Chapter 34
Strolling past the old chain ferry, Tilly watched as it clanked up the slipway.
Stopping for a bit, she looked down the estuary at the lovely hazy blue, not quite able to believe that a few days previously the sky had been an angry purple-blue, the rain had taken on a life of its own, and the wind had felt possessed.
The opposite looked back at her. The water looked like a mill pond, and the sky was such a lovely colour that there was hardly any definition between top and bottom on the horizon.
But it was the light of the place that got you.
Tilly had been to quite a few far-flung parts of the planet, and she'd not seen anything like it.
It sort of draped down from above on the inhabitants of Darling. Telling them they were home.
Peering down to her left, she could see a line of houses popping up into the hazy blue, one of which she'd worked out was Lucie's.
Five or so minutes later, she'd made her way past the comings and goings of the ferry and was standing on the pavement with raised eyebrows looking at The Coastguard's House. How the other half lived, eh? The garden was a picture in itself. Lush green lawn, old roses by the bucketload, a lovely white swing hanging from a tree, a willow tucked over by a picket fence. Tilly couldn’t believe how picturesque everything in the garden appeared.
And there she was, pleased with three pots of herbs on her windowsill and the fact that she'd watered them.
In fact, the whole building and road were lovely.
Was she, in fact, about to enter a whole different world?
Going up the path, Tilly looked around for a doorbell but was only greeted by an old ship's bell to the right of the door. Just as she was about to yank the rope, the door opened. Lucie smiled and ushered her in.
'Hey! So glad you could make it. You found it okay?'
As if Tilly could miss the huge old white house with the flags on the top. 'I did. It's absolutely gorgeous. Thanks for inviting me.'
Lucie rolled her eyes. 'It was not like this when I moved in. Come through. Oh gosh, love your dress. Where's that from?'
Tilly felt rather pleased that her dress had made an impression. 'Actually, I got it on my travels. It was from a market in India.'
'Fancy! Ooh, the fabric is divine. Just right for the weather too.'
Tilly held up her gilet and chuckled. 'Thanks. I came prepared with this, though. We are in England after all, and I have a vest on.'
Lucie gestured for Tilly to follow her. Tilly trailed through a gorgeous hallway and tried to absorb as much as possible: stripped and bleached floorboards, a paisley runner on the floor, a huge old dresser on the left, a staircase presumably up to glorious bedrooms. A long way from the basic little flat she'd found herself in.
The kitchen alone was fabulous. Lucie gestured around.
'This is my friend Jane, she lives on Darling too, Shelly, you've met on the tram, Tally, she's staying with me at the moment and my friend Anais. '
Tilly looked around, said hello and sat down next to Shelly. 'What a lovely house this is.'
Shelly nodded. 'I know, right? How are you getting on at the Boat Shed?'
Tilly nodded and smiled. 'Okay, yes, errm, there's a lot of hard work to be getting on with.'
'Nice part of Darling. Not too far from the tram but very quiet. You can't really go wrong over that way.'
Tilly shook her head. 'Nope, I guess not.'
'How did you fare in the storm? Held up well, did it?'
'Held up fine in the end.'
Shelly nodded knowingly as if she could read between Tilly’s words.
‘Your first Darling storm's always the worst, my lover.
You'll not bat an eyelid at the next one.
The Boat Shed's seen a hundred of them, and it's still standing, which is more than you can say for half the new builds on the mainland.
' She took a sip and tilted her head. 'And you're right down by the oyster beds there. The Carrington beds.'
'I am.' Tilly felt a little ripple of something at the mention of the oyster beds, or more aptly, their owner. She kept her voice very light and very casual, the picture of a woman with no interest in the subject whatsoever. 'I've actually met the chap who runs them. Otto, is it?'
Something flickered across Shelly's face, a small, soft sort of knowing thing. Tilly clocked it instantly. 'Right you are. You've met him, have you?'
Tilly thought about the mud and the swing episode and decided not to elaborate on the specifics of her escapades.
Although most probably the whole of Darling had heard about her antics anyway.
She also omitted the fact that Otto had asked her to The Darling Arms, although knowing Darling people already knew anyway.
'A couple of times. Let's just say he wasn't falling over himself to be friendly.
He read me the riot act about leaving a gate open and then again about wandering into his precious mudflats.
I got the distinct impression he'd rather I'd never set foot on the island at all.
' Tilly had meant for her words to come out lightly, but they hadn’t.
Her little throwaway dig, which she'd half expected to be met with a chuckle and that Otto was a miserable so-and-so and good luck to her, did not happen.
Instead, there was the small pause where no one said anything.
Shelly coughed. 'He keeps himself to himself, does Otto. He has for the last few years. Don't take it personally. He's like that with everyone, not just you.'
Tilly could not resist doing some digging for information, just as The Properlies had instructed.
Again, she attempted to sound breezy and casual, but it came out on the bitchy side.
'He seemed perfectly capable of stringing a sentence together when he was telling me off.
I assumed it was just me he'd taken against.'
Lucie had drifted over, topping up glasses. Lowering herself onto the arm of the sofa beside Shelly, she joined in. 'Otto? Oh, it's not you. It's really not, honestly.' She glanced at Shelly and made a face. 'When I first came to Darling, he was different.'
Shelly nodded. 'He had a lovely way about him back then. Always the first down the slipway when anyone needed a hand.'
Tilly looked from one to the other and felt the whole feel of the conversation shift.
Suddenly, she had the very uncomfortable sense that she'd been merrily slagging off a man without the faintest idea about him or what she was talking about.
'Sorry, did something happen to him to, well, to make him, umm, grumpy? '
'He lost his wife a good few years back. She was Irish. She'd gone over to see her family, somewhere out west, and she was, well, there was an accident.’
‘Oh, dear.’ Tilly felt her eyes go wide.
Shelly continued. ‘It was a hit-and-run; they never found who did it. She was killed outright. Shocking state of affairs. Absolutely awful.'
‘What? That’s terrible!’
'She was a smashing girl. They lived on the mainland then because of her work, and she needed to be near the fast train.
To be honest, none of us really saw much of them then.
After that, Otto came back here, and he just closed up and threw himself at the business and didn't come up for air. Yeah, it’s been like that for years now. You forget how quickly time passes.'
Tilly thought about how brusque Otto had been with her.
Now, she felt like an idiot. All her little remarks about the language and the dog off the lead and how she might ask him the same thing actually played back in her head in a mortifying new light.
'I had no idea! God. I feel dreadful. I gave him both barrels about his dog. '
Shelly patted Tilly’s knee. 'You weren't to know, and nobody expects you to.
Between you and me, a bit of attitude might do him the world of good, if you want my opinion.
Half the island's so busy treading on eggshells around him that they've forgotten how to talk to him like a normal person at all.
He can be a moody, rude so-and-so if you ask me. '
Lucie nodded and made a face at Shelly. 'You’ve got a point, you know. An attitude might be exactly what he needs. Somebody who doesn't know to be careful.'
Tilly gulped her drink and decided that when she got home, a little deep dive on Google was due. She’d be finding out a little bit more about Otto Carrington. That she knew for free.