Jake smiled at the long-ago memory and sent up a silent prayer of gratitude that it was a flat calm day and perfect for fishing. The perpetrators of that crime might be adults now, but they could still cause trouble when they got together and a few beers were added to the mix. He had enough to do today without having to drag Nick out of a fight or prevent his crazy sister from doing midnight parkour along the harbour wall.
He glanced down at his watch and saw with relief that it was only early afternoon. Great. That left him plenty of time to get everything finished. He could do the final checks on his wealthy customers’ boats, make a couple of phone calls to the parts people and, if he felt like it, grab a beer before heading up the hill to Seaspray. With any luck most of the visitors would be watching the tug of war on the beach, leaving the pub relatively quiet. Later on he knew that The Ship Inn would be rammed, visitors squashed together like sardines in a press of Seasalt clothing and Cath Kidston bags while getting merry on Pol Brew Ale. There would be hardly any space between the door and the bar, and any locals would be squeezed out into the small yard at the back to congregate by the beer barrels, where they’d smoke rollups and moan about the emmets. Jake didn’t smoke or have a burning desire to sit in a dank corner by the bins, and he certainly wasn’t going to join in any complaints about the influx of holidaymakers. He knew all the arguments about holiday cottages pricing out the locals and changing the village, and he had his fair share of sympathy with them. Nevertheless, the tourists who flocked to the pretty Cornish fishing village also provided a huge chunk of the Tremaines’ income. To make sure that the marina and Seaspray stayed in the family, Jake would willingly grit his teeth and put up with the crowds, the influx of Boden and the gleaming four-by-fours that invariably got wedged when their drivers chose to believe the satnav over the evidence of their own eyes.
Jake swung his tool case from the truck and steeled himself to carry it through the busy village and down to the harbour. He didn’t usually work on Saturday afternoons. Not in the marina, anyway – although more often than not he was busy mowing the lawns up at Seaspray or fixing something in a holiday cottage. Today, though, his wealthiest customer had just arrived from London and expected his boat to be ready to go.
This particular customer, Ashley Carstairs, was the worst kind of second-homer. He’d arrived in the Bay six months previously and quickly snapped up one of the premier properties, which he was hell-bent on renovating as fast as possible. The Cornish dreckly way of doing things drove Ashley round the twist. As an ex-banker with an annual bonus bigger than most people would earn in a lifetime, he was certainly used to flashing the cash and getting exactly what he wanted – and instantly, too. The pace of life in Cornwall was slower than in London anyway, but Ashley’s tutting and eye-rolling in the village shop as the locals chatted over the till only served to make everyone go even slower. He liked to complain, too, and had even found fault with The Plump Seagull, the much-praised Michelin-starred restaurant run by Jake’s brother Symon. Not only that, but Ashley had committed an unforgivable Polwenna Bay crime when he’d parked his flash car in the private space belonging to Silver Starr, the tasselled, tarot-card-reading owner of the hippy pisky shop Magic Moon. Silver, whose real but far less romantic name was Shirley Potts, had struggled to park her ancient Mini and had ended up leaving it on the harbour slipway, where it was soon marooned by the incoming tide. Ashley had been unrepentant and, to add insult to injury, had done exactly the same a week later. He was lucky, Jake thought wryly, that the only magic thing about Silver was the mushrooms she liked to pick from the cliff tops; it would have been fitting if she’d been able to turn Ashley into a frog. Parking spaces in Polwenna Bay were like gold dust, and using anyone else’s even momentarily put you in the bad books for at least two generations.
As well as upsetting the local New Age brigade and insulting Symon’s culinary prowess, Ashley had snapped up Mariners, one of the prettiest houses in the village, and was now busy pulling it apart – another thing that hadn’t endeared him to the locals. Not that Cashley, as he was known locally, gave a hoot about this. Property developing was his game and Polwenna Bay was the unfortunate spot where he’d decided to play. He might mention childhood holidays in Cornwall but everybody knew there wasn’t a sentimental bone in his body: it was all about making money.
Mariners was a beautiful stone property on the west headland. For sixty years it had stood staunchly through the worst of the winter gales, gazing out at the seascape from its huge ground-floor window. Although it was only accessible by a steep footpath, the inconvenient access was more than compensated for, in Jake’s opinion, by the breathtaking views across the bay and out to sea. At night the lights of the village floated below like those of a fairy grotto, and the Eddystone Lighthouse winked out of the darkness. By day anyone standing in the window felt as though they could stretch their wings and fly over Polwenna, just like the circling gulls that called endlessly overhead. Ashley, however, wasn’t prepared to lug his belongings up to the house. Nor was he willing to use a quad bike and a trailer like everyone else who could only reach their houses by the cliff path. No. Ashley wanted to bulldoze a road in through ancient woodland; he wanted an underground garage for his cars and, just in case he needed it, a helipad too. The house had already been ripped back to the walls but the project was currently halted in its tracks thanks to a fierce campaign orchestrated by a group of villagers, including Jake’s fiery sister, Morwenna.
“Why the bloody hell buy a house he can’t get to and doesn’t like anyway? Why destroy a thousand years of woodland just because he can’t be arsed to walk to his front door?” Morwenna had raged, storming back and forth across Seaspray’s kitchen. Her muddy yard boots had been kicked off by the back door, and stomping across the slate floor in thick Toggi socks didn’t have quite the same impact, but the tossing of her wild red hair and the determined tilt of her chin spoke volumes about her outrage. She looked like an angry Rossetti painting.
“Because he’s a cock?” Nick had offered mildly from his seat at the kitchen table where, feet up amid the debris of unpaid bills, newspapers and mugs, he was simultaneously flicking through Fishing News and texting his latest conquest. Even in a tatty smock and with his long blond hair caught up in a rubber-banded ponytail, Nick attracted women like the cream teas in the harbour tea shop attracted wasps. With his dancing blue eyes, stubbled jaw and glinting pirate-style earring, Nick certainly rocked the young-Brad-Pitt-meets-fisherman look. Female holidaymakers swooned when they caught sight of him mending nets on the quay or holding court in The Ship, a pint in one hand and the other leaning against a beam. Wherever he went, a trail of broken hearts followed. Not that Nick meant to upset anyone. There was just so little time and so many pretty girls; besides, going to sea made a man realise he had to grab life hard and squeeze out every drop (or so Nick said). He made Jake, who often ended up opening the door to hopeful females and making tea while his gran mopped their tears, feel as ancient as the weathered granite below Seaspray’s limewashed walls.
“A cock with money. Crap combination,” Mo had spat, charging to the window and glowering across Polwenna Bay towards Mariners, as though by sheer power of will she could make Ashley Carstairs burst into flames. Actually, Jake wouldn’t have put this past her. When it came to determination, his sister had more than her fair share. In fact, she’d probably elbowed the rest of them out of the way when God was dishing it out. From running her equestrian business, to riding horses over cross-country jumps that gave Jake vertigo just looking at them, to fighting her latest cause, Morwenna was a force of nature. She was constantly challenging Jake about his continued acceptance of Ashley’s flashy fuel-guzzling “penis boat” in the Tremaine marina. She made it very clear that she thought her brother was letting the side down by not giving the village’s arch-enemy his marching orders.
Threading through the ice-cream- and pasty-eating crowds on his way to make sure that the very same floating phallic symbol was fuell
ed and ready for its owner’s arrival, Jake reflected wearily that it was all very well for Morwenna to get on her high horse, both literal and metaphorical, but she wasn’t the one who woke up at three in the morning with a racing heart as thoughts of the family’s precarious finances whirled around and around in her head. Only Jake and his father, Jimmy, knew the true state of the Tremaine family business and the reasons why a family that had once owned so much of the village now teetered on the brink of losing everything. No, thought Jake bleakly as he dodged the local baker in full morris costume and narrowly missed having his eye put out by a stick with bells, Morwenna didn’t have a clue – and he was going to do everything within his power to make sure it stayed that way. Better she thought that he was a spineless coward who just wanted the easy money than that she knew the painful truth. Cashley was indeed a cock but he was a cock who paid their business handsomely. For that, Jake was prepared to grit his teeth and face his sister’s scorn. If he were to try to hang on to what little the family did have left, then every penny counted.
The main road into the village began as a fairly wide thoroughfare with enough room for two vehicles to pass. Today, visitors flowed along it like a human tide. The road meandered past the village hall and the old Methodist chapel, following the path of the River Wenn as it leapt and splashed on the final stretch of its journey from the moors to the sea. Little bridges across the river gave the locals access to their homes; nasturtiums and aubrietia tumbled from window boxes and lobelia foamed from the dry stone walls. Brightly painted signs announced the possibility of bed and breakfast in dwellings with romantic names like Seaways and Rivercott. Jake’s progress was slowed by groups of people stopping abruptly to point out sights that he had taken for granted for years; now, forced to reduce his speed, he found himself looking at the village through their eyes, and in spite of all his worries his heart lifted.
In all his travels around the globe, from working on the sheep station in Australia to a year crewing in the Caribbean, there was nowhere in the world that had matched up to Cornwall. The sharp scoured light, the headspace that being out on the sea gave him, the wide sweep of lemony sand that was the bay, the endless calling of the gulls as they circled overhead... The tug of homesickness he’d felt whenever he’d thought of Polwenna Bay had told Jake that no matter how far he travelled he would always come home. This place held his heart more firmly than any woman ever had – or, rather, more firmly than he would ever allow any woman to do again.
The holidaymakers were pointing excitedly down into the river as a flotilla of yellow plastic ducks bobbed by, chased by the new vicar, a plump apple-cheeked woman in her early thirties. She was brave on two accounts, Jake thought as he watched her huff and puff after them. Taking on Polwenna Bay’s charity duck race was no mean feat. Apart from the logistics involved in selling each numbered bathtub duck for one pound, tipping two hundred of them into the river and then making sure they all floated down to be caught in the harbour, the locals tended to get very competitive about the result. The Tremaine children had loved the duck race – it was always a highlight of the festival – and even now Jake felt an echo of the old excitement as he watched the new vicar splash after the jaunty yellow toys.
The plastic flock would, Jake was certain, be a lot easier to deal with than the human kind, even in a river and with a brisk north-easterly wind sending them scooting downstream. He wasn’t a churchgoer himself (having given up pleading with God many years ago, he now left such things to his gran), but Jake knew how central the vicar’s role was to Polwenna Bay. In true Vicar of Dibley style, the older villagers had been stunned to have a young woman sent to shepherd them. Jake also had a nasty suspicion that pretty St Wenn’s, set on the hillside and enjoying a stunning view over the lichen-crusted rooftops and out to sea, was on borrowed time before the Church of England decided to cash in its asset, once it twigged that you could count the congregation on one hand and still have fingers left over. Only a few weeks ago he’d been walking through the village and up the little lane near the church when he’d bumped into Cashley coming through the lych-gate. Since Cashley was a devoted follower of Mammon, it seemed unlikely he’d popped in to say a prayer or two. Now, as Jake watched the new vicar, looking like a cherub who’d fallen out of heaven and guzzled a few too many pasties, he felt a twinge of concern. Maybe he’d ask Granny Alice to introduce her to Mo? If anyone was up for fighting for the underdog, it was his sister.
With the duck race now gone, the tourists surged forward. Each side of the street was lined with gift shops, cafés and pasty shops all vying for trade, with their doors flung open to entice the new arrivals. Jake had seen all of these shops far more often than he cared to think about. He knew them all as well as he knew the creaking of the boats in the harbour, or the three hidden rocks that lurked just beyond the bay and only inches below the surface in deadly wait for the unaware (Morwenna had been furious when Jake had shown Cashley where these were); he didn’t even need to look to know what was where. Some of the businesses had been here forever – like the toy shop filled with dusty Lego and run by a woman who quite clearly detested children, or the old bakery which sold pasties the size of trawl doors – whereas others were new and changed every other season.
His toolkit was heavy so Jake switched hands, silently cursing the festival for preventing easier parking down at the harbour. He promised himself that once he’d checked Cashley’s boat he would reward himself with a well-deserved hour or two in the pub. To hell with it: he might even throw caution to the wind, take the rest of the day off and actually enjoy the celebrations for once. There was going to be a hog roast on the quay, courtesy of Symon’s restaurant, and later on their younger brother Zak’s band, The Tinners, would be playing in the square. This event was causing quite a stir. The Tinners had a big following in Cornwall, and legions of devoted fans (whom Jake strongly suspected followed the band more for Zak’s rock-star looks than the music) had been arriving all day.
As the street narrowed and the houses edged closer and closer together, Jake was in two minds as to whether or not his brother’s band playing tonight was good news. Zak was undoubtedly talented and apparently on the brink of great things, but to be honest Zak had always been on the brink of great things. Unfortunately, his deck-chair laid-back attitude and tendency to spend more time with the groupies than at rehearsals were proving to be stumbling blocks on his road to fame and fortune. At any rate, Jake doubted that Jon Bon Jovi was shaking in his leather trousers.
The main street was barely one car wide now and it was thronging with people. The jingle of Morris dancers and the piping of folk music drowned out the seagulls and went some way towards smothering the hopeless revving of a Range Rover wedged at the narrowest point, the large no-entry sign having experienced yet another fail. Turning right instead as he headed past the post office and down towards the marina, Jake stepped aside to let two pretty girls pass. All tousled hair crowned with daisy-chain headbands, and sporting tight white vests and tiny denim cut-offs displaying their endless honey-hued legs to full advantage, they dimpled up at him and batted mascara-heavy eyelashes. Jake smiled. Nice to know that at thirty and dressed in his tatty old Levi’s, work boots and a tee-shirt that had seen better days he still had it! No matter what chaos Zak caused tonight, an influx of twenty-something rock chicks with an urge to party could only be a good thing.
Still, Jake was a busy guy these days and at thirty was wise enough to realise that there came a point in every man’s life when chasing holidaymakers was no longer exciting but actually quite sad. He’d been virtually single ever since returning to Polwenna Bay several months earlier – in spite of his grandmother’s best efforts to match make. Jake knew everyone in the village but, as fond as he was of many of the women, there was nobody who made his nerve ends fizz or with whom he had a connection. Was he being unrealistic to want something more? Jake didn’t know; he didn’t let himself dwell on the lurking fear that perhaps that connection, that surety
of knowing someone better than you knew yourself, was a once-in-a-lifetime fluke. If it existed at all, that was. He’d been convinced in it once, but how wrong could a man be? He shook his head, unable to believe that even all these years on there was still a dull ache when he allowed his thoughts to wander in this direction.
I need to get a grip, Jake thought. Coming back to Polwenna Bay had unsettled him, that was all. Every corner he turned and every dark head he glimpsed transported him back to another lifetime. He’d thought that going travelling would be the key to escaping those feelings, but the tug of home had been his ever-present companion even when diving the gin-clear Caribbean Sea or galloping a horse across the outback. Finally he’d given in to his grandmother’s pleas and returned. Just in the nick of time too, as it had turned out. But maybe this hadn’t been a good thing? As much as Jake loved Polwenna Bay, there were far too many memories here.
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