by Jean Harrod
She stared at it. The brass key! She tip-toed over to the sofa and pulled the key out of her handbag. She glanced over at Tom, but he was still asleep. Excited, she went back to the globe, lifted the hurricane lamp and inserted the key into the lock. It clicked, and a small panel opened. Inside, lay what looked like a notebook. She lifted it out and went over to the Governor’s desk. Standing the hurricane lamp on it, she sat down and opened the book.
On the first page, the name Clement Pearson was written in ink, in the top right hand corner. The writing was small and neat. She flicked through pages and pages of entries, all recorded in date sequence, and in the same neat handwriting.
Clement’s journal!
She went back to the first page and began reading. Once she got going, she was so engrossed she just kept turning the pages. Occasionally the text was so painful, she stopped to rub her eyes with fatigue. Her emotions ranged from disbelief, to sadness, to shame… until she finally came to the last entry.
Monday 3 August
I lied under oath today. I told those British officials exactly what they wanted to hear because I knew they were not ready for the truth. Am I fooling myself as well as everyone else? Am I afraid to tell the truth? No, I am ashamed to tell the truth. The British are proud of their great democracy. They lecture everyone about human rights and good governance. Would they have believed me if I had told them that those two Haitian sloops were deliberately lured onto the reef, and their occupants allowed to drown? It is so wicked I can hardly believe it myself.
What can we do? Those people won’t stop coming. There are eight million of them, and only 50,000 of us. Every time we send them home, they come back again. Don’t they understand we are in a fight for our own survival? They will destroy us, and our way of life. We are so worn down by the flow of migrants that we are losing our compassion. We are fighting for our homeland, and to keep our communities as they are.
What happened to that first sloop was supposed to send a message to others not to try the perilous journey. That’s what he said – just once. But it was so easy, he did it a second time. Now, I know he must be stopped, or more and more people will die.
Already that evil has led to a new evil. When I walked out of the hearing today I knew I could not stand by and watch those children suffer any more. I am going to confront the Governor. He must stop all this. He is the only one who can. After that, I know what I have to do. I simply cannot bear the burden of this guilt any longer.
Dear God, please take care of my darling wife when I am gone, and forgive my own wretched soul.
Jess closed the journal. Clement’s words cut through her like a knife. Dear God! Could something like that really happen? Could people deliberately scupper boats and let the occupants drown because they can’t cope with a never ending flow of migrants?
She shivered as the wind wailed around the house, moaning and sighing like a wounded animal.
She re-read Clement’s final entry. That evil has led to a new evil… I knew I could not stand by and watch those children suffer any more. What did he mean by that, she wondered? She thought of voodoo and human sacrifice. No, that can’t be happening, she told herself.
She looked over at Tom, who was now wide awake and watching her.
He yawned. “You’ve been reading that for ages.”
“It’s Clement Pearson’s journal. I found it hidden in the world globe over there. There’s a secret compartment in the bottom. The little brass key opened it up.”
“Really?” He jumped up and went over to have a look. “Ingenious,” he said, as he peered inside. “Who would have thought of looking there?” He turned back to her. “So what’s in the journal? Bad news by the look of you.”
“Here. Take a look for yourself.” She got up. “You only need to read the last entry.”
He sat down, adjusted the hurricane lamp and started to read. When he’d finished he looked up and frowned. “This’ll cause a stink.”
Tom was the master of understatement, she thought.
“What I don’t understand is why the Governor would have Clement’s journal? And why would he hide it in his study in his Residence?” he asked.
“Hm. Sally said the two of them had a row in the Governor’s office after Clement gave evidence to the Inquiry. That was on August 3, the same day as Clement wrote his last entry. That’s when Clement must have had it out with him.”
Tom nodded.
“Perhaps Clement brought this journal to the meeting as evidence,” she went on, “and left it with the Governor for safekeeping.”
“But that suggests Clement didn’t know the Governor was involved in any wrongdoing. Or he wouldn’t have given it to him.”
“Not necessarily. Clement uses the word confront in his last entry, as if he knew, or suspected, the Governor was guilty of something.”
Tom got up and started pacing around.
Jess could see his detective’s mind sifting through all the information.
“Maybe the Governor was guilty of the same thing as Clement?” he reasoned. “Maybe he was thinking it would just be one sloop. Or maybe he thought the first sloop to go down really was an accident. But when it happened a second time, the Governor realised it was deliberate and confronted whoever the he is that Clement refers to – but doesn’t dare name – in his journal.”
“And that man, who seems to be the instigator of all this, must have persuaded the Governor not to tell the truth, perhaps by promising it would never happen again.”
Tom glanced at her. “Or by money changing hands?”
“We’ll soon know the answer to that. London are looking into the Governor’s bank accounts.” She sighed. “Still, whatever the Governor said that afternoon gave Clement the confidence to hand over his journal.”
“And, in return, the Governor handed him a duplicate key for the secret compartment in the globe. So Clement knew where it was hidden.”
“You know what I think, Tom.” Her mind was whirling. “I think they had some kind of pact. The Governor must have convinced Clement he was going to put things right by confessing. That letter to his wife sort of confirms it.”
Tom nodded. “It would make sense.”
“The Governor probably couldn’t live with himself, any more than Clement could.” She frowned. “But what’s this new evil Clement talks about?”
He shrugged and flopped back down in the comfy chair.
She picked up the journal and went back to the globe. “Let’s put this safely back in its hiding place for the time being.” She locked the secret compartment and slipped the key into her bag. “Have you still got the other key?”
He nodded.
“What’s the time?” she asked.
Tom looked at his watch. “4.30. Soon be light.”
“Thank goodness.” She went back to the sofa and sat down.
“Why does everything always come back to children?” he asked, quietly. “Sally keeps talking about voodoo ceremonies and sacrifices. I saw Alvita give Maggie a child. Then we find that nursery in the attic, and bottles of sedatives to knock kids out. Now Clement talks about ‘watching’ children suffer in his journal.” He glanced over. “Doesn’t look good for Maggie, Jess.”
“I know, but I refuse to believe Maggie would ever harm a child. And I think she’s been murdered because of it.”
Suddenly there was a violent gust of wind, followed by the sound of shattering glass.
“The kitchen!” Tom grabbed the hurricane lamp and ran out.
Jess followed.
The back door had blown open. The glass, in the small, top section of the door, lay shattered on the kitchen floor. The wind howled through the doorway, straight off the sea, almost knocking Jess off her feet.
Tom ran over and wrestled the door closed. He turned the key in the lock and threw the top and bottom bolts. Pulling the kitchen table over, he jammed it against the door. “I should have bolted it when I came in.”
“What about that window?” Sh
e had to shout above the noise of the wind whistling through the window with no glass.
“Can’t do anything about that now. We’ll have to wait until the wind dies down.”
That’s when Jess felt water under her feet. She stared at the door. Water was seeping underneath. “It’s the sea… coming into the house.”
“Right.” He took her arm. “We’ll sit it out upstairs!”
38
When Jess woke again in an upstairs bedroom, she could feel a dull ache in her back. She moved forward in the armchair and stretched to relieve it. That’s when she heard the silence. No wind. No rain. No rattling shutters. She looked over to where Tom had been sleeping. He’d gone.
Hearing a car engine start up, she jumped out of the chair, and went out onto the landing. “Tom?” she called. No reply.
She looked over the bannister. No water on the stairs. She ran down and stopped on the bottom stair. The hall floor was covered in wet sand and sludge. The watermark on the wall suggested about a foot of water had come into the house and receded again, probably with the tide. She squelched barefoot along the hall and into the kitchen, where the back door stood wide open. Leaves and sand had been forced through the door’s shattered glass window by the wind, and strewn everywhere. The same mucky residue as in the hall covered the floor, but everything else looked intact.
She stood in the doorway and looked out. Everything looked calm under a blue sky. What a relief! Were they in the eye of the storm? Or had the hurricane passed over? Taking a deep breath of cool, morning air, she stepped outside.
The retreating sea had dumped a pile of seaweed and other rubbish outside the door, and over the courtyard paving stones. Fortunately, Tom and the gardeners had stored the furniture inside the Residence garage. She could see it was still standing. “Tom?” she called again, as she headed for the garden. Two of the squat palm trees were down, their fronds littering the muddy grass, along with leaves, seaweed and driftwood. The sea hadn’t retreated far though. She looked at it nervously. Only a thin stretch of beach separated them. One large wave could sweep them both away.
“Over here, Jess!” Tom waved and disappeared round the side of the house again.
When she caught up with him, he was about to start hammering nails into one of the hurricane shutters that hung off a downstairs window. He looked happy to be outside and busy after being cooped up all night.
“If this is the eye of the storm,” he said, “we need to get this repaired before it starts up again.”
“I thought I heard a car.”
“You did, but it was only me checking to see if ours was okay in the garage.” He smiled. “The sea came up right over its wheels, but the engine seems fine. I found this box of tools on one of the shelves. Thought I’d start on some repairs.”
Jess nodded. Tom was such a reassuring presence. It would have been a nightmare in the house on her own last night. “I need to report Maggie’s murder to the police,” she said, “and find Sally.”
He looked at her. “Not sure if the road to the police station will be passable.”
“What time is it?”
He looked at his watch. “9.30.”
“How long have you been out here?”
“Fifteen minutes or so.” He paused. “It was totally calm when I woke up. Do you think we’re in the eye of the storm?”
She looked up at the sky. “Impossible to tell, but I want to go up to the Disaster Management Centre in case the storm starts up again. I’m not spending another night next to that raging sea.”
“Maybe the hurricane’s passed through?” He sounded unconvinced. “The house has stood up well, so far.”
“It’s survived hurricanes for decades.” She studied his drawn face. “You look like you could do with some caffeine.”
“Coffee would be great.”
“I’ll go and see if the cooker’s working. I’ll make us some eggs if it is, in case we get nothing else today. We’ll have to be really quick though.” She left him repairing the hurricane shutter and went back into the kitchen. She flicked on the light switch. Still no electricity. In the hallway she picked up the phone. Dead. She looked down at her mucky feet and went back into the kitchen. She didn’t have time to clean the floors. There wouldn’t be much point anyway if the sea came back in. When she turned on the tap, sludgy brown water came out. She’d have to use the water stored in the pans.
The Calor gas tank stood in a tall compartment below the hob, next to the oven. Balanced on a thick block of wood on the floor, it was tall enough for the water not to have reached the top valve that connected to the cooker hose. Brushing the damp sand off the hobs, she braced herself and switched one on. It lit immediately. She rushed around making eggs and coffee.
*
Tom put their bags, with a few things packed, in the boot of the car in case they couldn’t get back to the Residence later.
“I think we should check on Maggie before we go?” Jess said.
He looked at her.
“I just want to know if she’s… she’s at peace up there.”
“We’ll be back in ten minutes, if we can’t get along the road.”
“Please, Tom.”
“Okay. I’ll go.”
Jess waited at the front door with a heavy heart as he ran up the stairs to the attic. This house was so isolated, it felt like they were the only two people left on the island. Had everyone else come through the storm as well as they had? She looked along the drive, remembering her arrival. Only five days ago, yet it seemed an age. How stunning everything had looked that day, compared to the muddy mess now. She remembered walking along the verandah round to the back of the house, where she’d first met Maggie. Tears welled up in her eyes.
Tom came running down the stairs. “She’s lying peacefully up there,” he said. “In the house she loves.”
Jess nodded. “Thanks, Tom.”
“Right, come on.” He jumped into the driver’s seat. “I’ll drive slowly. The road will probably be littered with stuff.”
Jess sat quietly in the passenger seat as he started up the engine and drove off.
At the Governor’s Office, he put his foot on the brakes. “Want me to have a quick look round the building to see if everything’s all right?”
“Please.”
Leaving the engine running, with the gear in park, he jumped out.
Jess got out too and turned back to look up at the Residence attic windows. There’d never been anything but warmth and humanity in Maggie’s eyes. There was no way she could harm children. No way.
Tom shouted over. “No damage on the outside that I can see.”
She turned back and nodded.
“The hurricane shutters have protected all the windows,” he went on. “Don’t know about the state of the roof though.”
“At least it’s still on,” she said, drily.
He smiled as they got back in the car. It was slow going driving towards town. Tom drove carefully over or round debris, sometimes getting out to drag large branches, or the odd piece of corrugated iron roofing, to the side of the road. He looked at her as they heard something scratch the side of the car.
“The paintwork’s the least of our worries,” she said.
Large pools of water lay undrained on the main road into town. Tom took each one slowly, worried the car wouldn’t come out the other side. But he kept going. Outside town, people were repairing torn hurricane shutters and collecting up any debris the wind could hurl at their houses again. “We must be in the eye of the storm,” Jess said, flatly. “Or they wouldn’t be repairing things so quickly.”
“Yep.” Tom was concentrating on the road.
“Wonder how much longer we’ve got,” she mused. The sky was hazy, with no dark clouds on the horizon, yet.
As they got to the stretch of road that ran alongside the beach, the sea looked grey, rather than the usual aquamarine. The storm had churned up the seabed, leaving it cloudy and murky. Even in this calm spell, w
ater lapped almost up to the road. Last night at the height of the storm, it would have been flooded and impassable.
Tom drove through the open gates of the police station, and parked next to a solitary police car. “Looks like someone’s here, at least.”
“What’s the time?” she asked.
“10.35.”
Inside, the floor was covered in the same mucky residue as in the Residence. Jess was glad she’d put on her trainers as she squelched up to the reception.
A young constable looked up from behind the desk. “Morning, Miss Turner.”
Jess was quite sure she hadn’t met him before, but everyone seemed to know who she was. “Is the Police Commissioner here?” she asked.
The young man shook his head. “He’s out assessing the damage.”
She nodded. “Have there been any fatalities or serious injuries?”
He nodded. “One man killed, so far. Some corrugated iron roofing smashed through his car windscreen. And two young boys are missing, possibly drowned. That’s all we’ve heard about so far, but there’s a lot of structural damage to houses and buildings.”
“What about the Haitian settlement?”
“Flattened.”
She sighed. “When do you expect the Police Commissioner back? I need to talk to him urgently.”
The young man shrugged. “Can I help you?”
She hesitated. She didn’t really want to tell him about Maggie, but she had no choice. “There’s been another murder, at the Residence,” she said, calmly, “the housekeeper.”
The young man stared at her. “Maggie?”
She nodded.
“Wait there! I’ll get the sergeant.” He almost ran down the slippery corridor.
Jess turned to Tom. “This is going to be a shock for everyone.”
“Tom!” A deep voice boomed from the corridor.
Tom turned. “Hi Chuck.” He looked relieved to see his contact again. “Have you two met?” he asked, looking from Jess to Chuck.
She went up to Chuck and held out her hand. “Jessica Turner.”