a wombat,’ Dusty breathed, edging closer to the woman, fascinated. ‘A baby. Where’s his mum?’
‘His mother was hit by a car,’ the younger of the women told them. ‘Horrid things, cars.’
‘You’re taking him to Cassowary Island to look after him?’
‘It’s a wildlife shelter,’ the woman said, talking to Dusty as if he were an adult. ‘There are no predators for wombats over there. He’ll be safe.’
‘What are predators?’
‘Things that want to kill wombats.’
Dusty inched closer still, and so did Jess. The other woman also had a bulge under her jacket. As she tried not to look, it … moved.
‘You both have passengers,’ she breathed.
‘Don’t tell the skipper or we’ll have to pay,’ the wombat lady said, chuckling. The name tags on their uniform said they were Marge and Sally. Marge, the wombat lady, looked to be in her late seventies. She looked drawn, Jess thought suddenly, the professional side of her kicking in. In pain? But all the woman’s attention was on the wombat she was feeding. ‘We smuggle our babies all the time,’ she told Dusty.
‘The skipper knows,’ the lady called Sally retorted. ‘We’re not doing anything illegal. But they do need to be carried under our jackets.’
‘Why?’ Dusty was riveted.
‘Body warmth,’ Marge said. ‘Pop your hand under your T-shirt and tell me that’s not a warm, soft place to keep a baby.’ She cast him a shrewd look. ‘If you like, after he’s fed, I’ll let you wear the pouch until we reach the island. If you promise to be careful.’
‘Oh, yes …’
‘How old is he?’ Jess asked.
‘About two months,’ Marge told her. ‘He was born about the size of a jelly bean. He had no hair, and his skin was thinner than paper. But like all baby wombats, after he was born he’ll have managed to wriggle into his mum’s pouch. Normally he’d stay in his nice, safe pouch for about eight months but this little guy has a horror story. His mum was hit by a car and killed. It was only because a passerby knew to check her pouch that he came to us.’
‘You’re using a special formula?’ Jess was crouched on the deck, watching the tiny creature feed, as riveted as her son.
‘In an emergency we can give normal powdered milk, half-strength,’ Marge said. ‘But now he’s with us, we give him special wombat formula. Sally has a half-grown echidna under her vest. They’re both mammals. They drink milk but they need their own milk. Cow’s milk is for baby cows.’
‘And for us,’ Dusty said.
‘Not when you were tiny,’ Marge retorted. ‘I bet you had your mum’s milk.’
‘Did I?’ Dusty demanded.
‘I … Yes,’ Jess said—and for some dumb reason she blushed. Which was stupid. As natural a thing as breastfeeding. What was there to blush over in that?
But … an Oaklander was listening.
He’d abandoned his reading and strolled along the deck to see.
Ben Oaklander …
‘Every species has its own particular milk,’ he growled, but his voice was softer now, no longer repelling. ‘Designed exactly for that baby.’
‘So my mum’s milk was designed for me?’ Dusty demanded of him, and Jess saw Ben start a little, as if he hadn’t expected to be drawn into a conversation with a child.
She watched him turn professional as a way to deal with it. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to talk but the sight of the little creature had drawn him in. He squatted and touched the tiny wombat, stroking him lightly with one long finger, all his attention on the baby. ‘Yes,’ he said, softly, looking at the little wombat and not at Dusty. ‘When you were born, your mother had immunity from the germs she meets every day. By drinking her milk as a baby, you’ll have been safe from those germs, too.’
‘Are you one of those obstetricians?’ Sally asked him. ‘One that’s coming to the conference?’
‘I am.’ He stood, retreated a little, starting to look as if he was regretting coming over, but the women weren’t letting him off the hook.
‘We might need you,’ Sally said, casting a questioning glance at Marge. ‘We’re so pleased you’re all coming. We were sort of hoping to meet one of you.’
‘I doubt I’m much good at delivering wombats,’ he said, and the thought had him relaxing a little. The sunlight glinted on his dark hair. His eyes were narrowed against the sun, and he looked suddenly at ease.
Why had he been defensive at first? What had he thought, Jessie wondered—that she and Dusty were somehow intending on intruding on his private space? Or … She glanced at Dusty and then at Ben. The similarities were really marked. Maybe he’d seen.
‘We have a dog,’ Marge said, a bit shamefaced. ‘A pug. She’s sort of … pregnant.’
‘She’s very pregnant,’ Sally retorted. Sally was a wiry little woman with a mop of grey curls, considerably younger than her friend. Late sixties? ‘Dogs aren’t allowed on the island, but Pokey is fat and quiet and no threat to anything. She belongs to Marge’s sister, but Hilda had to go into a nursing home last month. Having her put down would have broken her heart. And because we run the shelter …’
‘We sort of sneaked her in,’ Marge admitted. ‘There’s three of us there, Sally and Dianne and me. The rules about animals on the island are strict—and good—but in this case we thought it wouldn’t hurt to hide her. But then she started to get fat.’ She sighed. ‘Or fatter. And now …’
‘She’s definitely pregnant,’ Sally said. ‘So we’re sort of in trouble. And if she gets into trouble we have no vet.’
‘You have no vet on the island—and you’re a wildlife refuge?’ Ben said, clearly confounded.
‘We’ve done specialist wildlife training,’ Marge said, with a touch of reproof. ‘Sally and Dianne and I, we pooled our money to set this place up. We plan to stay here until we die; it’s our dream retirement. We have a vet come over once a week, and we can do most things. But we can’t afford for him to come every day. And we sort of haven’t told him about Pokey.’
‘He might say she shouldn’t stay,’ Sally added, and Jess intercepted a worried glance at her friend. There were problems, Jess thought. Undercurrents. The words We plan to stay here until we die had been said almost with defiance. But then Sally caught herself and gave a rueful smile and the moment was past. ‘Okay, he would say she shouldn’t stay,’ she conceded. ‘Marge’s daughter’s coming home from New York after Christmas and we hope she’ll take her, but meanwhile we need to care for her. We’re worried,’ she conceded. ‘Native animals don’t have trouble giving birth. Joeys, baby kangaroos, wombats, possums are born tiny. If Pokey gets into trouble we don’t know what to do.’
‘But then we found out about the obstetrician
