‘Early lunchtime,’ said the other young man, Sammy. He grinned. ‘Can we turn the music back on?’
‘But quietly please, us older ones want to talk.’
The party atmosphere returned. One of the children, a boy of about five, demonstrated his breakdancing skills while his sister clapped her hands and jogged around. They both had a good sense of rhythm, Cass noted, and loved having an audience.
When everyone seemed to be looking at the children, Cass took out her day bag and looked inside. She opened the box of tampons and took out the top layer of them. Underneath, folded and wrapped in plastic, were the last pages of Bastian’s work. Her drawings were underneath. Then she took out her little pot of moisturiser. Inside, there was a tissue on the top and underneath was a memory stick containing the bulk of Bastian’s book. Well, it might not arriveat the competition in time but at least Austin wouldn’t get his hands on it.
She knew – or was nearly certain – that Austin had thought all this was in her larger rucksack, the one he had driven off with, the one with her father’s camera in it. Keeping Bastian’s work with her was an idea that had occurred to her when she realised how desperate Austin was for her to go with him. He didn’t need her to help get him on a plane; what he wanted was Bastian’s work to be destroyed. Then Bastian would have no chance of getting the prize money. If it wasn’t for her father’s precious camera, wrapped in her clothes in her rucksack in the back of the pick-up, Cass would have been happy.
But being right wasn’t as satisfying as she’d thought, she realised. Here she was, no chance of getting off the island for days if not weeks, while Austin might find the airstrip, get on a plane and escape to where there was internet coverage.
Or he might be killed by a falling tree, washed into a river by the rain, or fall to his death in a landslide. Cass realised she believed all these bad endings were more likely than him jumping on a plane to a hurricane-free island. And although she loathed him, she didn’t want him dead.
Eventually, food was passed round, bowls of rice and peas covered in well-worn plastic wrap. She was handed a cup of rum punch. She sipped it and gradually began to relax. It was hard to stay tense and anxious when everyone around her seemed to be in party mode.
The young women were dancing now, circling their hips with amazing flexibility. They barely had room to move but they looked marvellous.
‘Come on,’ said one, holding out her hand. ‘Put down your bag, no one’s going to touch it. Dance! We may be here for a long time!
‘This is called the butterfly,’ said her teacher. ‘Move your knees, open and shut, open and shut like a butterfly. Then with your hips—’
Cass had had no idea her hips could move like that and while hers were very stiff compared to those of the young women, they did move. And as the rum took effect, she stopped feeling so self-conscious and let herself go.
‘Hey, girl!’ said one of the young men. ‘You’re good!’
‘Thank you,’ she panted in reply. ‘But I need to sit down now.’
While she was sitting, some of the younger children came over, curious about this new person in their midst.
‘Hello,’ they said.
‘Hello!’ she replied. ‘My name is Cass. What are your names?’
It didn’t take long for them all to become the best of friends, and soon Cass got out her notebook and began making little sketches of the people around her. She showed them some of the other sketches in her book and they all gasped, wondering at such a lifelike drawing emerging from just a pencil with no high technology at all. Cass was quite sorry when the children’s mother appeared and took them off so they could sleep.
Eventually everyone settled down. Some people slept, others chatted quietly, everyone seemed calm, resigned. Cass realised that hurricanes were part of their lives. They weren’t easy to live with but live with them they did.
The hours passed. From the hurricane shelter, built into the rock, Cass found it difficult to calculate how hard the wind was blowing. She settled into a comfortable position; someone gave her a cushion. She closed her eyes and dozed.
When she awoke she realised the atmosphere had changed. People were more wakeful, stretching and talking in low voices. Tea was being boiled over the camping stoves.
Usain came in. Cass hadn’t been aware of him leaving but everyone looked to him for news.
‘Not too bad,’ he said although no one had asked him the question. ‘We got away with it well. The road has more or less gone but it wasn’t much of a road in the first place.’ He grinned at Cass.
‘Will I be able to get back to Bastian’s, do you think?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘I’ll take you.’
‘Oh no!’ said Cass, crushed with guilt at this suggestion. ‘You need to be here. I’ll be OK. I’ll just follow the road – what’s left of it – down. I’ll find the house.’
Usain shook his head. ‘Nuh-uh. I’ll take you.’
Cass took a breath to make her argument again but he held up his hand. ‘The whole island has a reason to be grateful to Bastian, but this family has a specialreason. Your man rescued a little cousin of ours. Without him, he would have been killed,’ Usain said.
‘Bastian’s not my man—’ Cass said, a bit overcome.
‘Figure of speech, honey,’ said Usain with a wide smile.
