Mr Todd took his craft to a point where they could turn about and watch.
The fire caught slowly at first, seeming at times reluctant to do its job, until at last a tongue of flame found the trail of petrol that had been laid along the deck, and seconds later the Light Heart was ablaze on the roughening sea.
As she watched from the safety of the tug, it seemed to Judy that she could hear Meggie’s exultant voice from all those years before – ‘That’s what I want – a Viking’s funeral’ – and she could hear her laugh, that wonderful laugh. ‘See to it, won’t you?’ How had Meggie known that Judy would?
In this way, Judy missed hearing the first few notes as Waldo began to sing the Ave Maria and the little flotilla retreated back to Bexham leaving behind one of its heroines.
Epilogue
Loopy laid out two Martini glasses and the cocktail jug then stood back from the table to make sure she had everything set, after which she looked at the clock and saw that not only was he late, which was so unlike him, but he was later than ever.
It was now five months since Meggie had died and Waldo had disappeared from all their lives to try to find somewhere to begin to recover from his grief. Now he was back in Bexham, and as soon as she had heard the good news Loopy had sent a note round to Cucklington House to invite him for cocktails.
‘Loopy.’ He arrived at the French windows, unannounced. ‘I hope I have not startled you. I rang the doorbell for hours but it appears Gwen must have gone deafer than ever.’
‘Waldo,’ Loopy said, with unconcealed delight. ‘I can’t tell you how good it is to see you. Come in. Come in at once.’
He came into her drawing room trying his best, she felt sure, to look like the Waldo Astley of old, but unsurprisingly what he had been through had left its mark – not visibly so much as internally, so that he now wore the look of a man who has been through so much grieving he had little emotion left to spend. Of course he was as handsome as ever, sun-tanned, leaner than before and immaculately dressed as always, yet to Loopy he seemed to be someone to whom every new port had only spelt distraction, and every departure relief.
He had left them without notice but not without thought. Like everyone else Loopy knew of his continued generosity, of how he had given over his share of the garage business to Peter and Rusty and their family, how he had bought the freehold of the Three Tuns and gifted it to Richards in Meggie’s memory, how Mickey Todd had been commissioned to build a new yacht for Waldo, inevitably named the Light Heart II, and how the people at the post office had been anonymously bought an allotment.
She had also heard the rumours that as soon as the housing shortage was over there were plans for the almshouses to be rebuilt for the old and the infirm, that someone had sent an anonymous donation to the cottage hospital which would keep it running for many years to come, and that the village hall was to be rebuilt and renamed the Gore-Stewart Memorial Hall. She was also well aware of the sarcasm that this generosity had bred in certain quarters, and of the fact that Waldo’s nickname in the village was Mr Bountiful, or at other times The Great Provider, which Waldo, also knowing, joked about sometimes in his letters to her. What Loopy did not know, however, was why Waldo had felt compelled to do as he had done.
‘That’s easy,’ he said. ‘At least it is now that I’ve had time to think about it. You know I had this kind of pilgrimage I felt I had to make, to try to sort out the mystery of my father’s famous photographs, but what happened instead was that I fell in love, something I thought I wasn’t capable of doing. First I fell in love with Bexham, and then with Meggie – and that was what counted.’
‘But before that – before you fell in love with Meggie – you started helping people long before that.’
‘As I said, I was in love with Bexham. I also reckoned you all needed a bit of cheering up – everyone was so got down, so depressed. In fact you all appeared to be feeling exactly like I’d felt when I left America, and so I thought this won’t do. And when I started doing this and that, here and there – you know, for the first time in my life I felt I had a purpose. Instead of being some little rich kid, I felt needed.’
‘Of course you are,’ Loopy assured him. ‘Believe you me, Bexham’s not been the same without you. How long will you be here for?’
‘I’ve come back to stay – to live, I’m not sure for how long till I see what the natives make of me. I’m not sure I’m going to go on working for Hugh. I think maybe I’ve had enough of secret agents – and people taking pot shots at me.’
‘There was a rumour that you weren’t well.’
‘I wasn’t. I had a bullet in my lung after that fracas in Berlin, and they couldn’t take it out until the infection had completely died down. Took a while. But Henry – Henry Wright who looked after Meggie? He managed to extract it three weeks ago, and I’m right as rain now.’
‘So if you don’t do any more work for Hugh—?’
‘I shall probably just retire and – as Pascal said – cultivate my garden.’
‘Which garden?’
‘Cucklington.’
‘Meggie’d like that.’
‘That’s why I want to do it, Loopy.’
‘What was it actually, Waldo? If you don’t mind me asking? Everyone said it was her heart—’
‘Everyone is right then.’ Waldo finished his Martini and placed the cocktail glass on the table next to him. ‘Henry couldn’t say what caused it or when – whether it was as a result of two bad doses of influenza, or whether it was the strain of the war, or just a separate infection altogether. It was degenerative, that was all. After Henry had x-rayed her he knew at once. He cabled me in New York, telling me it was only a matter of time. There was nothing anyone could do. Except make it as painless as possible. He couldn’t say for sure when it would happen. Just that it would. And that it might happen soon.’
‘We all miss her so dreadfully.’
‘I shall never stop missing her.’ Waldo paused. ‘The good thing is that because of her, because of you all really, whenever I drive into Bexham I get this coming home feeling. When I walk through the front door at Cucklington – I can feel her there. I can feel her waiting for me. I can feel her knowing that I’ve come home.’
‘She’ll always be with you at Cucklington, Waldo,’ Loopy said, picking up Beanie as Waldo got to his feet. ‘And so too – please God – will you.’
Loopy walked with him to her front door, where with Beanie still under her arm she kissed him on the cheek.
‘I’m so glad to see you’re back, Waldo.’
‘So am I.’
‘We’re always here,’ she called after him, stroking her little dog’s head as she watched Waldo ambling down the drive, past the neat flowers in the borders and the small square of green lawn until he reached the road that led back to the village. A tall, elegant, lonely figure, walking back to embrace his memories.
THE END
To be continued in The Moon at Midnight
Charlotte Bingham would like to invite you to visit
her website at www.charlottebingham.com
The Wind Off the Sea Page 41