Page 31 of The Island

“Them or us, Matthew?”

Matt took off his hat and shook his head. The hatband was drenched with sweat. He mopped his brow and nodded. “Ma took me in. Treated me like a son. It’s always going to be family first.”

Kate lowered the gun. “That’s what I had to hear, Matt. Jacko and Ivan never need to know we had this conversation. But I’ll be watching you. Just remember where your loyalties lie.”

9

The kids were crying. Heather was trying to breathe. Dozens of flies were circling in slow spirals about him. Tom’s head was throbbing. They’d done this all wrong. If they’d come clean in the first place, perhaps the O’Neills wouldn’t have reacted with such hostility. He should have followed his first instincts: Confessed all. Gotten the police involved. Why had he listened to Heather? She was a Millennial. She didn’t know anything.

He shook his head.

It was too late for recriminations.

This didn’t necessarily have to be a fatal mistake. This wasn’t some hick county in America. This wasn’t the third world. This was Australia, one of the most civilized countries on Earth. They would threaten them and try to bully them, but an arrangement would be made. This very situation had happened to Thomas Edison in Germany. Edison had run over a peasant woman in his car and he had simply opened his wallet and paid off the entire—

“What’s going to happen to us?” Olivia asked softly.

“Nothing’s going to happen, sweetie. They’re just trying to intimidate us. That’s what bullies do,” Tom said.

“You killed the woman,” Owen said.

“It was an accident, Owen. I didn’t kill her. She swerved onto the road with her bike. It was an accident. It’s the sort of tragic thing that happens all the time.”

“That’s a lie. You are both liars. That’s not what happened,” Owen said, leaning forward but stopping abruptly as the ropes choked him.

Tom looked at Heather for support but she was writhing around in her jeans trying to get comfortable or doing God knew what.

“This is your fault, Heather,” Olivia cried. “We should have called the police. You don’t run away when you have an accident! Didn’t you ever learn that where you came from?”

“There was no phone signal,” Heather said.

“Now they’re going to take revenge on us,” Olivia said.

“That’s not how things work. Not in Australia. Not anywhere. They’re angry now but they’ll see reason. This is a police matter. Sooner or later they’ll call the police,” Tom insisted.

“They said there aren’t any phones here either,” Owen said.

“They’ll take the ferry over to the mainland and call from there.” Tom could see Heather still wriggling in the dirt. “What are you doing over there?” he asked.

Heather was drenched with sweat. She looked up at him. “I shoved my key chain down the front of my jeans. I think I can get it out.”

“What good will that do?”

“There’s a penknife on it,” Heather whispered. “I picked it up in Alice Springs. I thought they’d make us turn out our pockets, so I hid it.”

“Jesus!” Tom said. “You’re amazing.”

“Amazing if I can get it out,” she said as she tried to manipulate the penknife down her pant leg.

Tom’s senses heightened. Here was a plan B in the making. He looked through the cracks in the timbers. It was dark. Presumably the O’Neills would debate what to do overnight and in the morning they’d probably be more rational. But why take that risk? If they could cut through their bonds, it wouldn’t be difficult to dig under the dirt at the back of the hut. It was, what, two miles across country to the ferry? If the boat was still there and he could get its diesel engine working, they’d be across the little strait to the mainland in fifteen minutes. They were in a semi-enclosed bay—surely the currents were bound to take them ashore. If he couldn’t get the diesel engine working, they could maybe launch it anyway and drift over on the tide.

Heather had now maneuvered the penknife down her leg and out the bottom of her jeans. She grabbed it in her tied hands and opened the blade. It was a tiny little thing.

“Is it sharp?” Tom asked.

“Yes,” Heather said, testing it with her thumb. “Shall I try to throw it to you?”

“No! Don’t do that. It might land in the middle between us, and then where would we be? Cut yourself free first and then bring it over,” Tom said in a loud whisper.