Secrets of the Tides (45 page)

‘But why did you lie? Why didn’t you just tell the truth? We might have . . . we might have found him, you know . . .’ Dora’s voice drops to a soft whisper, ‘. . . in time.’

‘I don’t know . . .’ Cassie shakes her head and another teardrop runs down her cheek and drips onto her jeans, turning the faded blue a dark navy where it lands. ‘I was stoned. I couldn’t think straight. I was so scared. I knew I would get into trouble, so I just blurted out the lie to protect me and Sam.’

‘Why didn’t Sam say anything? The police questioned her too, didn’t they?’

‘She just went along with what I said. After we all split up to search for Alfie I warned her that we’d need to stick to my story. I knew you didn’t send a little boy out onto the beach by himself. I knew you didn’t tell a toddler to go swimming! I told Sam we’d both be in trouble with the police if they ever found out what I’d said, what we’d done that day in the cave . . . the spliffs, the stuff we did . . . they’d find out all about it. I told her we’d be arrested for drugs. She was scared and she didn’t like it, but she went along with it, for me.’

Dora suddenly saw a collection of blue paper envelopes spilling out across Cassie’s teenaged bed. Letters from Sam. No wonder Cassie had been so cagey about them. She shakes her head, piecing things together like a complex jigsaw. ‘But all that time we spent in the Crag looking for Alfie . . . all that time we wasted when you
knew
. . . you knew that he was out there?’ She is struggling to comprehend the enormity of Cassie’s confession. ‘You even told Mum later that you thought he had left with me? That’s why she . . . why she blamed me so much.’ Dora chokes on her final words.

Cassie hangs her head. ‘I know. I’m so sorry.’

‘But why lie?’

‘When I saw Mum’s face that day, I looked into her eyes and I knew she would never be able to forgive me. I couldn’t bear it. So I told her that I hadn’t seen him. I didn’t realise it at the time, but it was probably the worst lie I could have told though, wasn’t it? For you?’

Dora thinks about the blame and reproach she has felt in her mother’s angry glances ever since Alfie’s disappearance. She thinks about the heavy guilt she has borne these last few years and the hours and hours of agonising she has suffered, trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together, to understand why Alfie had left the cave, and where he might have gone. All this time she has berated herself for leaving the cave; for being the most plausible reason Alfie had taken it upon himself to head out of the safety of the Crag on his own. She’s imagined him following her out into the bright sunshine of the day, peering up the beach for a sign of her, before turning, for some reason, to head out across the treacherous rock pools. She’s always thought it was her fault. Hers alone.

‘So you see, Dora,’ Cassie says, breaking through her painful memories, ‘we each bear our scars and carry our guilt, but I am the guiltiest of us all. I live every day with the knowledge that I sent him out onto the rocks. And if I had told the truth straight away, there might have been a chance we’d find Alfie, alive. I live now with the suffering I’ve inflicted on you all, not just poor Alfie.’

Cassie runs her hands through her hair, smoothing her plait down the side of her neck and twisting the loose ends below the band nervously between her fingers. ‘So now you know that I failed you. I betrayed you. I hate myself for that, for hurting you. And you, Dora, you did
nothing
wrong.’ Her voice was rising insistently. ‘Do you see? Do you understand?’

Dora closes her eyes.

It is too much to hear.

Cassie is weeping quietly next to her on the grass, but Dora can’t bring herself to comfort her. Her head rings with her sister’s words and her stomach twists with nausea.

Fragments of the day whirl frantically around her mind. Helen speeding off down the drive to be with Tobias. Cassie and Sam dropping down out of sight into the Crag. Alfie poking at crabs with a long, gnarled stick. A ball of ice cream disappearing into the oncoming breakers. The sight of Alfie’s sodden cape in Cassie’s arms. Her mother’s disbelieving stare as she learns that Alfie is missing.

The images crowd her brain until she feels dizzy with it all. She presses her fingers to her temples to try to slow things down. She knows now. She knows it all. Each of them has played some part in the tragic events leading to Alfie’s death and they have each paid, day after day, for their choices, their failings and their secrets. All of them, Cassie, Helen, herself, even Richard have lived a lifetime of guilt and regret. Cassie’s hidden desires, her cruel suggestion and lies, Helen’s affair, they are new pieces of the puzzle that fit together to form the whole sorry picture of that one day when Alfie was taken from them. But really, Dora realises, the only thing she can still be certain of amidst the swirl of emotion surrounding her, is that none of it, no tears, no recriminations, no confessions or self-inflicted punishment or pain is going to bring Alfie back.

‘Do you hate me?’ Cassie’s words break through her thoughts. ‘I’d understand if you do. I’ve found it hard enough to forgive myself these past years so there’s no reason why
you
should.’ She speaks fast, the words tumbling out of her mouth.

Dora sits utterly still under the shimmering boughs of the tree. She can’t answer. She feels sick at the thought of what Cassie did. She is shocked by the news of her mother’s infidelity. The revelations swirl wildly in her head. She needs some time.

As the silence deepens she notices her sister wilt a little. Cassie sits slumped in the shade of the willow, a river of tears drying on her face and the white criss-cross scars on her wrists glinting like delicate silver bracelets in the strange green light, and Dora knows. She’s not sure if she can forgive her, but she knows she doesn’t hate her.

‘I don’t hate you, Cassie. You’ve hated yourself enough for one lifetime.’

Cassie lets a small sigh leave her lips and then clasps her hands together in a prayer-like gesture, turning her wrists inwards so that the scars on her arms no longer show. They sit together in silence for a moment longer before Cassie speaks again in a small voice. ‘You know if I could turn the clock back and do things differently that day, I would? I would give my own life, gladly, to protect Alfie.’

Dora nods. ‘I think we all would.’

Cassie looks up from intently studying her hands. ‘Look, Dora, there’s no reason you should listen to me now. I wouldn’t blame you if you got back into your car, drove away from here and never contacted me again. But while you are here you might as well know that I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on things in this place. I know all of us, if we could, would go back to that day and do things differently if it would mean a different outcome. But we can’t, and nothing we do now will bring our little brother back, will it?’

Dora nods again, the tears welling in her eyes. She recognises that her sister’s words echo her own thoughts just moments ago.

‘So don’t you think the best thing we can do for Alfie now is to look forwards and live our lives as best we can, for him?’

Dora wipes at her eyes as her sister continues.

‘It might be too soon for you to let me back in your life again. What I did that day . . . and the way I left . . . well, I wouldn’t blame you.’

Dora swallows. She doesn’t know how to answer that.

‘But let me just say this one last thing,’ continues Cassie. ‘For all the talking and analysing I’ve done, it was probably Bill Dryden who helped me to see it best of all.’ She opens her arms expansively. ‘The restoration of the garden . . . it’s all for Alfie. I did it for him; it is my shot at redemption, if you like. I’ve brought it back to life; a way of healing.’ Cassie reaches over and puts her hand on Dora’s arm. ‘And now you have a life growing inside you.’ She looks at her meaningfully. ‘It’s time for you to let go too, Dora. It’s time for you to move on. We can’t bring him back but we can remember him through the things we do in our own lives.’

Dora nods. Suddenly it makes sense. Everything she’s been fighting and everything she has feared is suddenly melting away. She doesn’t need to be afraid. She doesn’t need to feel guilty. The only thing she owes Alfie, her family and Dan is that she lives her life to the fullest possible.
A life half lived
. Her father’s words echo in her ears. They have all been so busy with death they have forgotten there is still a world of life out there.

They sit together in silence for a while, both of them listening to the hum of insects and birds taking flight outside the shadowy green chamber. A shaft of sunlight penetrates the boughs of the willow and shines down in Dora’s lap, warm as a cat and, as she sits there, next to her sister, she feels a sudden and immense peace wash over her, a sense of calm she hasn’t felt for a long, long while. She imagines her mother in the kitchen at Clifftops arranging long-stemmed roses into one of Daphne’s crystal vases, and Richard with his sensible slippered feet reading the paper in his beige living room as Violet fusses around him; she thinks of her sister kneeling over the soil around them coaxing plants and seeds to life, and of Dan in his studio working clay and wax into a beautiful new creation. And then she thinks of the baby, a tiny, curled being nestled deep inside her with its own perfect heartbeat. She thinks of them all and as she does, she feels another wave of peace wash over her.

HELEN

Present Day

Helen is in the garden pulling thistles and bindweed from the flower beds outside the kitchen window when she hears the shrill cry of the telephone. She stands quickly, removes her gardening gloves and walks into the house, hoping to make it before the caller rings off. She is in luck.

‘Hello?’

‘Mum, is that you?’

Helen’s breath catches in her throat. ‘Dora?’

‘Yes.’

There is a pause at the other end of the phone and in the silence Helen’s mind fills with a jumble of questions and thoughts. Why is Dora calling? They haven’t spoken since her visit earlier in the year. Is something wrong? Is the baby OK?

‘What’s happened?’ she asks.

‘Nothing, everything’s fine.’

‘The baby’s all right?’

‘Yes,’ says Dora, sounding surprised. ‘The baby’s fine. We’re all fine,’ she adds.

‘Oh, good.’ Helen relaxes slightly.

‘I was wondering . . . I thought maybe . . . would you fancy a daytrip to London?’ Dora blurts the question and Helen feels her heart swell with sudden emotion.

‘A visit? To see you?’

‘Yes.’

‘When?’

‘I was thinking next weekend – but if you can’t make it then we could—’

‘No,’ says Helen quickly. ‘Next weekend is fine.’ She mentally runs through her calendar. She can rearrange a few things; it won’t be a problem.

‘If you’re sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘OK.’

There is another long silence and Helen can hear her daughter’s quiet breathing at the other end of the phone. ‘And you’re all right, nothing’s wrong?’

‘No, Mum, everything’s fine.’ Dora gives Helen the name and address of a café in Primrose Hill, a tearoom called Rosie Lee’s tucked away off the main drag.

‘It will be nice to revisit an old stomping ground. I’ll call you if I have trouble finding the place.’

‘Great. See you there next Saturday at eleven?’

‘Yes, see you there.’

‘OK.’ There is another pause. ‘Bye, Mum.’

‘Bye, Dora.’

Helen hears the click of the handset at the other end of the line. She stands in the kitchen holding the buzzing receiver against her chest, feeling an unexpected warmth seep through to her heart.

She catches the train up to London early the following Saturday morning and arrives at Waterloo station just before ten. Within minutes she is sitting on the Northern Line hurtling towards Chalk Farm. The tube carriage is virtually empty, but it still holds the residual smells of the thousands of bodies that have passed through its doors all week. She breathes in the warm reek of it and is taken straight back to the time she and Richard lived in north London as young newly-weds and nervy first-time parents. It seems like a lifetime ago now. So much has happened since then.

There is a young woman about Dora’s age sitting opposite her. She wears a diamond stud in her nose that glints boldly under the artificial lighting and she nods along to music emanating from tiny white headphones. Helen catches her eye and smiles. The girl curls the corners of her lips in the slightest of acknowledgements, before turning her gaze politely to the adverts above Helen’s head. Of course, she realises, it has been too long; she is out of practice when it comes to Underground etiquette.

Helen averts her eyes and begins to fiddle with her tube ticket, letting her mind wander back to Dora’s phone call. It was strange; Dora had given no indication as to why she should suddenly invite her up to London. The last time they had seen each other was at Clifftops, when Dora had announced her pregnancy and they had spoken, albeit awkwardly, about Alfie. Since then Helen has tortured herself over the way she handled things. Dora had reached out to her and she had pushed her away. Once again, she had failed her family. She is haunted by their encounter and angry with herself for being too afraid to speak the truth to her daughter, when it is clear it was what she had needed to hear.