoted on its long neck. Its eyes bulged; its jaw dropped open; and then the snakelike coils appeared—huge, heavy, and powerful.

Oh, God! Please help me, Mum
, Vanessa pleaded silently.
Make it go away.

She watched it sink slowly down into the water again. But that didn't help. It was bad enough seeing a sea serpent above the water, but how much worse to imagine it swimming beneath her at that very moment!

Vanessa felt a current of water rush past her legs and saw it well up around her in a smooth, circular pattern. She gave a strangled cry, let go of the ring, and swam for her life. The cold had crept into her bones and her teeth rattled in her head like boiled sweets in a jar. With each stroke she got a little weaker.

The beach wasn't all that far. Surely she could make it.

On 5 October 1933, the
Victoria Daily Times
was the first newspaper to publish a story about a “real” sea monster that lived in the Gulf of Georgia, British Columbia, Canada. The sightings were made by two witnesses, a lawyer and an official at the Provincial Library of Victoria, who saw it independently and on different dates and were considered above suspicion.

Vanessa leaned against the rail of the ferry and stared out across the expanse of gray sea. Her eyes watered in the wind and her hair whipped across her face,
making it difficult to see anything. Vancouver seemed a long way behind her now, and the gulf stretched like a huge empty canvas before her. Land was just about visible on the horizon, but the thin layer of mist that had descended made it hard to guess the distance to Duquette Island.

In front of her, the seagulls circled and skimmed the choppy water thrown up by the engines. Their hoarse shrieks of delight punctuated the monotonous thud of the engines pounding away beneath Vanessa's feet.

What freedom birds have!
she thought.
And what fun to fly like that!
Vanessa looked around. As there was nobody else on the deck, she stretched out her arms, face to the wind, and imagined the feel of the wind under her wings, the moisture of the clouds on her face.

The ferry lurched suddenly. Before Vanessa had time to grab hold of the rail, she was thrown backward along the deck and fell heavily at the feet of an elderly man. Flustered, she jumped up and started to apologize, but the wind carried her words away and the man continued to ignore her. He stared silently out to sea, looking so frail and white that Vanessa
wondered how he had managed to stay on his feet—he wasn't even holding on to anything.

Where had he appeared from? She hadn't seen him in the lounge earlier or on deck when she came out. He was probably a local. His yellow raincoat suggested that he was better prepared for the unpredictable weather in Canada than a tourist like her. Maybe he was feeling seasick and just wanted to be left alone.

Vanessa turned away and walked purposefully toward the stairs which led inside. It was time to join Lee—her father's girlfriend, and now also a good friend of Vanessa's—in the warm lounge. It would be much easier to ignore the stale smell of sick in there now that she was freezing cold. Her thin cotton jacket was drenched through. So much for the start of summer in Canada and the clear blue skies she had imagined! Gloves and a woolly hat would have been a lot more useful.

Lee was sitting exactly as Vanessa had left her, with a cup of coffee in one hand and a book in the other, her glasses perched on the bridge of her nose. Vanessa threw herself down on the chair beside her, and Lee looked up, surprised.

“You're soaked, Vanessa. I didn't realize it was
raining.” Lee dropped her book onto her knee and looked out the window.

“It's not rain as such, just very wet mist,” Vanessa replied, pushing the wet strands back off her face. “An attractive look, huh?”

“Have some coffee. It'll warm you up.”

Lee offered Vanessa her cup and Vanessa took a slug.

“Blah,” she said, shaking her head and making a face. “It's lukewarm.”

Vanessa leaned her head back and closed her eyes. The chairs were uncomfortable and she was restless.

“Lee, have you ever wondered why it's called lukewarm?” Vanessa said suddenly. “Could it ever have been johnny-warm or henry-warm, do you think?”

Lee grinned at Vanessa.

“You're bored, my dear. The rubbish you talk gets much worse when you're bored, I've noticed.”

“True,” Vanessa replied solemnly. “So you can imagine how bad I am at school.”

Vanessa stretched out across a couple of seats and took out the travel guide that she had bought in Vancouver. She had tried to read it earlier, but the combination of the smell in the lounge and the hard plastic
seats, which gave her dead legs, had forced her out onto the windy deck.

“It's not boredom really, Lee. I'm just impatient to get to Duquette Island. I'm dying to see what it's like.”

“Well, it's just another forty minutes or so,” Lee said, checking her watch. It was half past five. “Mrs. Bouche from the guesthouse says she'll be at the ferry terminal to pick us up.”

Vanessa looked around the lounge. Most people had gotten off at the last stop—Galiano Island. Apart from herself and Lee, there were now just four women and two men left in the lounge—making seven passengers total, if you included the grumpy man on deck. Only two of them were chatting; the others sat silently reading or preoccupied by their thoughts. Were these people visiting Duquette Island, like herself and Lee, or did they live there? If so, they might know Mrs. Bouche, the guesthouse owner. One of them might even be a relation.

“Maybe the guy in the raincoat is Mrs. Bouche's husband,” Vanessa wondered out loud. “No, her father, more like it.”

“What guy?” Lee looked puzzled.

“Oh, a man I almost knocked down when I was up on deck. He was wearing this bright yellow raincoat and just appeared out of nowhere.” Vanessa frowned. “He didn't seem all there, actually—very tired and ill-looking.”

“And what's he got to do with Mrs. Bouche?”

“Nothing, probably,” Vanessa admitted.

Lee opened her book again and started to read. Vanessa flicked through the pages of her guidebook.