“You’re right about that,” Jaime said. “We can’t get to North Brother Island.”

“Why not? Isn’t there a ferry or something?”

“No,” said Jaime.

“A water taxi.”

“No.”

“We could rent a boat, if we could get someone to do it for us. Though that’s going to cost a fortune. I have some money I saved up. Not sure it will be enough.”

“No.”

“No?” Tess said. “What do you mean, no?”

“There are no ferries. No water taxis. No boats. No nothing. It’s been abandoned for a hundred years. It’s a bird sanctuary now.” Jaime held up the phone, so Theo and Tess could see. “It says right here on the website. Visitors are forbidden.”

“Where are visitors forbidden?”

They all turned to see Aunt Esther standing in the yard, waiting for an answer.

As it turned out, Aunt Esther didn’t believe that people should be forbidden to visit public lands anywhere on God’s green earth, if those visitors were responsible, cleaned up after themselves, didn’t break anything or take advantage of anyone.

Which was how they ended up in a small solarboat speeding toward North Brother Island, a cool spray dampening their hair and skin. Aunt Esther was wearing wading boots and had packed her fishing rod and tackle.

“I didn’t know you had a boat,” said Tess.

“Oh, this isn’t mine. I’m just borrowing this from a friend. She won’t mind.”

Despite the splash of the water and the rush of the wind, Aunt Esther barely had to raise her voice, the solar engine was so quiet.

“One does miss the open ocean, though. I haven’t been out on the ocean since I was the captain of the Mrs. Cheng. There’s nothing like tuna fishing to get one’s blood up. But we must make do with what we have. There are plenty of fish by North Brother Island.”

“You’ve been here before?” Tess said.

“Many times,” said Aunt Esther. “The island has quite a history.”

Jaime took off his glasses to wipe away the water droplets. “What kind of history?”

“The Dutch India Company claimed North and South Brother Islands in the 1600s, though they didn’t have a right to claim anything, as you know. The islands were called De Gesellen then. ‘The Companions.’ A friendly name, though this hasn’t always been a friendly place. Mary Mallon was confined here for the last twenty years of her life.”

“Mary Mallon?” Tess said.

“You might know her as Typhoid Mary. First documented asymptomatic carrier of typhoid fever. She worked as a cook. Sickened many people when she unwittingly passed the disease on to them. But she never got sick herself, and she refused to believe she was infected. So she kept moving from place to place, making people ill, until she was quarantined here.”