Stuart moved to give them a slow sweep of the land entrance. There were a series of steps crudely carved out of the rock’s incline; effectively a ladder up and over the artfully placed branches. From outside, it would simply look like shrubs growing in a shady crevice. Like the water entrance, it would be impossible to detect unless you witnessed anyone using it.
‘Ah,’ said Dana, suddenly comprehending. ‘I’d been wondering why the canoe was there, if he’d been to Jensen’s Store. But I get it now.’
Bill looked across quizzically.
‘I mean, he used that land entrance and walked cross-country to Jensen’s Store. He didn’t need to canoe to the southern end of the lake and go on foot. The store is west, on that side of the lake. He could walk it. That’s why the canoe is still in situ.’
As Stuart made his way back to the entrance, Mike pointed at the screen. ‘Did you see the poles on that flysheet? Same paint as the canoe. Why paint the poles?’
It came to Dana. ‘Sunlight. Glinting off the metal poles. He’d be paranoid about being seen from above. When I talked about his home not being visible from the air, and that’s why he wouldn’t use a tent, he smiled. That’s what he meant. He is using a tent, but it can’t be seen from the air, not even if the sun caught it.’
Stuart was now back at the entrance. There were two metal spikes, also painted, driven into the threshold wall, with water bags suspended from them. A canvas camping chair was parked in the sand, next to a milk crate that served as a table.
Stuart moved in close. ‘Just for you, Dana. His reading habits.’
Several books were piled perfectly on the crate – Clavell, Hammett, Dostoyevsky.
Dana grunted. ‘That’s ironic. I was going to give him Crime and Punishment to read here, but I thought it was too cruel.’
Stuart stepped gingerly past the chair and into the chamber. His torchlight was strong but the beam was narrow; it swept across items in a way that was almost too quick to take in. ‘Yeah, this probably isn’t coming across well, so I’ll give you what video I can and talk you through it. We’ll get the tech boys out from the city with the heavy gear, now we know what we’re about.
‘On this side are towers of plastic boxes. All airtight. Hard to see what’s in them, but uh… yeah, first aid in that one. I can see bandages and stuff. This one has crockery, I think. Plates, spoons, dishes. Can’t tell what’s in the bottom one. Maybe tools – he’d need hammers, pliers, that kind of thing.’ Stuart shuffled across to the next tower. ‘Clothes. Hmmm. Maybe in order of season. Probably changes the sequence of the tower every few months. On top here are sweaters, heavy-looking trousers, maybe a coat. The lower ones have T-shirts, I think. Yeah, he has a little annual wardrobe thing going on.’
The next tower was slightly apart from the other two; jammed up against a wall of the chamber. These containers were transparent while the others were opaque. Above them, a series of rough-hewn alcoves had been cut into the rock. Maybe fifteen centimetres deep and twenty centimetres of space on them, they were occupied by perfect pyramids of tins.
‘Oh, food. This is the pantry. Nice and dry, and away from the water even if it floods a bit. These beauties float, anyway, so he’d be fine in an emergency. I can’t see’ – another drunken loop upwards and back, making the three of them slightly queasy – ‘nope, no hole in the roof anywhere, no damp runs. This place is watertight. And look how crazy neat he is. Not a qualified medical opinion, of course, boss.’
He pushed the torch closer to the shelves and containers. ‘Canned stuff, mainly. Tinned fruit, cans of vegetables, that beans-and-sausage seems like a favourite. Sweet tooth – chocolate, grain bars. Guy ate like a king. This store would last eight, ten weeks easy.’
Bill grunted. ‘How did he get all that stuff out there?’
‘The clothes?’ asked Dana. ‘Or the food?’
‘Clothes and camping gear, I get. Standard hiking procedure. I mean several months of canned goods. They’re heavy.’
Dana thought how methodical Nathan would be, how he’d think slowly and deliberately.
‘One piece at a time, like the Johnny Cash song. Each time, he acquires more than he needs for a week or two and stores the extra. Over time, he builds up a cache. Then he manages it using sell-by date; probably has a system where the near-overdue stuff is at the top of each container.’
Bill gave her a raised eyebrow that said, That’s exactly how you’d do it. Dana gave a half-grin, and they both looked back at the screen.
Stuart turned and scanned the chamber. It was only three metres across yet the light seemed to die in it.
‘Stu, what’s that to the left?’ It was out of Mike’s mouth before he realised.
Dana caught it. ‘Yes, Stu, travel forward in time to get Mikey’s message, then go back to your own time and turn left.’ She shucked him in the shoulder. ‘Seriously, why isn’t he doing that, Mikey?’
‘Boyish enthusiasm. My bad, people,’ he said with a raised palm.
All three laughed when Stuart did indeed turn left.
‘That’s freaky,’ said Dana.
Stuart tracked to the corner, where a sheet had been pinned up against a wall using a small hook. He dragged it back by one corner and looked beyond. ‘Ah, bedroom.’
Dana wondered briefly why Nathan would want to shut off the bedroom, in an isolated cave in the middle of nowhere, known only to him. She assumed it was simply Nathan being Nathan – privacy to the power of privacy; solitude squared.
The room contained an inner tent – the little brother of the flysheet outside. Pegged out and tied off, it was fully zipped up. Stuart peered through one of the mesh windows. There was a bed inside. He moved across, opened the zip door and crouched at the entrance.
The bed was a single blow-up mattress, partly covered by a thick sleeping bag. Milk crates kept it off the ground. Stuart bent so they could see underneath it – an insulating mat and what looked like raw wool bundles to stop the worst of the damp seeping up. To prevent it sliding around on top of the crates, it was largely hemmed in by more containers, which seemed to store books and food cans.
Stuart’s torch beam landed on some maritime flares. ‘Not sure why he’d need these. Maybe if he got too ill to carry on, he could let these babies go and hope to be saved? Dunno. That’s one for you to work out, Dana.’
No, thought Dana, it would never be for that. She couldn’t imagine Nathan doing such a thing. He would literally rather die.
One container had the lid slightly ajar – batteries, spare torches, pens, what looked like a journal. Dana’s heart yelped with empathy – she would kill anyone looking at her journal. She physically squirmed when Stuart knelt down and picked it up – as if he were holding a toddler over a fire. He held the book out of view; in the corner of the screen they could see pages flicking and they all strained to see what was written.
‘Some kind of diary? I’ll bag and tag it for you.’
The camera looked back to the bed. A radio, with a set of earphones trailing from it to the pillow. Even out there, she thought, in the midst of the wilderness, Nathan was so paranoid about discovery he would listen only with ear buds. Dana shivered.
Stuart stood again and looked around. In one corner of the chamber there appeared to be a fold in the walls. It turned out to be another semi-chamber, the furthest part of the cave from the entrance. A hole had been dug, and Stuart peered into it.
‘Now, I’d been wondering since we got here how he did this. Toilet and waste disposal. Without attracting wildlife. I’ll need to explore this a bit more to work out how he’s doing it, but I’ll spare you the footage. Let’s say he has a system, and it looks like he was running out of room.’