‘I can pass it to you if you like.’
‘Thanks.’
As Isla held out her hand a sob erupted. I mustn’t lose it, she told herself. Keep it together. There will be an explanation. You just have to find it.
‘Here.’
She felt the phone in her palm. ‘Hello Charlie.’ She greeted her intelligent personal assistant. ‘Ring Captain Bob Brown for me.’
An electric voice intoned, ‘Calling Bob Brown, mobile.’
In the brief silence, she could hear nothing but her heart hammering, feel sweat starting to spring all over her body. Dear God, what was going on? The sob rose and this time, it took an immense effort of will to swallow it down.
It rang three times before it went to Bob’s message service. ‘Hi Bob, just Isla here. I seem to be having a…’ Her voice wobbled and she took a huge breath of air ‘…bit of a problem with my sight. I just wanted to know if anyone else was too. That’s all. Bye.’
She held on to the phone. She was trembling.
‘You say you lose your sight over the night?’
‘Yes,’ she whispered.
‘You need a hospital. You must go.’
‘I…’ Isla put her hand to her face, ran her fingers over her cheeks, her eyebrows, her eyelids.
‘Are you in pain?’
‘No.’
‘This is an emergency. My auntie lost her sight very suddenly one day. She had a stroke. I will ring the hotel doctor straight away.’
Isla heard the maid making a telephone call but she couldn’t concentrate. A stroke? Oh my God, did that mean she might not see again? She’d never heard of anyone losing their sight overnight. What was wrong with her? Would she recover? Would she need an operation? Would her sight return as fast as it went?
‘The doctor is coming. Now, you let me help you get dressed.’
Isla didn’t see she had any choice but to trust her. Besides, the maid was incredibly gentle, and made murmuring soothing noises as she helped her, like she would to a panicky child.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Zamira.’
‘Thank you, Zamira.’
After the doctor had seen Isla, he agreed she should go to hospital. ‘It might be a transient ischaemic attack but best you get to hospital quick smart. They can do ultrasonography and an MRI along with some blood tests.’
‘It couldn’t be connected to aerotoxicity, could it?’ she asked him.
‘I don’t know enough about it, I’m afraid.’ He was brisk. ‘Now, Zamira tells me she’ll go with you, is that okay?’
Isla realised she had to trust someone and since Zamira seemed the best bet of the day, she said, ‘Okay.’
Twenty-four hours later all the tests had been done. She’d been questioned and prodded and poked, and she was still blind.
18
Tuesday crawled past. Lucy kept looking at her watch as if it would suddenly be 4pm and she could grab her phone and ring her father.
Hi Dad, it’s Lucy here. Yup, your daughter. I’m fine, thanks, how about you? Oh, really? I’m so glad you’ve had such a fantastic life without us, you selfish bastard…
Desperate to distract herself, Lucy tracked down Teflon Tom’s phone number through Reg the publican (‘Just this once, love, I’m not a telephone directory, aw-right?’) but when she rang it went straight to Tomas’s messaging service. She dithered about leaving a message or not before deciding to be straight. She told him who she was and why she was ringing, and that although calling him was part of a police investigation it would still be great to see him.
Hanging up, still wanting diversion, she went to see the tech guy who had Kaitlyn’s computer. Skinny, glasses, hoodie, he was the living stereotype of a computer nerd. Even his name was nerdish: Albin Kirk. With thoughts of Captain Kirk from Star Trek in her mind she almost asked if he was a Trekkie but decided not to go there in case he was insulted. See? she told an imaginary Magellan. I can be as sensitive as the next person if I want to.
‘Any luck?’
‘You have no idea how many emails the woman received.’
Apparently Kaitlyn had set up Google Alerts for anything to do with flight EG220.
‘There’s stuff about the bodies, survivors, witnesses, suspects, Boeings, assembly lines, twin-engine aircraft, flight recorders… you name it, she had it coming in.’
Curious, Lucy had a look over Albin’s shoulder. ‘How many in a day?’
‘Ten years ago, maybe five hundred, but over time she refined her searches so today she gets around a dozen or so.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like…’ He swivelled the screen round so she could see an email, a link to the BBC.
EG220 Morocco plane crash: Dead remembered amid tears.
It was dated Monday 11 February. The anniversary of the crash.
The next email alert was headed: ARINC Standards are prepared by the Airlines Electronic Engineering Committee (AEEC).
‘Anything between her and Ricky?’
‘No. They communicated through texts. Do you want to see?’
‘Sure.’
Ricky’s messages were practical, more about arrangements, but Kaitlyn’s were flirtatious and fun and filled with emojis.
Hey you
