Summer Harbor (30 page)

Grainger had left his dog in the house, and it barked and scratched at the door until Kiley roused herself enough to holler at it. “Shut up!” Pilot looked back at her with a cocked head and immediately she felt bad. “Come over here.” The gray dog did, sitting on her feet, keeping her in place when she would have been outside in the drizzle, pacing up and down the short pier. What if she lost Will in the same way she’d lost Mack? If anything happened to Will, she’d die. But first she’d kill Grainger. But she knew that neither of those things were true—death would be too easy.

All the time they were reveling in each other’s bodies, Will was out in the wind and rain and darkness. It would be too tempting to see the ironic comparisons between the first time she slept with Grainger and this. Kiley shook her head. No. This time they’d find
Blithe Spirit
before it was too late. She wouldn’t imagine the worst, not here, not alone except for this dog. Kiley slid her feet out from under the dog’s rump, got up, and opened the door for him. “Get out of here.”

“Ma’am, do you want me to take you home?” A very young police officer in a long rain slicker was just outside the door.

“No. I’m fine. I’m waiting here.”

“Just let me know. It could be a while.” He seemed awfully young to be so confident, betraying no discomfort at the sight of her tear-streaked face, no fear that she might launch off into hysterics.

Kiley shut the door. She wasn’t going to succumb to hysterics, or wallow in inertia. She found the harbor master’s channel on Grainger’s radio and a navigational chart, beside it an Eldridge’s Tide Chart. She’d follow the progress of the search with a felt-tip marker.

Grainger had gone out to look for them. Maybe she should have gone with him. They had come so close to renewing the purity of their old love. But as the night wore on, Kiley knew that whatever the outcome, that renewal was tainted.

As she heard the crackle of static punctuated by a voice reading off a location, she marked a red dot at the spot. She needed to be here in case the Coast Guard or the harbor master, or someone else found them, and not Grainger. How awful would that be, for Will and Catherine to be rescued and her not be here? What if she’d gone with Grainger and then
they
were lost?

Kiley’s mind sketched a million variations of lost and found as she followed the slow progress of the search.

Bell’s Cove, Bird’s, Morrel’s, all empty. Was that good news or bad? As long as there was no flotsam, no empty life jackets or broken spars, there was hope.

Grainger fought the desire to close his eyes for a minute. The wind had died, and the rain had diminished to a mere drizzle. Dawn was coming, less a brightening than a lessening of dark. Gray, soupy dawn, a single gull bright white against the murk. French’s Cove was next, smaller than the others, but more familiar. The Sunderland house, where he’d once lived, crouched on the headland. Its white-and-black chimney stood sentinel over the cove below, the rising sun striking fire in the eastern windows.

Below the headland, riding her anchor, he saw
Blithe Spirit
.

At the sound of his motor, two heads popped up from the cockpit. Two sets of arms waved madly. Grainger wiped the spray from his face, mingled with tears of relief and joy. He fired his flare gun into the new dawn.

Kiley shivered, but not with the fresh air touching her moist skin. The weight of worry that had been holding her down, once released, levitated her limbs into a St. Vitus’ dance of relief.

When the thin, raspy voice on the radio dispassionately announced the boat had been sighted in French’s Cove, all hands aboard, Kiley fled past the young officer and into the dawn. She ran to the end of the pier, where she scanned the distance for the lights of the Coast Guard’s search-and-rescue boat. After what felt like hours, the boat finally chugged into the cove. Two figures were clear, standing on the deck beneath the windows of the pilothouse. She waved, and they waved back. Just as the vessel pulled alongside the dock, Kiley spotted Grainger’s Zodiac coming into the cove,
Blithe Spirit
towed along behind.

Suddenly a man and a woman were with her on the pier: Catherine’s parents. She knew she should introduce herself as the mother of the villain in this piece, but she was so caught between relief and anger herself that she was incapable of civility. The three said nothing until the boat was made fast and the kids jumped onto the pier. After a slight hesitation, a swift kiss good-bye, the pair separated to go to their respective parents.

Will was quick to hug her and offer assurances. “Mom, we’re all right. I’m so sorry.”

“We’ll talk about it at home.”

Will knew better than to argue. Kiley kept her hand on his arm as if he would try to escape.

Catherine had run to her parents, taking their relieved hugs, soothing them away from their anger. “We’re all right. We just got pushed out of the channel; the sail ripped.”

Kiley heard her say, “It wasn’t Will’s fault,” and knew that the relationship between Will and Catherine was about to come under siege.

It felt almost like that night she’d gone to the police station to collect Will. Disappointment that he would take such a chance; anger that he would endanger himself and someone else. The utter foolishness appalled her and reminded her viscerally of the helplessness of a parent—or a friend—to prevent such mistakes. The only thing she wanted now was to get him away, away from Grainger, away from Hawke’s Cove. That she had ever believed they would find peace in Hawke’s Cove, that it would help repair the damage to her trust in him, was laughable.

Grainger was securing
Blithe Spirit
back on her mooring. Done, he gunned the outboard to run up to the pier. Kiley pushed Will toward the car.

“Get in the car.”

“But I want to talk to Grainger, to thank him.”

“Get in the car, Will.”

As they drove home through the village, up Seaview Avenue and along the bluff, it was already full daylight. The damp night air was warming toward the day’s heat. Tonight the breeze would rise again with the moon, but tonight Will would be safely away from Hawke’s Cove.

The human heart couldn’t take too many blows, and hers had suffered two too many. Will had too closely reenacted the other accident. Kiley could barely remind herself that, as if in some cosmic consolation, this time it had ended happily, everyone chastened but safe. All she knew was that Grainger, by introducing her son to
Blithe Spirit
, had nearly cost her Will.

They went in by the kitchen door, and Kiley looked with weary eyes at the collection of boxes that needed to be packed into the small car.

“Can I thank Grainger later?”

“No.”

“He found us, Mom.”

“He should never have given you that boat.”

“It wasn’t his fault; it was mine.”

“I know that. It
was
yours.”

“So why are you mad at Grainger?”

“Go take a shower and get some sleep. We leave at noon.”

“What about all the stuff? We need to get a roof rack.”

“I’m going to leave it. All of it.”

“No. You can’t be serious.”

“I am. It’s time to go.” Kiley kicked a box into a corner, then opened it, pulling out the bunched newspaper and dropping it onto the floor.

“Mom. Stop. What are you doing? Leaving it all behind won’t help.”

“Help
what?”
Kiley spun to face her son. The grittiness in her eyes had passed, fresh tears cleansing them.

“It won’t help to make you forget. You can’t take this place and Grainger out of your life, any more than you could forget about me. They’re part of who you are. You can deny it, hide from it, pretend otherwise, but I’ve seen it in you all of my life. From the time I was a little kid, any mention of this place made you smile, whether you wanted to or not. It killed you not to be here.

“Don’t do this to yourself. Why can’t you just understand that even if you never took back a single object from this house, it, and everything it represents, still lives inside you? As long as you have me, you have a connection here. To Grainger.”

“Or Mack.”

“And Mack.”

“Mack died. You could have died!” she hollered.

“Neither of which is Grainger’s fault.”

They stood in appalled silence until Will walked out of the room.

Suddenly Kiley felt done in. She had been thinking about how to punish Will; instead, he had stood in front of her, not as a child needing her reprimand, but as an adult in full comprehension of things she’d long kept hidden, reprimanding
her.

He was all grown up. For the first time Kiley faced having to accept his adulthood. Her little boy was gone and she no longer held sway over him. She pressed her forehead against the cool wood of the doorjamb. Her job was over. What would she do for the rest of her life?

Kiley lay down on the old divan in the parlor. She was helpless suddenly against the need to sleep, as if sleep would protect her against the roiling emotion and confusion. She lay with her arms folded against her stomach, her legs drawn up, wondering if it was possible to die of memory. Everything was all mixed up: images of Mack’s angry departure blended with Will’s safe return, until, in half sleep, she imagined that Mack had been the one to come off that Coast Guard boat. The thought startled her awake; then she plunged into an exhausted sleep. Dreamless, for a while Kiley found a refuge.

She didn’t know how long she’d been asleep. Her mouth felt metallic and her eyes heavy. She half opened them to see Grainger sitting in the armchair opposite, simply looking at her. He looked haggard, unshaven, slightly gray with his own long night of pain. She half expected that he was a ghost, that the real Grainger was gone. Then he spoke and his husky voice was thick with the fear that it wasn’t he, but she, who was the ghost.

“Do you remember the letter you brought me? The day we made love, the last day we were together? Do you remember that the postmark on that letter was Boston, and the return address was blacked out? That letter was from my mother, Kiley. I managed to decipher some of the return address when I held it up to a light. I could just make out ‘McLean Hospital.’ ”

“The psychiatric hospital?”

“Yes.”

“Was she a patient?”

“That’s what I feared, but no. She was working there as an aide.”

Kiley was upright, sitting with her hands clasped, attentive, but distant. “How was she, your mother?”

“Surprised to see me. She didn’t know me at first, as if she’d put me so far out of her mind I didn’t exist. Then she cried and told me that she’d had to leave, she was afraid for her life. One time, Rollie found her packing us up, and he not only knocked her around, but he told her that unless she went alone, he’d hunt her down wherever she went. If she left me behind, she was free. I was the price of her freedom.”

“I can’t believe she’d do that. I can’t believe she’d put herself first.”

Kiley was ill with the thought of this woman leaving a small boy in the charge of a drunken, violent man. What kind of mother did that? Grainger’s sad young face came to her then, his pale and pensive expression, smiling only when the three of them were alone together.

“She told me she honestly believed he’d treat me all right. She had no idea that he never imagined she’d actually do it. He was calling her bluff.”

“Did you tell her how he treated you?”

There was a long silence. Grainger’s breath seemed a little labored, his eyes turned from her, the imagery of his childhood nightmare before them. “No.”

“Why not?”

“What good would it do to make her suffer any more than she had?”

“You forgave her?”

“Not in so many words, but I suppose so.”

“I’m glad for you, Grainger.” Kiley heard Will’s footsteps above. “Why are you telling me this now?”

“Because I want you to know that I wasn’t running away from you, and I didn’t think that Mack was in any danger. I wanted you to go to him, because I believed he was the one you really loved. That you two were right for each other and I never would be. If I stayed, it would just spoil any chance you two would have together.”

“You never believed me when I said it was you I loved.”

“No. You were so anguished over Mack’s hurt that I knew you were mistaken.”

“Feeling sorry about hurting someone’s feelings is a different thing.”

“Do you hold me responsible for Will’s actions?”

Kiley stood up, amazed at how wobbly she felt. “If anything had happened to Will last night, I would have done more than hold you responsible.”

“You wouldn’t have had to. I would, and do, hold myself responsible. For all of it.” Grainger was on his feet. “If I had known what was going to happen, Kiley, I would have stopped him. I loved him.”

“Who, Will or Mack?”

“Both of them.”

Will was coming down the back stairs.

“I came to ask you to come with me. I have something I want us to do together.”

“What?”

“I’d rather show you. It’s something I need you to help me do.”

“No. We’re on our way in a few minutes.”

“Please, Kiley. Come with me.”

Kiley felt strength return. “No, Grainger. And I would prefer it if you left now, without seeing Will.”

“I won’t do that.” His voice was low and even, uncompromising. “I won’t let you keep him from me. He could be mine. And even if he isn’t—”

“Get out of here.” Her emotional bank account was overdrawn, the horror of thinking she might have lost Will was the last check. She couldn’t take any more drama or demands on her heart. “I won’t have it.”

“Won’t have what?” Will was in the room with them, holding up his hands in a referee’s gesture.

“Will, go put the suitcases in the car. Grainger was just leaving.”

“I want your mother to come with me for a few minutes.”

“Go with him. I’ll finish packing,” Will said.

“No. Get out of here, Grainger. Don’t you get it yet? I want nothing to do with you.”

“That wasn’t how it was last night.”

Kiley stepped across the room, her outstretched hand ready to slap Grainger, but he caught it in mid-strike. “I’ve had enough of your hitting me. It isn’t physical pain you commit, it’s emotional—and I’m a past master at receiving emotional pain. You’re only hurting yourself. Maybe you still blame me for Mack’s death, but I think you blame yourself too.”

“Stop it!” Will shouted. “Grow up, the pair of you, and deal with it! Neither of you killed Mack. You aren’t responsible for his death.
He
is. Mack chose to act stupidly, to make a dramatic point. Neither of you could have stopped him, any more than taking me away from D.C. and Mike would have stopped my smoking dope if that’s what I wanted to do. Any more than taking me away from Catherine will stop us from being together. It was my decision to go out last night. Mom, if you chose Mack and then changed your mind well, you were kids, for god’s sake. That’s what kids do. Lori changed hers. I changed mine.” Will’s ocean blue eyes were wide with emotion as he looked from one to the other. “It doesn’t mean anyone is responsible. You’ve built a whole life regretting someone else’s mistake. Isn’t it time to move on?”

Kiley’s wrist was still gripped in Grainger’s hand as they stared at Will. Tall and blond and fiery in the sun streaming in through the big windows, his face a little shadowed, for an uncanny instant, he looked like Mack.

Grainger let his grip relax and slid his hand to take hers in a gentle touch. And as she took his fingers in hers, Kiley felt the slow dissolving away of years of pain.

The sultry morning had given way to a threatening afternoon. The eastern sky was nearly purple as they climbed into Grainger’s Zodiac. Kiley fastened her life jacket with a trembling hand. Without discussing what they were doing, they began to act in tandem, little conversation needed, allowing the solemn activity to progress in respectful silence. There was nothing else to say.

Behind them,
Blithe Spirit
willingly came along. Her fresh white paint was bright in the eerie sky, her varnish like sweet maple syrup. At the top of her mast, her blue pennant fluttered. Kiley and Grainger reached the middle of Maiden Cove, just above the point he knew to be the deepest.