“But she didn’t hear you. Don’t forget that. She can only hear what she wants to hear. And dammit, Robert, you can have all my money! You know that.”
He grinned. “And I won’t take any of it except what I earn. You know that.”
Agnes looked down toward the Sank. “Then at least let’s take a walk. I’m going to have land trust people come soon, and I want to imagine seeing the Sank for the first time, as they will. You can make sure I don’t fall and crack my head open.”
She meant to be funny, but he neither rolled his eyes nor smiled. Instead he hesitated. She saw his entire to-do list flash through his eyes, weighed against his desire to be in a favorite place. She pressed her request.
“I forbid you to torment those poor boxwoods today. Archie and Seela can stew together in their truffle-infused juices. You’d be doing them a favor, making them wait. They like having something to complain about.”
Now she earned a grin. “So this is really for them, not you?” he teased.
“Of course! Selfless is my middle name.”
“All right, then. Are you coming, Maisie?” he asked.
Maisie looked up and gave Agnes a slow, acknowledging blink. She sauntered back to the house.
Agnes pointed down Point Path with her stick. “Your job is to chase off the snakes,” she said to Robert. “And please don’t tell me not to be afraid because the snakes around here are harmless. It’s not harm that bothers me, but the sight of them.”
“I know that, Agnes. But you have given me an idea. Why not create a row of topiary snakes for Seela?”
“Promise?”
They headed down Point Path. He walked at her pace, which was respectable, considering. She liked that they were about the same height, or had been.
“I’ll say it again, Agnes. You’re doing the right thing with the land.” He reached out and linked arms with her. She gave him a squeeze in return.
“I’m not doing it yet. Polly has to talk to Dick about it. Same as it ever was.” She rolled her eyes. “Maybe you could tell her I’m dying, but I’ve been sparing her the bad news?”
He pulled back and looked into her eyes. “That’s not true, is it?”
“It’s always true, Robert.”
He was visibly relieved. “I’m not going to lie to Polly.”
“You know,” Agnes said, “the very reason I like you is the very reason you can get on my last nerve.”
Robert squeezed her arm again. “Thank you.”
CHAPTER 6 Polly, Fellowship Point and Deel Town, July 2000
POLLY, TOO, NEEDED ROBERT. DICK HAD FINALLY AGREED TO her plan to widen the path from the house to the rocky shore and plant it with bluets and Kentucky bluegrass seeds to transform it into a blue river. She wanted Meadowlea to look its best when the family came in August. She’d tried to catch up with Robert over the past few days, but he’d been scarce. Agnes said it was effing Seela. Polly, who made a point of finding the good in everyone, didn’t like Seela either. She practiced a set of showy good manners that were actually bad manners, such as explaining why she couldn’t accept an invitation or complimenting someone’s dress. She’d even brought some sort of loaf to a luncheon at Gay Burk’s. “It’s a pound cake with lime zest,” she’d said to the assembled group. Gay received it as if she’d been handed a dead squirrel, and rushed it to the kitchen, where it disappeared and was never heard from again. Polly wished Agnes had been there to see Gay’s face, but Agnes never went out in the day due to her writing. She’d shattered the afternoon peace with laughter, though, when she heard the story. “I’d call her a Philistine, except the Philistines have been misunderstood, and she hasn’t.”
Robert would be excited about creating the path, she was certain of that. He’d told Polly that Meadowlea was his favorite of all the cottages he cared for. When the original structure had been expanded, the additions were simple, with an eye toward bringing light inside and affording views of the landscape. Polly’s mother, Posy Hancock, found Victorian taste oppressive, and resisted it even as Grace Lee next door was putting up velvet curtains and having mahogany shipped from Philadelphia. Lachlan Lee had looked around wistfully when he came over to Meadowlea.
This morning Polly was determined Robert be hers. After breakfast she walked up to the top of Point Path to get a jump on Agnes. Agnes liked to believe she was closest to Robert, and maybe she was, but Robert and Polly’s boys had played daily during the summers and later shared a love of hiking, often driving over to Acadia for the day. Dick had had Robert as a student and always said he was one of the best—broad-minded, brilliant, curious, and calm. Sometimes Robert had a Scotch with Dick in the late afternoon while Polly was over nipping the white with Agnes, after which sessions Dick was stimulated and robust with ideas. Polly saw both sides of the argument about what Robert should have done with his life. He could have been successful on Philadelphia terms—lawyer, banker—but he was successful here, too. She and Agnes agreed he had made the most of his education by being a decent and reliable man. Not to mention that he made a great living and created beautiful gardens. He’d never remarried after his brief early attempt, and, predictably, Polly examined the young women at the club and around town with him in mind, while Agnes made pointed remarks in his presence about the pleasures of solitude.
“Neither of us are having any effect,” Polly observed one day as he drove off.
“Dammit, Polly, you are so right!” Agnes said, with warm exasperation.
The Circumstances had moved off the Point in 1962. There’d been deaths that winter, the town librarian and that odd young relative of the Reeds—Virgil Reed—who had been a source of fascination for her and Agnes right after Agnes’s father died. Virgil and his little girl, Nan, had lived in what they’d always called the Chalet, a cabin by Rock Reed. Agnes had gotten close to Virgil—maybe more. Polly had never known exactly what happened between them. After his death, Nan had been whisked away by relatives and had sadly died herself when she was still a child. Polly had always wondered if there were any connection between that tragedy and the Circumstances’ departure. Perhaps the place felt haunted afterward. She’d never asked Agnes about it. Somehow, the whole topic shimmered with an aura of taboo.
Never mind. The past couldn’t be retrieved, much less fathomed. No more than one could fully know one’s closest friends, or partners…
Even after Hiram had moved farther up Cape Deel, he’d remained attentive. Robert, too, when he took over. But if he lived on Fellowship Point all the time, it would be easier to catch him.
She waited until ten for him to show up, but he didn’t, so she walked home, checked on Dick, and left for town. She had a daily habit of doing her marketing, getting the mail, and maybe having a chat or two if she ran into anyone. She thought of it as her time, which sounded very women’s magazine, but nevertheless. If she said she wanted to be alone, the boys got anxious and found reasons to ride along. But the word shopping made everyone scatter, Dick included. He had a horror of being the man in the store sitting on a settee while the wife tried on dresses. He wouldn’t hold her handbag for her even for a minute.