Luanne Rice (2 page)

But she’d
had a small skin cancer removed from her cheek last year, and was determined to
do her best to keep it from happening again, to stay as healthy as she could,
to stay alive until she knew the entire truth.

She had
always been fastidious about putting lotion on her granddaughter. Mara had had
such fair skin—so typically Irish, pale and freckled. Her parents—Mara’s, that
is—had been killed in a freak ferry accident on a trip to Mara’s mother’s
hometown in the west of Ireland.

Maeve had
taken over raising their daughter, their only child; every time she’d ever
looked at Mara, she’d seen her son, Billy, and she’d loved her so much, more
than the stars in the sky, more than anything—because she was a direct link to
her darling boy, and she’d dutifully put sunscreen all over her freckled skin
before letting her go down to the beach.

“You have
the soul of your father in your blue eyes,” Maeve would say, spreading the
lotion.

“And my mother?”

“Yes, Anna
too,” Maeve would say, because she had loved her Irish daughter-in-law almost
as if she’d been her own child. But the truth was
,
Mara had been all-Billy to Maeve. Maeve couldn’t help herself.

So now she
just stood in her garden, clipping the dead heads from the rosebushes. She
tried to concentrate on finding the three-leaf sets, but she was distracted by
the two newspeople standing out by the road. They had their cameras out,
clicking away. Tomorrow—the anniversary of Mara’s disappearance—the headlines
would no doubt read, “Grandmother Still Waiting after All These Years” or
“Roses for Mara’s Remembrance” or some other malarkey.

The local
newspeople had always made a cartoon of the situation—tried to boil everything
down into an easily palatable story for their readers to understand.
When no one knew the whole truth—except Mara.
Edward had
played his part in the terrible drama, and Maeve knew some segments, but only
Mara knew it all.

Only Mara
had endured it.

The state
police detective had learned some of it.
Patrick Murphy,
another Hibernian, although not in the tradition of Irish cops that Maeve
remembered from growing up in the South End of Hartford.
Those fellows
had been tough, all steel, no nonsense, and they’d seen the world in black and
white. Everything was one way or another. Not Patrick.

Patrick was
different. Maeve had taught school for fifty years, and if she had ever had
Patrick Murphy in her class, she knew that she would never have pegged him to
be a police officer.
Not that he hadn’t done a thorough
investigation
—if anyone could find Mara, Maeve knew it would be Patrick.
But there was something in his makeup that reminded Maeve of Johnny Moore, an
Irish poet she had once known.

She had
seen it the day he had come here to Maeve’s house, held her hand as they sat in
rockers on the porch, and told her about the blood they had found on Mara’s
kitchen floor. Maeve’s heart had frozen. It really had. She had felt her heart
freeze and constrict, felt the muscle shrink, pulling all her blood back from
her face and hands, so that her head had dropped down on her chest.

And when
she’d come to, just a second or two later, Patrick was kneeling in front of her,
with tears in his eyes because he was thinking the same thing she had so often
feared would happen—that Mara was dead, the baby was dead, that Edward had
killed them both.

Maeve had
only to think of the tears in Patrick Murphy’s blue eyes to feel her heart
twist now, again, as she snipped away at the tangled rosebushes. She knew that
he would come by—sometime in the next week or so—to check on her.

Maeve held
the green plastic-handled garden shears in her pink-gloved hand, clipping her
rosebushes. Cutting far enough down, right to the place where new life in the
form of tiny green leaves emerged from the stem. Her arthritis was acting up.

She could
almost feel the photographers wanting to ask her to go get the yellow boots and
watering can, stage the yard as it had been that day nine years ago tomorrow.

“Hello,
Maeve.”

Looking up,
she saw her neighbor and lifelong best friend, Clara Littlefield, coming
through the side yard. Clara carried a wicker picnic basket overflowing with
French bread, grapes, Brie, saucisson, and a bottle of wine.

“Hi,
Clara,” Maeve said. The two women bumped straw hats as they kissed.

“The roses
look so beautiful this year,” Clara said.

“Thank you
…
look
at Mara’s beach roses—they’ve really come into
their own, haven’t they?”

“They
have,” Clara said, and the two women admired the full bushes, lush with pink
blooms, planted by Mara the year her parents drowned. So many years ago, meant
to cherish her parents’ memory, and now they were all Maeve had of Mara
herself. Maeve’s eyes filled with tears, and she felt Clara’s arm slip around
her.

“You
brought us a picnic?” Maeve asked.

“Of course.
I can’t come to stay at your house without
bringing food. It’s like those sleepovers we had sixty years ago, when we’d
take turns providing the s’mores.”

“The
sleepovers continue,” Maeve said, smiling. “No matter how old we are …”

Clara
laughed, hugging her again, almost making Maeve forget the reason for this
particular sleepover, this picnic. Every June for the last eight years, Maeve’s
best friend had come over to stay, to spend the night before that day when Mara
put down the green garden hose and yellow watering can, slipped off her yellow
boots, and walked out of her grandmother’s yard forever.

Forever was
such a long time.

But, Maeve
thought, holding Clara’s hand as they walked into the kitchen to delve into the
picnic basket, it went by just a little easier when you had a best friend by
your side.

Chapter 2

T
he two girls had missed the bus, so they walked
home from school, kicking a pebble ahead of them on the bumpy road high above
the Gulf of St. Lawrence. They took turns. First Jessica would give it a good
smack with her sneaker, send it bouncing along. When they caught up to the
stone, Rose would take her shot. In between kicks, they walked and talked.

“Favorite
color,” Rose said.

“Blue.
Favorite animal,” Jessica said.

“Cats.
Favorite book.”

“The Lion,
the Witch, and the Wardrobe.”

“Mine too.”
Rose laughed as she kicked the pebble and got air, sending it in a long arc
down the middle of the road. “Did you see that?”

“Okay, you
get the gold medal,” Jessica said.
“Back to Question Time.”

“We’ve
played this before,” Rose said. “We already know the answers to all the
questions.”

“Not
all
the questions,” Jessica said mysteriously.
“We’ve only been friends since I moved here in April. I’ll bet you don’t even
know where I’m from.”

“Boston,”
Rose said.

“That’s
just what we tell people,” Jessica said. She had a pretend-scary look on her
freckled face. “But there are secrets that even my best friend won’t know—
until she asks me
…”

Rose
giggled. She and Jessica were almost nine, and it felt delicious to imagine
that her new friend had deep dark secrets—and to know that to find out about
them, all she had to do was ask. Mulling that over, she walked in silence. Off
to the left, the Gulf of St. Lawrence stretched on forever. It was very calm
and bright blue, with just the finest of haze spread like a silk scarf over its
surface. Rose knew, when she saw haze like that, summer was almost here. She
scanned the bay, in search of Nanny … when summer came, so did Nanny.

Jessica
mis-kicked the pebble into the weeds, so she started over with a new one. Rose
inched a little way down the bank to find the old stone; something made her want
to keep it, so she put it in her pocket. By the time she looked up, Jessica had
disappeared around the bend. Rose skipped a few steps. When she broke into a
run, her heart fluttered like a trapped bird.

“Don’t you
want to know?” Jessica asked, dribbling the pebble the way she did a soccer
ball on the field.

“Sure,”
Rose said.

“Then ask,”
Jessica teased. “Go on—I’ll give you a clue. Ask me my real name.”

“I know
it—it’s Jessica Taylor.”

“Maybe it
is, maybe it isn’t. Maybe Taylor is my stepfather’s name, or maybe we decided
to name ourselves after James Taylor. We love his music.”

“So do my
mother and
I
!”

“My real
father saw him in a concert once.
At Tanglewood.”

“Your real father?”
Rose asked. She wanted to ask more, but
something about the look on Jessica’s face made her hold back. Stress pulled
her eyes tight and made her jaw square. It only lasted a moment, was gone in a
flash, but Rose had seen. The words “your real father” slashed between them;
Rose felt them in her heart, like another trapped bird.

“The air
sure is clean up here,” Jessica said, changing the subject as they started
walking again. “It’s the reason we moved to Cape Hawk, so far from pollution
and junk in the air. Or, at least, that’s what my mother tells everyone. But
maybe …”

“Maybe what?”
Rose asked.

“Maybe the
real reason we moved here is another scary secret!” Jessica said. She tugged on
one of Rose’s braids,
then
pointed up at the mansion
on the hill. Deer tracks led through the thick brush, into the pine forest
surrounding the great big stone house where the oceanographer lived. “Let’s go
up there and spy on Captain Hook.”

“I don’t
think that’s such a good idea,” Rose said, feeling the strange flutter again.
“Considering he’s our friend and my mother has her store right next to his
office.”

“Yes, but
that’s way down at the dock,” Jessica said. “She probably has no idea what goes
on inside his big, crazy house. What if he’s a mad scientist and we have to
save her? What if he’s a real pirate, with a name like Captain Hook?”

“His name
is Dr. Neill,” Rose said. She knew the kids called him Captain Hook, but she
never did. Rose knew that people were different, in all sorts of ways. She
loved the things she and Dr. Neill had in common, and it made her sad when kids
made fun of him. He was so tall and quiet, with that dark hair and deep-set
eyes, and a thin mouth that never smiled.
Except when he was
near Rose and her mother.

“I feel bad
that your mother’s beautiful shop has to be right next door to him,” Jessica
said. “Any one-arm guy who spends his life chasing
sharks
…” She shivered.
“When the rest of his
family is so nice, with their whale-watch boats.”

“My
birthday party’s going to be a whale watch,” Rose said.

“I know, I can’t wait.
Because it’s my birthday
too.”

“No! You’re
kidding!”

“Maybe I am
… and maybe I’m not.”

Rose
pictured their classroom, with one bulletin board decorated with colorful
squares, showing all her classmates’ birthdays. Jessica’s was in August.

“You
are
kidding,” Rose said.
“Because it’s August 4—right up there on the board.”

Jessica
smiled. “You caught me. Well, only one of us gets to celebrate on Saturday.
You, lucky girl!”

“I just
hope Nanny’s back by then. She’s always here for my birthday.”

“Who’s
Nanny?”

“You’ll
meet her.”

“Will we
really see whales?”

“Yes,” Rose
said. “They come back here every summer. This is their home, just like it’s
ours.”

“Is that
why the Neill family is so rich?
Because they have all those
whale-watching boats?”

“I guess
so.” Rose’s fingers began to feel numb. She felt prickles race across her lips.
The road inched upward, toward the eastern curve. Once they got to the top,
they could start down. They were almost to the pinnacle.

“My
stepfather says whales are just overgrown fish and people who pay good money to
see them are suckers. He had an ancestor who got rich from whaling.”

“Whales are
mammals,” Rose said, concentrating on every step. “They breathe air, just like
us.”

Tall rock
cliffs ringed the town—from behind the big white hotel out to headlands jutting
into the protected bay, which led into the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The icy
Lyndhurst River flowed down, cutting a jagged path through the steep rock and
forming a fjord. Rose had learned in school that this whole area had been
formed by the Ice Age—that the rocks were from the glacier, and that the river
flowing into the bay attracted fish and was the reason this spot was so popular
with whales and seals.

“Come on,”
Jessica said suddenly, grabbing Rose’s hand, tugging her toward a deer track
leading up to Dr. Neill’s house. Rose lifted her eyes. The sturdy Nova Scotia
pines seemed to somehow elevate the stone house, hold it up above their
branches toward the sky—sunshine glanced off the vast slate roof. She heard
songbirds—just back from their long migration to the south—singing in the
trees. Even with the glinting sunlight and the birdsong, and the hope of seeing
Dr. Neill, the path was just too steep.

“Are you
coming?” Jessica prodded.

Rose leaned
forward, hands on her knees, resting a little. “Let’s go down to my mother’s
shop instead, okay? She’ll give us a snack, and maybe she’ll teach you how to
needlepoint your initials.”

“You’re
just chicken!” Jessica said. But Rose noticed that Jessica actually looked
relieved that they didn’t have to go up the dark and spooky hillside. Rose
shrugged, pretending to agree. She stayed there, leaning on her knees,
conserving her strength.

“Okay,
then,” Jessica said. “We’re soccer players. I’ll pass you the ball, and let’s
see you take it down the field.”

Jessica
kicked the pebble her way, expecting her to dribble it the way she had. Rose
started, but the walk home had been so long, and the trapped-bird feeling was
getting worse. She glanced down at her hands, and saw Jessica follow her gaze.
Her fingers were blue, and the expression on Jessica’s face was pure shock.

“Rose!”

“I’m just
cold,” Rose said. “That’s all.”

“But it’s
hot out!”

Feeling
panicked, Rose kicked the stone into the bushes—as if by accident. Jessica
whooped with disbelief,
then
began to run down the
hill toward the harbor.

“Come on,”
she called.

Rose wanted
to sit down, but she couldn’t bear for Jessica to see. Jessica was her new
friend, and she didn’t know
… .
It’s all downhill
, she told herself.
I can do it
… .
She scanned the harbor
town, fixed her eyes on her mother’s store. Then she took a deep breath and
began to walk.

Cape Hawk
was not the sort of fishing town lined with elegant houses once occupied by sea
captains. Its sidewalks were not of brick and they were not shaded by graceful
elms. These wharves were not magnets for long white yachts and the people who
sailed them. There was one beautiful hotel and a small campground for
travelers. The nicest houses in town were owned by one family, the same people
who ran the hotel and owned all the whale-watching boats.

This small
northern outpost of Nova Scotia’s herring fleet had four roads, called Church
Street, School Street, Water Street, and Front Street. Frost heaves kept
buckling the sidewalks, and the sea winds were so constant and relentless that
only the sturdiest pines and scrub oaks could withstand the battering. No sea
captain but one had ever made enough real money from the hard life in these
waters to build houses worth commenting on, and he had built three—for himself
and his children. That man was Tecumseh Neill.

This
particular house, down by the quai, had been built in 1842, after Captain
Neill’s third voyage around the Horn aboard his ship, the
Pinnacle
. Town legend had it that he had been in pursuit of a
single whale during the last years of his life, but three trips previously he
had successfully caught whales and sold their oil in New Bedford and Halifax
before building his house in Cape Hawk.

Glistening
white clapboard with black shutters and a red door, his “downtown” house
rose
three stories to a widow’s walk overlooking the Gulf of
St. Lawrence. This structure, like the others he had built, had never left
Captain Neill’s family, having been passed down through the generations. For
two centuries it had been occupied by his descendants, but this generation had
split it up and rented it out—the top two floors being apartments, and the
ground floor divided in half for commercial space. The house had wide granite
steps, a wide front porch with white railings, and a red door.

Once inside
the door, visitors stood in a small common space, the front hall. Captain
Neill’s original chandelier hung over the staircase. Lily Malone, the woman who
rented one of the two first-floor stores, had tried to make the center hallway
welcoming by hanging needlework done by
herself
and
other women from the town. She had also hung some of her daughter Rose’s
paintings.

Lily Malone
sat in the back of her shop, finishing up the party favors. She had sixteen
pink paper bags lined up under her worktable, hidden from view, in case one of
the intended recipients happened to wander in. So far today she had had five
customers, three of them Nanouk Girls—members of Lily’s needlepointing,
hanging-out, and support club. She had also received two deliveries of thread
and yarn, including the much-sought-after French-Persian wool-silk blend that
everyone had to have, in rich, wonderful colors ranging from morning clover to
sunset mesa.