“His schedule was upside down, since he worked all night. So he thought nothing of eating pickles and coleslaw and fried chicken at ten o’clock in the morning,” she marveled. “Sometimes he’d show me the notes he’d made in his log book. His position required him to keep track of the tides and the weather and such. He was very smart but he could really go on and on—not at all like he is now, hardly a word out of him. I think he was even lonelier than I was, back then.
“Anyway, by the next summer my mood had improved and I only walked to the end of the peninsula once or twice and when I did, he wasn’t there. I’d cross paths with him on occasion in town, but we never struck up a real conversation again… until our rift.” Ivy’s bottom lip quivered. “I’ve often regretted how I treated him that day.”
Zoey’s aunt was consistently gracious to everyone, so she couldn’t imagine her saying or doing anything so offensive it would have caused an estrangement that lasted for years. Fordecades.Nor could she quite believe that a simple attempt to help her aunt get interested in a hobby, or something to get her out of the house, had led them down this path of reminiscences, and that Mr. Witherell had come up again for what seemed the dozenth time since she’d been on the island. But clearly something was troubling Ivy, so Zoey proceeded cautiously. “Do you want to tell me about it?”
Ivy hesitated, her eyes brimming. “You know I don’t like to speak ill of anyone.”
Zoeydidknow that; it was the reason Ivy never directly said Sylvia’s father was abusive. It was why she called her own fatherinfluentialinstead ofopinionatedordomineering.And said that Mark “isn’t good at demonstrating affection,” rather than admitting most of the time he was too self-centered to care about anyone else’s feelings. Her aunt’s tendency to sugarcoat the truth used to drive Zoey nuts.
“Why doesn’t Aunt Ivy see how conniving Mark is?” she’d asked her mother once.
“Just because she doesn’tsayit doesn’t mean she doesn’tseeit,” her mother had replied. “She grew up in a different era, with a mother who told her if she couldn’t say something nice, not to say anything at all. And a father who didn’t want her speaking her mind, period. Besides, what’s the harm in demonstrating a little grace instead of calling attention to someone’s flaws?”
Zoey acknowledged to her aunt, “You’re always very generous in your attitude toward others. But if talking about it makes you uncomfortable, you don’t have to tell me about your fight with Mr. Witherell.”
“It wasn’t a fight. No, nothing like that. But I did use stern words—too stern,” Ivy brooded. “Looking back, I wish I hadn’t, but I didn’t know how else to stop him from pestering Sylvia.”
Once again, Ivy’s revelation made Zoey feel as if she had to lift her jaw off the floor. Mr. Witherell had once been bothering Sylvia?That just proves how wrong Gabi’s theory about them was—he didn’t evenlikeher,she reassured herself.“What do you mean, he was pestering her?”
“He wrote her a couple of letters. Two or maybe three. Then he’d drop them through the mail slot here at the house. She wouldn’t show them to me or tell me what they said, but the letters flustered her so badly that she’d cry and run upstairs to her room. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what was going on—he didn’t want her to get involved with Marcus.”
Zoey’s heartbeat skittered. Was Gabi right after all? Had Sylvia and Mr. Witherell been a couple? She struggled to sound casual when she asked, “Why not?”
“I couldn’t be certain because Sylvia was so modest and wouldn’t talk about it, but I assumed it was becausehewanted to date her. Maybe he’d even gone out with her once or twice. As you know, Sylvia was quite a looker. A lot of men’s hopes were dashed when she married Marcus. Although it’s funny that Phineas found out that she was falling for my brother, since they never went out in public together. She must have confided her feelings for him to one of the maids from the boarding house and the girl let it slip. Gossip spreads like wildfire around here.”
Even if Mr. Witherelldidn’twant Sylvia and Marcus to date becausehewanted to date her, that doesn’t necessarily mean she was pregnant with Mr. Witherell’s baby,Zoey reasoned as Ivy continued her story.
“Sylvia never answered Phineas’s notes so one day instead of dropping an envelope through the slot, he rang the bell. Sylvia and I both went to answer it at the same time. When she saw who was standing there, she turned as white as a sheet. She might have fainted if I hadn’t helped her to the kitchen and given her a cold drink. Marcus was upstairs napping so I had to take control of the situation myself. I returned to where Phineas was waiting on the step and—oh, Zoey, I shouldn’t have been so harsh…” When Ivy dissolved into tears, Zoey went over and perched on the arm of the chair, patting her aunt’s shoulder.
“It was so many years ago. And I’m sure whatever you said, your intentions were good—you were protecting Sylvia.”Probably because you knew how cruel her family had been to her.
“Yes, I was, but I shouldn’t have hurt Phineas in the process.” Ivy pulled a tissue from where she kept it folded in the cuff of her sleeve and dabbed her cheeks, confessing, “I told him he was a bully for harassing a docile young woman like Sylvia, instead of accepting it that she wasn’t interested in him. He tried to say Sylvia wasn’t as innocent as I thought and that he was only looking out for our family. You know what he was implying, don’t you?”
Yes. That she was pregnant with his child,Zoey thought, her heart palpitating. “What?”
“That she was only interested in Marcus for his money.” Ivy shook her head in disgust. “So I said, “Phineas, if you were any kind of gentleman, you’d bow out gracefully. But since youaren’ta gentleman, as long as Sylvia is living in my home, I don’t want you darkening my doorstep. I don’t even want you coming through the front gate.’ Then I warned him if he couldn’t be civil to her in public, he shouldn’t bother speaking to me, either.”
“That’s not so bad at all, Aunt Ivy. You had to be firm with him.”Although you may not have known the whole story.
“Perhaps, but you should have seen how forlorn he looked.”
“Did he apologize?”
“That’s the worst part. I didn’t give him a chance—I slammed the door in his face. And he scampered off like a kicked puppy.” Ivy cried harder.
Setting aside the remote possibility that Mr. Witherell may have been right about Sylvia’s intentions, Zoey replied, “You and Aunt Sylvia were like sisters. If anyone had insulted Jessica’s character, I would have said something a lot worse. It was necessary for you to establish your boundaries. To tell him what kind of behavior was unacceptable. Who knows, maybe by being firm you set a good example for Aunt Sylvia. Maybe that’s how she found the strength to ask the police to leave when they wanted to take her to the hospital the time she went up to the widow’s walk.”
Ivy blotted her eyes and then blew her nose. “I didn’t realize I’d told you the story about the police coming to the house. Sometimes I think Mark is right—I’m becoming too forgetful.”
Oops.Ivyhadn’ttold her; Zoey had heard about it from her mother. Fortunately, her aunt didn’t give her the chance to clarify.
“You know, I always suspected Mr. Witherell was the one who called the police that night.”
“What makes you think that?”
Her aunt turned her palms up. “Who else would have spotted her up there at that hour? He had the perfect vantage point from the lighthouse.”
Thinking aloud, Zoey asked, “Do you think he did it out of revenge—to get her in trouble with the police or to humiliate her in front of her neighbors?”
