I met Danny and his older brother Keith at their stand in on the beach in the craft village next to the Trelawny Beach Club. They were pedaling the usual stuff, mostly wood carvings, some made of brown coral. I bought a little shark carved from a hunk of brown coral. They were both in their twenties, fine looking lads, strong and not an ounce of fat on them. They lived in their shack on the beach part of the time, eking out a meager living. I always stopped in and chatted with them on my daily beach walk. Danny and I connected right away. We eventually got around to talking about diving. I had done a few dives with the resort, but was disappointed. They only went to the sand flats and the regular dive boat was on the fritz so we were using the water ski run-about. You can only look at so much sandy bottom before boredom sets in. I had given up. Danny offered to take me out to the wall, for a price of course. I was keen and we made a deal. I looked around, "Where's your boat?" "Don't worry mon, just come down tomorrow morning at 7:00." "You'll bring me a tank, right?" "Yeah mon!"

Next morning I dragged my ass out of bed as quietly as I could. I didn't want to wake Mona. She was from New York, I think. Nice girl. She rolled over and peeked at me through one half-opened eye. "Goin' diving", I said. "Uh", her eye slid shut. It was a beauty of a morning, but most of them are in Jamaica. Two scuba tanks were standing in the sand next to a boat. Really, it was more like a punt. Made of flaking plywood, flat bottomed, two oars made from sturdy branches with flat boards nailed to them. The oarlocks were short lenghts of sturdy rope. Keith came out of the shack, rubbing his eyes. I pointed, "That's the boat"? "Yeah, mon, help me drag it to the sea". What the hell, I thought, I'll wear my BC. If I have to, I can swim for it.

The sea was calm but rolling with four footers. On this side of the island you do your water sports in the morning, afternoons are usually rough. We all sat quietly as Keith rowed us out to the drop-off, me thinking that maybe I had made a mistake. Headline reads, 'Canadian Tourist Lost at Sea, Presumed Dead'. Danny had brought a homemade spear gun and a rusty old knife. His mask and flippers looked like cheap Wal Mart stuff, stiff, blue and cracked. He didn't have a snorkel and didn't need weights. Luckily, I had brought all of my own gear.

The colour of the sea changed from light to dark blue, we were about a mile out, still within swimming distance of the shore I figured. "Okay, lets go". It was then that I realized there was no anchor. "Don't worry mon, I'll follow your bubbles and pick you up when you surface". The wind was freshening and the surface of the water was starting to break. 'Bubbles', I thought. Oh well, in for a penny, in for a pound. I bite down on my regulator and roll backwards into the deep blue Caribbean.

The greatest cure for a rum hangover is a breath of compressed air and a cool ocean dip. I felt better already. I spot Danny, already 20 feet down and diving like a homesick devil. When diving with a group, I'm usually one of the first to hit the bottom, but try as I might, I couldn't catch Danny, the human fish. Sixty feet, eighty feet, one hundred, one hundred and thirty. I level off at one-thirty, my personal limit. I figure the bottom is still 30 below. At this depth a tank of air only lasts about 15 minutes. Danny keeps on going down. I follow above but lose site of him when he deeks behind a rock formation. I keep looking for him, but I can't even see his bubbles. Things start to feel spooky, I picture myself from one of those long view shots. A flimsy boat floating somewhere above, me suspended at 130 feet in a vast ocean, and Danny nowhere to be seen. 'Surface', I think, and realize that I am already ascending. Three minutes later I break the surface in the middle of a five-foot trough.

My inflated BC buoys me and I crest the swell, scanning the surface for Keith. I spott the 'boat' a couple of hundred yards away, Keith is looking the other way. So much for the 'bubble' plan. After much shouting and waving he sees me and paddles over. "Where's Danny?" "Don't know man, he disappeared." I heave myself in the boat. There's a big splash behind me, Danny. He spits his regulator out of his grinning mouth and starts to laugh. "White mon, no know how fe dive!" He throws his speargun in the boat. Its followed by a five foot brown coral tree. He pulls a 15 inch trigger fish out of his trunks and hurls that aboard. All the while he berates me on my poor diving skills.

We head into shore, the sea has a good roll to it now. I tell Danny that he should be careful about how deep he dives. He thumps his chest, "Me no get no blood clot, mon!" Ashore we cooked up the trigger fish for breakfast. It was delicious.

The next day I headed for MoBay. Before I left I went for one last visit with the brothers. I gave Danny my flippers and wished them both well. I never saw them again.


(Note from DD: Hubby is the scuba diver in this family and after reading this, I know why I prefer snorkelling!)


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