Mike Dixon

„Okay, buddy. We‟ll go down to the fifty-foot ledge and
watch from there.‟
He held out his arms.
„Check me out.‟
Humphrey ran his eye over David, starting at the feet
and working up.
„Your weight-belt is fastened on the wrong side.‟
„Good!‟
David removed the belt and turned it round. Then he
checked Humphrey.
„Okay. All correct.‟ Humphrey
was impressed. David had made an
intentional mistake. That was not
the sort of behavior he expected
from someone of his age. He
watched the other divers vanish
down the descent line and sat on
the side of the inflatable. David sat
opposite. They exchanged signals
and rolled backwards into the water.
That was the easy part.
On his last trip, Humphrey had
been marooned on the surface and had failed his test for
that and other reasons. Getting down was not as simple as
some might think. He‟d had too little lead on his weight-
belt. That is easy to understand in class but far from obvi-
ous when you are bobbing around in a choppy sea. This
time he got it right.
He cleared water from his facemask, released air from
his buoyancy vest and sank beneath the waves. David hov-
ered beside him. They reached the fifty-foot ledge and
Humphrey looked around. It was like another world.
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