He pulled opened the side door of the Customs House and we entered that way. I saw his back office for the first time – the radio equipment there, the vast horizon of ocean in the window. I saw the camp bed, the toothbrush, a sketchbook. I saw the chisel and the whittling knife, beside a half-worked piece of oak.

What was it, I wondered, with our island and our misplaced hearts? One riven with nails, harms the wrong man; another is carved with love by the wrong man in the first place.

I said nothing.

At the front desk, I filled out my particulars on a form and watched Saul copy this across into a ledger, using a fountain pen.

‘This one is for island records,’ he said. ‘I’ll enter all the necessaries on the Border Agency computer.’

I let him record my profession as ‘teacher’, no discussion as to whether this was still true. My training certificate was rolled up in my suitcase. Soon I would know what it was worth.

‘Visiting Paul, are you?’ Saul said as he wrote, an official voice, cheerfulness a duty. ‘To tell him about your father? Your mother never did get through on the satellite phone, did she?’

I wasn’t sure how to respond. Were we playing a scene? Pretending everything was fine, that I was only going for a short while and returning the following month. Was he pretending that Ben’s name wasn’t already there in the ledger above mine?

I looked down at the watermarked page.

Friday 13 April, 2018

Outgoing passengers.

Passenger No. 1 – Leah Cedars

Ben’s name wasn’t there. But he knew that he had to register. I’d told him. I’d told him!

‘Do we have until midnight?’ I said.

Saul glanced up, a little too expectantly. ‘For what?’

‘To register to travel.’

He checked the clock on the wall above the desk as it twitched a minute after six.

‘Ah, you’re well within the time limit,’ he said, returning to his calligraphy. ‘You don’t need to worry, Leah. You don’t need to worry at all.’

Eastertide 2018

EASTERTIDE 2018

There was barely a moon.

It was the perfect night for sleeping on your troubles, not for rising up, challenging them. But still, all across the island, in the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night, they were about and misbehaving – as Proverbs tells us women are wont to do. They were being loud and stubborn, not abiding in their houses, slipping through the keyholes.

They were in the streets, lying in wait at every corner.

At nightfall, Leah Cedars was seen at the Billet House. She walked straight in, forgoing the politeness of a knock, and there was the glimpse of a scene – figures illuminated, two men close, then jumping apart. The door snapped shut on its hinges.

All that remained were voices.