Five Parts Dead (14 page)

Miss Lily still feverish. Mrs Bellows says she is unable to care for Miss Lily, having been weakened by her miscarriage. Mrs Sutton also refused, stating that she fears bringing the fever into her own cottage and therefore cannot help. I am grievously worried at their cold-heartedness towards this young woman.

A
UGUST 19
Commenced with strong wind at NW, overcast and passing squalls till noon. From noon heavy showers of rain and a few claps of thunder and lightning.

I have raised the signal flag, Whisky, seeking medical assistance. Miss Lily is taking little food and appears to be failing.

A
UGUST 20
Commenced with strong breeze at NNE and overcast till 6am. From 6, ditto wind. Very dark and gloomy.

At noon, Miss Lily's fever appeared to have broken at last. The signal flag has vanished from the light station. I asked as to its whereabouts and Mr Bellows replied it must have been lost in the wind. Mr Bellows also informed me he has injured himself and won't be able to fulfil his duties for the foreseeable future.

The next entry in the log is August 30 but there's no mention of Lily. I don't get it. The lighthouse keepers dutifully detail every weather pattern, passing ship and quart of oil used. What could have happened to make them skip nine days? I flick ahead in case they made the entries on the wrong page. But no, there's nothing. Business as usual from August 30. It doesn't make sense. Frustrated, I slam the logbook shut.

Hang on…with the book closed, there's a slight gap visible between the pages at the spine. I slide a fingernail into the cavity and open the book at that page… August 20. What the?

I bend forward, my face close to the sepia paper. It looks as though three or more pages have been cut from the logbook. There's even a score mark along the previous page, as if someone ran a razor blade along the binding. Whoever made the incision didn't want it to be obvious or they'd have torn the pages out.

Why have they been removed? Who took them? And how do I find out what happened to Lily?

I replace the log and move outside, pausing to look out to sea. The sun is bright overhead and a glint on the memorial plaque below the lighthouse catches my eye. I leave the path and gingerly make my way down the slope until I'm close enough to read it.

Lily Wilton dec. Aug 1859
By her own hand, the Lord's light extinguished.
TI Historical Society

No way. I don't believe it. Lily wouldn't…She seemed so determined and strong.

When the others get back from the beach they're desperate for hot showers. I'm itching to tell Pip about Lily but hold off. I don't want to look too obsessive.

Mel must sense my eagerness to get Pip alone. After the showers, she offers to cook dinner, and I ask Pip if she'd like to walk down to the boardwalk. Mum and Dad, with their radar clearly switched off, decide to join us. As we leave the cottage I hear Mel in my head:
Bummer
.
I tried
.

The four of us wander along the path past the lighthouse and onto the wooden staircase built for the tourists who venture west to the Cape. I'm finding it easier to walk without the crutches now, if you can call it walking: lurching like a zombie.

As is his way, Dad spots something rare, endangered or unusual and beckons the others out onto the rock platform. There's no way I'm risking more bone breakage to see a starfish or sea slug. I lean against the railing, savouring the afternoon sun.

The others have moved down to the waterline when I hear footsteps and sense someone behind me. Mel must be finished cooking already. I look over my shoulder but there's no one. I could have sworn there was someone coming this way.

Below me, a rogue wave slaps the rocks. Mum and Pip squeal with laughter as Dad, kneeling over a tidal pool, gets a face full of water.

A teasing wind skids off the sea and scoots past my ears. The hair stands at the back of my neck. There's got to be someone there. I can feel them. I squint back towards the lighthouse, the setting sun in my eyes. For a second I think there's someone moving around the lighthouse balcony, then something massive, maybe an albatross, swoops from the tower. I duck, my gaze following its path out to sea. And then I see her. A girl.

She's lying face-up among the vicious black rocks at the ocean's edge, her body twisted in the oil-coloured ribbons of kelp. She's wide-eyed, her skin as pale as milk. A bruised arm points beyond me, to the lighthouse. I call to Pip and Mum, gesturing frantically for them to save the stranger before the waves snatch her away.

They look where I'm pointing and frown back at me, confused. I begin to clamber through the railing, my cast dangling, then clunking clumsily onto the rocks. Another wave crunches ashore. Out of the corner of my eye I see Dad leap out of its reach. Why can't they see her? I lope, then crawl towards the mesh of kelp. The girl is gone.

I stare at the waves, knowing she couldn't have been swept away, not without a monster wave, not without passing Pip and Mum. But she's vanished. How? I teeter upright, scowling back at the lighthouse. As my eyes adjust to the glare, I'm certain there's someone leaning over the balcony, looking at the ground below.

Something grabs me from behind. I almost shit myself. There's a familiar chuckle and Dad grips my arm, pulling me to face him.

‘Hey, Dan, you look like you've seen a…'

I don't hear the end of the sentence. The wind, the waves, Dad's voice, the council of gulls squabbling are all just white noise. I lunge away from Dad, struggle onto the boardwalk and up to the lighthouse.

I can't keep doing this. Seeing and hearing apparitions, stuff that no one else hears or sees. Voices. Dreams. Bodies. Spirits or whatever they are. I don't even know if I believe in ghosts, but around here…it's like the ghosts believe in me.

And then it hits me. The girl—Lily? Maybe it's like the tarot reader said. Maybe I'm on the threshold and she's calling me from somewhere on the other side?

I storm into the lighthouse and up the stairs. Step. Clump. Step. Clump. I. Don't. Want. To. Be. That. Guy. The weird one. Mr I-See-Dead-People. I can't.

Step. Clump. Step. Clump. I rest my elbows on the arm rail, head on my arms, chest straining to pull in enough oxygen. I can't remember panting like this since the fire.

That day is seared into my memory like a software fault, triggered every time I'm puffed. It's happening again, the short, stabbing breaths, the starved lungs. You just don't appreciate the stuff your body does by itself— basic stuff like breathing—not until systems fail, not until you inhale and everything turns to shit, not until you're on the brink of death…again. Breathe, Dan, breathe…

A horse stud on the outskirts of Melbourne. Barney and I are helping the apprentice with a controlled burn of the stubble in two ploughed paddocks. We're crammed into a Toyota ute with a water tank, a generator, a pump and a hose on the tray, backpack water sprays and a ninety-gallon drum of water and wet Hessian sacks as back-up. The flames are compliant, dawdling north into a whisper of breeze. All too easy.

Then the wind wakes up surly and the mood of the fire changes. Wiry tussock grasses bow to the east. Clay-coloured eucalyptus leaves skitter across the face of the burn. The flames follow, switching at right angles through a barbed-wire fence.

The wind spits. The flames obey, marching into an uncleared paddock knee-deep with dry bracken and bordered by forest. Controlled burn, my arse.

The apprentice slams the ute's brakes. ‘Go! FerChrists-sakego!' I gape at him then jump out, snatching a backpack pump and wet sack from the tray. Barney stays in the cabin as they accelerate away, my door swinging open over the blackened soil. There are horses in the bracken paddock. They have to find the gate and get the horses out. Fast.

I wrestle the backpack over the fence. Fold myself between strands of wire. The pump pack weighs a tonne when it's full but right now it's barely noticeable as I slide into the straps. My right hand pumps up the pressure. My left directs the hose. The flames, no longer orderly and ankle-high, sizzle and scoff at the spray. They cavort around me like dancers, leaning, flirting, swirling away.

I have to stop them before they reach the trees, or the whole hillside will go up. But the pump is doing nothing now—it's either blocked or out of water. And the other guys are nowhere to be seen. I shrug out of the backpack and swipe at the flames with the sackcloth.

The wind surges again. The dancers become snarling wolves, encircling me. Beyond the pouncing orange and gold, I can only see a bitumen blue haze.

It's time to concede defeat and flee. I take a deep breath and regret it the instant I inhale.

Smoke. Hot and thick and I've gulped it deep into my lungs. My body screams for air, rasping, retching. No thoughts of survival. No time for flashbacks or regrets. The hunger for oxygen eclipses everything else. ‘Air! Air! Air!' And, somehow, my body takes charge. I'm bounding like a scalded roo through crackling, snapping flames.

Ten metres, twenty…can't do this. Not. Without. Air.

The sackcloth drags behind me, dry and useless. A glowing tree trunk leers ahead. I stumble, veer left, hunched and hopeless.

Blazing bracken swirls like Catherine wheels. Shrubs hiss. I collide with the stinging wire of the boundary fence and tumble through onto blackened ground.

V

T: KEEP CLEAR, ENGAGED IN TRAWLING

I make it to the lantern room by forcing myself to take deep and slow breaths after each step. There's no one inside. I hobble out to the balcony and lean forward over the railing. Storm clouds slide east like freeway traffic as I stare at the rocks where I saw the girl. I wait for my breathing to settle—wait and think.

I think about Carlo, Boris and Aaron, the ringleader I was sick of following. The baby that never got to be born. Lily, who endured so much that she might have reached breaking point.

Below me, the door opens and slams shut in the wind. Brisk footsteps clatter up the tower. Dad emerges, ruddy-faced and wary, edging towards me, his back close to the tower wall. For a bloke who likes flying he's never been great with heights.

‘You all right, mate?'

Pip follows him out, a concerned look on her face, too.

I give them the best smile I can summon. ‘Yeah. I'm okay. Just had to check something out. Umm, I'd like to go into town tomorrow though, if that's cool with you guys.'

Back at the cottage, Mel catches my eye to ensure we're on the same wavelength. I list against the kitchen doorway, waiting to hear her inside my head.
I knew you'd be okay
, she tells me, silently.
The others are…worried. They think you've been through so much and…might not be able to see a way ahead. I told them you're strong. You'd never do anything to hurt yourself…or anyone else.

I'm aghast. Scowling, I beam Mel my response.
They thought I might jump!? I'd never…I wouldn't. No way.

I know that
, she answers.
But it's not as clear to them…You haven't exactly been yourself lately.

Dinner is awkward, unspoken conversations swirling around us.

Next morning, I bounce out of bed and harass the others. Come on! Places to go, stuff to sort out.

Heading in to Donington means driving the length of the island but Mum and Dad don't mind. On the way I get Dad to translate the Latin from inside the lighthouse. He reckons
Lucem Spero Clariorem
means ‘I hope for a clearer light.' I guess that sums up what poor old Captain Wilton was hoping to achieve.

We drop Mel at a yabbie farm to wait for Hiroshi. She's happy; she has mobile phone service there and plenty of mainland gossip to catch up on. Pip and I prepare to walk around town.

I don't know exactly what we're looking for. Pip's going to try the Donington Historical Society. I'm checking out the courthouse. There has to be something about Lily on file, somewhere.

At the courthouse I step between thick limestone columns onto a verandah peppered with bird shit. Pinned on the maroon double doors is a laminated notice: ‘For enquiries, visit the police station.'