The girl didn’t reply. I guessed she was seven or eight. She had a round face with small features that suggested she would one day grow up to be an attractive woman.

I wondered if she could be Solano’s daughter. Had he had an affair with a local woman and been charged with raising the illegitimate child? Or was it more sinister than this? Had he kidnapped her and held her prisoner here until he died? If so, how long had she been on the island? Her clothes weren’t in tatters, but they weren’t clean either.

I opened my mouth, then shut it. I wasn’t good with kids, wasn’t one of those people who could converse with them using falsetto voices and fake laughs.

I thought about getting Pita, but I discarded this option immediately, knowing the girl would be gone when I returned.

“What are you doing under there?” I said—then realized she likely didn’t speak English. “Er… Que haces…haciendo?”

The girl swallowed. Her eyes darted to the door, then back to me. She was going to make a run for it. And what would I do? Let her go? Grab her? Close the door, trap her in the room, and shout for help?

No, no shouting. Jesus and Nitro would never let me live that down.

“Umm… Puedes entender? Mi español... mal…”

The girl said something so softly if I hadn’t seen her lips moving I might not have believed she’d spoken.

“¿Qué?” I said.

“Yes,” she said louder, but still not much more than a skeletal whisper.

“You understand me?”

She nodded.

“So you speak English?”

“We study it at school.”

I hadn’t known English was studied in Mexican schools at such a young age, and I said, “Where’s your school?”

“Balcones de San Mateo.”

“Is that in Mexico City?”

“Naucalpan.”

Which was north west of the city. “So what are you doing way down here on this island?”

“I—” She bit her lip. Tears shimmered in her eyes, then spilled down her cheeks.

“Hey, hey,” I said. “It’s okay. It doesn’t matter.” I lifted my baseball cap with one hand and ran the other through my hair. “What’s your name?”

“Rosa,” she said.

“Okay, look, Rosa. Why don’t you come out of there?”

“I don’t want to.”

“You can come meet my friends.”

“Your friends?”

“Yeah, I’m here with…” I had to mentally count. “Five of them.”

She sniffled, then rubbed her leaking nose and eyes with the back of her hand. “Are they nice?”

“Two of them are tools. But the other three are nice.”

“Tools?”

“Like, uh… Do you know what a dork is?”

She nodded.

“Well, they’re like that. Dorks. One’s called Muscles.”

“Is he strong?”

“He thinks he is.”

“Maybe he can protect us?”

“Protect us?”

She bit her lip and didn’t say anything.