Manatee Rescue Chapter Sampler

8/20/2019 Manatee Rescue Chapter Sampler

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MANATEE RESCUE


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MAN

HEROES OF THE WILD

A


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his is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either

products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

Text copyright © 2013 by Nicola DaviesIllustrations copyright © 2013 by Annabel Wright

Illustration on pages 50–51 © 2013 by Robin Crossley

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted,

or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means,

graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and

recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

First U.S. edition 2015

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2014953073

ISBN 978-0-7636-7830-2

5 16 17 18 19 20 XXX 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Printed in City, State, U.S.A.

his book was typeset in ITC Usherwood.

The illustrations were done in watercolor.

Candlewick Press

99 Dover Street

Somerville, Massachusetts 02144

visit us at www.candlewick.com


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For Sar ta an T m

W th than s to support rom a

Society of Authors’ Foundation Grant


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C apter One

anuela’s paddle slipped in and out of the

ar water w t out a sp as . S e steere

t e g ugout canoe etween t e oo e trees

as lightly as a windblown leaf, never breaking the

silent rhythm of her paddling. A flurry of small

ats tte over t e water an sappeare nto a

tree o e, e smo e suc e ac own a c mney.

High above in the branches, a party of parrots


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uarre e . Manue a too no not ce. A er atten-

tion was on the huge renaco up ahead, and the oil-

ark water around it. The fig tree’s green fruits were

floating on the surface and being nibbled at from

underneath by the pale shapes of fishes.

In the bow of the canoe, her father, Silvio, held

up his left hand: the signal for her to slow down.Manue a n’t nee to e to ; s e was a rea y

bringing the canoe to a stop within perfect range.

Insects, frogs, and birds called all around, but the

eep s a ow o t e g tree e a per ect st ness.

Silvio shifted his grip on the end of the har-

poon, and fixed his gaze on the flicker of fins and

tails under the surface. Manuela held her breath.

Silvio was a good fisherman, but when the river

was this high, fish were hard to find. They had been

out since before dawn and had caught nothing but

a few little bocachicos.

The whiplash action of Silvio’s sinewy arm was

too fast to follow, but the bobbing of the harpoon in

the water showed that he had struck a fish, and a big


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one. With three deft strokes of her paddle, Manuela

brought the canoe alongside, and a moment later, a

fat silver fish, bigger than a dinner plate, flapped in

the bottom of the canoe.

ilvio hit the fish once with the handle of his

machete, and it lay still.

“Gamitana!” He grinned. “Not the biggest I’vecaug t, ut g enoug . We can coo t w t peppers

and celathro You’ll like that, won’t you, Frog?”

The thought made Manuela’s stomach growl.

S e oo e at er at er, an t ey ot aug e .

“Can we coo some ocach cos before we go home?”

she asked.

“Of course! I think Frog and her papa have

earned some breakfast!”

ilvio took up his paddle, and together they

pushed the canoe out from the shade of the trees

into the morning sunlight.

They put aside their paddles in the middle of a

flooded clearing. All around, floating plants covered


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t e water n a carpet so ense t oo e e an .

Manuela loved these clearings, shut away from all

the world by their wall of trees. The only sounds

were the booming call of a ec o ng n t e

still air and the faint sizzle of the fish, over the little

charcoal fire in a tin can. Manuela closed her eyes

and let the sunlight warm her face. Fishing with herfather was so much better than going to school. She

was glad the council in the town, Puerto Dorado,

had run out of money for diesel. Maybe the boat to

sc oo wou never run own t e r ver aga n!

Manue a’s ay ream was nterrupte y a s arp

hiss. Her eyes snapped open to find that her father

had poured water over the fish and doused the fire.

He was pointing at a small area of clear water, per-

haps ten canoe lengths away. At its edge, a patch of

floating plants quivered, and the faintest of ripples

spread over its smooth surface. Underneath the

water, somet ng g was mov ng.

Silvio turned to her over his shoulder and

silently mouthed a word: “Manatee!”


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Manatee! Manuela’s heart raced, her hunger for-

gotten. She had only glimpsed a live manatee once

before, and never this close, close enough to hunt.

“Not everyone can a manatee, tt e Frog,”

Silvio had always told her. “Only the most skillful.”

There was a law against killing manatees, but

out here, so far from town, no one took any noticeof it. Catching a manatee was too special to bother

with what the police two hours downriver might

have to say about it. When someone brought in a

manatee, t e w o e v age got exc te . T ere was

so muc meat t at w oever caug t t e creature

could trade it for almost anything.

But Silvio hadn’t caught a manatee for a long,

ong t me. T ey were gett ng scarce. Somet mes, n

the dry season, when the rivers and lakes shrank,

somebody speared one. Sometimes one would

drown by accident in a net, or a calf would be caught

a ve an so n t e town ownr ver.

Manuela had always dreamed that one day she

and her father would bring home a manatee. Then


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peop e wou say ow s u s e was an not ow

strange it was that a girl should go fishing with her

father. She would be a heroine instead of a freak.

Here at ast was er c ance!

“Manatees are very wary,” S v o a a ways to

her. “They can hear a bare foot shift in the bottom

of a canoe.”So Manue a s er pa e s ow y, s ow y

between the floating plants and pushed smoothly

against the water’s resistance. Her senses were on

g a ert. Co ors were r g ter an even t e t n est

sounds rang out: the scratch of a dragonfly’s feet as

the insect perched on the gunwale, the plink plink of

grasshoppers, jumping to avoid the canoe’s stealthy

pro ress.

Up ahead, the manatee’s nose broke the sur-

face. It was so easy to miss: just a disk of flesh with

two black nostrils set in it, no bigger than a coin. It

took a breath, making a soft , an was gone.

“Remember,” her father had told her, “they swim

backward after taking a breath, so if you throw a


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harpoon in front, you’ll likely miss it.”

Manuela pointed the canoe behind the spot

where the nose had appeared. They were almost

close enough now. One more careful paddle stroke

turned the craft to the side, to give them clear shots.

Silently, Manuela put down her paddle and took up

her own harpoon.T e poo was a smoot , ar m rror aga n.

Silvio and Manuela waited, their harpoons poised

and ready to throw. A jacana screeched as it flew

ow over t e oat ng mat o p ants, ts egs tra ng,

an t e camungo’s mournful booming began again.

Still they waited, eyes straining, muscles tense.

There! A minute swirl on the surface, not quite

a r pp e, not qu te a u e. No or nary person

would even see it, but Silvio knew it was the trail of

a tail, moving underwater.

Manuela caught the flick of Silvio’s arm from the

corner of her eye. Her own arm, already on a hair

trigger, shot like a coiled spring. Silvio’s harpoon

struck. It had been thrown with such force that


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w en t t t e an ma , t s vere w t t e s oc

of the impact. Just to the side, Manuela’s struck, but

glanced off and lay floating on the surface. Then

S v o’s arpoon, upr g t an stuc n t e manatee’s

o y, sappeare as t e creature ve .

“It will come up again in a moment,” Manuela’s

father said. “Then we’ll have it!”T ey ot too up t e r pa es an were at t e

the spot where the manatee had dived in a moment.

Blood blossomed in the water, but there was some-

t ng e se, too.

“Fat er!” Manue a cr e . “T ere’s a tt e cr a.

Look!”

A bristly nose showed above the surface, and a

sma ar o y o e es e t e canoe. But t e

calf was wounded. There was a bloody cut slanting

across its shiny black back.

“You must have scraped it as I hit its mama,”

sa S v o. “Qu c , put a rope aroun ts ta . T en

we can be sure the mother will come back!”


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C apter Two

Manue a a mag ne t at ng a manateewould be like killing a very big fish, just moreexciting. But it wasn’t at all. The manatee mother

fought hard and took a long time to die. Her calftried to get up close to her, even after she was dead,

when Manuela and her father were straining to roll

the vast body into the canoe. The sun was already

s n ng y t e t me t ey manage t.

“If we put the cr a next to ts mama, t m g t

wriggle out of the boat,” Silvio said, looking at the

huge corpse. “You’ll have to hold it on the way back

w e I pa e a one.”

Manue a no e ut sa not ng. T e ong,

gruesome struggle had changed how she felt about

manatees. Killing them wasn’t heroic or exciting. It

was ust orr e.

The calf lay very still in the water, but it

squirmed a little when Silvio lifted it into the boat.


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“It’s pretty sma ,” e sa . “I on’t t n t’s more

than a couple of months old.”

The calf didn’t seem small to Manuela when

S v o put t n er arms. It was as eavy as er

cousin Valerio — and he was a solid little boy of

early two.

She held the baby with its round tummy againsther chest, its paddle tail curled onto her lap. Its funny,

bristly nose rested on her shoulder. It didn’t wriggle

at all, but its nostrils opened and closed as it

reat e , an ts eyes, e tt e c ps o

o s e c arcoa , n e . T e s n

f its back was tough and rubbery,

but underneath its flippers, it

was like velvet, the softest

thing Manuela had ever

felt. It was odd that an

imal without arms

r legs could feel

o much like a

uman baby.


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“Do you think he will live?” she asked her father.

“Don’t know, Frog.” He sighed. “That cut on its

back is bad. I hope it lives, because Jose Gomez will

buy it for a good price and sell it to some govern-

ment official as a pet.”

Jose Gomez brought basic supplies from Puerto

Dorado in his big, fast boat and sold them inManuela’s village, San Larenzo, for a high price.

Everyone knew that he would do anything for

money. They called him Clink-Clink because of the

way money was a ways ang ng n s at poc ets.

omez fished too, with his three sons, but

unlike Silvio, they used nets.

“It takes no skill to use a net!” Silvio would

grum e.

“It may not take skill, brother,” Silvio’s older

brother, Luis, would answer him, “but it catches fish.”

Luis was right. Gomez’s nets caught enough fish

to se n Puerto Dora o. An , see ng ow we t e

nets worked, other fishermen, like Uncle Luis, had

begun to use them, too. But nets didn’t just catch


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fish. They caught other things as well, by mistake:

river dolphins, turtles, and manatees. A baby man-

atee had been caught in Gomez’s net last year and

he’d sold it for a lot of money. Afterward, Manuela

a ear t at t e .

Manuela hoped the cut would discourage Jose

omez from making a deal. She didn’t want thiscalf to die, too.

Silvio paddled the canoe through the flooded

forest and then out onto the milky-brown river.

Manue a watc e t e r yt m o s pa e stro es

and remembered the story her grandfather Mauricio

had told her about manatees.

“There are certain ceiba trees — big, big trees

where fat caterpillars feed,” he’d said. “And when

the caterpillars drop into the river, they turn into

anatees!”

Manuela loved this story. Even though Mauricio

a rowne w en s e was sma , s e cou st

recall his voice. She’d dreamed of watching cater-

pillars drop into the water and becoming manatees.


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But this little calf had not dropped off a ceiba

tree. It had come into the world the same way she

had, from a mother’s belly.

A t e ong way ome, Manue a stare own

at the dead mama manatee and felt sadder and

sadder. The curve of the animal’s tail was just under

Manuela’s feet, and her bloodied head touched theseat w ere S v o sat to pa e. T e pa e patc on

her chest stood out in the evening light like a bright

island in a dark lake. Her flippers were folded on

er c est, t e way o a es o e t e r an s n

t e r aps.

In her head, Manuela told the mama manatee

how sorry she was that they had killed her. I’ll make

your a y we , s e to t e mama. An I’ put h m

back in the river one day. I promise.

he whispered to the calf, “Don’t die! Please

don’t die!” And in her heart she named him Airuwe.

T e wor meant “manatee” n T cuna, er gran -

father Mauricio’s language.


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Manatee Rescue

Nicola Davies

illustrated by Annabel Wright

www.candlewick.com
http://www.amazon.com/Manatee-Rescue-Heroes-Nicola-Davies/dp/0763678309/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1429720802&sr=1-1&keywords=manatee+rescue+davieshttp://www.indiebound.org/book/9780763678302

Manatee Rescue Chapter Sampler

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