“So why didn’t you stay? Make an honest woman of Abi?”
“I was far too restless and too damn selfish for that I’m afraid. Abi understood—I mean, she wasn’t happy, couldn’t speak to me for years, and rightly so—but she understood, you see, that’s the thing that saved us.”
A gull flew across the stern and he turned to watch it for a few moments.
“We eventually got back in touch and then, after my heart diagnosis, I begged Abi to let me live out my final years here, closer to her and Helen. She wasn’t having it at first but I talked her round.”
He took another small, tentative sip of his Coke.
“You know, Roxanne, I didn’t set out to be a bad father. It’s not something you plan to be. I had made a few return voyages to see Helen over the years, but she never really took to me. More intuitive than her mother, that one.”
“Does she know that you’re her father?”
“No, that probably didn’t help. Abi swore me to secrecy you see.” He sighed again. “Too many blasted secrets on this island! It’s what’s got us all into trouble. It’s the reason Abi’s not with us today. It’s probably the reason Helen nearly died last night.”
“So how is Helen? Really?”
“Exhausted, drained, but she’ll survive. In fact she’s in pretty good shape considering what she’s just been through.”
“And what is that exactly?” asked Roxy. “It was definitely quinine, again?”
He nodded.
“Do you think she was poisoned or did she do this to herself?”
“I honestly can not say for sure. I suspect the latter mainly because she won’t say a word. Just keeps shaking her head, won’t meet my eyes. It’s as though she’s... embarrassed or something. It’s truly tragic. She has nothing to be embarrassed about. If she was trying to forget, well...”
“Forget? Oh not you, too. You don’t also think she was trying to kill herself out of guilt? That perhaps she was the one who killed Abi?”
He squinted back at Roxy. “I’d hate to think so, my dear, nothing would make me sadder, but who’s to know what to think anymore? Helen, like her mother, has plenty of secrets, I know that, you probably suspect as much. Perhaps she was trying to end it all. Or perhaps she knows who did this to her and is protecting them.”
“That’s what the Chief suspects.”
“He may very well be right. I just don’t know. I can’t help feeling that it’s all my fault, though.”
“Why? Because you didn’t tell her you were her father?”
“No, no, nothing to do with that.” He hesitated. “Well, I guess it is related to that in a way. I... I was trying to protect her, trying to keep her safe. It was foolish of me, I see that now.”
“Protect? What do you mean?”
“I realised after the Chief searched my rooms that it was probably Helen who’d taken the quinine. She was the only one who’d come for a consultation recently, to see me about a different matter entirely, but I did leave her on her own for several minutes. Perhaps she spotted the quinine then and pinched it.”
“To kill Abi?”
“Yes. No! I don’t know. I wasn’t sure, and I didn’t want the Chief barging in on her, accusing her of that. So I kept it to myself. And now, well, what if she did steal the quinine? What if she used it to kill Abi and then to kill herself out of guilt?”
Roxy considered this. “Has she admitted any of this?”
“No she has not.”
“Then maybe she didn’t. You’re just guessing, right? Maybe, just maybe, somebody else stole it, and tried to kill Helen just like they tried to kill Abi. We’ve got to find out, we’ve got to speak to Helen.”
“Well it’s over to you my dear. She won’t speak to me. She seems to think you are the best person to solve this thing and is not interested in speaking with anyone else.”
Roxy swallowed hard. “That’s insane pressure.”
“Perhaps not.”
He turned to watch a school of fish dart to and fro under the glassy water.
“I could tell from the start that you’re smart, smarter than anyone else around here, although I think we both agree that’s not hard. Helen obviously agrees and feels that you’re the only one she can trust. Says she hasn’t been completely honest with you. Says she needs to set the record straight. Do you know what she means?”
He looked at Roxy keenly and she stared straight back.
“I have a bit of a hunch,” she confessed, then raised her eyebrows. “What about you?”
He tapped one finger to the side of his nose. “I have doctor/patient confidentiality. But I will tell you this, Roxanne. I worry about bringing her back so soon. She keeps insisting she’s not in any danger. But, as you say, we don’t know what’s happened...”
Roxy put her hand over his. “You know, Doc, I think we need to go with Helen on this. If she feels she can return to Dormay and she’s safe, then I think we need to respect that.”
Roxy struggled to her feet, scooping both empty bottles up along the way.
“What are you going to do now?”
“I’m going to check my email, Doc, because I’m waiting on something important, then I’m going to do what I’ve been wanting to do since I got here. I’m going to take a big walk, right around the island. I could really use some perspective.”
“Splendid idea,” he said. “It’s a very hot day though, even for Dormay, so be sure to take plenty of water. And get Mary to organise a packed lunch for you.”
He frowned suddenly. “Are you going to say anything? To Helen, I mean? About me?”
Roxy shook her head. “Not my place to do that. Although I think it’d be nice for you to do it, and soon.”
“Really? You don’t think it’s a little too late for that?”
“Not at all. I think the timing’s perfect. With Abi gone, it might help Helen to know she’s not completely alone in the world.”
He nodded, getting it.
“There is one other thing, though,” she said and he looked at her curiously. “You do realise that this puts you firmly back on Abi’s suspect list?”
He squinted again. “Oh? Why?”
“Well, I’ve got to ask myself, Doc: if Helen really is your daughter, how far would you go to protect her legacy?”
She jumped across the railing and back onto the jetty, leaving the old man to ponder this very question as she made the quick walk back to the hotel.
When Roxy logged back into her email account, she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. There was a message from Oliver, the one she’d been impatiently waiting for, and there were five from her mother. She cringed. The news about Abi’s death must have finally filtered through to Australian television news. She sighed heavily and opened Lorraine’s first message.
‘Oh my dear, we’ve just heard the most awful news. Am hoping I heard it wrong. Charlie says I must have. Isn’t Abigail Linter (sic) the woman you’re currently writing for? The 6 o’clock news tells me she’s dead! Please tell me I heard it wrong, that everything’s okay. Love Mum.’
The second email had been sent an hour later—no doubt after the 7 o’clock news had confirmed the death as suspicious—and Lorraine’s tone had grown slightly more melodramatic. By the fourth note she was close to imploding:
‘Oh Roxanne, we’re so very worried! You must let me know you’re okay! Is there a killer lurking about on that island of yours? Are you even alive?! Desperately wanting to hear from you. Your mother.’
Reluctantly, and fortifying herself for the worst, Roxy clicked open the fifth message but relaxed considerably when she realised it had been written by her step-dad Charlie. He was characteristically calmer.
‘Roxy, love, please get in touch with your mother. She’s having a minor breakdown. Just wants to know you’re okay. Love Charlie.’
Roxy sighed again, glad her mother had not thought to track down the island contact number—imagine the stream of irate phone messages poor Joshua would have t
o field—and sent them a group reply:
‘Hi guys, please don’t panic, I’m perfectly fine. The police have detained us here until the case is sorted. I’ll give you a call when I get a chance. In the meantime know that I am safe and in good hands. xo Roxy’
She didn’t think for one moment that it would placate her mother, but she hoped, at the very least, it would stop the flow of hysterical emails. She turned her attention, next, to Oliver’s message and this one, despite its morbid content, cheered her up enormously.
“You were right,” he wrote. “According to that old article you’ve got, a 50-year-old woman took 48 x 5 gram tabs of quinine bisulphate back in the 1920s. That’s 240 grams, Roxy. No wonder she didn’t make it. It also mentioned other cases where the women survived: in 1955, a 31-year-old dissolved 15 grams of quinine in a glass of port. It says: ‘Within minutes her vision was blurred and there was a buzzing in her ears. Vomited repeatedly until she fell asleep.’ The next morning she couldn’t see or hear, but pretty much back to normal within a few days. Also, according to the article there’s been about a hundred quinine-related deaths and hundreds more serious quinine-related adverse medical events since 1969. Many of them, as you thought, by poor wretched women with no other choice. But tell me, what has this got to do with Abi? Isn’t she in her 70s?!”
After reading it through twice, Roxy sat back, stunned. She had recalled reading something intriguing about quinine many years before. It had been intriguing enough to bother cutting it out and pasting it into her so-called Book of Death. Now, thanks to Oliver’s good hunting skills, she knew why. And it left her both surprised and vindicated. Already she could feel several of the jigsaw pieces clicking into place, but there were still plenty of odd pieces lying about, not making any sense.
She sighed. It’s not over yet, Roxy Parker. Not by a long shot.
Chapter 17
The sun was beating down hard when Roxy stepped out onto main beach and began walking up towards the village track and the place of Abi’s demise. Despite the stifling heat and humidity, Roxy needed to return to the scene of the crime, and not just to search the area for more clues. She also needed to take this walk, today, to force herself past that spot if she was ever going to move beyond it metaphorically. When she got to the location, she noticed both pergola plots had been filled in and a bouquet of frangipani was turning brown where it had been placed nearby. She stopped, dropped her backpack to the ground, and bowed her head silently.
As the insects twittered around her, Roxy tried not to remember Abi as she had last seen her here, her head protruding so ghoulishly from the sand. Instead, she tried to recall her throaty laughter, her bright apparel, her larger-than-life smile. Sadly, she couldn’t conjure them up. All that remained of Abi, for now, were slack eyes, wiry hair, a silently screaming mouth. She scowled, disappointed, and looked about. But there was nothing to see here anymore. The ground was now trampled—the police had obviously gone over it and over it—and all she could glean from the site was more bad memories. She picked up her backpack and continued on.
The track to the village meandered across sand and soil, with ragged grass, mangrove and coconut trees lining the way. Roxy stopped at one point to stare up at those trees and was mesmerised by the orange splatters that appeared like spilt paint down their sides. And at the top were those green swishing fronds, flying up from time to time, like a skirt let loose in the breeze. Most of the trees seemed to lean into the wind and some were so overloaded with coconuts it was a miracle they didn’t topple onto her. She put her head back down and kept walking.
Within 10 minutes Roxy was at the village. She looked around, surprised to find the area devoid of life except for several chickens and a few mangy dogs that sidled up to her, their dull eyes staring, not daring to hope. She reached into her backpack and found her bread roll, pulled a few clumps off and tossed them in their direction. They bolted away, clearly expecting these to be painful missiles, not replenishing food. Slowly they returned to sniff and then gobble up the bread.
She saw a slight movement to the side and swung around to find a small boy sitting on the steps of a hut playing with a banana leaf he’d folded into a kind of boat. He peered at her with a shy smile. She wandered over to him being sure to keep a respectful distance.
“Hello,” she said softly.
He smiled more widely, his teeth fluorescent white against thick black lips. She wondered at what age they began spoiling them with betel nut.
“Where is everybody?”
He looked confused. She didn’t know Pidgin English, but she gave it a try. “Mama? Belong you?”
This seemed to work. He pointed back, inside the hut. Ah, thought Roxy, smart people. They were resting indoors during this hottest time of the hottest day. They were not striding about like mad Aussie women in the midday sun. She thanked him, waved goodbye and returned to the track.
The path lead off from the village inland towards the lookout but Roxy decided to continue walking along the coastline. This time, she found her way to the beach and stuck to sand and rocky edges as best she could. On several occasions, she had to backtrack into the bush when the coastline became too steep or impenetrable, but for the most part this island was beach-bound and within an hour she was at the old boatshed near the airstrip, the one that had suffered through a past cyclone.
She took a good long sip from her water bottle and stared at the old shed, intrigued. It was certainly derelict with an overgrown passionfruit vine almost pulling the structure down in parts, but there were several wooden cartons piled up to one side and hundreds of cigarette butts littering the ground.
Someone had been here recently.
She stepped closer and spotted what looked like a brand new padlock and chain wrapped securely around the front door. She tugged at it to no avail. Why was it locked up, she wondered? Was it to do with health and safety? Spotting a small, dingy window on one side, she dragged some of the cartons to the wall and climbed up to take a look. It was pitch black inside and she could see very little through the cobwebbed window. She could smell though, where it was slightly ajar, and it made her reel back in shock. The room smelt like old fish and hundred-year-old socks. There was something seriously dead inside.
“Can I help you, Missus?” came a deep voice behind her and Roxy swung around, nearly toppling off the cartons in the process.
There was a tall black man standing there, a woollen beanie on his head and a furrow chiselled deep into his brow. Roxy plucked a passionfruit from a nearby vine and climbed down, wiping her hands on her khaki trousers and attempting a harmless smile. But her heart was beating wildly all of a sudden and she could barely feel her legs.
“H-hello,” she stammered. “You must be Willie. I’m Roxy, one of the guests. Just er, helping myself to some fruit.”
She thrust the passionfruit towards him, her hand shaking. “And, you know, taking a look around.”
His scowl deepened further. “There is nothing for you here,” he said and she nodded her head vigorously.
“No, no of course not. Just hungry, that’s all.”
She glanced behind him to the track. “Okay then, I’d better be off.”
She indicated the path but he didn’t move, just stared at her strangely, and she tried to take deep, calming breaths while Abi’s words kept ringing through her head.
‘Willie’s up to something, Joshy, I can smell it. The man is trouble.’
What if he was more than a rascal or a common thief? What if he was a cold-blooded murderer? And here she was, all alone with him, on the remotest part of a remote island.
With no one to help her.
Willie was very young, much younger than she realised, and had what looked like a safety pin crudely thrust through one ear. His curly black hair was hidden behind his beanie and he had a slight amount of stubble just above his lips—a teenager’s attempt to grow a moustache. Where the sleeves had been torn off his cotton work shirt she saw thick, rippled biceps, g
listening now with sweat. He moved suddenly, reaching into his pocket and brought something silver out. A switchblade.
She thought her heart would leap out of her mouth. He flicked it open and held it up as Roxy’s legs almost gave way beneath her. She darted anxious glances behind him, to the road and her escape.
He stepped closer to her. “I cut,” he said.
She looked at him, startled. He indicated the passionfruit.
“Oh!” she exhaled loudly, the sweat dripping down her face. “Of course, right, the fruit. Yes, great, that would be... great.”
She handed it over and he stabbed into it and around it, slicing it into two. He handed it back and she tried to smile, sure she was looking more like a crazed nutter than anything.
“Okay, then, thank you,” she said and he stepped aside to allow her back onto the path.
She tried not to run down it like a madwoman, tried to maintain a dignified pace, but every cell in her body was urging her to flee. Just in case. She glanced back, noticed that he was following slowly, at a distance, and she tried to take deep, calming breaths. She gradually picked up her pace, not daring to look back now, knowing that if he chose to continue following her, to catch up, hit her over the head and bury her in a ditch somewhere, there would be no one around to stop him.
No one to hear her scream.
The sweat was streaming from Roxy’s body and she was panting loudly when she finally reached the open airstrip. A sudden, cool gust of air whipped against her like a splash of cold water and she sighed, thrilled by the cool change. Only then, out there in the open, did she dare to glance back. Willie was now nowhere to be seen. He had clearly stopped following her some time ago. She dropped the passionfruit she had been clinging to, gulped for air and kept walking.
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