Chapter 31
Chapter 31
By the time the pork came out of the oven and they sat down to eat, Joanna had learned about the wreck of the Belvedere and the week her grandfather had spent on Sable Island, a place that sounded make-believe, like something out of a children’s story. How was it possible that a community had grown on a sand dune, hundreds of miles from the edge of the North American continent? And how in the world had wild horses become the natives?
“I’m in shock,” she said, watching her grandfather open a bottle of wine at the table. “You spent a week with this woman, and you wanted to marry her?”
“Not at that point,” he replied. “When I left, I didn’t expect to ever see her again, which I thought was best.”
“Because you were already married to Nana,” Joanna said.
“Yes, and I was too old for her. It seemed ridiculous to imagine us being together.”
“You weren’t that much older. Twelve years isn’t so bad.”
He shrugged as he popped the cork. “She was only twenty-one, and it was a small community. I didn’t want to cause talk. Times were different then.”
“I understand,” Joanna replied. “But you said Nana was already with another man, so she was the one having the affair. That must have been so difficult for you. Does my mum know?”
Her grandad poured wine for each of them. “Yes. When she turned twenty, she asked me about a man she remembered from her childhood as Uncle George, who spent a lot of time with Nana when I was away during the war. I knew your mum was suspicious about that, and I couldn’t lie to her, so I told her the truth—that her mother needed company because I couldn’t love her the way she needed to be loved. I’m not sure if your mother understood, but she never asked me about it again. Whether or not she confronted Nana, I have no idea. She and I never spoke about that.”
“It sounds like you both swept a lot of things under the carpet,” Joanna said.
“We did.” He sat down. “But our relationship was like that ... we didn’t talk about intimate things. It was very ... superficial.”
Still reeling, Joanna sliced into her pork and swirled it around in the gravy. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Mum never told me about this. It happened so long ago, and it’s not exactly something that needed to be known.” She met her grandfather’s gaze across the table. “But if you intended to marry Emma, you would have had to divorce Nana. Were you prepared to do that?”
Joanna found it difficult to imagine because they’d always seemed so content. She’d never once seen them argue.
“That was my plan,” he replied. “But remember, our marriage wasn’t on solid ground. She was in love with someone else, and I thought she’d be glad to be rid of me.”
“But that’s not what happened,” Joanna said. “Obviously, you changed your mind about marrying Emma, and you forgave Nana, and you reconciled. But how did you work things out? What brought you back together?”
Her grandad reached for his wine. “I didn’t change my mind about Emma. I loved her and I wanted to be with her, but the universe had other plans.”
Joanna set down her fork. “What happened?”
The stark fluorescent light over the table flickered, and Joanna glanced up at it. Suddenly it went out and left them sitting in the dim golden lamplight that spilled into the kitchen from the front hall.
“What was that?” Joanna asked, her heart fluttering in her chest. “Please don’t tell me it’s Nana trying to stop you from spilling the beans. I’ll never get a wink of sleep.”
“It’s that bulb,” he replied irritably. “I need to replace it.”
Joanna glanced toward the front hall again, where the large wedding portrait hung. She felt an odd twinge of gloom and urged herself to return her attention to her grandfather. “You were saying? About the universe having other plans for you?”
“Yes.” He paused a moment to gather his thoughts, then continued at last. “I returned to Sable Island a few years later, and the love was still there, so I promised Emma I’d arrange for a divorce and return in time for Christmas to propose properly. But I wasn’t able to keep that promise.”
“Why not?”
He picked up his wine again, took another sip, and his eyes clouded over. “This is the part that’s difficult to talk about.”
Joanna sensed a heightened reluctance in him, a need to leave the past buried in the forgotten caverns of his heart and mind. “Take your time,” she said.
He nodded and rubbed hard at the back of his neck. “I took my ship to Boston first for a load of cargo destined for Morocco. Then we crossed the Atlantic and ...” He paused and cleared his throat. “Somewhere off the coast of Africa, we struck a mine—one of those floating hazards left over from the war.” He reached for his wineglass again, slid it toward him, but left it on the table, holding it by the stem. “There was an explosion, and I thought we were done for. We radioed for help, but the ship was going down.” He paused for a drawn-out moment, remembering the events of the night, his brows slowly pulling together with a look of both rage and terror. “It was going down fast by the bow. Listing forward. I’ll never forget the sound of the water rushing up the deck, the men shouting and screaming.” He took a quick sip of his wine and gulped it down. “It was a miracle we all made it into the lifeboat, except for the two men who were killed in the blast.”
Joanna covered her lips with her hand. “My God.”
His eyes turned glassy, unseeing, as if he were floating again in the ocean, in darkness. Joanna knew that in his mind, he was not sitting in his warm kitchen with his granddaughter, decades later. He was somewhere else. Reliving it. She waited patiently for him to continue.
“We rowed for at least a week,” he finally said, “and ran out of food and water. By that time, I’d given up. I tried to make my peace with God, but I was so angry with Him for everything—the explosion, the deaths of those men, and for keeping me from getting back to Emma.” His gaze slowly turned toward the window. “I thought about her a lot in that boat when we were adrift. I tried to understand why God refused to let us be together. Why did He hate me so much? Then I thought maybe it was my fault, because I’d abandoned my wife for the honor of serving in the war and I thought nothing of it at the time. I was more devoted to the British navy than I was to my marriage. Maybe this was my penance for that, for being selfish, for putting my career first. I started to think that, in a way, that was a form of infidelity.” He returned his attention to his wine and swirled it around in the glass.
Joanna watched her grandfather with concern as his face reddened, and his eyes darkened with resentment.
“But then one of the younger men spotted land,” he said, “and I found out I still had some fight left in me. I remember thinking that maybe God didn’t hate me after all. As weak as we were, we rowed like hell.”
He finally raised the glass to his lips and sipped what was left of his wine.
“Where did you end up?” Joanna asked.
“On a small island with a good beach for landing,” he replied. “I learned later that it was about four hundred nautical miles from the Canary Islands, due west of the Sahara.” He paused to remember and reflect. “I don’t know why it took so long for anyone to find us after our SOS, but it was months before a young couple in a sailboat came ashore. They were sailing around the world, exploring uninhabited islands. Pure luck for us. Or maybe it was God who decided that I’d served my penance—because I’d certainly spent enough time on my knees, begging forgiveness for everything I ever did wrong and pleading for another chance.”
Joanna’s heart was beating convulsively in her chest. She couldn’t take her eyes off her grandfather, who was staring down at his plate, looking almost catatonic.
“I can’t believe you never told me about this,” she said. “What a terrible experience. Thank God you were rescued.”
“Yes,” he replied, “but not before two more of my men died from infections. And the rest of us were so malnourished it’s a wonder we survived, even after we made it back to England.”
For a while, all Joanna could do was stare at the wedding ring on her grandfather’s hand—the same hand that had gripped an oar on a lifeboat and rowed to save his life and the lives of his crew, probably until his palms were blistered and bloody.
He stared pensively at the floor. Then he looked up again, more alert now, and contemplative. “All my life, I’ve never understood why I’ve been given so many second chances. Whenever I thought I was done for and all hope was lost, a hand would reach down and pull me back from the brink.” He paused and gazed across the table at Joanna, as if she had all the answers.
“Was it God?” he asked. “The same God I’d cursed in the lifeboat? I don’t know. Maybe. Either way, I can’t help but wonder why. Why save me? Why not others who were just as deserving, or even more so?”
He sat back in his chair and rubbed his forehead, while Joanna sought to answer a question that had no concrete answers, only guesses—and most of them required some kind of belief in God or the power of the universe.
“You told me before,” Joanna said, “that the universe had a plan for you. Maybe this was it.” She waved her arm about, gesturing around the kitchen. “The years you spent with Nana, the family you raised. I’m so grateful you’re my grandad because you fed my passion for horses and helped me find my way in life. You’re still helping me now. I’m happy with my career, and I’m a vet because of you . I can’t imagine where I’d be without you in my life.”
Joanna wiped a tear from her cheek and clutched both her grandfather’s hands across the table. “So maybe this was your destiny—to touch the lives of your children and grandchildren in incredible ways. But please tell me, Grandad. Have you been happy? I hate to think that you didn’t live the life you wanted, or that you sacrificed something or felt that you were repaying a debt. Do you ever still dream about what your life might have been like with Emma?”
Her grandfather slowly drew his hands back and shook his head. “Let’s not talk about regrets. I’m an old man. The past is out of my hands, and I can’t change it. But Sable Island will be with me forever, because Emma helped me see the glass as half-full, not half-empty, which served me well all my life. She was like that herself, and it rubbed off on me. I learned to be grateful and appreciate what I had. Which was Nana and our children—your mum and your uncle, Arthur. Later, you and your cousins. It’s been a good life, more than I could have asked for when I was stuck on that island, praying for another chance just to live.”
Joanna sat back and decided that the old adage must be true: with age comes wisdom. Her grandfather was able to look back on his life with a bird’s-eye view. He saw the whole picture—the beginning, the middle, and the end. Everything made sense to him now.
Joanna was twenty-eight and couldn’t possibly imagine what might be next for her now that she’d achieved her career goals. What might the middle of her life look like? Or the end? And how fortunate she was, in that moment, not to be praying for a second chance to live. She was blessed to be alive, in times of peace, not war, with her whole future ahead of her.
But there was still one question that lingered in her mind.
“Can you at least tell me what happened to Emma? After you were rescued, did you ever see her again?”
Her grandfather took a breath and sighed with resignation. “I knew you were going to ask me that.”
“You always said I had a curious mind,” she reminded him teasingly, and he nodded in agreement.
“Fine.” He rose from his chair. “But let’s clear the table first and bring out those cinnamon rolls. Then I’ll tell you what happened.”