Bright Air - Barry Maitland [75]
‘The boats stayed out till midnight, using lights, though we knew the chances of them spotting anything were slim. They set out again at dawn, by which time the Newcastle and the second Orion had arrived.’ He shrugged. ‘What can I say? The experts had taken over by then, plotting the currents, defining the search area. They were using radar altimeter measurements from satellites. It’s like plotting pressures on a weather map—the ocean currents were rotating in a huge anticlockwise flow around a high spot way to the south. Mate, they were taking her far, far away from land. We knew she was a goner, even if she’d somehow survived that fall. I’m sorry. I don’t reckon there was anything else we could have done.’
‘No, I’m sure there wasn’t, Grant. Thanks.’ I took a deep breath. If my suspicion was right, the whole effort in those critical first hours on the Monday afternoon before sunset had been wasted, displaced twenty kilometres north of where they should have been looking. It made me sick to think about it. No wonder Owen had felt guilty. I wanted to ride back into town and find Bob and choke the truth out of him, but I guessed he’d just deny everything, as Damien would too.
We thanked the cop, and mounted our bikes again and pressed on down the road. There was a steep climb past the golf course, and the physical effort helped work out a little of the frustration I felt. We stopped at a sign to Lovers Bay, and sat on the hillside looking out over the ocean. The sight of that vast sea chilled my heart, and I immediately began pouring out the anger I felt. Anna listened in silence while I ranted on about them searching the wrong sector. Then, when I ran out of steam, she said simply, ‘No, it couldn’t have happened like that.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘If they were on Balls Pyramid when they radioed for help at two that afternoon, how would they have got back to the southern cliffs in time to meet the rescue boats?’
I was stunned. Of course she was right. I wasn’t thinking clearly. ‘How did it work, then?’
‘I’m not sure. It would depend on whether Bob and his boat were there with them when it happened. If he was, they’d have searched for a while themselves, until they were convinced they weren’t going to find her. How long would that take? Hours, surely, if they weren’t prepared to call for help. Then they’d have returned to the southern cliffs, dropped the climbers, and Bob and Marcus would have headed back to the jetty to wait for the radio call from Curtis. If Bob wasn’t with them, it would have taken even longer—he’d have had to go out to them, then search and so on as before.’
‘You’re right! And then there’s Damien. Was he really sick in bed, or was he with them, refusing to have anything to do with it and demanding to be taken back? However you look at it, she must have gone in hours before they gave the warning—maybe first thing that morning.’
‘Why that morning, Josh? I told you right at the beginning, didn’t I? We only have their word for any of this. We haven’t found anyone else who saw Luce after Thursday night. Why did Owen take over filling in Carmel’s log?’
The timing—that’s what had been bothering me all along. Why did they delay their return to Sydney?
I said, ‘There’s something else I thought of, to support the idea that they weren’t on the southern cliffs when she fell.’
‘What’s that?’
‘If they were there, and they were doing their research project, why wasn’t her electronic diary lost with her? Why didn’t she have it on her, the way she had all the previous month, recording their positions?