Grady sniffed.
Jaqui cast him a suspicious glance and offered him an out. ‘Dr Reece, Doug wants you in the control room,’ she told him. And then, as he turned to leave, she pressed something into his hand. ‘Don’t forget your hanky.’
‘So where the hell is he?’
‘There’s nothing else we can do, Grady.’ Doug, their search and rescue chief, was looking grim as Grady emerged from his encounter with Lucy. ‘We have to assume all the missing are drowned. The Kooris were all on the beach when the wave hit and we can assume Hamish was on the beach as well. There’s been bodies washed in but if they were caught in currents, we need to accept the fact that we’re never going to find them.’
‘You’re still searching?’
‘It’s been twenty-four hours. Surviving in the water for that long…’
‘It’s possible. Especially if they caught hold of debris.’
‘Grady, it’s been a really calm day. The water’s like a pond. Our visibility is great. We’re checking every piece of debris in a twenty-mile radius-’
‘Make it thirty.’
‘Grady…’
‘These are kids,’ Grady said. ‘Kids.’
‘Grady, let’s keep the emotion out of it,’ Doug told him, giving him a curious glance. ‘We’re doing the best we can.’
‘And long term?’ he asked dully.
‘Services are non-existent,’ Doug told him. ‘No power, no water, no sewerage. No money and no political clout. There’s no long term for this island.’
That was blunt. Grady dug his hands in his pockets and stared out into the late afternoon light. From this point high on the cricket ground, he could see the devastation the wave had caused. There was so much destruction. To rebuild…
Morag would have to leave.
It was personal. He found his hands were clenched into fists deep in his pockets and Doug was staring at him as if he didn’t recognise him.
‘You OK?’
‘Yeah.’ He grunted an assent. ‘Yeah, I am.’
‘The powers that be want a health statement from you,’ Doug told him. ‘No water, no sewerage… You know the risks.’
‘And the answers I give will mean this island goes under.’
‘This island went under yesterday,’ Doug said bluntly, and then looked skyward as a helicopter appeared on the horizon and started its descent. ‘Here’s the chopper for the girl. Maybe we could move some more people out on the same flight. The evacuation has to start some time.’
‘Not yet,’ Grady growled. A group of men were making there way up from the township and he recognised Marcus, the unofficial spokesmen for the townspeople. He was walking slowly, his shoulders slumped. Like a man defeated, Grady thought. Hell.
‘Let’s get everyone out who’s medically unfit at least,’ Doug urged, and Grady thought back to the old lady dying slowly and unnecessarily back at the Koori settlement.
‘Let’s not,’ he muttered. ‘Not yet.’
He paced.
The helicopter landed and took off again, half-empty. From where Grady stood he had watched as Jaqui and Morag had seen Lucy on board, handed her medical notes over to the flight team and then stood back while the chopper had roared off toward the mainland.
He watched as Jaqui turned and gave Morag a hug.
He wasn’t the only one this situation was getting to, he figured. His team was trained to be dispassionate. Trained to get in hard, do what had to be done and get out again.
In two or three more days they’d have made a decision about evacuating the island. The place would be empty and he’d have moved on.
And Morag?
She’d have moved on, too. Back to Sydney?
He couldn’t see it.
Did he want to see it?
It didn’t matter, he thought heavily. It wasn’t going to happen. He and Morag… No and no and no…
Jaqui was down there, hugging her. Damn, why wasn’t he down there, hugging her?
Because he knew that if he touched her, he’d commit himself.
Hell, Reece! He gave himself a sharp mental kick. He didn’t do commitment. At least, not to women who were caught up with small boys and islanders and who were going to blame him for every decision that was made about this island and…
This was really deep water.
He dug his hands still further into his pockets. Morag was walking back to the tents. There might not be a medical need back in the hospital beds, but there was certainly an emotional need. From the moment she’d appeared back from the settlement the rest of the med team had been telling Morag who desperately needed to talk to her. She was burdened as no woman should be, he thought savagely. How dared the islanders put such a load on her shoulders?
‘She’s quite a woman,’ Jaqui said softly, and he jumped. He’d been watching Morag, and hadn’t noticed his partner come up behind him.
‘She’s devastated,’ he said, almost to himself. ‘This island’s finished.’
‘It’d take a huge commitment to keep it going. One doctor’s not going to cut it.’
‘Not only one doctor. The infrastructure…’
‘I know.’ Like him, Jaqui was looking down at the ruined town. ‘Did you know my husband’s head of the Public Works Department in Sydney West? I’ve been talking to him about the vast effort it’d take to rebuild this place.’
‘Huge.’
‘It’d be such a project…’ She cast him a look that was as curious as the one Doug had given him. ‘How did you go with the Kooris?’
‘They’re…’ He hesitated and then shrugged. Why not say it? ‘They’re fantastic. They take our medicine on their terms.’
‘They wouldn’t let me near,’ Jaqui told him. ‘But, oh, I wish…’ Her voice trailed off and he knew exactly what she wished. He was wishing it himself.
‘It’s not going to happen,’ he said roughly. ‘They’ll be relocated.’
‘I’d imagine they’ll refuse to be relocated,’ Jaqui said. ‘They’ll stay here with no medical facilities at all, and all the good Morag’s done will be undone.’
‘It’s none of our business.’
‘No,’ Jaqui said, with another curious sideways glance. ‘Of course it’s not. How can it be?’
There were still a couple of hours of daylight left. He could go back into the hospital and help Morag-but for most of the things she was doing she didn’t need help. She’d be adjusting pain medication, talking through terrors, facing the future.
With her people…
The thought was unsettling and Grady wasn’t sure how to handle it.
At least there was other work to be done. He took himself down the hill to where an army of people was sifting through sodden belongings, searching for some trace of a past that had been washed away.
Doug overtook him there and together they checked the smashed infrastructure as Doug talked him through the impossibility of rebuilding.
‘OK, it’s not possible,’ Grady said at last. He gazed at an elderly woman in the ruins of what had obviously been
