Nantucket Sisters (32 page)

“Cameron,” she says.

“Emily,” Cameron says, at the same time.

They laugh. Cameron leans over and kisses her cheek. “I’d better hurry. Thanks for driving me out.” He opens his door.

“Wait,” she says. “What were you going to say?”

Cameron faces her, suddenly serious. “We need to talk. Soon. What were you going to say?”

As he speaks, he’s pulling his suitcase from the backseat. He’s only half-focused on her. His mind is elsewhere. They need to talk? What does that mean? Emily wonders.

“I wanted to tell you it was a wonderful weekend with you, Cameron, last night and today, with Serena and the island, and everything. Thank you.”

Cameron waves absentmindedly and strides toward the terminal. The electric doors slide open. He’s gone.

Sunday morning, Emily’s awakened by light slanting through the guest room onto her deep queen bed where she sleeps on blue-and-white-checked sheets. She’s not used to light coming from this direction, or coming across her face, or being this clear and luminous. Going to the window, she sees the clouds parting to display a pure blue sky. Raising the window, she hears gulls cry and the gentle swoosh of the tide gently sweeping up to the shore. The day is mild and fine.

She peeks into Serena’s room. Her daughter lies flat on her back, her black hair spread over her pink pillow. Emily tiptoes past her parents’ closed bedroom door. Pulling on her fleece robe, she pads downstairs, she quickly makes herself a cup of coffee, then slips out to the patio to enjoy the morning. The lounge chair she set out yesterday is damp with dew; she doesn’t mind. She settles in, knees drawn to her chest, and lets herself breathe.

This side of the island faces the open Atlantic. The expanse of shining water, so calm this morning that it’s almost glassy, hides a galaxy of secret lives. Seals lazily swim in the depths, and also, probably, sharks, who have been enticed by the prevalence of seals to explore these particular waters. Bluefish, sea bass, tuna, swordfish, cod, and other fish flick through the cold water, and squid, eels, and grouper squirm around seaweed, mussels, crabs, and clams. The Algonquians named this bluff area “Siasconset.” That means “Near the great whale bone,” and all her life Emily’s been hoping for a glimpse of a whale breaching out in the sea. She hasn’t seen one yet, but she has time. Of course Serena always keeps an eye out for mermaids.

“Mommy?” Serena’s suddenly at her side, startling Emily from her thoughts. “What are you doing?”

“Sweetie.” Emily pulls Serena onto her lap and wraps the sides of her robe around her daughter’s thin body. “You snuck up on me! Are you hungry?”

Serena shakes her head. “I want to go to the beach.”

Emily laughs. “Baby, it’s too cold in April to swim.”

“I know that. I want to look for shells. Please?”

“Why not? Let’s sip some orange juice and we’ll be off. But let’s be as quiet as fairies so we don’t wake the grands.”

They walk through the sleeping town along Main Street and down Gully Road to the beach. Over the years storms have eroded this part of the island so deeply that an entire row of beach houses has been swept away. Now the ocean in its fickle wisdom has decided to build the beach back up again, which will present a dilemma to land owners: to build again or not? Is this still their land?

Emily thinks such adult thoughts while Serena, clad in a tracksuit against the chill but barefoot, like Emily, skips through the sand to the edge of the water. She plays a game with the sea that all children must play, daring the incoming waves to catch her feet as she skirts the shoreline, trying to figure out the tide’s pattern.

“Eeek!” she shrieks, when the sea washes over her bare ankles. “Cold!”

The summer people who own the houses facing the water haven’t arrived yet. No lights shine from the empty houses. No cars pass, no pedestrian strolls past with a dog on a leash. The golden beach stretches empty and still to the left and the right. Serena and Emily could be the only people on earth.

“Mermaid’s purse!” Serena calls, holding up one of the rather hideous black skate egg cases that litter the shore. The little girl drops down to her knees, absorbed by a particularly fascinating cluster of rocks and pebbles.

Emily takes her time catching up to Serena. “Pretty,” she says, observing the design her child is making from the rocks. “Why are you making a moon shell?”

Serena shrugs, as if to say,
What a silly question
. “I like moon shells. They’re whirly. Crabs live in them. And fairies could live in the ones the crabs are through with. They’re like a maze.” Serena glances up at her mother. “Like a mystery, going round and round and in and in.”

Emily sinks onto the sand next to Serena. “I see.” Focusing on the varicolored rocks, with their stripes, streaks, blotches, holes, and bumps, she selects the ones that catch her eye and begins to make her own design.

Mother and daughter work for a while in silence.

“Mommy,” Serena says, not looking up from her pebble moon shell. “I want to live here.”

“Oh, sweetie, you have to go to school.”

“But they have school here.”

“Well, Daddy has to work in the city.”

“Daddy’s always working.” Serena places a gleaming rock polished by the sea in the center of her spiral. “Why can’t we live here and Daddy can come visit on the weekends?”

“Oh, darling.” Emily sighs, unable to come up with an immediate answer. She stares out to the blue water. The tips of the waves catch the morning sun and seem to be flashing a message. “Daddy would be sad not to tuck you in bed at night.”

“But I like it here!” Serena protests.

“I do, too,” Emily agrees.

This makes it more difficult when it’s finally time to return to the house to pack up for the flight back to the city. Nantucket’s Daffodil Weekend is not a national holiday; Serena has preschool tomorrow. Emily has committee meetings.

Back at the house, she finds her parents at the kitchen table,
drinking coffee. Morning has never been an easy time for her parents. Emily serves her daughter a proper breakfast and allows Serena to shower with her, both of them washing their hair. After she dresses Serena, she asks her to help pack her little suitcase and her own duffel bag in which she carries the tiny pink Game Boy she’s allowed to play only when traveling. Her parents dawdle around the house, their suitcase at the door. Emily goes through the house, double-checking lights, blinds, window locks, the kitchen.

“Mommy!” Serena calls. “There’s a man at the door!”

Ben
, Emily thinks. Her heart races. She looks in the mirror. She’s back in city mode, wearing a loose black dress, high black boots, with a gray cashmere sweater. Her skin still glows from all the spring sunshine—she looks good.

She walks toward the door, knowing it doesn’t make sense for Ben to be here, yet still unable to stop hoping.

It’s not Ben.

“Mrs. Chadwick?” A police officer is at the door, in a navy blue uniform. He’s young, in his early twenties, and the expression on his face is grave. Next to him stands a young woman, also in uniform.

Emily freezes. Police at the door mean bad news. Serena senses Emily’s distress and presses up against her leg, hanging on to her tight.

“Yes, I’m Mrs. Chadwick.”

“I’m Officer Jimmy Patterson. This is Officer Kathryn Stover. May we come in?” His face is flushed; he’s under stress. The woman officer squints sympathetically.

“Why would you want to come in?” Emily asks.

“We need to speak with you. Alone, if you don’t mind.”

She doesn’t want to hear whatever it is they’re going to say. “I don’t understand.”

“We have some news for you,” the female officer says quietly. “About your husband.”

“Well, he’s in New York. You must have—”

“Mrs. Chadwick? Please.”

“I don’t think so.” Emily doesn’t move from the door but she realizes she must protect her daughter. “Serena, would you run and tell Grandmother to make a fresh pot of coffee?”

“Grandmother doesn’t like to work in the kitchen,” Serena argues. She keeps one hand tightly fastened to her mother’s sweater.

“Please do as I ask, Serena.” Emily uses her
serious
voice.

With a dramatic sigh and drooping shoulders, Serena slowly, slowly trudges down the hall to the dining room.

“What’s happened?” Emily asks.

“We’d like to come in.” Officer Patterson steps forward.

Emily makes a sudden decision. “I’ll come out.” A force deep in her gut insists that this house, this happy house where she was a child, where her child plays and laughs and loves, should not be contaminated by whatever news these officers of the law are bringing to the door. She steps outside and heads down the slate walk to the street. Once on the pavement, she faces the officers, who look slightly unsettled. “All right. Tell me.”

Officer Patterson takes a deep breath. “We regret to inform you that we’ve received word that a private plane crashed early this morning in the Adirondacks. Mr. Cameron Chadwick was on the plane. There were no survivors.”

Perhaps everyone’s first instinct is to disagree. Emily crosses her arms over her breasts defensively. “Cameron wasn’t going to the Adirondacks. He’s in New York.”

“Ma’am, we have the flight manifest. Cameron Chadwick was on the plane that left from LaGuardia at six-fifteen this morning, headed for the Adirondacks Airport at Saranac Lake. It crashed on landing.”

Emily’s fingers are numb as her mind tries to compute their words.

The female officer interjects helpfully, “The plane belonged to
the Endicott, Streeter, and Towle investment firm, based in New York City. Seven people were on board. We don’t have the cause of the crash yet, but it seems faulty landing gear was involved.”

These young people in their crisp uniforms look terribly uncomfortable delivering this news. Endicott, Streeter, and Towle
is
the firm Cameron works for. Still, Emily thinks they must be wrong.

She shakes her head, trying to figure it out for them. “All seven people on board died?”

“Fire,” Officer Stover gently informs her. “The fire consumed the plane before the rescue trucks could get there.”

Emily is silent for a long moment. Then she strains toward Officer Patterson and Officer Stover. “But I was happy this morning. Serena and I were on the beach, happy to be here, to be on the beach. Cameron has never enjoyed this island like I do, and he was a good sport to join us for Daffodil Weekend, but what you’re saying, let me be clear, Cameron’s plane from Nantucket to New York didn’t crash last night, it was another plane, a smaller plane, a private plane, probably the company plane that crashed. So that’s all right, then. I mean, it’s not my fault.”

“Mrs. Chadwick?” Officer Barrett steps forward. “You’re shivering. Let’s go inside and have some coffee, okay?”

“Yes, but—” Emily’s head is all muddled. “You see, my daughter is in there, Serena, you saw her, she’s only five years old, and I don’t want to upset her. I really don’t think we should give her this kind of news until we know for sure.”

“Ma’am, we do know for sure.”

Emily smiles gently. Officer Patterson is young. Such a sweet fresh face. “I don’t see how. You haven’t
seen
Cameron. Perhaps he wasn’t on the flight, or he’s still home—” Yanking her cell from her pocket, she punches his number. Unpleasant beeps meet her ear, followed by a robotic voice telling her this number is not in service at the moment.

Please try again later
.

But she notices several messages have arrived for her this morning, which is unusual. They’re all from wives of the investment firm employees. And from Edward Towle, one of the partners. Edward never calls her. Why would he call her? She listens to his voicemail, which begins, “Emily, we are grievously sorry …”

She drops the phone.

Behind her, the front door of the bluff house opens. Her mother stands in the doorway, holding the house phone.

“Emily, honey? A call for you. From a John Endicott.”

Oh, Cam, Emily thinks, with your golden hair and your gleaming smile, with your kindness, your courtliness, your determination to be a good husband and father, how can this happen, how can all of your shimmering brightness be gone from the earth?

She can’t remember whether she told him she loved him when he left.

She doesn’t think she did.

Part Seven