‘I don’t know.’ She flicks her gaze to Simone’s. ‘But what I do know is that everything that stems from it isexplainedby it.’
‘I’ve got a message ready to send to Airbnb about CCTV at the lodge …’ Simone thinks. ‘And we could try to find the phones he communicated with me on.’
Lucy pauses. ‘We need help,’ she says softly. ‘We need to get help.’
‘What do you mean?’ says Simone, invisible fingers walking their way up her spine.
Lucy leans away from Simone and takes her hair out of the scrunchie. ‘We know some things about him. He is probably involved with drugs. He has a daughter who I might recognize if I saw her. He had a messenger whose name will likely be released soon. I think we find him. And if necessary, we get the authorities to help us find him. Police in Terlingua. Police that aren’t his police.’
‘I’m really not sure he’s … We don’t know he’s in with the police.’
‘I know. But –’
‘Hand ourselves in?’ Simone says.
‘Wouldn’t a lawyer help us? Or the embassy?’
‘The embassy. Hmm.’ Simone thinks about it. ‘We’d still have to confess, to the embassy. To get their help.’ She looks at Lucy. She can’t allow her to do it. She would still be arrested.
‘I know. But a lawyer – we could build a case with him –’
‘Or her,’ Simone is unable to stop herself adding.
‘Or her. He or she would be truly on our side. So that ifwe …’ Lucy can’t even speak the words. Her hands are shaking as she messes with her hair. ‘So that we have the evidence we need if we do go to – to more sympathetic police.’
‘Get a lawyer to help us find him, then take our case to the police,’ Simone clarifies.
‘Yes.’
Simone nods slowly. Her daughter is so smart. And she is right: they do know some things about him. The information they have is not insignificant. Perhaps they could find him. But then what?
‘But what would you do if you found him? How would we prove it, even if we did get to him?’
Lucy raises her head, meets Simone’s eyes in the bright sunlight, and Simone thinks again about how this must have changed her daughter. Lucy shrugs, saying nothing, but it’s loaded, an exercising of her right to silence rather than anI don’t know.
Simone shivers.
Now that Lucy is up, she can at least cook. She wants something to do while this conversation plays out, while she thinks. They have mackerel in oil in a tin. Simone deliberately got Lucy to buy things that could hold their own, flavour-wise. She places a small double-folded square of kitchen towel that she brought specially on top. She uses the matches to set fire to the towel, then puts it down on the desert ground and watches it carefully in the white morning light. The towel catches light fully, curling black and grey at the edges. The flames whip upwards, air shimmering around them, and then as the towel begins to smoulder, she knows that the oil will start to smoke and heat the fish. They will have it in ten minutes on dry bread, and it’ll be delicious. No salt needed.
‘Let’s say we do find someone willing to help us, and they also find him. How do we …?’ Simone asks softly, and sheisn’t being difficult, and it isn’t rhetorical. Nevertheless, something flashes across Lucy’s features, as quick as light flickering. You might miss it if you weren’t looking closely. Something about the eyes. It’s more than defiance.
Simone stands and looks at the mackerel. It’s almost done. The ground underneath is scorched black with it. The sky around them is wide, clouds thin and golden, their edges scalloped.
‘That person could investigate him,’ Lucy answers. She’s perfectly rational. ‘After all, if he’s done it once, he will probably do it again.’
‘I agree.’ Simone breathes. ‘That’s so smart.’
‘It’s the only option. There are no other good ones,’ Lucy says darkly. ‘We can’t hand ourselves in now. Go to trial.’
‘No.’
‘Although you might get proper cups of tea in prison.’
Simone lets out a laugh. She pokes the mackerel. The oil sizzles; it’s almost done. ‘Cons: prison,’ she says, and her tone is deliberately light-hearted, but internally she is thinking that she’d take this if it were only her. But it isn’t, it’s Lucy, too, and Lucy shot a police officer. They would throw the book at her.
‘Agree,’ Lucy says. ‘Possibility two, we are never found and we become feral desert animals. Pros: no prison.’
‘Cons: no hairbrushes, either. Can you get the bread?’
