Saint X

An omniscient third-person narrator begins “Indigo Bay” by laying out the geography, topography, and demographics of a Caribbean archipelago and the island of Saint X. A division between locals and vacationers is underscored even in this bird’s-eye view, as residents of Saint X live on the north side, while resorts line the south side, including “the island’s crown jewel, Indigo Bay” (4). The narrator also introduces what will become an important motif, Faraway Cay, a cay that can be seen from the shoreline at Indigo Bay. It’s known to be beautiful, with a waterfall in its center, but it’s not a common destination for the resort guests because it’s overrun with wild goats.

The narration then turns to the vacationers who visit the island. At first, these guests are spoken about as a monolith, before the narrative becomes specific in time and place: “They have no notion of the events about to unfold here, on Saint X, in 1995” (5). The narrative lens then focuses on one 18-year-old girl named Alison, who is walking along the beach. Alison is on vacation with her parents and younger sister, Claire, who is seven years old.

Two important figures are introduced in this chapter: Edwin and Clive, who both work on the resort beach. Edwin, “the skinny one,” and Clive, “the fat one” (6) are opposites: Edwin is charming and gregarious, while Clive is quiet and clumsy. Nevertheless, the guests notice how close the two are, sharing in the workload and caring for each other in small ways. Clive goes by the nickname “Gogo,” and Edwin tells guests that he can’t share the origins of this nickname.

Alison invites Claire to watch her play in the volleyball game organized by Edwin. Before the game starts, Alison removes her tunic to reveal a large scar on her stomach, which everyone immediately notices. As the game is played, guests complain of aspects of the resort and the prices, and the narration briefly enters the perspectives of several players, including a man identified by his pink dolphin swim trunks. Alison meets a group of young people about her age, including a “blond boy” who goes to Yale. They become flirtatious with one another.

That evening, Alison tends to Claire’s sunburn, and Claire relishes this moment with her sister, who has begun college and is therefore no longer living at home.

In the morning, the narration shifts to the perspective of an unnamed father, who grapples with trying to appreciate fully the beauty around him and his own privilege.

On this vacation, Claire finds that, as usual, she cannot make friends as easily as all the other kids, and so she spends much of her time with Alison. Claire struggles with a compulsive behavior, which surfaced a few months prior: She will often spell out words in the air with her finger. When Clive spills the family’s fries, which he calls “chips,” he sees Claire spell out the word.

As the days go on, Alison separates from Claire more frequently, spending time with the blond boy but also disappearing without saying where she’s going. On the fourth day, Claire follows Alison, and sees her meet up with Edwin and Clive in the parking lot next to an eggplant-colored car. Alison smokes something with them that Claire assumes is a cigarette.

On a very rainy day, Alison tells Claire she’s going to the gift shop, but she’s gone longer than Claire expects. From their room, Claire sees someone swimming in the choppy water. When Alison returns with a puka-shell necklace for Claire, her hair is wet. That same night, Claire wakes while it’s still dark and sees Alison standing on the balcony looking at something in the distance.On the final night of their vacation, Claire has trouble sleeping because of terrible bug bites, and she wakes up to notice that Alison isn’t in the room. Alison doesn’t come back by morning, and soon the police are notified. As time passes, Alison’s parents become increasingly panicked, and a full search begins. Vacationers hear that the blond boy is being questioned, that Edwin and Clive were picked up by the police the night Alison went missing, and that they spent the night in jail.

Earlier in the week, a famous actor arrived at Indigo Bay with his girlfriend. He is here reluctantly, due to a crippling fear of the ocean, but his girlfriend insisted on this trip. She hears about the waterfall on Faraway Cay, and convinces the actor to take a day trip there with her. The two have sex behind the waterfall, and then decide to make their way back to the guides, who are waiting near the shore. Just before the girlfriend gets out of the water, she looks down to see an arm reaching up from below, “as if frozen in the act of beckoning” (34).

This chapter ends with a shift in perspective: a first-person passage from Officer Roy Cannadine, a longtime police officer on Saint X. Roy says he has a good relationship with the residents on the island, including Edwin and Clive, whom he has known for most of their lives. He reveals that he’s pulled Edwin and Clive over many times for drinking and driving and will often bring them to the jail to sleep it off. The night Alison went missing, though, was different. When he picked them up, they were uncharacteristically quiet, as though something serious had happened.