‘All that crap about waiting for the weather to change. Let’s get one thing very,veryclear. We’renotstaying another night.’
Reubyn shows his palms. ‘I know. I know.’
‘I don’t care if this forest gets hit by a category five hurricane, we’re leaving today. Understood?’
‘One hundred per cent,’ Reubyn says.
The others stare at him, as if waiting for Reubyn to pledge a higher level of commitment. George feels a rare smidge of sympathy for him. What’s he supposed to say? Even Reubyn wouldn’t stoop to using the phrase ‘one hundred and ten per cent’ – only a football enthusiast would do that.
‘Look,’ Reubyn says eventually, gesticulating, as if handling an invisible object. ‘His boots and coat are gone. He’s obviously gone for a hike. We’ll just have to wait until he returns. And if he’s still not back in a few hours, then, at that point, obviously we’ll have a decision to make.’
There are a few sighs. An eye-roll from Jessie. They are sure signs an agreement, albeit a reluctant one, has been reached. It seems they’ll remain in the forest for a few hours yet.
George slumps back into the corner of the bench and closes his eyes. Bloody Elis. Eventually, everyone is going to head out and look for him – George can sense it. And, eventually, they’ll find him. George would rather they didn’t.
The afternoon passes with card games – mostly rummy – being glumly contested on the living-room table. Not everyone is partaking; Polly has been engrossed in her novel, and Reubyn is using the remaining battery life on his laptop to edit. In the time they’ve killed, the weatherhasn’t improved. But they really need to get going. The sandwiches Jessie made are long gone, and there’s not much in the way of food. Most of it requires cooking or will soon perish without refrigeration. In short, Elis’s time is nearly up.
After some negotiating, they decided the cut-off – the time at which they would cease waiting for Elis – was to be five o’clock. That way there would still be a few hours of daylight left, and they wouldn’t have to drive out of the forest in the dark. Now, it’s gone four-thirty, and the mood is getting antsy.
They’re between games, and Faith has been riffling the cards with a metrical precision. The steady thrum under her thumbs is stark against the chaotic weather outside. Such skilful shuffling would be pleasing to watch if done by a croupier, but George finds it mildly irritating – that she can shuffle like that, and he can’t. Surely those cards are good and shuffled by now. This has become performative.
As if reading his thoughts, Faith places the deck on the table. ‘All right, this has gone on long enough. It’s obvious he’s not coming back.’ She folds her arms, waiting for a response.
‘Maybe—’ Miles clears his throat, having croaked the word. This is the first time he’s spoken for a while. ‘Maybe he’s gone. He was in an awful mood last night, and it didn’t seem like he wanted to be here anymore. He can be a bit impulsive, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he’s just left.’
‘But all his stuff.’ Faith points. ‘He wouldn’t leave his bag behind.’
‘Maybe he wants to travel light?’
Faith moves swiftly to the spot where Elis’s belongings are piled up on the floor. She crouches, stands his backpack on end, and unzips the front pocket, feeling inside. ‘Keys,’ she says, placing them on the sideboard, before going in for another rummage. ‘Phone,’ she says, repeating the action. Faith digs in again, then waves a navy-blue documentabove her head. ‘Passport. I’ve heard of travelling light, but who goes running off into the wilds of a foreign country without this?’
They stare at each other, even Polly, who rests her book open on her lap. Until now, no one has thought to look through his stuff, and it is, of course, pretty obvious that Elis wouldn’t have fled without such crucial personal effects.
Polly sits up straight. ‘So, what? We can’t wait for him forever.’
‘We have to go look for him,’ Jessie says.
Faith nods. ‘What if he’s been in an accident? With this kind of rainfall there could be landslips or God knows what.’
‘I don’t get why he would even go out hiking,’ Jessie says. ‘In this weather. It makes no sense.’
‘I’m worried about him.’
‘Me too.’
A funereal silence takes hold. George gets up and paces slowly to the far end of the bus, deep in thought. Someone needs to take charge, and naturally, it needs to be him. He clears his throat to command their attention. ‘All right, look. Here’s what we should do. We send out a search party. For half an hour, tops. And if we don’t find him, then we drive out of here and let the authorities know what’s happened, report him missing.’
‘Report him missing?’ Reubyn asks the question with a crease in his brow. ‘That’s a bit extreme, isn’t it?’
‘We don’t know where he is though, do we? Hence missing.’ Reubyn opens his mouth to reply, and George shows him the hand – a command to shut up. ‘This way, we’ll have done our due diligence, taken reasonable steps to check on Elis’s welfare, and we’ll still be out of here by six. Sound fair?’
‘So, who is going to be in your search party, George?’ Polly says.
‘Notmysearch party. I’m not going.’
Jessie rolls her eyes. ‘I think we should stay together. We should all go.’
Within five minutes, and despite George’s protestations, preparations are being made to go out into the storm. All of them. Those who own hiking boots – Miles, Jessie and Faith – are lacing them up. Coats and umbrellas are unpacked. George zips up his windbreaker jacket, which he suspects will provide feeble resistance to the rain, and reluctantly joins the others by the door.
