this would be a good way of . . . well . . . getting me back to England without making too much of a scene. Apparently we can address all the legal matters from a suitable distance.”
“What’s Lowestoft?”
“A little town on the North Sea coast. Not exactly my first choice, but . . . Well, I suppose I’d have some independence at least.” And be away from my parents, she added silently. She swallowed. “They’re forwarding money for my passage. I told them I needed to stay for the end of Margery’s trial.” She let out a dry laugh. “I’m not sure if my being friends with an accused murderer improved their opinion of me any.”
There was a long silence.
“So you’re really leaving.”
She nodded. She couldn’t say any more. It was as if with that letter she had suddenly been reminded that her whole life here up to this point had been a fever dream. She pictured herself back in Mortlake, or in the fake-Tudor house in Lowestoft, her aunt’s polite inquiries as to her sleep, whether she was ready for a little breakfast, whether she might like to take a walk to the municipal park that afternoon. She looked down at her chapped hands, at her broken nails, at the sweater she had worn for fourteen days straight over the other layers, with its tiny fragments of hay and grass seed embedded in the yarn. She looked at her boots, with the scuffs that told of remote mountain trails, of splashing through creek beds or dismounting to make her way up narrow passes in mud, fierce sunshine or endless, endless rain. What would it be like to be that other girl again? The one with polished shoes, stockings and a tame, orderly existence? With nails that had been carefully filed, and a shampoo-and-set twice a week? No longer dismounting to relieve herself behind trees, picking apples to eat as she worked, her nostrils full of woodsmoke and damp earth, but instead exchanging a few polite words with the bus conductor about whether he was sure the 238 stopped outside the railway station.
Fred was watching her. There was something so pained and raw in his expression that she felt hollowed out by it. He hid it, reaching for the ax. “Well, I guess I might as well do the rest of these while I’m here.”
“Margery will need them. When she comes home.”
He nodded, his eyes on the blade. “Yup.”
Alice waited a moment. “I’ll fix you something to eat . . . If you’re still happy to stay.”
He nodded, his eyes still downcast. “That would be good.”
She waited a moment longer, then turned and walked back into Margery’s cabin with the empty glass, and the sound of each whack of the blade splintering the wood behind her made her flinch, as if it were not just the wood being rent in two.
* * *
• • •
The food was terrible, as food cooked without heart often is, but Fred was too kind to comment on it, and Alice had little to say, so the meal passed in an unusual silence, accompanied only by the rhythmic croaks of the crickets and frogs outside. He thanked her for her efforts and lied that it had been delicious, and she took the dirty plates and watched as he stood, straightening stiffly as if the wood chopping had taken more out of him than he’d let on. He hesitated, then walked out onto the stoop, where she could see his shadow through the mesh of the screen door, looking out at the mountainside.
I’m so sorry, Fred, she told him silently. I don’t want to leave you.
She turned back to the plates and began scrubbing furiously, biting back tears.
“Alice?” Fred appeared at the door.
“Mm?”
“Come outside,” he said.
“I have to do the pl—”
“Come. I want to show you something.”
The night was possessed of the thick darkness that comes when clouds swallow the moon and stars whole, and she could only just make him out as he motioned to the swing seat on the porch. They sat a few inches apart, not touching but linked by their thoughts, which, underneath, wound around each other’s like ivy.
“What are we looking at?” she said, trying surreptitiously to wipe her eyes.
“Just wait,” came Fred’s voice, from beside her.
Alice sat in the dark, the seat creaking under their combined weight, her thoughts tumbling as she considered her future. What could she do if she didn’t go home? She had little money, certainly