The Silver Dark Sea

by Susan Fletcher

  Couldn’t tell her, either.

  No. I understood.

  But he lied for his sake, too. For if he had told the truth – if he’d set Tabitha down on a chair and said right, here’s my story or if he’d walked down to the harbour and knocked on Ed’s door – then he could not have stayed. The tale would have spread; his name would have flown; the islanders would have stepped back from him, perhaps, unsure and alarmed. And his friends on the mainland would have come for him, taken him back to his darkened house and he imagined tests in hospitals, bowls of soup, leaflets pressed into his hands with words like bereavement on them and coming to terms with your loss, and he’d have been urged into therapy or into a friend’s spare room and what weight – what a thick, profound hopelessness – that would have felt, to him. He listed these likelihoods. He thought of them at night, whilst the sea said hush, hush …

  No – he did not want that. Instead, he wanted this island. He wanted the blow of salt. He wanted horizons, such as these. Once, he found lanolin on his hands – brownish grease from a ram’s fleece – and he sat in the grass and stared at it, as if this grease spoke of life.

  And you.

  Me.

  I did not want to leave you. I knew that from the start.

  And, at last, there was Jim Coyle. Of course. He’d dropped his walking stick and then whispered, urgently, do not tell the truth – do you hear? For Jim knew there was no Fishman. He knew absolutely that this man was not half-fish or anything other than a human being who was choosing to lie for his and others’ sakes. As Jim had done, long ago. Stay who they want you to be.

  He told me to look after you, too.

  Jim did?

  Oh yes. He whispered it. He knew that this would happen.

  Before we did?

  Long before we did …

  Like a proper fairy tale, the blind man had the sight.

  * * *

  Folklore and Myth. I knew why she had it. I understood why Abigail pressed it to her chest. For as children, we are told stories of magic and unending love. But then we grow and discover that cells divide, that love can be uneven, that loneliness can sweep a man’s skin away so that he’s bare, bleeding, and feels even the softest touch as pain. We discover that there can be wars, droughts, high-school shootings, a whole new awful reason for the lock upon a chicken shed, and we look for our comfort. We try everything. We miss the world we’d believed in when we were small, unscarred.

  I’ll be buried with this, Abigail said, patting the book’s leather spine.

  How we all clung to the Fishman of Sye – as if he alone could save us. And maybe he did, in his own small way.

  Joe. His name was Joe. He was a drink of fresh water, after years of brine. He was a shell, left behind. And if I lifted that shell and put it to my ear, I heard a story that defied all human possibility, in which chance felt too flimsy to be the proper word. It was – is – the best story because of how strange it is, and how impossible it sounded when he whispered it to me; but it’s the best story, most of all, in that it was his.

  He was a note in a bottle, or a lone wellington boot that had found one that almost matched it – almost, but not quite. Is that too trite?

  He was a piece of driftwood after a winter storm – unexpected, intricate, and such a smooth, unearthly shape that was like art in its beauty. It was like art in every way. I could not believe it came to me, that it washed up by my feet whilst I was looking out to sea.

  How beautiful. Human beauty is the finest kind.

  How I wish I could have taken it home, like driftwood, to keep.

  Twenty

  I send a text to Sam and it says this: You said you would do anything. Did you mean it?

  And he replies: Yes. Nothing else.

  He walks up from the harbour and I walk down from Crest and we meet at the fence above The Stash. We lean side by side, look down. The sea has the brown lace of unclean water. It slops against the mossy walls and I can feel its coldness. There is the smell of trapped sea.

  Sam’s elbow touches mine.

  I say when did you last sail?

  Not since Tom.

  Could you still do it? After four years?

  A shake of the head, a wry smile. I’m on that boat again every night. Every night …

  How about Pigeon. Could you handle Pigeon?

  It is hard to tell a story from the very start, or at least it is hard when the story is ours – Joe’s and mine. A tale so full of oddness and absolute chance that most people would hold up a hand and say what? Because perhaps we can cope with one wonderful thing, one event of incredibility – but not more than one. Not a tale as strange as ours. I expect Sam to flinch, rub his brow. But he does not flinch.

  I tell Sam Lovegrove everything: the meaning of sea, the grazes on the stranger’s hands, the reason a nail would be flush against Tavey’s wood after only two strikes with the hammer. How I feel when I am with him. How I feel now, at this moment. How I am asking, at last, for Sam’s help.

  The water says stash. His hair shines gold.

  The highest tide is tomorrow. Didn’t you say that?

  And a smile passes over him, momentarily. Yes. Tomorrow night.

  * * *

  Sam makes his way to Pigeon on his own. He goes down the steps that are cut into black rock. He pulls on the rope, brings Pigeon in.

  He unhooks the tarpaulin.

  Oh God … He crouches down. Sam puts his hands against his chest, takes hold of the boat. Four years. He has put notes under her door, sent her messages, sat on the stile in the field by Crest as night comes in for no other reason than to watch over her, protect her and to make sure that if she needs something – anything – Sam would be there. He has listened to the shipping forecasts for her. He has gone online and trawled the sites because she is Maggie – Tom’s widow. Tom’s wife.

  I will do anything. Tell me.

  Tell me how I can help.

  And now, at last, she has told him. Four years, and here it is.

  * * *

  Maggie crosses the fields. She steps over a stile, moves through the sheep.

  The Fishman watches, as she comes.

  I found him. I spoke to Sam.

  He’ll do it?

  He’ll do it.

  She is trembling. Joe … Joe, I am so scared.

  He holds her. Shh … Strokes her hair.

  Also, Sam goes to the shed. He opens the door of the old boat shed by the harbour, goes inside. He lifts cans of diesel, shakes them. He moves through them until he finds one that is so full he can hardly lift it.

  Outside there is Lady Caroline. Sam scans the harbour: the black cat is sitting neatly, but there is no-one else. And so he drops down into Lady Caroline, lifts the cushioned seat. Another container of fuel is there and he takes it. No-one will notice – and besides, he will replace it, when all this is over in two days’ time.

  Maggie comes to him. She picks him and the fuel up from the harbour, drives them north. They tread back down the slippery steps and Maggie and Sam fill Pigeon’s engine, put blankets, flares, lines, medicines, spare gloves, maps and waterproof clothing into her wooden chest. Maggie wedges plastic boxes of food under the seat, bottles of water and lemonade. Happy with the boat? See the radio? And … She is nervous, unsure. She runs her fingertips over her lips and her frown is deep so that Sam has to tell her I’ve got it, Maggie. Don’t worry – it’s all going to be fine.

  He sticks to the plan, as promised. In the morning that follows, he claims he has a migraine. He’s not had one for years, and he is not fond of the lie – but he cannot go on the Star today, or stay overnight in the hostel near The Bounty Inn. He needs to be here, for her sake. So he says I think it’s bad …

  He stays in bed for most of the day, which is no hardship. He needs his strength and wakefulness for the night ahead.

  * * *

  The day passes. And I become anxious. I feel guilty because I know this is a lie.

  But he kisses me. And fo
r a moment his breath is my breath; for a short while I have his breath in my lungs and perhaps he has mine in his, and maybe that is how this is. Maybe that is how I must see it, what I must compare it to: isn’t the false breath we give to a dying person a trick, of some kind? It is not their own true breath; it is fooling the body. But it is worth it, surely, if it saves the life.

  Easy to see, by such moonlight. The full moon like a friend.

  I carry his clothes – jeans, the red and black shirt – down to the beach at Sye. I leave them folded on the grass. I tuck the socks into the boots.

  And then I make my way to the splintered sign that says Do Not Use In Wet Weather and I drop down the steps, two at a time. Pigeon waits at the bottom. She bobs, as if eager. Sam, too, is there. He has oars in his hand. Joe stands on the slab of rock, shiny-eyed.

  I’ve known my goodbyes. I have had many, and I’ve grown used to saying them – I have strengthened against them, perhaps. But not this one. Not now.

  I fasten his top button; I smooth down the collar of his waterproof and say you’ll wear the life-vest – won’t you?

  Of course. Smiles.

  He takes hold of me. Joe brings me against his body and I close my eyes. We do not speak, but I know how he feels from the way that he holds me – tightly, breathing the smell of my hair. I burrow against him. I think, do not go.

  But I know that he has to go.

  I pull back. I say mend. Mourn her. However long it takes you.

  Joe does not nod, or answer. He puts his hands, very gently, on either side of my face and his eyes move across me, taking in each part – my brow, my chin, the groove between my nose and upper lip. I know what he’s doing. I think he is remembering me. He is storing away the face of me in case we never meet again.

  I hope we do. How I hope.

  I make a frail chick’s sound.

  Hey … He feels it, also. He thumbs my tears away, says we found each other once. Wasn’t that the hardest part?

  And I soak up his kiss as if it will be my last kiss, for always; not simply from him, but from any man. It is warm, and damp. It is a salted kiss from our island life, our island days and nights.

  Sam calls out. We need to leave, now.

  So they do. Joe climbs down into Pigeon. I hold his hand until our arms are stretched out as far as they can be, until we have no choice but to let go. He puts on the life-vest, sits. And Sam rows the boat away from me – out of the harbour, towards the open sea.

  He looks at me, and I look at him.

  Sam pulls on her engine; I hear the sound, far out.

  Pigeon becomes smaller. In time, I lose his face to darkness; I lose the engine’s hum until there is no sound but the slop … slop … of the sea against the mossy harbour walls.

  * * *

  A good story would say that the waves were high, that night. A proper bedtime tale would say that the sea was wild, that water raced on Pigeon’s floor – up and down, up and down. It would talk of a spray, cold faces, and their voices being carried away from each other by a menacing wind that has no wish for them to be on this water, so late at night. The tale would have that fierce punch beneath the boat as it dropped from one wave onto the other, and Sam would be shouting woah! as they climbed up the black, black face of an approaching wave. Pigeon would be vertical. The men would look down, see the sea beneath their feet. That would be the best story – two men, one boat and a night-time storm.

  But the truth is that the journey is a flat, quiet one. The motor whines steadily. There are waves, and there are a few moments when the boat drops like a handclap and sudden spray finds them. But it is not wild. It is not the sea he knew before.

  The Fishman is thinking this. He sits on one side, low down. He says a month ago … as we all have done, and he counts the changes that have come to him in that handful of days.

  Sam knows the place that he is heading for. And with the first light of day he can see it – a dark-grey cove with a line of wooden groynes.

  With dawn, the sea quietens. The outboard motor seems louder for the silence that is around it. Joe still sits on Pigeon’s floor. The water is only a foot beneath him; a cormorant beats his blackness over the flat surface and it is the same height off the water as Joe’s eyes are. It is a sight he will keep always, he knows that. The dark bird, and the morning sea.

  The cove comes towards them. No-one is on it.

  It is not yet four in the morning.

  Sam turns off the motor. Everything is still. Made it, he says.

  They row Pigeon into the shallow water. A few yards from shore, Joe rolls up his tracksuit trousers and sits on the boat’s side.

  Here. Sam hands him a bag. Food. Torch. Some money – stuff like that.

  The man from Sye takes it, feels its shape. He did not expect this.

  What will you do now?

  He thinks. Eat. Rest a while. Go home.

  You have a house? An incredulous smile. You’ve got them all fooled, you know that?

  What about you? What will you do?

  Fill up the fuel tank and head back. Should be back by nine, if I push it. Get back before the Star.

  Sam … He thinks of what he might say, and finds nothing – only thank you.

  You’re welcome.

  You saved my life when you found me. And this …

  He shrugs. I told her I’d do anything. Who wouldn’t do anything for her?

  Joe drops into the water. He has boots slung over one shoulder and a plastic bag in one hand. He wades onto the beach.

  Sam watches him go. And then, suddenly, he calls out from Pigeon. He cups one hand round his mouth so that his words carry and he says you’ll be talked about in a hundred years’ time! A thousand! And he drops that hand back down into his lap.

  They smile at each other. You will be too, Sam.

  What a morning. What a new day.

  Afterwards, Sam eats a sandwich on Pigeon. He watches the tiny daybreak things that humans rarely see – the eastern side of every groyne lighting up, gold-brown; starlings flying in and out of bins. This is my best moment. It is the single best moment in his life.

  He makes his way back to Parla. It is a calm crossing. He sees a seal, and the tucked dive of gannets to the south of him.

  Sam moors in the half-moon harbour two minutes before nine.

  As for the man from Sye, he thumbs a lift and, later, catches a bus into the town that he has known all his life. He feels a different engine thrum through his bones. He looks at the rough, patterned fabric of the bus seat beside him, where it’s been smoothed and greyed from use, and he thinks of Maggie pushing the straps of her dress to one side. He thinks of Maggie showing him the feathers she keeps, in a vase.

  He knows he will think of her every day, all the time. Being here does not lessen it. But he knows – as she does – that yes, he had to go.

  His house is as he left it – curtains open, the squeak of the gate. His key is still there, beneath the flowerpot; inside there is mail with his name on, a red flashing light on his telephone. Plates stands like gravestones on the draining board. Joe looks around. He walks from room to room. My old life … When he knew nothing. When he knew far less than he does now.

  There is always hope – always.

  He showers, and sleeps on the sofa. Maggie … he says, in his sleep.

  Parla’s new dawn. The highest tide has been and gone. The wind is blowing from the west, and the mare stands with her back to it. Shells are lying on beaches; plastic bottles and driftwood have been brought onto grass. Such clean air … They all think it as they open their windows or step outside in their dressing gowns, breathing in the brand-new day.

  In a red-bricked house by a harbour, a young girl is singing. She jumps downstairs with unbrushed hair. Her song is her own: let’s go and look at beaches for shells and dead crabs and pretty things …

  Dee is buttering toast. She says keep it down. Sam’s migraine, remember – and she bites into the toast with a crunch. But Nan still sin
gs and clambers over furniture and she maintains that it’s Sye she wants to go to – where the Fishman was. There might be another one! She knocks over a pot-plant; a part of the armchair cracks as she climbs on it so that Dee says fine, I’ll take you to Rona’s. Rona can take you. How’s that?

  They ready themselves, finish their toast, and Dee says I shall just pop up to Sam, let him know where we’re going. And as she’s climbing the stairs towards the attic room, the phone rings. It shakes into life, rattling the china in the cupboard next to it. Dee hurries back to the kitchen, scoops up the receiver. Hello? Yes?

  A breathing sound. Static.

  Dee frowns. Hello again. Who’s there? Anyone there?

  Outside, on the quayside, there is a young man with a reddish beard and a diesel smell. He holds his mobile phone. On the screen, lit up, it says HOME.

  Sam knows where his mother is. He knows she will be in the kitchen. She will be standing by the fridge with her back to the door saying hello? I can’t hear you … Nan, too, will be with her. She’ll be hopping from foot to foot saying who is it? Who can it be? This mystery caller with no words to say? Like a story in one of her books? Neither will notice as Sam creeps inside.

  He takes hold of the door handle, pushes down.

  Sam passes the kitchen; he treads up the stairs.

  He knows to keep to the wall where the floorboards creak less, and he knows that the cat will be sprawled on the landing so he steps over her, and he passes Nan’s room where her bedside lamp is a bright-red heart, and just as he reaches the trapdoor to his room he hears the single pring of the receiver being placed back down in its cradle. He looks down. His mobile’s screen reads CALL ENDED. His mother, far below him, says how very odd …

  Sam climbs into bed. And within a minute – less than a minute – Dee comes into his room. Does she notice the smell of diesel and brine? In the room’s darkness, does she see the wet hems of his trousers which are lying on the floor or the white line of salt that has crusted on his boots? Is there a fishy tang to the room? Can she hear him shivering?