They went to the mosquito net veil and looked through. The camp in front of the plane was empty except for Barney, who was carefully positioning more branches on the fire. Everyone else was high up the slope, and as Tom craned his neck, he could see why and what they were cheering.

There was a bonfire on top of the ridge, burning erratically but producing a thick pall of black smoke that drifted straight up into the still air. He looked at his watch—it was early afternoon.

Quietly, Alice said, “Well I guess if anything’s likely to attract attention…”

“It’s luggage.” It was Shen, who’d come into the cabin behind them. “All the things they don’t think we’ll need, people’s suitcases, clothes, things like that.”

“But why?”

Shen shrugged. “People were complaining, saying they should be doing something to attract rescuers, so Joel came up with that idea. And I suppose there’s a possibility it’ll work.”

“But?”

“But they’ve been working in the full heat for the last few hours, carrying it all up the hill, and that means they’ve been drinking more. The water might last until the end of tomorrow if we’re lucky, but…”

Alice said, “Did you mention that to Joel?”

“Yes. I did. Apparently we won’t need water if we get rescued.”

George cursed under his breath. Alice grabbed her backpack and headed into one of the bathrooms. Shen was still looking at Tom as if waiting for him to respond or come up with a decision on what to do next.

On the one hand, Tom could almost appreciate why Joel had come up with the idea of building a bonfire. For one thing, Joel thought the skies above were full of planes searching for them, and maybe they were. For another, he’d been responding to disquiet among the people he thought he was leading. But it was still an insane decision to have people doing hard labor during the hottest part of the day, and to use up the water like that.

“Shen, you and George start separating the food and drinks, half to leave behind, half to take with us. Start going through the equipment too, figuring out what we’ll need, what we won’t. Once everyone’s back down I’ll tell them.”

George nodded with what appeared to be relief, and Shen smiled—both with the air of people who’d been waiting for Tom to take control. He felt like telling them that he was doing nothing of the sort, but in a way he was—he wasn’t stepping up as leader, just taking control of his own escape and trying to insulate himself against Joel’s stupidity.