The Silver Boat (20 page)

Tim led her downstairs, through the main boatbuilding shed, outdoors, down to a smaller shed with iron tracks running down to the water. Dar's heart beat so hard she could barely breathe.

Could her father be living here? Was it possible? She thought of Harrison on the Vineyard, living in a storage unit. Her father loved the sea; did he live aboard one of the boats in the cavernous loft? Or in a dock slip outside? Or inside this smaller shed?

“Are you ready?” Tim asked. His face was full of grief. Dar knew but didn't want to know. She wavered, and he steadied her. He kept his arm around her waist as he unlocked the brass lock, and eased her inside.

The space was dark, about thirty by forty feet large. It smelled of must, shellfish, and salt water. Tim turned on the light, and Dar spotted green crabs scuttling out of the glare and into the ironbrown water sloshing under the door. Blue-black mussels grew in colonies against the submerged iron rails.

“Look,” Tim said.

Dar sensed the bulk behind her, but couldn't make herself turn. She felt Tim's hands on her shoulders, easing her around. She kept her eyes shut so she wouldn't have to see.

“No,” she said, trying to push away from him.

“But you know already, don't you? He tried to sail home to you and your family—it was all he wanted. He left from here, this very dock, to attempt a second solo crossing.”

Dar opened her eyes. She eased away from Tim, and walked over to the
Irish Darling
, up on a cradle. She looked just the same as Dar remembered her, except her white paint and brightwork were peeling and covered with algae, and there was a deep gash in the front quarter of the starboard side.

“She's been here for twenty-eight years,” Tim said. “He sank just a mile off Kinsale Head. The weather was fine; he'd left on the outgoing tide of a full moon night. We'd stood at the end of the quay, watching him go.”

Dar closed her eyes, trying to imagine that moment, wondering how her father had felt to be leaving, to be sailing home.

“We can only imagine that he hit a shoal, something uncharted. He never had time to radio for help. She must have filled fast, and he went down with her. My mother tried so hard to reach your family, but he'd never given her your mother's name, or where she lived. He must have wanted to spare her.”

“Was he trapped inside?” Dar asked.

“No,” Tim said. “We never found his body. He'd taken off his boots, belt, anything that could weigh him down. Maybe he'd tried to swim for shore once he was sure there was no hope for the
Irish Darling
. We found his belongings in the hold when we salvaged her.”

“Would you mind if I went on board?” Dar asked. “Just to see?”

“If you want. But the old clothes are gone. We took them off. There's nothing of him left in there.”

Even so, Dar climbed the ladder. She stepped over the rail, pitted with salt and mildew. She was standing in her father's grave. She touched each surface tenderly, whispering his name. She squeezed her eyes shut as hard as she could, tried to bring up his face. But she couldn't—it was gone. She had to reach into her pocket and take out the black-and-white photo.

There he was, her beloved dad. He had wanted to return home to her family. Sinking onto a bare wood settee, she held the photo and smiled at him. She loved him more than ever. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine him sitting right behind her. The Kinsale dockmaster had been right: she'd seen a ghost ship.

She stood up, began to move through the cabin. Time fell away, and she swore she was exploring the boat with her father, just like the first time. She looked at the bookcases he'd built because she and her sisters loved to read so much, the galley now stripped of its compact stove and refrigerator box. Algae had marred every surface. She scratched her name on a porthole; the dry green organism felt like dust and stuck under her fingernail.

Even the deck was covered with the stuff, in spite of the many people who must have tromped through over the years. She stared at the beautiful deck; her father had been so pleased with the teak and holly pattern he'd installed. And then she remembered: the tiny secret spot in the main saloon. She held her breath. Was it real? Had she dreamed up the hidden compartment for Dulse, for a story? She went straight to it—forward of the folding table, port side.

Crouching down, Dar pressed a square the size of a Scrabble piece. It released a mechanism, and a foot-square section of the teak and holly flooring lifted out. She gazed into the watertight compartment, but it was too dark to see. Feeling around inside, she felt squeamish. There could be crabs or something worse hiding there. Her hand found something: a pouch. She pulled it out slowly, carefully.

Made of rubber, wrapped in a plastic bag. Dar didn't want to take the time to learn what it held. Tim had had the
Irish Darling
all these years. He could have searched and found it; but now it was Dar's, and she slid it into the inside pocket of her jacket.

When she climbed down, she caught the compassionate look on Tim's face. “I'm sorry I didn't tell you right away, when you first came.”

“Why didn't you?”

“Ah, it's shitty. I hated you for years—not just you, but his whole family. I wanted you to meet my mother—not only for her, but so you could see she was real. We existed.”

“You mattered to him,” Dar said.

Tim shrugged. “He'd been with us barely a few months, but he took a big slice of us when he left. He raised our hopes, that's how I think of it now. It was good to have him with us. But it hurt my mother to see him walk out to the end of the rock jetty, looking west every single night. As if he could see you, all he'd left behind.”

“Hurt you, too,” Dar said.

“Maybe,” Tim said. Dar looked down, not wanting to cry.

“We'll stay in touch,” she said, suddenly needing to get out of there, reaching into her pocket, giving him her card.

“Yes,” he said, glancing at the bold charcoal print of a darkeyed girl swimming among the strands of a kelp forest. “What's this?”

“That's Dulse,” Dar said. “She's the main character in a series of graphic novels I do.”

“Wow. My new friend's super talented,” he said.

She glanced at her watch, knowing Rory and Delia were probably packing, waiting for her to get back for dinner.

“I want my sisters to see the boat,” she said. “I know it's getting late, and you probably want to leave.”

He shook his head. “I'll wait here till you get back.”

So Dar hurried down the quay, into the small bed-and-breakfast, found her sisters standing in the lobby, looking at menus for local restaurants.

“Dar!” Delia said. “We exchanged our tickets, and we're all set. I'm going to the Vineyard with you instead of back home right away. Is that okay?”

“Where did you go?” Rory asked. “We were getting worried.”

“I was at McCarthy Manufacturing,” Dar said. “And I want you to come there, too. There's something you have to see.”

The two of them stared at her, and she knew they could see the truth in her eyes, the smell of algae and the sea pouring off her. Her hands were dirty from touching their father's boat, but she used them to ease her sisters down, into creaking lobby chairs.

“I found out what happened to Dad,” she said.

“What?” Rory asked, sounding afraid.

“Is he alive?” Delia asked, gripping Dar's hand.

“No,” Dar said softly. She knelt down, her mouth dry. After so many years, all the hoping and wondering and giving up, she searched for the words. “He didn't make it . . .”

“He's dead?” Rory asked.

“He is,” Dar said. “He died trying to sail home to us. It was a clear night, the tide was with him, there was no reason . . .” She broke down, picturing her father sinking just offshore, wondering what must have gone through his head. Her sisters held her.

“Did Tim tell you?” Delia asked after a while.

“Yes,” Dar said. “He's waiting for us, so you can see the boat. They salvaged her, kept her all this time.”

So the three of them headed out. The wind blew straight off the harbor, tasting of salt. Tim was waiting just outside the shed door; Dar saw his cigarette glowing in the dark. He spotted them coming, came forward.

“Hello,” he said. “You must be Rory and Delia.”

“Hi, Tim,” Rory said.

Delia gave him a hug. “Dar just told us.”

“I'm very sorry,” Tim said. “Your father was a good man; we all knew how badly he wanted to get home to you . . .”

Dar watched her sisters take in his words. They nodded, tearing up. Tim turned to lead them into the damp boathouse, over to the wreck of the
Irish Darling
. Rory went straight to the hole in her side, cried out as she touched the ragged splintery edges.

Tim held the ladder so they could climb up. Again, he didn't follow, but let them be alone together. There was no surface untouched by salt water, and the hold smelled of seaweed and barnacles. Dar stood back, letting her sisters make their way around the small space, doing the same thing she had: touching everything he might have touched.

“He was on his way home,” Rory said. “Even though he didn't get what he'd come for.”

“Maybe he did,” Dar said.

“But Cathleen made it seem he didn't,” Delia said. “It's horrible, but that means even more to me, thinking he'd decided to sail home no matter what. I hated thinking of him basing everything on that land grant.”

“I think Cathleen was wrong, or meant something else. I think Dad did find what he was looking for” Dar said, reaching under her fleece.

Her sisters gathered close, staring at the rubber pouch. The zipper had rusted out, so when Dar pulled on it, it ripped apart. She reached inside, pulled out a folded piece of parchment paper, the creases fragile and brown. They leaned over, gazing at impossibly fine writing, the black ink blotched and faded to almost nothing in spots. The pen's imprint had been strong, however, and there was a thick, cracked red wax seal beside the signature line.

“Is it?” Rory asked.

“I think so,” Dar said.

“He was right, then,” Rory said. “He was right all along . . .”

“I wish Mom could have known,” Dar said. “She lived the rest of her life thinking he'd left her forever.”

“Why couldn't he have called?” Delia asked. “Do you think he'd gotten more involved with Cathleen than Tim said? Maybe he was torn about coming home.”

“I think he was involved with Cathleen,” Dar said. “But I know he wasn't torn. He was always coming home. The things he was most confident about were sailing and the sea. He'd made it to Ireland in terrible weather; I'm sure it never occurred to him he wouldn't make it back to the Vineyard safely.”

“He wanted to surprise her,” Delia said.

“Or prove something to her,” Rory said. “But he still could have called, told her he'd tracked down the deed. Or whatever it is.”

“How
did
he track it down?” Delia asked.

Dar shook her head. She had no idea. They'd have lots of questions for their lawyer, Bart Packard, when they got home. But just then she and her sisters fell silent, thinking of their father, knowing they were in the place where he had died. The boat felt holy, just as the cemetery had when they'd surrounded their mother's grave.

Whatever their father had or hadn't accomplished had never made them love him more or less. Standing in the cold, dank saloon of the sloop he had built with such love, they felt his loss more than ever, and held hands with tears running down their cheeks.

NATHANIEL SOUTHGATE SHALER , 1894

T
he key was easy to find. It had always been hidden under the angel in the garden. During summer the chipped stone statue was covered by vines, surrounded by marsh grass, but in spring the grass was barely turning green and vines were a distant memory of summers gone by. Once Pete had asked Dar why they had an angel. No one was particularly religious. And she'd said, “Everyone needs a protector.”

Pete thought of that now. When Granny got really sick, she allowed Dar to place a statue of the Buddha in the herb garden. But the angel predated the Buddha by a lot of years, and it had been keeper of the key all that time. He saw a small plastic doll sitting near the angel. A little girl had been around. His daughter.

Most of the time the house was left unlocked. But right now the three sisters were in Ireland, and the house was basically sold, and Pete guessed Dar didn't want any vultures entering without permission. She'd told him to go home to Maryland. He was a piece of shit who'd never even met his own kid, but he hoped his aunt would understand.