The Light Between Oceans(64)

‘Since it was about evidence!’ the policeman replied.

It took time for the photographer to set up his equipment, and as he did, Lynch looked around the walls at the portraits illustrating choices of style and frame. His gaze passed evenly over an array of examples that included the local football team, Harry Garstone and his mother, and Bill and Violet Graysmark with their daughter and granddaughter.

A few days later, a photograph was duly pinned to the notice-board outside the police station, showing the rattle next to a ruler for scale, and asking for anyone who recognised it to come forward. Beside it was a notice from Septimus Potts, Esquire, announcing that the reward for information leading to the safe return of his granddaughter Grace Ellen Roennfeldt now stood at three thousand guineas, and that all approaches would be treated in the strictest confidence.

Down Partageuse way, a thousand guineas could buy you a farm. Three thousand – well, with three thousand guineas there was no telling what you could do.

‘Are you sure?’ Bluey’s mother asked again as she paced the kitchen, her hair still in the rag curlers in which she had slept. ‘Think, boy, for God’s sake!’

‘No. I can’t be sure – not completely sure – it was so long ago. But I’d never seen anything that flash before, and in a baby’s cot!’ His hands shook as he rolled a cigarette, and he fumbled the match as he lit it. ‘Ma, what am I going to do?’ Beads of sweat were forming on his forehead beneath his red curls. ‘I mean, maybe there’s some reason for it. Or maybe I was just dreaming.’ He drew fiercely on his cigarette, and exhaled a thought. ‘P’raps I should wait until the next trip out to Janus and ask him then, man to man.’

‘Man to monkey, more like! You’re more lame-brained than I thought if that’s your idea of what to do. Three thousand guineas!’ She waved three fingers in his face. ‘Three thousand guineas is more than you’d make on that godforsaken boat in a hundred years!’

‘But it’s Tom we’re talking about. And Isabel. As if they’d do anything wrong. And even if it is the same rattle – it could have just washed up and they found it. You should see some of the stuff that ends up on Janus. He found a musket once! And a rocking horse.’

‘No wonder Kitty Kelly sent you packing. Not an ounce of ambition. Not an ounce of common sense.’

‘Ma!’ Bluey was stung by his mother’s jibe.

‘Put a fresh shirt on. We’re going to the station.’

‘But it’s Tom! It’s a mate, Mum!’

‘It’s three blessed thousand guineas! And if you don’t get in first, old Ralph Addicott might be down there spinning them the same story.’ She added, ‘Kitty Kelly’s not going to look down her nose at a man with that much money, is she? Now brush your hair. And put that wretched cigarette out.’





CHAPTER 24



AT FIRST TOM thought he was imagining the shape of the Windward Spirit as it approached, lashed by the tail end of the cyclone which had been whirling down the West Australian coast. He called to Isabel, to see if she saw it too. They had been back on Janus only a week. No boat was due again until the middle of March, when it was scheduled to take them to the mainland before their transfer to Point Moore. Perhaps it had engine trouble on the way from another job? Perhaps Ralph or Bluey had been injured in all the wild weather?

The swell was treacherous, and it had taken all the skill of the crew to dock the vessel without smashing it into the jetty. ‘Any port in a storm, eh, Ralph?’ Tom shouted above the wind as the boat came alongside, but the old man did not respond.

When, instead of Bluey emerging from the back of the boat, Tom recognised the craggy, timeless features of Neville Whittnish, his confusion deepened. Four policemen followed.

‘Crikey, Ralph! What’s all this?’

Again Ralph failed to reply. A chill crept through Tom. He looked up the slope and saw Isabel edging back, out of sight of the jetty. One of the policemen staggered down the gangway like a drunk, and took a moment to adjust to the stationary dock. The others followed.

‘Thomas Edward Sherbourne?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Sergeant Spragg, Albany police. This is my assistant, Constable Strugnell. Sergeant Knuckey and Constable Garstone you may recognise from Point Partageuse station.’

‘Can’t say I do.’

‘Mr Sherbourne, we’re here about Frank Roennfeldt and his daughter Grace.’

It was a king-hit, knocking the breath out of him for a moment. His neck was stiff, his face suddenly waxy-pale. The waiting was over. It was like finally getting the signal for a hop-over after days of waiting in the trenches.

The sergeant fished something from his pocket – a piece of cardboard that flipped about in the blustery wind. He held it steady between both hands.

‘Do you recognise this, sir?’

Tom took in the photograph of the rattle. He glanced up at the cliff as he considered his reply: Isabel was gone. Time balanced on a fulcrum – there would be no going back after this.

He gave a great sigh, as though relieved of a physical weight, and hung his head, eyes closed. He felt a hand on his shoulder. It was Ralph’s: ‘Tom. Tom, son … What the bloody hell’s been going on out here?’



While the police question Tom alone, Isabel retreats to the little crosses near the cliff. The rosemary bushes move in and out of focus, like her thoughts. She is shaking as she goes over the scene: the shortest of the policemen, the youngest, had been very solemn as he showed her the photograph, and could not have failed to see her eyes widen and her breath stop at the sight.