Page 43 of The Women at Ocean's End

‘Oh, right, well, you know, there’s a lovely little maternity leave coming up here in a few weeks, part-time hours. It might suit you if you enjoy surfing, now there’s no cottage but…’

‘So, it would be office-based?’ The irony was, she couldn’t type to save her life, was very dodgy at taking messages and keeping files in order was something she feared would bore her to death. ‘Anyway, that’s grand,’ she said, swallowing down her frustration. There was a huge lump opening up in her throat and while she might like to drag the old boy over hot coals for a little longer, actually, there was no point. She definitely did not want him to hear her become a sobbing mess. ‘So, you’ll let me know when he’s arriving on the island? I presume you’ll want me to stay until he comes and I’ll have to organise a new place to live and a job and…’ That was it, she was about to cry.

‘It’ll be a while yet and… Ros, there is that little job here. I’m sure that we can find you something to tide you over, if…’

‘Hmm, thanks for that, must go, the rain is coming. I’m going to get soaked here and I still haven’t gotten a good look at that figwort to be sure,’ she said and she hung up the phone before collapsing into a spasm of despairing sobs. What on earth was she going to do now? She couldn’t leave the island, she just couldn’t, it was the first time she’d ever felt as if she had a real home, the first time in so very, very long.

That evening, Ros felt so low she knew, no matter how much she wanted to, she couldn’t just put on a brave face and go to Constance’s house and pretend that it didn’t really matter. It did matter. It mattered very much to her. She felt as if the idea of leaving was like cutting out some vital organ. It made her breathless, the fact that she would have to go and live somewhere she knew now she’d never belong. Pin Hill Islandwas her home. All right, she wasn’t born and bred here. She didn’t have any actual family, but she had Constance and now Heather and the fact was they were as close to family as she had in the world.

That evening, she stayed in the ranger’s cottage, snuggled up with a throw she’d bought in the Christmas market several months earlier. She curled up on the sofa and watched as the sky turned from grey, to shadow, to charcoal to black. She sat there with a bottle of whiskey that Max Toolis had bought before he left and never gotten round to opening. Well, he was unlikely to come back and claim it now. The taste stung her lips but it warmed her mouth and down all the way to the very centre of her empty stomach. Over the course of an evening where it felt as if time both dragged and stood stock still, she got slowly, miserably drunk.

At some time after ten, she heard the unwelcome sound of a rumbling jeep turn into the back yard. Bloody Jonah Ashe, it had to be him. She listened as the driver pulled to a stop and the handbrake squeaked noisily. There was an odd silence for a moment, as if the driver was holding his breath just as Ros was – perhaps he sensed this would not be a good time for a sparring match with her. Then she heard the jeep door creak open, imagined she heard Jonah cross the yard, although in reality, there wasn’t a sound, but then a loud thunk, as if something hit the door. Silence, for a full thirty seconds. There was no knock on the door, no calling out of her name, no signs that he had actually come to see the person who lived here. Just one excited bark and Ros imagined that black-and-white collie that sometimes travelled with him leaping about with excitement because his master had returned to the jeep. And then she heard the engine roar to life, the sound of the jeep being turned around on the gravel and growling once more onto the narrow road that led away from the cottage.

A half-empty bag of feed nuts, suitable for ewes and lambs. That’s what he’d left against the back door of the cottage. Part of Ros wondered if perhaps he was saying sorry for their argument the last evening she’d met him, another part of her couldn’t help but wonder if it was the wages of guilt – had he reported her to the Parks and Wildlife Service for not doing her job properly? Was Jonah Ashe responsible for her losing out on her dream job? That thought made her even more upset and then angry. How could someone be such a complete and utter bastard? But of course, a man who’d cheat on his wife wasn’t going to have very much in the way of a decent character when it came to other things in life either, was he?

She wallowed for a whole evening and made a silent vow that the following day, she would get up and start all over again. She had done it before; she’d just never actually wanted to do it less than she did now.

28

September 1957

Dotty

If Dotty lived to be five hundred years old, she’d never understand how she got through the next few weeks after her father ended up in the well. It helped that their house took on a completely different shape, as did her mother. Perhaps her mother thought the change in Dotty herself was down to some sort of terrible grief at losing her father. Well, she was wrong about that. Dotty was simply petrified that anyone would find out what had happened in Mr Morrison’s garden.

That first evening, Dotty made her excuses. Belly ache. Too many gooseberries and a mild reproach meant she could hide in her room for the night. She didn’t sleep, how could she? Instead, she sat up in bed, listening to every floorboard creak, every stroke of the old poplar tree branches outside against her bedroom window. Her mother didn’t sleep either. She heard her pad up and down the stairs several times over the course of the evening. Her father had stayed out before. If there was an occasion, or sometimes for no occasion at all, he could stay out until the early morning and then stagger noisily to bed with only the muffled sounds of her mother trying to mollify him quietly for what remained of the night.

Dotty knew she couldn’t stay hidden forever, but the next few days shot past her as if they were unconnected images taking place around her, just beyond her reach. Search parties were organised; her mother watched the door silently, as if there was some chance he would walk through it at any moment. It felt as if every neighbour on the road sat in the front room drinking tea and talking about it being such a terrible to-do.

No-one, not one person, asked Dotty if she knew anything of her father’s whereabouts. Not even her mother. Which was strange, because her mother asked just about everyone else, she even went to the local garda station with Mrs Macken and reported him missing.

It was a week later, maybe longer, when Dotty heard the doorbell ring. Time had taken on a new form in their lives; now it was measured out by ticking seconds on the clock, she couldn’t possibly hope to calculate those into days or even into hours sometimes.

Mrs Macken. Again. At least she did not come bearing awful dinners that they could not face and did not want to eat. Her mother brought her into the front room where they sat for a small while. Mrs Macken would not drink tea and refused cake, which was probably just as well, since Mrs Gillespie had made it and Dotty wouldn’t have put it past Lickey to spit in it if he knew it was being given away.

It had always been the way, Dotty wasn’t sure why, but as soon as adult voices dropped to a whisper, you could be guaranteed it was then the interesting things were being said. Mrs Macken and her mother spoke in whispers that afternoon, but thankfully, they wereboth of an age where they couldn’t bear not to have fresh air slice through a room, so the door was left ajar. At first, from her vantage point at the top of the stairs, Dotty feared that maybe Constance had let the cat out of the bag. This thought occurred to her often and, when it did, she felt bile riseuncomfortably in her chest, a thin layer of sweat oozing from her palms. This time she had to fight hard to stay exactly where she was, rather than bolt out into the wet afternoon. It was better to move closer to the open door, try and pick up what was being said.

‘It’s just a thought,’ Mrs Macken said softly.

‘But that’s just it, I can’t think… it’s all so much. I mean, Norman has always been the one to decide these things and…’

‘But Norman is not here, Sylvie, and you’re a grown woman, you can make your own choices. For goodness’ sake, you can’t tell me he decided everything.’ There was a taut silence then. ‘Sorry, I just… I didn’t mean…’

‘No, no, you’re right. I shouldn’t have let him, but…’ Her mother began to weep quietly. ‘It’s just, it’s always been like that. I was so young when I married him, only just sixteen, and he took care of me. You know, I’m not like you, I can’t just go out and make a life for myself, you’ve no idea where I came from or what…’ She seemed to gather up her words for a moment. ‘Well, no-one expected very much for any of us, put it like that. I was the only one of my family to get away, the rest of them are all…’ She didn’t say it, but maybe she didn’t need to.

‘Simple farming folk?’ Mrs Macken was being kind.

‘Stocious drunks, Norman called them and he was right, my parents just didn’t really…’

‘None of that matters, Sylvie. You are not your parents, you don’t have to live like them and you don’t need Norman Wren to make you a better person. You are just fine as you are.’

‘I’m sure he’ll come back, it’s just…’

‘We’ve checked everywhere, the hospitals, the guards. Sylvie, you have to do something, you can’t live on fresh air and Nellie Gillespie’s leftovers.’

‘God, they’re awful.’ Sylvie giggled; it was a strange sound because, suddenly, Dotty realised, her mother rarely smiled, she hardly ever laughed.

‘I know, I’d rather starve.’ Maggie was laughing too. ‘So, will you think about it?’ There was silence, a long silence, and Dotty was on the point of bursting into the sitting room to ask exactly what it was her mother had to think about.

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