Sandcastles

by Luanne Rice

  “Oh, Maeve,” Honor said, sounding happy. “She and my mother were great friends.”

  “What’s this I hear about your daughter marrying a Hubbard’s Pointer?”

  “Peter Drake,” Honor said. “Yes, they’re engaged.”

  “Oh, his parents are here. See? Just past Maeve and Tara.”

  “Oh, yes,” Honor said. “I see them. Well, John and I are undercover tonight, just sneaking in to see the movie. I think we’ll wait to see the Drakes another time.”

  “Have you met them yet, John?” Darby asked.

  “They’ve heard about me, I’m sure,” John said.

  “Well, of course they have,” Suzi said warmly. “We’re so proud to know such a famous artist.”

  Honor threw her friend such a grateful look for the support, and in that instant John saw her vulnerability—and wondered how often she’d had to defend him to other friends and acquaintances.

  Just then the screen brightened; the movie was about to start. Suzi and Darby kissed Honor, smiled their goodbyes at John, and left them to their blanket. As they walked away, John noticed quite a few people along the boardwalk looking in his direction.

  Honor held his hand, pulled him down on the blanket. The pit they’d excavated kept them snug, and their sand backrest hid them from prying eyes.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  “I’m fine,” he said. “Are you?”

  “I’m fine, too,” she said.

  They each smiled; they were both lying and knew it. His heart was racing, and when he glanced over the top of the backrest, at the people Suzi had said were Peter’s parents, he saw them staring at him, talking with several others. He felt as if he were about to be lynched.

  “Honor,” he said. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m very okay,” she said. “And getting better.”

  “This is going to be your life,” he said. “With me. People like that staring and talking. I don’t blame you if you don’t want it. I swear, Honor—I wouldn’t blame you at all.”

  “I told you—I don’t care what people think. That’s never been the problem.” She stood up, brushed sand from her legs. “Come on.”

  “What are you doing?”

  She gave him her hand, hauled him up. Her eyes were blazing as she led him across the beach, toward the boardwalk. John looked up, saw the Milky Way, a filmy swath of white stars across the summer sky. Honor walked directly over to a couple standing under the pavilion.

  “Hi, Millie,” Honor said, smiling politely. “Hello, Ralph. I’d like you to meet my husband, John.”

  He stood straighter at that, my husband. She could have said Regis’s father…

  “How do you do?” John asked. They all shook hands.

  “We’ve heard so much about you,” Millie said, dimpling with unrestrained glee, leaving what they’d heard hanging in the air.

  “Indeed we have,” Ralph said, with the friendly smile of the nineteenth hole. A man who lived the good life, his face was red, his eyes squinty.

  Dead silence as the Drakes let the moment pass, letting it be known that, to them, he was famous for something other than his art. He felt as if he contained the eye of a hurricane, the calm before the storm. Trouble was brewing in his chest, low pressure forming. That old rage he’d felt in Portlaoise Prison was building, building, as he felt himself judged by the parents of a boy he already didn’t like, a boy who thought he had a right to John’s daughter.

  “So,” Ralph said. And in that instant his puffy eyes went from golf-friendly to bull shark. “You were released early.”

  “I was released on time,” John said.

  “I understand from friends at the Dublin bar that Tom Kelly prevailed on a barrister to intervene on your behalf.”

  “Ralph…” Millie said, authoritative.

  “Friends at the Dublin bar…” John said.

  “I made inquiries,” Ralph said. “Your daughter is marrying my son, after all.”

  “All you would have had to do,” Honor said sharply, “was ask me. I’ve not tried to hide anything.”

  “Yet you didn’t know he was on the way home,” Ralph said.

  John felt Honor cringe beside him. He sensed her wanting to defend him, but Ralph’s words were true. Down on the beach, the picture stuttered, hesitated—technical difficulties. Everyone groaned; bunches of kids took the opportunity to run to the ice cream truck for movie treats.

  “I didn’t tell her,” John said. “That’s on me—I know what my family has gone through, and I didn’t want to force anything on them.”

  “Force?” Ralph asked, with a low chuckle. “That seems a specialty of yours.” Shadows wobbled behind him, kids congregating out of nowhere. John narrowed his eyes, couldn’t make out the faces.

  John opened his mouth to reply, but what was the point? He didn’t owe this guy anything—he had seen the contempt in Peter’s eyes already, and now he knew where it came from.

  Peter’s father took a step closer. John felt the energy change—he didn’t see it coming, had no idea what was about to happen. All he knew was that Ralph Drake was in his face, leaning forward, in an almost menacing way.

  “Don’t hurt my father!” Regis shrieked. “Leave him alone!” She came charging out of the shadows, out of control, crying and throwing herself between John and Peter’s father. Ralph Drake ducked back, to get away. Regis wouldn’t let him go; she started flailing, and suddenly Brendan stepped forward, gently guiding her backward.

  Regis dissolved in sobs, hands over her eyes. Everyone around them was silent, in shock.

  “He was hurting my father,” Regis wept. “I had to stop him.”

  “I know,” Brendan said. Regis’s sisters crowded around, trying to get to her.

  John watched, stunned. Regis just stood there, burying her face in her hands, as if by not looking she could block it all out. Her sobs were deep and wrenching, almost inhuman, as if they weren’t even coming from her.

  “Are you all right?” John heard Millie Drake ask her husband. “Did she hurt you?”

  “She scratched me,” Ralph Drake said.

  “Regis, what’s going on?” Peter asked, sounding shell-shocked.

  But Regis just cried, unable to look up or speak or move. John met Brendan’s eyes, gesturing for him to go to Agnes, who stood off to the side, eyes wide with helpless shock. John stepped forward, reaching out to hold his daughter

  “Daddy,” Regis wept. “I had to make him stop…”

  “Stop him?” Millie Drake asked. “From asking a few questions? You attacked Peter’s father!”

  “This is crazy,” Peter said to Regis.

  “I’m sorry,” Regis said, eyes wide now with panic and confusion.

  “You’re acting just like him. That’s what you come from. Why should I be surprised? My parents were just trying to protect you—from him!”

  John heard someone behind him saying that the police were on the way. Agnes and Cece pressed closer to Regis. Her knees went weak, and John tightened his grip to keep her from falling.

  Honor turned on him, all the love and tenderness gone, replaced by a distant, dead look.

  “Don’t,” she said coldly.

  “Honor,” John said, “I have to talk to her.”

  “No,” Honor said. “She’s coming home with me.”

  “You don’t understand,” John said, lowering his voice so no one in the crowd could hear. “It’s important…I have to talk to her right now.”

  “It’s too much!” she said, her voice rising. “No more, John. It’s over.”

  “Honor, you have to listen—”

  She ignored him, supporting Regis as she walked away. She gestured to Brendan, who nodded and ran to the parking lot to start his car. The other girls followed, glancing back at John with confused regret.

  Brendan pulled the car up to the end of the boardwalk, and everyone got in. John walked to the car, looked through the windows at his family.

  “D
rive them home safely, will you?” John asked.

  “I will, sir,” Brendan said.

  And then he left, with everyone John loved in his car, leaving John alone with a crowd of strangers on the beach, everyone watching him, whispering about what had just happened.

  And John was the only one who really knew.

  When they got home to Star of the Sea, Regis went to her room to lie down. The next thing she knew, it was past midnight. She heard Brendan and Agnes talking softly outside. Cece was asleep. Regis could hear music drifting from her mother’s studio.

  The world felt very new. She stared at the ring on her finger as if she had never seen it before. Sitting up in bed, she thought of the scene at Hubbard’s Point, running it through her mind frame by frame as if it were her own tiny, private movie.

  She saw herself standing back with her sisters and Brendan, so happy to see her parents heading along the beach for the movie. And then they had walked up to the boardwalk to meet the Drakes, and Peter’s father had made that snide comment.

  That’s really all it was. Regis had to face the fact. It was rude and insensitive, but not much more than that. Her father could certainly have survived it—maybe even laughed it off eventually.

  But Regis had gone…what had Peter said? Crazy. She had become hysterical, attacking his father. Thinking about it now, she could barely understand what she’d been thinking. But back at Hubbard’s Point, it had felt like life and death and she had charged to her father’s defense.

  Peter had looked at her as if he hated her. His parents, too. But she hadn’t cared. She had a mission, to get between her father and Peter’s, prevent him from being hurt. She’d have done anything to stop it. She ran the little movie over, picturing the way Mr. Drake had leaned forward. Had Regis thought he was going to hit her father? Yes, that must have been it.

  What were the words again? They had burst out of her at the beach. She felt them in her chest now, but once she let them out, she could never take back their meaning again. They had come to her last night; they had been teasing her at the edge of her dreams for all these years.

  She was shaking. When had that started? She climbed out of bed. Her mother was in the studio; she knew she should go see her, reassure her that she was okay, but she couldn’t bring herself to do that. Regis felt as if she were coming out of the haze, waking up from a long coma. Thoughts were flying, and she had to get them straight before she spoke to either of her parents.

  She walked into the kitchen. This was where her family had sat for dinner, all of them, for the first time in six years. She had wanted to believe they could be happy again. She had seen her parents right where they were supposed to be—in their seats at either end of the table.

  She sat down. Don’t hurt my father… Why hadn’t he told anyone? Why had he kept it such a secret? Their whole family had fallen apart because he had kept the truth locked inside. Her hands trembling, she covered her eyes. She wished she could block out the images swirling in her mind.

  Bowing her head, she rested it on the table. She felt so tired—exhausted from six years of blocking out the memories. She saw the corner of a blue envelope sticking out, and pulled at it. Staring, she saw a strange, sort of primitive drawing on the back of the envelope: a squiggly snakelike sea creature rising from the waves. It reminded Regis of the sea monster on Tom Kelly’s family crest ring. She had loved looking at it when she was young.

  The envelope was blue…. It was old, for one thing—maybe not ancient, but many years old, older than Regis, enough to have yellowed slightly around the edges. But the handwriting was as familiar as Regis’s own.

  It was her mother’s, and the name on the envelope was Aunt Bernie’s. She pulled out a single fragile sheet.

  Regis bent over the letter, and began to read.

  Twenty-two

  The next morning dawned hazy and warm, with scraps of fog woven like filmy scarves through the vineyards, caught on grapevines and stone walls. Goldfinches attacked thistles, tearing at the purple tufts, releasing delicate fluff into the wind, the thorny stems and leaves silver-green in the morning light. The fields were alive with songbirds and crickets.

  Sister Bernadette had barely slept the night before. She had had bad dreams and, unable to get back to sleep, had walked the grounds until lauds. Her brother had been up, too—working on the stone circle again. Now, sitting at her desk, she was working on lesson plans when the call came in.

  “It’s Tom Kelly,” Sister Gabrielle said, poking her head into the office. “He needs to see you at the grotto.”

  “Tell him I’ll be there shortly.”

  “He says it’s urgent, Sister…”

  Glaring, then sighing, Bernie laid down her pen and pushed back her chair. She walked briskly down the long hallway. As she passed the house chapel, she glanced in—not that she was keeping track, but she did like to know who was where. Two novices, dressed in white, were kneeling by the altar; one other person was seated in the back, all alone. Honor.

  The sight startled Bernie. She didn’t see Honor in church much these days. She gazed at her sister-in-law, and nearly went in, but Tom had said it was urgent. So Bernie just continued on, out the hall door, and along the path through the fields.

  As she neared the hill’s crest, she looked down toward the beach. The stones John had laid out were glistening in the morning sun. From up here, she could see that the concentric circles were perfectly formed and with a start, she realized that the circles were not separate, but actually connected. Her eyes followed the inroads and backtracks, marveling at the intricacies, at John’s creation of a labyrinth.

  Heading downhill, on the western side of the slope and away from the morning sun, she felt the shade’s coolness. And as she walked into the hollow, through the stone archway into the Blue Grotto, she felt a gentle chill that was welcome this hot day.

  Tom stood with his back to her, staring at the wall. The statue of Mary was to his right; someone had left freshly cut roses at her feet. Bernie took note, thinking she should bring a vase of water later. She stood very still, staring at the back of Tom’s head. If she turned now, she could leave and he wouldn’t know she’d been there.

  “Hello, Bernie,” he said without looking.

  “How did you know it was me?”

  He glanced back, raised an eyebrow. “I always know,” he said.

  “Sister Gabrielle said it was urgent,” she said.

  “We had another visitor,” he said, gesturing at the stone wall. “Or the same one again…”

  Bernie stepped closer to stand beside him. She read the words:

  SET ME AS A SEAL ON YOUR HEART, AS A SEAL ON YOUR ARM;

  FOR AS STERN AS DEATH IS LOVE.

  It had been written on the wall below the first message, chiseled into the stone, though not as deeply. Bernie reached up, touched it with her fingers. She knew very well that the writer had worked hard to etch the letters into the rock.

  “What do you make of it, O Theological One?” Tom asked.

  “It’s from the same source as the first,” Bernie said. “Lines of scripture, from the Song of Songs.”

  “You know them by heart?” Tom asked.

  “I know them,” Bernie said quietly.

  “Old Testament,” Tom said. “Fire and brimstone, right? God throwing lightning bolts, sending plagues of locusts to torment the sinners?”

  “The Song of Songs is a love poem,” Bernie said. She wanted to leave the discussion right there, and not tell him that she had lived in its verses all those years ago. It had been the only reading she could handle at the time, because it was the only thing she’d found that reflected the depth of her love and pain.

  “This doesn’t sound like a love poem to me,” he said. “Sounds like some kind of a warning.”

  Bernie stared at the wall, still touching the letters.

  “You disagree?”

  “I didn’t say that,” she said. “A love poem can also be a warning, and the other way
around. Think about it.”

  His silence made her blush. She could only imagine what was running through his mind. She stared at the wall, at the dark words written there.

  “And a warning can be a love poem,” he said after a long moment. “For Bernadette Sullivan and Thomas Kelly, anyway. Well, there are warning bells going off all over. Did you hear what happened last night?”

  “No,” she said. “What?”

  “I woke up this morning early, got here before sunrise. Found John working on the beach. Turns out he’s building a labyrinth. I told him his stonemason ancestors would probably take their hats off to him—but he wasn’t in the mood to laugh.”

  “Why? What’s wrong?”

  Tom shook his head. “At first he wouldn’t say, but once he saw I wouldn’t leave unless he told me, he started talking. Seems he and Honor went over to watch the beach movie at Hubbard’s Point.” He threw her a look to see if she remembered—of course she did. She kept her expression very calm, her face immobile.

  “I’m glad they went,” she said.

  “The year he and Honor started dating,” Tom said, “we all used to go to beach movies. Remember?”

  “A long time ago,” Bernie said sternly.

  “Here comes the nun’s voice,” he said.

  “That’s because I’m a nun.”

  “As if I could ever forget that,” he said.

  “What happened between John and Honor?” she asked.

  “John said Peter’s father made some comment, and Regis attacked him.”

  “Attacked him?” Bernie asked, shocked.

  “Yes,” Tom said. “John said she was out of control. He’s worried about her. Honor wouldn’t let him talk to her.”

  “What did Honor say?”

  “Well, I guess she blamed John for last night, and everything else,” Tom said. “Worst of all, he blames himself. I didn’t like the look in his eyes.”

  “What are you thinking?” Bernie asked, her gaze falling on the words written in the wall, thinking of Honor sitting alone in the chapel.

  “He wants to talk to Regis and finish his project,” Tom said. “Beyond that, I’m not sure. I think he’s going to take off.”