He touched the sleeping child on the forehead, his mind sliding towards what-ifs.
Useless! This was here and now and Beth was offering him a chance at redemption. Oh, she might not know it. She might be thinking of a brief affair—although that suggestion was so foreign to the Beth he knew, he realised there was something he was missing—but he didn’t have to agree to that. He didn’t have to fit into her so-called parameters.
Did he?
He bent and kissed the little boy on the cheek, hoping somewhere in his sleep he might feel the caress, then he made his way to the front of the new building, night-quiet now the worst was over for the patients within it.
No, the little boy who’d had the seizure was still very ill and according to a doctor called Luke, who had been on duty when Angus had arrived, one of the adults from the resort wasn’t much better, being monitored all the time, with respiratory support, fluids and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs the only things they could give him until they knew exactly what had caused the illness.
Angus had heard the murmur of voices as he’d passed the man’s room, and been reminded of just why he’d been called to the medical centre.
Not for an affair with his ex-wife, that was for sure, but until the lab arrived there was very little he could do.
Beth was sitting in the driving seat of one of the carts and Angus felt panic clutch at his intestines.
She’d changed her mind—
‘I thought you’d need clean clothes, to say nothing of a razor and toothbrush, so I’d drive you over to the resort and you can either stay there or get your things and come back to my place. Up to you.’
Angus got warily into the cart and peered at the woman beside him, visible in the light of the moon they’d intended walking under earlier.
Was there a packet of condoms in her shorts pocket?
Excitement tightened his body and he peered at her again.
She looked like Beth, and her voice sounded the same, it was just—
He had no idea what it was, but it was time to find out. People didn’t change this much for no reason and for all she’d said he was the only man she’d had in her life, he was beginning to suspect that might not be true. Someone or something had changed her in some way.
‘I’ll get my things and come back to your place,’ he said, watching closely so he could read her reaction.
Except he couldn’t—not even when she’d glanced his way before she started the cart. She steered them onto the narrow track that led into the rainforest, reaching into the shelf below the dashboard and handing him insect repellent.
‘Put this on your face and arms. The mossies in the forest could carry you away they’re so fierce.’
He took the cream and smoothed it on his skin, hating the smell of it but not wanting to be bitten.
They drove through the dark rainforest, aware from the wailing cries of the shearwaters, the buzzing of insects and the rustling movements in the ferns that the forest was as alive at night as it was during the day.
‘The canopy made up of vines and plants—like stag-horns and elkhorns that live high up in the trees—blocks out the moonlight, that’s why it’s so dark,’ Beth said, needing to break the silence that was like a glass wall between them. ‘Farther into the park, on the edge of the mountain, the park rangers have built a suspension walkway through the canopy, so you can see all the life that’s up there.’
Angus remained silent and she began to wonder what on earth she’d done, asking him back to her place, suggesting he stay—a packet of condoms burning a hole in her pocket…
All to satisfy her lust?
She hoped she could pass it off as that, but in her heart of hearts she knew it wasn’t anything to do with lust. What she wanted was some more time with Angus—a little period of togetherness she could enjoy then wrap up like a parcel and tuck away inside her, to be taken out and relived when she felt lonely or depressed.
Like a diamond tucked away somewhere safe, brought out to shimmer in the light from time to time. Better by far a memory like that than the bleak, black stone that had been Bobby’s death and the harsh words she and Angus had exchanged so soon after it, before they’d each retreated into their separate cocoons of grief…
She stopped the cart where she’d parked it the previous morning, suddenly aware of just how long this day had been.
How confusing…
Would Angus go into the hotel and return or was he already regretting his earlier decision?
‘Walk in with me?’ he said, and Beth’s heart leapt because she knew it meant he would return. Then she glanced down at the shorts and shirt she wore and decided walking through the lobby of a five-star resort in this attire wouldn’t be the done thing, no matter how late the hour.
Or possibly because of the late hour.
‘I’ll wait here,’ she said, and the wall crumbled, Angus leaning right through it to put his hand behind her head and draw it towards him, kissing her with such fierce urgency that desire flooded through her body.
‘See that you do,’ he said, then he was gone, striding along the path, past the ocean-like swimming pool and up the stairs into the foyer.
Her mobile chirped at exactly the moment Angus reappeared, small overnight bag in hand. Beth answered it, knowing it would be a summons to the hospital.
‘The restful sleep didn’t last long—can you come?’ Marcia said, and Beth knew she would.
Angus saw the mobile held to her ear and asked a silent question.
She nodded in reply, her body tight with tension.
Would he turn and walk away?
Was that it?
The death of the diamond before she’d had it in her hand?
But he threw his bag into the back of the cart and climbed in beside her.
‘If it’s all right with you—’ he began, and Beth, her heart too full for speech, just nodded in reply.
* * *
‘You had the chance to go back to the hotel and didn’t take it,’ Angus muttered to himself as he dried himself, post-shower, in Beth’s small bathroom.
He tried to analyse his irritation, deciding in the end it wasn’t that Beth wasn’t there, but that she was so much there in the little cabin she called a home. The soap he’d used in the shower and which had now scented his skin was the smell of Beth, the moss-green mosquito net he was unknotting from above the bed smelt like the little tea candles she’d sometimes lit in their bedroom, a romantic notion he’d looked upon indulgently but had fiercely missed when she had left.
And the bed, with its mountain of pillows and cushions of every size and colour, things he’d flung to the floor before sharing the bed in her little flat, then appreciated when she’d tucked them behind his back in the morning so he could sit and sip the cup of tea she always brought him.
Hell! He must have been the most spoilt, pandered to, pampered and unappreciative mongrel on earth, the way he’d let Beth look after him.
He climbed beneath the net, shifted a million cushions, then settled his head on a pillow.
Which smelt of her shampoo…
He sighed and, accepting the inevitable, breathed it in and, for the first time in three long years, slid peacefully into sleep.
CHAPTER SEVEN
ROBBIE was more than restless, he was crying, uttering little whimpering words that didn’t make sense, and twisting in the bed as if his body was racked with pain.
Charles, looking grey and tired, was in the room when Beth entered, close by the bed, talking quietly to Robbie.
‘Perhaps we did the wrong thing with the quarantine,’ he said to Beth, when the little boy’s spasms ceased and he seemed to sleep again. ‘We could have airlifted Robbie and Mr Todd, the guest who’s in a bad way, across to the mainland.’
‘And done what there?’ Beth queried.
Charles looked at her and shook his head.
‘Watched them both, as we’re doing here,’ he admitted. ‘Control the fluid intake so we’
re not adding to the pressure on the brain, control seizures with anti-convulsant medication—not that either of them have had seizures—monitor breathing, pulse and oxygen levels in the blood, measure urine output and test it for anomalies. That’s what’s really bothering me, Beth, the fact that with all our specialised medical knowledge there’s nothing more we could be doing for these people on the mainland than we are here.’
He offered her a rueful smile.
‘Yet I still feel guilty that they’re here. Crazy, isn’t it?’
‘Not really,’ she said. ‘We’ve come to think we can work miracles with machines and drugs. We can put new hearts into tiny babies, even operate on them in the womb, we understand how the human body works and most of the diseases that afflict it, but we’re not infallible, and neither is modern medicine. Like doctors always have, we just do what we can.’
His smile this time was even more strained.
‘That’s true of most things in life, I suppose,’ he said quietly, then he wheeled backwards, leaving room for Beth to slip into the chair beside Robbie’s bed and take his hand, talking quietly to him, hoping somewhere in his consciousness he’d know she was there and be soothed by her presence.
She was asleep, her head resting on the bed, her two hands clasping one of Robbie’s. Angus stood and looked at her for a moment, seeing the shadows of tiredness beneath her eyes, the tangles in the silky dark hair.
He’d slept so well himself, wrapped in the scent of Beth, that he felt guilty, seeing her exhaustion. Not that she’d have slept in her own bed while she was worried about the child.
Although Robbie looked at peace again this morning, his breathing deep and easy. Hopefully, the crisis had passed and he was on the mend. Two of the other children had recovered quickly—well, not fully recovered, they were both tired and listless and would need careful watching for a week or two, but they were certainly well enough to leave the hospital.
Perhaps it was good the quarantine was in place, for with the number of hospital and camp staff and volunteers available it would be easier to keep Robbie on the island while he recuperated rather than sending him home to a harassed mother with four other children.
Children!
He frowned at the memory the word threw up. Last night Beth had denied she was obsessed about not having more children, yet surely the argument they’d had—the only real argument he could remember having with Beth—had been over having another child. He’d been trying to comfort her after Bobby’s death and had said there’d be other children and she’d flown at him like a demented banshee—or were all banshees demented?
Anyway, they’d argued, then retreated into their separate cones of silence, held there by some misunderstanding, Angus had felt, as well as grief.
He studied Beth for a moment longer. Fate—and Robbie’s setback—had kept them apart last night. If they’d come together, would they have talked?
Really talked?
He shook his head in rueful denial—they’d have made love all night, revelling in the pleasure they could bring to each other. Damn, his body was stirring just thinking about it.
He walked into the room, wondering if he should wake Beth, then walked out again, deciding she needed sleep more than she needed the confusing presence of her ex-husband.
Or he imagined she did, although now he’d realised he didn’t know this Beth for all she looked and smelled the same. He wasn’t sure what she might or might not need…
‘We’ve had word from AQIS that the two mobile units will be in Crocodile Creek by midday and the army has one of their huge helicopters standing by to airlift them straight to the island.’
A tall man who introduced himself as Cal Jamieson was behind the desk in the office that had become, to Angus, the headquarters of the quarantine.
‘I’ve persuaded Charles to go back to his cabin and get some sleep,’ Cal continued to explain. ‘This emergency, on top of Lily being sick, has really knocked him.’
‘How is Lily?’ Angus asked. He’d met the little girl on his first visit yesterday.
Cal smiled.
‘Being difficult, would you believe? And “difficult” is a word we’ve never associated with Lily. She can be naughty, like all kids, but usually she’s the most biddable child imaginable. Not this morning, though. She’s sitting up in bed like an imperious little duchess, demanding to go home. When Gina, my wife, who was sitting with her, explained that no one could leave the island, she announced she didn’t want to leave the island, she just wanted to go home to Jill and Charles because they were her new mummy and daddy and that’s where she should be.’
‘New mummy and daddy?’ Angus queried.
But the phone rang and as Cal reached out to lift the receiver, he said, ‘Ask Beth, she’ll explain,’ before adding a polite, ‘Wallaby Island Medical Centre, Cal Jamieson speaking,’ to whoever it was on the other end.
At a loose end, Angus mooched around the building, checked Beth was still asleep, then walked outside, slapping at a mosquito as he went, wondering if all the carts had insect repellent in them.
He found some in the first one he checked, and smoothed it onto his skin, noting as he did so it was a sunscreen factor 30 as well.
The mosquito he’d slapped at and missed buzzed around his head, but something else was buzzing inside it.
He walked back inside and found Cal was off the phone.
‘What were the original symptoms of the illness?’ he asked, and Cal frowned at him.
‘Beth could probably list them straight off. I wasn’t here when it began—not at the hospital—but from what I know, it was listlessness, a general malaise, achy feelings, headache, some vomiting.’
‘Not flu symptoms?’ Angus persisted.
‘There must have been,’ Cal said, ‘because we talked of some kind of flu-like virus. I suppose general achiness is often an early symptom of flu—that might have been what set us on that path. Or, with the kids with lung problems, any illness at all is usually accompanied by chest infections. I know Susie, our physio, was involved from the start.’
He paused, studying Angus as if to read his thoughts.
Gave up and asked, ‘What are you thinking?’
Angus waved the question aside.
‘It’s too vague even to be considered a thought at the moment, but my computer’s back at Beth’s place—I need to check out some stuff. The mosquitoes here—they’re fresh-water?’
Now Cal looked downright puzzled.
‘I guess they must be—aren’t all mosquitoes? This far north we have a long wet season over summer each year and the rainforest is full of places where water can pool or puddle and mosquitoes can breed.’
‘And you’re how far from the mainland?’
‘A half-hour helicopter flight, two hours by fast catamaran—about a hundred k’s, I suppose.’
‘That’s far enough,’ Angus said, more to himself than to Cal, thinking if what he suspected proved right, the virus wouldn’t spread to the mainland.
Though how had it got to this island?
Thank heavens the island had wireless Internet connection facilities. Back at Beth’s cabin, he brought his computer out to the deck table and booted it up, then tracked through all the sites he could find on mosquitoes. Japanese encephalitis was well known—there was even a vaccine available for people travelling to Japan or nearby Asian countries. The disease caused fever, headaches, vomiting and confusion, and there was no antiviral available. All specialists advised was to treat the symptoms.
Next he worked out how far they were from Japan—although the virus had also been found in Southeast Asia. Thousands of kilometres, but tracing the path mosquitoes would take he crossed the big island of New Guinea.
Vague memories surfaced—the miscellaneous file in his head again. The early days of colonisation in New Guinea—people suffering from some form of sleeping sickness. But malaria had raged there and the emphasis had been on finding drugs to deal with that. The sleeping si
ckness had stayed vague, more a myth than something written up in medical journals.
He switched his research to mosquitoes.
‘The problem is,’ he said to Beth who’d appeared, a sleep crease in her right cheek, at the bottom of the steps, ‘that mosquitoes rarely travel more than a few hundred yards in their lifetimes, maybe a mile, unless, of course, there’s wind assistance. But if they breed in the rainforest here, there’s no wind—or virtually none…’
He stared at her as he tried to take his thoughts further.
Tired as she was, Beth felt warmth stirring inside her. A different warmth—remembered warmth—the kind she’d always felt when Angus had discussed things with her, using her as a sounding board for his thoughts.
Not that it meant anything to him—he simply found it easier to arrange his thoughts by talking through them. Probably Garf would have done just as well.
‘And good morning to you, too,’ she said, as she came up the steps, suddenly aware how daggy and sleep-rumpled she must look. ‘Have you had breakfast? Would you like a cup of tea?’
The ordinary questions, far removed from how far mosquitoes might or might not travel, seemed to bring him out of his head.
‘You sit, I’ll get it. I found my way around your kitchen earlier. Went up to the hospital as well. You were sleeping so I didn’t disturb you.’
The idea of Angus finding his way around her kitchen was disturbing somehow, although she’d asked him to come—to stay.
But if he could behave as if all this was perfectly normal, so could she. ‘How is Robbie today?’
‘Sleeping peacefully, but we thought he was over it when he was like that yesterday, so who knows? But Danny is still very ill. They’ve called in Alex Vavunis, the paediatric neurosurgeon, again.’
She felt the weight of the sick children bearing down on her again and must have shown her feelings, for Angus stood up and came towards her, wrapping his arms around her and giving her a comforting hug.
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