Page 11 of Dauntless

“Hence your Henry Jessup diary.”

Eddie nodded.

“How many people did you tell about this diary?”

“Um,” Eddie said.He wrinkled his nose and his glasses shifted.“Just you, and John Coldwell from the museum.Oh, and I might have mentioned it on the trip over here.”

“So, the whole island basically.Young Harry Barnes is the biggest gossip on Dauntless.”I rubbed a hand over my forehead, trying to ease some of the tension there.“And did you tell them you actually had the diarywithyou?”

“Wait, you seriously think someone attacked me to try to get the diary?”

“Well, we’re not actually in the habit of attacking tourists just for the hell of it.”

“But it’s adiary.It’s not even worth that much.A couple of thousand dollars maybe, for people who are super into maritime history.Maybe more than that when my thesis is published, but not much more.”

“Eddie,” I said softly.“This is Dauntless.There is nothing more important to people here than the legend of Josiah Nesmith and the mutineers.”

Eddie raised his hand and touched the cut on his temple that extended into his hairline.He frowned, and I thought maybe he’d realised it at last: a Hawthorne on Dauntless was asking for nothing but trouble.

* * *

Before we went into the village, I took some aspirin out of the medical chest for Eddie.I placed Henry Jessup’s plastic-wrapped diary carefully inside the medical chest before closing the lid and locking it.

Eddie watched me carefully.

Such a small book, but it weighed more than it should.

Chapter 4

EDDIE

Our first stop in the village turned out to be the statue of Josiah Nesmith.I examined the plaque on the statue’s plinth, and a seagull peered at me from the top of Josiah Nesmith’s head.

Erected in commemoration of Josiah Nesmith, the hero who delivered the people of Dauntless Island from the tyrant George Hawthorne.

“The tyrant George Hawthorne,” I said at last, and exhaled slowly.“They didn’t mince words, did they?”

“They really didn’t,” Joe agreed, with that quirk of his mouth that I was starting to figure out was as demonstrative in him as a broad grin would be in someone else.

I examined the statue again, sneaking glances to compare Josiah Nesmith to Joe, who was watching the boats in the harbour.He raised his hand at a guy striding down towards the jetty.The guy looked like he was about to wave back, but then he saw me and jammed his hands in the pockets of his orange jacket instead.

Joe’s mouth quirked again.“Will Harper,” he said.“My best friend.”

The guy seemed about as friendly as anthrax, but that was apparently the effect I had on people around here.Except for Joe.

Down the street, a woman stepped out of the little shop.She was carrying a tin of milk powder and still wearing her dressing gown, as though she’d been halfway through making breakfast when she remembered she was out of milk.

“Julie Dinsmore,” Joe said, when she caught me looking.“My third cousin, which is about as distant a relative as possible on Dauntless.”

The woman stepped into a house across the road from the shop.It was one of the typical sandstone cottages that dotted the island and dated back to the 1880s, when the British government attempted to establish an outpost.The outpost had only lasted a few decades.Dauntless Island might have been the centre of the world to the people who lived on it, but it was really just a tiny speck in a very vast ocean, completely insignificant—and forgettable—to an empire.

I took another look at the statue of Josiah Nesmith, and then me and Joe walked back down the street to the museum.Hiccup meandered alongside us.

“This was the old customs house once,” Joe said.The door was closed, but Joe lifted the latch and pushed it open without knocking.“John?You here?”

I followed him inside, my guts knotting up at the idea that John Coldwell might have been the man who attacked me last night.I wandered over to the postcards, all casual, and inspected them.Hiccup sat on my feet.

From here, I could glimpse into the main display room beyond the foyer and light shining on protective glass—but not what was behind the glass.Probably the mutineers’ flag, made from a piece of sailcloth from theHMS Dauntlessherself.

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