The Mermaid Collector (32 page)

“I’ve got all his things,” Sarah said, sniffling as she smoothed Henry’s fine hair with her fingertips. “I’ve put in a few more blankets. Just in case. And if he doesn’t take all his milk at once, don’t worry. He’s a careful one, is all.”

Pearl hugged Sarah Keene and walked back up the
hill with Henry. She tried to keep her eyes fixed on the keeper’s house, but she couldn’t think straight for the sound of the surf. It was deafening, but more than that, it was intrusive; like an impatient child banging his chair for attention.

Fine, she thought, changing course when she’d reached the walkway to the tower. She’d indulge it this once. Did it wish to tell her something, this miserable sea, this white-tipped moving grave that had been the coffin to her sister’s beloved husband? Had it known how much Lydia feared it? Had it driven her so mad in that moment on the gallery that she’d sacrificed herself to quiet it once and for all?

Pearl traveled the wooden bridge, Henry rooting uselessly at her collar. She came as far as the door to the tower, not wishing to advance. She looked around, imagining her sister’s last moments on this earth, her purposeful steps up into that glass room that saw all, her bottomless sadness that she hadn’t dared share, the hopelessness she’d never given anyone a chance to repair.

It was then that Pearl heard them. Soft at first, gentle, as if someone had brushed past them with his shoulder, they then grew louder, as if they’d been pummeled with fists, twisted mercilessly by the wind.

She squinted up to where the sound seemed to originate and caught the reflection of something silver, short shafts of light that looked strangely like flatware.

“She thought it would keep them away.”

Pearl looked over, startled at the voice, and found
Angus Keene beside her. The young man looked exhausted, drained, and weary, Pearl thought.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“The chimes.” Angus nodded toward the gallery. “It was an old wives’ tale she’d read. She hung chimes to keep them from coming back.”

“You don’t mean the men?”

“No, ma’am. The mermaids.”

Pearl stared at him, bewildered. “I don’t…I don’t understand.”

“You don’t know?” he asked.

“I know my sister has taken her life. I know my brother-in-law has drowned.”

“Mr. Harris left it all in his log book,” Angus said. “They found it in her things when they went through the house. He said they’d been rescued by mermaids when everyone thought they were lost. Said they fell in love out there and finally went back to be with them.”

“
Back?
But that’s absolute madness.”

“That’s why everyone thinks she killed herself. But she didn’t.” Angus held out an envelope, the edges grayed with fingerprints, as if it had been opened and sealed a hundred times. “She just slipped. She was coming to be with me. She and Henry.”

Pearl stared a moment at the letter, then at Angus, seeing his gaze had fallen to the baby, a faint smile tugging at his mouth, his eyes filling, and her breath caught. She’d suspected a long time ago, standing in her sister’s kitchen,
when she had asked about the man who strode down the path and had seen the flash of affection in Lydia’s eyes. Pearl had witnessed it then and once again when they’d stood around Henry’s cradle just a few weeks before. Didn’t Lydia know that sisters could see inside each other’s hearts?

“You can read it for yourself,” Angus said, dragging his sleeve across one eye, then the other, and sniffing hard. “I haven’t shown it to anyone. I can’t, you know. But it’s not true that she killed herself. She would never leave Henry. Not for anything.”

Pearl gently pushed the letter back at Angus. She didn’t need to read it. Instead, she came at him and hugged him fiercely, but only with one arm to keep Henry from being squeezed.

After a long moment, she let him go and stepped back.

“What will you do now?” she asked, blinking at her own tears.

“I put in for work in Connecticut,” he said. “I leave in a few weeks. It’ll be good. Get out from under everyone’s feet. Get on with things.”

When Pearl looked back, she found Angus watching Henry again, his eyes dry now but full with longing.

“You can see him,” she said. “Whenever you wish. I promise you.”

Angus looked at Pearl, his eyes flashing with concern, then in the next instant, with calm understanding.

“I appreciate that. I do,” he said, but they both knew he would never see his child again.

Together they walked back to the house where the carriage was waiting, Henry’s clothes and cradle stowed above. Angus waited until she and Henry were tucked safely inside before he began back down the hill. Pearl watched him as they drove away, turning her gaze to the lighthouse only when Angus had slipped beneath the rise, the cupola remaining in view until they rounded the turn in the road, daylight bouncing off the wedges of black like sunbursts, brighter than any beam.

Friday Night

The Mutiny Dash

THE VILLAGE GREEN WAS LIT
up like a fairground and twice as crowded. A few amusement park rides, including an old-time carousel with purple and pink horses and a pair of emerald dolphins, had been set up on an adjoining stretch of lawn. Paper bowls of hot blueberry crumble, topped with quickly melting scoops of vanilla frozen custard, lined picnic tables, while musicians played in rousing clumps up and down the sidewalk.

Down at the town beach, the speakers sizzled expec-tantly
into the soft night air, crossing the bustling crowd that lined the sand, braced and prone. The four of them—five including the baby—had parked at Pike’s, as the owner always let Buzz and Tess do every year for the festival, and they made good time getting through the crowds to take their places on the cold sand. They’d added their shoes to the impossible mountain of sneakers and sandals at the top of the beach. (“We’ll never find them again,” Tom said, worried. “Not tonight, you won’t,” Tess had answered, kicking off her own and watching them be swallowed up in the pile.) It was indeed a banner year, Tess thought as she looked up and down the shore. There had to be at least four hundred people running the Dash this year, a striking increase from the handful there for the first Dash she and Ruby had attended when she was just nine, with Buzz watching from the sidelines, try as Ruby had to convince him to join the line of racers.

“You’re not scared, are you?” Ruby had whispered, clutching Tess’s small hand. “Because it’s okay if you are.”

“I’m not scared. Are you?”

“How can I be scared? I have you.”

“Do you think
they
were scared?”

“Who, lovey?”

“Those men. Those men who loved the mermaids.”

“No, they weren’t scared.”

“But how can you be sure?” Tess had asked.

“Easy.” Ruby’s eyes had filled then, glistening like jarred honey on a windowsill. “Because true love isn’t scary, lovey. That’s what makes it true.”

“Look!” Tess turned to see the town manager taking his place on the podium at the end of the pier, his bullhorn raised to his mouth.

Then it had been like being poured out of a spout. That was how Tess would always remember it. The crush of people, the shrieks of delight, the rush of wind and cold water, the taste of salt spray as they’d charged into the ocean, splashing and cheering.

Now it was Tom standing beside her. He scanned the beach, his eyes drifting over to the pier where Edith Hawthorne and the rest of the town officials were lined up, beaming like jack-o’-lanterns under a canopy of lights.

“They won’t quit, you know,” he said. “They want me out of that house.”

“Just let them try,” Tess said.

Tom looked around. “Where’s Dean? He was right behind us.”

“There.” Tess pointed down the beach to where Dean and Petra stood with Mia.

“He thinks it’s going to be easy,” Tom said, watching his brother blow raspberries on his daughter’s fists. “Like a puppy. He has no idea.”

Tess smiled. “He will.”

But Tom’s expression remained dubious, even when he turned his gaze back to her. “So, what do we do now?”

“Now we take the hand of the person next to us, and when the time comes, we all run in together.”

“I didn’t mean about the Dash,” Tom said.

Tess reared up and kissed his cheek. “Neither did I,” she whispered.

“Dashers, ready?”
The town manager’s voice crackled over the loudspeaker. Tom took Tess’s hand and squeezed it hard. Dean appeared beside them just in time, sliding his hand into Tess’s. The three of them smiled at one another, hands linked; then they faced the water.

“On your mark, get set…dash!”

It was like being poured out of a spout. That was Tom’s first thought as he felt the rush of speed and energy blowing behind him, and he and Tess and Dean all allowed themselves to be part of the flow. They crashed into the water, hundreds of bodies whooping and flailing into the cold surf, getting waist deep before they finally slowed their advance. Tom couldn’t believe how cold it was; Tess had never felt the water so warm. She submerged herself, tasting the salt. Bending her head back to float, she saw Tom above her. He was smiling even as he shook his arms to regain feeling in them.

There were clouds tonight; Tess could see them thinning. They’d hide the stars, those stars that were always there, even if you couldn’t see them, even if you didn’t know their names. Closing her eyes, she swore she heard chimes above the din of the crowd, colliding in a far-off breeze, a farewell tinkling, a shifting good-bye of salt-lapped metal, or maybe just a ringing of memory, of love, of new.

I am so fortunate to work with such talented and gracious people at NAL. To my editor, Danielle Perez, who saw the early spark of this novel and gave it air and plenty of fuel to burn bright—my deepest thanks. I also wish to thank Jane Steele, Daniel Walsh, Rosalind Parry, Kayleigh Clark, and Mimi Bark for all they have done on this book’s journey.

To Rebecca Gradinger, who always steers me in the right direction. I thank her—and my lucky stars to have her as my agent.

As someone raised in Maine, I came to realize that I knew embarrassingly little about lighthouses and sea travel when I started writing this book, so I am indebted to several people for sharing their expertise and keeping me from looking dim on the subjects: David Richards, Erma Colvin, and Thomas Tag from the U.S. Lighthouse
Society for detailed information on keeper’s log books. Thanks as well to the lighthouse museums of Maine—and those all over the world—that tirelessly maintain these important historic structures so we can all be “keepers” of the magic and the majesty of the sea.

A NATIVE NEW ENGLANDER WHO
was raised in Maine,
Erika Marks
has worked as an illustrator, an art director, a cake decorator, and a carpenter. She currently lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, with her husband and their two daughters. This is her second novel, after
Little Gale Gumbo
.