Bright Air Part 13

'Why didn't you tell the coroner?'

'Luce asked me to keep it to myself, although I did tell my husband. He was very embarra.s.sed. Asked me to keep quiet about it.'

My head was buzzing, and I had difficulty concentrating on what they were saying.

Anna said, 'Embarra.s.sed about what?'

'His misdiagnosis. And the fact that Luce came to me, not him.'

'I still don't understand.'

Pru took a deep breath. 'd.i.c.k was in love with her. Horribly, grovellingly, embarra.s.singly so. Things were pretty bad between him and me at that stage-we went to Lord Howe originally to patch things up after I'd had a stupid affair. We thought it would bring us back together again, the two of us on an idyllic island, but it turned out to be a very bad idea. By the time Luce came along we couldn't stand the sight of each other. We hadn't slept together for six months. And, of course, he couldn't look at any of the women on the island, not in a place like that-everybody would have known about it within ten minutes. We were just about at breaking point, ready to throw it in and return to the mainland, then this beautiful, intelligent, sympathetic girl stepped off the plane.'

'Morning sickness?' I hissed. 'Are you sure?' I felt like the man who was mugged in the library and had to whisper for help.

Pru turned and looked carefully at me. I understood her caution now.

'She came to see me late in the afternoon of that Thursday, before the party, when she knew d.i.c.k wouldn't be at the hospital. She asked me to test her, so I did. It was positive. She didn't say much more other than to ask me to tell no one.'

'Didn't she say how late her period was?' Anna said.

'No. And I didn't ask about the father. She didn't want to talk.'

'How soon does morning sickness happen, after conception?' I whispered.

'Usually between two and ten weeks.'

'Did your husband ...' For once Anna seemed to have difficulty finis.h.i.+ng a sentence.

'Have s.e.x with her? I honestly don't know. He was certainly badly shaken up when I told him about the positive test. That was a couple of days after the accident, when it was becoming clear that she hadn't survived.'

'Did you ask him?'

'Yes, but he didn't say anything. He just burst into tears. I debated what to do, but in the end I decided I should respect Luce's wishes.'

We sat in silence for a long moment, then Anna said, 'What really happened to Luce, Pru?'

Pru frowned, as if not sure what to make of that. 'What the coroner said, presumably. Why? Do you know something different?'

'We're not sure. Can you think of any other explanation for Luce's disappearance?'

'No, of course not.'

'Was anybody angry with her?'

'What are you getting at? Are you suggesting somebody pushed her? The two boys with her that day?'

'Is that possible? Or somebody else?'

Pru shook her head in disbelief. 'I'm sorry, I haven't the faintest idea. They seemed like nice boys. Have you spoken to them?'

'They're both dead, Pru. They were killed in a climbing accident in New Zealand about a month ago. They left a message, you see, that was ambiguous.'

Pru looked shocked. 'My G.o.d, so many accidents ... I suppose theirs was an accident?'

'As far as we know.' I gave her one of Mary's cards and wrote my mobile number on the back. 'Please give us a ring if you think of anything else.'

Anna said not a word as we tramped back to the car. We got in and I said, 'Leichhardt?' and she just nodded. I said, 'Did you suspect it all along, or was it just a sudden brainwave?'

She looked at me as if I was a bit slow, and turned away. I had a powerful urge to kick her out and drive somewhere quiet and just scream or weep or jump into the ocean. But there'd be time for that. I buckled up and started the engine.

We were in luck. Dr Pa.s.slow had a Sat.u.r.day morning surgery, for the older ragazzi and their dads by the look of it. I asked the receptionist for a piece of paper and an envelope, and wrote a short note for the doctor. 'Would you mind giving him this as soon as you can, please? It is rather urgent.'

After ten minutes he appeared, ushering an old man to the desk. He looked impatient as he took the note, ripped it open, read, and then turned very pale. He scanned around the room until he saw us, then gave a brief jerk of his head for us to follow him to his room.

'What did she tell you?' The muscles of his mouth bunched around the words as if they were sour.

But I'd had enough of being questioned. 'Why don't you just tell us.'

'I had no reason to suspect pregnancy. She didn't hint at the possibility to me. The symptoms were compatible with gastroenteritis, which was going around at the time.'

'Can you estimate how far gone she was?'

'No, I've no idea.'

Anna took over. 'Why did you tell your wife to hide it?'

'For Luce's sake. She'd specifically asked Pru to say nothing.'

'You were in love with Luce, weren't you?'

He dipped his head. 'That's none of your business.'

'Did you try to have s.e.x with her?'

He winced, then said, 'No.' It didn't sound convincing, but it was an ambiguous question. Had he had s.e.x, or had he tried?

I said, 'I've been in touch with the detective who drew up the report for the coroner. Maybe we should tell him about this.'

Pa.s.slow shook his head hopelessly. 'Please don't do that. It has no bearing on anything.'

'How can you be sure?'

'Well, you're the amateur detectives!' he shot back suddenly, switching to bl.u.s.ter. 'Work it out. If anything suspicious happened to Lucy then those two on the cliff with her must have been involved, right? And I don't believe that for an instant. They ... they were good friends. They'd never have hurt her.'

He had picked up something about Curtis and Owen, I thought.

'Look, if you want rea.s.surance, go to the island. Speak to the ranger, Carmel Bisset, or Bob Kelso. They were her friends too. She may have confided in them.'

Anna was reluctant to let it go at that. 'So you still maintain that the last time you saw Luce was at the party on the Thursday evening?'

He nodded sadly. 'I barely saw her there. She was avoiding me, I think. I never saw her again.'

'What about Damien Stokes? Remember him? He complained of having a tummy bug in that last week, too. Did he come to see you?'

'Stokes?'

I described him. 'Black hair, beard, my height, science/law student. He arrived halfway through their month on the island.'

'Oh yes, I remember. Pru took a fancy to him, as I remember.'

'That'd be right,' Anna muttered.

The doctor had got to his feet and was searching through a row of large desk diaries in his bookshelves until he found the year. He turned to late September, scanning the pages. 'Yes, I saw him on the Tuesday, but not because of a stomach upset. He came to see me that evening to dress a sc.r.a.pe on his knee he'd got while climbing with the rest of them that day. Nothing serious.'

'May I?' I asked, and reached for the book in his hand. He released it reluctantly. I checked the pages for that last week. Damien's was the only name from the university group that was mentioned. 'Thanks.'

When we got back into the car, Anna said, 'Pa.s.slow's right. We're going to have to go to the island.'

I felt queasy. 'I think we should consider this a bit more, Anna. I'm not sure it'll do any good going there. In fact it could do a lot of harm.'

'I need you there, Josh.'

'Why?'

'I was never one for solo climbing.'

14.

Nor was I. One of Luce's heroes was an American climber, Lynn Hill, whom she had met once when Lynn visited Australia. Lynn was the first person to free climb, without artificial aids, the Nose route up El Capitan at Yosemite, an almost impossible thousand-metre ascent, in just twenty-three hours, much of it in darkness. Luce had shown me photographs of the epic climb, to me unimaginable. I remembered that as I was poking about in the boxes I'd left with Mary four years before, pulling out my old climbing shoes from one, my helmet and chalk bag from another. They looked worn and tired, someone else's possessions, not mine. How had Luce ever come to love that other person, that other me I could hardly recognise now?

Even my nylon rope looked worn out. I put the stuff down with a flutter of anxiety. I was different in other ways now, out of shape and out of practice, hands soft from office work. I couldn't see myself scaling the cliffs below Mount Gower any more. Not without Luce. But this was for Luce, Anna insisted; one last climb for Luce.

My phone rang. I returned abruptly to the present, recognising Damien's voice.

'Josh, hi. How's it going?'

'Good, thanks. You? Lauren okay?'

'Fighting fit. You been to see my friend yet?'

The merchant banker. I'd forgotten about it. 'Um, no, not yet, Damien. Been a bit tied up. Maybe when I get back.'

'Back?'

'Yes. Anna and I are going away for a short trip. To Lord Howe.'

'What?' I heard his breathing, heavy against the mouthpiece. 'What exactly do you hope to achieve there?'

'I don't know. Talk to some of the locals. Listen, that last week on the island, the week of the accident, you mentioned that you were pretty much out of it in the days after the party, not feeling well.'

'Yes?'

'So you didn't go climbing on the Friday, the day following the party?'

'I ... I can't remember now. Is that what I said? Why are you interested?'

'Just trying to place everybody at the scene.'

'Jesus, Josh, listen to yourself. Who do you think you are, Ed McBain? Where are you going to stay?'

'We booked on the internet. It's one of the Kelsos' cottages.'

'Well ... I really don't see the point, but if it helps you get over this, good luck.'

'Thanks.'

He rang off. I hadn't mentioned our big discovery. The thought of him knowing-of anyone knowing-that Luce had been pregnant when she died just made me feel sick.

I didn't tell Mary either, but I did have to discuss our trip with her. She thought it was a good idea, but I didn't let her see the climbing gear I'd packed. That evening I roamed around the hotel, apprehensively checking the locks and light bulbs, as if I might not be coming back.

15.

Luce had told me something about Lord Howe Island. It was the remains of an ancient volcano, the only island in the Pacific that the Polynesians missed as they hopped across the ocean. When HMS Supply Supply came upon it in 1788, it was one of the last places left on earth on which no human foot had ever trod, a true Eden burgeoning with unique species. The sailors managed to eat a good few of them to extinction as well as introduce some feral predators, and the arrival of the black rat, came upon it in 1788, it was one of the last places left on earth on which no human foot had ever trod, a true Eden burgeoning with unique species. The sailors managed to eat a good few of them to extinction as well as introduce some feral predators, and the arrival of the black rat, Rattus rattus Rattus rattus, from a grounded s.h.i.+p later didn't help, but still, a great deal of its natural state had survived and was now being nurtured and restored.

For my benefit, hoping to tickle my interest, Luce spoke of the island's economic history too; of how the early settlers survived by selling fresh meat and vegetables to pa.s.sing American whaling s.h.i.+ps; of how they were almost wiped out by the collapse of the whaling industry in the 1870s, and were saved by the discovery of the kentia palm, uniquely adapted to a cooler climate and so ideally suited to the Victorian drawing rooms of the northern hemisphere; of how the black rat took a fancy to kentia seeds as well as everything else, and had to be hunted on a bounty system, a rat's tail being worth one penny in 1920, rising to sixpence by 1928.

She tried hard, but I was determined not to be interested. I was going to London. What could I possibly want with a place whose whole history could be told in a couple of paragraphs? Now, belatedly, I was on my way.

We met up at Central and took the train together out to the airport. I thought Anna looked younger, with her backpack and holiday gear, and there was a blush of colour in her cheeks. I still had that hollow apprehensive feeling in my stomach you get before a journey or a climb, and we talked with a forced cheerfulness. Neither of us referred to Pru Pa.s.slow's revelation.

An hour out from Sydney, as I watched the shadows of puffy clouds glide across the rippled surface of the ocean far below the little plane, I told her I bet I could guess what she was thinking.

'Oh yes?'

'Islands,' I said. 'In books. Robinson Crusoe Robinson Crusoe, Treasure Island Treasure Island, The Lord of the Flies The Lord of the Flies ...' ...'