Page 128 of The Island

Copperheads had killed children in the past. They ate small prey such as possums and rabbits. Occasionally they went for bigger targets like wombats and wallabies.

Did a sleeping girl look like a sleeping wombat?

Maybe.

She was a good sister. Most of the time.

The snake had curled into a figure-eight shape. It raised its head. “They are shy and retiring by nature, and prefer to escape rather than fight where escape is possible,” the book had said.

Escape was definitely possible for this snake. There was plenty of room between the fire and the cave wall. No one was bothering it.

It must have gotten very hungry down here.

He supposed that if it did bite Olivia, that would be his fault too.

Owen went back behind his wall and built it a little higher.

39

If there’s one thing the Dutch know about, it’s water.

Hans had understood that the O’Neill farm was built over a sandstone aquifer. There were no rivers or lakes on Dutch Island, nowhere for rainwater to go but back into the ocean or down into those layers between the rocks. The O’Neills had been drawing water from the aquifer for decades, and the well had had to be drilled deeper, as the original water was not replenished. The actual wellhead itself was no longer necessary, as the water was pumped to a cistern, but they’d kept it.

Hans had seen all of this and knew it was a mistake.

Heather checked that the coast was clear. As the ants continued to bite, she pulled Hans by his feet to the well thirty feet away at the north of the compound. She dragged him slowly and carefully for fear of the dogs hearing or taking an interest. A few curious barks were all she heard. The dogs perhaps knew something was up but they weren’t overly concerned about it yet.

The well was covered with an iron grating to keep out birds and possums. She set down Hans and lifted the grating. It wasn’t heavy and she laid it carefully in the dirt. She felt another big raindrop on her neck.

There was a rope and a bucket hanging above the wellhead for anyone who wanted to drink water the old-fashioned way.

The knot was a double granny—nothing shipshape or finessed—and she had it untied in a minute. Her dad had taught her half a dozen knots he’d learned in the military. A bowline would do the job here. It was an easy one to do in the dark. You make a six, the rabbit comes out of the hole, runs behind the tree, and goes back down into the hole.

She looped the rope around Hans’s feet and hoisted him up onto the edge of the well. Using the side of the well as a partial lever, she lowered him down. Her shoulders were straining and she was sweating, but this improvised pulley was dividing the weight in half by mechanics, which, she thought, was a branch of physics. Take that, Owen.

She lowered and lowered until the pressure began to ease and she knew he was floating in the well water. She let go of the rope and dropped it down into the well after him. Hans had wounds all over his body, and the longer his body floated in the well, the better chance it had to contaminate the O’Neills’ water supply.

Another thought occurred to her.

The farm’s generator was also upwind of the dogs.

Hmmm.

She crawled to the generator on the edge of the compound. It was a big beast, more than enough for the farm and the outlying houses. An 800 kW Caterpillar diesel. The fuel supply would be nearby.

Yup. The diesel was stored in two big plastic drums. They were far too heavy to tip over, and the plastic covering was weathered but thick and designed to resist the attentions of vermin. A determined woman with a knife might take all night to make a dent.

She walked around the drums looking for a safety-release valve or anything like that, and sure enough, someone had connected a faucet to one of the drums for filling up portable diesel cans. She gave the tap two hard turns, and the diesel began to pour out onto the dirt. The night was still warm and some of the diesel began to evaporate. It was hard to ignite diesel in its liquid form, but diesel vapor was very flammable. She should have brought the cigarette lighter with her. Would a bullet do the trick? She would have to see. The gasoline was stored next to the diesel in a similar drum. She turned the valve and let the gasoline pour out too.

No diesel to make electricity meant no way to recharge the drone.

No gasoline meant no ATV or motorcycle or pickups when their tanks ran dry.

She knew that so far, she had been very lucky. This was not the place to push that luck.

She disappeared back into the grass and worked her way around to the north of the compound.

It began to rain in big, slow drops.

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