I didn’t have the answer. I was thinking about Daniel, lonely after losing Ann, and of myself without Katrina, looking desperately for somewhere to belong. Which one of us, I wondered, had first called out to the other across time?
I watched the sundial too, and drew a breath that caught a little in the place above my heart. ‘But it’s so hard,’ I said. ‘I mean, what if I never do go back again? What if the whole thing just stops, or …’ My next breath caught more painfully.
I thought of Fergal, telling me he wouldn’t ever want to know his future. ‘Nor should anyone,’ he’d told me, ‘know what lies in store for someone else, for that would be a burden, would it not?’ If he were here, I thought, I could have told him it was just as great a burden, sometimes, not to know.
I said as much to Claire. ‘It’s just so hard,’ I said, ‘not knowing what will happen.’
She looked at me, and in the fading light her eyes were filled with understanding and with sympathy. And knowledge.
And she asked me, ‘Shall I tell you?’
CHAPTER FORTY
Mr Rowe slid the last of the papers across his desk to me and sat back as discreetly as he could within the confines of his office to wait while I read through them.
‘Perfect,’ I said finally. ‘Thank you.’
‘Not at all.’ He watched me initial the pages and sign them. ‘And here,’ he said, pointing to one line I’d missed. ‘You are sure about this? It’s a very large Trust.’
‘Quite sure, Mr Rowe. It was never my money,’ I tried to explain. ‘It belonged to my sister, and this is what she would have wanted.’
‘But this new arrangement leaves nothing,’ he said, ‘for your personal use.’
‘I have other accounts.’ Which of course was a lie, but I said it convincingly, and with a smile, and he seemed reassured.
‘Ah.’ He gave a nod.
I signed the final page. ‘There’s nothing else I need to do?’
‘No, nothing. From now on we’ll see to everything. Mr Hallett and his sister and their heirs can rest assured that the Trelowarth Trust will be well managed; they won’t have to do a thing but let us know what monies they require, and when.’
‘And you’ll explain this all to them? They’re just off to London today, but they’ll be back on Tuesday.’
‘Then I shall contact them on Wednesday.’
‘I have a letter here, for both of them.’ I drew it from my handbag. Passed it over. ‘If you wouldn’t mind, when you do see them, could you give them this as well?’
‘Of course.’ He stood when I stood. Shook my hand when I thanked him. ‘It’s been a great pleasure,’ he said.
‘And for me.’
I left the bank and stepped back out into the midday sunshine and the narrow crowded street. The mood of the tourists down here in Polgelly had subtly shifted, as though they had only just realised that summer was nearing its end and so, too, were their holidays. Gone were the leisurely couples and families, replaced by a purposeful horde who were actively looking for fun and impatient to find it, thronging the pavements and pushing through shops in their search for it.
People perched all down the harbour wall as always, with their newspaper-wrapped fish and chips and their rattling striped paper bags from the fudge shop, but even those people seemed restless now, keeping one eye on the time while they ate, no doubt very aware there were still many things left to do in the limited hours of the day that remained.
I knew just how they felt.
I was running a bit late myself when I wended my way through the crowd by the harbour and ducked through the door of the Wellington.
I’d never seen the inside of the pub, and the brightness disarmed me a moment. From the outside the Wellington looked every year of its age, whitewashed walls leaning slightly on ancient foundations, a little bit rough and disreputable, much as it might have looked back in the day when it went by the name of the Spaniard’s Rest, when Jack had come to drink rum here and Daniel had made sure his pistol was tucked in his belt before venturing in. Knowing some of that history, I’d somehow expected the inside of the pub to look a little dark and dangerous, a den fit for smugglers and thieves.
Seeing the white stuccoed walls and the honey-warm wood of the tables and booths and the light dancing in through the multi-paned windows surprised me, so much so that Oliver, already comfortably settled in one of the booths with a view of the harbour, glanced up with a grin as I joined him.
‘Not quite what you’d pictured?’ he guessed.
‘Not a bit.’
‘I know, it disappointed me, too, when my Uncle Alf brought me in here for my first legal pint,’ he admitted. ‘After the way all us kids had been warned off the Wellie so long, I’d expected there’d be knife marks on the tables and a band of cut-throats in the public bar, but no such luck.’ Draining the dregs of the pint he’d been drinking, he levered himself from his seat and asked, ‘What can I get you?’
Normally I would have had something non-alcoholic at lunch, but this wasn’t a normal day. ‘Half of whatever you’re having, please.’
Oliver didn’t question my choice, crossing over to the bar to place our order with the barman while I bent to read the menu, but when he came back and took his seat again he held my half-pint ransom. ‘All right,’ he asked me, curious. ‘What’s wrong?’