The fort was little more than a few stone walls now. At some point someone had hauled a couple of First World War ship’s guns up the hill, and their long white barrels still pointed cautiously at the Atlantic. A few meters below them were their ancestors: a pair of bulbous Victorian cannons also keeping watch. Kane propped himself against the fort’s remains and studied the sleeping town, then the sea itself, wondering how many had stood here gazing out. Men wrecked or abandoned; men discovering new worlds, new parts of existence, then setting up guns to protect them.

Kane slid his way back down. He needed a car. The museum where he’d been told he could hire one was on the road out of town: a long, flat building painted the same flesh color as the rock behind it. It was still only seven a.m. and he didn’t expect it to be open, but the door swung when Kane pushed.

Artifacts and display cases crowded the main room. An old US jeep sat in the corner beneath a ship’s bell: Roebuck—wrecked off Ascension, 1701. Huge turtle shells the size of shields lined one wall. Shelves sagged under the weight of telegraph equipment and rusted cannon balls.

Kane stepped inside, heard someone vacuuming at the back.

“Hello,” he called. The vacuuming continued. He turned the light on, studied the sepia photographs: Eastern Telegraph Company staff in high socks and stern mustaches. A game of cricket in front of St. Mary’s, circa 1920. Several photographs showed turtles tipped onto their backs, ready for slaughter. Then you reached the Second World War: American GIs staring out with guarded smiles and cigarettes behind their ears and what may have been the faintest flicker of bemusement. The BBC engineers arrived in the first color images, with shaggy hair and tinted glasses, ready to bring the voice of Britain to Africa and South America. There was nothing about GCHQ or the NSA.

An office in the corner contained a lot of cardboard files and an old PC. Beside it was a bookcase advertising the Ascension Island Book Swap. If you take a book, please replace it. Warped copies of Dickens, Stephen King, Tom Clancy. The bottom shelf had a stack of issues from a local newspaper called the Islander, each comprising a single, folded sheet. The top copy was dated yesterday. Marine Protection Area Approved; New Pier at Georgetown Delayed.