by Faith Hogan
‘I’m not sure.’
‘Maybe I can help you there…’ Kate put her arm around Rita. She was going to enjoy teaching Duncan Quinn a lesson.
*
If Kate enjoyed the hectic routine of the coffee shop each day, so different to the stuffy office in London, she enjoyed her free time even more. In Ballytokeep, she only had to walk out her front door and she was on permanent summer holidays. She wondered some days if that sensation would ever leave her. Even Castle Rock in the distance, seemed to shrink in the days after she had seen Todd. It no longer loomed above her, casting a cold and judgemental eye over what she had managed to eke out of life for herself. So, she hadn’t married a super handsome barrister, nor had she managed to fill her home with the children that always seemed part of the deal. But she was happy, in this place, sharing her days with Rita and her nights with the wind whipping up the waves beneath the rocks. She had Iris, Archie and Colin. She walked through the village and there were people who were glad to see her. She had peace of mind and, for the first time in over a decade, she was not searching for something she could not name.
She enjoyed the ongoing work that was involved in running the bathhouse. The builders had sorted out the coffee shop, the baths and the steam presses. For this season, they were up and running. Perhaps, when winter loomed dark and cold she could look at making space for a therapist or two to offer massages or treatments. She spent her evenings sitting on the rock, watching the porpoises and dolphins play in the frothy waves. When the sky inked to darkness over her head, and the stars sparkled brighter than it seemed they had any right to, she dragged herself inside. The flat held its own attraction. She was still making her way through the papers and belongings of Robert Hartley. Archie told her she should just dump them. They would be old and moth-eaten and hardly of any interest to anyone now. Perhaps he was right; certainly, Archie had no interest in anything of his brother’s that she found.
‘It’s like going back there,’ she whispered one day when Kate gave her Robert’s watch. It was engraved, from some girl; Iris couldn’t remember her. ‘Robert had many girlfriends, I’m sure neither Archie nor I knew half of them.’
‘It’s a really good watch.’ Kate held it up to the light. ‘It’s definitely gold and it still works, listen.’ It was keeping perfect time. She wound it up the previous day and it hadn’t lost a minute. ‘I thought maybe Archie might like it?’
‘I doubt it,’ Iris took the watch in her hand, draped it across her crepe skin. ‘He was so smart, so dapper,’ she said the words softly, as though she forgot Kate was there. ‘So well dressed, and then you would see him bring seaweed from the beach and you knew he was strong and full of life. Such life.’ She shook her head.
‘He was certainly handsome,’ Kate said. It didn’t capture the sense she had of him. ‘Sometimes, I think I can feel him in the bathhouse. I am never lonely, because it feels like he is there, watching over the place. Does that sound a little mad?’
‘Not at all, I could feel it too, when you opened the place up. I suppose it’s just the fact that it’s all the same as it was before, but of course it’s not the same at all.’ She lifted her head, smiled a wisp of a smile at Kate. ‘Well, they were different times then. I’m not sure that things would have worked out the same if they happened now.’ She looked out towards the sea, as though she might spot someone familiar on the soft waves. ‘Anyway, it was all a long time ago.’ She held the watch close to her for a second, listened to the soft murmur of its ticking. ‘You keep it, Kate. It won’t do Archie any good now.’
‘I’d love to have met him,’ Kate said as she took the watch back.
‘Oh, yes, he was quite…’ Iris smiled a small movement of her quivering lips. Then her eyes travelled towards the porch door where Archie was making his way in.
*
‘I thought it was you that day at the bathhouse, but I couldn’t believe it, I had to come back to see.’ Todd was waiting for her on the narrow track that led down the back of the bathhouse.’
‘Oh, yes, it’s me alright, what were the chances, eh?’ Kate said, but she smiled at him and felt much better than she ever imagined she might. Here, with the sea rolling toward her and the bathhouse glinting welcome, her years of anger seemed to dissipate as she met Todd for the second time in a decade. ‘How are you, Todd?’ There was nothing to be gained from crying or recriminating now, and it took standing here in this place to know that for sure.
‘I suppose I’m well,’ he said, joining her step and they walked side by side down the steep hill. ‘Small world?’
‘Well, chances are we would have met up eventually, somewhere.’ She looked at him now. All that booze and probably drugs, she thought, his heart attack too probably had knocked a lot out of him. He was only in his forties, but he looked so much more. ‘I hoped maybe I might have the pleasure of meeting you in court, actually.’
‘So you did think about me?’ His smile was still the same: rakish, raw, assured.
‘Do you really want to go there?’ She laughed at him now, fingered Robert Hartley’s watch in her pocket. ‘No, I thought maybe you would marry and you’d cheat and then…’
‘Revenge?’
‘It helped me sleep easier for a while.’ She laughed. It was true. Somehow, it was cooler to laugh now than to scream and shout, as she’d always wanted to before. ‘Anyway, I’m glad you met Claudia, she’s very beautiful and you seem happy together?’ It wasn’t any of her business, but it was better to talk about him than have to tell him about herself.
‘Yeah, me and Claudia, I suppose, we are…’ he was distracted for a moment. From here, Rock Castle looked austere and isolated. ‘This was going to be a new start.’
‘I heard about your heart attack, I was sorry about that,’ Kate said the words and meant them.
‘Yeah, well what is it my protestant buddies say, what you sow you reap?’ He shook his head. ‘It was a long time coming. Lifestyle.’ He looked at her now, studied her for a moment too long for either of them to pretend was polite. ‘So, we’re going to be neighbours?’
‘You’ll never stick Ballytokeep.’ Kate laughed again.
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Because I know you and I’ve been here for the quiet season. Most of the pubs close and the days are short, miserable, and cold. Let’s just say, it’s not Monte Carlo.’
‘Maybe I’m not looking for Monte Carlo anymore?’ He pitched a stone out towards the water. The rock was beautiful today, almost light pink, dried in the wind and baked warm by the sun.
‘Oh, Todd, I think you’re always going to be looking for Monte Carlo.’
‘I get the feeling we’re not talking about geography anymore.’
‘Were we ever?’ She turned towards the bathhouse and, in that instant, it looked the best she’d ever seen it. The sun cast orange radiance on the white rounded walls. The baskets and pots of hydrangeas were blooming hard against the salty sea air. ‘It is nice to see you, by the way, Todd.’
‘Can I…’ he moved towards her, uncertain, his voice just rising over the cry of two homeward-bound gulls. ‘Can I call down someday…’ he was before her now, ‘to talk?’
‘Well, you know where I am, Todd,’ she said, smiling. ‘I’ll be charging you for the coffee though.’ Suddenly, he was too close. She heard her voice begin to wobble, he would not notice. She was elegant at covering nerves, had learned too many tricks in the courtroom to let Todd Riggs pull her down now.
‘And if I knock on your door when the coffee shop is closed?’ His confidence deserted him, she had a feeling he hadn’t planned to speak like this.
‘I’m not sure.’ She stepped down from the doorway. ‘Todd, I’m not sure.’ Then she retreated to the safety of the bathhouse, banged the door and stood listening to her heartbeat keep perfect time with Robert Hartley’s watch.
Things were changing. A year ago, Kate knew, she’d have handled Todd very differently. Was it just the effects of time? Of age? P
erhaps, but Kate had a feeling that Ballytokeep was at the core of her new detachment. Time had taught her that love, loss and life were what you made of them. It had taken belonging in Ballytokeep to help her let go.
15
Todd
Todd replayed that scene a million times over in his mind. He couldn’t help it, couldn’t get the whole thing from his mind, it was all too surreal.
Kate Hunt. He hadn’t thought about her for years. Actually, that wasn’t strictly true. He had thought about her a lot these last few weeks. Since his heart attack, he thought about her frequently. Another unexpected consequence of his recovery – his mother would have been rejoicing. He had located his conscience, finally. He just hadn’t thought about her before that. If she did wander into his mind, he’d have assumed that she probably hated him, with good reason. He imagined her married to a boring barrister and producing legal sprogs in the depths of London suburbia. He’d been a complete rat to her. When he thought about her now, it was different. Not guilt – he knew guilt. That was the emotion his parents evoked all too readily. No this was different; when he thought of Kate Hunt, it was with an emotion that was new to Todd. Some people; people like Meg for example, would probably call what he felt regret. Not, he clarified for himself, that he regretted not marrying her. It wouldn’t have worked, he wasn’t ready to get married then. No, he regretted the way he’d done it. That, he knew, was unforgiveable.
Never in his wildest dreams would he have imagined her here. Face to face with him, a decade on, he wasn’t sure what he expected. She was still beautiful, that was the second thing he noticed. The first was something else. Something he couldn’t put his finger on, but it was warm. Kate Hunt hadn’t wasted her time on anger or hatred or bitterness and that, he realised was a quality that only added to her attraction after all these years.
‘How do you know her?’ Claudia’s interest had changed to concern when she saw his reaction. She was out of her depth here. She’d arrived for a visit, he was glad to see her, of course he was. He was relieved that it would be short. He was growing to like the solitary life. He realized it most when people came to stay. It was, he presumed, just a passing phase. Possibly, they’d be out clubbing again before the year was out?
‘For God’s sake, Todd, say something. Anything? You’re as white as a sheet, are you all right? It’s not your heart again, is it?’ She was wittering on now and he stopped listening, tried to catch sight of where Kate had disappeared.
‘I…’ It was no good. There was an easy explanation for this. There was a reason that he bought a castle in the middle of nowhere, somewhere he had absolutely no connection with and it had thrown him straight into the face of Kate Hunt. He was only half aware of the words Claudia was whispering. They were empty, completely passing him by. He strained for sight of Kate again.
‘It’s Kate Hunt – the girl I almost married.’ This wasn’t fair on Claudia. He watched her now, maybe it was being out of London, but this place drained her.
‘Are you sure? I mean, it’s a long time since…’ Claudia knew the story; everyone in England knew the story of how he dumped Kate Hunt. He winced now when he thought of it. He had been a complete shit back then.
‘Claudia, you don’t forget people like Kate. I mean, you move on, but…’ he searched for the words. ‘I was going to marry her, you know.’
‘But you didn’t,’ Claudia sounded as though she was defending him, more than cross-examining him. Then again, that would be more up Kate’s street, wouldn’t it? ‘Did you know? When you bought the tower, did you know?’ There was an odd tremble in her voice, as though it might trip itself up.
‘Of course not, how could I…’ Todd shook his head.
‘But?’
‘It’s a coincidence, that’s all. Just one of those mad accidents – and we’ll probably never see her again.’ Well, that wasn’t true, was it? He had hung about waiting for her. He had to. It wasn’t fair on Claudia, he knew that. What was happening to him? These things would never have occurred to him before his heart attack. He turned now towards Claudia. He took her thin hands and smiled, pretended everything was normal. Todd had a feeling Claudia would not be in a hurry to have tea at the bathhouse, no matter how nice the food.
*
‘Kate Hunt, eh? There’s a blast from the past.’ Denny blew a circle of cigar smoke upwards. They were sitting outside the castle; sharing a bottle of red wine and watching the gulls chase home a small trawler in the hope of easy lunch. ‘So what’s she doing in Ballytokeep?’
‘She’s taken over the bathhouse and apparently it’s doing a bomb.’
‘She didn’t move here for the money, Todd. You know that, she would have been making plenty in London, I can name five blokes she’s fleeced in the name of the law in the last two years.’ He circled another loop of cigar smoke into the air before them, the tobacco ring static for a second before drifting on the salty air. ‘Is she married?’
‘I don’t know.’ There was no wedding ring, Todd noticed that, not that he’d been looking, well, he couldn’t help it could he? It was only natural to be curious, right?
‘Not that it matters,’ Denny’s tone dipped. ‘You have Claudia now – a supermodel, no one could compare to that.’ He winked at Todd, ‘Half the men in London would give a kidney to have someone like Claudia on their arm.’
‘I suppose,’ Todd said. He thought about this a lot recently. ‘Me and Claudia, it’s not…’ he searched for the word. ‘It’s not the same, you know?’
‘I bet it’s not.’ Denny chuckled, his dirty old man laugh that he kept just for times like this; it didn’t really fit him anymore, but it was probably useful when he was making deals with some of the promoters.
‘Not like that, I mean, it’s not the same as it was with Kate.’
‘Course it’s not, you left Kate, remember?’
‘Yeah, but maybe I was just being a shit?’ He’d thought about this a lot since that day she walked into the bathhouse.
‘You’ll always be a shit, Todd. That’s not going to change.’ It was a matter of fact as far as Denny was concerned. ‘But, Todd, you didn’t marry her for a reason.’
‘Yeah, but what if it wasn’t the right reason? What if it just wasn’t the right time? Or…’ He was being stupid, but if he didn’t say it to Denny, well who could he say it to. No one ever got him like Kate, down to how she packed his bags when he went on tour. She understood that he needed to be organized. She got that there was so much he couldn’t do for himself. She got all that, and what had he given her back? Nothing. Denny was right. He’d always been a selfish bastard. It hadn’t changed. The only difference was, now he could pay people to organize his life the way he wanted it. The problem was, it hadn’t made him very happy.
‘Would you listen to yourself, I swear, those tablets you’re taking, they’re making you soft in the head, not in the arteries.’ Denny put down the cigar and cleared his throat to lessen the phlegm that coated his words. ‘You listen to me now, Todd. You haven’t seen Kate Hunt in ten years, and I’ll wager that you haven’t thought about her in just as long.’ He put his hand up to stop any words Todd might add. ‘Whatever kind of crap luck has thrown you two together on a god-forgotten stretch of rocky coastline; it doesn’t mean anything more than that. You didn’t love her enough to hang around a decade ago. You don’t love her enough to screw things up with Claudia now. It’s a phase, like going off coffee, like buying this place, don’t throw away what you have for what you didn’t want back then.’
‘Right.’ Todd agreed, because it was what he always did with Denny. Maybe he was right, maybe Denny was always right. Claudia had been good to him. Blast it, she’d been good for him too. They both knew that without her he would still be playing to audiences well past their sell-by date and in much smaller venues. Claudia gave the band a new lease of life, an entrée to a younger audience. She made them absurdly, unexpectedly cool. Now chart stars, writers and rappers that had been babies when Todd s
tarted out wanted to work with them. They were good for each other, a promoters dream. Todd knew it clouded all of their judgements when it came to Claudia.
‘You stick with Claudia, forget about the lawyer, that’s my advice to you, Todd.’
‘Yeah, not many old blokes can pull a supermodel, right?’ Todd agreed. Denny was right, he had nothing in common with Kate Hunt anymore. The only problem was, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. She intrigued him. What had really brought her here? Was he meant to atone for his sins? God, he could hear his mother’s voice sounding out the words. Was it a second chance? To reset his moral compass? Then he saw her in the distance, standing at the door of the bathhouse, and reality seemed to wash over him like the salty waves against the rocks. Too much had happened along the way. What was he thinking? His best bet would be to keep well out of her way.
*
The next time their paths crossed, Todd thought he’d be prepared. He stopped walking past the bathhouse. Instead, for the next week, he took his five-mile trek across country, delving into the marshy fields that strode away from the sea spray. Sometimes, he would find himself walking back towards the castle and knowing he would be using the track that passed by the large outcrop of rock, he would sit for a moment. He would consider the possibilities and then, carry on, taking a longer route to avoid meeting Kate.
Today, looking out at the blue sky, falling hazily onto the shining rippling water, he thought she had every right to hate him. After all, she never had her say. He just disappeared. Not like people who disappear and they are never seen again. No. Nothing as classy as that. Todd had disappeared with a Russian stripper called – what was she called? He could not even remember her name. They were as hammered as each other. The papers had made enough out of it for him to concoct a few rancid memories. It had started on his stag night. Or what was meant to be a few drinks with the lads from the band. Some of them – they were all jokers – had organized strippers for the night. Then, maybe even now, Todd could not look a gift horse in the mouth. He still half remembered being bundled on the euro train, the darkness outside, the smell of alcohol and cheap perfume. They had lost days. Days when he should have been getting married, should have been going on honeymoon, should have been a decent human being.
