Read Online Midnight Dolphin by James Carmody - Free Book Online Page B

a keen
naturalist and corresponded with such luminaries as Charles Darwin.
They talked about turning the rectory where he lived into a folk
museum a few years ago. I think they tried to raise the money but
it didn’t quite happen.’
    ‘ Did he write
about dolphins?’ Lucy asked enthusiastically.
    ‘ Now that I don’t know’
replied Mrs Penhaligon
    ‘ Do you have
his book then? Is it in the school library?’ Mrs Penhaligon
laughed.
    ‘ No it’s not
the kind of thing you’d find in our school library. Maybe in the
local history section in the Merwater or Truro library or a
university perhaps.
    ‘ So I couldn’t
order it online?’ Mrs Penhaligon chuckled again.
    ‘ It’s not that
kind of a book. It will have been out of print for decades and if
you did find a copy, it would cost hundreds of pounds. Besides,
your Mum is writing about his journal, not his published
works.
    ‘ What would
his journal be then?’ Lucy asked.
    ‘ Well I
suppose it’s what he wrote his notes in as he went round the
countryside. That seems to be what your Mum was on about. There
must be something particularly significant in his third journal.’
Mrs Penhaligon glanced up at the clock. She handed back the book.
Break will be finished soon. I’d better get ready for my next
lesson.’ She looked back at Lucy. ‘Come back though and we’ll see
what we can find out. I like a challenge.’
     
    At lunch time
Lucy had swimming practice. The public swimming pool was right next
door to the school. Lucy’s sports teacher Miss Baldwin was
committed to build up the swimming squad and thought that Lucy
could win medals for the school if she put in the training. Lucy
was a keen swimmer and loved ploughing up and down the pool
whenever she could, working on her stroke. Dad had been set against
her doing swimming practice last year, but since September he
didn’t seem concerned about it all. If anything, he encouraged it
now. ‘ It’s because now he thinks I’ll lose
my gift anyway, it doesn’t matter if I’m good at
swimming ’ she thought grimly as she walked
over to the pool.
    The swimming
pool was a bit run down. The walls of the changing room were tiled
but several had fallen off and the paint of the steel window frames
was peeling. The occasional ant wandered along the grouting between
the tiles in search of discarded sweets. Still, Lucy felt at home
here. For her, it was a refuge from the worries of the
day.
    Just before
the school had use of the pool at twelve thirty, there was a
session for the over sixty-fives. It made Lucy smile to see the
elderly ladies moving slowly and sedately through the water. The
school children were so raucous and energetic in comparison. The
elderly ladies reminded Lucy of the manatees, or sea cows she had
seen in a programme about the wildlife of Florida on the TV. She
was so lithe and supple in the water in comparison; well a little
like a dolphin she supposed.
    ‘ Good to see
you Lucy’ Miss Baldwin said briskly. ‘Get changed quickly, we’re
going to be working on diving today.’ Lucy was soon in her swimsuit
and swimming cap and at the deep end of the pool. A group of
younger kids were doing widths under the supervision of a couple of
sixth formers at the other end of the pool. At the deep end though
there were only five of the more advanced swimmers under Miss
Baldwin’s tutelage. The pool echoed with the noise of the
boisterous children at the other end.
    Lucy was used
to diving in to the pool to start swimming a length and felt that
she was able to slice into the pool quite cleanly when she dived.
That wasn’t what Ms Baldwin wanted to teach them today
though.
    ‘ Okay team’
said Miss Baldwin, clapping her hands to get their attention. She
was wearing shorts and a polo shirt and she had a look in her eye
that suggested that she was going to work them hard this lunchtime.
‘There are basically four positions in diving. There’s straight , which is when
you keep your body in a fluid