stayed a few minutes longer, finishing her water, when she spotted something guaranteed to make her smile. A small and elderly yacht had dropped anchor off shore and a man with a long grey beard was rowing a small RIB towards the shore. Maisie grinned. She’d recognised the yacht as it had sailed into the channel.
She slipped off the rock and hurried forward as the old man reached the shore and jumped into the shallows with a splash. Archie Pendower was as much a part of the landscape of the isles as any rock or tree. He was well over eighty and his work had won a reputation that spread beyond the isles, although you wouldn’t know it to look at the sorry state of the Starfish Studio these days. Like many islanders and many artists, even he found making a living tough. Not that Archie cared about money.
Water soaked the ragged hems of his denim dungarees as Maisie paddled into the water to help him haul out the RIB. He wore a salt-encrusted fisherman’s cap and a chunky jersey with patches on the elbows. Funnily enough, Maisie couldn’t recall ever seeing him wearing any other clothes, although he smelled fresh enough apart from a faint tang of cigars.
‘Hi, Archie. I wasn’t expecting you today,’ she said as they hauled the RIB onto the sand.
Archie grinned. ‘I wasn’t expecting to be here either, but the light is so beautiful. I haven’t painted Petroc from Gull for years and I’m expecting a cracking sunset.’
‘Fen decided to stay at home today?’ Maisie asked, enquiring after Archie’s neighbour and, according to some, ‘lady friend’, although no one had any idea exactly what their relationship was before, during or after Archie’s wife had passed away a decade ago.
‘She’d be bored watching me paint all day and she has a work of her own to complete. She’s giving the bathroom a lick of paint,’ he said with a grin.
‘And have you heard from Jake lately?’
Archie pulled a face. ‘He Skyped me last week from some far-flung place in the south seas. I can’t recall exactly where. Fen’s the one who uses the computer. She came round and set the call up for me.’
‘Do you think he’ll make it home for Christmas?’
‘Who knows? My son and daughter-in-law have asked me to go to them, but I’d rather stay here. Jake wasn’t too sure. He’s not too keen on the isles since that terrible business with his fiancée.’
‘I can understand that,’ said Maisie, reminded of the dreadful day when Jake Pendower – Archie’s grandson – had lost his fiancée in a boating accident off St Piran’s treacherous coast.
‘Awful thing. He’s never got over it, even though it’s been a good few years now. I don’t think he ever will. I’d hoped he’d take over the Starfish Studio from me one day but I don’t hold out much hope of that.’
Archie reached into the boat to lift out his easel and workbox.
‘Will you be setting up on the beach?’ she asked, holding the easel while Archie shrugged a khaki duffel bag onto his lean shoulders.
‘Yes. If I’m not disturbing you.’
‘Oh no. I’d love to stay and watch you paint, but I ought to scoot back to work. Can I get you the usual?’
Archie rubbed his hands together. ‘You know me too well, Maisie. Always oils the creative juices.’
‘I’ll send someone out with a pint.’
‘Put it on my tab,’ said Archie.
Maisie gave a wry smile. Archie’s tab was as old as the hills but he wasn’t such a frequent visitor to the pub these days so she didn’t mind.
‘Are you busy?’ he asked as he set up his easel on a dry patch of sand facing the Petroc channel.
‘For today, yes, but things will be a little quieter after the weekend. I doubt I’ll be able to savour this sunset. I’ll be too busy running the inn and making sure everything’s not going to cock in the restaurant.’
‘You work too hard.’
‘Not as hard as I used to on the mainland. It’s different being your own boss.’
The reminder of the mass exodus of her small but hardworking team made Maisie’s heart sink again. She’d sorely miss Debbie’s energy and enthusiasm. The pot washer, chef and barman were going too, leaving Maisie and her parents plus a couple of locals who might be able to spare the time to help out occasionally over the quiet season. She didn’t need and couldn’t afford to keep all the staff on over the winter.
‘They never stay here these days, the young people,’ said Archie. ‘I was surprised when your mum said you were coming home. Still, some of us old-timers need to stick it out and keep the place limping on, eh?’
‘Yeah. Some of us,’ said Maisie, half amused and half horrified that Archie counted her as an ‘old-timer’. She hadn’t thought of limping on anywhere when she came back to Gull Island; she’d thought of making improvements and securing the future of the Driftwood and helping out her neighbours too, if she could. Archie meant well but he’d added to her wistful mood. Or was it the prospect of winter and dark nights that dampened her spirits? She didn’t like to think it was the tick tick tick of time and her biological clock. Thirty-nine was still young-ish, whatever Archie thought.
She was only human and perhaps a fling with a stranger was exactly what she did need. The lean, rangy figure of the Blond loomed in her mind again, with his tousled hair and laid-back charm. Maisie laughed at herself. He was very likely chatting up some other woman in the pubs of Hugh Town now. Well, good luck to him – and her.
Who turned off the sun? Patrick McKinnon opened his eyes onto darkness and wondered where he was. Still in his flat in Melbourne? Had he woken up after another bender? Was he in bed with Tania? He reached out for her warm body.
‘Jesus!’
A drop of cold water hit him smack on the nose.
Ah, now he remembered. It was Sunday morning.
The roof of the tent glistened with condensation and another drop fell onto his face. The heavens had opened in the night and wind had started blowing in off the sea. Patrick had thought he’d wake up in three feet of water so he considered himself lucky that the tent, his sleeping bag and all his stuff was only damp, not soaked. He’d have to find somewhere to dry his clothes before he packed away and left Scilly or everything would be rank in no time.
Patrick rubbed the rain off his nose with the back of his hand and unzipped the sleeping bag. Condensation had formed on the inside of the tent and there was a musty scent that made his nose twitch. Urgh. Was that him? It was no surprise he didn’t smell too great following a day spent playing rugby on the beach with a load of students from the Gull Island campsite, and a night spent under canvas in a one-man tent. That was his agenda for the next hour: a shower, probably a cold one, and then cook a fry-up with his newfound mates. They were fifteen years younger than him and although he’d played Aussie Rules and Rugby Union as a young man, last night’s game and a cramped
