Bird Island Expedition - A Mel, Tab, Mewla & Cathy story

Chapter Six
Next Morning


  Next morning, I woke up to find Cathy getting dressed. She accidentally kicked me as she pulled on her jeans. I grinned.
  "Morning." she said. "And before you ask, no you didn't dream it last night, yes we are in a mess. The boat is gone."
  "I can't smell breakfast cooking." I said. "That probably means that the teachers are going to tell us all about it before we have breakfast."
  "Probably." Cathy said. "Remember - surprised faces."
  "Yeah, I know." I said.
  Mewla woke up and nudged Tab.
  "Is it real?" she mumbled to us as Tab sat up in her sleeping bag, fluffing out her hair.
  "Afraid so." Cathy grimaced. "Come on - hurry up and get dressed."
  Cathy got out of the tent and went wandering over to the campfire, which Mr Mewan was just lighting. He smiled weakly at her and squeezed her arm as she went by. Mewfal, Tom, Francis and Mewbile were already out of their tents, kicking the football around over at the other side of the camp, and Cathy went to join them. She seemed quite cheerful, she didn't let on that anytyhing was wrong.
  "It's weird - it seems like it was all a bad dream last night." Tab said, as we got dressed. "It was all very surreal - Cathy coming into the tent so late, and telling us the boat had vanished, etc etc."
  "I know. I said. "Is  still can't comprehend how it happened; the more I think about it the more it seems like that person we saw must have had something to do with it, but I can't think what or why - why would there be someone else here on the island?"
  "I think it's scary." Mewla said.
  There seemed to be a general feeling of unease passing through the class as we all assembled round the campfire at Miss Mewola's request. There was no breakfast cooking, no cheeriness amongst the teachers, and everyone picked up on it and sensed that there was something wrong.
  "What's happening, Miss?" Tibbicca asked, as we all sat down on the grass.
  "Something very serious has happened." Miss Mewola said. "Our boat has disappeared."
  "What?" Mewfal said.
  "Disappeared? Where?" Mewlarka asked.
  "Well we don't know." Miss Mewola said. "Mr Mewan discovered it last night. He went down to fetch something he had left on the boat, but the boat wasn't there when he got down to the cove."
  "Well where can it have gone?" Purla wailed. "What are we going to do?"
  "Not panic is the first thing." Miss Mewola said. "We are all going to have a good breakfast, then make a good search of the island for any clues or places we haven't discovered yet."
  "We even thought we might try and make a search of any nearby islands." Mr Mewan put in.
  "Why, sir?" asked Tab. "And how?"
  "Well, there are some islands over there that aren't too far away at all." Mr Mewan said. "If we could make a good strong raft, Mr Banmew and I might pop across and have a look to see if there is any sign of the boat."
  "But why would there be?" Purla asked.
  "Very simply - because there wasn't enough fuel in the boat to take anyone much further than those islands." Mr Mewan said. "All the spare fuel is up here in cans."
  "Ahh - planning ahead I see." Tom grinned.
  "For what exactly?" Tibbicca asked, laughing.
  It was good to see that people were smiling, even after what we had just been told. I beckoned to Cathy and she moved close to me so that I could whisper to her.
  "I guess we ought to tell someone about that figure we saw." I said quietly. "It could be very important. More than likely it will send the teachers into a great panic if they think someone else was here, but they ought to know."
  "And how the hell do they think the boat vanished - by magic?" Cathy said. "No - they know damn well there was someone else here - there had to be. They're just keeping it quiet so as not to panic us all."
  The teachers didn't say much more, but just told us that we were going so be split up into groups and each group go with a teacher and explore the island. Miss Mewola cooked a quick fried breakfast for us all and after we had eaten we went to our tents to get anything that we might need for the expedition. No-one bothered to wash the breakfast things; we were going to do that when we got back. Mrs Fisher made up some picnic packets for us, and when we were all ready, we assembled at the campfire to be put into our groups.
  "Right then." Mr Mewan said, as he stood there with his clipboard. "My group will consist of Mel, Tabitha, Mewla, Cathy and Mewbellinne. Mrs Fisher will take Tibbicca, Tibleau, Purla, Tom and Mewbile. Miss Mewola will take Tibbick, Mewbellan, Purbecca, Purlibya and Mewliam. Mr Banmew will take Mewlip, Mewfal, Francis, Purbelle, Mewlarka and Alimew. Has everyone got that?"
  "Yes sir." we all assembled in our different groups. Mewbellinne looked very sulky as she came over to stand by us.
  "Ok then." Mr Mewan said. "My group will take the southern side of the island, Mrs Fisher, you take your group to the western side, Miss Mewola will go to the east, and Mr Banmew will go to the north. That way I think we'll cover most of the place."
  Mrs Fisher distributed the picnic packets amongst our groups, and by that time we were ready to go. We all felt pretty gloomy as we set off across the island and started to climb down the rough rocky outcrops that eventually led down to the sea.
  "Hey." Cathy said to me, as we scrambled down. "How about we check out that bit of cliff where we saw that person? WE might find something."
  "Well I doubt he dropped an ID card but it's worth a shot." I said. "We could suggest to Mr Mewan that we check the cliffs too."
  "Oi! Sir!" Cathy yelled to Mr Mewan, who was scrambling off quite a way ahead.
  "It amazes me how you get away with being so rude." Mewbellinne said coldly to Cathy, as Mr Mewan came climbing back up to us.
  "Oh shut your face, you." Cathy said, as she went to meet Mr Mewan halfway. Mewbellinne scowled and Mewla and Tab burst into giggles at Cathy's blunt repsonse.
  "What's up, Cath?" Mr Mewan said.
  "Well, I was just thinking that maybe we should check out the cliffs too before we start o the beaches." Cathy said.
  "Yeah, that could be a good place to start." Mr Mewan said, looking round at the cliffs. "Ok then - we'll branch out here and check the cliffs. Cathy, you take Tabitha and Mel and go that way, and Mewbellinne, Mewla and I will go this way."
  "Oh goody." said Mewla, in such an unenthusiastic voice that we all screamed with laughter.
  We set off along the cliff top.
  "Look." said Cathy. "The grass seems to have been flattened a bit along here."
  "Which it would if someone had walked along here recently." I said.
  "Which they have." Cathy said. "Look, we were right over there in the water; I reckon that person must have stood near here somewhere for us to see him."
  We all started to look round at the ground for any sign of the mysterious person we had seen. We found nothing, apart from the odd bit of flattened grass here and there.
  "Should we show Mr Mewan then?" Tab wondered, examining the thick, soft grass.
  "I suppose so." Cathy said. "There's something odd going on here, I'm sure of it. And I don't think we'd be doing any of us any favours by keeping something secret that we found."
  "Yeah, you're right." I said. "Come on - let's go and find them and tell Mr Mewan."
  We set back across the clifftop and across to the other side, where Mr Mewan had wandered along with Mewla and Mewbellinne. We soon saw them not far off, all looking round on the cliff top for any sign of anything.
  "Sir!" Cathy called. "Mr Mewan!"
  Mr Mewan came over.
  "Everything OK?" he said.
  "Sir, we think we ought to tell you something." Cathy said.
  "What?" Mr Mewan asked.
  "Well, yesterday, when we were swimming in the lagoon down there, we saw someone standing up here on the cliff." Cathy said. "We thought it was one of the lads, so we waved, but then the person vanished. We thought that one of lads was going to come down to the lagoon to see us, but no-one came down. That's why we were asking yesterday if all the lads had been at the camp all afternoon."
  "Cathy, this is very serious." Mr Mewan said. "You mean to say that there was someone else on the island and you didn't tell any of us?"
  "Well we didn't think it was someone else." Cathy said. " Why would there be anyone else here? We honestly thought it was one of the lads playing a joke and that they were all in on the secret. It was only after we found out the boat was gone that we started to wonder if it really was a stranger."
  "Nice one Cathy." Mewbellinne glared. "So there's a stranger on the loose here with us and you thought you'd just not bother to mention it?"
  "Just shut up, Mewbellinne." Cathy said. "Sir, what do we do?"
  "Well, we shall report this, of course, when we get back to the camp." Mr Mewan said. "But in the meantime, we will continue looking round, have our picnic, and ty and enjoy the sun. Let's go down to the lagoon and have a look round there."


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