Gull Island

by Grace Thompson

  ‘Except the man in your life,’ he ventured.

  ‘How did you know?’

  ‘I didn’t. But I’m right, aren’t I?’

  ‘Does it show that much?’

  ‘Yes, Rosita.’

  She stared at him, wondering at the outstretched arms and the tearful smile. ‘You know me? But—’

  ‘I’ve known you on and off since before you were born, on Christmas Day, my twentieth birthday. My name is Luke.’

  ‘Luke?’ She frowned, trying to connect the gentle and elderly face with the faint memory she had of his visit to the farm. A man with funny glasses and a long beard. ‘Did you come to the farm once when I was little?’

  ‘Just once. Your stepfather didn’t encourage Richard and me to come a second time.’

  ‘But you’re different. The Luke I remember was – different,’ she finished with a shrug.

  ‘So are you!’ He raised an eyebrow and self-consciously asked, ‘Can I have a hug? Just one? I’ve wanted to for so long.’ Shyly, a little doubtfully, Rosita allowed herself to be hugged. ‘I tried many places for news of you,’ Luke went on, ‘but I couldn’t find a single clue. No one at the farm knew anything about you. I asked Mrs Stock, thinking she might have heard. I even asked your mother’s parents but they hadn’t changed. The Careys are gone and no one I asked knew where. Perhaps you were hard to find because, like me, you aren’t the same person any more. People keep a picture of someone without allowing for time to do its work sometimes, don’t they? Where have you been since you left the home?’

  She told him some of her story, including the purchase of the shops. ‘That’s the trouble with Richard,’ she said. ‘He can’t accept that I am a businesswoman and not someone prepared to give it all up and run his home.’

  ‘Richard?’

  ‘Richard Carey.’

  ‘I’ve lost touch with him, too.’ He sighed. ‘And Barbara, your mother.’

  ‘I’ve no wish to see her,’ she said sharply. ‘Stuck me in a home so she and that Graham Prothero could live comfortably without me.’

  ‘She didn’t want to let you go, but she had no choice. I saw what he was doing to you. I felt so helpless and afraid for you and I was glad when I heard you were safe in that place and being cared for.’

  ‘Sorry, Luke, but I can’t forgive her.’ Her lips were tight, her expression closed in and determined.

  ‘And yet you have to. You can’t carry all that anger around with you for ever. Anger and hate are terrible burdens, Rosita, and they get in the way of so much that’s good.’

  She stood to leave. ‘Thank you for the tea. I’m so very pleased to have met you.’

  ‘Rosita, we must all get together and catch up on all that’s happened to us. Share each other’s adventures. You, Richard, Barbara and me. Soon?’

  ‘Not Barbara. I’m not ready to meet my mother again. I doubt I ever will be.’

  ‘Then you and Richard and me, eh? I’ll be in touch now I know where to find you.’

  As she drove back from the unexpected encounter, she began to think of Luke as her own discovery. She needn’t share him with Richard. Not yet anyway. There was excitement in her dark eyes as she parked the car and locked it. She jangled her keys as she walked towards the Station Row shop, but to her surprise she didn’t need them. The shop was still open.

  ‘Kate?’ she asked, seeing the young woman standing behind the counter. ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘Well, not really. But there’s something I wanted to tell you so I thought I’d wait. Best to keep the shop open while I stood here, so I’ve taken a few shillings we wouldn’t otherwise have had.’ She spoke in a monotonous voice as though her mind was elsewhere.

  Frowning, Rosita closed and locked the shop door. ‘What is it, Kate? You look upset.’

  ‘I had a visit from a lady. She said someone called Mrs Stock was looking for you. Old, she was, at least seventy-five. Rosita Jones she said she wanted, this Mrs Stock. Rosita Jones who’d left the town and gone with her mam to live on a farm with a man called Prothero.’ She looked at Rosita and in a trembling voice asked, ‘You’re Rosita, my half-sister, aren’t you?’

  Rosita could only nod.

  Chapter Fourteen

  KATE STARED AT the smart, well-dressed woman in front of her, trying to connect her to the vision of the wild, disliked and unhappy child she could scarcely remember. Seeing the distressed look on her sister’s face, she held back all the hundreds of questions that poured into her head.

  ‘You didn’t wear glasses then,’ she said. ‘And your hair, it was a long, thick plait. Your face and hands were always red and rough, as if the wind picked you out for special attention.’

  ‘My face wasn’t red when I left the home, it was very pale.’ Rosita’s voice was harsh. ‘I went from one extreme to the other; working out of doors all hours of the day, running around trying to please your father, then going to live in a house where exercise and fresh air were administered in rationed amounts like sweets and stories.’

  ‘The name, Caroline, why did you change it? So no one would know who you were? I didn’t know your other name – is it Evans?’

  ‘It’s Jones.’

  ‘Mam never said. She talked about you very little once you left. Dad didn’t like it; he used to get upset.’

  ‘Illegitimacy isn’t something you talk about.’ Rosita’s voice was still harsh, her eyes glaring.

  Kate hesitated, wanting to say something to comfort Rosita but not knowing what. ‘The glasses, they’re new,’ she repeated.

  ‘I’d always needed glasses, although no one bothered to check. It was why I got so many things wrong, but I didn’t realize, not until a friend pointed it out. It was so obvious then.’ She paused a moment, thinking of Miss Grainger, then went on. ‘The hair, well, I intended to be different, so I had to look different. I wanted to be more fashionable. I’d had enough of looking like all the rest, wearing clothes chosen for me by others. My hair was cut in what they called a shingle. Mam got hers styled, didn’t she? Pretended she was one of the “flappers” they talked about when she was young.’

  ‘Were you very unhappy there?’

  Rosita wanted to cry. She felt vulnerable, weak, like a child caught out in some naughty escapade. Memories flooded back, the days when everyone had visitors except her. Birthdays when there were only two cards, one from the Careys and one – which she threw in the ash bin – from her Auntie Babs. ‘What d’you think!’ she snapped angrily.

  More softly she went on, ‘It wasn’t your fault, Kate. I know that. I’m sorry but I didn’t want you to know who I am. I didn’t want you running to tell Mam. You weren’t to blame – although I still wonder why you and Hattie never visited me. But Mam was to blame. I’ll never think differently.’ Kate began to speak and she added quickly, ‘And I don’t want to see her. I hope that’s clear, Kate.’

  ‘She works on a farm, not far from where we were brought up, did you know that?’

  ‘No, I didn’t. Auntie Molly Carey didn’t say and I wouldn’t have asked. Why didn’t you stay with her? Being brought up on a farm I’d have thought you’d prefer it?’

  ‘I was married to Idris by then and Hattie, well, you know Hattie. She prefers the lively opportunities of town life to the quiet of the countryside.’

  ‘Auntie Molly Carey knows who I am, of course, but you won’t tell Hattie, will you? I need time to think about whether I want her to know.’

  ‘What about Idris?’

  ‘No! Keep it to yourself for a while, please, Kate.’

  ‘And I can’t tell Mam when I write?’

  ‘No, you can’t! Did you know she told the people at the home she was my auntie? “I’m her Auntie Babs,” she said. Couldn’t even admit she was my mother!’

  ‘I’d better go. It’s very late. Will you – will you be all right? I could come back if you want to talk?’

  Tears threatened again but Rosita shook her head. ‘I’m all right.’ She took out a hand
kerchief and wiped her eyes. ‘I’m glad you know, Kate. It will make things easier for me, not having to pick my words for fear of you guessing.’

  ‘That’s never been a risk, has it? You rarely talk about the things that really matter to you, do you?’

  ‘Not a word to the others, right?’

  Kate put on her coat slowly, reluctant to go. Turning as she touched the latch, she said, ‘Oh, I almost forgot. I’ve made a list of applications for the job of running the new shop. And two people willing to help out here, while I’m in London with the girls and Idris’s mam and dad.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Rosita took the piece of paper and Kate left.

  After Kate had gone, Rosita sat in the semi-dark shop for a long time, still dressed for outdoors, her handbag over her arm. She felt small and mean having been found out and she didn’t understand why. Perhaps it was because Kate was such a kind and gentle person and they had built up a rapport that was now probably spoilt. Whatever the explanation, she felt she had let herself down by keeping her identity a secret from Kate all this time.

  Luke’s words came back to her. He had warned her that continued bitterness would colour the rest of her days with destructive anger. That hatred would spoil every nice thing that happened to her.

  Perhaps if she hadn’t harboured this hatred her attitude to other things would have been different and Richard would have understood? Had he thought her unkind and cruel? And Miss Grainger? And the Careys?

  Suddenly she wanted to see Richard and persuade him to understand. Forgetting everything else, she went to the car and drove to the Careys’. Richard wasn’t there.

  ‘He dressed himself up and went out an hour ago. I thought he was meeting you,’ Mrs Carey said with some embarrassment. ‘Business. It’s business, sure to be.’

  Rosita didn’t want to go back to the flat. She took out the piece of paper with the names of prospective employees on it, and went to the first address on the list. By nine o’clock she had chosen two part-time women to run the Station Row shop in Kate’s absence and taken on two more for the new premises. She would continue to manage the one near the school; she needed that pretence of a group of friends that The Horsey Gang supplied.

  Outside the shop in Station Row, Richard waited in the van until just after nine for her to come home, then he gave up and went to meet Monty for a drink.

  Rosita thought about the woman who had called to find her on behalf of Mrs Stock and, after a few days of consideration, went to see her absentee grandmother. The house was locked up and looked silent with the emptiness a house acquires when the owners are away.

  Perhaps they had decided to move and had wanted to say goodbye? Although that was unlikely after the lack of communication over the years. She was about to give up and walk away when a neighbour opened the door and called, ‘You looking for Mrs Stock? You’re too late, miss. She’s dead and gone.’

  ‘Oh!’ Rosita didn’t feel any sadness, just a mild irritation at having wasted her time. ‘I understood she wanted to see me. I must have been mistaken.’

  ‘No, you weren’t mistaken. I came to the shop for you, but it’s too late now. Although, the solicitor will want to see you, mind. Got something to tell you, he has.’

  Two days later, Rosita was informed that her grandmother had left her £1,300.

  Money could never repay the debt Mrs Stock owed, she thought, trembling with mixed feelings. The debt the old lady had owed was in time and love, desperately needed over the years. The money was less of a thrill than it should have been, causing instead a renewal of the hurt and neglect. Then she shrugged. It would pay another kind of debt and help the accountant to sleep easier at night. But her feelings softened and she grieved for the loss of someone who should have been an important part of her life. A lonely, stubborn old lady, whose pride had deprived her of a granddaughter to love.

  The new shop kept Rosita busy for the next few weeks and she rarely saw Richard. She had said nothing more to Kate on the question of her true identity and Kate had not referred to the subject again. The only change in their relationship was Kate using her new Christian name, Caroline, instead of calling her Miss Evans.

  The week before the Careys left for their London holiday, Richard came to see her. Her first thought on seeing him was to wonder where he had been the night his mother had said he had ‘dressed up and gone out’. She wouldn’t question him. She might not like the answers.

  ‘I had a visitor on the site yesterday,’ he said. ‘Luke arrived at five o’clock and we went for a meal. I tried to find you but, as usual, you were too busy with your empire-building.’

  ‘Is he well?’ she asked, ignoring the last remark. She glared at him, daring him to repeat his accusation that she was too busy for friends.

  ‘He suggested we go to the cottage tomorrow afternoon, it being Sunday. You’ll presumably have a few hours off?’

  ‘Not really,’ some devil in her made her say. ‘I have books to do and – but all right. I can spare you and Luke a couple of hours. I’d like to come.’

  ‘Honoured we’d be.’ Richard didn’t hide his sarcasm.

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Oh, and wear something sensible,’ he added as he left.

  ‘You mean nothing smart and elegant?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  Defiantly, she put on a tight-fitting white skirt with an angora jumper in a very pale grey. A blue jacket, severely tailored as she liked them, was thrown casually over her shoulder and a pair of ridiculously high-heeled white shoes completed the outfit. The white drawstring bag with straps hanging over her arm and a blue and white scarf gave a summery impression. She knew she looked good. She smiled as she saw Richard’s look of admiration change to disapproval when the van stopped outside the shop. He wasn’t going to tell her how to dress!

  Luke admired her and said so. Richard’s mood darkened.

  ‘I’d planned a sail in my new boat,’ Luke told them, ‘but from the look of you, it mightn’t be a good idea, unless you change into something of mine?’

  ‘No, I’ll sit on the beach and wait for you. I’m not very adventurous.’ Angry with herself for ruining an afternoon by trying to win some silly game with Richard, she wished she had brought the accounts books with her. At least then the day wouldn’t have been a complete waste!

  She removed her shoes and stockings in Luke’s cottage and, feeling annoyed with herself, stood on the beach and watched as the two men set off down the coast in the small rowing boat to where he moored his newest possession. They were laughing, the sound of their voices coming over the calm water like a reproach.

  After a while they crossed the bay before a light wind, waving at her from the deck of the boat which Luke now owned. Again she heard their laughter and her self-directed anger increased and encompassed Richard. If he hadn’t been difficult she wouldn’t have spoilt her day trying to defy him. Then she reluctantly admitted to herself that he wasn’t to blame; it was her own stupidity that had caused her to miss a pleasant hour on the blue sea. Richard had advised her to wear casual clothes – it hadn’t been an order! The biter bit, she thought as she sat on the beach in her unsuitable clothes and waited miserably for their return.

  They were back after a couple of hours during which she sat and read a book she had selected from Luke’s shelves. Luke had brought food and they ate fish and potatoes cooked over a fire in the open, with a crisp salad. Rosita ate little, just listening to the two men talking and laughing, and wondering why she had created a situation in which she couldn’t relax and enjoy the occasion with them.

  It was dark when she and Richard left and the journey home began in silence.

  ‘Did you enjoy your day?’ Richard asked as they approached the first of the houses. ‘You seemed very quiet.’

  ‘I have a lot on my mind. Kate knows I’m really her sister. I – I came to tell you and discuss it but you were out.’

  ‘Yes, Mam told me.’ That stubbornness from which they both suffered made h
im hold back on the explanation he knew she wanted. He didn’t tell her he had been sitting outside her flat for most of the evening, waiting for her to appear.

  ‘Kate hasn’t told Hattie yet and I don’t know that I want her told. I don’t want to see my mother, ever.’

  ‘It’s your choice, but I’d think very carefully if I were you. My father was always a fool but I still love him. Your mother was lacking in confidence, gentle, unsure of herself. She tried damned hard to keep you, under very difficult circumstances, and she failed. So what? Who’s perfect? She chose the way to cope with life by abandoning you to a place of safety and going back to Kate, Hattie and Graham. What would you have done, I wonder?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have thrown out my child!’

  ‘Not much chance of that happening!’ He sounded harsh, his jaw tight with anger. ‘Too sorry for yourself. Too afraid of showing a human side. What chance do you have of ever producing a child?’

  ‘Stop the car! I won’t ride with you a moment longer!’

  He skidded as he clamped on the brakes and brought the car to a squealing stop in a few yards. She got out and turned to him, a clever retort on her tongue, but he slammed the door and drove off without giving her the chance. Fighting back tears of hurt and humiliation, she walked back to the flat on stupid shoes that hurt and the emptiness closed, like a hollow shell, around her.

  Hattie was just leaving his mother’s place when Richard reached the door and she smiled and said, ‘Oh dear, Richard. You look as if you’ve had a disappointment. There’s a shame. Pity for you. That Caroline Evans again, is it? Want to tell me about it, do you?’

  The prospect of walking inside and spending the next couple of hours trying to calm himself after the latest argument was an impossibility. He said nothing as Hattie took his arm and pressed against him. The night was already dark and gave a false intimacy between them. They walked towards the silent anonymity of the park, the trees looking enormous with the addition of shadows from the street lamps. Unerringly she led them to where the railings had been broken and without a word spoken they went through.