And then they start walking – marching – towards the sea.

I step forwards and then falter. I shout ‘Hey!’ and even I barely hear it. But still I don’t think that they’re going to just walk into the sea while I watch. Until they do.

My second ‘Hey!’ is far more horrified. And when they’re briefly pushed back towards the shore by a particularly high wave, and that hood is wrenched free to reveal long silver-blonde hair, I stagger backwards too. It’s Cora.

‘Shit. Shit!’

There’s no time to get to the easier path down to the beach. Instead, I start climbing backwards on my hands and knees, scrabbling for purchase as I slip and slide and drop far too quickly, grabbing hold of clumps of long grass that straightaway break or tear out at their roots. I fall the last few feet, landing hard on a dune.

The sand is no longer a soft white Caribbean arc, but hard and wet. Deep twisting channels have been carved from the sea to the grass, filling up with swirling, frothing water. The sea is no longer a brochure-perfect clear turquoise either, but an angry, choking mass of white spray and dark seaweed. I run through streaks of yellow-grey foam, shouting Cora’s name. I can still just about see her, that flapping blue cagoule. In between breaking waves, the water has reached as far as her chest.

I jump backwards when the first wave hits against my calves, splashes up past my knees. It’s freezing cold, shockingly so, but that’s not what makes me hesitate. I can swim, but not well. Up close, the size of the surf is terrifying. Before they break, the waves have to be close to fifteen feet high. And when they do break, cresting white and far too fast, the roaring crash of them is almost deafening. I don’t see how to get past one, never mind how to reach Cora. I think of that polished granite memorial at Ardshader and I suddenly understand how a whole village of fishermen could die within yards of home and safety.

‘Cora! Cora!’

But I can no longer see her at all. And that’s what decides me. I can stand here and shout and pretend that might work, or I can go in. There isn’t enough time to do anything else.

I take off my bag, my boots, my mac, throw them back onto the beach as I start wading into the sea. Almost straight away the sand is sucked from under my feet and then a wave slams into me hard, dropping me backwards, roaring over me like a stampede. I scrabble to get up again, salt water washing out my mouth, rushing up my nose, making me choke and panic. But I’ve no sooner got onto my feet than another wave pushes me back, pushes me down, chokes me some more. I get up again, and when I see another dark wave rising, rising, barrelling towards me, I manage to spin back towards the shore, and to stop panicking long enough to jump upwards when the wave is almost on top of me. It still hits me hard enough that for a few seconds I’m propelled along with it, before its peak passes and I’m able to regain my balance and my breath.