The Secret Path by Karen Swan (summer beach reads TXT) 📕

before Rory woke. At least that was something she could do – under-promise and over-deliver.

She picked up the sheets and pillow Jed had given her last night and carefully folded them into a neat pile. Her sleeping t-shirt had remained in her bag; it was far too hot for nightclothes and she’d slept in her bra and knickers – much to the mosquitoes’ delight, she realized, noticing some bites and scratching them before she could catch herself.

She stepped back into her denim cutoffs and soft khaki waffle shirt, a new raspberry-pink bikini doubling as underwear. Her hand brushed against the smooth mini doctor’s kit in her bag and she felt another kick to the stomach at the thought of Paco, languishing. Suffering . . .

She straightened up and headed outside. To her surprise, there was a tiny package just outside the door. She might have trodden on it if she hadn’t happened to be looking down. She picked it up carefully – it was something soft, wrapped in leaves and secured with a young vine. Unsure what to do with it, she kept it in her palm and walked over to Jed’s hut, setting her bag down against a banana tree. She could hear voices coming from within, now that she was closer. It sounded like they were talking in hushed tones and she wondered whether that was for her benefit – as the ‘honoured’ guest – or Paco’s.

Should she knock? Wait out here? She turned a circle on the spot, wondering what to do – and almost jumped six feet into the air. A man outside a neighbouring hut was watching her. He was sitting astride a large dug-out wooden trough and grinding some grains beneath a giant whittled pestle.

‘Hola,’ she stammered, recovering herself as he continued to grind, watching her impassively.

The man nodded and she gave a nervous laugh as a silence stretched. Her Spanish didn’t extend to anywhere near good enough to shooting the breeze with a tribesman in the Costa Rican jungle.

‘Oh, Tara.’

She turned, to see Jed standing behind her. He was holding a small basket.

‘You’ve met Juan, I see.’

‘Juan. Yes. We were just saying hello.’ She nodded awkwardly in the tribesman’s direction again.

‘And you received the ointment from Don Carlos?’ He looked down at the parcel in her hands.

‘Oh. Yes. I wasn’t sure—’

‘It’s for the mosquitoes. Best to put it on before you get dressed.’

‘Oh, right. Thanks.’ She gave a small laugh, as if to say, ‘Bit late now.’ Besides, she had some commercial-grade Deet that could have nuked the dinosaurs. She didn’t want to cause offence, however, and she opened her bag and carefully set it on the top of her clothes.

‘Come. I’m just going to feed the chickens,’ Jed said, beginning to walk away. ‘How was your night? Did you sleep well?’

‘So well. How about you?’

‘Fine, thank you.’ But she had heard the hesitation before the word. How was it possible for them all to share a bed, much less with such a sick child?

‘You look tired.’

‘Me?’ He shook his head. ‘No.’ They had stopped at a small pen constructed a short distance from the huts and watched as several skinny black chickens scratched at the ground. Jed reached into the tub and began scattering some feed, sending the birds into a frenzy. ‘We can leave soon if you are ready. We must not leave your guests unattended.’

She watched the chickens peck and flap, then looked back up at him. ‘Sure, yes. Whenever you’re ready.’

He turned back towards the huts without looking at her and she realized he had barely made eye contact with her. ‘But Jed, before we go back—’

He stopped walking, his gaze on the ground. ‘Don’t, Tara. I know what you want to say and it will make no difference. She is my wife.’

Tara ran around and in front of him, determined to make him look at her. ‘And he is your son. This is about what is best for him, surely? He’s suffering. At the very, very least, we could get him somewhere they can make him comfortable.’ Her voice was rising, pleading, her concern an anxious wheedle.

Jed stared back at her, implacable, unreachable. ‘Sarita trusts the Awa, and I trust her.’

He walked away, leaving Tara staring at his broad back. She wanted to scream, cry, block his path again. But it was hopeless. She had no rights here. That child was going to suffer and, in all likelihood, die a slow, drawn-out death and she could do nothing about it.

She followed him back, stepping disconsolately into the hut a few moments after him and taking in the scene from the door. The children were sitting on the ground eating from banana-leaf bowls. They ate with their hands, chattering happily.

‘Please.’ She looked across and saw Sarita beckoning for her to come in. Tara crossed the room and sat obediently on the stool Sarita pointed to for her. A ‘bowl’ of fruit was placed in her hands and Tara could see the anxiousness in her hostess’s eyes that she accept their hospitality, having ducked out last night. She knew her behaviour would have been considered rude. What did jet lag mean to these people out here?

‘Mmm, wonderful,’ she smiled as best she could – but her gaze kept returning to the inert form on the mattress in the corner. To just leave him there . . .

‘Para usted.’ She looked up to see Sarita holding out a carved coconut cup. Inside was a drink she again could not recognize, but which manners compelled her to accept. She watched curiously as Sarita placed two banana leaves curled towards one another by her feet.

‘To balance the cup,’ Jed explained, nodding to the coconut in her hands.

‘Ah.’ She drank – it was stronger and more bitter than the one she had received yesterday but she swallowed it anyway, setting it down on the ‘brackets’ Sarita had set. The system worked.

At least something did.

Twenty minutes later, she and Jed were just reaching the car, when he asked her how she