Whale Pot Bay (5 page)

Milt bent over, picked up the camera, opened up a slot, and pulled out the memory card. While he looked at it, trying to decide what to do, Weston got to his feet. ‘You take that and I’ll have you charged with theft. Then I’ll make sure it gets published in every magazine in the world.’

Milt glared at him, before putting the card back. But instead of handing the camera over, he turned it on and began pushing buttons. ‘Then I won’t take it,’ he said. ‘I’ll just reformat the memory and wipe all your photos.’ After he’d done it, he took out the batteries and handed the camera back.

‘So now I’ll charge you with stealing the batteries,’ Weston said calmly.

‘But I’m not stealing them,’ said Milton, swinging his arm back and scattering them across the beach. ‘I’m just making sure you don’t take any more photos before you leave, which you’re going to do right now. And if you return, I’ll have you charged with trespassing.’

Weston stuck his chin out. ‘I’m not trespassing. This beach is public land.’

‘The beach may be, but you came over private land to get here.’

‘Yes, but I was guided here by the owner’s agent.’

‘What! My manager led you here? I don’t believe it.’

By then my stomach was tumbling like a clothes drier. I’d hoped that my part in the matter might be kept secret, but Weston clearly wanted Milt to know.

‘No, not your manager—this young man here,’ he said pointing to me. ‘He helpfully gave me a ride in his jeep.’

Milton spun around to me. ‘You brought him here.’ It was an accusation, not a question.

‘He said Grandad had sent him to test the soil.’

‘And you didn’t check him out?’ By now Milt was almost shouting at me.

‘Yes, I did!’ I protested. ‘I rang his firm and they said he was all right.’

‘Well, he plainly isn’t, is he?’

I remained silent. I felt fool enough without opening my mouth and making matters worse.

He turned back to Weston. ‘Get out of here!’ he shouted. ‘And next time I
will
charge you with trespass, no matter how you get here.’ He then turned and strode off towards the elevator. I glared at the man for a while before following.

The trip across the sand was in silence, but I could feel Milt’s anger alongside me. It wasn’t until the elevator was halfway up that he turned to me and asked, ‘Did you tell anybody about the surfing lessons?’

I hung my head.

‘Did you?’

I nodded.

‘Who?’

I told him.

For a while, he just looked at me. Then we reached the top and the door opened. I moved to go out, but he put an arm out to block me. ‘I asked you to keep it quiet, didn’t I?’

By then I’d recovered enough to start defending myself. ‘I thought it would be OK to tell Stephanie. I told her not to pass it on.’

‘Well, she obviously did! I bet she went to school and told all her friends. Then the text messages would have started and by now half the world knows.’

I said nothing, knowing that he was probably right.

He grabbed hold of my shoulders. ‘Look at me, Jake. I want you to understand what you have done.’

I tried to look him in the eye, but found I could hold it for only a moment.

‘That man took photos of me surfing. He hoped to sell them for thousands and thousands of dollars. He can’t now because I wiped them. But that won’t stop him selling the story. Someday soon, some sleazy magazine or newspaper will publish it, and then everyone will know. One of the few private things in my life has been taken away from me. Because of what you’ve done. Well, it’s not going to happen a second time. If I ever go surfing again, it will be on my own. Do you understand what I’m saying? From now on you’re not welcome around here anymore.’

I once did a school project on scatology, which is the study of animal scats—more commonly called ‘droppings’ or ‘faeces’ or one of the several other words which I won’t mention. Scientists can find out lots about an animal by studying its scats. The sperm whale is an example. A middle-sized male produces about half a tonne of faeces a day—which really is a pile of it. While most of us wouldn’t want to swim in the water just after a whale has gone to the toilet, that’s exactly what whale scientists do. They follow sperm whales and collect their scats. They’re hoping to find three things: remains of food, so that they can work out what the whale has eaten; bits of gut lining, so they can analyse its DNA; and parasitic worms, as these indicate the health of the animal.

As I lay in bed that night after the argument with Milt, I thought about the photographer, and I also thought about those worms they find in scats. It seemed to me there was a lot in common between the two. The photographer fed off other people’s lives in the same way that the parasitic worms fed off the whales. Just before I went to sleep I came up with my own name for Mr Stuart Weston. I called him ‘Scatworm’—the creature that lives in faeces. It was surprising how much better that made me feel.

I didn’t tell Dad about Scatworm’s visit. I did, however, ask about his trip to town. He confirmed that he and Grandad had gone out for afternoon tea. By then I’d worked out that
Scatworm must have been hanging around the valley so that he could study us. He’d probably collected heaps of information, just so he could trick me into showing him the secret way to Whale Pot Bay.

After school the next day, I recovered Scatworm’s business card from the rubbish, thinking that I would ring SoilSeek again and tell them that I knew they were fakes. That’s when I saw a mobile number on the card. Maybe it was Scatworm’s real number? I decided to give it a go.

The telephone rang for ages before switching to a message: ‘Gidday! If you’ve got something useful to tell me, then leave a message. Otherwise, have a nice day.’ There was no doubting that it was Scatworm’s voice.

I thought quickly. ‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘I’ve got something useful to say. Get lost, Scatworm. Why don’t you crawl back into the hole you came out of?’ Then I hung up.

I’d thought Milt had been pretty clever when he’d wiped the memory from the camera: it destroyed the photos but didn’t lay him open to claims of theft. However, as it turned out, he must’ve wiped a blank card, for it wasn’t long before we found that the photos still existed. Scatworm must have been swapping the cards when I saw him hiding between the boats. By the time we caught him, the photos were safely tucked away in his pocket.

The first I learnt of this was on the last day of school before the Christmas holidays. That evening there was an ad on television for the latest
C’leb Investigate
magazine. It was only a ten-second commercial, but it had enough for everyone to know about Milt’s surfing. It showed the
cover, which featured a photo of Milt in the air just before crashing into a wave. The caption said:
Milt’s secret surfing lessons.

I didn’t think it was all that bad
—
nothing for Milt to get too upset over. But when I went onto the
C’leb Investigate
website, I soon discovered that things were bad. Very bad. Much worse than I’d ever imagined they could be.

The whole magazine article was reproduced on their website. There were four photos, all taken during Milt’s wipeout, which I thought unfair, as he’d had a good ride before that happened. However, it was the article that upset me most. The headline read: MILT’S SECRET LESSONS AT REMOTE HIDEAWAY.

Then came the story which used the word ‘secret’ several times, including several synonyms such as ‘clandestine’, ‘hush-hush’, and ‘surreptitious’. Much was also made of the remoteness of the hideaway, as if it was somehow illegal to be in a place where the media couldn’t see everything you were doing. Finally, there was the sting in the tail:

When
C’leb Investigate
first learnt of these
clandestine lessons, we naturally thought
that the world’s richest twenty-four-year-old
would have employed one of the top
surfing coaches from Hawaii or Malibu.
But not so. Milton chose a boy to do the
job—a local boy. Now why would that be?
we asked. Who is this boy? And what is so
special about him that Milton would choose
him above all others?

C’leb Investigate
is seeking the answers, so
keep watching this space!
Stuart Weston
Freelance Journalist

It had never occurred to me that I would get caught up in the publicity. I was just a kid—who would want to know about me? However, when I thought about it, I realized that Scatworm would also have photos of me, either in the surf or walking up the beach with Milt. I began to believe that if I did ‘keep watching this space’, then chances were I would soon see my own photo on the website and in the magazine. And I sure didn’t like the thought of that, because I had a fair idea what the magazine would suggest.

They’d use words that implied there was something wrong with Milt and me surfing together, without saying exactly what that might be. This innuendo unfortunately allows people to fill in the message with their own thoughts—and some people in this world can have particularly nasty thoughts.

I slept late the next morning. Normally, on the first day of the holidays I would get up early, excited about all the things I was going to do in the coming weeks. I felt none of that excitement. Instead, I half-wished that school had continued, for it would have helped take my mind off my worries.

I was deep into blaming myself for the whole mess. If I’d reacted differently during Vicky and Stephanie’s visit, then things would have been altogether different. Also, I should have told Scatworm to go away and make an appointment with my father. Then there was that stupid message I’d left on his voice-mail; that was a mistake and was probably why Scatworm had written that nasty bit at the end of the article.

My self-pitying thoughts were disturbed by the sound of a car pulling into our driveway. A moment later there was a knock on the front door, followed shortly afterwards by Dad inviting someone to come in. For half an hour I could hear the mumble of conversation from the kitchen without having any idea who the person was. Then Dad came to my room and said there was a visitor to see me.

After dressing hurriedly, I walked into the kitchen to find Milton Summer sitting with Dad at the bench. A copy of
C’leb Investigate
was open in front of them.

‘Hello, Jake,’ said Milt in a serious voice. ‘I think we
need to have a discussion about this.’ He pointed to the magazine. ‘Have you read it?’

‘Only on the web.’ I picked it up and looked at the article. It was the same as on the website, but it all seemed worse when printed on paper.

‘It’s horrible,’ I said putting it down.

Both the men nodded in agreement. ‘Yes, it is,’ said Dad, grimly. Then after a pause, ‘Why didn’t you tell me about it?’

‘What? That I was giving surfing lessons?’

Dad nodded.

‘I didn’t think it was any big deal.’

‘Well it is now, isn’t it?’

‘Only because that magazine wants it to be,’ I countered, feeling my face tighten in the first stages of anger. ‘I didn’t do anything wrong. If I’d given lessons to anybody else, nothing would have happened.’

‘You told other people about it,’ Dad accused. ‘You told Steph.’

I took a deep breath. ‘I was only trying to make her feel better. I didn’t know that she’d blab it all over the place.’

‘We don’t know that she did,’ said Milt, quietly. ‘There are other possibilities.’

I waited for him to say more: maybe he wasn’t blaming me for everything.

‘It could have been somebody at the surf shop,’ he went on. ‘We need to talk to your friend Stephanie.’

I wanted to say that she was no friend of mine, but let it go.

‘We’ll be able to do that soon,’ put in Dad. ‘They’ll be arriving any time now.’

That threw me. ‘Are they coming to stay?’

‘Yes.’

‘You could have told me,’ I said angrily. Who was he to blame
me
for not talking about things?

‘I would have, if you hadn’t shut yourself in your room so much.’

Milt was obviously getting impatient with our family squabbles. ‘What we’ve got to do,’ he said forcefully, ‘is make sure the story doesn’t get any bigger than it is now.’

That shut us up and got our attention.

‘First, my lawyers have made contact with
C’leb Investigate,
and after a few threats
C’leb
have agreed not to continue the story. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they’ll stick to the agreement. They probably lie as much in their business dealings as they do in the stuff they print.’

‘Have you made contact with the photographer?’ I asked, thinking of the phone number I had.

‘My lawyers have. He was not particularly cooperative. He says he has other photos and he’s within his rights to sell them.’ Milt gave a little snort. ‘He even offered to sell me the ones showing me surfing properly.’

‘Do you want to continue surfing?’ asked Dad.

‘Yes,’ Milt replied without hesitation. ‘Very much so.’

‘Do you think you still need lessons?’

Before he could answer, we were interrupted by a knock on the door. I looked out the window and saw that Vicky’s car had arrived.

Dad rushed to the door, opened it, and pulled Vicky
into his arms. It was clear that their passion for each other hadn’t diminished in any way.

Only when they separated could Stephanie come in. She did so sheepishly until she saw Milt. Her eyes went huge and her jaw dropped so much that it looked like it might fall off.

I couldn’t help but laugh. ‘Milt, this is Stephanie Frew, the girl I sent your photo to.’

Milt stood and reached out his hand. Still Stephanie stood there, staring.

It was Vicky who eventually took the offered hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, Milt,’ she said with a big grin. ‘I’m Vicky. You’ll have to give my daughter some time to recover. She’s one of your biggest fans, you know.’

‘I am, too,’ agreed Stephanie, finding her voice. ‘The biggest you’ve got. I think you’re great.’

‘Thank you!’ said Milt, smiling. ‘It’s nice to know that some people still think I’m all right.’ He glanced at the magazine lying open on the bench.

‘Is that the article?’ asked Vicky, picking it up. She scanned down the text. Then she angrily slapped it back onto the bench. ‘That’s ghastly,’ she said, almost spitting at it. ‘How can people write such malicious rubbish?’

Milt shrugged. ‘They write it because that’s what lots of people want to read.’

‘I didn’t tell,’ put in Stephanie in a small voice. ‘I didn’t tell anybody about the surfing or the photograph.’

‘Are you sure?’ asked Milt.

‘Absolutely! Cross my heart, I didn’t tell.’

Milt was plainly relieved. ‘Then it must have been the surf shop.’ He thought for a moment before standing.
‘Look, I’ll get out of here and start looking into that. But I’d like you all to come to my house for lunch. You can admire my view while we have a chat about how we move into the future. Can we do that?’

‘Yes, please!’ cried Stephanie in a rush, before anybody could turn the invitation down. ‘I’ll make sure everybody gets there.’

Lunch was a pleasant affair. We sat around a low table in the big room where the view through the curved window attracted your eyes like a magnet. The food was great—just the sort of stuff I like. Vicky, who was sitting beside me, nudged me at one stage and whispered into my ear, ‘No weeds for you to worry about this time, are there, Jake?’ I gave an embarrassed smile in return.

That was the general tone of the meal: a chance for everyone to get to know each other, and put the differences of the past behind us. If that had been Milt’s intention, then it generally worked. The only exception was Stephanie’s attitude towards me—it was still icy, to say the least. She avoided eye contact with me, and showed impatience, almost disgust, every time I contributed to the conversation.

After the meal, we sank down into the leather lounge chairs for a frank discussion about how we would behave in future. Milt made his views known first: never again would we provide the opportunity for a photograph to show the two of us together. The same would apply with Stephanie. Anything that could imply that he was alone with a child was unacceptable.

He used the word ‘paparazzi’ to describe the people who would come and take photos. That’s the name given to the herds of photographers who make a living out of taking embarrassing photos of the rich and famous.

‘Is “paparazzi” the Italian word for “parasite”?’ I asked with a smile.

Milt chuckled. ‘No, but it could be, couldn’t it, Jake?’

That earned me a glare from Stephanie, who either didn’t appreciate Hauruanui humour or was upset because I was getting some of Milt’s attention.

The discussion continued with Dad and Vicky offering to do anything that would help. Vicky said she would chaperone us whenever needed; Dad suggested some surfing lessons, if Milt thought he still needed them.

‘Thanks,’ replied Milt. ‘I’ll see how it goes. Anyway, I won’t be doing much surfing for a while. I’m heading back to England to spend Christmas with my mother. So you’ll have the bay to yourselves. I’ll be back before New Year.’

‘Aw,’ complained Stephanie, who probably had visions of dining with Milt every day.

Milt saw her disappointment and said, ‘You haven’t been in my elevator yet, have you? Would you like a ride down to the beach?’

‘Yes, please!’ she shouted, jumping out of her seat.

In line with the new policy, everyone had to go to the beach. I noticed that Stephanie made sure she was on the opposite side of the elevator to me. Maybe she imagined that if she were too close, somehow I would make the thing crash.

We were part-way down when Stephanie pointed to the water and said, ‘Look! There’s something swimming out there.’

‘Is it a dolphin?’ asked Vicky, excitedly.

‘No,’ replied Milt. ‘I think it’s one of the smaller whales.’

‘A whale!’ squealed Stephanie. ‘How cool!’

I looked and, yes, it was a whale. Immediately, I began searching for another one, which I soon found. Except this one wasn’t in the water—it was washed up on the beach. I glanced across to Dad, and he returned my look with a sad shake of his head. He knew that we were in for a tough time.

The whales that strand in Whale Pot Bay were usually sick. In the past we’d struggled for many long, emotionally charged hours trying to save them. Yet never once had we been successful. And by what I could see of these ones, there was nothing to indicate that this time would be any different to the others.