Sea Glass Summer

by Dorothy Cannell

  ‘I’m sure he was as happy to be of help as I was. Your roses have brought a breath of life to the house, but a four-footed visitor would be very welcome. How would it be if I came and fetched Jumbo for an outing on Monday?’

  They agreed on early afternoon. The call ended rather hastily when Sarah remembered the cake in the oven. She checked it, decided on another fifteen minutes and went in search of her wire cooling rack. Harris’s call had slipped from her mind when she unwrapped the roses; now it drifted back in. She had only the vaguest curiosity as to what he had wanted to ask her, but she would phone him back as promised after she had taken her cake out of the oven and set it to cool on the rack. But when she did so there was no answer. Apparently he had not lingered in setting off with Lisa and the little girl to visit the in-laws. Never mind, he’d try again or she would.

  The chocolate cake came out just right: moist but not soggy to the touch. An hour later she was dusting it with powdered sugar prior to wrapping it loosely in two layers of tin foil. Four o’clock. Sarah headed out into warm sunshine to go next door, having made up her mind not to go in if asked. That was where she was a little shy, or perhaps old fashioned: a man on his own – Nellie had said his wife was away for the weekend visiting the college daughter. Also a lot of people didn’t appreciate impromptu visits that dragged them away from whatever they were doing. Nellie Armitage’s showing up to camp in her living room for a lengthy chat, especially on moving-in day, would have driven even her easy-going mother, Louise Draycott, right up the wall.

  Sid Jennson handled the situation perfectly when he opened his front door. He thanked her enthusiastically for the cake, made light of repairing her fence, invited her to step inside but didn’t press her when she said she really needed to get back and continue her unpacking. Entirely true – there were her clothes to be hung in the closet. Also towels and other necessities to be stored in the bathroom.

  ‘Seems never-ending, doesn’t it?’ He gave her a rueful smile and she thought again what a genuine man he seemed to be. ‘I remember when we moved in here five years ago we wondered if we’d ever get organized. Seemed to go round in circles for bloomin’ days. The wife and daughter claimed I was chiefly to blame with all my tools. You’d think to hear them go on that I’d moved in an entire hardware store.’

  That led to Sarah mentioning her visit to Brown’s that morning and how she needed to work out the amount of floor tiles and paint she would need.

  ‘My Libby’s a great hand with a paintbrush should you welcome any help. And I’ve one of those special ladders for doing staircase walls. She’s not much of a one for heights and if you’re the same I could take care of that job. Expecting her back Monday morning from visiting our daughter, Phoebe, at college and getting her ready for going to England to stay with family for a month. She’ll want to have you over for dinner one night, will Libby. How’d you fancy roast beef and Yorkshire pudding?’

  Sarah replied that she’d love to try the real thing and was just about to say goodbye when she heard a meow and a large ginger cat sauntered through the living room on which the door opened. For not the first time that day she thought of the frightened one she had been holding when Sonny Norris crashed the car through her fence. She had been out several times calling and looking for it without success. Sid Jennson didn’t mention bringing Sonny here and providing Gwen with a break for a few hours. He wouldn’t be one to hold his acts of kindness up to the light.

  ‘What a lovely-looking cat,’ she said.

  ‘Thinks he owns the world. Spoiled rotten, just like the dog. A great one for animals, my Libby. Would rescue a lion from the zoo if they’d let her and have it sleep on its own pillow at the foot of the bed. Still, mustn’t grumble,’ his smile deepened, ‘she sees me right. Have to play fair and not hog all this cake before she gets home.’

  On returning to Bramble Cottage Sarah hoped to get a glimpse of the stray cat, but only saw a grey squirrel dart across the road and skim up a tree. Without much optimism she put a saucer of milk on the front step and another on the back patio. Her fear was that the cat had succumbed to some predator the previous night. That Libby Jennson was an animal person encouraged her to hope that they would get on well. She spent that evening pleasantly occupied with a dozen small tasks. She had only one small television and, other than watching the news, rarely had it on unless she was sitting down to knit. She made a note to get cable or an alternative installed.

  Sunday morning passed to the accomplishment of removing the kitchen cabinet doors, baking the cake for Gwen and getting to work on the sample of a design for a child’s sweater – ages two to six – with its first name worked on the front. She used Julia. Her niece at eleven would consider herself way too old for it but she would enjoy seeing it in the magazine. In the afternoon she took a long walk along the beach, in the opposite direction around the bay than she had taken yesterday. The sun was warm on her shoulders, encouraging her to gravitate to the water’s edge. It came furling up without fuss or foam over her canvas shoes. There were a couple of sailboats at rest sufficiently far out to be no more than graceful silhouettes, their naked masts piercing the thin, silver-blue sky. She paused to draw them into herself. Did they dream of past voyages, or future ones? A plump white and gray gull eyed her beadily from a barnacle-encrusted grouping of rocks. What did she want most as she spread her own wings? She felt something touch her hand. The strong, firm grip of a child’s hand in hers. The gull shot upward to join in a fierce flapping of its cronies, accompanied by quarrelsome squawks. The foolish moment was gone with dizzying abruptness.

  It had been hours since lunch. And that had been a skimpy one because her mind hadn’t been on eating. Turning back, she skirted the bigger islands of rock and pocketed several pieces of sea glass before reaching the steps up to her garden. She would have to find a little glass bowl to put them in, along with the one she had found yesterday. Could she now call herself a collector? Even something of a connoisseur? Amusement erased that odd moment on the beach.

  While eating dinner, the niggling thought crept in that there was something she had made a mental note to take care of – something small yet important – but she couldn’t get further than connecting it with talking to her father on the phone shortly after her arrival. It would come back to her, but it didn’t that evening. It was only after phoning Brown’s hardware at nine the following morning to reel off her list – including a last moment addition of a drop cloth – that she remembered the note she had promised her father would be written promptly to Aunt Beth. A thank you for the overnight stay in New Hampshire. Best to take care of that small courtesy immediately. Brown’s had promised a delivery between eleven thirty and noon. She had stamps in her billfold and quickly located a Hallmark card. Aunt Beth didn’t think much of those who didn’t ‘care enough to send the very best,’ and filled up both sides without mentioning Harris’s call. He hadn’t phoned again, so perhaps what he’d wanted to ask Sarah wasn’t all that important.

  On opening the front door she saw that it was spattering rain – must have just started – and ducked out at a run to the mailbox at the foot of the drive. She pulled down the front, slipped in the card and was just about to close it again when she noticed another envelope further back. Mail for her already? How nice! Her heart sang as it had done so often during the last three days. No possibility occurred to her, but when she withdrew the letter she saw that it was addressed to Nan Fielding. It must have arrived after her death, but it would take studying the postmark to tell how long it had been there. That wasn’t something to do with the rain coming down; if it wasn’t smudged already it soon would be. She slipped the envelope in her jeans’ pocket, closed the box and raised the red plastic flag to alert the deliverer that there was outgoing mail.

  As she turned to hurry back inside, a woman wearing a lightweight pink jacket and a white cotton scarf wrapped around her neck came around the near side of the house next door. Her hair, with its blond highlights, was drawn
back in a ponytail. At her heels was a small, fleecy dog of a yellowish white that suggested he wasn’t bleached along with the scarf. Sarah had paid more attention to dog breeds over the last year or so and hazarded a guess this one was a mix. Half shiatsu, half poodle. Possibly. As it approached her in a short-legged charge it was clear from the joy de vive in his eyes that this was one compact bundle of mischief, who’d relish pulling the wool – or fur – over your eyes just for the fun of it at every given opportunity. He, or she, actually appeared to be laughing at her as he scooted to a halt.

  ‘Hello, there!’ The woman’s greeting was an unmistakably cheery one. Also noticeably British. ‘I’m Libby Jennson.’ She could have been Sarah’s age had Sid not mentioned the daughter in college. Rather lovely eyes, an unusual shade of golden gray, coupled with the proverbial English rose complexion. Also indicating her country of origin were the calf-high green rubber boots. Sarah was enchanted. She had always loved the word Wellies. Libby breezed on. ‘You must be Sarah! I’ve really wanted to meet you! Especially after having three slices of that chocolate cake! Sid kept tapping my hand away and reminding me it was at least half his! I’d love the recipe! Don’t tell me it’s been in your family for three hundred years and is a fiercely guarded secret!’ All said in large print with super-sized exclamation points, undampened by the rain.

  Sarah laughed. She was to discover that Libby often had this effect upon her. ‘Wish I could say it had been handed down, but I found it on the internet. I’ll gladly print you up a copy. It was so good of your husband to fix my fence.’

  ‘Don’t give it a thought. Sid isn’t happy if he isn’t busy. I’m over the moon I didn’t come home to find he’d torn out a wall like he did the last time I went away for the weekend. I said to our daughter Phoebe last night that I think I’d better set off for home now rather than wait for morning; I’ve a nasty feeling Dad will turn the garage into a disco room if I don’t. At sixty-six you’d think he’d be slowing down. Fat chance! And to think of the flack I got for marrying a man twenty years older. He’ll be the one pushing me in a wheelchair!’

  Sarah responded with that old line about age being only a number.

  ‘He’s off now doing a hundred errands and there was me down on the beach with Sheridan, with not one industrious thought, just miles away in my head with the fairies. We’d be down there still if it hadn’t started to rain.’ Libby wiped a spatter from her face. ‘Crikey! It looks ready to come down cats and dogs and I’m keeping you standing here. How about coming back to my house for a cup of coffee or tea?’

  Sarah hesitated. She needed to wash the kitchen walls and scour out the interiors of the cabinets, but that shouldn’t take much more than an hour and surely establishing friendly relations with her next-door neighbor was more important.

  ‘I’d love to,’ she said as several heavy drops plopped on her head to trickle down her neck.

  ‘Let’s make a dash for it then. Come on, Sheridan, you need drying off and tucking up under your blankie.’

  The little dog did now resemble a wet mop, but considering he skittered in circles, risking getting stepped on as they headed for the Jennson’s house, he gave no indication of readiness to plop down for a nap. Libby entered the house by a side door that opened to a mud room. Unhitching an orange towel from a row of hooks she told the mop to sit, which he did with the offended look of someone asked to submit to a strip-search. Maybe it was the color orange that got to him. There was no mistaking the frown. With a name like Sheridan he could be excused for having expanded ideas of his own importance.

  To prove Sarah wrong about the nap he shot toward a cushion-lined basket the moment Libby opened the door into the kitchen after shedding the pink jacket and white scarf. It was a light, spacious room, with a lengthy farmhouse table at the far end surrounded by a mismatch of chairs painted in various colors, echoed by the Toulouse-Lautrec prints on the cream walls and the up-to-date Tiffany-style pendants suspended about the butcher block island. Libby excused herself to spread the blankie over Sheridan, who was giving a good impression of being asleep if he wasn’t.

  ‘Are you wet through?’ she asked Sarah on straightening up. ‘I can lend you a sweater; it would be wretched if you got pneumonia, especially after your narrow escape from that car.’

  ‘I’m fine, thank you. Just a few damp spots.’

  ‘So what will it be? Tea or coffee?’

  ‘Tea, please.’ Sarah had been looking at the wooden sign on the door to the mud room that read: Second Chances Are Better Than First Ones.

  ‘You may find it stronger than you’re used to, even if I don’t let yours steep. I use British blend, you see. And I’m out of lemons. Sid and I still take ours with milk and he’s been here twenty-five years to my ten. We met on one of his trips home, in a pub where I worked evenings as a barmaid.’

  ‘I’d really like to try tea the proper English way.’

  While Libby got busy putting on the kettle and getting out cups and saucers, Sarah wondered about Phoebe, the college-age daughter.

  A faint snoring drifted their way from the basket. ‘That’s always the way with the little tyke. He’s always worn out after a good run,’ said Libby. ‘You wouldn’t think to look at him how fast he can go. Should be in the Olympics.’

  Sarah thought about Jumbo’s sedate indoor pace. Would he too go all out if released from his leash on the beach? She hoped the rain would clear by the afternoon so she could go and collect him.

  ‘It’s a great name, Sheridan. How did you come up with it?’

  ‘From the TV series Keeping up Appearances. The one with Hyacinth Bucket – pronounced Bouquet. Sheridan’s her son, who never appears on scene, but brings lots of laughs.’

  ‘My mother won’t miss it, even though she’s watched every episode half a dozen times. I’ve been over when she has it on and it is funny, but I don’t remember anything about the son.’

  ‘Who could blame him for not visiting? The dreaded Hyacinth causes someone to fall off a bike when she mentions an invitation to one of her candlelight suppers with the Royal Doulton. Everyone wondering how her mild-mannered husband, Richard, stands it. I always get the biggest kick out of her,’ Libby continued to enthuse as she poured steaming water into a brown earthenware teapot, ‘when she’s on the phone to Sheridan wanting to know how he’s doing with needlepoint studies at the university. Thrilled to the core by his devotion to Mummy until he asks for seventy pounds for a pair of silk pajamas. Anyway, as soon as I saw my little guy – the one presently snoring his head off – I knew I was going to be every bit as batty and braggy about him.’ Libby was now filling the teacups. ‘Do you want to put in your own milk?’

  ‘No, you do it, please.’

  Libby reached for the pitcher. ‘That’s another of Sid’s things.’

  ‘Snoring?’

  ‘Needlepoint. Mostly cushions. His mother taught him to sew when he was six; told him every man should know how. Along with being able to darn his own socks – not that anyone does that anymore. But she certainly did Sid a favor; he trained in upholstery and got in with a good firm before getting a job offer over here from an American on a buying trip in England on vacation. Sid stayed with that company till he retired. Now he does jobs part time. We usually head south for a couple of months in the winter and he’s like a bear with a sore head, pining for his sewing machine.’ Libby handed over a cup and saucer. ‘Would you like some lemon bread with that? Don’t mind if I hang on to your wonderful cake?’

  The alternative proved to be delicious when they took it along with their tea into a living room that opened off the end of the kitchen with the farmhouse table. They sat in bright yellow armchairs that went excellently with the black and cream toile sofa, a repeat of the wallpaper pattern. If Sid had done the upholstering he was a master. Sarah summed up the general vibe as mod-traditional. What fun! Against the staircase wall was a cabinet with broad cranberry and cream stripes. Its oversized black knobs added just the right amount of mis
chief chic without detracting from the silver tray and sparkling cut glass decanter and wine glasses, or jibing at the elegant walnut-framed mirror above. Sarah admired the cabinet.

  ‘I painted it,’ Libby admitted.

  ‘I’m impressed. You really have a knack; I love this room and the kitchen.’

  ‘Thanks. For all my grumbling it makes it nice that Sid takes a big interest. Did you look at a lot of houses before deciding on the one next door?’

  ‘It was the first I was shown and a case of love at first sight. I had this instant feeling that we belonged together and refused to look at any others.’

  Libby looked at her across the glass coffee table. ‘Are you a bit that way?’

  ‘What way?’

  ‘Psychic?’

  ‘Oh, no! Not a grain of anything like that.’ Up through the voiced denial wriggled a worm of uncertainty that wouldn’t have been there a couple of days ago. There was the suddenly remembered episode on the beach yesterday afternoon, which she had shoved from her mind as a waking dream, and the strong feeling of connection to Gwen Garwood. ‘I’m like a lot of people in thinking houses have atmospheres. Probably something to do with ones we have related to in the past, without really remembering them. Anyway,’ she added lamely, ‘that’s just my thinking. Do you believe in psychic phenomena?’

  ‘Well, I’m not as strong on it as Nellie Armitage across the road with her spirit guides.’

  ‘I’ve met her. Quite a character.’

  ‘Showed up on your doorstep within two minutes of the movers taking off is my bet,’ suggested Libby shrewdly. ‘Not one to let the grass grow under her feet is Nellie. But you can’t help liking her. Can’t do enough for people she likes. She goes to a spiritualist church in Dobbs Mill, that’s about four miles from here, towards Ferry Landing. I got interested when she got talking one day, soon after Sid and I moved in here, about circles outsiders are invited to attend. They’re held in the evenings mid-week and I suppose you could call them séances, but without the lights being turned off and the holding of hands. You sit on folding chairs lined up around the walls like you’re there for a book club meeting or what have you.’