Finn yanked his door open and strode over to Jamieson’s cruiser.
“I’m worried,” he said. “She’s been gone too long. I don’t believe Hy would leave without a word, unless something was up.”
“Probably not.” Jamieson had been thinking that herself. “Jump in. We’ll go looking.”
“We should take Ian’s vehicle,” he said. “It’s got four-wheel drive.”
“Okay. Good idea.”
Not so good, as it turned out.
***
Hy battled the swell and grabbed Dot’s lifeless body. She knew she had to get out of the water fast. It was cold; they were at risk of hypothermia. Hy knew all about that. This was the third time in her life she’d faced it, the third time there had been extreme danger for her in the water. Third time lucky? She’d been lucky the first and second times. Could that kind of luck hold?
She tugged at Dot’s body. She couldn’t move both herself and Dot through the turbulence. They were two separate bodies; she would have a better chance if they became one.
She entwined herself around Dot and kicked one leg to swim forward, one arm tugging on the rope around her waist to get them back to the boat.
It was slow and frustrating. She regretted that she’d attached the rope at the other end to the steering wheel. It gave it play; the wheel moved back and forth at the will of the waves and Hy’s tugging.
She didn’t know how long it took her. She would have said an hour, but it was minutes only. It could only have been minutes, she knew, otherwise they would both be dead. She had that consolation to keep her going: they were not dead, not she, nor Dot. Dot’s eyes were closed, and she wasn’t moving on her own, but Hy put a hand around her wrist and could feel her steady, slow pulse.
Now for the tricky part. Gripping onto Dot with one arm, Hy began to undo the rope from her own waist. If she freed herself from the rope and attached it to Dot to secure her, Hy could climb up the outside of the boat, get on deck, and then pull Dot up after her.
If she could take the weight. If the rocking of the boat didn’t pitch her back into the water, where they’d both be lost.
Panic struck her – squeezing the air out of her lungs and refusing to let any in. Her mouth open, gasping for air, water gushing into it. Choking. Her heart racing, pounding with the swell of the sea.
Lost. They were lost. There was no hope.
The rope slipped from her waist, slipped from her hands. They were adrift. Hy clung to Dot. Dot was her life raft. And she was Dot’s.
***
Finn had set him up so that Ian was able to work on his computer from the couch, with his wireless keyboard and the big screen in front of him. It was his window on the world for now. He had texted Jamieson, asking her to keep him informed, and she had said she would.
He opened his email.
Damn! How had he missed it? An email from Hy. Yesterday night. It was buried in a thread of postings, and it had become hidden, not noticed.
She had gone looking. For Abel. For the fish.
She’d left a link she said explained it all.
Feeding the World in the Future. That was the website. Dozens of links covered everything from the giant vegetables of Findhorn to ocean areas where giant sea creatures were forming, in strange new pockets that seemed to nurture them in inexplicable ways. Continuous breeding seasons. Long lifespans. Not just cod, but other species. A lobster had been found – as big as a boat.
Hy believed one of those breeding places of oceanic giants was here, on Red Island. She was convinced that Abel had stumbled on it thirty years before, and now it had reappeared, fully formed, possibly teeming with giant cod that might save the Atlantic fishery. How many giant cod would it take to do that?
Clearly, they would have to be farmed, spawned in vitro, caged as they grew in the cold Atlantic waters they favoured, in giant fish farms. The appearance of these big fish along this coast could be critical to a revival of the industry. That was why the fellow at fisheries, Seamus O’Malley, had asked Hy about Abel, looking for the only man on Red Island who’d encountered one of these giant specimens. O’Malley wanted to be in on the ocean floor.
It’s in the circles, Hy’s email had said. The circles beyond Big Bay.
It all came together, like pieces of a puzzle in a snug fit. Abel was after the big fish. He wanted one. So, it seemed, did O’Malley. And Ferguson. Yes, Ferguson, too. He’d announced at the hall, in front of the entire village, that he was looking for Abel. None of Abel’s neighbours had seen him for years, so what else could have led Ferguson to him than the photograph and the fish? That episode had been forgotten in the continuing absence of Abel, the distraction of the cattery coming to the village, and the tragedy at the lobster supper. It had been lost, for Ian, in his worries over Jasmine. It wasn’t hard to figure out why Ferguson wanted the fish. It could only have been to satisfy his record-setting mania.
Beyond Big Bay. That’s where the circles were.
That’s where he’d be. Abel. That’s where she’d be. Hy.
Did Finn and Jamieson know what he knew now? The search for the big fish, by unscrupulous people like O’Malley and Ferguson, might have put Abel in danger. Maybe Hy, as well.
Jamieson and Finn were mobile. He wasn’t. They could do something. He couldn’t. Life was unfair.
He grabbed his cell from the table, the movement so fast it sent a stab of pain across his back. Ignoring it, he speed-dialed Jamieson.
No answer. Voice mail full.
Finn.
No answer. Voice mail full.
Damn.
Ian hated texting, especially anything of length, but he had to let Finn and Jamieson know what was going on. He began the laborious task, full of misspellings and poor punctuation.
***
A massive wave loomed over them.
This is it, she thought. Hy closed her eyes and clung hard to Dot, just managing to keep both their heads above water. She wasn’t sure why – because that wave was about to well and truly drown them.
The impact ripped Dot from her grasp and sent Hy spinning, spinning underwater, her eyes still closed, no idea where she was headed, where Dot was, if the boat was being tossed in her direction, too, and might kill her before the killer wave did.
But this wave turned out to be a saviour.
***
The storm had driven the inflatable back to Big Bay, where it got caught on the sandbar now that the tide was low. The big waves chased up by the storm shoved it farther across the sand with each surge. He was getting nowhere near the fish, near the prize, but Abel hadn’t reached the age of ninety without good luck dogging him all his life. As it was about to do.
***
Hy was deposited with a thump on shore. Dot was thrown clear of the rocks beside her.
The seas and the sky went calm. The rain stopped. The wind died down. The calm in the midst of the storm. The storm pausing to gather its strength and launch another attack.
In the relative calm, the Annaben slid up onto the shore, nesting by a fall of sandstone tumbling down from the cape. The Cape Islander was nowhere to be seen.
Hy wanted to close her eyes and sleep. Sleep. She could get a blanket from the boat. No, she didn’t need it. She was warm. Nice and warm.
The warmth began to build. Hot now.
Hypothermia. Her old enemy. She had to fight it.
She dragged herself onto all fours and crawled toward the boat.
No! Dot. She must take care of Dot first. Fight the heat. Fight the cold. She couldn’t tell one from the other, burned with it, shivered right to her core.
She struggled to where Dot lay with her face planted in the sand and tried to roll her over. Her muscles felt like they were tearing apart with the effort. Dot was a lump, an unmoving, unyielding lump.
A dead weight.
/> Or simply – dead?
***
Finn headed for Big Bay. If Hy were chasing Abel and Abel were chasing the fish, then it made sense to go where the boats and the water were.
The harbour was deserted. No activity except the rain pelting down on the wharf. Rain so thick it formed a curtain beyond which they could not see. Could not see the small human huddled in the watercraft shifting on the sandbar.
They paid no attention to the lone car, a black PT Cruiser, parked behind a shed of some kind. It could be anyone’s.
Finn and Jamieson got out and walked down the pier.
Finn pointed.
“The Annaben. It’s gone.”
They looked at the gap where the Annaben should have been. There was another space, too, at the end of the line of boats, but neither Finn nor Jamieson was aware that it was Fairweather’s berth, that there was another boat on the water that night.
“Do you think that Hy has gone out in the boat?”
“I’m sure she has,” he said.
“We better call the coast guard.” Jamieson pulled out her cellphone and activated her contact list. But she couldn’t use it. The bar across the top read No service. It flickered on and off – a quick single bar of reception, teasing but not functioning. She turned to Finn. “Can we follow?”
“Maybe,” he said, a scheme forming in his mind. “Maybe we can take one of these other boats.”
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
“No. We can’t do that. It would be stealing.”
They made their way back to the truck, rain at first easing then pouring down on them. In the cab, Finn’s phone was flashing. He’d left the truck idling and the cell plugged in to power it up. Now the sound of his ringtone – a couple of bars from The Proclaimers’ Letter from America – filled the air with its heartrending message, and Finn answered.
“Ian,” he mouthed at Jamieson. “Yes… Big Bay…no…they’re not here… Where?… Text?... Link?… Okay.”
Finn checked his messages, the service band flickering on his phone, too. He scanned Ian’s message.
The service cut out.
“Damn,” he said, shaking the phone as if that would fix it.
Jamieson observed him, questioning. He stuck the phone in his pocket. At least it was charged.
“So, you don’t want to borrow a boat?”
Jamieson frowned. Is that what Ian was suggesting, too?
“You’re not going to like the alternative any better.”
Chapter 33
Hy stared up at the massive dunes behind them. They were stuck here.
She’d never get Dot out.
The whole thing had been a complete failure.
She’d tried to roll Dot over, torso and head, but her arm flopped back and brought the rest of her with it. It was like grappling with jelly, but she kept at it.
Finally she managed. As she rolled Dot onto her side, a flood of water came out of her mouth, out of her lungs. She coughed. She gasped. She was breathing, but she didn’t wake.
Hy had no idea what to do.
***
“They’ll have gone to the circle of cods,” said Finn, pressing hard on the accelerator, the speed indicator hitting forty kilometres per hour above the limit. With a Mountie in the car. “I gather it’s kind of like a pool, with conditions of its own.”
“A pool? There’s a whole ocean out there. Who needs a pool?” Jamieson was being irritating on purpose. She didn’t want to tell Finn to slow down. She should, she knew, but the truth was she wanted him to go even faster.
“The giant cods apparently do.”
Jamieson smirked. “Is this some kind of seafaring myth?”
“No. Ian says they exist and a few people are interested in them. Hy emailed Ian before she took off.”
“What else did she say?”
“It’s what Abel’s after. A giant cod. Some guy at fisheries is involved…a Seamus O’Malley, and, get this, Hy thinks Brock Ferguson wants a piece of the pie.”
“I’m still asking why?”
“Hy seems to think they’re all nuts, a bunch of kooks.”
Jamieson smiled a small smile.
If it came to kooks, she wouldn’t rule out Hy or Abel, or practically anyone in the village.
Jamieson did remember Gus talking about the big cod, but she hadn’t thought much of it. Her mind still played with the possibility that Abel didn’t exist. As for giant cod…
***
As Jamieson and Finn drove away from Big Bay, the inflatable boat came free of the sandbar, and the waves began to toss it out to sea. A dark shape loomed in front of the tiny rubber boat.
The Cape Islander was pounding on the waves, its wide, flat bottom keeping it stable. It moved relentlessly forward toward the tiny craft, bumping on the waves. It kept coming closer, seeming to eat up the sea and the space between itself and Abel’s rubber boat.
***
The pile of sandstone next to the Annaben allowed Hy to climb with ease onto the boat. She went into the cabin and down to the hold. There was Annabelle and Ben’s double bed, the unusual feature that had convinced them to buy the boat. There were their duvet and wool blanket, and Hy grabbed them both. She wrapped herself in the blanket.
A Thermos was lying on its side on the floor of the cabin. She recognized it as Dot’s. She opened it. Steaming hot tea. She sipped it, and the liquid seeped into her and warmed her.
She was still at risk of hypothermia, but Dot must be, too – if she were still alive.
That thought galvanized Hy. Securing the Thermos, she stumbled across the deck, threw the blanket and duvet onto the sand, and climbed out.
Dot lay on her back. Hy approached her and turned her face sideways, set the Thermos down, and covered her with the blanket. Then she touched her, lightly, on the face.
No response.
She put her hand in front of Dot’s nose.
She couldn’t feel a breath.
She unscrewed the cap of the Thermos, poured a tiny bit into it, and held it to Dot’s mouth.
The tea dribbled down onto the sand.
A terrible fear gripped Hy.
Was Dot dead?
And the other question still dogged her.
Where was Abel?
***
The old man had never seen waves this high in these waters. The waves would shove the big craft toward him and then bat it back. Forward. Back. Forward. It spun around as a huge wave launched his boat into the air. He was flying in the little rubber boat. Flying. Arching. And then propelling down to what he imagined would be a bouncy landing on water.
But that’s not what happened.
***
Finn pulled over to the side of the road. He turned off the ignition and opened his door.
“Now we walk,” he said.
“Walk?” Jamieson questioned, as she, too, got out of the vehicle.
“Yup. Only way in, unless you’ve got a boat.” He hauled a rucksack out of the cab and shoved it at Jamieson.
“Here. Put this on.”
Before she could object, he pulled out another for himself.
“Emergency gear. Ian’s well supplied.” He slammed the truck door shut and aimed his flashlight at the terrain ahead, the tall dunes that encircled the coast beyond Big Bay Harbour.
“We’re walking through those?”
The dunes loomed up ahead and seemed to roll on forever – to the horizon and beyond.
“It’s not as bad as it looks.” Finn knew them well. He’d been here before, exploring the strange environmental oddities that seemed to have collected around this region of Red Island. Not like anywhere else. Certainly not like the rest of the island.
***
Hy had dragged Dot under a
n overhang in the cape, drilled out by the waves to form a shallow cave, high enough to sit in. Normally it would not be a safe place – the sandstone so unstable, it could collapse on their heads at any time, especially in a storm. The cave offered little real shelter. But she had to get Dot warm and dry. There was some driftwood in the back, and a lobster trap, in pieces. Hy broke up the wood and laid a fire.
A match.
On the boat? She dashed back, climbed aboard, and found a box of matches in the galley. She also found some flares. She shoved them under her jacket.
Dot was still not moving. Breathing? Hy put her hand in front of Dot’s mouth. Did something stir? She bent over and concentrated. She might be imagining it, but she thought she had felt something. As long as there was breath, even a thin thread of breath…
Hy put a match to the fire, and it burst into flame. It wouldn’t last long. She began to itemize the things aboard the Annaben that might be burned. Wood cabinet doors, railings, the bed frame – all beautifully crafted, a shame to destroy them. It was a matter of life and death. Surely Ben and Annabelle would forgive her for stripping the boat of its beautiful wood fittings.
Hy set off the flares, doubting they would be seen. But they were.
***
“You’re sure we should be doing this?” Jamieson and Finn had begun the trudge to the dunes, looming up ahead of them.
“Pretty sure. Sure enough to try.”
As if on cue, a flare went up. Then another.
“That’s her. That’s bound to be Hy. Come on.”
They picked up the pace.
Thank God, thought Jamieson.
***
Brock Ferguson’s unmistakable voice boomed through Ian’s house. There was the clump of feet crossing the kitchen floor.
“Simmons. You here? Alone?”
No. Not alone. Jasmine was there, snoozing. She’d woken up at the sound of Ferguson’s voice.
“I killed her. Of course. I killed her.” An exact mimic of his booming voice, sounding sleepy.
“Ah. Not alone, I see. Good. Good.”
It didn’t sound good to Ian. Nor to Jasmine.
Ferguson strolled across the room, as if it were a casual visit, but Ian could see the malicious intent in his eyes and the tightness of his body. Ferguson’s eyes darted sideways, aimed at Jasmine and not looking where he was going. He tripped over the footstool beside the couch – the one that held Ian’s pain pills and jug of water.
Cod Only Knows Page 22