The Girl Who Dreamt of Dolphins (14 page)

Legend had it that the people of Merwater were as happy in the
water as they were on the land and that no local could move more
than a few miles from the coast and the sound of the sea without
falling ill and pining. Nate’s own children didn’t see the sea for
months on end or smell the salt spray on the breeze.

Nate was hungry and looking forward to getting some food
inside him. Work on a boat was cold, even in good weather and
physically draining. He needed a hearty meal in the middle of the
day to keep him going. Thelma had a job in the afternoons at the
doctor’s surgery up the road, but still managed to cook him lunch
most days before she went. Nate knew he was a lucky man.

Nate’s home was a suburban brick-built semi on the edge of
town, on a road that narrowed into a lane which went on between the
fields just beyond his front gate. It wasn’t picturesque like the
cottages in the village were, but it was practical and kept warm in
the winter when the winds could be cruel.

Nate was slowing down, before turning into his drive. A
beaten-up Land Rover emerged from the lane beyond him, coming his
way. The Land Rover was just getting close when suddenly there was
a bang and the whole vehicle lurched dangerously across the road
into Nate’s path. He slammed on his brakes and he could see the
driver of the Land Rover struggling to control the vehicle. It
skidded back over to the other side of the road narrowly missing
Nate’s car, bumping up onto the curb and almost hitting the small
red post box fixed to the telegraph pole.

Nate jumped out of his pick up and ran over to the old Land
Rover. The woman behind the wheel was evidently shocked and hung
over the steering wheel, taking great gulps of air to calm herself.
She was unhurt though.

‘
You all right?’ asked Nate anxiously. ‘You had a blow out’ he
continued, glancing down to her right front tyre. ‘This one here’s
flat as a pancake’ he added, giving it a small kick. The woman gave
him a weak smile.

‘
Yeah, I’m ok, no bones broken I think’ she said, composing
herself. ‘More a shock than anything else. I thought I was going to
slam into your pick-up truck for a second.’

‘
Me too’ Nate agreed. ‘But you kept your hands on the wheel and
your wits about you.’ She opened the door and climbed out, a little
shaky and unsteady.

‘
Come on, I only live in this house here’ he said pointing, ‘My
wife Thelma makes a mean cup of tea and that’s what you need I
reckon.’ He turned his pick-up onto the drive and made sure her
Land Rover was out of the way of oncoming traffic while she waited.
They walked up the side of the house and in through Nate’s back
door into the kitchen. Thelma looked up from the stove.

‘
Bethany love! What are you doing here?’ she
exclaimed.

‘
This young lady almost had a nasty accident’ said Nate,
walking in behind her.

‘
Hello Mrs Merryweather’ replied Bethany.

‘
Sit down my love, you look white as a sheet!’ said Thelma,
pulling up a kitchen chair.

‘
You two know each other?’ asked Nate brightly.

Thelma soon told Nate that she knew Bethany from the doctor’s
surgery and Bethany told Thelma about the blow-out on her car.
Thelma poured her a welcome cup of tea from the pot.

‘
Oh and call me Thelma’ she said reassuringly, ‘None of this
Mrs Merryweather now.’ She turned to Nate.

‘
Bethany’s a well-known artist you know Nate. She’s been in the
paper and gets commissions from all over the country!’ Bethany
looked bashful.

‘
Well that’s not exactly true’ she said shyly, her hands around
her mug of tea. ‘I could do with one or two more commissions if
truth be known.’ She sipped her tea gratefully. Nate stood
up.

‘
You two enjoy your tea. I’ll just pop out and change your
wheel’ he announced, borrowing Bethany’s car keys from the kitchen
table as he did so.

‘
Oh but you don’t have to!’ exclaimed Bethany.

‘
No, no. It’ll be done in a jiffy’ Nate replied, as he slipped
out.

Nate was soon back, wiping his hands on a greasy cloth. The
tea had steadied Bethany’s nerves and she stood up to leave,
conscious that Nate’s lunch was getting cold and that she was
keeping him from it.

‘
Are you sure you want to drive on your own?’ asked Thelma with
a concerned look on her face.

‘
Of course’ replied Bethany, ‘it’s like falling off a horse,
the sooner you get back on the better you feel’ she joked. She
waved them goodbye and walked out to her old Land Rover. She sat
behind the steering wheel and sighed, gripping it nervously. She
really didn’t want to start the engine and drive off, but she knew
that she had to. She turned the key in the ignition, moved off
cautiously and headed back up the country lane she’d just come down
an hour before. Banks and hedges steeped up on either side of the
lane which led back to the farm.

Bethany parked the car and climbed out. Two years before she’d
managed to persuade a farmer to rent an outbuilding to her, that
until then he’d used as a repair workshop. It was basic, but it was
brick-built and its roof was sound. It was a big space inside and
had iron-framed windows, letting in plenty of south-facing light,
ideal for an artist. There was a decent sized platform on the left
hand side and this was where she’d set up her bed and living space.
Down below was her studio. She loved the space to work, but in the
winter it got pretty cold. She had a stove to take the chill off
the air, though sometimes it was so cold that she could barely hold
a paint brush. When it froze Bethany would generally decamp to a
friend’s house in town where she’d hole up and enjoy a bit of
warmth and comfort till the thaw set in.

She’d set her easel up in the middle of the studio where the
light stayed the longest during the day and round the edges various
canvasses were propped up against the wall. Some of her sketches
were taped up on the brick-work. It might have looked messy to an
outsider, but to Bethany it was the model of
organisation.

Thelma had been right, Bethany was working on a commission. A
well-known naturalist had set up a local sanctuary some thirty
years before. Bethany’s painting gave prominent space to several
animals as well as the naturalist himself. The painting was almost
finished, though she was still working on the fine detail,
unwilling to lay down her brush and say it was done.

Bethany would have liked a studio overlooking the sea, but
that kind of space was way too expensive for an up and coming
artist like her. She loved the sea with a passion though and would
often spend time on the cliff or down by the shoreline with her
sketch pad in hand, trying to capture the different moods of the
sea. She would look out, half hoping to see a familiar sight amidst
the waves, though she could never quite glimpse it.

Bethany tidied her paints, examining the tubes to see how much
she had left. She’d been off to run some errands and pick up
supplies when her tyre had blown. It didn’t matter though. She
could get the supplies in another day.

She had a photo of Megan, Lucy’s mum, holding Lucy round her
middle. Lucy had been only three or so at the time. They were both
smiling at the camera and it looked like Megan had been tickling
Lucy’s tummy and making her giggle. Bethany paused as she looked at
the photo. Lucy sure had grown up a lot in the last few years, but
she was Megan’s girl all right.

Bethany worried about Lucy. It hadn’t been easy for her or her
Dad and she wasn’t sure that either of them were coping so well. It
wasn’t easy to lose your Mum like that. Or your sister, she might
have added. Lucy was growing up and she needed to know more about
who she was, where she came from, what was in store for her. Her
Dad didn’t know that much and what he did know, he wished he
didn’t. He certainly didn’t want Lucy to know. It wasn’t easy for
Bethany, because John shut her out and made it increasingly
difficult for Bethany to visit them and spend time with Lucy. She’d
recently made an impromptu visit, taking John by surprise so he
didn’t have an excuse to say no. But he’d made her feel unwelcome
and got rid of her as soon as he could then next day.

Looking at Lucy in the photograph just made her think of Megan
at the same age. Lucy was a lot like her mum Megan. Bethany was six
years younger than Megan and, when they were young, it seemed like
an immense age gap between them. When Bethany was six, Megan had
already turned twelve. Bethany had idolised her elder sister,
always trying to imitate her, but she could never catch up no
matter how hard she tried.

Megan was fascinated by the sea and was a natural in the
water, swimming with an easy grace without even seeming to try.
Bethany on the other hand had hated getting water in her eyes,
especially salt water and it took her years of swimming lessons
before she developed a decent front crawl.

They used to come down to Cornwall for their summer holidays;
Megan, Bethany and their parents. Megan had quickly made a couple
of local friends and was allowed to go off and play with them,
while Bethany had been stuck with their parents, jealous of Megan’s
freedom. Yet Bethany had loved those bucket and spade holidays,
decorating her sandcastles with shells and seaweed that she found
on the water’s edge or in the rock pools.

One summer afternoon, Megan had gone out to play with her
friends as usual, away from the cottage where they were staying
half a mile or so in from the sea. The afternoon had worn on and
the shadows started to lengthen across the garden where Bethany had
been playing with her toys and her parents were sunbathing. Megan
still didn’t come home and their parents started to get worried.
She was always told that she had to be back in time for tea at five
o’clock, but six o’clock came and went and Megan still wasn’t
home.

Their father went off down the hill to knock on the doors of
the parents of the children that Megan generally played with to see
if she was with them. He came back half an hour later with a
distraught look on his face. Neither child had seen Megan all day.
She was out on her own. Time had crept on and their Mum and Dad
kept reassuring each other that Megan would be back soon. The days
were long and there was plenty of daylight left. Megan had just
forgotten the time, they said to each other. Yet still she did not
return home.

Their Mother got the young Bethany ready for bed, but was too
distracted to send her off upstairs. Bethany could feel the tension
between her parents. Eventually her mum said ‘That’s it, were
calling the police.’ Twenty minutes later two police constables
were in their kitchen, taking notes, asking where Megan usually
played. Their father had been to every place he could think of that
Megan might have gone to play and each time had drawn a blank. He
was happy to believe he might have missed somewhere obvious though
and carefully went through it all again with the two
constables.

The policemen asked her parents if Megan liked being up on the
cliff or playing down by the water’s edge. Of course, said her
parents, doesn’t every child? The older policeman pulled a face and
got on his radio to the coastguard. The tide had turned and it was
common knowledge, he said, that it was easy to get cut off at the
bottom of a cliff when the tide came in. He told her mum and dad
that they should never have let Megan go off unaccompanied like
that. ‘It’s irresponsible’, he said. Bethany’s dad got angry and
defensive, but her mum started to cry and that had set Bethany off
too.

The coastguard got the lifeboat out and off it went to check
whether anything unusual could be seen at the foot of the cliffs.
An hour later the reports came back in. Nothing at all had been
found. It was as if Megan had disappeared without a
trace.

By ten pm, the long summer day had given way to darkness. The
two constables had gone and a woman police constable had taken
their place. Patrol cars were checking the local roads and there
was talk of organising a search of the nearby woods and fields at
first light. Her mother sat, hunched in quiet anguish. Her Dad went
out, flashlight in hand, calling Megan’s name loudly, feeling he
had to do something, anything rather than just sit there and
wait.

Eventually sleep overcame the young Bethany and her mother
covered her with a blanket on the sofa where she had lain down. No
one was in the mood to go to bed that night. Night gave way to
bleak morning.

Suddenly the police-woman’s radio crackled into life. Megan
had been found alive and well. Twenty minutes later Megan was
bustled into the cottage, a blanket round her shoulders. Bethany
blinked wearily but happy that her sister was safe and sound. Her
parents were as angry as they were relieved and demanded that Megan
tell them immediately where she had been all night, what she had
been playing at, worrying them half to death.

But Megan hadn’t answered and had had a small smile and a far
away look upon her face. She didn’t seem able to say. It was up to
a young policeman to tell them how she’d been found. He’d been in
his patrol car driving along the sea road going west out of town.
He’d seen Megan just sitting there, on a rock a few metres off,
staring out to sea. He called to her and clambered over the rocks
to get to her, but the girl didn’t seem to hear. When he got close
he could see that she was wet through, as though she’d been in the
sea, but she wasn’t shivering and didn’t seem cold. He said that he
was cold though and he was wearing a dry uniform. He scooped her up
off the rock where she was sitting and brought her home to the
cottage.