In another package, wrapped in yellowing tissue paper, are a bundle of birth certificates. Grandma Sarah was right when she said it was all here. The oldest certificate is dated 1810. Twins, John and Thomas. I wonder if that’s the John who married Gabrielle? Still nothing about Sarah Cassandra. In a weird way it’s like she never existed.
‘Hello, Cassie.’
I’m so busy thinking and rifling through papers, I’m unaware of Aunt Elenor’s arrival until she’s almost on top of me. Startled, I drop the documents and swing round. Mum didn’t say anything about her coming. Maybe she doesn’t know.
‘Is your mother about?’
‘She’s in her work room.’
‘Good. Good.’ Aunt Elenor trots off, muttering to herself about her shoes never being the same after tramping through the long, wet grass.
I think no more about her and go back to searching through the family papers. Two minutes later Richard streaks past my cabin.
‘What’s wrong?’ I call, glancing up at the interruption.
‘Aunt Elenor’s stupid,’ he bellows, storming up the path.
Curious as to what’s been going on, I leave my cabin and go to the main cabin to find out. Mum and Aunt Elenor are sitting, facing one another, at the table. When I appear, Aunt Elenor says, ‘Cassie, don’t you think it would be nice for Richard to be part of the wedding as well as you?’
I go over to the sink, eyeing Mum as I do so. Her face is set, like it’s been starched.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I thought he could be a page boy,’ Aunt Elenor says, fussing with the red dotted scarf around her neck.
A giggle escapes from my mouth. Quickly, I turn and pour myself a glass of water. No wonder Richard was upset. ‘But page boys are little,’ I say in Richard’s defence, turning to face my aunt. ‘He’s eight.’
Aunt Elenor shifts around on the chair, as though scared she might pick up something. ‘But he is very small for his age.’
‘Cassie’s right, Elenor,’ interjects Mum. ‘There’s no way he’d dress up …’
‘Dress up!’ exclaims Aunt Elenor, shocked her idea could be considered this way. ‘Dress up indeed. Is that all I get for my kind thoughts?’
‘Now, Elenor, you know very well what I meant.’ Mum relents a little. ‘We’ll see.’
I turn away in disgust. Why can’t Mum say no. Why is she always saying ‘we’ll see’, when in reality she means no. It’s like she can’t bring herself to be honest.
For example, take the time when I wanted to sleep on the island with Rana. I was about nine and a half. All I kept getting told was ‘we’ll see’ until, in the end, after Rana and I had made all the plans, she said no.
Another time was the school camp. When I asked if I could have a new sleeping bag and Mum said ‘we’ll see’, I knew I wouldn’t get one. And I was right. It would have been better if she had said no right at the beginning.
Mum gets up. ‘A cup of tea?’ she suggests, easing Aunt Elenor away from the page boy subject.
‘Well,’ replies her sister, her bristles softening. ‘I can’t stay long. But that would be nice.’
As I’m drifting outside, Mum calls, ‘See if you can find Richard, Cassie. Tell him nothing’s definite.’
Richard is in his hut. He thinks no one knows about his secret hideout. It’s hidden under a whole lot of creeper, growing over the trees and bushes, about halfway up the track.
‘Richard?’ I rustle the bushes. When there’s no answer I pull the curtain of creeper aside.
‘Go away,’ he says.
I kneel down. ‘Hey, this is great.’
He scowls. ‘No girls allowed.’
‘I don’t count. I’m your sister.’
After a couple of seconds, he gives in. ‘All right. But watch the stuff.’
I crawl in. The ground is covered with an old blanket and behind him are two boxes stacked on top of one another like cupboards. Inside the cupboards are several broken dishes, plastic cups and shells. I let the vine fall over the narrow opening. ‘It’s dark in here.’ Only a few green pinpricks of light steal through the web of branches.
Richard pings on a torch.
‘That’s mine.’
‘I’m only borrowing it.’ The torch suns a circle of light around the hut.
‘Mum said there’s nothing definite about you being a page boy,’ I tell him.
‘I’m not going …’
‘You don’t have to, if you don’t want to.’ Now I’m telling half-truths, but I’m sure in time Mum will take more notice of Richard and me than Aunt Elenor.
‘True?’ Richard asks, his face brightening.
‘Yes.’ I smile and add teasingly, ‘Although you’d have made a lovely page boy.’
Richard glares at me, then pulls out a packet of biscuits from the top shelf. ‘Want one?’
‘Thanks.’ I take one, bite into it. It’s soggy, but I don’t let on that it tastes more like a lump of porridge than a biscuit. ‘What do you use the hut for?’ I ask, my eyes now used to the dimness.
‘It’s a secret.’
I swallow the remaining lump of biscuit in one go. ‘I’d better get back. I’m meant to be doing my project. I’ll tell Mum you’re okay.’
As I’m backing out, Richard says, ‘Bet you didn’t know Mac’s after you.’
I halt. Half-in, half-out of his secret world. ‘That’s not funny, Richard.’ My voice is trembling.
‘I am half-sick of shadows,’ said
The Lady of Shalott
It’s the last thing in this world I ever expected to hear.
‘It’s true. I heard him talking.’
‘Richard …’ By this time my pale breath is haunting his face, my fingers locked in secret behind my back.
‘He was telling Clare.’
Clare? Where does she fit into all of this? My head feels light, fizzy. Why would Mac be discussing me with Clare?
‘Me and Justin were playing spies,’ carries on Richard, unaware of my dizzy state. ‘That’s how I got the biscuits. Every time one of us gets a good spy secret, the other one’s got to …’
I butt in. ‘You must have got it wrong. About Mac …’ The control in my voice slips. Now it is anxious, desperate to know what Richard is telling me is a possibility. Oh, divine day, if only …
Richard folds his arms. ‘I’m the top ace spy. I don’t make mistakes.’
Are the stars in my head real? Or am I in another world? ‘Okay. I’m sorry,’ I tell him, my voice fluttering with happiness.
Richard continues. ‘Do you want to know who Clare’s keen on?’
All I can think about is getting away, disappearing somewhere so I can think about what I’ve been told, but just to make sure Richard has got it right, I say, ‘Not Mac?’
‘I told you he’s after you,’ says Richard crossly. ‘Haven’t you been listening?’
The voice in my mind shouts in glee, No, I haven’t, not a word since you told me about Mac. Out loud I say, ‘Tell me about Clare.’
‘She’s only mad for the head prefect at North Boys’ High,’ he says in a hushed, reverent voice.
I nod and grin at this big bit of news and pretend to be deeply interested, while all the time the words ‘Mac’s after you’ are exploding in my head like a thousand circles of coloured confetti. Then realising that this bit of information could be all over the bay in no time, I make Richard promise he won’t tell anyone.
‘I will if I can keep your torch.’
‘Do you promise?’
He shines the torch onto his face, making it look macabre and nightmarish. ‘I promise,’ he says in a deep voice.
Once out of the hut, I start down the track, flying, no longer any thought of going home, flying to the ocean … I must down to the seas again … he likes me … And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by … he really likes me … And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking … I can’t believe it!
Whe
n I reach the water, I jump down off the track onto a large boulder at the very neck of the inlet. After catching my breath, I lie back, gaze at the grey sky and listen to the sound of the ocean. Way above me, a lone seagull screams, its white wings wheeling wide. Then suddenly I realise that for the past two hours, I haven’t given a single thought to Rana.
Chapter Eleven
Over the next two weeks I see very little of Rana. She’s hardly at school and when she is, the both of us keep well out of each other’s way. Not once has she bothered to apologise or explain about that Saturday night, what she did and where she went, so I tell myself I don’t care. But inside me there’s a hole, big and hollow, and no matter how much I try to fill it with other things, no matter how much I try to pretend it isn’t there, every single morning when I wake up, I feel its emptiness.
My dreams at night are filled with shipwrecks, galleons sailing blue against the sky and sea and treasure troves lying deep on the ocean floor overflowing with shells and seaweed; plundering and killing, bones and blood floating on the water.
Mac seems to have disappeared and I’m beginning to wonder if I didn’t imagine what Richard told me. But until this evening, the weather over the last few days has been glorious, too much so for autumn and I have made the most of it by going for walks on my own and savouring the beauty of the bay.
The change comes when I’m tucked up in bed, snug and warm, working on my project. All at once there is this great noise, like an express train, as the southerly screams up the inlet and straight into the front of my cabin, making it feel like a raft on the ocean.
I’m thinking about Anne Bonny and Mary Read, the two women pirates Grandma Sarah had mentioned, who I had since read about in the book from the library. What must it have been like living among so many men, most of whom would have been quite foul? The chapter on the two women said how they had both managed to conceal the fact that they were women from the crew until they were brought to trial in Jamaica in 1720. The only ones who knew they were women were their lovers. Would it have been the same for Sarah Cassandra?
In spite of all my searching and trying to find out about my sea ancestor, all I’ve found are blanks. Every time I think I’m getting close, I find myself back in the neverending circle of nothingness. More and more it’s getting hard to believe Sarah Cassandra ever lived. Perhaps it’s the time factor again. Is it too far back? Is it because she lived when very little attention was given to such things as keeping records?
Even as the question forms in my head, I know that family births and deaths were documented, if not by the family themselves then by the local church in the county where they were born. But to find that sort of information could take me weeks, even months. I know I could ask Ted to help. But every time the idea slips into my head, a little voice says, ‘Not yet.’ I was hoping our family had its own record book, kept by the head of the household, one that had been added to and handed down through the years, and was waiting in the suitcase for me, but no such luck.
As I lift out the last few envelopes, the bottom one catches on the inside metal corner of the case. Easing it gently, I manage to free it, but not without ripping some of the rotten material covering the inside of the lid. Under the material, I see a piece of cardboard. I tell myself it’s only an extra backing to the lid of the case, but curiosity gets the better of me.
Investigating further, I pull at the cardboard. It comes away without effort. I stare at it, unbelieving. Behind the piece of cardboard is a coloured sketch the size of a postcard. With trembling fingers I lift it out. The girl in the drawing is me. It’s like I’m looking in a mirror. Same eyes, same hair, same small nose. I turn the picture over. Written across the back is the name Sarah Cassandra Addison in curly handwriting. Underneath is the date, 6 February, 1720. This is followed by the words, On my sixteenth birthday.
On Monday, instead of Miss McKenzie, there’s a strange man in the classroom.
‘Not so much noise,’ he instructs as we clatter into the room. He is short and wears black trousers and a blue jersey. Tight brown curls cover his head, looking as though they’ve been stitched on. Everything about him is neat and tidy. ‘Be as quick as you can.’
When we are settled at our desks — Rana’s is empty again — he introduces himself. ‘Good morning. I’m Mr Boot.’ His eyes dart over us, waiting for someone to laugh. There is not a sound. ‘Miss McKenzie had a fall this weekend. She won’t be back for some time. So instead,’ he says, bringing his narrow lips together, ‘you’ve got me.’
Disappointment wells up within me. I’d sat up late last night, making notes, putting all my research information in chronological order and writing up my introduction especially to show Miss McKenzie today, knowing how interested she would be in Sarah Cassandra, and now she’s not here. I haven’t shown the sketch I found to anyone. Not even Mum. Somehow I felt Miss McKenzie would understand more. It seems my pirate ancestor is fated to remain a secret.
Mr Boot’s voice clips my thoughts. ‘This morning we will be studying the poet Ralph Grayson. A modernist in thought. Turn to page eighty-two of your New Poetry Book.’
Miss McKenzie never did modern poets. She was taking us through the old ones. Then an awful thought strikes me. If Mr Boot is going to be our teacher, what’s going to happen about the family assignment?
At that moment the door opens and Rana walks in. It’s the first time I’ve seen her for ten days. She looks pale. Mr Boot waits for an apology for being late, but Rana says nothing. She closes the door and walks silently to her desk, pulls out her chair and sits down.
‘And you are?’ asks Mr Boot.
‘Late,’ says Rana, her eyes challenging him.
The class twitters. Whatever’s been going on with Rana, it’s obvious she hasn’t lost the swiftness of her tongue.
‘You will see me after class,’ says Mr Boot, pulling away from Rana’s sulky gaze and returning to the poetry book.
Once, during class, I feel Rana glance over in my direction. I pretend not to notice. This time I’m not giving in. As she was the one to make the rift in the first place, she is going to have to be the one to mend it, and without any help from me.
The lesson drags. Most of the time my mind is back on the sketch of Sarah Cassandra. When I looked closely at it, I saw that her hair is thicker and darker than mine. But her face is my face. Even down to the round, yet slightly pointed chin. Around her neck is a band of pearls and on her ears are the earrings Mum had shown me, the pink ones made from a shell. How long they have lasted! In the sketch Sarah Cassandra is looking down, half smiling, secret-like. A small bunch of blue flowers lies in her lap. They look like forget-me-nots. Then I remember Grandma Sarah telling me she supposedly ran away from home when she was sixteen. The sketch must have been done the same year.
The buzzer interrupts my thoughts. At last Ralph Grayson can be laid to rest for a while. As I’m packing my books in my bag, Rana says, ‘What’s been happening with you, Cassie?’
I want to ignore her, but I don’t. ‘Nothing,’ I say, picking up my pack and walking towards the door, trying to stop the well of hurt that’s filling up the empty hole inside of me. If she thinks I’m going to be friendly just because she’s decided it’s okay, then she’s got another think coming. I push away the part of me that wants to tell her how much I’ve missed her, and instead listen to the part that is red and angry.
At lunchtime Rana tries again. I’m sitting in the gym talking to Clare. She is asking who I’m taking to the school dance. When I shrug, she says, ‘How about Mac? I’m sure he’d go with you, if you asked.’
So perhaps Richard, the ace spy, is right. But I haven’t seen Mac since the night of the pictures. Perhaps he saw me with Denny and it has put him off. And what about the phone call Mum told me about? It’s odd that he hasn’t rung back. Usually I see him once or twice a week, if not on the bus then around the bay, but he’s been nowhere.
Before I can casually ask Clare if Mac’s away or something, I
see Rana out of the corner of my eye, standing in the doorway of the gym. She’s looking around the hall. I turn my head towards Clare. ‘Have you got a partner for the dance?’
Clare smiles. ‘Daniel Koetz.’
‘Isn’t he the head boy at North’s?’ I say, smiling inside, already knowing the answer. Richard is a top spy. I wonder what other secrets he knows? I’m about to ask Clare what she’s wearing, when Rana appears in front of us.
‘Hi Rana. Nice to see you again,’ says Clare, glancing at her watch, then getting up. ‘I’d better get moving, I said I’d help a couple of year nines with their Maths.’ She leaves.
‘What a saint,’ says Rana, slipping into her seat.
I make no comment.
‘Do you want to come over after school?’
‘I can’t. I’ve got something else on,’ I say, snubbing her for the second time that day.
‘Oh. Okay. Some other time?’
‘Maybe,’ I say, keeping my voice aloof, allowing myself the pleasure of deliberately hurting her. At that moment it feels like Rana and I have switched places.
Rana gets up. ‘See you then, Cassie.’
‘Yeah,’ I nod and watch her walk away. And that’s the last time I see her, until three weeks later, when the tide threatens to drown the bay.
Sometime during History, the last period of the day, I decide to go and visit Miss McKenzie. After the final buzzer has gone, I ring Mum from the school office, tell her what I’m doing and that I won’t be home on the usual bus, then set off down the long hill that runs behind the school.
I think I know where Miss McKenzie lives. Not long ago, when Mum was delivering two dolls to twin girls and I was looking for the right house number, I saw Miss McKenzie going into a wooden house. It was second from the end of Harris Street and painted green. There was no mistaking it was her.
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