Firefly Beach (37 page)

C
AROLINE STOOD INSIDE THE SCREEN DOOR
,
WHERE SHE
had been watching for Joe’s truck. She wore a buttermilk linen sundress and flat beige sandals, things she might wear to work. As Joe walked up the steps, she felt her pulse jump. Seeing him made her nervous, and as he approached the door, she wished she had not offered to do this.

Standing on the other side of the screen, he looked nervous himself, as if he weren’t sure what he was doing there. He gave her a dazed smile. She noticed the lines around his eyes and mouth; he spent a lot of time smiling out in the sun. He wore chinos and a blue oxford shirt. Although the collar was frayed, the shirt was freshly pressed.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

Caroline had planned to ask him in, but she realized there really wasn’t any reason for it. So she grabbed her bag. He held the door for her. Their hands brushed, and their eyes met. Caroline blushed, remembering their kiss. When they got to his truck, he put his hand on the passenger door handle.

“I’ll take my car. You can follow me,” she said, thinking it would be faster for him to return to the dock from Firefly Hill.

“That’s okay,” he said, pulling open the truck door. “You’re doing this for me. The least I can do is drive.”

He backed out of her driveway, circled past the inn, and headed east down Beach Road. They passed the Ibis marshes, where the river turned brackish and flowed toward the Sound. Stopping at Black Hall’s only traffic light, they watched four teenagers fly by on their bikes. Sea gulls perched on the roof of the gas station.

Joe drove with his elbow sticking out the open window. His blond hair flew in his eyes, and he kept brushing it back. He turned on the radio, then turned it off. Caroline stared out the window, feeling so tense, she didn’t know what to say.

“Did you get the chest of gold yesterday?” she asked finally.

“We didn’t, actually,” Joe said. “We tried, but the sea wouldn’t cooperate. The wind kicked up yesterday morning, and then the currents shifted. My guys are thinking of mutiny, they’re so ready to finish the job.”

“What about today?” Caroline asked.

“Today I had plans,” Joe said. “Besides, the currents are still fluky.” He tried to smile, but his mouth was tight. His gaze slid over to Caroline. His face was drawn, and she noticed the bluish circles under his eyes.

They were on their way to Firefly Hill, the place where it had all started.

“Did you tell your mother I was coming?” he asked.

“I thought it was better not to.” Caroline said. “But she won’t be there. My sisters took her to Providence for tea.”

“They know?”

Caroline nodded. “I told them. They’re glad to help.”

“No use upsetting your mother,” Joe said.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he nodded. He glanced over, then back at the road. They were on the stretch where it hugged the rocky shore. The driving was treacherous, but Joe didn’t seem to be able to keep from glancing over at Caroline.

“This is it,” she said as they rounded the bend. She directed him to turn into the driveway, up the hill into a thicket of dark trees. At the top they emerged back into bright sunlight. Caroline wanted to point out the
Meteor,
which was visible on the horizon, but Joe was staring at the big white house standing between him and the sea. He must have been thinking of his father, his last hour. James Connor had driven up that hill, parked on the rough grass, walked across this very yard.

At the sight of Caroline, Homer trotted over with his towel. He dropped it to say hello, panting up at her with love in his eyes. Joe obviously knew dogs. He offered Homer his hand. The dog sniffed it, then turned quizzically back to Caroline. She took his big head between her hands, shaking it gently. Crouching down, she touched the top of her head to his.

“It’s okay, Homer,” she said.

“He wants to make sure I’m not going to hurt you,” Joe said.

“He knows,” Caroline said.

They walked across the back porch, into the mud room. The wainscoting needed paint. The linoleum was old and cracked. Framed fingerpaintings by all three girls hung on the walls. Caroline could have brought him in the front way, through the big hall with its sweeping stairway, but this was how the family always entered. It was the way his father had come in.

The kitchen was open and airy. Big windows gave onto the lawn, sloping to the ledge that dropped to Long Island Sound. Red clay tiles covered the floor. The big oak table had two coffee cups on it, left from Augusta’s and Skye’s breakfast. One wall was covered with pictures of the family in other places: Paris, Siena, St. Lucia, Colorado. Between two windows curved a silver fish, stuffed and mounted. It was a landlocked salmon, caught by Caroline at age thirteen.

Joe looked around the room. Caroline could see the pulse beating on the side of his neck. His blue eyes were steady, taking everything in. He stood in the middle of the room, a question on his face.

“Here,” Caroline said, taking his hand. It felt big and rough, covered with scars and calluses. No matter what, she would have known the man it belonged to worked on the sea. Pulling gently, she led him to the spot where his father had died.

“Right here?” Joe asked. His tone was neutral. He might have been asking about some historical site that had nothing to do with him. But as Caroline nodded, his eyes began to betray him. They clouded over. His lashes lowered so she couldn’t see.

“I don’t remember everything,” Caroline said, “but I remember thinking he loved you and your mother.”

Joe made a sound deep in his throat. “At five years old?”

“Yes. Too young to understand what was happening—” Caroline paused, trying to say it right. Her throat felt dry. “But I understood the tears.”

Joe wasn’t looking at her. He leaned against the kitchen counter, examining some pebbles someone had left lying there.

“He was crying?”

“Yes,” Caroline said, because she couldn’t lie to him.

“And angry?”

“At first, yes,” she said, trying to remember. She could see the man’s red face, the gun wobbling in the air over her head. “But then he just seemed…sad. Very, very sad.”

Joe moved to the kitchen window. He stood looking at the sea, dark blue against the bright sky. His hands were jammed in his pockets. Beyond the breakers, across a long stretch of water, lay the
Meteor
. He stared at it intently, as if he wanted to fly away from Firefly Hill and be safely back on it. He shot a quick glance at Caroline.

“Where were you?” he asked with his usual wariness.

“That night?” she asked, surprised. She pointed at a spot eighteen inches from where his father had stood. “I was right there.”

“A lot for a little girl,” he said, still cradling the pebbles.

“Nothing compared to what it was like for you.”

Again, a violent breath of air. “I wasn’t even here.”

“Do you think you should have been?” she asked softly. “Do you think you could have stopped him?”

A shrug. He turned back to the window. The sun was going down, and the cliff’s shadow fell across the wide bay. Staring at him, Caroline could read his thoughts.

“He had your picture,” Caroline said gently. “He was holding it, and for a minute we held it together, he and I. I’ve always thought—” She stopped herself.

“Go on.”

“I’ve always thought your father had you with him. The last face he saw was yours. And he loved you so much.”

Joe turned from the window. He shook his head, and for a moment he couldn’t talk.

“No,” he said simply. “The last face he saw was yours. You were with him, Caroline. With him when he died.”

Caroline took two steps, and she was in Joe’s arms. As he reached for her, she heard the pebbles he had been holding clatter to the floor. She understood his feeling because she wished she could have been with her own father at his death, but he had shut her out long before then. She felt her tears hot against Joe’s neck. His strong arms gripped her body, his hands grasping each of her shoulders. He gulped hard, swallowing his own sobs. Behind him, the sea was silver and black, a crescent moon hung over the horizon.

“We loved them,” Caroline said of their fathers. “We just thought we’d have them longer.”

They stood locked in an embrace. Joe’s hand stroking Caroline’s hair. She had wanted to comfort him, but here he was, holding her close, whispering her name, telling her he’d never realized before, never pictured how it had been, how close she had stood to his father, how much it meant to him that she had been there.

The kitchen clock ticked loudly. Waves beat upon the beach, tumbling rocks in their wake. It was time to leave. Augusta would be home soon, and Caroline didn’t want to face the explosion her arrival would bring.

Joe looked into Caroline’s eyes. He wiped his own face with the back of his hand. Reaching into his pocket for a handkerchief, he offered it to her. She dried her eyes, folded it, and handed it back. She felt his reluctance at having to leave this place where his father had died, and she stood still, waiting.

Without another word, he just walked out the door.

He drove her home. As they got closer to her house, Caroline knew their time together was almost over. She glanced over at Joe. The lines in his brow and around his mouth were deep. There was something going on behind his eyes.

“Thank you for taking me there,” Joe said when he caught her looking.

“Oh, Joe,” she whispered, overcome.

“I’m glad I went.”

Caroline nodded. Joe had recovered his tough reserve. A chilly breeze blew through the truck, blowing his hair into a windy mess.

When they reached the inn, he turned into the wide drive and continued left, down the private road that led to Caroline’s house. Sharply trimmed privet hedges lined the road, and the branches of tall maples interlaced overhead. The approach felt safe and private, and at this time of day, just after sundown, it was already very dark.

Parking the car, Joe turned to her. His right arm was stretched out along the seat back. He had a strained smile on his face, as if this were good-bye. He stared at her for a long time, and she began to feel the color creeping into her face. They had come a long way, Caroline and Joe. She wished she could say what she felt, but she didn’t believe he wanted to hear.

“Well…” she said.

“Yeah,” he said, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel.

Gulls cried. Across the river, a whippoorwill began to call. Locusts hummed in the trees. The night sounds got louder.

“I have to get back to the boat, they’re expecting me.”

“I know,” Caroline said, trying to smile.

Joe stared at her. He looked out the window. A minute passed.

“Say good-bye to Sam,” she said, her hand on the door handle.”

“I know I should leave,” Joe said slowly. “But the thing is, I can’t.”

Caroline looked over, her pulse quick and light.

“We could have tea…” she began to say.

He opened his door even before she finished the sentence. They walked up her flagstone walk, and Caroline used her key to open the front door. Augusta always left Firefly Hill wide open, but Caroline had locks and alarms.

Joe entered, looking around. At Firefly Hill his attention had been on one spot, but here he seemed interested in everything. The rooms were spare and cool, done in the colors of dusk. Her floors were wood, stained deep brown and highly polished.

In the living room, she had a cream-colored sofa with a heathery dark blue throw folded across the back. A matching armchair sat by the gray stone fireplace. A single mahogany table held a blue glass vase containing wildflowers she had picked on her hike up Mount Serendipity. There were no rugs.

They walked into the kitchen, and Caroline turned on some lights. It was a cook’s kitchen with a stainless steel stove and refrigerator, copper pans from Paris, plenty of counter space for chopping. The cabinets were made of warm, pale-gold natural wood. They seemed to glow from within. The kitchen table was round, lacquered black. In its center were tiny silver salt and pepper shakers, a silver sugar bowl, and a single framed picture of Caroline, Clea, and Skye.

Caroline filled a big copper kettle. She turned the heat on low, a ring of blue flame. Turning to Joe, she saw him studying the photo. It showed the three girls dressed in warm jackets, each holding a fish they had caught. Caroline was about eleven.

Replacing the frame on the kitchen table, Joe continued to look around the room.

“It’s different from your mother’s house,” he said.

Caroline nodded, pouring milk into a silver pitcher.

“Hers is warm and cozy, all cluttered up with life,” she said. “This place is…” She had been about to say “cool and spare, like me,” but she didn’t want him thinking she was feeling sorry for herself, looking for a contradiction. But the fact was, Caroline felt empty and alone, as if they had already had their tea and Joe was already gone.

“It’s beautiful,” he said. “I was thinking it’s kind of mysterious.”

“You were?”

“Yeah,” he said. The woodwork in Caroline’s kitchen was painted slate gray. One section of the wall was pumpkin. Joe went to the kitchen window, when he noticed six moonshells arranged there. Reaching into his pocket, he took something out. He examined it, then placed the object on the sill with the shells. He glanced over his shoulder at Caroline.

Slowly she approached. Her heart was beating fast. Caroline’s desire for order was reflected in the shells, spaced at three-inch intervals in a straight line. Exactly three inches past the last shell, Joe had placed a cameo. Caroline stared at it.

“It’s from the
Cambria,
” Joe said in a low voice. “It belonged to Clarissa’s mother.”

Caroline, moving to touch the cameo, looked at Joe first. He took it off the sill and placed it in her hand. She stared at the fine rim of gold, worn to a thin line. The cameo itself was incandescent.

Held to the light, the carving was ivory, the background translucent pale green glass. The woman looked noble, with strong cheekbones and a straight nose, her hair drawn back, her chin tilted up.