After half an hour her feet started to chafe and then to throb, and then into their second hour of walking they went blissfully numb. Maybe she’d rubbed the skin clean away.
Andrew attempted to chat with Lily about her schoolwork, but Rachel could tell he was distracted. He kept looking back down the trail, as if expecting to see Claire hurrying after them. Several times he took his phone out, until Rachel said in exasperation, “Surely a civil engineer such as yourself realizes there is no way to get phone reception up here.”
He gave her a sheepish look and put his phone back in his pocket. “I’m worried.”
“Why? I think she can manage to walk down the trail we just came up.”
“But by the time we get back it will have been hours—”
“So? She’ll go into the inn and have a drink. If she has any sense, she’ll have several and be properly kaleyed by the time we arrive.”
Andrew frowned at her. “Kaleyed?”
“Cumbrian for ‘drunk.’”
“That’s the last thing she needs.” Andrew sounded outraged.
Rachel gave him a conciliatory smile. “Does Claire really have a drinking problem?”
“You shouldn’t have heard that.”
“Considering you were practically yodeling it, it was hard not to. Seriously, though—”
“It’s none of your business,” Andrew said, and started to walk faster. Rachel lengthened her stride to keep up with him.
“It’s none of my business and yet you asked me to look out for her? You can’t have it both ways.”
Andrew sighed. Lily was behind them, snapping photos, but he still lowered his voice. “She was in rehab for a month before she came back to Hartley-by-the-Sea.”
“For alcoholism?”
“Yes.”
“Did she check herself in?”
Andrew glanced at her sharply. “Why do you ask?”
“Just curious.”
“As it happened, her fiancé, Hugh, called my parents and shared his concerns. They checked her in.”
Rachel nodded her understanding. “So everyone managed Claire, as usual.”
“She needed help, Rachel.”
Rachel knew she should drop it. She didn’t know what Claire had been up to these last few years. Maybe she’d been knocking back a bottle of gin every night. Maybe she still was. “Even so, I think you should give Claire a little space to make her own decisions.”
“I agree with you in principle, but as I told you before, now is not the time.” Andrew sighed and gave her a semi-apologetic smile. “Claire’s not as strong as you, Rachel.”
She felt an irrational pulse of pleasure at the implied compliment and quickly squelched it. “Maybe she’s never been given the chance.”
“Maybe,” Andrew allowed. “But maybe there is a reason for that. I know you were friends with Claire a long time ago, but you don’t know her now. Or our family.”
“That puts me in my place,” Rachel murmured.
He shook his head, sighing. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way.”
“Actually, I think you did.” Rachel shrugged. “It’s true anyway. No one in Hartley-by-the-Sea really knows any of you. But then you Wests never tried to fit in, did you? You lived here for decades, but you always acted like offcomers.” Andrew frowned, and Rachel continued lightly. “Up in your house high above us all, going to the private school in Keswick, swanning off to Cambridge, your parents to London. We didn’t stand a chance.”
