Gardner replied. “But Carter Shippey hasn’t been off this island in months, has he?”
“No. He and his wife were planning a vacation, but they’d had to do a lot of work on their boat. It was banged up in a tropical storm last year.”
“And you don’t get a whole lot of strangers here?”
“Just occasional houseguests at the other end of the island. Deliveries at the airport and the harbor, but everyone there checks out clean.”
Joe nodded. “Then whatever it is started here. And it’s my bet that it can’t be highly contagious. No way. Anything highly contagious that had been introduced on this island over the past couple of months would have affected other people besides a retired fisherman.”
Dec nodded thoughtfully. “Do you have any ideas?”
“Not yet. So far we haven’t found a single living or partly living thing in Shippey’s body. Not so much as a prion.”
“What about chemicals?”
“Nothing unusual so far. But we’ll keep testing.” Joe yawned and stretched. None of them had slept since the previous morning. “So tell me again how this island works. If you had an outbreak of say, influenza, what kind of epidemiology would you expect to see?”
That was an easy question. The other doctors at the hospital had often talked about that, since they’d had an influenza outbreak two years before. “We all live pretty closely on this end of the island. I’d expect to see a number of cases reporting simultaneously, and then a rapid spread through the town and schools. It’d hit the other end of the island somewhat later, carried over there by household employees.”
Joe nodded. “How long?”
“Last time it was flu, and it only took a week for full contagion.”
“I would have expected that.” Joe yawned again. “Between you, me and the fence post? This isn’t going to be an easy solve.”
“Do you have to sound so damn happy about it?”
Joe laughed. “Admit you’re intrigued, doctor.”
Declan was. But he wasn’t happy to admit it. Not at all.
Tim Roth wasn’t happy, either. He’d cornered Steve Chase on the way out of the hospital.
“Let’s take a drive,” he’d said, his hand tightening on the man’s forearm.
They’d climbed in his Land Rover and wound their way up into the hills, where he pulled off onto the shoulder. To their right, six hundred feet below, a white beach was empty despite the picture-perfect teal expanse of the Caribbean. To their left, a handful of blackened, chiseled stones fought a losing battle with the underbrush. They were the sole remains of a plantation house that had been burned to the ground two hundred years before.
“Why here?” Steve asked, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. “Why here, of all places?”
“You need to calm down,” Tim said. “Quinn had his eyes on you. You’re a public figure.”
“Declan Quinn is my doctor,” Steve said. “If he was concerned, it was strictly medical.”
“Maybe. Probably. But we don’t need the attention.” Tim pointed to the ruins. “It’s rubble, Steve. Dust and ash, just like she is.”
Steve’s chin set. “Carter Shippey said he saw her. Carter wasn’t the type to make up stories.”
Tim hesitated, then met his gaze. “Carter was a fisherman. He’d spent his life at sea. Tall tales are as much a part of a sailor’s life as salt spray.”
“You’re a fisherman.”
“I’m a businessman,” Tim countered. “I send rich people out for day trips with a bottle of champagne, a case of beer and the hope that they’ll catch a marlin to hang on a wall. The sea isn’t a mystery. It’s a cash cow.”
He paused for a moment. “And Annie Black isn’t a ghost. She’s a legend you tell to make people feel like they’re buying a slice of the supernatural with their five-thousand-square-foot Colonial Georgian with verandah and pool. She’s an extra five grand on the asking price. That’s all.”
“And the Shippeys are still dead. Of unknown cause.”
“Exactly.” Tim sighed and repeated the words. “Of unknown cause. Could be a virus. Could be some chemical he got hold of at the high school shop. There’s just no reason to assume they were killed by a two-hundred-years-dead murderer.”
Steve shifted uneasily, eyeing the blackened stones again. “I didn’t say that.”
“No, but it’s crossed your mind ever since Cart opened his damn mouth.”
Steve nodded, and Tim pressed on.
“Look, we’ve lived on this damn island most of our lives. If the ghost of Annie Black were hanging around, don’t you think somebody would have seen something at some time? But nobody ever has. So relax. Besides, ghosts are bullshit, and you know it.”
“My sister saw one in our house in New York.”
Tim sighed. “Yeah. Right. A twelve-year-old hysteric home alone at midnight sees a ghost. That’s one for the headlines.”
Steve flushed, but this time it wasn’t an unhealthy color. “Okay. Okay.”
Tim clapped Steve’s shoulder bracingly. “Annie Black’s ashes were strewn all over this island two hundred years ago. That’s a lot of time for wind and rain to work. There couldn’t possibly be enough left of her to do anyone any harm.”
At that Steve laughed nervously, and the two men headed back into town. Steve even managed not to look over his shoulder as the burnt-out husk of the old plantation fell away behind them.
But he felt Tim was somehow lying to him. And he felt someone watching.
Jones and Perlman bought it today. Shit, this is starting to be like Nam. Nobody will say anything. But I know. Hell, everyone knows. Jackson said he saw it happen to Jones. One minute he’s sitting in his barracks room, working his damn crosswords. The next minute, he’s shaking like a leaf. Then he’s dead. Flat dead.
Word is the CO called Washington last night. Of course, he’s not going to tell us anything. We’re just peons. Bunch of damn draftees who’d rather be sitting home, smoking some weed, listening to Jimi Hendrix and painting flowers on the VW minibus. That’s how they see us. Worthless.
They’re going to kill us all.
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