Prologue

    The Lone Islands were a small cluster of islands, separated by narrow channels and coves. They weren’t on any map, nor were they known to mankind. The islands were home to monkeys and birds and one or two orang-utans; there was every type of tropical fruit and fresh springs of pure water. Nuts and berries and certain yams and potatoes grew on the grass inland. 

    A boy named Jack had lived on one of the islands for five years. He'd lived alone there ever since he was ten. He was friends with all the animals and was kind and caring to the plants. He had been washed ashore there from a shipwrecked boat.

    He lived alone and followed a regular schedule. He knew nothing of the outside world and had no desire to leave either – until Michael came.

    Before we moved to Cornwall, I lived in Suffolk. I was happy there; I had many friends. When we came to Cornwall, I first hated it but, gradually, came to enjoy it. I didn’t go to school; I had a governess names Miss Walt. Life there was simple and relaxing.

    One day in early summer I woke up at the crack of dawn and went for a swim. I wasn’t stupid enough to swim in the sea, so I found a small cove by a low cliff and splashed around there instead. Afterwards I roasted myself on the sand. 

    ‘Nice day, eh, Mike?’ said a raspy voice. 

    I saw a smiling face peering down at me. It was Joe Mackereth, a hearty, wizened old fisherman who lived some distance down the beach. He was in his late fifties, with a red face, a curly black beard, and untidy dark hair. He was honest and kindly and never kept back his opinions. He always said straight away what he thought,

and always told truth, no matter what it was he had to say.

    ‘What do you suppose is beyond the edge of the sea, Mike?’ he asked. He never called me Michael like everyone else did. He said the name Mike suited me more – sharp and short, just the way he liked things.

    ‘I don’t know,’ I said after a moment. Joe grinned and left.

    I gazed at the sea, wondering what was on the other side of that line grown-ups called the horizon. Did the world simply stop there, or was there some distant land on the other side? Was the horizon where drowned sailors went after they’d died? 

    The questions swirled around in my head until my eyes finally closed and I drifted into a fitful sleep.

    It was the cold that woke me.

    When my eyes fluttered open I was lying on a beach

and it was night-time. I knew immediately that I wasn’t in Cornwall. The sea there was always rough; the ocean here was as still as glass. I was clothed in a blue shirt and trousers that were one size too big. The evening chill bit into my limbs. 

    I got unsteadily to my feet. My stomach was hollow: I hadn’t eaten all day. I staggered forward towards a hill about a mile inland. There was a cave at the base of the hill and I stepped inside. A boy with long, shaggy blond hair was sitting on a mattress of heather and bracken, whistling softly. As my shadow fell across the room, he looked up with an expression of alarm and fear on his face.

    ‘Who are you?’ he demanded. ‘How did you get here?’

    ‘My name’s Michael,’ I said. ‘I don’t really know how I got here.’ I looked down at the clothes I was wearing and tugged at the hem of the shirt. ‘Do these clothes

belong to you?’ I asked.

    ‘Yes; but I can’t wear them anymore.’ The boy stood up and clamped his hands onto my shoulders. ‘Go back to wherever it is you came from,’ he ordered. ‘I don’t want you here.’

    His grip tightened. ‘I don’t know which directions to take!’ I said. ‘I don’t even know how I got here!’

    The boy let go of me and I stumbled backwards. ‘How old are you?’ he asked.

    ‘Fourteen,’ I replied, somewhat surprised by his question. ‘What about you? And what’s your name?’

    ‘My name’s Jack,’ he said. ‘I'm fifteen, nearly sixteen, I think. I've lived here for five years.’

    There was a long silence. ‘Would you like to explore?’ Jack asked suddenly. ‘There’s that shipwreck we can see. It’s bound to have some good treasure.’

    ‘All right.’ I glanced back at the beach. ‘Let’s go.’

    Jack gave me a fresh meal of yams, mangoes and some slices of pineapple. Then he led me to the other side of the island, where a large, battered ship rested on the rocks, the waves surging around it. Vaguely visible on it hull were the words: Lady Jane. 

    I whistled. ‘That’s a nice ship.’

    ‘Come on,’ Jack said, ‘let’s go.’

    We scrabbled up the hull and somehow got on to the rotting wooden deck. The huge white sails were ripped and stained with splatters of what looked suspiciously like blood. Jack pointed to a door – the door to a cabin. I followed him inside it. 

    The moment my foot came down on the wood, the floor gave way and I cried out as I fell through space, my voice echoing off the walls. 

    Unfortunately, I tried to land on my feet. My feet didn’t like that. Pain exploded in my right ankle all the way up

to my thigh; it felt so intense I wobbled backwards and landed on my back, banging my head against something hard. My vision blurred and then everything went dark.

When I came round I was lying on a prickly mattress of heather. My head throbbed and there was a sharp ache in my ankle. In the distance I saw Jack, cutting up a mango with a blunt knife. 

    ‘You feeling better?’ he asked, looking at me. 

    ‘A bit,’ I said, trying to sit up. I felt nauseous when I saw my foot: it was pointing in a strange direction and looked horrible.  

    ‘Hold still.’ Jack was suddenly standing next to me. He gently pushed me back onto my back and pressed his fingertips lightly to my ankle. I yelped and pulled away from him, the effort making me feel lightheaded. 

    ‘I told you to stay still,’ Jack scolded. ‘Do you want me

to help you or not?’

    ‘I do,’ I said meekly. ‘I just wasn’t expecting you to do that.’

    ‘Well, I'm going to set your foot whether you like it or not. And I'm not going to lie to you. This is going to hurt.’

    He twisted my ankle, while I tightened my jaw in the effort of not screaming. It felt as if Jack was hammering nails into my foot; it hurt that much. 

    ‘Right then.’ Jack’s voice sounded distant. ‘Stay just the way you are all right, Michael? Don’t move.’

    I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I braced myself. I felt a wrenching pain in my foot and yelled loudly, no longer able to stifle my cries of agony. I continued shouting, tears stinging the back of my eyes, but I kept perfectly still. When it was done I opened my bloodshot eyes to see that my foot was pointing the right way, wrapped in a strange type of plaster.

    ‘Thanks,’ I said, looking at him. Jack smiled.

    ‘No problem. Would you like something to eat? I've made a sort of bread out of yam, and there are mashed potatoes to eat it with.’

    It was a delicious meal. I told Jack of my life in Cornwall, and then of my schooldays in Suffolk. 

    ‘I'd like to see the world,’ Jack said dreamily, his gaze distant. ‘It sounds nice.’

    ‘It is,’ I said. ‘How’d you come to be here anyway?’

    ‘I was only ten when it happened, Michael. Those scandalous pirates kidnapped me and killed my mother. They took me to that ship we explored. They sailed to goodness knows where, and then there was a storm. They all drowned, and I say good riddance to them. They were horrible.’

    I listened in silence, processing his story. I felt very, very sorry for Jack. 

    ‘What about your father?’ I asked softly.

    ‘He died,’ Jack said bitterly. ‘I don’t know how or when, but he died soon after I was born.’

    He buried his head in his hands, his whole body quivering. His shoulders rose and fell rapidly, and I could hear a soft sound rather like sobbing. When he looked up again his eyes were red and his face was streaked with grime and water. 

    ‘Time for bed,’ he said. ‘Go on. Off with you.’ And he stood up and flopped onto his bed of heather.

    *     *      *

      I don’t know how long I spent on the island. Jack and I had a little conversation every evening; sometimes inside the cave, sometimes seated on the beach under the sparkling stars. We grew quite close to each other. I never forgot my parents, but now the memory of them seemed vague and distant, as if they were from a

dream, or as if I'd known them for only a short while and had forgotten them even though I knew they were important. 

     One day – it could have been days or even months later – Jack and I perched atop a large slab of grey stone on the beach, our legs dangling in the air, the waves lapping at my toes. 

    ‘Do you think you'll ever get back to your home?’ Jack asked suddenly. ‘Do you want to get back to England?’

    ‘I guess so,’ I said slowly. ‘Why?’

    ‘If you’ve any idea of leaving, take me with you.’

    ‘Oh. All right.’ I hadn’t the foggiest idea how I'd do it, but I was determined to at least try.

    ‘We can try making a boat,’ I said, after a few minutes of thought. ‘We could use driftwood and rope and things from the Lady Jane–’

    ‘Call it the Lady Tyrant,’ Jack cut in. ‘That was its

original name, you know.’

    ‘Really?’

    ‘Yes. Those rapscallion pirates stole it and painted it.’

    ‘Seems an odd name for a ship, doesn’t it?’

    ‘Well, yes rather.’

    I gave him a friendly shove. ‘You're lying aren’t you?’

    He shrugged. ‘It was actually called the Lady Aurora, but the Lady Tyrant sounds a lot better.’

    ‘I guess so.’ I still found it hard to wrap my mind around the idea, but I kept my mouth shut.

    ‘Back to the point.’ Jack prodded me in the shoulder. ‘We can use the wood from the Lady Tyrant, and I've got some rope. We can explore the other three islands for other shipwrecks too, if you want.’

    ‘Let’s manage with the Lady Tyrant first,’ I said. ‘We can start work tomorrow.’

    We worked hard, and soon we had a fine boat. It took many days and a lot of effort, but we put in it such a lot of affection and hard work into it that the boat was a sturdy little thing in no time at all. 

    It wasn’t very big, with two flat wooden benches and a sort of cupboard at one end. We carved two short oars out of sticks and a flat piece of wood. We used rope and some sap from a tree to hold everything together. Jack scavenged some nails and a hammer from the Lady Jane – or Lady Tyrant, as he called it – and we used those as well. Soon the boat was ready. 

    Although the boat was now primed and ready to set sail, Jack seemed reluctant to leave the island. I, too, felt hesitant. The island was special somehow. I remembered those cheeky monkeys who would come and pester us while we worked; the two orang-utans who shouted and howled at us; the calm cove where we

swam on exceptionally hot days; the homely little cave where we’d lived; the loud and cheerful song of the birds. We hadn’t even left, but already my heart ached to think of forgetting all this. 

    ‘It was an old exploit,’ Jack said. ‘We have to close that part of our life. We need to move on.’

    ‘You're right,’ I said with a sigh. I turned towards the boat, which we’d named The Island. ‘Come on, Jack.’ I laid my hand on his shoulder. ‘Let’s go.’

    We stepped into the boat and began rowing. Behind me, the birds sang. Jack threw me a grin. I smiled back. Slowly but hopefully, we sailed into the sunset.

    Epilogue

    Michael had been on the island for over a year, which meant that he was now fifteen and Jack was sixteen. His parents had held a memorial service for him on his birthday, and it had been the shock of their life to see him standing in their doorway, grinning lopsidedly, his brown hair long and untidy. 

    Jack was fostered by Michael’s parents, which meant that the two were now half-brothers.

    Michael had never been happier. When the police were told, there was an investigation and the truth came out: Michael had been kidnapped by Joe Mackereth. 

    As the police said, ‘It just goes to show how little you know about someone.’ 

    Michael felt sorry but unforgiving towards the fisherman. 

    ‘I liked you, Joe,’ he said to the old fisherman, ‘but it

seems you didn’t like me in return. I don’t hate you, because I never would’ve met Jack had you not taken me. But you will never be completely liked by me or my family. Remember that the next time you're going to do something nasty.’

    All in all, some good came of it. 

    ‘I'm glad we’re all a family now,’ Jack said to Michael. ‘And you're an amazing little brother. Except for when I tried to set your foot. That was a real pain.’

    ‘Shut up!’ Michael playfully swatted his brother and the two burst out laughing.

    ‘Life isn’t so bad,’ Michael said to himself, and even as he thought it he remembered the island and smiled to himself. Now he knew what was on the other side of the horizon. And he had never felt happier than when he remembered the Lone Island.