Scrambling forward, Marissa reached for the hoisting cable.
Just as she made contact, the shark hit the cage and rocked it once more. In the process, Marissa rolled partway off, her legs dangling in the water. In a panic, she lifted them and curled herself around the cable, holding on for dear life.
April 8, 1990
11:47 A.M.
Marissa remained in a tight ball around the hoisting cable until she felt the cage settle on the deck of the boat. Only then did she open her eyes.
Rafe was already opening the cage door, swinging it out and away. Wynn struggled through the small door. He had a hand over the gash on his arm. Despite the pressure, it was bleeding profusely.
Marissa let go of the cable and, with her flippers still on, managed to climb down from the top of the cage. It took a few moments for the awful truth to sink in: Wendy wasn’t on the boat with them. In her mind’s eye, she saw Wendy in the shark’s jaws.
“Wendy’s still in the water!” she screamed. But Rafe was busy attending to Wynn’s wound. The two men had rushed to the spot where they kept an emergency first-aid kit.
Tripping over her flippers, Marissa tried to run after them. She struggled out of her scuba tank, letting it drop on the deck. Then she bent down and pulled off her flippers.
When she reached the men, Rafe was trying to stem the arterial blood flow with a pressure bandage.
“What about Wendy?” Marissa screamed.
Rafe didn’t even look up from his dressing attempts.
“Wynn says there was a hungry great white down there.”
“We have to find her!” Marissa screamed.
“We can’t leave her there. Please!”
“That’s the best I can do for now, mate,” Rafe said to Wynn, who nodded. Wynn clamped his hand over the bandage.
Unable to control herself, Marissa broke into tears.
“Please!” she screamed.
Rafe ignored her and went to his radio to request assistance from the shore patrol.
Marissa was beside herself After the captain got off the radio, she pleaded with him between sobs to go into the water to find Wendy.
“What do you think I am?” Rafe shouted.
“Bloody crazy? You don’t go into the water when there’s a great white in the neighborhood.
I’m sorry about your friend, but there’s nothing I can do but wait and see if she surfaces. She could have fled into the coral heads.”
“I saw the shark grab her,” Marissa moaned.
“You have to do something,” Marissa pleaded.
“If you can think of anything besides going in the water, let me know,” Rafe said, going back to attend to Wynn.
Not knowing what else to do, Marissa sank to her knees, covered her face with her hands, and wept.
Soon she became aware of an increasingly loud whirring noise.
Sitting up against the gunwale, she spotted a helicopter bearing down on them. When it was directly above the Oz, it began to hover. Marissa could see a man at an open door, clutching a hoist secured to the side of the craft.
Rafe went back to the radio and had another conversation with the shore patrol, then he contacted the helicopter pilot overhead. Rafe told him that they had been able to stop the bleeding. Between the two of them, they decided that it wasn’t worth the danger of trying to get Wynn up to the helicopter now that the bleeding was under control.
“I’m still missing one diver,” Rafe said into the radio.
“We’ll send out a patrol boat,” the chopper pilot said. After signing off, the helicopter dipped forward, then sped back toward the mainland.
Rafe hung up the radio receiver.
“Guess we’d better wait for the patrol boat to get here,” he said.
“I can’t believe you people!” Marissa yelled.
“You really aren’t going to do anything about Wendy, are you?”
Rafe ignored her while he checked Wynn’s dressing. It was staying dry.
“And you,” Marissa said with venom, pointing at Wynn.
“You wouldn’t let me in that damn cage.”
“I was trying to help you,” Wynn said.
“The door opens out, not in. I was trying to show you, but you wouldn’t let me.”