Ember Island (30 page)

“Greek! Hurrah!” Nell reached for a book and was soon scratching away on her paper. Tilly sat by, eyes turned towards the window, suppressing the smile that tried to force its way onto her lips.
Somebody dear to me. Somebody dear to me.
Just for now, she put all the attendant worries and doubts out of her mind and basked in the warmth of that simple thought: she was dear to him, she was dear to Sterling.

“There!” Nell proclaimed, sliding a sheet of Greek exercises under Tilly’s nose.

The letters swam. She tried hard to focus.
I take the torch from
my father. I give the torch to my brother. It is my mother’s torch. I take my mother’s torch from my father and give it to my brother.
“This all looks right,” she said. “Good work.”

“Too easy.”

It is my mother’s torch
. How would Nell feel if she knew that Sterling had been speaking of Tilly, that Tilly was the “somebody dear”? Would she love the idea? Or was it too soon after her own mother’s death? “Do you ever miss your mother, Nell?” she asked.

Nell cocked her head. “What a question. Where did that come from?”

“We’ve never spoken about it.”

Nell pondered for a moment, her lips tightly drawn. Then she said, “I think about her every day and when I think about her I feel hollow somehow. As if a piece has been taken out of me that I can’t get back. I suppose that is missing her. But then I remember feeling like that sometimes even when she was alive. Even before she got sick. She was often busy and that meant she got impatient with me or told me to go away and leave her be. I’d get the hollow feeling then, too. What about you? Do you miss your mother?”

“I . . . I don’t even remember her. She died when I was four.”

“Then I suppose I am lucky. I remember my mother well enough to miss her.”

Tilly felt no clearer, but then perhaps she was preempting a problem that would never arise. Nell may have misheard, perhaps he didn’t say “dear to me” at all. Nonetheless, she made a little vow to herself that she would seek Sterling out that evening and boldly insist that they reinstate their evening ritual.

It was in the early afternoon, while Tilly watched Nell stitch to the metronome, that the door burst open and Sterling himself stood there.

Tilly smiled up at him, but he didn’t even notice her. “Nell,”
he said urgently. “We need to go to our emergency plan number three. Please explain everything to Tilly. I haven’t time.”

And then, just as suddenly, he was gone.

Nell had gone pale.

“What was that about?” Tilly asked.

“Papa and I, we have a set of emergency plans, for various things. Fires, storms, and so on.”

“So what is plan number three?”

“We have to lock all of the doors and windows,” Nell said. “A prisoner has escaped.”

T
he island looked different today. Through the glass—for they were forbidden from opening the windows, despite the cloying heat—Tilly could see out across the fields. No white uniforms moving about. Instead, only blue uniforms, dozens of them, combing every dip and hollow. The two tall watchtowers were manned and a warder with a rifle paced the verandah of their house. The world was strangely quiet up here on the escarpment, without the constant footsteps of people coming to see Sterling in his office. Nor was Hettie in the garden: she was locked down, like every other prisoner.

Well, every other prisoner but one.

Nell came up behind her. “You oughtn’t worry, you know.”

Tilly turned. Their schoolbooks lay forgotten on the table. There was far too much excitement to work. “Then why are we locked in?”

“It’s just a precaution. We’ve had escapees before. Trust me, they are trying to get away from the turnkeys, not closer to them.
They never come up here. They head for the mangrove forest. That’s where most of them get caught.”

Tilly raised an eyebrow. “Most of them?”

“The ones that don’t die,” Nell said, in a matter-of-fact tone.

Tilly glanced back at the window. “It is strange,” she said. “We are up here so far from it all. Down there, all must be very tense.”

“Yes, and Papa will be running himself ragged. He needn’t be down there, you know. He need only give orders then sit back with a pipe.” She mimed a man smoking a pipe with a smirk on his face.

Tilly had to laugh. “Your father doesn’t smoke a pipe.”

“Yes, but he could, you see. He could be one of those men who sits back and smokes a pipe, but he’s not. He’s something quite different. Whenever there’s an escape, he hopes to be there when they catch the prisoner. Because he knows . . . what goes on when the turnkeys catch one. They can be cruel.”

“And how do you know ‘what goes on’?”

“People shouldn’t say things quite so loud if they don’t want me to hear,” Nell said with a defiant tilt of her lips.

Tilly reached out and stroked Nell’s curls. “Your father would be appalled. If you hear too much of this grisly stuff, Nell, you will become hard.”

“And so what if I do?”

“Then . . .” Tilly couldn’t answer. The first words in her brain were, “Then you’ll never find a husband.” It was the kind of thing her grandfather had said to her, to encourage her to regulate her behavior. But saying it to Nell seemed all wrong. So what if she never found a husband? With her brain and her strength of character, she would probably get on fine. Perhaps Tilly would have too, if she’d been given a chance. Here she was, working and earning a living without the benefit of inheritances and fancy country
houses. In fact, she preferred to be busy with work than to be idle and produce an endless parade of embroidered cushions or watercolor paintings.

“I would rather that you enjoyed the innocence of childhood a little longer,” Tilly said instead. “Because the adult world comes rushing upon one so quickly and so unrelentingly. There is time enough to be horrified when you are grown.”

“Pish,” Nell said. “I’ll be thirteen this year. Juliet was married to Romeo at thirteen.”

“I think you’ll agree that didn’t end so well.”

Nell laughed, dancing away from the window and back to the table. “Come on, Tilly. Let’s pass the time this afternoon by me reading you my new epic. It’s almost the same as schoolwork. I think you’ll agree that I’ve used the word ‘crepuscular’ very well in a sentence, and thus demonstrated both my knowledge of twilight animals
and
extended metaphors.”

Tilly took comfort in Nell’s complete lack of concern about the situation. She listened as Nell read, impressed as always by the girl’s imagination and grasp of idiom and tried to forget about the escapee, and the strange empty feeling of the day.

They didn’t see Sterling at dinner. The staff retreated back to the eastern wing of the house, eager to lock themselves in their rooms. Nell and Tilly went to their bedrooms early.

Tilly stood by the window a little while. Lanterns bobbed up and down between rows of sugarcane and she imagined others would be glimmering dimly far out in the mangroves. She longed to open the window and let the cool evening air in, but dared not. Imaginings of a creeping murderer tormented her. Instead, she lay down on top of her covers and tried to sleep, with no success.

She heard Sterling come in, very late, and rose to greet him in the hallway by lamplight.

“Sterling?”

He glanced up. He was muddy and sweaty and looked exhausted. “Why are you up so late, Tilly?”

“It’s so hot and I’ve . . . I’ve been worried.”

He shook his head. “You’re not to worry. We found a raft down in the mangrove forest. Old branches and driftwood bound together with rotting string and vines. We’re concentrating our search down there. That’s where he’ll be. A long way from here.”

“What did he do, Sterling? I mean, what was the crime that had him sent here?”

“I won’t talk about it, Tilly, save to reassure you he wasn’t a murderer.” He ran a hand through his hair, leaving some of it sticking up at a strange angle. “I’m going to try for a few hours’ sleep and get back down there at dawn. I’m sorry. I can’t stop to talk.”

“Yes, of course. Don’t let me hold you up.”

Tilly watched as he walked down the corridor to his bedroom. The door closed. She tried to take comfort knowing he was nearby, that the criminal was down in the mangroves, that he wasn’t a murderer. She returned to her bed and slept fitfully.

Some time, much later, she woke in the dark with her skin prickling. What had woken her?

She listened into the gloom, tense but not certain why. Then heard it again. A sound on the roof. Not the rough skitter of the possums that sometimes woke her. Creeping footsteps.

Tilly sat up, her pulse so hard in her ears she couldn’t hear. She forced her blood to be still, and listened.

One footstep . . . another . . . a pause. Then again . . . trying not to be heard on the roof.

Tilly threw back the covers, jumped to her feet, hastily donned her dressing gown, wrenched open the door, and raced
light-footed to Sterling’s bedroom in the dark. She stopped herself before she knocked: if she could hear footsteps, then the person on the roof would hear knocking. Instead, she tried the door and found it unlocked.

Sterling lay, half dressed, asleep diagonally across his bed. No doubt the long hours in the fields and mangroves today had taken their toll. He slept like the dead.

Tilly reached for his bare shoulder and shook it lightly. He stirred, blinked open his eyes, startled when he saw her.

She held a finger over her lips, and pointed at the ceiling. His eyes went upwards and together they waited.

And there they were again, the footsteps. Sterling bolted upright, every muscle in his strong chest tensed. He stood, pulled Tilly close. For a brief, almost unbearable moment, her breasts were smashed against his chest through her thin dressing gown.

“Go to Nell,” he whispered in her ear. His hot breath tickled her. “Bar the door. Don’t move.”

Then he released her and rushed off, leaving her reeling with desire and fear. She hurried to Nell’s room, opened the door, and slid onto the bed next to her, her hand clamped gently over Nell’s mouth.

Nell’s eyes flew open. Tilly motioned that she should be quiet and uncovered her mouth. She lay down so her lips were against Nell’s ear and said, “There’s a man on the roof.”

“The prisoner?”

“I don’t know. Your father’s gone to investigate.”

“But they thought he was in the mangroves. Are there any warders outside? What if he attacks Papa?” she said in a desperate whisper.

Tilly held up a cautionary index finger. “We need to be calm. Stay in bed. I’m going to bar the door.”

Nell ignored her, grabbed Pangur Ban from the side table, and followed Tilly to the door. Together, they lifted the writing desk and moved it across the door. Nell dropped her end and it thudded against the floorboards. They both froze. Tilly’s heart ticked in her ears.

Moments passed. Nothing happened. They relaxed. Tilly went to the window to check the latch was in place.

Nell was right behind her again. “What if he breaks the glass and comes in?” she whispered.

Tilly’s eyes had adjusted properly to the dark now, and she could see the girl was pale and shaking. “Perhaps we should hide under the bed.”

So they clambered under the bed and lay there, in the heat and dust, waiting.

No more footsteps on the roof. A long, dread silence. Nell started to cry.

“Shhh, Nell. It will be fine.”

“Yes, Papa is very strong,” she said cheerlessly. “Isn’t he?”

“Very strong.”

“And he will have taken the rifle.”

Then the sudden sound of thudding and bumping, coming from the verandah. A scuffle. No sound of gunshots. Tilly felt helpless and hopeless, here under the bed. And while she recognized it was the safest place for Nell to be, she also had to make certain that Sterling wasn’t alone out there. She intended only to listen, hoping to hear the voices of other warders.

“Wait here,” she said to Nell.

“Where are you going?”

But Tilly was already out from under the bed, across the room, and carefully positioning herself behind the curtain. She cautiously peeked out, but could see nothing on the verandah.
Carefully, as quietly as she could, she reached out to unlatch the window and lift the sash an inch.

Nell was under her arm. They both listened.

A man moaning. Another man’s voice. Nell gripped Tilly’s wrist. “That’s not Papa’s voice,” she said.

Tilly’s skin ran hot and cold. She was right. The man speaking—snatches came on the wind: “you pig,” “you tyrant”—was not Sterling. Which meant the other sound, the moaning sound, was Sterling.

“Did he not take the rifle?” Nell whispered, harsh and frantic. “Why doesn’t he shoot him?”

Tilly’s skin ran with cold fire. Who would come and save them if something happened to Sterling?

Nobody. Tilly would have to save them.

“Is there more than one rifle?” Tilly asked, closing the window and latching it.

“I’ll come with you.”

“No, you will not. You will get under that bed with Pangur Ban and you will be as still and silent as him. Where will I find a rifle?” Her heart hammered.

“Papa’s office. The cabinet over his desk.”

“Wait here. You will put us all in danger if you don’t wait precisely here. Get under the bed and do not come out until one of us comes for you.”

Nell choked on frightened sobs. “Come back safely. Please.”

Tilly crept to the door and dragged the writing desk out of the way. She checked that Nell was back under the bed, then made her way down the hallway to Sterling’s office. Then changed her mind. She had no idea how to fire a rifle. Instead, she turned to the parlor, to the cold fireplace, and seized the brass poker. She took it back to her own room, which was on the same verandah
as Nell’s. From here, she climbed out the window and listened for the voices. They were coming from the north verandah, behind the house. Her body shook with fear, but she couldn’t stand by and let Sterling be injured or killed. Where were the warders? Was everybody down at the mangroves? If she screamed into the dark, perhaps they would all come running and she could cower back inside where she wanted to be.