Chapter 24
‘There is nothing to do on Susak,’ Rocco said a few minutes later, ‘and they are proud of that. It’s why it is such a nice place to visit.
It is gentle. Carefree. We are all too busy these days, too noisy, too worried about silly things.
People come here to de-stress and think.
It is like medicine for the soul. A man can breathe here and—’
We never did find out what else a man could do on Susak, because at that moment Anjelica came into the dining room with a tray of fried eggs and crashed it down on the table next to him.
She then fixed him for a moment with a fierce look that would have felled a lesser man and stalked out again, muttering.
‘She’s awfully tense,’ Evelyn said thoughtfully. ‘Something tells me the other replacement crew member didn’t turn up and she is still working in the kitchens.’
‘No wonder all her songs are so miserable,’ Marjorie said. ‘Perhaps she was hoping Jolene would actually take her man the other night?’
* * *
Susak was without doubt one of the loveliest places I had even seen.
Rocco was right. There was an air of peace and calm about it that I’d never really experienced anywhere else.
There were only a few people around, just a couple of families on the beach, a café where the proprietor stood polishing glasses while watching the sea and us streaming off the Atalanta to spoil the tranquillity.
It seemed almost like stepping back in time.
The streets were narrow and well maintained, and there were decorative stone mosaics in the walls, not just house numbers. And everywhere was so quiet.
‘New Jersey must have been a bit of a shock to people after living here,’ Harriet said.
We were sitting on a stone bench with a lovely view of the bay. The weather was perfect, warm and sunny.
‘A lot of them come back in the summer, and then the place fills up. A lot of these houses that look deserted are their holiday homes, and I expect they are glorious inside,’ Evelyn said.
‘This is a nice beach,’ I said, ‘and by the looks of it, very shallow. Those children are a long way out and only up to their knees in the water.’
‘Perhaps Rocco was right. It’s a place to really relax. I can feel it, can’t you?’ Marjorie added.
‘A bit too quiet for me,’ Anna said. ‘What on earth would Rupert and I do if we came here?’
‘Talk to each other?’ I suggested.
‘Maybe. Once he had finished his book of sudoku.’ Anna looked thoughtful for a moment and then rather sad.
‘Rupert and I don’t talk much actually, not these days.
It’s more an exchange of requests. What’s for lunch?
Where are my clean socks? Will you push the recycling bin out?
And we used to talk all the time, about everything.
I can remember in the early days sitting up late into the night with him discussing things.
Politics and where to go on holiday and bucket list things. We don’t do that any more.’
‘Why not?’ Harriet asked.
Anna shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. Perhaps he doesn’t want to know what I think.
I suppose we just got out of the habit. And he can be so exasperating sometimes.
He had some new secateurs for his birthday in April and he went out terribly excited and pruned all the buds off the roses.
And then he collected up all the clippings with the wheelbarrow and left it on the patio for days, so it filled up with rainwater.
And when I ask him to do something about it, he looked around in astonishment as though it was nothing to do with him.
And he was totally confused in June when there weren’t many actual roses. ’
‘That does sound annoying,’ I said. ‘Fred never changed the loo roll, he just used to balance the new one on top of the old one.’
Everyone laughed in sympathy, with the knowing looks of women who understood exactly what I was saying.
‘Don must be very hard to live with,’ Evelyn said.
‘Last night when we were playing bridge he kept saying ‘I speak as I find’, and when Craig was making a dog’s dinner out of the bidding, he got very annoyed and said ‘it’s the principle of the thing’.
Which is a phrase that always annoys me.
Belinda wasn’t talking to him. She was knocking back the rosé like there was no tomorrow.
She told me afterwards they’d had a row because Don didn’t like the dress she was wearing as it was a bit low cut, and she said well, it didn’t stop him gazing down other women’s cleavages. ’
‘Mine for one,’ Anna said. ‘Rupert’s going to love it when I wear that blue dress to the golf club extravaganza. That’s one thing about him; he doesn’t have a jealous bone in his body. In fact, he loves it when I’m noticed. Silly old thing.’
She sounded quite wistful for a moment, then took out her mobile and sent a text.
‘There,’ she said, ‘I’ve sent him a soppy message. And lots of kisses. He’ll like that.’
We decided we needed coffee and yet more ice cream, so we walked around the bay a little way to a deserted café with tables set out under an awning.
Service was polite but slow and they didn’t have any ice cream, but somehow it didn’t matter.
Maybe this was the charm of the place, taking life slowly and pleasantly, not constantly rushing around being irritated.
It didn’t hurt that there was no traffic either, just a boy on an electric scooter buzzing about and a man with a tiny truck and a trailer delivering bread.
Anna’s mobile buzzed with a message and she chuckled as she read it.
‘It’s a reply from Rupert,’ she said, blushing and looking very pleased. ‘It seems as though he’s missing me too.’
‘I wonder how much houses cost here,’ Harriet said at last. ‘I’m going to google it when I get back on the ship. I could see myself living here and being happy. I can feel my blood pressure dropping to normal levels the longer we sit here.’
‘I bet they cost far more than you think, if descendants from Hoboken come back here on a regular basis,’ Marjorie said, ‘but how do people move things like washing machines and fridges without removal vans? How can anyone move house? The last time I moved, I had two pantechnicons outside my house.’
‘Perhaps you just don’t need so much stuff here?’ I suggested.
‘No, that’s probably true.’
‘Anyway, it’s time we got back to the ship,’ Evelyn said, ‘and off to – where is it?’
‘Mali something,’ Harriet said, coming out of her little daydream. ‘Yes, I suppose we should. I’d still like to know how much a house costs here.’
As we walked back I too wondered what it would be like to live here. Would it be the tranquil, easy life Harriet imagined, or would it feel too limited after a while? I didn’t need seclusion; I just needed to be happy. And I could do that anywhere if I let myself.
* * *
Mali Lo?inj was about an hour’s sailing and on the journey, we had another buffet lunch plus a tureen of pale-green soup which no one could identify.
When we arrived that afternoon, the town was like a little jewel in a perfect setting, with more pastel-painted houses clustered around the harbour. More cafés, more little boats moored in the harbour and more people of course.
‘The Island of Vitality, they call it, because of the healthy food and the clean air’ – Evelyn took a deep breath – ‘and it almost smells of herbs here. Quite astonishing.’
‘Look how clear the water is,’ Harriet said, leaning over the side of the ship, ‘it looks like glass.’
We all peered over the edge, and shoals of little fish swarmed around the side.
‘Perhaps I will bring them a few crumbs when we go out later,’ Marjorie said, ‘as I didn’t think to bring a tub of fish food.’
Harriet, Anna and I went down the gangway once the crew had secured it and out into the harbourside.
There were souvenir shops with the usual displays of T-shirts and magnets, a little supermarket discreetly hidden behind covered windows, and the most beautiful delicatessens and wine shops selling local liqueurs and delicacies.
There were flag poles proudly flying the Croatian flag, and a seemingly endless line of cafés and wine bars interspersed with palm trees spreading their leaves out into the sun.
A beautiful fountain surrounded by flowers.
Then on the other side of the harbour some old, wooden tall-masted ships. It was idyllic.
‘I could live here,’ Harriet said at last. ‘Walking around is better than a shed load of medication.’
‘I thought you wanted to live on Susak?’ I said.
‘Either would do, I don’t mind,’ Harriet replied.
‘I’m beginning to realise not all countries are the same after all.
People here smoke more but they don’t chuck their fag ends on the floor, and there are teenagers but they don’t drop their gum or scribble all over the walls.
And they have the best ice cream. Come on, let’s take a breather. My treat.’
We chose a gelateria and sat on comfortable chairs under a broad canopy and picked our flavours.
‘Shouldn’t we be looking in churches and museums?’ Anna said. ‘Not just dropping in to cafés all the time. We can do this at home, after all.’
‘Hardly the same,’ I said with a happy sigh. ‘I wonder where everyone else is?’
‘You mean Jack?’ Anna said. ‘Missing him, are you?’
‘It was just you made me think, about talking to Rupert. Realising how easy it is to stop talking properly to anyone. To have discussions and even arguments and still be friends. To disagree with someone and not have one of you go off in a sulk. That must be nice, I would like that.’
‘And you have that with Jack?’ Harriet said, a spoonful of strawberry ice cream halfway to her mouth.
‘Yes, I suppose I could. But then it’s easy for him to talk to me like that for a few days, on holiday, in the sunshine. What happens when one isn’t on holiday, and it’s raining and the car needs servicing? Would he be like that then?’
‘Only one way to find out. And anyway, he is working too, I assume that’s what he is doing now,’ Anna said, finishing up her double dark chocolate sorbet.
‘Perhaps you should go and knock on his cabin door when we get back? And slink in wearing your new caftan. You could twirl the tassels in a suggestive manner.’
‘Oh, Anna!’
* * *
We went to the museum, to see their one exhibit, the Apoxiomenos, which focussed on one bronze statue raised and restored from the seabed relatively recently. The whole place was very impressive and the statue absolutely beautiful.
Anna read out the brochure. ‘Discovered in 1997. An athlete of perfect physical proportions, impressive in its wholeness and beauty of composition. It dates to the second or first century BC.’
‘Reminds me of someone,’ Marjorie said thoughtfully as we peered up at the statue.
‘Now who did I know with a physique like that? Ah yes, Gregory someone, Gregory Bennet. He used to play in the village league years ago; he was a cricketer. They have very muscular bottoms. Cricketer’s rump, my mother used to call it. ’
‘Marjorie, really.’ Evelyn chuckled.
‘Don’t be such a prude, it’s true. Cricketers and ice skaters. You take a look when you get the chance, you’ll see I’m right. Buttocks of steel.’
Evelyn and Marjorie decided that they wanted to have a leisurely stroll along the sea front and the three of us went off to walk through the town, and on to what looked like a bike trail which brought us out to a little beach with little more than some stone seats.
‘I could live here,’ Harriet said after a while.
I tutted. ‘That’s the third time you’ve said that. You said the same thing in Susak and Cres. Do make up your mind.’
‘Well, I could, you know,’ Harriet said.
‘I’ve watched those house finder programmes on TV and occasionally the couple are looking for a house in Croatia.
And I’ve always thought, why on earth would you want to move there?
Well, now I understand. It’s unspoiled, gorgeous and the people are friendly.
And the food is good. As long as you like fish, which I do.
You were right about the cost of some of those holiday houses though, I was quite shocked, but there are other places which aren’t quite so high end where I could pick up an absolute bargain.
And they often come complete with all the furniture. ’
‘That’s because it probably costs a fortune to move anything anywhere. Remember what you said in Susak. I can just imagine you moving all your books into your new house with a wheelbarrow,’ Anna said.
‘I’m going to look into it when I get home, I don’t care what you say,’ Harriet said.
‘But what would you do here?’ I asked.
‘Paint? Write? Just be,’ Harriet said. ‘I haven’t done any of those things for years, and I got a grade one at Art O level. Miss Lowther said I was one of the best students she’d ever had.’
‘It’s not a lot to build a life on,’ Anna said. ‘Something that Lanky Lowther said fifty something years ago.’
‘All right then, I could teach English; I know a lot about that. Better than being at home, hoovering, cleaning and wondering if the girls are okay. And they could come out and visit me here. They would love it. They are all in favour of these simple places, and low carbon what not.’
‘What about health care?’ I said. ‘None of us are getting any younger.’
‘I’d get insurance. And now my knee is getting so much better… Anyway, stop being so negative, it’s just an idea.’
‘We’d miss you,’ I said.
‘You could come and visit me too, you know,’ Harriet said.
‘Stop encouraging her, it’s a daft plan,’ Anna said.
Harriet kicked at some pebbles by her feet. ‘Not as daft as spending the rest of my life never doing anything exciting or interesting. Which is all that lies ahead of me at the moment.’
‘Come on, blooming Marco Polo, we’d better get back into town before it gets dark,’ I said.
‘And the crime rate here is lower. I checked,’ she said defiantly.
‘We are off for two days in Rab tomorrow morning,’ Anna said. ‘I expect you will want to go and live there next.’
‘I probably will,’ Harriet said, lifting her chin, ‘and if I do you can come and visit me there instead.’
I pulled out my phone, feeling it rattling in my pocket with another message.
Ben
Jenna says her father needs another cat on his farm, and he wants to give Mrs Fluffy a home.
Jenna wants to adopt Buster and Darth. Would you like to keep Buzz?
He’s very sweet and playful. He especially likes smoked salmon which we brought home for him, leftovers after we had dinner last night.
He probably wouldn’t expect it every day *smiley face emoji*.
Me
I suppose I could. By the way I’m sure there is a tin of beluga caviar in the cupboard if he gets peckish.