“Tourism is in the crapper. Who’s coming here now except creepers who want a death tour of the exclusion zone? This is our chance to change that.”

“How?”

“By changing the story. Let Montserrat be known for something besides the volcano. This guy was rich, Jarty. All his friends were rich—and famous, too. There’ll be a lot of eyes on this.”

LeFleur was taken aback. “People died in that raft, Lenny. You don’t build tourism off of that.”

Sprague tilted his head. “How do you know people died in that raft?”

“I . . . don’t,” LeFleur stammered. “I assumed—”

“Don’t assume, OK? Just bring me the guy who found it.”

* * *

When LeFleur pulled up to his office, he was thinking about the notebook and the pages he had read. He thought about the stranger on the raft refusing at first to save the others.

I can only do that when everyone here believes I am who I say I am.

LeFleur balked at that part. But then, he’d stopped relying on God right after his daughter died. There was no place in his mind for a benevolent force that wasn’t benevolent when it came to a four-year-old. Praying was a waste. Church was a waste. Even worse. It was a weakness. A crutch that let you dump your misfortune on some make-believe scale that would balance when you died and reached a “better” Heaven. What crap. The way LeFleur saw it now, you either ran from a volcano or you stayed and shook a fist at it.

As he entered his office, Katrina was hanging up the phone. She seemed upset.

“There you are. I’ve been trying to call you!”

“I turned my cell off. A reporter was bugging me.”

“The man is gone.”

“Rom?”

“He never told me his name. He sat on the porch for two hours. I offered him some ginger beer, and he said OK. But when I brought it out, he was gone.”

“Where did he go?”

“I don’t know, Jarty. He was barefoot. Where could he go? I tried to call you ten times!”

LeFleur raced out the door. “I’ll find him,” he hollered over his shoulder. Katrina got worked up easily; he didn’t need that now. He hoisted the briefcase into the passenger seat and hopped into the jeep. Rom. He was beginning to wish he’d never met the guy.

Sea

We saw an airplane today.

Geri was the first to spot it. We are so weak that most of the day we just lie under the canopy, drifting in and out of sleep. Geri had dragged herself to the rear of the raft for another futile check on the solar still. She looked at the sky, guarding her eyes with her hand.

“Plane,” she rasped.

“What did you say?” Lambert mumbled.

Geri pointed up.