The police boat moves toward Badger Island. It enters the small bay watched over by Jack’s hut. His is the only hut on this side of the island, and the only one inhabited. Its occupation is betrayed by streaks of chimney smoke that stain the retreating sea fog above it. The hut is nestled amongst thick, green coast wattle above a small granite cliff. It is comfortable in its isolation, just like its owner. Both are unaccustomed to being disturbed.

The sound of approaching engines invades Jack’s dream and he wakes, unsettled. The police boat circles around his bay, arrogantly declaring its presence. It is large, white and luxurious, with tinted windows and gaudy blue lettering on its side. It looks foreign amid its surroundings of ancient lithic structures, protruding from the mirrored sea. Or perhaps it is the islands — Jack’s island in particular — that are out of place: trapped in another era and detached from the modern world.

Naked and bleary-eyed, Jack creeps to the window and peers over the sill. He watches the boat power its way across to the jetty. The party in blue take their time to disembark and hop across the boulders before disappearing into the tunnel of overhanging ti-tree leading away from the point. Once, the mere sight of police uniforms would have seized Jack’s insides. Now, after years in isolation — years of reflection on the life he abandoned — he is impervious to their aura of fear and the threat of their authority. They are as redundant in his world as he is in theirs.

Jack takes his time to dress before leaving the hut. He observes the visitors soundlessly from his hiding place within a thatch of dense boobialla. There are five of them: three men and two women. The men stay at the edge of Jack’s vision like ghosts. His eyes seek out the women, whom he studies with primal fascination. He sniffs desperately at the air for new scents. After years on the island, Jack has been cleansed of the pollutants that dulled his senses for much of his earlier life. He has become finely tuned to his environment. He has developed the ability to differentiate between native and foreign smells and can isolate and concentrate them in his mind.

As the police approach his hut, Jack catches whiffs of orange peel, crusty bread, washing powder, deodorant, lanolin and engine fumes. As if in response to some inner desire, a spiral of wind delivers to him a fleeting waft of femaleness: warm and perfumed and laced with the promise of contentment. With an impulsive shudder, Jack imprints this essence into his mind, to savor for as long as possible. Such small and once-insignificant things he no longer takes for granted.

Jack watches them leave. A white envelope on his rustic table, scattered footprints on the dusty track and an ephemeral trail in the ocean is all they leave behind.