I thought the beach’s isolation might provide an ideal opportunity to move on with Sophie and perhaps ask a few questions to see if there was anything in Abby’s suspicions about her. I was a complete amateur at passive interrogation – judging when the time was right was important. Anything I might glean and could report to Abby would at least show that I had tried.
During the night, as well as thinking about the effect Sophie was having on me, I had also decided that a dear friend or not, I was going to have to disappoint Abby. If Sophie wasn’t able to throw any light on the matter then that would be that; I wasn’t going to take it any further. It wasn’t that I was worried, but I didn’t know what I was doing and a fumbling amateur can only guarantee one outcome, and anyway, the thought of quizzing Sophie didn’t sit easily with me for other reasons.
Putting the hotel beach towels down in the shade of some small rocks a short distance back from the water, I surveyed the scene while Sophie shrugged off her dress. Underneath she was wearing the black swimming costume she had worn the first time I saw her in the pool at the Sheraton. It was a perfect early evening: the sky was a clear blue, the sea calm, the humidity not as bad due to proximity of the sea, and the sun was well over an hour away from dipping below the horizon. The only sounds were the lapping of the waves and a birdcall every now and again from the jungle behind us.
“Aren’t you going to strip off?” Sophie asked, settling down onto her towel.
“I’m going to get some driftwood for a fire. It’ll keep the bugs away because they get a bit tiresome at this time of day.”
“Do you want a hand?” The offer was made absent-mindedly, because, as she made it, Sophie lay back to soak up what was left in the sun’s heat.
“No thanks.”
I wandered away in search of the wood. Because of the recent storm a lot of the wood was still damp which meant I had to go closer to the jungle to find anything suitable. I collected a small bundle of reasonably dry driftwood before heading back along the deserted beach to Sophie.
“I’ll go and have a look the other way. There wasn’t much over there,” I told her dropping the bundle by the rocks.
“Before you go, will you put some cream on my back, please?” She rolled over onto her front and then peeled the top of her costume down, handing me the cream. Squirting some of the cream from the tube onto her back and working it into her skin was a lovely sensation … hopefully for both of us.
“That was kind of you,” Sophie commented, lifting her head, her eyes on mine.
“How much do you want on?” I asked, hoping my unease didn’t show too much.
“That’s fine,” she said, twisting a little towards me. Her breast was almost exposed. “Can you do the tops of my legs as well?”
I put some cream onto the backs of her thighs and rubbed it in as quickly as possible. Sophie settled back down on the towel.
“That’s great, thank you,” she said.
Without saying anything else, I headed off along the beach in the other direction. Sophie’s request had been innocent enough, but my reaction concerned me. She was still a stranger and the simple act of putting sun cream on her back and legs was sensual. I had misjudged the previous evening, and now I was perhaps misjudging Sophie’s intent once again. I was acting like an immature teenager.
Belinda had been dead less than three months and yet I was allowing a controllable situation to get the better of me … was that a silly thing to think?
I bent down and picked up a piece of driftwood.
I was thirty-nine years old with two teenage children, I had recently lost my wife, and my mother-in-law was, as far as I knew, critically ill in hospital. Nevertheless, I was allowing a woman I had known for forty-eight hours to take over my mind because, whether I liked it or not, she was featuring more and more in my thoughts, and not because of the mystery that surrounded her.
Even when Abby told me that she might be the source of at least some information on an extremely important political situation, her image had appeared but for the wrong reasons. I saw her with me not as an acquaintance but as a friend, a close friend. We were exploring together, finding out about each other, discovering what was important and what was unimportant.
Once again my thoughts were muddled, and all because Sophie had asked me to put some sun cream on her back and legs.
The screams reached into my mind and mingled with my irrational thoughts but quickly assumed precedence over anything else on my mind.
Then the screaming masked out all other thoughts.
The screams were real.
Somebody was in agonising pain. The screaming made my blood run cold. I had never heard anything like it before. I stood still, trying to work out where they were coming from.
I turned round.
Having walked beyond the Cave, I no longer had a view of where I had left Sophie. I dropped the wood onto the sand and began running. The screams were still piercing every nerve in my body. The soft sand slowed me down. I lost balance and fell over, scrambled to my feet and tried desperately to run faster.
I rounded the corner past the cave and looked to where I had left Sophie.
She wasn’t there.
I stopped, searching the beach for her.
Running a few more paces, I fell over again, got up and scrambled forward. The screaming was coming from the water. I changed direction.
Then I saw her.
She was in the shallows clawing at the water. Throwing her head back she screamed again but it was cut off as her body slumped and her head fell backwards into the water.
I reached her seconds later.
Taking hold of her hands, I dragged her from the water and as I did I saw what had caused her agony.
It was almost transparent with a tinge of blue.
What the hell was it?
A shimmering translucent mass of what looked like jelly.
I dragged Sophie out of the water and the thing moved with her. Its tentacles wrapped round Sophie’s thighs shone in the fading sun. The jellyfish was pulling her away. I grabbed a rock and smashed down as hard as I could on the slimy fingers of hell enveloping her legs. I felt useless but I acted instinctively. I threw the rock at the main body of the jellyfish and then dragged Sophie further onto the beach.
She was quiet, perhaps unconscious.
The screaming had stopped.
Not even a whimper.
Her head was to one side, her eyes closed.
I assumed she had gone into the sea where the freshwater stream joined it to cool off and this thing had been waiting for her. This thing had wrapped its slippery arms of death around her.
I tried to think.
What should I do?
I had heard about using vinegar or even urine on jellyfish stings. For her to collapse like that it must … was she still alive? I ran up the beach, grabbed a towel and attempted to wipe away the bits of slime that were still on her legs. The red welts were like furrows across her thighs and calves. Christ!
I had never seen anything like it before and I was panicking.
She hadn’t pulled up her costume before going into the water. Lowering my head, I put my ear between her breasts, praying that I would hear her heartbeat. The lapping water masked any sound … I couldn’t hear anything. I lifted her arm hoping I would find a pulse in her wrist … if it was there it was so faint I couldn’t detect it.
I looked up into the fading blue sky and shouted, “Not again, please God, not again!”
How many more?
Squeezing her nose, I prised open her lips, checking her airway before blowing into her mouth. After a few breaths I stopped. How many should I do? I couldn’t remember. Putting the palm of one hand onto her chest between her breasts I pressed, lifted, pressed, lifted, pressed. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.
Back to her mouth, deep breath – blow in, deep breath – blow in. I remembered there was enough oxygen in exhaled breath to give life to somebody. Deep breath – blow in, deep br
eath – blow in.
Heart, back to her heart. Hands can give life. Press hard – release, press hard – release. God, please don’t let her die.
Don’t let another one die.
All of a sudden, she began to shake. Her hands, arms, legs and feet began to tremble. Her entire body convulsed. She was alive, thank God!
But, it wouldn’t be enough.
I had to get her to hospital. How could I drive and try to keep her alive? I looked around, praying that somebody else would be on the beach having heard Sophie’s screams, but there was nobody.
I left the first towel where I had thrown it: there may still have been jellyfish spores on it. I looked down at the murderous mound of jelly in the water and then it came to me.
Box jellyfish!
Sea Wasp!
What had I read other than the fact that the sting could be fatal? Sometimes found lying in the shallows where fresh water meets seawater. There was a chance in a million of seeing one, but if they made contact with anything, they wrapped their tentacles round it.
Its tentacles had found Sophie’s thighs, Sophie’s legs.
Hospital, I had to get her to hospital.
The shaking had become uncontrollable. She was in shock, but she was alive. The shock could kill her. It nearly had, so it could again.
I ran up the beach and grabbed the other towel. On seeing the red wine Sophie had brought from her room, I wondered. Vinegar, urine, red wine – maybe it would work. I smashed the neck of the bottle against a rock and then poured the wine over her twitching legs. I tried to pour some on all of the welts but there were too many. Then I thought of the ice. Should I put the bags of ice on her legs? Was I doing the right thing? I threw open the cool-box. Not all the ice had melted. I tried to cover the areas that were badly stung, sliding the ice gently up and down the wounds.
I pulled up her swimsuit to cover her breasts and slipped the straps over her arms and shoulders. Why I was thinking of her dignity at a time like this? I was wasting time. Was I expecting her to die? Holding her in a sitting position and wrapping the towel round her shoulders, I lifted her. She was as light as a feather. Her head lolled against my shoulder.
Was she still alive?
The shaking had subsided but was that wasn’t necessarily a good sign.
I carried her up the track to the car. The ice was melting too quickly in the bags. Shit! I realised I didn’t have the keys. They must be in her bag that was down by the rocks. After lowering her gently onto the track I raced back down to the beach, grabbed her bag, her dress and sandals. The rest would have to wait.
The rest could go to hell.
I probably broke every traffic law in the book: speed limits, traffic lights, give-ways, and all the laws of the road. Oblivious to what was going on around me, I concentrated on what was going on in front of me. For once, I was thankful that there was little traffic on the Brunei roads, and what was there tended to ignore what other drivers were doing. I was another incompetent; I needed avoiding, and ignoring.
Where was the hospital? Shit, I didn’t know where the hospital was. I had automatically headed for Bandar but I hadn’t the faintest idea where to go. There were no signs that I could see. Was I looking for a Red Cross? No, you idiot, it would be the Red Crescent!
Were Muslim hospitals signposted with the Red Crescent?
Sophie was on the back seat which meant there wasn’t anything I could do for her while I was driving. Every now and again, I looked over my shoulder but I didn’t know whether I was looking at her dead body or whether she was hanging on to life. I thought I saw her twitch but it may have been the car hitting a bump. She was still in her swimming costume with a towel draped over her, the bags of little more than cold water splayed across her thighs.
Then I saw it – a sign!
The Raja Isteri Pengiran Anak Saleha Hospital – of course, the RIPAS – I remembered going there once with another employee of Astek. A simple cut was infected and I took him to the RIPAS to get it treated. How could I have forgotten? How could I be so stupid? It was on a hilltop about half a mile from the centre of Bandar. I was on a dual carriageway and I accelerated as I saw the sign.
Screeching to a halt outside what I assumed was Accident and Emergency, I lifted Sophie off the back seat and rushed in through the automatic doors. I stopped. There wasn’t anybody who resembled a nurse, a doctor, anybody. I was frantic: so close and yet … there had to be somebody. I was in a hospital for God’s sake.
A door swung open and a nurse came through. She walked across the foyer of the hospital and she had quite a few files in her hands. The other people in the area stared at me as I rushed towards her.
“Nurse, nurse,” I shouted. I prayed she spoke good enough English to understand what I was about to say.
The nurse stopped and looked at me, a worried expression on her face that vanished as soon as she realised the bundle I was carrying was a human being. She came over to me and said in perfect English, “Can I help you, sir?”
“Thank God!” I shouted. “I think she’s been stung by a box jellyfish. Help her please.”
The nurse placed her fingers against Sophie’s neck, without taking her eyes from mine. She was assessing me. “A box jellyfish?” she repeated.
“I think so – a box jellyfish, a sea wasp.”
“Come with me,” the nurse ordered.
“Is she still alive?” I pleaded, following the nurse through a swing door and down a corridor.
“Yes, but only just.”
We turned a corner and we seemed to be in a small reception area. The nurse leant across the counter and said something to another nurse who immediately picked up the phone. A wheeled stretcher appeared from nowhere and another nurse lifted Sophie out of my arms and placed gently on to it.
Turning the trolley round the nurse disappeared back through swing doors.
The nurse who I had seen first came over to me. “Wait here, sir, and somebody will come and see you shortly.”
“Will she be all right?”
“How long ago did it happen?” the nurse asked.
“I really … I really don’t know … maybe twenty, thirty minutes.”
The nurse frowned. She had a pretty face and I guessed from the way she was dressed that she wasn’t Bruneian; she was probably on contract from Singapore or Malaysia.
“If it was a box jellyfish then only time will tell but the fact that she has survived the first bout of shock is a positive sign. She’s in good hands.”
“Thank you,” I said. “You’ve been most kind.”
She smiled again. “It’s my job.”
“What people like you do is never simply a job,” I told her, meaning every word.
“I hope she pulls through, Mr … Mr …?”
“Blythe, nurse, my name is Blythe.”
“If she’s strong, she will survive, Mr Blythe.” She pointed towards the reception desk. “The nurse over there will want some details.”
“Thank you again.”
“My pleasure,” the nurse said before she went back down the corridor.
I looked over towards the reception desk. The nurse behind the counter had a pen poised.
After giving the nurse the few details I knew, I sat in a very uncomfortable plastic chair and waited. All I knew was Sophie’s name, her age and that she worked for the British Foreign Office. I didn’t know her address or anything else about her. The nurse behind the reception desk had given me an inquisitive look when I couldn’t answer what she no doubt thought were the simplest of questions. I suggested she ring the British High Commission and ask for a representative to come to the hospital.
It was nearly six o’clock.
I assumed the High Commissioner lived on the Commission premises. He could be alerted and order one of his minions to come and assume responsibility for Sophie. I wasn’t going anywhere but Sophie was in Brunei on official business.
Watching the inactivity in A&E, I wondered what the hell was
going to happen next. One minute I was being asked to cross-examine a visiting member of the Foreign Office, the next minute I’m dragging the person I’m supposed to interrogate from the clutches of what I believe to be one of the most dangerous creatures to roam the South China Sea. I knew little about box jellyfish other than the fact that they could kill and invariably did. During my first visit to Brunei, I remembered being warned about the various undesirables that waited in the shallows around the waters, but, in the same breath, I was also told that the chance of encountering a dangerous creature was remote.
Sophie was unlucky.
The red welts on her legs had looked awful. I hoped that what I had done was right, or at least helpful.
I found it difficult to believe that it was no more than a couple of days since Sophie and I had shared the frightening experience of flying through a tropical storm and less than twenty-four hours since we sampled Mama Wong’s fish and chips accompanied by her specials.
The door next to me opened and a small man in a white coat went over to the desk. The nurse was pointing at me. A man I assumed to be a doctor, turned round and faced me, pausing for a few seconds before crossing the short distance between us.
I stood up.
“Your name is Bly?” asked the doctor as he approached me holding out his hand. “I am Doctor Pengiran Haji Momin bin Pengiran Abdullah Wahab.”
“Blythe,” I said, shaking his hand, “Richard Blythe.”
“Please sit down Mr Bly,” he suggested, indicating the chairs. He sat down next to me and half-turned to face me. He was a small man, probably about five foot six tall, jet-black hair and a similar neatly trimmed moustache to Abby’s. His glasses were gold-rimmed and the suit under his white coat expensive.
He watched me for a few seconds and then asked, “You brought the lady with the jellyfish stings to the hospital, Mr Bly?”
I nodded. “I did.”
Smiling apologetically he spread his hands. “Mr Bly, may I ask whether you were the only person with Mrs Mackin … Mackin …”
“Mackintosh,” I said, helpfully.
“Yes, Mrs Mackintosh, I am so sorry. Were you the only person with Mrs Mackintosh when the accident happened?”
Pooh Bridge: conscience stricken Page 20
