Chapter Ten
On Monday morning, the sky was still ink-dark as Ivy pulled on her thickest jumper and grabbed her Thermos, which had seen her through countless school trips and residentials, shutting the door to the flat quietly. Brooke had texted her last night, her message as businesslike as she was in person.
Brooke had then mentioned an hourly rate that was nearly double what Ivy was getting paid in the bookshop. That had decided it for her. If a couple of American tourists wanted to pay her to trek around Fox Bay, she wasn’t going to say no.
The drive to the harbour front was peaceful, the town silent.
Ivy rolled down the windows, letting in the sound of the wind whistling over rooftops and the occasional squawk of a gull.
She could smell the sea. The cold stung her cheeks, but it was the good kind of cold, clean and bracing, and she drove slowly, relishing it.
Trip and Brooke were waiting when she reached the shop a few minutes after seven, steam rising from the travel mugs in their hands. A dog barked somewhere in the distance.
Trip waved like they hadn’t seen each other in years. ‘Morning, Ivy!’ He patted his pockets. ‘I brought snacks. Fruit, nuts, chocolate, flapjacks …’
‘Great.’ Ivy hefted the Thermos. ‘I brought caffeine.’
Brooke was dressed in a matching navy hiking set, somehow looking both elegant and functional, hair smooth beneath a hairband. She looked far too pristine for Fox Bay, which was mostly all ancient fleece and lumpy cardigans. ‘You’re late,’ she said severely.
Ivy huffed. ‘It’s four minutes past seven.’ She glanced at Trip. ‘And you’re going to freeze to death up there on the cliffs.’
Trip was wearing a navy Aran jumper but no coat. ‘Then I’ll die doing what I love,’ he declared. ‘Seeing local landmarks. Finally.’
‘Ivy’s right,’ said Brooke, digging in her rucksack and pulling out an expensive-looking black fleece. ‘You’ll be cold. Put this on.’ She turned to Ivy. ‘Right, shall we get this over with?’
‘It’s a scenic walk, not the dentist,’ muttered Ivy, pulling her backpack on. ‘Okay. To the haunted lighthouse.’
They headed out of town, walking along the quay where Old Bill, busying himself by his boat as usual, wearing his sailor’s cap and with his pipe clenched between his teeth, gave them a wave.
‘Off to see the lighthouse, are you?’ he called. ‘Brave of you. You’ve heard the stories, I’ll bet?’
‘Yeah,’ said Brooke, pausing. ‘Something about a lighthouse keeper?’
‘Ah, well since you asked,’ said Old Bill with relish, setting down the rope he’d been winding and leaning against the boat.
‘It’s a sorry tale. Poor Jim Potterill. Lighthouse keeper in 1912.
Fell asleep one night when he should have been manning the lighthouse.
’ Old Bill lowered his voice impressively.
‘And that same night, the moon was hidden by clouds and a boat was wrecked. The crew perished. Unable to bear the guilt, Jim threw himself from the lighthouse down on to the rocks below to join them in their fate.’
‘Yikes,’ murmured Brooke. ‘I did not find anything online about this.’
‘And then ever since, when the moon slips behind the clouds,’ intoned Old Bill, ‘you can see it. A light lit where no light should be, and a ghostly figure walking back and forth, atoning for his carelessness all those years ago.’ There was a pause.
‘Aye. Well, take care. Don’t want to scare yerselves silly up there on the cliffs and join poor Jim.
’ Ivy caught the faint wink he gave her.
‘We’ll be careful,’ said Trip. ‘Ivy’s going to show us the way.’ He frowned. ‘Bill, you said you were going to cut out the pipe.’
‘I’ve cut right back,’ said Old Bill defensively. ‘And aye, no one knows the way to the lighthouse better than Ivy – she’s been walking these paths since she was a nipper. Plenty of other stories I could tell you about this place. Why there’s even a hidden island …’
‘See you later,’ said Ivy, dragging them on towards the Mariner’s Arms. She knew that once Old Bill got started on Fox Bay lore, they would never manage to stop him.
‘Take anything he says with a seriously large pinch of salt,’ she murmured.
‘All those stories and tall tales are just that. Who knows if this Jim chap ever existed? Old Bill doesn’t even go out on his boat much any more.
He just likes playing the part of a wise sea dog. ’
‘Why not?’ said Trip easily. ‘If it makes him happy.’
Ivy thought about that one. She couldn’t think of a single reason, suddenly, why Old Bill shouldn’t potter in his boat at dawn, winding rope, pipe clamped in his teeth, terrifying local tourists with his tales of regretful ghosts and souls lost at sea. Not if it made him happy.
‘Morning,’ called Simi, yawning on the front step of the pub. ‘You’re up early.’
‘Is this your pub?’ Brooke asked, raking her gaze over the Mariner’s Arms. ‘Didn’t you say it was a smuggler’s hideout, Ivy?’
‘That’s right,’ said Simi. ‘A famous smuggling ring used to hole up here. There’s a basement full of old rum casks. The owner planned to get rich by turning the ringleader over to the magistrate but the smugglers got to him first.’ She drew her finger across her throat. ‘Nasty stuff.’
‘Hmm.’ Brooke squinted up at the topmost windows. ‘Do you have rooms up there too? How many?’
‘Just the two,’ said Simi. ‘But I’m thinking of expanding and using the outbuildings now there’s so many tourists. I just have to hook up the Wi-Fi and re-do the bathroom. Why, do you need a break from Wildest Dreams? Josie’s plumbing getting to you?’ She winked. ‘I’ll do you a deal.’
‘Not just now, thanks,’ said Brooke crisply. ‘So, you’d be able to sleep, what – ten here?’
‘I guess,’ said Simi. ‘Why?’
‘No reason,’ said Brooke, turning to go. ‘Well, see you later.’
She hurried on, and Trip followed. Ivy caught Simi’s eye and shrugged. ‘Weird,’ Simi mouthed.
Brooke was weird, Ivy thought. She was approaching their sightseeing as though she were organising a business plan, ticking things off a list. And what was with all the questions? She was the polar opposite of her open, easy-going brother.
At last they reached the start of the cliff path and began the slow climb up, the dark giving way to grey-blue, with streaks of rose and gold that bled across the sky. The sea was a dull mirror at first, then shimmered as the first threads of sunlight touched it.
Old Bill was right. Ivy realised she knew these paths like the back of her hand, her feet unerringly finding the right turnings that were off the main path.
She had been coming here all her life. Her mum used to pack her and baby Liv in the car with flasks of tea and sandwiches, drive to the foot of the cliffs and force them on a walk.
Over the years, Ivy had been less and less willing to come.
She’d wanted only to be curled up with her pad and pencils, drawing everything she could see in her mind’s eye, making the images in her head come to life.
The last time her mum had dragged her up here, the spring before she left for art school, Ivy had grumbled every step of the wet, drizzly way.
This is so boring, she had moaned. Can’t we ever do something different?
Now, though, the walk did feel different.
The salt air, the familiar crunch of the path beneath her boots, the springy grass, the sudden stillness that wrapped around them like a blanket the higher up they got – Ivy knew it from childhood but it also felt like she was experiencing it for the first time.
Maybe because she’d had some distance, she thought.
Or maybe because she was showing it to strangers.
Their breath clouded in the cold. The sky lightened still more, the crimson sun rising.
And then they rounded a corner and, suddenly, they saw it: the lighthouse, standing ahead like a pale ghost from one of Old Bill’s stories against the brightening sky.
And beneath it, the vast expanse of sea.
They stopped, looking up, craning their necks.
‘Well, there it is,’ Ivy said, breaking the silence. ‘The famous Fox Bay lighthouse. You can see why it gets missed by all the tourist websites. From further round the headland you wouldn’t know it was here.’
Trip let out a low whistle. ‘Wow.’
Brooke whipped out her phone and took a series of pictures. ‘Perfect,’ she breathed, then tucked her phone away again. ‘Very cool. This is just the sort of thing I was looking for, Ivy.’
‘It really is cool,’ Ivy murmured. ‘I forget sometimes.’
Trip looked sideways at her, the sunrise casting gold across his face, lighting his rumpled curls like a halo. ‘Sometimes a break from a place isn’t a bad thing,’ he said. ‘You come back, you see it differently.’
Ivy didn’t reply, hugging her Thermos against her chest to keep out the chill.
She wasn’t sure she’d go that far – Fox Bay was still Fox Bay, with all of its frustrations and quirks – but all the same, she was glad they had come up here today.
They stood in silence, letting the wind buffet their cheeks.
Brooke stood slightly apart, looking out at the sea and rocks below. As Ivy watched, Trip walked over to his sister and threw an arm round her shoulders.
‘She would’ve loved this,’ she heard Trip murmur. ‘Wouldn’t she? A dawn trip to a haunted lighthouse?’
Brooke let out a small laugh and Ivy caught her words, muffled by the wind. ‘She would have made us wake up way earlier than this. 7 a.m. is for layabouts.’
‘She would’ve brought that ratty old tartan blanket and at least three Thermoses,’ Trip added. ‘And cake. You can’t have an adventure without snacks.’
‘It would have been character-building.’
The siblings laughed softly. Ivy watched them from the corner of her eye, wondering who they were talking about, but not wanting to interrupt.
She knew it was time to head back, get some decent coffee and open up the shop.
But she was in no hurry to leave, not when the brother and sister were having a moment.