Chip raced up the path toward the house, went in, and found Sabrina, tears running down her cheeks, at the top of the stairs. He blurted out his news about Garth’s body. Sabrina ran to call the police, and shoved Chip toward her grand-father’s bedroom.
“He’s dying,” she said. “We’ve already sent for the doctor.”
The old man lay pale and exhausted, his skin parchment-yellow, his breathing unnaturally heavy and sustained. Chip bent over him and called his name. Dr. Gwynn seemed hardly to notice; he was fading away. A phrase from Shakespeare came into Chip’s mind:
He doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Much truer of this distinguished old man, Chip thought, than of the sleazy Garth Laberge.
Chip and Sabrina took turns watching by his bed. Two hours later the doctor arrived, examined the patient, and immediately called an ambulance. They would have to take Dr. Gwynn to the Kingston Hospital, he explained.
The boat trip across the lake was sombre: the sunshine, the blue sky, and the shining water seemed cancelled out by the pain in the old man’s face. Lawson met them at the dock. Halfway to Kingston, with Chip and his granddaughter beside him, Dr. Gwynn passed away.
The funeral service took place three days later in the old man’s house. He was buried, as he wished, in a small plot on Tilmun Island. It was a beautiful place, planted with lilac bushes and roses and overlooking the lake. The Mallorys and Lawson joined Sabrina, Rachel, Cal, Mr. Bascombe, and May Bates. No other local people attended.
The next day Sabrina drove Chip down to Bascombe. On the way she explained, “I’ve talked to the executors of Grand-father’s will. I intend to give Mrs. Jackson’s cottage and her lake property back to Cal Froats, and to create a pension of some kind for him and Rachel. If they want to work on Tilmun Island they’ll be able to. I just have to put that right. I think Grandfather realized at the end that he’d made some serious mistakes.”
Sabrina steered the pickup onto Bascombe’s main street. Late summer weeds had nearly covered the old railway tracks, and seemed about to engulf the town itself, its shabby houses, it ramshackle sheds and stable. But the little orchard bloomed with a few small early green apples, and the old church spire rose above the place like the wind-battered mast of a beached ship.
They pulled up at Bascombe’s store, which looked as desolate and perversely homey as Chip remembered, with its leftover Christmas lights, broken signs, and rusty Coca-Cola dispenser.
They went inside. “WHERE’S CAPTAIN HOWDY?” Sabrina croaked in an imitation parrot voice. Gurgling noises followed, then a real parrot spoke from behind the bead curtain at the rear of the store.
“WHERE’S THE GIRL? WHERE’S THE GIRL?”
Sabrina and Chip burst out laughing.
May pushed through the curtain. She was carrying Captain Howdy in his old brass cage. The parrot — a blaze of colours, like a painter’s rag — croaked and fussed, and turned an eye on the newcomers. May gave them a big smile and set the cage down on the dusty counter.
“It sure is good you’re here,” she told them. “Ain’t seen you for a few days now.”
“Great to see you, May. We can go for a ride in the pickup later if you want. We have to talk to Rachel Stone first, though — it’s pretty important business.”
May made a face. “Well, she ain’t here. Don’t know if she’s coming soon. Don’t care much, either.”
The bead curtain moved and Peter Bascome emerged. He was dressed in what looked like the same old frayed white shirt and patched blue overalls Chip had first seen him in. At Dr. Gwynn’s funeral he had appeared in a tuxedo so ancient and ill-fitting it might have been worn by one of Queen Victoria’s mourners.
Bascombe gave the newcomers a sharp-eyed smile.
“Well, I’m glad you young folks made it here. Sorry to say, we ain’t seen nothing of Rachel yet. But maybe we can talk some ’afore she shows up. Can I offer you some tea and homemade pie while you’re visiting?”
“I’m sure Chip would love some pie,” Sabrina said quickly. “I’d like to have a word with you, May, if I could. Can we walk over to the orchard and back, maybe? I know it’s hot out there…”
Mr. Bascombe turned to Chip, winked at him in a conspiratorial fashion, then reached out and steered him gently through the bead curtain and into the back room. “The pie’s right here, and you and me can have a word now that them young ladies is gone.”
Chip sat, and gave Mr. Bascombe his full attention.
“I’m pretty sure you and the young lady is wondering how come I let out that I’m May’s daddy, when I didn’t say nothing to nobody for so many years. Well, that’s a long story, but to tell it simple-like, I wasn’t always some kind of worn-out old boy, like I am these days. Did quite a bit of courtin’ back then, and I sure liked walkin’ out with all them pretty ladies. Figured I would settle down when I found the right one. Always had good intentions, you understand. And I loved all them dances, and them hay rides! We sure had fun in them days!”
“You’ve had quite a life, Mr. Bascombe,” Chip said. “So, you walked out with some nice girl, sowed your wild oats, and May was born. Is that it?”
Mr. Bascombe looked relieved.
“That’s about it, son. That’s about it. You sure are quick on the uptake. ’Cept she weren’t such a nice girl, that one. She was shanty girl and nothing but trouble. And folks here didn’t like it that I went out with a shanty girl. They’d just moved in hereabouts, those shanty folk, and they was already making trouble. Nobody liked it that I had to do with them. Rachel Stone didn’t like it. Margaret Jackson didn’t like it. And the minister over at Nashua didn’t like it. What could I do, boy? They was all against me. So I just pulled my horns in and gave up on that little baby and her mother.”
“You didn’t even admit you were her father?”
“No, I didn’t. I didn’t want the disgrace of it.”
“But you sent some money later. You had May trained for the circus.”
“That’s it exactly — you are one clever young fella. I sent her money, but I wouldn’t have nothing to do with her. Then when I heard that her uncle was after her, and that them bad fellas took her… Well, what could I do? I got money saved up, and I decided to help her, to give her a good life. No more shanty town for my little girl!”
Chip jumped from his chair and offered the somewhat startled Mr. Bascombe his hand.
“You did exactly the right thing. May is one terrific girl. And I know you’ll take good care of her.”
“Oh, thank you. Thank you very much. And I got my story out just in time, ’cause I hear them girls outside and headin’ back this way.”
Chip followed Mr. Bascombe toward the front of the store. May burst in, looking radiant, the bell tinkled, and she stood back and held the door for Sabrina.
“She told me not to tell, but I can’t help it!” May cried. “You know what, Daddy? She’s giving me the horse! She’s giving me Quicksilver for my very own! I just can’t believe it!”
“Well, I’ll be.” Bascombe stood, scratching his head and wondering. Nervously, he slipped his sunglasses on, then off, then on again, as if the idea of such a gift was almost too dazzling to contemplate.
Tears streaming down her face, May gave her father a huge hug.
“We sure have to thank you for this,” he told Sabrina. “Your grandfather would be right proud of you this minute.”
It was Sabrina’s turn to shed a tear.
Chip reached out and squeezed Sabrina’s hand. “You did right,” he told her. “It’s a great thing to do.”
“I just love that horse and I’ll take good care of him,” May promised. “And any time, any time at all you want to ride him…”
“Don’t worry about that, May. We’ll see each other quite a bit, I’m sure,” Sabrina said.
“You two come in now and we’ll have some tea,” Peter Bascombe suggested. May picked up the brass cage and Captain Howdy cried out: “WHAT’S THE POINT?”
They laughed and retreated to the back room. Sabrina quickly turned off the television. Mr. Bascombe found more apple pie and made fresh tea.
At that moment, the roar of a car engine outside caught their attention.
“That’ll be Rachel,” Mr. Bascombe said. He rubbed at the dusty front window and peered out. “Yep! It’s her all right. I see Angus Ward drove her over. Ain’t no sign of Cal, though.”
Chip was puzzled. Nobody had seen Cal since Dr. Gwynn’s funeral, which was disconcerting, even though Rachel could certainly pass on to him the good news about Sabrina’s bequest. The return of his mother’s property, Chip thought, would be sure to bring the embittered man around, in due course.
Mr. Bascombe opened the door for the newcomer. “There been some trouble, Rachel?” he asked, pulling off his sunglasses. “You don’t look none too good.”
Sabrina approached the older woman. May stood back warily.
Chip saw at once that something was wrong. Rachel gazed from one to the other of them, with hurt, anxious eyes. Her old flower-print dress looked crumpled and soiled, as if she had been tramping through rough bush. Her white hair was scraggly and dishevelled. It seemed that she’d been weeping.
“What’s the matter, Rachel?” Sabrina asked. “Did you have an accident?”
“It ain’t that,” Rachel said in a slow, trembling voice, very unlike her usual harsh one. She sobbed a little; Sabrina put an arm around her, and tried to comfort her.
“I don’t need that, I don’t need none of you,” Rachel said, pulling away from the girl. She stood back and glared at Sabrina. “They all tortured him, but your grandfather — he was the worst of them. And after what that old man done to Margaret, I don’t blame Cal for what he done. Anyways, he’s gone now. You can get all the police you want, but you won’t find him. And I’m glad he did it. I would have done it myself, if I’d had the courage.”
“What are you talkin’ about, Rachel?” Peter Bascombe asked.
“He burned the place down, that’s what I’m talking about. He burned down his mother’s cottage, that place this girl’s grandfather stole from our Margaret. He turned it into a pile of ashes, just like he once told me he would. And now he’s gone away, and he won’t come back here no more. He’s gone away forever, I know he has!”
Rachel Stone collapsed into a rickety chair. She put her head in her hands, and burst into tears.