ماناتی

Chapter six

The Manatee

Max and Ikemi walked along the jetty. The wind was strong and it began to rain.

A small wooden boat, just big enough for two people, was tied to the end of the jetty. Max helped Ikemi down the steps and into the boat. He started the engine.

“Untie us” he shouted. Ikemi untied the rope and Max took the boat into the open water. He did not go fast. The wind was blowing against them, and waves broke over the little boat and water came in.

“Not far to go” Max shouted “We’ll be there in a minute!” He kept his eyes on the waves and tried to take the boat through them.

Ikemi looked at the water in the bottom of the boat, looked at the waves which were getting bigger as they left the land behind, and then looked at the Manatee. The Manatee looked very far away the boat was going very slowly and a lot of water was coming in.

Ikemi began to throw the water out of the boat. A lot of the salty water blew back into her face and hurt her eyes, but she kept throwing it out.

It came in faster than she could throw it out, and by the time it had reached the Manatee, the boat was almost half full of water. It was raining hard now, and they were both wet and cold.

“Quick! Get inside!” Max unlocked the door in the seaplane’s side and helped Ikemi climb inside. He followed and quickly shut the door. Inside the plane it was much quieter.

Ikemi looked round. The inside of the plane was empty. There were only three seats at the front and a big yellow bag just behind them.

“Why aren’t there any seats here in the back?”

Max was already sitting down and putting on his seat belt.

“The plane was used as an air ambulance up and down the Keys.”

Max pushed the wet hair out of his eyes and began to look through some maps. He pulled one out.

“Ikemi, come and look.”

Ikemi went up and sat in the seat next to Max. He showed her the map.

“Look. This is where we are. This is Key Biscayne and this is the marina. Now, where do you think your father might be?”

Ikemi looked at the map. There was a lot of water on the map, and not much land. She put her finger down east of Key Biscayne, about fifteen kilometers out to sea.

“He often goes around here.”

Her finger moved up the coast.

“But he sometimes goes up the coast, towards Boca Raton. He goes where the fish are.”

“And he didn’t say where he was going?”

Ikemi shook her head. “No, he didn’t.”

The wind suddenly hit the plane and shook it.

“We’d better go,” he said. “We haven’t got much time. OK. We’ll go east from here, for about 15 kilometers.” “Then we’ll be going straight into the hurricane,” said Ikemi. “Max, are you sure you can fly this thing? What happens if we fly into the hurricane?”

“Don’t worry,” said Max. “Ross Peters taught me to fly the Manatee. I’ve been up with him quite a few times.

And as for flying into the hurricane - if a small light plane like a hurricane hunter can fly in storm winds, then a heavy old plane like the Manatee will just sail through.” Max sounded very sure of himself, and Ikemi felt better.

“And anyway, we’ve got a very nice life raft if anything goes wrong.” He looked at the big yellow bag lying on the floor behind the seats.

“If we have problems landing the plane, drop it into the sea and jump in. There’s water in there, Chocolate, a light, a radio. everything you need for a nice few days at sea!”

Ikemi wished he hadn’t told her about the life raft.

“We’re flying towards a hurricane in an old, broken- down seaplane and you think a life raft is going to make me feel any better? Are you crazy?”

Max held her hand for a second. “Come on, put on your seat belt. Let’s go.”

He started the engine. “Are you ready?” He turned to Ikemi. “Are you going to be OK?” he said.

Ikemi nodded. “I’ll be fine,” she said, “and Max. thank you.”

Max did not reply. He was taking the plane into open water for the takeoff. The heavy plane moved slowly because the wind and the waves were pushing it back.

“Come on, come on, come on,” whispered Max.

Ikemi shut her eyes. Then suddenly they were in the air.

“We’re off” said Max.

Ikemi looked through the window at the sea below. The clouds were very low and dark and the rain was heavy. It was very hard to see anything out of the window.

“We’ll have to stay below the clouds,” shouted Max, “or we won’t be able to see anything!”

Ikemi could not see very far. The sky was dark and the rain was falling heavily. The waves below were dark, too, only showing white when they broke.

“This is impossible,” she thought to herself. “How can we find a little boat in this weather when we don’t even know where it is?”

It was as though Max could read her thoughts.

“Don’t worry, We’ll find him,” he said. And she believed him.

And as the Manatee began its journey east over the sea, Hurricane Irene was moving west. The hurricane left the broken island of Cuba behind and began to move over the water towards Miami.

It brought with it great walls of cloud, heavy rain, and high winds. The great walls of cloud formed circles around the hurricane’s eye.

The eye was at the center of the hurricane. It was a place of calm and peace. As the storm passed, first came the screaming winds and the biting rains which destroyed everything they blew over.

Then, as the eye passed over, the winds and the rain stopped. No wind blew inside the eye, there was bright sunshine and a warm blue sky.

You might think that the hurricane had passed - until the wall of the hurricane hit from the other side. Sometimes the eye is as little as six kilometers wide, sometimes as big as 60 kilometers wide.

The smaller the eye, the faster the winds blow round it.

Irene’s eye was only 15 kilometers wide, and the winds around the eye were screaming, killing winds of 274 kilometers an hour, blowing up waves over eight meters high.

Hurricane Irene moved slowly over islands, beaches, villages, towns, and the open sea. Nothing could stop it. Like a careless child, the hurricane picked up anything that lay in front of it, then threw it down.

Houses, ships, trucks, roofs, trees, people, animals were all lifted up, then thrown down as Irene passed by.