CHAPTER FOUR
Flicka
Brody sat on the beach and looked at the sea.
‘Hello, Mr Brody,’ Hendricks said. ‘He walked up to Brody. What are you doing here?’
‘Ben Gardner went out there this morning. He’s looking for the shark. But I can’t see him on his boat.’
‘Was there anybody with him?’
‘I’ don’t know.’
‘Do you want to go and see? It’ll be light for two more hours. I can get a fast boat.’
Brody felt afraid. He was a very bad swimmer. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘You get the boat. I’ll call his wife.’
Twenty minutes later Brody climbed into the Hendricks’ boat.
‘What did she say?’ asked Hendricks.
‘Nothing. She called him on his radio, but there was no answer. Perhaps he turned it off. And there was nobody with him?’
‘No.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Hendricks. ‘Why did he turn his radio off? People don’t usually do that.’
Hendricks started the boat, and they moved out to sea. Gardner’s boat was more than a kilometre from the shore. As they got nearer, Brody read its name: Flicka.
When they were fifty metres from the Flicka, Hendricks slowed the boat down.
Brody stood up and called out, ‘Ben!’ There was no answer.
The two men climbed on to the fishing boat. ‘Are you here, Ben?’ Again, there was no answer.
There was a sudden noise and Brody jumped. It was from the radio.
Brody looked at Hendricks. ‘He didn’t turn off his radio
‘I don’t understand it, Mr Brody. Did Ben fall overboard? But he’s not in the water and he swims very well.’
Brody looked down into the water and saw four holes in the boat. ‘Look at these, Leonard. Can you see what made them?’
Hendricks went down into the sea and looked at the holes. After a few seconds, he looked up and said, ‘Have you got a knife?’
Brody gave Hendricks a knife. ‘What can you see?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know. Something white in one of the holes.’
Hendricks put his head back down into the water. After a short time, he came up and said, ‘OK. I’ve got it.’
Brody helped Hendricks back on to the boat and Hendricks dropped something big and white into Brody’s hand.
‘It’s a tooth!’ said Hendricks. ‘Oh no! Do you think the shark got Ben?’
Brody did not answer. He looked at the tooth again. Then he put it in his bag. ‘We can’t do anything here now,’ he said.
It was nearly dark when they got back. Harry Meadows met them. He had a young man with him.
‘This is Matt Hooper, Martin. What did you find out there?’
Brody told them about the boat. Then he took out the tooth and handed it to Hooper.
‘What is it Matt?’ said Meadows.
Hooper looked at the tooth. ‘It’s from a very big Great White Shark.’
‘What do you think happened?’
‘I think this fish killed Mr Gardner.’
‘How?’ said Brody.
‘Perhaps he fell overboard. Perhaps the fish pulled him over.’
‘What about the tooth in the boat?’
‘The fish attacked the boat.’
‘What for?’
‘Sharks are not very clever, Mr Brody. They try to eat everything.’
‘But a boat…!’
‘A shark doesn’t think. To him it wasn’t a boat. It was something big in the water. Remember that sharks are afraid of nothing in the sea. They attack anything.’
‘And why is he staying around here for so long?’
‘I don’t know. It’s unusual, but sharks are unusual. We don’t understand much about them. But I can try and find this shark. Can I have a boat?’
‘Yes, I’m sorry to say,’ said Brody. ‘Ben Gardner’s. We’ll get you out to it tomorrow. Do you think you can catch that fish?’
‘I’m not going to catch it.’
‘Then what are you going to do?’
‘I don’t know. I’ll see.’
Brody looked into Hooper’s eyes and said, ‘I want somebody to kill that fish.’ Hooper laughed. ‘Who are you going to get to do the job?’
‘There’s a fisherman called Quint,’ said Meadows. ‘But I don’t know much about him. He works somewhere near Promised Land Beach.
Hooper said, ‘Look, Mr Brody, this is only a shark!’
Brody began to feel angry. Hooper did not understand!
The next day Larry Vaughan met Brody and Hooper. ‘Hello, Martin. I heard about Ben Gardner. What are you going to do?
‘We closed the beaches down.’
‘I know that! Nobody is coming to Amity now.’
‘So what do you want me to do?’ said Brody.
‘I thought… Can we open the beaches for the Fourth of July weekend?’
‘No, we cannot.’
‘Now listen…’
‘No, you listen, Larry. I listened to you before, and two people died. We’re going to catch that fish. Then we’ll open the beaches.’
‘But this town is dying!’
‘I’ know, Larry,’ said Brody. ‘But we can do nothing about it.’
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