The Far Side of the Sun (46 page)

‘I’ll help you,’ Dodie promised.

She had searched the deck for lifebelts but found none. She counted to three. They jumped.

Ella panicked the moment her head plunged underwater.

Her arms and legs spun out in all directions, forcing her down and she was dragging Dodie down with her. Her mind splintered. Which way was up? She had no idea.

Her eyes were wide open yet she was blind, totally blind. A wall of nothingness. Terror gripped her and her heart thundered in her chest. Not like this. She didn’t want to die like this with someone hauling on her arm, pulling her down to the depths where fish would eat out her tongue.

No. She kicked hard against it. Tried to breathe and felt water flood into her lungs. The shock of it made her go limp and she didn’t resist when she felt herself tugged down further because she realised this was the end. But she had it all upside down. This way was upwards and her head shot above water and air burst into her lungs, making her cough and retch, as a hand held her chin above the waves.

‘Dodie!’

‘I’m here. You’re all right. Keep calm.’

‘I almost drowned you.’

‘Just remember what I told you.’

What had she told her? Ella had no idea. She was kicking with her legs to keep afloat, but already her muscles were tiring. She tried to suck in air but a wave smacked her in the face.

‘Relax.’ Dodie was at her side, though she could see no more than the outline of a dim head-shape against the black waters. ‘Let me do the work.’

Things came back to Ella. Spiking into her mind.
We’ll try swimming one-handed together,
and
I’ll tow you,
and always
Relax. Don’t tense up. The waves won’t be big.

But they
were
big. Massive rolling monsters that lifted her like a cork and flung her forward, tumbling her over and dragging her back again. But she started to swim. Dodie was as good as her word, pulling her onwards over the swell of the waves, keeping her clear of the crests when they broke. Easy smooth strokes.

It was possible. For the first time it seemed possible they might reach the shore. But the swimming seemed to go on so long, as if they had somehow got lost, and it occurred to Ella to wonder whether Dodie had got it wrong in the darkness. Was she swimming out to sea instead of inland? Ella could feel her body growing colder. Her mind growing cloudy. The great black weight of night was heavy on her shoulders, pressing down on her, but Dodie calmly flipped them both on their backs, so that she could support Ella’s head on her chest while she kicked with her legs.

But an idea started to fix itself in Ella’s mind. If she could reach down to the bottom, put her feet on the soft white sand far below, she would find a door she could open that would lead her to Dan. The idea grew so strong inside her head that she twisted herself so that she was upright in the water, closed her eyes and felt her body drop like a stone. The black water enfolded her and this time she welcomed it.

Her arm dragged above her as she descended, then a foot suddenly kicked the side of her head and a hand yanked her under her arm. Again she was forced to the surface coughing foam from her lungs, with waves barrelling down on top of her. But beside her Dodie was screaming. It took her a moment to realise it wasn’t at her. It was at a light flickering on and off in the blackness.

He held her. By the light of the torch Ella knelt weakly on the sand and watched Flynn Hudson hold Dodie as if he would stop breathing if he let her go. The pair didn’t speak, just rested their dark heads together and let their hands touch, their skins reconnect. He released her with reluctance only when she stopped shaking.

Flynn carried Ella on his back up through the trees to a car that was parked on the road. No one mentioned that the car was Dan’s or that the keys to it must have come from Dan’s pocket.

‘I’ll telephone the police,’ Flynn said with a close look at Ella on the back seat.

He’d wrapped her in his jacket and Dodie sat next to her, chafing her hands. Flynn had opened the handcuffs in seconds with a set of picks in his pocket and Ella was shocked to find she missed them when they were gone. She felt disconnected. Cut adrift. Out on the black waves again, but this time on her own. Each part of her hurt in a way she’d never known was possible, as grief clawed its way through every vein, leaving dead white shreds behind.

Ella didn’t close her eyes.

The headlights of Dan’s car were cutting bright yellow holes in the blackness of the outside world and she wanted to crawl into one to him.

The car swerved to a halt.

‘What is it?’ Dodie asked instantly.

‘Something back there. Under the trees.’

Flynn threw the car into reverse and shot backwards to a spot where there was a gap between two banks of trees. It was another car. Its parking light was on but no headlamps.

‘Wait here,’ he said and opened his door.

‘I’m coming.’ She checked on Ella on the rear seat, then slipped out of the car.

‘Stay, Dodie,’ Flynn said. ‘You’re wet and cold.’

But she tucked her arm tight under his and was glad when he didn’t argue further. The wind was high, whipping the palm fronds into a frenzy and carrying with it a strong tang of the ocean. She could taste the salt on her tongue and feel the staghorn ferns lick around her ankles as she approached the big black Buick.

‘Stop right there!’

It was Hector Latcham’s voice. But it sounded as if someone had a wire around his throat. Flynn immediately stepped in front of Dodie but over his shoulder she could see the car no more than six feet away. Their own car’s headlights picked it out of the surrounding night, strange shadows writhing across its bonnet as the wind lashed the tree branches. But on the ground with his legs stretched out in front of him sat Hector, leaning back against the running board of his car. On his lap lay Tilly.

‘Stay away or I’ll shoot.’

Dodie locked a hand around Flynn’s arm. ‘Leave him,’ she whispered.

But Flynn couldn’t let it go. He had too much history with this man. On the drive from Portman Cay Dodie had given him a quick account of what had happened on the boat and she had felt his anger in the car.

When would this end?

In the strange yellow light, Hector looked sick. His usual neatness was gone, his hair raked by the wind, his skin the colour of tallow and his pale blue shirt streaked with what looked like purple stains. In his hand sat a gun.

‘What now?’ Flynn demanded, his gaze on the inert figure of Tilly. ‘What are you doing here?’

Hector’s arm was curled around his wife, supporting her against his chest, his chin tucked against the dark waves of her hair. She looked like a tired doll, because there was a slackness to her limbs that turned Dodie’s stomach. His jacket was draped over her middle and tears were running down his cheeks.

‘She’s dead,’ he said.

‘Mr Latcham, I…⁠’ Dodie tried to step forward but Flynn didn’t let her move. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘but she brought it on herself.’

He nodded, heedlessly, everything about him a pale travesty of the ruthless man who had threatened her earlier that morning and left them to die on the boat.

‘Tilly insisted,’ he said, ‘on going out to see you both on the yacht. I tried to stop her but… She was too drunk to be behind a wheel, so I drove her to Portman Cay but she refused to let me row her out. I begged her. I warned her. But she wanted to face Ella on her own. She was angry about the death of the policeman and we had a quarrel.’ His voice broke and he tenderly kissed his wife’s head.

‘Mr Latcham, we’ll go and telephone for an ambulance immediately.’

‘She loved him, you know.’

The yellow bubble of light distorted Hector’s thin face, so that he looked like a wraith, already separated from life, a part of the shadows behind.

‘Loved who?’

‘She’s always loved him.’ The wind snatched at his words. ‘Ever since the day she first met him.’

‘Who? Sir Harry Oakes?’

He uttered a raw bellow of laughter that sent a scattering of wings through the trees. ‘No, the Duke of Windsor, of course, he’s the one she loved. He bewitched her, you know, with his blue eyes and his infantile smile and the smell of his blue blood. She couldn’t bear to see him unhappy. That’s why she hated that Wallis woman and Sir Harry. Their affair was killing the Duke.’

Dodie felt Flynn tense. ‘Your wife shot Sir Harry because of his affair?’ he said in a low voice. ‘Not because of the gold?’

‘Ah, Hudson, it was both.’

Hector raised the gun and Flynn threw Dodie to the ground, but there was no need. Hector placed the gun barrel in his own mouth and pulled the trigger.

‘There is too much light.’ Ella shut her eyes.

‘You need light, Miss Ella. You is in the dark too much these days. Ain’t you feelin’ better none?’

But she closed the blinds halfway and the slats of sunlight settled around Ella’s feet, while Emerald waited patiently with her hands on her hips for a reply. She wasn’t going to let Ella get away with another of her silences.

‘You gonna lose the use of that tongue of yours soon if you don’t use it, Miss Ella.’ She had just placed a cup of tea in front of her and a slice of walnut cake fit for an elephant. ‘Now you eat up.’

Ella was tired of people being patient with her. That’s not what she wanted. Dan had never been patient, he had always been ready to push back at her when she’d tested where his limits lay.

‘Thank you, Emerald.’

Emerald took the dismissal, but with ill grace.

‘Ella, lovely to see you down for breakfast again.’

Reggie beamed at her and she saw his eyes carefully scan her face, looking for signs.

‘I’ll always be here for breakfast, Reggie. You know that.’

She smiled at him across the table, laid out with his favourite Fortnum & Mason marmalade from London and white Egyptian linen napery, exactly as he liked it. She wanted to make him happy in the ways she could. There were so many ways now in which she couldn’t. That’s why she was wearing the gold gate bracelet with the sapphire.

‘Good.’

His tone with her these days was resolutely cheerful. Sometimes she heard herself copying it and that made her want to cry, but she didn’t because he had been wonderful. He had dealt with everything. Cars and bodies had been removed and discreet funerals carried out without scandal. The police were kept at arm’s length, such is the power of a diplomat’s word. Ella had told him everything – without any mention of Dan. She had left that part out. Reggie knew she had left it out but never asked and in return she didn’t go to Dan’s funeral, which had nearly killed her. When she complained that Freddie de Marigny was being held in jail for a crime he didn’t commit, he had patted her shoulder and promised that the injustice would be dealt with when it came to his trial. She believed him implicitly.

‘Toast?’

One word. One simple question. A husband offering his wife food. But they both knew it was more. Ella lifted her gaze to the garden lawn spread out behind him, to the abundance of oleanders and zinnias and the cascade of scarlet bougainvillea and she knew that to say no to the toast would be unforgivable.

‘Yes, please, Reggie.’

‘You’re looking lovely today, my dear.’

It was so untrue, it made her blush. In the mirror she could see ten years etched into her face that had not been there before the day on the boat.

Reggie passed her the toast rack.

‘Enjoy it, Ella.’

‘Thank you.’ With her eyes still on the toast, she added, ‘I’ll make you as close to happy as I can, Reggie.’

‘Thank you, my dearest Ella. You always do.’

So polite it hurt.

‘The gold, Dodie.’

Flynn squatted down and placed a square box at her feet. It was an old Huntley & Palmer biscuit tin with a picture of the Derby horserace on the lid and a speckling of rust like a ginger snowstorm in one corner.

Dodie stared, appalled. ‘Take it away.’

‘Don’t you want to look?’

‘No, I don’t.’

Nevertheless he removed the lid. Inside lay the stuff men’s dreams are made of and Dodie wanted to turn and run away but couldn’t. She stared down at the coins that Sir Harry Oakes had given to Morrell to buy him off, at the burst of light that dazzled the eye and beguiled the heart.

‘I found it exactly where the Latchams said – on Oakes’ estate, buried where only a guy like Morrell would think to bury such treasure.’

‘Where?’

‘Under the pond.’ Flynn smiled. ‘The same as Oakes’ goldmine lies under Kirkland Lake.’

Dodie laughed at that.

‘Morrell was smart,’ Flynn said.

He lifted a coin between his fingers and offered it up to her, but she wouldn’t touch it, so he dropped it in his pocket and replaced the tin lid over the rest. They were in Mama Keel’s yard. The sun was baking the earth as hard as concrete and a handful of barefoot boys in shorts were kicking a ragged football around.