The Survivors

by Jane Harper

  Kieran couldn’t listen to any more. He forced his other arm into the wetsuit, zipped it up and shut the shed door behind him, loudly enough to make the voices outside fall silent.

  The rush of the wind and waves made it hard to talk on board the Nautilus Blue, but as they rounded the point and the caves came into view in the distance, George shifted from where he was sitting.

  ‘Amazing,’ he said as The Survivors came into sight. The trio stood strong and straight, the water lapping at their waists.

  Struggling under the weight of his gear, George scrabbled to the other side of the boat and pulled his phone out of his backpack. His arm lurched as he tried to line it up straight with the horizon and take a photo.

  ‘How many actually survived the shipwreck?’ he said to no-one in particular.

  ‘It’s not known exactly,’ Verity said. She was also watching the sculpture as they drew nearer. ‘Officially twelve, but they think there might have been a few more than that.’

  ‘The records aren’t great?’

  ‘There were a couple of men with various charges pending.’ Verity gave a small smile. ‘They didn’t manage to make it to shore to have their day in court. And a few others who probably had mistresses they preferred to their wives and kids.’

  ‘Is that right?’ George said. ‘So, what? They disappeared into the water and resurfaced as someone else?’

  ‘Maybe. Who knows?’

  ‘That’s why you can’t trust anyone in Evelyn Bay,’ Liam said suddenly. He’d been staring out at the water with his chin in his hand. If he’d meant it as a joke, it fell flat.

  Sean cleared his throat.

  ‘Not to endorse what Liam’s saying,’ he said with forced levity. ‘But if you want to lock your bag away in the dry box, George, I’ll secure it before we go under.’

  ‘Phone too?’

  ‘Yeah, best place. The box is watertight, it’ll be fine in there.’

  George snapped a couple more photos, then handed his things over. He turned back to the shore.

  ‘I wonder what the passengers on the Mary Minerva made of that sight?’ George said. ‘One of the last things most of them would have seen, I guess.’

  Kieran followed his gaze to the caves, their gaping mouths opening onto the thin strip of beach that flashed white with each breaking wave. The Survivors stared back at him, impassive. A particularly large wave crashed into the sculpture, and the woman at the edge of the trio disappeared completely for a second. Kieran looked away.

  Sean was squinting into the water as he guided the boat.

  ‘Right.’ He cut the engine. ‘We’re here.’

  They took it in turns to jump from the catamaran into the water, and as Kieran submerged he was immediately grateful for his cold-water suit. The waves that had been rough at the surface became calm once the water closed over Kieran’s head, and the weight of his equipment dissolved.

  They descended in single file, following the anchor line down. Liam led the way, disappearing first into the murky green. George followed, and then it was Kieran’s turn. He traced the line with his gloved fist, listening to the inward hiss and outward roar of his own breathing. Somewhere above Kieran was Verity, with Sean the last on the line. Kieran inhaled and exhaled as he let himself sink deeper, to the wreckage waiting below.

  He peered through the cloudy green water, watching for the Mary Minerva to take form. The skeletal outline emerged first, like a crude bird’s-eye sketch of a boat. It almost looked intact for a few moments, through that dense watery filter, but as Kieran descended further a tangled nest of fallen beams and collapsed walls sharpened into detail. The remains of the ship lay silent and still on a clear bed of sand, too deep for seaweed to grow.

  Kieran let go of the line and floated, watching fish drift in and out as he saw Verity appear. She glided down next to him, almost anonymous in her suit and mask.

  ‘Verity, you pair with Kieran,’ Sean had said back up on the surface. ‘And George –’ Sean had hesitated and glanced at Liam, whose expression had been dark. ‘You stick with Liam, and I’ll go between you all.’

  Neither Liam nor George had looked particularly happy with this arrangement, but now Kieran could see the two men moving together up ahead. The pair swam slowly along the side of the wreck, thick white clouds bubbling from their masks in regular bursts. George may have been certified, but he’d done his training in warm water, Kieran could tell. He had the upright swimming style of divers used to better visibility, and rather than sticking to a frog kick, he kept lapsing into a flipper kick that stirred up sediment in cold water, making it hard to see.

  Kieran and Verity exchanged a look as best they could through their masks and turned and swam in the other direction. They passed Sean hovering in the midst of the tangled mess as he examined something with his torch. He raised his hand, thumb and finger forming a circle. Okay? They reflected the gesture. Okay.

  Kieran let Verity lead the way, floating alongside her as they moved around the ship’s bow, still tall and towering. Verity kicked – with the correct frog-like motion – and swam up the length of the metal, tracing its curve. She turned back to Kieran and gestured for him to join her.

  This had been a good idea of Sean’s, Kieran thought now. The breathing, the buoyancy. Everything about it was otherworldly. No wonder Verity liked it. It felt as though they were in a different reality. He liked it too.

  They swam side by side, stopping for a few minutes by the ship’s anchor, now thick and swollen with rust. Verity reached out and touched Kieran’s arm as a fish whipped out from the wreck and flashed by. Kieran felt the mild sway of current as she moved.

  Gabby’s backpack.

  The thought came to him with the flow of water. Kieran had never really stopped to consider that bag before, beyond the tragically obvious implication. But he thought about it now. The search had ground to a halt after the bag was found washed up on the beach by a group of dog walkers. The soaked purple mass had been pulled out of the water within sight of the rocks where Gabby had last been seen before the storm hit; the same storm that had torn up trees and destroyed homes and roared into the caves and swallowed The Survivors whole. The same storm that had flipped a boat and dragged two strong local men to their deaths.

  Kieran paused beside the wreck and felt the weight of the underwater currents press against his wetsuit. A push and pull, firm and persistent. The water did what it wanted. So it was lucky – perhaps he’d even go so far as to say conveniently lucky – that Gabby’s bag had been found at all. Kieran thought about this now as he floated, and felt a strange coldness seep through him that had nothing to do with the ocean.

  He swam on, distracted enough by his thoughts that it took him a second to realise that Verity had pulled up short. She was pointing at something through the water, and Kieran looked over to see George swimming towards them, very fast, his legs flipper-kicking up a cloud of sediment. Immediately on high alert, Kieran surged forward to meet him, one hand ready to grab for his back-up respirator line in case George reached up with that terrible cut-throat slashing signal. No air.

  But no, Kieran could see now as they came face to face. George still had his primary respirator in his mouth, the bursts of bubbles flowing normally, if a little fast.

  Kieran put his finger and thumb together. Okay?

  George’s expression was distorted by his mask but his hand immediately went out flat, palm down, twisting back and forth at the wrist. Something wrong.

  Kieran pointed, trying to work out what. Mask? Oxygen? George was shaking his head. He raised a hand, his thumb and first finger forming an L shape with his glove, and suddenly Kieran realised what was right in front of him. George was all alone. Kieran twisted around. Near the stern, he could make out only the beam of Sean’s torch as it bounced and swept over the twisted wreckage. He could see no other diver. No Liam.

 
George was making an L shape again and a frantic thumbs-up motion.

  Kieran repeated it back to make sure he’d understood. Liam has gone to the surface?

  George started nodding behind his mask.

  Kieran put out his flat palm and twisted his wrist. Something wrong?

  Yes. A mirrored reply. Something wrong.

  Chapter 23

  The ascent to the surface felt like the longest one Kieran could remember. They had found Sean and immediately begun the slow crawl upwards. Kieran could tell Sean was considering pulling ahead, calculating how far he could push the safety standards. He was starting to drift up, and Kieran had reached out and caught his wrist. Don’t. Stay. Kieran could see the effort it took him to slow down, but he did, and the four of them moved towards the surface together. Another minute, another nine metres.

  Liam was on the boat.

  He was sitting cross-legged, hunched over as he stared across the sea to the caves on the shore. He had stripped off all his equipment including his wetsuit and was shivering in just his shorts, a towel draped around his shoulders. He looked up as they emerged.

  ‘What happened?’ Sean was the first on board, his fear visibly waning at the sight of his nephew alive, if perhaps not completely well. Sean waited, but Liam wouldn’t meet his eye.

  ‘I dunno.’

  ‘You don’t know?’

  Kieran had not often seen Sean angry, but he was fast getting there now.

  ‘Liam?’ Sean tried again. ‘Oi. Hey. You listening? What’s going on?’

  ‘I said. Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’

  ‘I’d had enough, all right?’

  Sean stared at his nephew. ‘Are you serious? So, what, you just decided to come up? Didn’t bother telling anyone?’

  ‘George saw me.’ He didn’t glance at the writer, who was watching Liam closely, his brow creased.

  ‘That’s not what I bloody meant,’ Sean said. ‘And leaving George is a whole other thing for you and me to have a very long chat about, by the way.’

  ‘Yeah, okay. I can hear.’ Liam shook his head. ‘I don’t know what I can tell you. I’d had enough of being down there so I came up.’

  Sean looked at him, shivering on the deck. ‘Did you even ascend properly?’

  A small nod. The only sound was the water lapping against the boat.

  ‘All right,’ Sean said, finally. ‘Let’s get back. We’ll talk about this later. You got anything you want to say to everyone?’

  No answer.

  ‘Liam? Jesus, you’re still not even listening –’

  ‘I am. Sorry. It’s just –’ Liam was frowning now, his eyes focused on the shore.

  ‘What? What’s going on, mate?’

  ‘There’s something wrong out there, you know.’

  Sean blinked. ‘Down at the wreck?’

  ‘No. Out there.’ They all turned to follow Liam’s gaze, towards The Survivors and the cliffs and caves beyond.

  ‘What are you on about?’ Sean frowned.

  ‘The birds have been all riled up lately.’ Liam’s voice was still flat. ‘On and off. Something’s been scaring them.’

  George tilted his head, squinting. Above the cliffs, the sky was mostly still and clear. ‘They look fine now.’

  ‘And what would you know about how things are around here, mate?’ Liam snapped. ‘You don’t even know how to kick properly.’ He sighed, his energy spent. ‘They’re fine right now, but they’ve been getting worked up about something.’ He jerked his head in Kieran’s direction. ‘It happened the other day when he and his baby were messing around down there, and the day before that.’

  ‘You went down to the caves?’ Verity said sharply, fixing Kieran with a gaze that made him squirm. ‘With Audrey?’

  ‘Yeah. Only once though. And not for long.’

  His mother did not look away. ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘I hadn’t planned to, I –’ Kieran stopped. He couldn’t explain. ‘The tide was out. It was fine.’

  Verity didn’t answer, but continued to stare at him in a way that set him on edge.

  ‘What, Mum?’ he said. ‘For God’s sake, she’s my child.’

  Verity still didn’t reply. Kieran could feel the others watching and he turned away, annoyed.

  ‘Perhaps it was a sea eagle,’ George said out of nowhere, and they all looked over. He shrugged at Liam. ‘Upsetting the birds. Could there have been a sea eagle around? Trying to get at the babies?’

  Liam blinked at him. ‘I don’t know.’ He looked very tired. ‘Yeah. Maybe.’

  There was a roar as Sean fired up the engine. ‘Jesus. Let’s just get back to land.’

  If the journey out to the wreck had been quiet, the journey back was silent in a different way. The mood was still sombre as they disembarked.

  George was off the boat as soon as they docked. He stripped off his wetsuit, pulled on a t-shirt from his bag and with a thank you that managed to sound at least partly sincere, he disappeared through the marina gate, shaking his head.

  As Liam took the wetsuit away to rinse it down, Sean turned to Kieran and Verity.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said, rubbing a hand over his face. ‘If you want to go out again another time –’

  ‘It’s fine, Sean. I wanted to see the wreck once more, and I did,’ Verity said as they headed to the shed to get changed. ‘So, thank you. Really.’

  Kieran had less trouble getting out of his wetsuit than he’d had getting into it, and this time it was him waiting outside the shed for Verity. Still a little cold from the water, he moved around to stand in the sun and leaned against the wall, feeling tired suddenly. Over the sound of equipment being hosed down around the back, he could hear Sean’s voice.

  ‘– know you’re not having an easy time but –’

  Liam gave a short hollow laugh at that. Sean ignored it.

  ‘– but you can’t leave people in the water. It’s bad enough now, but you do that with the real clients and I could lose this business. Or something worse happens.’

  No answer.

  ‘I mean it, mate. Liam? It’s a serious safety issue. You know that. You can’t –’

  ‘I had to come up because I couldn’t stay down there anymore.’ Liam’s reply was so low Kieran barely caught the words.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Sean said.

  ‘I got water in my mask and I was clearing it but I sucked some in and –’ Liam stopped.

  ‘That’s nothing new though.’ Sean’s voice was soft now. ‘How many times has that happened? Hundreds.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. But this time –’ It seemed for a second like Liam might not say any more. ‘When the water was in my nose and mouth I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I mean, I could – the air was coming through and everything – but I felt like I couldn’t, you know? I couldn’t stand it. Being down there. So that’s what happened. All right? I needed to breathe so I came up.’

  There was a silence.

  ‘Okay,’ Sean said. ‘All right, mate. You should have come and found me, though. Or anyone. Not disappeared like that.’

  ‘I know. But –’ Liam sounded embarrassed now. ‘I didn’t know how long I had. I was scared I was going to rip my mask off.’

  Neither of them spoke for another moment.

  ‘Is it that bad?’ Sean said.

  ‘People thinking I killed a girl? Yeah, it’s pretty bad.’

  Kieran heard movement around the front. Verity was ready. Still, he stayed where he was.

  ‘All right.’ Sean’s words were almost inaudible. ‘Maybe –’ A pause. ‘Maybe don’t mention this to anyone else for now, mate.’

  Verity’s head appeared around the corner.

  ‘Ready?’ she said, and Liam’s reply was lost.

  ‘Yeah.’ Kieran
stepped away from the shed and he and Verity walked together out of the marina. As they hit the road, they both opened their mouths at the same time.

  ‘Sorry,’ Kieran said. ‘You go.’

  ‘I was just going to say I’m going to get a coffee to take home to your dad.’ Verity’s voice was light but still frosty. ‘Apparently the Surf and Turf could do with the business. Do you want to come?’

  ‘I suppose,’ Kieran said. ‘You know it was Julian who told the cops about Dad wandering, don’t you?’

  ‘I do. It was also Julian who kept him safe until I got there. Not for the first time, either.’

  ‘Right,’ Kieran said as they started to walk. ‘Listen, though, I’m sorry about taking Audrey to the caves. You’re completely right. I was on the lookout and I could see the tide was out and –’ He looked over.

  ‘Okay,’ Verity said simply. Ahead, the Surf and Turf’s sign was lit up.

  ‘I won’t take her down again.’

  ‘That’s up to you.’

  ‘Mum –’

  ‘Like you said, Kieran, she’s your child.’ Verity’s voice was steely calm. ‘But you’d be very sorry if anything happened to her.’

  Kieran stopped walking. After a few paces, Verity relented and stopped as well. She turned and they stood on the street and looked at each other.

  ‘Is there something you want to say to me, Mum?’

  ‘No, Kieran.’

  ‘Are you sure? About Finn, maybe?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Because I’m sensing a little passive aggression here.’ He was goading her now, using the same placid tone Verity was so fond of.

  ‘Well.’ She looked him in the eye. ‘I’m sorry you feel that way.’

  ‘Mum –’

  ‘Kieran.’ Verity sighed heavily. ‘Let’s not. Okay? You’re right. Audrey is your child. But if something happened to her, you would be sorry. And that’s all I want to say.’

  It wasn’t, of course, but she was already turning away. ‘I’m getting coffee. You’re welcome to come, or not.’

  Kieran watched her for a few moments longer, then followed.