So while George had been studying the bird in detail she had sought out old friends among the crowd, listening first to the anxieties of an undergraduate who was trying to combine the stresses of twitching with working for finals, and was being distracted from both by a girl in the first year at his university. Vera, mocked and teased by the men—more, Molly thought, because she frightened and attracted them than because they found her genuinely amusing—wanted to talk about her divorce and her affair with an American birder ten years her junior. Vera was very alive. Everything about her—her femininity, her clothes, her aggression—was overstated to the point of caricature. Despite her noise, Molly found her very restful. Vera always did all the talking. Molly had only met Pete Littleton once before, at Trekewick, but she had found him entertaining, and she was flattered when he recognized her and came to talk to her. He, of all the people with whom she had spoken that afternoon, seemed unequivocally happy.

“I know that I’ll get bored by the freedom very soon,” he said. “So I intend to enjoy every minute of it before I do.”

“Was it really so bad being married to Barbara and living on St. Agnes?”

“Oh, it wasn’t only Barbara,” he replied vaguely. “There were other worries. But they’re all cleared up now. So today I’ve seen a new bird, the sun’s shining, and I refuse to talk about anything unpleasant.”

And he had charmed her with his description of his return to Rushy, Ella’s reaction to him, the cottage he had rented there and his views of the teaching profession and his aim to reform it.

“Rushy is so special,” he said, “because most of the locals are happy to have birders around. They think we’re a bit mad, but they treat us like human beings. On Scilly the islanders barricade themselves in for the autumn. They hate the birdwatchers. I suppose there are so many birders on Scilly in October that there’s bound to be some damage. There is one bloke, though, in Rushy who doesn’t seem very friendly towards us. I was out on the marsh early one morning last week and someone started to fire an air gun at me. I don’t suppose it could have done me any real damage, but it was pretty frightening. He wasn’t a kid either. It was a middle-aged man.”

“Was it Bernard Cranshaw?”

“I don’t know. It’s so long since I’ve been in Rushy that I don’t know many of the locals by name. He was really wild, shouting at me and shaking his fist. I was just out on the reserve watching the avocet chicks.”

Pete shook his head, wondering at the odd behaviour of the man on the marsh, but not really worried by it. He looked at his watch, remarked that the pub would be open and walked away to find Rob.

The beach was nearly empty now and, with the people, the light was draining away from the flat. The sea was quite calm and the sand where Molly sat was still warm. Soon only two figures remained. They lay on the soft, dry sand, quite near to her, but oblivious of her. They were two young people, lying on their stomachs, close together but not touching. They were deep in conversation, running their fingers through the sand. She recognized them: Adam and Tina, long dark hair next to long fair hair. She watched them tenderly and with, she told herself, an old woman’s romantic spirit, she hoped that they were falling in love.