Doctor Who_ Rip Tide - Louise Cooper [10]
There was nothing more to be done, so they turned towards the surface. Steve felt foolishly glad to see the light increasing as they rose, and when his head broke from the water, the brilliance, despite the day's cloudiness, seemed dazzling.
He took out his valve, breathed salty air and hoped that neither Martin nor Tim noticed his sigh of relief. Charlie was looking expectantly at them from the Fair Go, and Steve dumped the pot over the gunwale and heaved himself into the boat. 'Sorry, mate, he said. 'It's a bit the worse for wear.'
'Oh, well.' Charlie was philosophical. 'Win some, lose some. Thanks for trying, anyway.'
As Fair Go headed for home, Tim and Martin were telling Charlie more details of the wreckage on the sea bed. Steve, though, was studying the broken crab pot, and suddenly he reached inside. There was a small, silver-coloured object in there: stainless steel or chrome by the look of it, about the length and thickness of his thumb, and perfectly cylindrical. It bore no markings of any kind.
He pulled off his wetsuit gloves so that he could feel the object. It was cold, and very smooth. He held it out to show the others.
'That's a rum thing,' said Charlie. 'Cigarette lighter, could it be?'
Tim shook his head. 'Nothing to press. It looks a bit like one of those address tubes you can get for dog collars, only bigger.'
'D'you reckon it came off that wreckage?' Tim asked.
'I shouldn't think so,' said Steve. 'The only thing it could be is the barrel of a lock. But there's no keyhole.' He weighed the object in his palm, then handed it to Charlie. 'There you are: souvenir of the adventure. You could make it into a pendant.'
'I might at that.' Charlie made jewellery in his spare time and sold a few pieces at the local craft shop. He pocketed the cylinder, then, as they came in to shore, turned his concentration to getting the boat safely through the surf.
Friday was the night when people went to the pub to celebrate the end of the working week, and by eight-thirty Steve and most of his friends were in the Huer's Arms, which was in the middle of the village and a conveniently short stagger home. The bar was lively with locals and visitors. In one corner a group of girls were giggling while a middleaged holiday couple at the next table frowned their disapproval at the noise. The girls were eyeing a solitary man who sat near the window: a slightly eccentric-looking individual, probably in his mid-thirties. They tried to attract his attention, but he had his nose in a book and didn't so much as look up at them through the curls of his unfashionably long brown hair. At the bar's far end, beyond a haze of tobacco smoke, a three-piece band were setting up their equipment.
Steve spotted Nina with two of her friends; she saw him, pointedly indicated the fact that she was drinking a Coke and nothing stronger, and stuck her tongue out. Their paths didn't cross until later, when Steve, coming out of the gents, met her going to the ladies.
'Still sober?' she asked, then grinned to show it was a joke.
'Yeah.' Steve rubbed his palms against the legs of his jeans, then winced.
'What's up?' Then she saw his fingers more clearly as he flexed them and said, 'Something the matter with your hands?'
'Uh? No. They just itch a bit:'
Nina took one of his wrists and turned the hand over. 'That doesn't look like nothing,' she said. 'What have you been doing?'
Extraordinarily, Steve hadn't even noticed the marks until that moment, but she was right: both his palms were covered with a red rash, and in places the skin was actually blistering.
'You ought to tell Victor to get some better soap in the gents,' Nina said. Victor was the pub's landlord. 'That looks horrible. Does it hurt?'
'No-o ...' Though now she mentioned it, there was a soreness.