Chapter Forty-five – Jack
Chapter Forty-five
JACK
A buzzing sound jolts me awake. At first, I think Clara has left the downstairs door open again and a swarm of bees have somehow found their way inside. Then I realise that it’s my mobile jumping up and down on the nightstand like a hyperactive Izzie begging for more banana.
I swipe to answer. ‘Hello?’ I croak.
‘Jack, you need to get down here.’
‘Keith? Are you okay?’ Already out of bed, I grab a shirt and a pair of shorts. I always worry about him staying in the cabin down on the oyster farm. It’s too draughty for his old bones, but he refuses to let me help him get a place of his own.
‘It’s not me. It’s the pearl oysters; there’s been a robbery.’
‘Oh, shit. Okay, I’ll be right there.’
Just a few days ago we had spoken about installing surveillance cameras, but we decided that with Keith basically living on the premises, the risk of theft was low. I tiptoe past Clara’s room, then down the stairs and past the dining room where Hannah is sleeping. We set up her bed in there a few months ago, once it became too difficult for us to help her navigate the stairs.
I borrow Beryl’s general store golf cart and make it to the oyster farm in record time. Keith is sitting on the sand at the shoreline with his head in his hands.
‘How many, do you think?’ I ask.
‘We’ll have to wait until daylight to know for sure, but I reckon five hundred-odd.’
‘Shit.’ I collapse down next to him. ‘Right when they were ready for harvest, too.’
‘Yup,’ Keith says, staring out into the distance. ‘Fucking bastards.’ The stricken look on his face tells me he’s already done the sums.
‘At least that’s not all of them,’ I try to reassure him, slinging an arm around his shoulder.
‘Good as,’ he says.
He’s not wrong. If it is five hundred nets, that’s over half our stock.
Guilt seeps through my warming skin. Still, I don’t mention that I saw a suss-looking boat here late yesterday. I could have stopped them, or at the very least written down their rego. I can’t believe this is happening.
By the following week, the first reports of oyster poisoning surface, originating from an upmarket seafood restaurant in Sydney. The contaminated oysters are pearls. Next comes the Holibob article.
I’m with Keith, scrubbing our salvaged stock, when he receives the call. I watch as his expression pales.
‘We’re being shut down,’ he whispers, the phone slipping from his grasp and clattering to the floor.