“I’m going to be sick,” gasps Louie, turning away and vomiting the entire contents of his stomach.
Afterwards they give up. They managed to roll the body over once or twice, and the ocean has half covered it.
“The sea will take it away,” murmurs Louie, wiping his mouth. “With the tide it will go away again. Let’s just not stay here.”
Because they feel even dirtier now than when they first went into the water, when they go back up the house they rinse off with a bottle of fresh water; they have a big enough supply, and tonight they’ll drink orange juice.
“Yuck, yuck,” says Perrine, over and over.
“It was disgusting,” whispers Louie, remembering the swollen skin he saw briefly under the tarp.
They haven’t stopped shaking, although they are standing by the walls of the house, away from the sea—but still too near, and they’d rather be where it’s safe, as if the corpse might suddenly pop up next to them otherwise.
“Who was it?” asks Noah. “Was it Liam?”
“Of course not, don’t say such a thing.”
The little boy shrugs.
“Well, it could have been.”
“Stop talking nonsense.”
“It wasn’t someone we know, then?”
“Of course not.”
“So they’re not dead.”
“I don’t think so, no.”
Louie was right: by morning, the body has disappeared. They walk around the island to make sure the tarp didn’t get caught on a root or in an eddy, and they sigh with relief when they come back. They feel as if the smell is still there with them, in their noses, as if it is firmly planted inside them. They rub their noses, blow them. Even while they’re drinking their cold chocolate at breakfast and eating their melba toast, the memory of the smell is disturbing.
The weather has turned drizzly, and they look out the windows at the sullen sky, and the sea they cannot imagine swimming in and that is beginning to turn rough. In addition, the hens they let out early that morning have come back, a sure sign the day is turning stormy. At the end of the corridor they’re squawking, each one louder than the other. In the room where Louie locks his birds the children find eggs laid in odd little places, as if the hens were trying to hide them, thinks Noah; for the children every day is like a treasure hunt. It reminds them how at Easter Madie and Pata hid eggs in the garden, in the grass, under rocks, behind trees, for whoever could find the most—but those eggs were hard-boiled, painted all sorts of colors, decorated with drawings and stickers, not the white or brown eggs that break if you squeeze them too tight when you pick them up and which leave big gooey driblets all down your fingers.
Perrine makes a new pancake batter. Their eyes no longer glow with delight: eggs, pancakes, noodles, they’ve had their fill already for eight days. Even this is boring. They dream of grilled meat, the smell of rosemary and thyme, red peppers roasted on the barbecue. Noah nibbles on a potato left over from Louie’s escapade and grumbles, “I like sautéed potatoes better.”
“There aren’t any left,” says Louie.
“There isn’t anything left, here. It’s stupid.”
Again they let their gazes drift to the horizon—or to where they suppose it must be, they can’t see very far for the curtains of fine rain, that faint drizzle you don’t think will get you very wet which gradually soaks you to the bone, freezing your skin and your clothes. Wind, clouds, rain. Noah shouts, clenching his fists as he leans toward the window.
“Wind, clouds, rain! I’m sick of it!”
And that shape all the way at the end of what is visible out there on the ocean, a black mass half hidden by sudden cascading downpours, Noah frowns, stiffens. Takes a step back and looks anxiously at the others.
“I think there’s another dead body.”
“A what?” asks Perrine.
“A dead body like yesterday. Only it’s far away.”
Louie shoves the little boy aside and takes his place at the window.
“How can you see that from here?”
And then:
“Oh!”
“What?” says Perrine.
“Is that what it is?” says Noah.
Louie turns to them, frenetic.
“No! It’s a boat!”
All three of them cluster suddenly at the window, squint, shout.
“Yes, it’s a boat!” exclaims Noah.
“We have to call them!” says Perrine, fidgeting with impatience.
They run out of the house, mindless of the rain, scramble down to the shore and wave their arms.
“Hey!” they cry, sweeping their arms over their heads and jumping up and down.
“Over here!”
“Here, here!”
Perrine sobs:
“They can’t see us.”
Now and again it looks as if the vessel has disappeared behind the clouds and is going away, and then it reappears for a few seconds, at the mercy of the waves and the spray; they wait for the square shape to turn and head toward them, to come closer, but it doesn’t.
“A fire!” cries Louie. “We have to build a fire!”
“But it’s raining,” says Perrine.
“We have to try! Noah, you and Perrine go and get some kindling in the barn.”
“And you?”
“I’m going to take a burning log from the stove. That way it will work.”
He rushes to the house, lifts some brands with the tongs and drops them into a metal bucket, slips a box of matches in his pocket. When he comes back, Perrine and Noah are there with wood and pieces of cardboard; Noah gushes, Cardboard will burn really well!
Louie tips the bucket out on the ground. The embers hiss in the rain, it makes a funny sound, some are going out already.
“Give me the cardboard!” shouts Louie, tearing it up to get the fire started again. “Stand around it to shelter it from the wind!”
They kneel on the ground, still watching the shadow in the far corner of the sea as it sails in a disorderly dance, they go on screaming, one after the other, so that the boat will hear them, until Louie gives up: No point shouting, we have to make the fire, just the fire. A few flames rise, licking the cardboard. Noah yells.
“It’s started, it’s started!”
Louie adds some wood, a little bit, not too much, leans closer to listen to the tiny fire, wishes it would crackle; for the time being only the cardboard is burning.
“Come on,” he says, urging it on.
“There’s smoke!” says Noah, clapping his hands.
“But this is nothing, they won’t see it, it’s not big enough. If we don’t have big flames it won’t work.”
Perrine leans down, blows on the embers to kindle them. The boys do likewise, hair sticking to their brow. Louie has tears in his eyes, he remembers how he helped Pata burn branches over the years; Pata would grumble, Fire never starts the way you want it to. Either it’s hot, and it burns too quickly, or it’s cloudy and you can’t get it going.
Smoke rises from the embers as they die one by one. Louie hears the hissing sound, carefully watches the pieces of cardboard that are still burning. He cups his hands around the twigs that don’t want to catch, the rain snuffing the sparks the moment they appear. Noah has already given up, he stands up straight and turns to the sea. He goes on shouting, his little voice covered by gusts of wind and the roaring of the sea, there’s nothing else to do, so he tries. Louie cannot even feel the warmth of the flames on his hands anymore, cupped over the brands. He won’t give up. He shouts again.
“Come on!”
Suddenly an idea flashes through him: the lawnmower fuel, in the jerry can. Pata used to take a little to get a fire started, when he’d been struggling for half an hour with his leaves and his green branches and nothing happened. Louie leaps to his feet, runs to the barn, returns quickly, the jerrycan banging against his legs. He remembers it’s dangerous. He steps back, removes the cap to pour out a little fuel, holding the can at arm’s length.