She reaches for her sketchpad and her pencil.
‘You’ve made me look quite nice.’
She laughs. ‘What an odd thing to say, Winny. Quite nice. You sound like a little English girl.’
Winny leans over the drawing, her long blonde braids hanging over the sketch like two tassels. She smiles at her mother, her blue-grey eyes shining. ‘C’mon, Mummy. I want to show you something.’
‘Not right now, pet. Mummy wants to rest for a bit. Sit down and I’ll draw another picture.’
Winny holds out her hand. ‘Please, Mummy. You’ll like this. I promise.’
Ellie looks at her daughter’s eager face. Someone’s drawn a Peace sign on her cheek. ‘Where did that come from?’
Winny laughs. ‘Florie. She has one too.’ She beckons to her mother. ‘C’mon, Mummy.’
Ellie sighs. ‘All right then.’ She sets her sketchbook on a velvety clump of moss. ‘But we can’t be long. Your sister’s coming later, all the way from New York. We need to make supper.’
‘Can we have spaghetti and meatballs?’
‘If you like.’
‘And chocolate cake? It’s my favourite.’
‘We can have chocolate cake too. Just don’t let the dogs get at it. Chocolate’s not good for them.’ Ellie threads her fingers through her daughter’s. ‘So, where are we off to?’
‘You’ll see.’
They start along the crest of the cliff, through the scrub woods and past the old grey piebald horse in Joe Gill’s field. When they reach the marshland, they stop to pick handfuls of fat, ripe red partridgeberries, and then they climb, higher and higher, up the grey rocky hills until they reach a thick mass of bushes heavy with blueberries. Someone is bent over one of the bushes, intent on filling a fedora hat with loot. He turns around.
‘Thomas?’
‘There you are, maid. You took your time. Blueberries are some good, but there’s a limit to how many a body can eat.’
He picks up the hat and walks over to them. ‘Go on. Help yourself, m’ darlins’. They’re the best you’ll ever eat.’ He pops a fat blueberry into his mouth. ‘Purple heaven.’
Far below, the ocean glimmers blue under the summer sun, the water broken only by spouts like fountains. Far down the coast, the red roof of the lighthouse is a dot of colour against the blue sky.
They stand on the cliff, eating blueberries from Thomas’s hat. Winny points out towards the horizon, which shines silver in the distance. ‘See, Mummy. I told you.’
‘It’s lovely, Winny. You were right.’
Thomas holds out his hand. ‘C’mon, maid. Let’s have a dance.’
Winny squeezes Ellie’s hand. ‘Let’s go, Mummy.’
***
Sophie takes another sip of coffee. ‘So, the fire in Boston was caused by faulty wiring?
‘We’d been renovating an old Victorian house in Dedham. It was pretty much a wreck when we bought it, but we could see the potential. Our money was tied up in my construction business. I figured if I did most of the work myself, we’d save money.’
‘So you did the wiring.’
Sam nods. ‘The night of the fire I was out of town managing a project upstate. Becca was in the hospital having some tests. Winny …’ He shakes his head. ‘Winny never had a chance.’ He presses his fingers against his eyes.
He shakes his head. ‘There was an inquiry. I was found to be culpable. I lost my business. I had a deaf five-year-old daughter to support. It was a disaster. Ellie offered me a lifeline.’
‘A job working for Emmett.’
Sam shrugs. ‘We moved into Kittiwake with Ellie and Florie. I had to swallow my pride and get on with it. I knew how to build things, and Emmett taught me how to turn wood. I built the cottage in my spare time, then I started making furniture. I set up my own joinery company a few years ago. I’ve been helping Emmett with the boat-building when he needs it. He does some work for me. That’s over now.’
Sophie pushes the coffee mug away from her and taps her fingers on the table. ‘My mother always believed that you could control your destiny by the decisions you make and the actions you take. If you don’t choose your path, your path will be chosen for you. Random things would occur, and you’d be like a plastic duck bobbing in a swirling current, getting tossed around with nothing to ground you. My mother hated that idea. She was all about control.’
She looks across the table at Sam. ‘Maybe she felt that way because she grew up in England during the war, when everything was so chaotic. She and Aunt Ellie lost their mother in a car accident when they were young. That’s pretty destabilising. Maybe that’s why she pushed me to take control of my future from an early age. Then, one day, a plane got diverted and I found myself here. Something totally out of my control.’
‘And everything changed.’
‘It should have, shouldn’t it? But nothing really changed for me. I didn’t let it. Nothing changed until I came back.’
‘What’s changed this time?’
‘Me. I’ve changed.’
The screen door slams and Toby Molloy bolts into the room with Becca, her cheeks flushed as she chokes on sobs.
‘It’s Ellie! Mr Byrne, she’s dead!’
Chapter 79
Tippy’s Tickle – 24 September 2011
On the hill of St Stephen’s Cemetery, the crowd slowly files past the weather-beaten headstones on its way to Kittiwake. In the distance, the aluminium spire of St Stephen’s Church shines on its spit of land, pale grey against the blue September sky. Clouds scuttle like seed tufts across the vast blue, and, here and there, black-legged tickle-aces keen and dive for fish in the undulating ocean beyond the village. Sophie wanders over to the stone cross beside the newly dug grave and rubs her hand along the top as she reads the inscription.
Thomas Augustus Parsons
17th March 1915 – 19th June 1954
Always loved
‘I always knew they’d end up together in the end.’
Sophie looks over at Florie. ‘She loved you too, Florie.’
Florie adjusts the black felt fedora that Becca had decorated with purple ribbon and seashells for the funeral. ‘Oh, I knows it, maid.’ She looks out at the ocean, its water glistening a deep blue under the September sky. ‘She was the love of my life, just like Thomas here was hers.’ She shrugs. ‘It goes like that sometimes.’
‘You made her happy. Isn’t that what’s important, in the end?’
‘Well, Sophie duck, you’ve changed your tune. I thought you were all about work, work, work. Didn’t you once tell Ellie that relationships were a distraction? What’s happened to you?’
Sophie glances over to Sam, Becca and Toby at the far end of the cemetery.
Florie nods. ‘Ah, say no more. Sam Byrne.’
Sophie smiles. ‘I didn’t come back here to rekindle anything with Sam. It was all about my career, Florie. I tried to convince the consortium to find another spot along the coast, but they loved the pictures I’d taken of Tippy’s Tickle and Kittiwake the last time I was here. This was the place they wanted. I sold my soul to the devil, all because I wanted to be a partner in the firm.’