I threw back the covers, jumped down to the floor, and yanked on my off duty clothes: a pair of trousers, shirt, suspenders, and flat-soled shoes. I could not stay here in the cabin; right now it was just like my room at home, motionless, small, collapsing in on me.
No, not shipwrecked. We would fly again, the captain had promised. I would fly again. I just had to keep moving. I opened the cabin door and practically ran out into the corridor. I nearly collided with Baz and Bruce Lunardi. They looked like they were going somewhere.
“You two need a hand?” I asked.
“If you like,” said Baz. “The captain’s asked us to find some fresh water.”
“We’re not out,” I said, with some alarm. “Are we?”
“Not yet,” Baz said, “but he had to dump most of it last night. We’ve got enough to last maybe one more day.”
“We’ll be gone by then,” I said confidently.
“Even so we’ll need to take on more to make it to Sydney,” Lunardi pointed out. “Plus we need ballast.”
“I know that,” I said, annoyed he was telling me about my ship, and annoyed at myself for forgetting all the ballast we’d dumped. We walked down the gangway onto the beach, squinting in the sudden sun. Bruce and Baz were walking ahead of me, side by side, and I noticed they were about the same height. I supposed they were about the same age too. I wondered when they’d got so chummy; I’d never seen them together before. Suddenly I felt like a little brother, tagging along, unwanted.
“You all right after last night?” I asked Bruce. “Seemed like you were having a rough time up there.”
“I was,” he said, turning around and giving me a smile. It wasn’t a matinee idol smile; it wasn’t cocky enough. This smile was humble, and it took me back some. “Thanks for helping me out,” he said. “I really appreciate it.”
“It was nothing.”
“I don’t have much of a head for heights.”
“You’re in the wrong line of work, then,” I said.
“Probably. Do you think there’s any hope for me?”
I felt bad. “It looked good, your patching,” I told him. “Very tidy.”
“Really?”
I grunted.
“Well, that’s encouraging. Maybe there’s hope for me yet.”
I didn’t want him to feel too encouraged, so I said nothing more.
“Shouldn’t be too hard to find water,” Baz said. “The island looks fairly big. There’s got to be a stream somewhere.”
“Let’s start over there,” said Lunardi, pointing to the far end of the beach.
We walked along the sand, away from the ship, past the makeshift marquees we’d thrown up to shade the passengers. I caught a glimpse of Miss Simpkins stretched out on a wicker lounge chair. She appeared to be dozing, like many of the others. I didn’t see Kate until we were farther along the beach. She was standing close to the water, her back to the lagoon, staring up into the forest and hills. She wore a long white summer dress and a simple white hat with a single magnificent rose on it. Her hair hung around her shoulders in two loose plaits, each tied with a red bow. In one hand she held a parasol, in the other was a book—her grandfather’s journal, I realized. Her chin was tilted up, and she was peering off into the distance. Occasionally she put down her parasol on the sand so she could write something in her book. She looked very intent.
“Who’s that there?” Lunardi asked, squinting. “She’s rather attractive, wouldn’t you say, gentlemen?”
“That’s Miss Kate de Vries,” Baz told him. “And you’ll have stiff competition from Matt. He’s already set his sights on her.” Baz gave me a playful poke with his elbow.
“Don’t talk rubbish,” I muttered.
“Kate de Vries,” Bruce said, surprised. “I do believe I know her.”
“Really?” I said coldly.
“Hmmm,” he said vaguely.
As we approached, Kate looked up and waved.
“Hello!” she called out.
“Are you all right, miss?” Baz asked. “Can we help?”
“Oh, no,” she said. “I’m just taking notes.” She smiled at me. “Hello, Mr. Cruse. How are you today?”
“Very well, thank you.”
“Hello, Miss de Vries,” said Lunardi, “I believe we’ve met before.” He suddenly seemed much older and sure of himself, almost suave.
Kate looked up at him. “Yes, I think you’re right,” she replied. She thinks he’s handsome, I thought forlornly. Plus he was in his uniform and looked very crisp and sharp. I felt shabby in my off duty clothes. His gold steering wheel insignia gleamed in the sun. Cover those up, I wanted to growl. You haven’t earned them. Better yet, tear them off and give them to me.
“Was it at the Wolfram gala last year?” Kate asked.
“Indeed it was,” said Lunardi. “Your mother and mine were on the same fund-raising committee.”
“Yes,” Kate said, “of course. How nice to see you again.”
“What are you taking notes on?” Lunardi asked her.
“Oh, just the local flora and fauna,” Kate said, closing her notebook.
“Are you sure you wouldn’t be more comfortable with the others, miss?” said Baz. “We’re off to find a stream.”
“Oh, it’s over there a ways,” said Kate. “I spotted it earlier. Not far.”
“Really?” I asked, impressed. “You’ve been doing a little exploring?”
“Hardly,” she said. “You can’t miss it.”
Bruce laughed. “Well, she’s saved us a lot of work, gentlemen. Thank you, Miss de Vries. Perhaps we can consult you again when we’re foraging for food.”
“Food won’t be any problem either,” Kate said.
“Found a nice restaurant nearby, have you?” Baz joked.
“Look at those trees,” she said, pointing. “Do you know what they are?”
“Can’t say I do,” said Lunardi.
“Breadfruit trees,” she told him.
“Breadfruit trees,” Lunardi said with a laugh. “Very creative.”
“That’s what they’re called,” she said. I saw her nostrils narrow, and Lunardi’s smile dissolved, his matinee idol suaveness with it. “See the fruit up there in its branches?” Kate went on. “They’re a tremendously filling food. If you split it open. Starchy, but filling. We’re lucky to have them. We won’t starve here, gentlemen. And look, coconut, and mango, and I think that’s pineapple over there. In terms of other food sources, we’ve got an abundance of marine life. Just take a peek in the lagoon. We’ve got many varieties of fish and shellfish.”
We just stared at her, the three of us, in amazement.
“We’re lucky to have you, Miss de Vries,” said Bruce graciously.
“Miss de Vries,” I said, “please don’t tell the captain what useless clods we are, or we’ll all be out of work.”
“Your secret’s safe with me,” she said, smiling.
“We’d better go take a look at this stream and report back to the captain,” said Baz. “Everyone’s agreed I found it, right, and I had to fight a crocodile and piranhas on the way? Good. Thank you very much, Miss de Vries. You’re a font of wisdom.”
“All from books,” she said.
“I must read them more often,” said Baz.
The three of us said good-bye and ventured up the beach to find Kate’s stream. Before long we caught sight of a little network of rivulets cutting through the sand and emptying into the lagoon. We followed them into the forest where they all joined up and formed a single stream. I bent down and had a taste. Silky fresh. I splashed some on my face. It was cold enough to make my cheekbones ache. I closed my eyes.
“All right?” Baz said to me. “You look a little woozy.”
“I don’t like the way the ground feels under my feet,” I told him.
“You should get some sleep, mate.”
“I’ll sleep later. I’ll sleep when we get off this blinking island.”
“Don’t fancy lugging buck
ets of water back to the ship much,” said Baz, turning to see how far it was to the Aurora.
“Well, the captain’s not giving us that order yet,” Lunardi said. “He just asked us to find a stream. Here it is. Not going anywhere.”
“Right you are,” said Baz. “This is good news. We won’t die of thirst, at any rate.” He sighed and his shoulders sagged a little. “Bloody hell. I had plans in Sydney.”
“I should get back,” said Lunardi. “Still plenty of patching to do.”
“Will there be enough hydrium left?” I asked. I didn’t like having to ask him. Were I a sailmaker, I would’ve known. Then I wouldn’t have to be making picnic lunches for the passengers.
“I don’t know,” Lunardi admitted. “Shall we head back?”
“You two go on ahead,” I said. “I need some more fresh air.”
“See you back at the ship, then,” Baz said, asking me with his eyes if I was okay. I gave a nod.
I walked a little farther out along the beach. If I’d seen this view in a book, I would’ve said it was beautiful, an image of tropical paradise. But I felt like a convict who’d just been dumped on a prison island. All my thoughts were of escape.
I turned and slowly made my way back toward the Aurora. Kate was still standing alone with her journal, scribbling. It irritated me suddenly, all her intense talk about mysterious winged creatures—it seemed childish right now. What was important was the ship, getting airborne. I felt too sour to speak with her and would have turned away, but she’d already seen me.
“Hello,” she said with a smile. “I was hoping you’d come back alone.”
Amazing how a few words can change everything. I felt a bit of air enter my lungs.
“I wanted to thank you,” she said.
“For what?” I asked, confused.
“When you were helping us on with our life jackets—”
“I was just doing my duty—”
“But it was the way you talked to all of us. You made things seem like they were going to be perfectly all right.”
“I was lying,” I said.
“I thought you were, but it was still immensely comforting.”
“I shouldn’t have said I was lying,” I added hurriedly. “I don’t want you to think we lie all the time or anything. And everything did turn out all right, didn’t it? Maybe not perfectly all right, but—”
“I understand.” She smiled. Despite her parasol, her cheeks were flushed from the sun. Her hair looked redder in the full light. Maybe it was just the red bows—girls knew how to do these things.
“A desert island,” she said, as if it was the most fabulous thing in the world. “Do you have any idea where we are?”
“They said it was uncharted.”
“Uncharted,” she repeated with real zest. “Do you think we’re the first people ever to set foot here?”
“Can’t say I’ve given it much thought.”
I gazed over at the Aurora, bellied up on the sand like a beached whale. Palm trees shifted in the warm breeze. My feet felt alternately heavy as cement blocks or so light they barely touched ground. The whole world looked swimmy to me, unreal.
“Well,” Kate was saying, “I read this terrific book a few months ago about a girl shipwrecked on a desert island. Completely alone.”
“No chaperone?” I asked.
“Actually, I think she did have a maid, but that was it. They had to build their own shelter and hunt for food. It’s really fabulous.”
“I’m glad being shipwrecked appeals to you.”
“Captain Walken made a point of avoiding that word.”
“Well, he was trying to keep everyone jolly, wasn’t he? It’s no good having everyone running around screaming and eating each other.”
“I wouldn’t run around screaming,” she said. “I can see eating someone in a pinch, though. If it really came down to it, I mean.”
“I don’t doubt it.”
“Come on, Matt Cruse, don’t you find it just a bit exciting, being here?”
“No.”
She looked at me as if I’d suggested we stop breathing for a few hours.
“Well, I’d expected more from you,” she said.
My heart raced with anger. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we’ve been boarded by pirates, had one of our crew murdered, and crash-landed on a desert island no one knows exists. The ship might not fly again. Me, I find this upsetting. But go ahead, think of it like a voyage, tropical beach holiday, and fairy tale, all three for the price of one.”
Kate looked at the sand, contrite, and I almost regretted my sharpness. “I’m sorry. How obtuse of me. You must think me a complete fool.”
I couldn’t help smiling.
“Although,” she said, looking off into the distance again, “I guess technically it’s not really a desert island. That would imply very little flora or fauna, which is obviously not the case here. Are you off duty?”
“For a time, yes.”
“Well, here’s what I’m thinking, Matt Cruse. I don’t think we’re the first people to lay eyes on this island.”
“No?” She had that look. There was no turning away when she shone her eyes on you like that. I should have known we weren’t in for just a simple little chat on the beach.
“No.” Sand and palm trees and blue sky blazed in her eyes. She patted the journal. “Did you read Grandfather’s description of the island?”
“Skimmed over it mostly. I wanted to get to the creatures.”
“Completely understandable. Just listen to this.” She opened the log—she must have had a bookmark, for she didn’t even need to flip pages. She just started reading: “It looks a tropical place, with a crescent shaped beach behind a green lagoon, and densely forested.’”
She closed the book and looked up at me triumphantly. No wonder she was so chipper. We’d crash-landed in the middle of nowhere, but she was in high spirits because she actually thought we’d ended up on the same island where her grandfather had sighted his winged creatures.
“Miss, that would—”
“You’re supposed to call me Kate.”
“Kate. That would describe pretty much every volcanic island in this part of the Pacificus.”
“Yesterday you said our course would take us close to his coordinates. Sometime in the early morning you said?”
I sighed. “Anything’s possible, but let’s say I think it improbable.”
She frowned and opened the book again, turning pages, looking for more evidence.
“I could ask Grantham if he has coordinates for the island,” I offered. “He might not have exact ones; I don’t know how much time he had to chart our course with all the business last night.”
“Would you?” she said, looking up.
“Yes,” I said, but then something in the log caught my eye. It was one of the drawings of the creatures. In the background Kate’s grandfather had sketched a bit of the island. I hadn’t really paid attention to it before.
It was the mountain, the bony peak poking into the sky. I remembered the outline of that peak as we’d made our dawn approach. Startled, I looked back at Kate.
“We’re here,” I said.
9
BONES
I’d scarcely uttered the words before Kate was walking across the beach, away from the ship, away from the other passengers, toward the forest. I fell into step beside her as she strode through the palm trees.
“Where do you think you’re going?” I asked.
“We need to explore.”
“The captain doesn’t want us wandering off.”
“That’s not what he said.”
“That’s what it sounded like to me.”
“No. He said to make sure a crew member accompanied us if we ventured inland. Are you a member of the crew?”
“You know I am.”
“You’re accompanying me.”
“No, I’m not. I’m not coming.”
“Good-bye, then.”
&nbs
p; We’d left the palms behind and were now in a bamboo grove, the yellow knobbly trunks as thick as my body, towering a hundred feet in the air. The white sand had given way to soil and ferns. Before us hung the dense green veil of the forest. Just looking at it made me feel all hemmed in.
“What about Miss Simpkins?” I cried.
“Her? She’ll sleep for hours. She excels at sleeping.”
Not much of a chaperone, our Miss Simpkins.
“Look, you can’t just wander off alone!”
“Are you going to stop me?”
“Yes.”
“How?” She stopped and looked at me, genuinely interested. “Would you grab me and drag me back?”
I blushed at the thought of it.
“Do you have handcuffs?” she wanted to know.
“Of course not!”
“You’d have quite a job if I struggled.”
“I suppose I would, yes.”
“Do you think you could flip me over your shoulder and carry me?” She puzzled over this for a moment. “I’m not sure you could manage it, if you don’t mind me saying so. Otherwise, you’d just have to drag me. Really, it seems hard to imagine you bringing me back unless I cooperated.”
I laughed despite myself. “I was hoping you’d listen to a bit of reason.”
“Reason,” she said. “How’s this for reason: this is the same island my grandfather saw. The creatures flew around this island. Remember, he saw that newborn fall into the trees. If it died, its bones should still be here somewhere. And surely there are others who died here. Bones, Matt, that’s what I’m after.”
“Fine, but we can’t just go wandering into the forest. It’s not safe.”
“It’s perfectly safe.” She kept walking.
“Miss de Vries, I must insist you come back.”
“I’ll be fine,” she called over her shoulder with a cheery wave. “Don’t you worry about me.”
I folded my arms across my chest and smiled. She would stop. When she realized I wasn’t about to rush after her, she would have second thoughts about pushing on into that forest alone. By this point she was getting quite far away and showed no signs of faltering. She pushed through some thick fronds, and I lost sight of her altogether.
I started counting. By ten she’d be peeping out from behind the foliage to see if I was coming.