Chapter 20

ADA

The phone rings, and I open my eyes. “Hello?”

“Ada, it’s Joanie. I have news.”

I rub my eyes as my surroundings come into focus. “Sorry,” I say. “I must have dozed off.” For a moment I’m confused. What is she talking about? And then I remember the articles I read about Penny Wentworth’s disappearance before falling asleep.

“Penny Wentworth,” she says. “She disappeared from her houseboat on Lake Union on July 29, 1959.”

I sit up and stretch my arms. “I know,” I say. “I found the date in an article online.”

“Seems like they suspected the husband, Dexter, first,” Joanie adds. “The police interrogated him. I found the transcripts. From what I can tell it ruined him. He stopped painting. Left the lake. In the end, they closed the case, saying Penny likely drowned in Lake Union. But they never did find a body.

“A producer from Unsolved Mysteries actually inquired about this case,” she continues. “I found a note in the file online. So I put a call in to the show, because I know a guy who works there. Interestingly, it looks like the estate of Penny Wentworth declined to be interviewed or to cooperate.”

“The husband?”

“Yes, Dexter Wentworth.”

“Either he’s the shy type or—”

“The guilty type,” she says. “But the husband wasn’t the only suspect. There was some character named Collin McCleary. It says here that he was wanted for questioning but the cops could never find him.”

My eyes widen. Jim mentioned someone named Collin. But who was he? “Joanie, what if she didn’t die? What if she just left?”

“I suppose it’s a possibility,” she says. “She didn’t have children, did she?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“So there wouldn’t be anyone holding her back if she did want to leave. It’s not clear what happened, but I’ve worked for the police department long enough to know that this story has a strange vibe to it.”

I nod. “You might be right. I just keep hoping that she’s out there somewhere, living the life she always dreamed of with the man she loves.” I pause for a moment. “Did you find an address for Collin?”

I can hear Joanie typing before she responds. “Well,” she finally says. “Looks like there is one. He used to live at 2203 Fairview Avenue Number 9, in Seattle. Do you know where that is?”

My heart beats wildly as I walk to the window. “Yes,” I say, my gaze locked on Alex’s houseboat. “I’m looking right at it.”

I venture out to the dock before dinner and see Jim ahead. He’s holding a hose and spraying down the dock after a morning visit from a gaggle of Canadian geese. I wave to him.

“City folks have pigeons,” he says. “Houseboaters have geese.” He kneels down to turn off the water spigot.

I smile to myself.

“Well,” he says, looking up at the clear sky. “Nice day. I was thinking of taking the boat out. Would you like to join me?”

I’ve been admiring the Catalina since I arrived. “I’d love to,” I say quickly.

He tosses me a life vest, and we walk toward the end of the dock. The old sailboat is worn, but well kept and regal-looking, like a seventy-five-year-old woman whose beauty shines through her wrinkles. Jim climbs aboard, and I follow, taking a seat on an upholstered bench at the front of the boat. I watch as he unties the ropes and tugs at the little motor to start the engine.

“We’ll just motor out to the lake, then set the sails up there,” he says.

I nod as we gain momentum. It’s easy to feel free out here, easy to let go of your worries. I wonder if Penny felt that way living here.

“Jim,” I say cautiously, “may I ask you something?”

“Shoot.”

“I’m trying to figure out who Collin was. The man you mentioned.”

He looks up at me as if the question has startled him, then kills the engine, so all we hear now is the sound of the lake lapping against the side of the boat. “Yes,” he says after a long moment.

I’m not sure if I’m about to broach a sensitive topic. He already seemed a bit cagey when I inquired about Penny before. But why? “It’s just that, well, I did a little investigating, and I learned that after Penny Wentworth’s disappearance, there seem to have been two suspects—her husband, Dexter, and a man named Collin. I’m just trying to make sense of it all.”

Jim looks lost in thought. His eyes drift out to the horizon. “Penny loved him,” he says. “Even as a boy, I could tell. You can see the way people look at each other.” He shakes his head. “But their timing wasn’t right.”

“Collin, you mean?”

He nods.

“She was married when she met him, wasn’t she?”

“Yes,” he says, standing up to adjust the sails. I duck my head to make room. “They were going to sail away together that night, the night of—”

“The night of her disappearance?”

“Yes,” he says, looking out at the lake longingly, as if he hopes to steer the boat through the locks and out to the open water just then. “But Penny never did join him that night.”

“What did he do, Collin?”

“He stayed away a long time,” he says. “It was years before I saw him again on Boat Street, and when I did, I hardly recognized him. Just a shadow of the man he once was. Hollow cheeks. Ashen eyes. He didn’t speak of what he’d gone through, but I knew it must have been harrowing. He secured the Catalina on the slip at the end of the dock and knelt down to where I was sitting. ‘Can I ask you a favor, son?’ Of course, I was eager to help him in any way I could. I’d watched Collin building the sailboat, sometimes for hours at a time. He used to let me sand the boards before he put them in place, then I’d take a cloth and rub them with teak oil. ‘I need you to look after the Catalina for a while,’ he said. ‘I need you to keep her right here for me.’ I beamed. It was the greatest responsibility anyone had ever given me, and I almost pinched myself in that moment. My parents wouldn’t agree to a hamster, but here was Collin entrusting me with a ship.

“‘Will you come back for her?’ I asked. He looked startled, as if my question had stirred a pot deep in his heart. Will you come back for her? I knew he was thinking of Penny then, just as I was. It had been years since her disappearance. The night was a blur to me then, just as it is now. But we both looked out to the lake that day as we always did—hopeful that she’d come sailing in on a boat with puffed sails, eyes sparkling, apologetic for staying away so long.

“‘No,’ Collin said solemnly. There was more finality in his voice than I was comfortable with. Surely he’d return for the Catalina, his pride and joy. I couldn’t understand his reasoning. Collin was a man with sea legs. He was best suited to the water. I’d even heard my mother make an offhand remark about him seeming weaker on land and positively Triton-like in command of a boat. I knew that giving up the Catalina, for him, would be like giving up his right arm, or one of his senses. He’d be crippled without his boat, without his life on the sea. And yet, when I looked into his face that day, I knew there was no talking sense into him. He’d already made up his mind. He was leaving the Catalina with me, and he was leaving Boat Street, forever perhaps.

“‘Just promise me one thing, Jimmy,’ he said. It was impossible not to see the sadness in his expression, the regret. ‘Take her anywhere you like. Sail around the world if you decide, but please, bring her home to Boat Street. She belongs here.’

“I nodded as he took a final look at the sailboat, then the former home of Penny and Dexter, before he patted my shoulder and turned toward the dock. I watched him walk up to the street above until he was gone. That’s the last time I saw Collin.”

“Wow,” I say. “And you’ve kept the Catalina here ever since?”

Jim nods. “Yes. I took her to Mexico and back, and I spent a great deal of time in the San Juan Islands, but just like Collin said, I always brought her home.”

“Why do you think he was so adamant about bringing her home to Boat Street?”

Jim reaches for a rope tied to the mast and pulls it tighter. “For Penny, I suppose. I think in the back of his mind, he retained some hope that she would return.”

I place my hand over my heart in sympathy for Collin. “That’s so romantic. He must have loved her so much.”

“Yes,” Jim says. “We all did.”

“You said you never heard from him again,” I continue. “But did you ever learn how he spent the rest of his life? I’m assuming he—”

Jim shakes his head. “Never knew. And I s’pose part of me doesn’t want to know. I saw him walk away that day. He was in bad shape. He’d probably aged more in those years away from Boat Street than he did in his entire life. I don’t know that he had the strength to keep going after that. But I like to think he found his way.” He runs his hand along an edge of the Catalina’s cream-colored sail, and I imagine how Collin might have stood in this very place, showing a young Jim, Jimmy, the run of a sailboat the way a father might teach a son. I think of Gene and his dementia and wonder if they had that kind of relationship.

I make a mental note to search for more information about Collin. I have to know what happened to him and if he’s still alive. I then turn my thoughts to Penny again. The residents of Boat Street may know what happened to Penny the night of her disappearance, but I’ve made little headway with them. Now that Jim is opening up, will he reveal more information about that fateful night? “What do you think happened to Penny, Jim?”

“Listen,” he says quickly, “I was just a boy.”

I nod. “Of course. I’m sorry, I just—”

“Whatever happened to her, Collin had nothing to do with it.”

I think about Collin’s love for Penny, the way Jim described his sadness. They shared a love of the sea and possibly more. But Penny was married to someone else. Could Collin have snapped? Could he have killed her somehow in a moment of intense jealousy? “You’re sure?”

He looks momentarily exhausted, as though he and every other longtime resident of the dock have carried this burden for far too many years. He sighs. “Collin’s world orbited around Penny. He was willing to risk everything for her. You only do that when you love someone.”

His words pierce my heart, because I know just what he’s talking about.

Nine years prior

James presses his ear to my bare belly as if he can hear Ella talking to him. I’m only twenty-two weeks along, but after our last ultrasound showed our little girl on the screen, we decided to name our baby.

I’m lying on a hospital bed in the radiologist’s office. A massive amount of ultrasound gel covers my belly, and every time I move, the protective paper cover crinkles beneath me. The radiology tech has just finished the exam, but she’s prompted us to wait for a moment. Her eyes dart around nervously. She wants the radiologist to come in to see something, she says. We’re not sure what this “something” is, but James doesn’t seem to be worried, so I’m not either. “They’re probably blown away by the size of her brain,” he says. “Clearly, takes after her daddy.”

I give him a gentle shove as the door opens and a middle-aged man enters the room. “Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Santorini,” he says. “I’m Dr. Hensley. I’d just like to have a closer look, if you don’t mind.” The tech hovers behind him. Her face looks pinched, concerned. She clasps her hands behind her back. My heart begins to beat rapidly. I turn to James and he squeezes my hand.

The doctor deposits another glob of gel on my belly and then firmly presses the imaging device to my skin. Seconds later, I see Ella again. Her legs are kicking back and forth. “That’s our girl,” James says proudly. “Feisty like her mama.”

The doctor doesn’t seem to hear him or share our sentiment. He’s focused on the screen and rubs the device against my belly again and again, trying to get a closer look at something on the screen.

“What is it?” I finally ask. I know something is wrong.

He increases the size of the screen, then freezes the image. I stare at the mass he points to, and I want him to press Play again. I want to see Ella kicking her sweet little legs. I want to go back to the moment when everything was fine.

“What’s wrong?” I ask again. “Is my baby OK?”

He sets the device down and peels off his gloves. “Ms. Santorini,” he finally says, “the baby is fine.”

I exhale deeply.

“It’s you I’m concerned about.”

“What? Why?”

“There’s a very large tumor growing on your left ovary.”

“A tumor?” James says, shaking his head.

The doctor takes off his glasses and rubs his brow, then puts them back on again. “I want to be as direct with you as possible. This looks like cancer.”

I sit up instantly, gasping. “I don’t understand. How can I have cancer? I feel fine. I, I . . .”

“When ovarian cancer is detected in pregnancy, we have to act fast,” the doctor continues. “The pregnancy hormones can make it grow and spread faster than usual.” He looks at James, then at me. “We’ll need to do a biopsy, more tests.” He clears his throat. “We’ll obviously have time to discuss this with the oncologist, but I want to be frank with you. It’s not too late for termination.”

“Termination? You mean . . . ?” I’m suddenly speechless. One moment I was looking at my baby girl kicking her legs on the screen, and the next we’re talking about terminating the pregnancy. Ending her life.

“No,” I say, before anyone can say anything else. “No, I won’t.” I reach for some tissues and wipe the gloppy goo off my belly, then pull my sweater down.

“Ada,” James says. He reaches out to me, but I push his arm away.

“Mrs. Santorini,” the doctor continues, “you will risk your life if you don’t at least consider termination in the event of—”

“I refuse to discuss this,” I say, standing up. “James, let’s go.”

“You OK?” Jim asks.

I shake away the memory and turn to face him. “No,” I say. “But I’m trying.”

He doesn’t ask me to elaborate; he just tugs at the sailboat’s rigging as it glides across the lake, and nods. “Me, too,” he says.