She followed Bay Street back down to the boardwalk carnival and turned left, following the promenade. She turned down Old Harbour Road and drove along until the houses gave way to ragged thatches of coastal woodland.

Soon enough, she arrived at Beech Tree Landing, where someone had lured her husband, slit his throat and let him roll into the sea behind the wheel of his car. He’d hated this place, this island. It seemed painfully unfair that he had to die there.

The landing had thirty or so extra-long parking spaces to accommodate people’s boat trailers, and every one of them was empty. She drove diagonally across them and parked at the top of the furthest boat ramp.

In the water beyond stood a dozen or so wooden pilings rising from the sea like blunt teeth – the remains of what must have been the old ferry terminal, where David Stemple met his end.

She looked across the face of the water and thought: this is where it happened, this is where I was made a widow. The last word hit her hard. She was a widow. Worse, she was a widow who never really knew her husband.

She threw open the door of the car and stepped out into the wind. She marched to the bottom of the boat ramp, far enough so her sneakers touched the water, and screamed.

When she was done screaming, she folded to her knees on the damp concrete. Grief poured out of her, hot and wet and salty. She wished that she could leave the grief here in Belport, but knew she’d be carrying it home.

If Kate had driven away from Beech Tree Landing thirty seconds earlier or later than she did, everything would have been different. She wouldn’t have arrived at the intersection of Old Harbour Road and Elm just as Ed Gilpin’s work truck – MAINTENANCE stencilled along the side panel – rolled past. She would have turned right, driven back to the motel, and caught the last ferry back to the mainland.

Instead, she turned left, and followed Ed deeper into the island.

28

THE WIFE

Abby put the kettle on and sat John down at the kitchen table. God knew how long the kid had been out there in the dark, creeping around the house. The knees of his jeans were muddy, and there were pine needles caught in the collar of his windbreaker, which he’d left in a pile on the floor beside his shoes.

John had been to the house before, once or twice, she now realised. He was one of Eddie’s summer friends. There was a big group of teenagers around the same age that knocked around together during the on-season. It was hard to keep track of who was who, and John didn’t stand out any more than the rest of them.