Because I’m certain I saw my dad and Iona together before we had to leave. Together in the clearing. Only I don’t understand how that fragile strand means Iona ended up deep in the ground.

Evergreen Island

5 August 1993

David was always aware when Maria was watching him. He could sense her eyes penetrating his back and when he looked in the mirror, after spitting out a mouthful of toothpaste, he caught her hovering behind him. He rinsed off his brush, slotted it back into the pot, and turned to face her.

‘There’s something about Iona,’ she said.

David had to agree. There was something about the girl, the way she brightened up Bonnie, how she was always so keen to please everyone around the table. But he knew Maria didn’t mean those kinds of things. Her face was pinched, which meant she was worrying herself over something.

‘I can’t put my finger on it,’ she went on.

‘I thought you liked her.’

‘I did. I do – I …’

David didn’t like that Maria got so wrapped up with everything, twisting things around, making problems where there weren’t any. They were always the little things too. In his mind it was the one big thing she should be anxious about, but his wife seemed to have miraculously glossed over that as if it didn’t play on her mind.

In this way, David thought, they could not be more different. He lived with it hanging over him every day. They just never spoke of it.

He refused to agree with his wife about her recent concern. ‘Iona’s a lovely girl. Don’t go there, Maria.’

Maria sighed. ‘I don’t see her doing much university work,’ she went on.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake.’

‘I’m just saying,’ she murmured, gnawing at a patch of skin on her thumb. He gently prised it out of her mouth, knowing she was nervous. What did she really think there was to be afraid of with Iona?

He kissed her on the head and moved past her. He wouldn’t be drawn into this. Not when he was beginning to really like the girl.

The following morning Maria was still agitated by her conversation with David. She shouldn’t have to prove to him that she was beginning to realise there was something odd about Iona’s behaviour, but it seemed she was going to have to.

By the end of the summer she would wish she’d tried even harder to get David to see that side of Iona, and maybe he would never have done what he did. But the fact was, at this point, Maria didn’t really understand the depth of it herself.