Summary

In Chapter 6, the narrator describes a situation three years earlier when Mercer visited the island for the first time in years under the cover of writing a novel. She was actually being paid by a security firm to look for a stolen manuscript. It was believed that Bruce had the manuscript and had it hidden on the island. Bruce, however, was suspicious of Mercer when he first met her. Bruce shipped the manuscript off the island before Mercer could find it and then sold the manuscript for a fortune in ransom. Bruce’s role in the missing manuscript was never made public and he was never charged with any wrongdoing. Three of the men who stole the manuscript were in prison. One was dead.

Since that time, Bruce had been in awe of the firm’s elaborate scheme...