“Quite.”
Jules didn’t press for details.
“You must come to Sparrow Island right away. He’s named you in his will.”
“Sparrow Island? I’m afraid that’s out of the question.”
“There’s a cab waiting outside. I’ve made all the arrangements for your travel this evening.”
“Tonight?”
The Garden Terrace Room was bustling all around him, as Jules considered his obligation to the institute. He was, after all, the main reason for the dinner. On the other hand, the reporters at his table had no grasp of botany or the implications of his experiments. It wasn’t viewed as news of a scientific breakthrough, but as entertainment. They would probably write two-inch articles with snappy headlines like “Smarty Plants” and “Getting to the Root of Gossiping Tomatoes.”
Jules felt uncomfortably torn. He spotted Edward Schroeder, pointing him back to his table where the reporters had taken their seats and the Enquirer madman was holding court, displaying Jules’s book in a comical manner.
He nodded to the lawyer. “Give me half an hour to pack.”
CHAPTER 4
THE SEA AIR WAS FOGGY with silver mist as the Acadia bounced along the waves.
The old fishing boat looked ready for scrap. The deck was splintered and warped by thirty years of lobster traps thrown about. Its boxy shape was antiquated, the hull chipped and bleached to seagull gray. But her engine was in top shape and she maneuvered deftly over choppy waters, cruising toward Sparrow Island at eighty knots, faster than most sailing ships.
Luke and Monica stood on deck, laughing at their own failed attempts to walk a straight line. They fell over each other, squealing like children whenever a spray of water blew across the bow. It was late afternoon and much colder than the marina in Halifax. Luke put on a ski jacket and Monica wrapped herself up in black leather against an ocean breeze that brought the temperature to a brisk forty-five.
Isabelle watched them from the window of the bridge, fighting nausea but glad to see Monica finally loosened up and cheerful. Sean stood beside his mother, holding tight to a holly bush. He wanted to replant it on the island for George, who had been a real botanist. Isabelle was touched and thought her father would appreciate the gesture.
The boat captain was a jovial man named Flannigan. He was a Canadian from Halifax, round and rosy, with a scruffy red beard and eyes as blue as the sea. He had known George for years, brought him supplies once a month, and he navigated the waters like the local cod. Sebastian, his steward, was a small, wiry man with a rugged face who seemed far too muscular for his age, which Isabelle guessed to be close to seventy. He raucously hosed down lobster traps and stacked them in the stern.
As the captain steered the boat, Sean watched in earnest, gripping his fists in the air and mimicking the captain turning the wheel. Flannigan laughed heartily and allowed the boy to take the helm. Sean spun the wheel, looping in a circle as everyone shuffled starboard.
“Please, Sean,” Isabelle complained, her stomach heaving.
Flannigan laughed. “Ye look a wee shit-picky, miss,” he said with an accent that seemed a mix of Irish, Canadian, and pirate.
“Is it always so choppy?” Isabelle asked.
“Been weatherin’ lately. She’s got some lops now, but by tomarra mornin’ she’ll be flat-ass calm.”
Sean pointed to all the instruments and Flannigan nodded, giving names to the tachometer, voltmeter, fuel gauge, and barometer. He tapped a black box above his head. “And dars yer radio.”
It was a two-hour ride, fifty miles up the Nova Scotia coast to Liscomb Island, and then straight out to sea. Luke and Monica watched Sebastian clean lobster traps. With the wicked smile of a salty dog, he handed them an old deck of cards adorned with topless women from the 1950s. They laughed, riffling through the deck. Then they got cold and went inside the cabin to play poker.
Flannigan spent the time giving Sean lessons on how to drive a boat. “’Ave a son m’self,” he told Isabelle. “Quiet boy, loike dis fella.”
She asked how often he’d visited George, and he said once a month he’d bring food and a drum of diesel. George would give him a list of books to order and deliver, along with various magazines on botany and scientific equipment.
“Yer fodder ’ad a fondness fer nature, ’e did.”
Isabelle nodded and asked the captain if he delivered supplies to other islands.
Flannigan smiled, pointing to the eastern horizon. He told her of Sable Island, three hundred kilometers out to sea, and how he was the only boater willing to make the trip. The island was home to five people, eight hundred feral horses, fifty thousand seals, and the great white sharks that ate them. But it was famous for its high number of shipwrecks. Over three hundred vessels had fallen victim to the island’s sandbars, thick fogs, and treacherous currents.
Flannigan talked for an hour about storms and shipwrecks. As Isabelle listened, the fog suddenly brightened. Through a veil of white, she squinted at a silhouette in the distance, a dark clamshell that could only be an island. The boat seemed to pick up speed and the engine strained. They were fighting a strong current and the captain shouted over the motor.
“She’s a brutal tide, means we’re gettin’ close. Yer fodder ’ad no one but me to come oyt ’ere. Ye won’t see a single vessel come by fer months.”
Isabelle shifted uneasily.
“Don’t ye worry, miss. Oi ain’t been wrecked once.”
Then the fog lifted and the air became warmer. Seagulls shrieked overhead and the water looked almost black. Sparrow Island lay dark and desolate before them, every detail quickly taking form. The boat glided faster, pulling sideways with the current.
“Thar she is,” Flannigan said with a smile of meeting an old friend.
The island was no more than three miles wide. Isabelle didn’t remember seeing the land from afar and its grim appearance took her by surprise. The woods seemed ominous and ugly, cast in shadows of dark gray. Spikes of conifers and of spindly white trees twisted like skeletons. Tendrils of fog wrapped around their trunks and there was an eerie stillness to the place. She felt a chill on her neck that wasn’t the wind.
The Acadia made a wide loop around the western shore and closed in on a lagoon. The inlet was partly fenced in by a natural jetty, and getting inside wasn’t easy. The current pulled the boat east, where the shoreline rose sharply into thirty-meter cliffs. Waves crashed violently against the rocks below.
The boat shimmied and bounced as the engine sputtered and the captain swore under his breath, struggling to stay on course. As they reached the inlet, the current fought hard and Isabelle stared anxiously at the ominous rocks of the jetty nearly upon them. The waves were picking up speed, growing wild as they headed toward the cliffs.
“’Ang on,” Flannigan warned. Isabelle clutched Sean with one hand, the seat cushion with the other.
At last they broke through the riptide. The engine quieted and the boat scuttled into the lagoon, still rocking. The captain called his steward to take the wheel. Sean and Isabelle followed him to the lower deck. They grasped the railing for support, while the captain seemed balanced and cheery.
“Land ’o!” he shouted, and prepared for docking.
The engine hummed pleasantly and Isabelle felt her heart begin to calm. There were seagulls overhead, tiny sparrows tweeting, and the boat chugged along on tepid waves.
Monica followed Luke out of the cabin and they stood at the rail.
She turned up a lip. “That’s it? Where’s the palm trees? Those look like Christmas trees.”
Luke chuckled. “We’re in the north Atlantic. It’s not tropical. Did you think this was a tropical island?”
“No,” she said quickly. “But I thought it would at least be warm. Not so hideous. Jeez, this is gonna suck.”
Up close it was all wilderness and jagged rocks, and along the shore was a thin strip of black beach.
“That’s not even sand,” Monica said. “
It’s like … dirt.”
“Tar Beach,” Isabelle said. “That’s what my mother called it.”
Luke shook his head. “It’s not tar or dirt. Probably volcanic rock. Fragments of lava, just like Hawaii.”
“This is so not Hawaii.”
“It does seem a bit creepy,” Isabelle said to Flannigan. “Especially those woods.”
“’Eard some bad stories aboyt dem woods.”
“Yes,” she replied. “My father told me many.”
“Yer fodder was a tough old bird. Just loike dis oiland.” Then his grin slipped away. “Ye be sure to stay indoors at noight. Gets cold enough to skin ye.”
The boat pulled up to the dock, where Nicholas Bonacelli was standing in a suit and overcoat. He waved as they pulled into the mooring.
“Eh-yuh, mister lawyer, sir,” Flannigan shouted. “’Oweya gettin’ on?” He jumped ashore with the dock lines and quickly wound them around the cleats.
Everyone grabbed suitcases and backpacks and lined up to depart. Luke was first to hop off the boat.
“Careful, fella, dock is greasy,” Flannigan said, tying up the stern.
They were all finally standing on land and no one was more pleased than Isabelle. The air was cold and damp like she remembered. A constant breeze blew over the island, carrying droplets of salt that coated everything in a layer of white.
She was struck with a feeling of being home as she gazed over the beach, and a flood of memories assaulted her senses: the smell of fish, the ripping sound of wind, the taste of salty air in her mouth. She used to paddle around the shallows, squealing with delight, until a wave hit the back of her head and her body would roll over itself, white foam and sand churning before her eyes, stinging her throat. She’d laugh as the tide dumped her onshore, coughing, sputtering, and running back to the sea for more. When it was warm, she’d lie on a towel and read stacks of books, or catch minnows in the tide pools with her hand, scooping up their slippery bodies as they flailed, and dropping them in a bucket.
Isabelle turned her gaze to the jetty, where she would sit on the cool wet stones and look out to sea, watching for boats that never came, feeling the rush of wind on her cheeks and hearing the roar of the waves that smashed against the cliffs. And all around, towering trees hemmed the beach, sentinels of the island.
Bonacelli reached for Isabelle’s suitcase and started down the gangway. Normally, she would have insisted on carrying her own bag, but the lawyer seemed like the type of gentleman who might be insulted.
Luke watched him, impressed by his chivalry, and picked up Monica’s duffel bag, rocking as he walked with two heavy loads. Instead of being grateful, Monica punched him in the arm and told him not to drag it. The island was a bit warmer and less windy than the boat, but everyone kept their jackets snug as they started down the gangway. Bonacelli told the captain he would be returning, and asked him to wait a couple of hours until his business was complete.
Flannigan smiled at Isabelle. “’Eard yer ’usband’s comin’ to join ye later on. Shall oi pick ’im up den?”
Her cheeks flushed. “It seems he’ll be getting a lift from the Coast Guard.”
Flannigan looked impressed. “Military man, eh?”
“Policeman,” Isabelle said. She gave Flannigan a few dollars for his kindness.
“Aye, God bless yer cotton socks, miss.”
Sean waved to the boat.
Flannigan waved back. “Fair weather to ye, son.”
* * *
The path through the woods was marked with red tags nailed to trees that led straight to the house. It was a twenty-minute hike and Isabelle let Luke and Monica walk ahead. Sean trailed behind his mother, gathering pinecones.
“Stay close,” she told him with an uneasy gaze.
Isabelle and Bonacelli stepped carefully over the littered ground. Neglect had narrowed the path with rotting logs and fallen branches, hanging vines and pricker bushes desperate to scratch. At times the path seemed to disappear completely.
Isabelle couldn’t see the older kids anymore, but heard a bout of laughter and then all was quiet. She hoped they didn’t accidentally veer off course; it was easy to get lost in these woods if you didn’t know the way. Countless times she had walked this trail, but now it seemed unfamiliar. The woods were murkier, gloomier than she remembered. Overhead, a few trees had begun to sprout leaves, but mostly the canopy was a web of naked limbs. White-skinned birch, mangled oaks, and towering pines with paltry needles.
Isabelle felt a twinge of fear, which made her feel foolish. As a child she’d never been afraid of the woods—never afraid of anything—and it was troubling to think how such a brave little girl could have grown so meek. She thought of the stories George had told, silly attempts to scare her. She could almost see their tiny heads hanging from trees, antique faces with knowing expressions, dead eyes rolling back in their sockets.
“Doll Head Woods,” she whispered.
“Pardon?” Bonacelli said.
“The man who lived on the island before my father collected dolls. He would slice off their heads and hang them from tree limbs. George said that when he arrived, he had to cut down hundreds of dangling heads.”
“Grizzly story to tell a child.”
“I wasn’t afraid. The poor man had lost all his money in the stock market and came to the island with his daughter. She was young, maybe five, and she died in some horrible accident right in these woods. Anyway, the man was convinced he was cursed and started hanging doll heads everywhere. People thought he went crazy, but my father said he believed the dolls kept out evil spirits. He hung the heads facing every direction, keeping an eye on the demons. I thought it made perfect sense at the time.”
A second trail cut across their path and they stopped.
“We keep straight, take the one in the middle,” she said.
“Where do the other two lead?” the lawyer asked as they continued walking.
Isabelle recalled that the path to the left was mostly thick woods and difficult to navigate, but the path going right had a lot of steep rocks to climb and a small pond as well.
“My mother called it Ice Pond because it was too cold to swim, and we skated there every winter.”
“There must be lots of places for a child to explore.”
“Not really. It took some imagination to have any fun by myself.” She glanced around at Sean, who was busy examining something on the ground. “George must have been lonely.”
Bonacelli nodded. “For a while he took in students. Poor kids from farms or working the boatyards, strays backpacking through Nova Scotia. He gave them work and a place to live. Some were grateful but most took advantage of his kindness. He finally gave up on civilization.”
They walked in silence, until he said, “Do you want to know what happened?”
She knew he was referring to George’s death and stopped abruptly. “Yes. I do.”
He paused beside her. “Your father jumped off the cliffs at High Peak.”
For a moment, she didn’t say anything. Then she nodded and continued their walk. “Were drugs involved?”
He shrugged. “I’m afraid the body was too decomposed. It was caught among the rocks and in rough water for days until we found him.”
She fell silent again.
“Your father was tormented. Some people are just made that way through no fault of their own. He was a good man, Isabelle.”
“Please don’t make excuses.” She glanced around the woods where George had spent half his life and wondered what kind of demons could have tormented him into such a tragic ending. She stared at the trees, silent witnesses, and whispered, “Perhaps he should have left the heads hanging.”
CHAPTER 5
THE TRAIL ENDED, and the woods opened to a vast clearing of unbroken sky. In the distance, the house stood under yellow sunlight, surrounded by tall fields of ryegrass that blew like waves in the wind.
Right away, Sean ran up the path. Isabelle didn’t try to stop h
im.
From where she stood, the house was lovely. It was a grand two-story farmhouse, made of rustic fieldstone and white clapboard, with pillars and porches, a lot of glass doors and windows, all under a blue slate roof. There was a path of gravel that stretched toward the house, intersecting at the halfway point with another trail, a sweeping uphill climb to the cliffs at High Peak.
Isabelle wasn’t going to think about the cliffs. She stared at the house and felt a flicker of joy that eased the painful news of her father. It was an extremely personal moment coming back to her childhood home and she resisted the urge to run up the path, straining to slow her pace. Bonacelli could sense her eagerness and told her it would be fine if she walked ahead. She did, and was soon well past him.
As she got closer, the house wasn’t quite what she remembered. It was large by anyone’s standards, but Isabelle had thought of her home as a castle. There were significant signs of decay—missing tiles, collapsing roof, splintered window frames, crumbling chimneys—but none of that mattered. It felt good to be home.
Luke and Monica were on the fieldstone patio, squatting by a pit of ash the size of a child’s swimming pool, poking a heap of charred remains with a stick. Isabelle called out to Luke, but he didn’t notice, or at least didn’t respond.
The front of the house had tall, floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out on the fields of rye and the distant woods beyond. There were three sets of glass doors with entrances to the laboratory, kitchen, and library, and in between were small rock gardens where her mother had grown wildflowers and strawberries. Nothing remained but some twisted stems that lay brown and withered in the dirt, but there were a few blossoming weeds, tiny buds of white and yellow.
Isabelle slid open the door to the library and a musty odor struck her senses. She stepped into the dimly lit room. It was enormous with a twenty-foot ceiling, the walls covered in dark cherrywood. In the shadows of the sitting area were overstuffed sofas and chairs upholstered in a worn floral print of burgundy and olive.
Seeders: A Novel Page 4