Poison Bay (30 page)

In the morning, the windstorm had died of exhaustion, and the sun was presiding in full optimism. The previous night’s agonizing conversation round the campfire had receded. They had confronted the unthinkable, and survived. As he and Callie packed their tent, the mood was lighter than it had been for days.
 

“I have this feeling that we’re within reach of the lake,” Callie said. “I really hope it’s true.”

“Me too. And I hope this pass turns out to be manageable.”
Please God, take us toward the lake today. We can’t possibly turn around and go back into the valley of the shadow of death.
The image of the bodies of the two friends that lay below crept into his mind, but he flicked it away.

They’d formulated a plan for Callie and Erica to take turns monitoring Rachel. With the last of her glucose testing equipment used the night before, they had no scientific way to measure her blood sugar. So they would give her a sliver of energy bar each hour to supplement the ferns she nibbled constantly, and watch for the early warning signs of a hypo. Now that she was out of glucose tablets, with all the exercise they were doing low blood sugar was her biggest danger.

The women stood back and waited for Jack to lead off, a development that took him by surprise, and made him feel needed. Manly, even. He didn’t know if they were doing it on purpose, and he didn’t care.
 

The far side of the mountain did not turn out to be the sheer cliff he’d secretly feared. There were several false starts, as they found themselves up against obstacles, and then they were confronted by two possible paths—two different valleys. Jack felt drawn to one of them, but it wasn’t something he could explain to the women. “I know this way looks harder,” he said, “but I truly believe it’s where we need to go.” He waited for a discussion, but Rachel and Erica had become passive, and Callie said, “I trust you. Lead on!”

Half an hour’s awkward scrambling through a boulder field led them to a steep but doable slope. A couple of sidles along ledges, but none with perilous drops. Some alpine vegetation, some rocky sections. Not too much cloying mud, thanks to last night’s drying wind. Visibility was good, so they could see ahead, and modify their route when a barrier was approaching.
 

They zigged and zagged their way down, for an hour, and another hour, and then the slope moderated, so they could push ahead in a more direct manner. Through ferny tangles and past waterfalls that were beautiful rather than roaring monsters, now that the rain was gone. Across streams only ankle deep in this weather, steadying each other on moss-covered rocks.
 

A month ago, they’d each have thought today’s hike an endurance test. After the experiences of the past three weeks, it seemed as civilized as a city footpath.

By common consent, instead of stopping, they snatched fern tips as they went past, snacking on the go. For an hour and another hour. And then another hour. They were making amazing time.

Around midday, they came upon a clearing along the side of the valley’s river, a stony beach jutting out into the crystal flow. So they stopped and lit a fire, and cooked more ferns. Opposite, cliffs rose sheer from the river, and their mirrored image fell back into the water at the opposite angle. Jack saw the glimmer of fish, and wondered what he might or might not be able to do with Adam’s knife and a stick.

With the twists and turns of the long valley, he could no longer even see the peak above last night’s campsite. He could pretend the horrors they’d left behind there had never existed.

***

A mountain parrot landed on a high ledge, and poked around the large bundle that lay there. Orange plastic, very bright. He was curious, persistent, but ultimately unsatisfied. The big green canvas thing alongside it looked more promising. He tugged at the straps, pulled at flaps, looked for a zipper—they were fun! But there wasn’t one on this so he kept pecking until he was through the canvas, and started pulling through the hole the treasures that lay within. Much to play with, but nothing to eat.
 

And then he spied, wedged under the canvas thing, another item, a plastic capsule. Small and light. Brightly colored. He pecked at it hesitantly, probed it with his tongue. He picked it up in the claws of one foot, but as he launched from the ledge into the sky, a strap dangling from the object snagged on a rock and jolted it from his grip.

His lost prize spiraled down and down into the valley below, fluttering fluoro yellow for one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine seconds. It hit a boulder with such force that it instantly snapped the pin obstructing its activating mechanism, a pin so carefully inserted many weeks ago by a saboteur with dreadlocks.

And it skittered and banged and came to rest wedged among rocks, its radio signal winking into life, its strobe lights flashing and flashing and flashing at the big empty sky so far above.

***

It wasn’t that she saw water. The terrain here didn’t allow for that. But what she did see was a widening of the sky to the east. For days, they’d seen nothing but mountains in every direction, lurking in groups, jostling for a better look at the Lost. Crowding around, obstructing their view, tripping them up at every opportunity. But now, pausing on the brow of a hill as she brought up the rear, Callie could see a gap ahead, narrow but definite. An absence of mountains.

It had to be the lake.

“Hey, you guys!” she called. The three ahead of her stopped concentrating on their feet and turned back to look at her. “It’s more open down there.”

They peered towards the east, and Erica clambered onto a rock for a better view. “It has to be the lake, surely?”

“I think so. I hope so. I hope this wilderness isn’t going to throw us another curveball—a swamp or an impassable river, or one of those smaller lakes you need a boat for, like we had the very first day.”

“The only way to find out is to go and see,” Erica said.

“How long do we want to push on?” Jack said. “We’ve got maybe three more hours of daylight left, and we’ve been walking a long, long time today. We don’t want to be making camp in the dark if we can help it.”

Callie looked at Rachel for her opinion, and saw her massaging her temples with fingers that betrayed the telltale tremor.

“Rachel, sit down.” She fished in her pocket for the energy bar, broke off a chunk and gave it to her friend. Everyone found a place to perch, and took a rest break.
Please God, whoever you are, don’t let my best friend die,
thought Callie
.

After a few minutes, Rachel seemed more settled. “I really want to keep moving,” she said. “If we can possibly get to the lake today, I want to go for it.”
 

“You’d better hang on to my pack all the time now,” Jack said. “And we can carry you if we have to. I mean it. We have to make those carbs last as long as we can.” He turned to Erica. “How are the knees?”

She shrugged. “Like pumpkins. I’m sure they’ll feel brand new though, if we get to the lake. I say we go for it too, while ever there’s light. And even afterwards. We’ve still got some battery power in our headlamps.”

He looked at Callie, and raised one eyebrow in question.

She nodded. “Yep. Let’s do it. Onwards and upwards. Or downwards, as the case may be.”

“Onwards and downwards!”

He turned and plunged back into the rainforest, Rachel’s weight dragging down on his pack. Erica followed, and Callie slotted into her place at the back.

51

“No survivors?” barked Peter into the radio. Fury rippled along his arteries and he wondered if he might actually have a stroke. When the call came through from Wellington that a Personal Locator Beacon registered to Bryan Smithton had been activated, hope had surged through the search room. Even though his very next thought had been:
If they’ve got a PLB, why the hell didn’t they activate it a week ago?
It had taken only four hours from the first appearance of the signal to the search team’s arrival on the spot. You just couldn’t do it any faster than that. And whoever had activated the thing hadn’t stuck around to wait for the rescuers they’d summoned. Just an orange body bag on a ledge. There were precious few hours of daylight left, and so much wilderness to search. He swore in technicolor, but kept it clean when he turned on the radio again. “Do the retrieval, while the other crew starts to search a radius. We’ll get another fixed-wing over there. Keep me posted.”

“Ellen!”

Peter wheeled around in time to see Amber putting a chair under Ellen’s backside to stop it sliding to the floor. He swore again, and strode across the room—just a couple of steps for a man of his height. “What’s the matter, Ellen? Have you eaten today?” His voice was harsh, a combination of frustration with the missing trampers who’d shot through when they should have stayed put, and regret that he’d ever allowed Ellen into the search room now that things were hotting up and it was so hard to ask her to leave. Amber, in the middle of getting Ellen to put her head between her knees, shot him a reproachful look. It didn’t work.
 

“This isn’t a romance novel. If you’re going to be swooning all over the place, you’d better wait back at the hotel. I need my staff to be doing their jobs. We’re stretched to the limit.” The next look from Amber had moved well beyond reproach to sheer poison.

But the rebuke seemed to have a reviving effect on Ellen, a bit like the smelling salts of old, and she sat up and gathered her wits, her spine long and straight. “So, is she dead?” Her voice was carefully controlled.

“I don’t know.”

“But I just heard you say there were no survivors.”

“Oh.” He lost a little momentum, suddenly on the back foot. Perhaps not so unreasonable for a woman to faint if she thought she’d just heard that her daughter was dead. “That’s not what that meant. They haven’t found six bodies in a row.” He didn’t mention that they had found what appeared to be one body—it wasn’t helpful, especially when he didn’t even know if it was male or female yet. “But whoever activated the beacon didn’t stick around. That’s what I meant by no survivors. Whatever survivors there may be, they have not stayed with the beacon.”

There was a pause. “So is it possible that she is still alive?”

“With what I know at present, it’s possible. I can’t guarantee it though.”

“Possible is enough for me right now.” She paused again. “So you’re probably pretty cranky with them for not staying with the beacon.” There was just the slightest challenge in her eyes. Gotcha, it said, or something similar. You’re angry with them, and you took it out on me.

He conceded to the challenge with the merest twitch of the corners of his mouth. “That would be a reasonable assumption.”

She stood, a fluid and elegant movement, and reached for her shoulder bag slung over the back of a chair. “If I’m at the hotel, is there any way for me to know how things are progressing? Could I phone here, or would that be too disruptive?” She was all business now, professional, respectful. Leaving the awkward moment behind them, ignoring it, not rubbing his nose in it. A seriously classy woman, and way out of his league, by anyone’s measure.

“We’ll contact you the moment we have news of Rachel.”

“Thank you.” She turned and left quietly, her posture dignified but not stiff.

Amber shot him another glance, this one loaded with razor blades, and returned to her post.

Peter watched the assistant’s prickly back for about a second, and then followed Ellen down the corridor and out onto the street.

“Ellen!” She turned and waited politely for him to reach her. She didn’t remove her sunglasses.

“Listen, Ellen, I’m sorry that I was rude to you just now. You’re right that I was reacting to other stresses when I spoke to you in that manner. I apologize.” He didn’t believe in beating about the bush when it came to apologies.

“Thank you Peter. I did feel insulted by your attitude”—she didn’t pull punches either—”but I’m not going to take it to heart in such a circumstance. It also gave me some clarity about how things have changed in the past couple of hours. I don’t belong in there this evening. My presence there is no longer helpful, even to me. Things are extremely intense now, and you all need to be able to speak quickly and without restraint.”

“Thank you for understanding that.”

She did take her sunglasses off then, and looked intently into his eyes. “Peter, I have a natural desire for reassurance and hope—any mother would. But anyone can do that for me—someone down the coffee shop, for instance.” She waved her hand down the street in that general direction, but kept looking at him. “What I need above all things from you right now is for you to do your job. I have enormous confidence in your ability to do so. It is my daughter’s very best chance for survival.” She smiled slightly, and nodded once. “Go with God.”

52

In the fading light, Jack couldn’t be sure, but it looked like a roof. A man-made structure. Was he just hoping for a roof? Growing delirious with the stress of it all?

The last break had stretched from five minutes into twenty-five, when he saw more fish in the river, quite a group of them clustered in a shallow stretch. The spear fashioned from Adam’s hunting knife, duct-taped to the end of a sturdy stick, had proven effective not just once but three times. Dinner was now dangling from the back of Erica’s pack, swaying silver in the evening light. He felt like a proud caveman.

When Rachel started to show warning signs of another hypo an hour later, he worried that the delay for the fish had been a huge mistake. It had cost them half an energy bar to bring it under control.
 

He was still fretting about it now, as he labored over a slimy boulder, hanging moss slapping at his face. Rachel was strapped by the shoulders to the harness of his rucksack, Callie and Erica supporting one of her legs each. She had objected to being carried, but they had insisted. They had to stop her burning energy so fast.
 

Callie was somehow also managing the weight of Rachel’s rucksack clipped to her front, and he could hear the ragged breathing of the others even over the pounding and roaring in his own head.