The edges of dawn glowed gold above the mountains, but night shadows still lingered in the treetops. The beach lay like a slice of the moon, white painted with grey.
Ellen ran ahead of James and Zelda, taking long strides and then jumping, with legs and arms outstretched, head held high above a straight back. The sand was cool and hard and flat beneath her feet. She leapt again and spun round in the air, barely touching the ground with her feet before taking flight again.
She waited for the others at the end of the beach where the sand gave way to pale granite boulders coloured with orange lichen. She was breathless, pink-cheeked.
‘You looked like a fairy,’ called Zelda, as they came close.
Ellen stared over her head and on past James. ‘I’m losing it,’ she said.
They jumped from rock to rock, picking different paths, glancing down into deep cracks encrusted with small purple mussels. Near a rock pool they stopped to eat muffins with jelly, leaning over the weedy sides to see clusters of red sea anemones waving thin arms into the water.
‘Tas calls them bloodsuckers,’ said James. Reaching down, he poked one with his finger. It closed up with a shudder, snatching in its arms. Zelda laughed with delight and tried to copy him but before she even touched the creature she squealed and snatched her hand away.
‘We should get back,’ said Ellen as she watched the crumbs from her muffin falling down and floating in slow circles. ‘I want to do some things outside before it gets too hot.’
‘It’s never too hot for me,’ said Zelda. ‘Is it, Daddy?’
James gazed out over the ocean, and then inland to the line of mountains patterned with wind-beaten highland shrubs. ‘It’s the end of the earth,’ he mused, turning to Ellen. ‘Like we’re the only people in the world.’
‘I wish we were,’ said Ellen.
‘Why?’
‘I don’t know. It’d be … simple. There’d be no-one to worry about. Nobody starving, or dying of cold.’
James looked at her and shook his head. ‘That’s what I like about you, Ell. I can never tell what you’re going to say—or do, for that matter.’ He screwed up his eyes slowly. ‘Still waters run deep, my ma used to say. Must be a damn mine shaft inside your head.’
They walked in silence. Even Zelda stopped pointing and chattering. The sun rose higher in the cloudless sky, tracking them as they hopped from rock to rock, heading home.
Still waters run deep. Ellen looked down into the cracks between the rocks. Deep and murky. Hiding all kinds of evil. James was right.You could never tell what she might do. Suddenly she stopped and crouched down. ‘Look! Come here, James.’
He came over, holding Zelda’s hand as she picked her way between sharp barnacles.
‘There …’ Ellen pointed down between some rocks. In the middle of a small patch of sand was a single white shell. Against the dark basalt that walled it in, the pale shape seemed to glow, as if possessing a light of its own.
‘It’s a nautilus,’ Ellen said. She said the word slowly, like the name of a god.
‘What?’ asked James.
‘I read about them at Joe’s museum. You only find them every seven years.’ She looked up. ‘It shouldn’t be here. Joe said it’s only four years since last time.’
James reached down and picked up the shell. He settled the graceful arch into his hand. ‘It’s a good omen, then,’ he said. He smiled with his eyes. ‘Perhaps it’ll bring us seven years’ good luck.’ Turning it over, he passed it to Ellen. ‘Feel it. It’s amazing. Weighs nothing at all.’
She ran her fingertips lightly over its colourless pattern of tiny bumps. It was paper-thin. She imagined its journey; a small and fragile craft afloat in a savage sea. A deep, dark and endless place, with rocks, reefs and wild currents to fear.
‘Give it to me!’ Zelda reached up for it, clawing the air.
‘You can look but don’t touch,’ said Ellen. She bent down, cradling the shell in her two hands.
‘No, let me,’ cried Zelda. ‘I want to hold it.’
‘No, you can just look.’
‘Give it to her. She won’t break it,’ said James.
‘Daddy said I could.’ Zelda fixed Ellen with her dark, angry eyes.
‘Okay,’ said Ellen. ‘Here you are.’
Zelda walked a few steps away, pretending to study the shell. She lifted it up to her ear. ‘It doesn’t even work.You can’t hear the sea.’ She held the shell out towards James. ‘Here you are, Daddy.’
James took the shell and stowed it carefully in Ellen’s backpack, on top of the leftover muffins and a bottle of water. ‘Let’s get going then. I want to be back in time to catch the tide. There’s work to be done.’
When they reached the home beach, they saw Lizzie and her boys fishing from the rocks. James waved at them, but kept walking straight on towards the jetty, where the Humble Bee bobbed at her moorings.
‘We can’t stay and fish,’ Ellen warned Zelda as they went to join their friends. ‘We’re just saying hello.’
Lizzie stood up as they came close. ‘Hi,’ she called. ‘Where have you been so early? I thought you’d be here.’
‘We just went for a walk,’ answered Ellen. She helped Zelda cross to the big flat rock where the three boys sat bent over their lines. ‘Caught anything? Sammy? Mickey? Drew?
‘Nope,’ the boys called back together without turning round.
Zelda pushed in between Drew and Mickey and squatted down, propping her elbows on her knees.
‘I brought a thermos,’ said Lizzie. ‘Drew, you watch Zelda while we have a cuppa. Got that?’
‘Okay, Mum.’
Ellen followed Lizzie back to where the rocks met the sandy beach. In the thin shade of a she-oak a rug was spread out, dotted with sandshoes, cricket bats, balls, towels and bags.
‘Boys …’ said Lizzie, frowning as she cleared a space to sit down. She took out a workman’s metal thermos and poured two mugs of tea.
Ellen sat beside her and sipped at the hot brew.
‘Look at Zelda,’ said Lizzie with a smile. ‘Wedged in between Mickey and Drew. She’s in heaven!’ Her face grew serious. ‘If I knew I’d have a girl, I’d have another baby tomorrow.’
‘Would you?’ asked Ellen.
‘Oh, yes!’ answered Lizzie. ‘I’d love a little girl.’
‘Why, particularly?’
‘I guess, to have someone that was—like me.When I see you and Zelda—I mean, she’s the spitting image of you.’ She looked at Ellen over the rim of her mug. ‘It must be special.’
Ellen didn’t reply.
‘It must be,’ repeated Lizzie.
‘Well,’ Ellen answered slowly, letting out words one at a time. ‘It’s strange in a way.’ She lowered her voice, even though the children were well out of earshot. ‘But I think she’s too much like me.’
‘What do you mean?’ Lizzie asked.
‘Oh—nothing really.’
‘Yes, you do. I can tell by your face. What’s wrong?’
‘I don’t think I can explain it.’ Ellen looked out into the dis-tance. There was a small boat, a black speck against the sea.
‘Try,’ insisted Lizzie.
Ellen chewed at the side of her finger. ‘Well, it’s like—do you believe in telepathy?’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
‘Well, perhaps it’s something like that. Sometimes Zelda looks at me, and it’s as if she’s—’ Ellen’s voice cracked.
Lizzie leaned round to look at her face. ‘She’s what?’
‘Well, say she’s standing up on a rock. I feel her saying “You want me to fall, and crack my head”. Or, if I’m holding a hot iron, or shutting the car door. I … It comes from somewhere outside me. Or way inside me.’ Her voice became thin. ‘Sometimes I think I just pretend that I love her like a mother. But deep down, I hate her.’
Lizzie’s eyes were wide in her face. ‘That’s a terrible thing to say,’ she said quickly. ‘You don’t mean it. You’ll have to talk to James. Take a holiday.’
Ellen nodded slowly, picking up a piece of driftwood that was lying on the sand nearby. Years of wind and water had etched out the grain. She picked at a jagged splinter with her fingernail.
‘Look, Ellen,’ said Lizzie in a firm voice, ‘leave Zelda with me and go to the mainland. Do some shopping, see some films. It’s all right for us who were born and bred here. Others need to get away now and then. Or they go coastie.’ She grinned, to signal a joke.
‘What’s that?’ asked Ellen.
‘Coastie. It’s what happens to cows when they’re put out for too long in the sea paddocks. The grass is short on some mineral they need. After a while they start to hang their heads on one side. They go a bit mad.’
‘Oh, thanks,’ said Ellen.
‘Any time,’ Lizzie smiled. ‘Really, I do mean—’ She looked up at a cry of excitement. ‘Hey, they’ve caught something.’ She jumped to her feet. ‘Be careful!’ she shouted. ‘Don’t fall in, any of you! You hear?’