It was, to be fair, a lot to take in. My mind was more boggled than it had been when it had first encountered advanced calculus. But the main thing was this: Christina was probably – or at least very possibly – still alive on another planet.
And of course I had no idea if I should trust Alberto Ribas. But I needed him. He was the only person in the world who knew what I had become.
‘I want to show you something,’ he said.
He pulled out his phone from his denim shorts and played a video. I saw a woman on a boat. It took me a moment to realise that the boat was Alberto’s. And that the woman I was staring at – this grey-haired, graceful, slightly bewitching woman – was Christina herself.
What Christina Said on the Boat as the Wind Gently Blew Her Hair
Hello, Grace. Long time, no see. This is your old friend, Christina. I guess I look a little different from how you remember me. I even have a tattoo. See! Of the sun. What could be better than the sun?
By the time you see this, a month from now – on the 26th of June, in the car with Alberto – I will no longer be here. No. I don’t mean I will be dead. Even though I can see my own death, I hope to avoid it. Someone is trying to kill me, but I don’t know who. I know this sounds quite dramatic, but so has been my life in recent times. I will, hopefully, be in Salacia. I can see much of the future, but I can’t see that for sure. So I need to have faith. Like you, I had a tiny glimpse of it when it first reached out to me. The beach, the trees, the sweet air. It is meant to be a bountiful paradise. You get to live a very long time there, in health and peace. Maybe for ever. The Salacians care. That is why they sent La Presencia here. I sometimes place the olive jar beside my bed. Right next to my head. If you do that, it tells you things in your dreams. Things you need to hear. The dreams are the most vivid you have ever known. And they are filled with the kind of truth that heals.
The theory is that if you dive down and swim directly towards La Presencia, straight as an arrow, rather than wait for it to come to you, then you are basically telling it you want to escape. And I don’t want to escape. I need to. Because otherwise I will be killed.
And who my killer is, as I said, I’m not sure. Like you, I can’t see the minds of everyone. Some people are harder to reach. And I know what you are thinking. You are thinking it could be Alberto. That he could be the one who wants to kill me. After all, you struggle to reach his mind. But no. Take it from someone who knew him before he pulled up the drawbridge. It is not Alberto. He is many, many, many things – at least half of which are enraging – but he is not a killer.
Now, I know I left you a letter, but I couldn’t tell you everything there because it would have endangered you. You must be discreet. Indeed, I sense that if I hadn’t been so public, if I’d never set up a stall at the market, then I would not have been a target. So I will say here what I couldn’t write in the letter.
You are a special person. I always knew you were special. I knew it when I was at my loneliest and you gave me company. But I didn’t know precisely how special. When La Presencia first came to me in the ocean, it gave me certain talents, but it has given you more. I have known lots of people in my life, both in England and in Spain, but you are the only one La Presencia would have gifted with so much. Believe me, I know this. You were the one it wanted. The one it was calling, through me. The only block you will face is yourself. Let La Presencia heal you.
The real talent it has given you is an appreciation of life. It is hard to explain, at least in English, what this truly means. But there is a word in Spanish, ‘duende’. One connotation of the word comes from the Spanish poet Lorca. It describes that feeling when someone truly connects with the sublime essence of life, its tragedy and beauty, whether in art or flamenco or in nature. You know, like if you have ever been in a gallery and seen a painting that made you feel terrified or ecstatic, but now it won’t just be art or a sunset that can make you feel that. It will be anything and everything. It could be a warm breeze, the simple scent of pine on this island of pines.
I know you have felt emptiness. But you will feel fullness. Maybe for the first time since you were a young child. Now you get to live. You will taste every experience entirely. You will be present here. This presence is better than any drug on Earth, and believe me I have tried a few of them in my time. It is the most alive it is possible to be.
In understanding the present so deeply, you will also understand the future, the way that a shark can predict a hurricane by sensing changes in water pressure.
This may not feel like a gift right now, but you have been gifted, I promise you. The talents are a gift. Alberto has them but his are fading. I had them but I am gone. There have been others that La Presencia has touched. But with you, the change will be among the most dramatic.
I know by nature you are a sceptical person, and so I have had to lay a trail of breadcrumbs for you to get to this position. That is why I left you the house. And the note. And that is also why I spoke to Rosella, the girl in the shop at Santa Gertrudis, about you. And why I told you to talk to Sabine at the hippy market, who absolutely hates poor Alberto, because I knew she would get you suspicious. And of course there is this, what I am holding in my hand. The gift you gave me. The necklace with the pendant of St Christopher.
This has been the key, Grace. This is how I knew. Psychometry. This gave me the knowledge about you. Holding this. Remembering you. Then gaining the knowledge of how strong you could be. How you could have the talents as strong as anyone. How you could save the island, animals, the sea, and even people, from destruction. How you would be a gift to nature.
I am right now going to drop it in the ocean. And on the dive in a few minutes Alberto’s daughter Marta will photograph it and upload it to the Atlantis Scuba website. You see, when you saw the photo of your necklace you thought the chances were many millions against one, but it wasn’t. Because we wanted you to see it. And we predicted you would visit the website after seeing Rosella and once your suspicions started to rise. And that will have been enough for you to go and find Alberto. And the rest…well, you know the rest.
You see, now you are a protector. Because it is impossible to feel life so deeply and not want to protect it. You will find yourself needing to help people – and animals.
I have been a protector too. I have tried to protect animals. The environment. I have tried to protect people from the future from my stall at the hippy market. I have dressed this science up as fortune-telling mysticism and the authorities have left me alone. But I have obviously stepped on someone’s toes somewhere. I think I have helped people, or tried to. My daughter might disagree. But I think you will be able to help even more.
Of course, a gift is often also a curse. And you must be aware these talents come with dangers, as I now know too well. But I had to choose you, Grace. I had to choose someone to continue my work. You don’t have to tell people their futures like I did. But you will find yourself protecting life, protecting nature, protecting this beautiful island.
Back in the thirties, there was a fisherman called Joan Bonanova, who was saved by La Presencia. Alberto has told you about him by now. He had such a pure soul, free from guilt and sin, that the talents he developed were powerful. One night, amid the invasion by Franco’s fascists, he sent a signal to every animal on the island to help, and soon there were reports of goats and other creatures attacking Nationalist soldiers. I genuinely believe, if you really want to, you can be like Joan Bonanova. You will be able to have talents beyond anything anyone has known for decades.
And I really want you to find my would-be killer. Not for me. I will be safe, I am sure of it. But for others. They are still out there. I want you to stop them, because others are in danger. But mostly, I brought you here to save not other people’s lives but your own. I want you to live, Grace. I want you to let go of your past and live. You need to do this. For the good of everything. Do you hear me?
Goodbye, my friend.
Grace Good-for-Nothing
‘Oh God,’ I said, once the video ended. I didn’t like this. I felt like I was being scammed again. I felt like someone had placed a watch in my hand that I didn’t want, and I was now expected to pay for it.
I felt like I was having a panic attack and, as I often had done in my life, I compulsively tried to do sums and see patterns for comfort.
The video was three minutes, twenty-two seconds long. 3 into 22 is 7.33. The square root of 3 is 1.73…
Alberto put the phone away. The heat in the car wasn’t making things better. I stared out at the sea. Of all the strange stuff I had just heard, the absolute madness of it, the thing that was left ringing in my ears was the phrase ‘my friend’. If I was such a friend, why had she never made contact with me in more than four decades? When Daniel died, when I lost Karl, when I needed a friend, where was she? I kept thinking of Lieke in the garden centre.
She didn’t give you the house for nothing. She was recruiting you. It was a trap. You are her replacement.
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘This is too much. I didn’t choose this. Why do I need this gift?’
‘All I know is that it is rare to be chosen. And it is a lucky thing that you were…Christina knew it had to be you. She had seen the future.’
That was it. That was the moment. That was when the scales tipped. That was when I completely forgot about the enhanced taste of orange juice or the new wonders around me. That was when I realised Christina’s act wasn’t just selfless generosity.
‘It’s like a cult,’ I said. ‘It’s like a sinister cult.’
‘Well, look, I didn’t necessarily approve of Christina’s methods—’
‘They were your methods too. You could have spelled it out to me.’
‘It would have been the easiest thing in the world to send you away. I warned you. But you wanted to know the truth. I told you this would change you. The truth is, it wasn’t Christina who chose you, or me, it was La Presencia itself. She just saw it. Out of the thousands of people Christina knew in her life, you were the only one it wanted. My powers are weak next to yours. They were weak next to Christina’s. They were once strong but they have faded. They have retreated like a low tide. But you are special. See what you managed to do, just there in the church…’
‘I am not special,’ I said. Those were the easiest four words I had ever said. The voice of a feeling I’d had for seventy-two years. A deep awareness of my own mediocrity. ‘Why would I be special? I am a crotchety old Brit. I am a retired maths teacher from the middle of nowhere. I am a big nothing, is who I am. A big nada. No, not even that. I am not a zero, I am a minus. I am a mediocrity who has never had any impact on the world. Except occasionally for the worse. My sweet little son Daniel died because I let him out on his bike in the pouring rain while I read a bloody catalogue because I apparently thought that was more interesting than going into town with him. He died beneath the wheels of a Royal Mail van. I am the person who never made it. The one who lets people down at the last hurdle. The one who lets bad things happen. The one who settles for less because that is what she deserves. Who never got the job she wanted at the university. Who became a middle-of-the-road teacher who probably put more people off the subject. The one who was unfaithful to her husband. I have been useless over and over again. I can’t do this. It’s a mistake. I am not free of guilt and sin like Joan bloody Bonanova. I am a bad person. I will never be any good at this. I will never be able to send a magic signal to all the animals. And I don’t think I want to.’ My heart was racing. ‘I. Am. Not. Special.’
‘Quite the opposite,’ said Alberto, as smug as ever. ‘Christina tried to think of everyone she knew. And everyone she had ever known. And she knew a lot of people. She could predict every scenario, every possibility. There were others who La Presencia would have come to, but none would have had the same response. That is why you went unconscious in the water. And the fact that you have been able to travel back to 1855 and break lobster tanks and stab forks in the legs of men with your own mind just confirms it. This is all unusual – muy, muy raro…’
‘I shouldn’t have stuck a fork in that man’s leg,’ I said, remorsefully. ‘He wasn’t all bad.’
