“We used it with the crates we stored.” He pushes against the pulley.
When she hands him the hammer a few minutes later, she asks, “How did you learn to do that?”
“Don’t I have servants to do it for me, you mean?” He grunts as he twists sideways to hammer a nail into the beam. “Hand me another nail, will you? We have to repair our own things on the ship. It’s not as if I can afford to have a carpenter on board. Besides, I like to fix things around the estate when I’m not trading or sailing. I can’t stand idleness.”
Ten minutes later, she gives the crank a turn: the pulley holds. “Thank you, Jack.”
“It’s nothing.” He hands her back the hammer and wipes his hands on his breeches.
“Could I offer you some refreshment? I could make tea. I don’tknow if you have time before you meet with Mr. Holder?” Before he has the chance to answer, a thought hits her. “Wait. If you’re meeting Mr. Holder this afternoon and you were waiting for me here this morning, why did you come all the way back to Roskorwell?”
Almost shyly, he says, “I got cheated of the chance to accompany you home last night. I wished to claim the honor today.”
“You’re not meeting Mr. Holder?”
“I am, but not until seven this evening.” A smile; no, she thinks, a grin. “You caught me.”
“Well, what were you going to do in the meantime? You’ve got the entire afternoon.”
“Besides fixing your well? I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I suppose I could see if Tom has got time now.”
She picks at some of the moss growing between the stones of the well. It comes loose and crumbles in her hand.
“Isabel…”
Something about the way he says it, low and full of meaning. It gives her the courage to say, “Should you like to spend the afternoon with me? We could take a walk.”
His smile settles in her chest. “A walk would be splendid. If you don’t mind a longer one, I could show you one of my favorite places on the coast.”
She says, “I should like it very much, but what about Myra?”
“I’ll stable her in the shed, if she could have a bucket of water.”
“Naturally. But as for the shed, I’m afraid there isn’t a lock. Well, there is, but it isn’t mine and I don’t have the key to it.”
He laughs. “And who do you think does?”
She stares at him, then she begins to laugh, too. “Oh!”
She goes ahead of him into the house. Lifting a round tin off the shelf in the kitchen, she says, “Shall I take some oatcakes? I baked them only two days ago. It’ll be like having a picnic.”
“Is that my shirt?” Jack says behind her.
She whirls around, skirt flying, hands fluttering. She says, “No. Imean…” She’d forgotten about the shirt. Why did he have to see it? She tries to take it from him, but he holds it high above his head.
“Why, I believe it is.” He shakes out the shirt and holds it up in front of him, inspecting the cloth. “You’ve mended it.”
“I…it was foolish. I thought you might have need of it, but that was before…I did not realize you’re a man of independent means and…and I should’ve realized it, of course, because you did tell me of the profits you make smuggling, but quite apart from that, your estate…” She runs her hand along her cheek. “Suffice to say I was mistaken. I never got the stains out completely, you see, and the tear was very large. It’s not good for wearing.” She forces a smile. “It kept me busy. Like you, I don’t enjoy being idle.”
“I hardly think you have time for idleness here,” Jack says unexpectedly brusquely. He refolds the shirt and she thinks he’s going to hand it back to her, but he doesn’t. “Thank you for your efforts. It’s mended very neatly.”
When he goes out, she quickly takes two oatcakes and wraps them in cheesecloth before getting a bucket of water, which she takes to the shed and places on the floor. Jack has tied the horse to the shelf at the back. “Don’t forget this,” he says, taking the book about La Pérouse’s voyage from his saddlebag and handing it to her.
The sun is still high in the sky when they set out. They follow the coastal path into the village, around the water’s edge and the houses hugging the cliffside, past the Shipwrights Arms. To Isabel’s surprise, they don’t continue on the coastal path, nor do they wait for the ferry, but instead they strike out into the thick forest covering the banks of the river. Jack carries the bundle with the oatcakes as well as a bottle of something—wine, she thinks—which he took from Roskorwell in his saddlebag. “It was meant for Tom,” he says. “But I daresay we’ll put it to good use.”
They walk single file, and for about half a mile, Isabel cannot make out any sort of path, but Jack seems to know where he’s going. After a while the grass drops back to reveal a trail, tucked among the brush.It’s so narrow it could be an animal track. From time to time, Jack calls something over his shoulder about the land or the vegetation, but mostly they walk in silence. Just as she’s beginning to wonder where he is taking her, the trail turns and then she sees it. In front of them lies a branch of the river, with tall, rocky banks covered in flowers and giant trees dipping their roots into the water, which is impossibly blue under the faded, sun-filled sky. “Heavens!” she says, taking in the hushed beauty of the place.
Jack turns and gives her a smile. A canopy of leaves shields them as they follow the trail along the side of the creek, which cuts deep into the land. “They call it Frenchman’s Creek,” Jack says. “We anchor here sometimes.”
