Dusk

by Maureen Lee

Genres: General Fiction; Thrillers

Synopsis

As the summer break begins, lifelong friends Norah and Daisy are looking forward to one last summer together. That was until they fall under the spell of charismatic newcomer, Jack Hannay. But as the summer draws to a close, Daisy refuses to accept that it is over. She insists on one last visit to Jack's boat where something so horrific happens that leaves them suffering the effects for years to come…

Release date: June 18, 2015

Publisher: Orion Publishing Group

Print pages: 192

Sample

Chapter 1

NOW

The newspaper cutting was creased, as if it had been crumpled up and thrown away, then retrieved. It was an aerial photograph of Magward’s boatyard from that week’s Tredgarric Standard. The date was yesterday’s, 26 July, 2014.

Norah frowned at the headline. At first it made no sense. MARINA TO BE DEVELOPED – HOUSEBOATS WILL HAVE TO GO. She transferred her gaze to the text beneath.

‘The American-based construction firm, Dram-Ludell, have applied for planning permission to drain and develop Magward’s Marina and erect a hotel complex on the site. The marina, once one of Tredgarric Bay’s main tourist attractions with its picturesque waterside café and bar, has been the subject of much criticism over recent years, not least from this newspaper. The proud boat dwellers have long since departed, and the yard has become an eyesore and a danger to the health of the new residents, particularly the numerous children. Only recently, the police made several drug-related arrests and—

Drain Magward’s!

Norah felt bile rise in her throat. Why had it taken so long for the penny to drop? She closed her eyes briefly, and when she opened them noticed a slip of paper had fallen on to the floor. She picked it up. It was a sheet of writing paper, containing only a few words. There was no signature, but there was no doubt who it was from. The message was written in Daisy’s shaky, childish scrawl.

‘What are we going to do?’ it said.



Norah had breathed a sigh of relief when she’d arrived home and closed the front door behind her. At work, Barney had been in a funny, withdrawn mood for weeks and she was looking forward to a lazy, relaxed weekend catching up on her library books.

The bulb had gone in the hall again. She must tell Mrs Ferguson, though the woman probably already knew and was counting the pennies saved by letting her tenants fumble round in the gloom until she deigned to fit a new bulb, which would be sinister red and all of twenty-five watts. Even when the sun shone at its brightest, the hall was much too dark. Tonight, with black clouds shuddering across a steely grey sky, it was more like winter than July, and the place was cold as well.

Her eyes got used to the dimness until she was able to see the half-dozen letters scattered on the hall table. She held them up against the window one by one, and found the one addressed to her. She put the others back, and began to tear the envelope open as she climbed the stairs.

The tenants in the first floor rooms were home. ‘We are the champions’, Freddie Mercury claimed passionately from one room while Lea Michele sang ‘If you say so’ from the other. Norah could hear the rattle of dishes, the sound of voices, laughter. They must have people in.

In contrast, the second floor was unusually silent. Norah unlocked her door and switched on the light, wincing at the drab wallpaper, the odds and ends of furniture that didn’t match. She hurried across and turned on the pink-shaded lamp next to the single armchair, then switched the main light off. The room softened, became warmer, more inviting. Norah relaxed slightly and, putting the partially opened letter between her teeth, she half-filled the kettle with water. She stood well back when she lit a ring on the ancient cooker which was tucked inside a smoke-stained alcove. A tongue of blue fire threatened to engulf her, before settling into a circle of inadequate orange flames.

She sank into the armchair and read the newspaper cutting and Daisy’s note.

THEN

‘Thank God, I’ll never have to wear this dress again,’ Daisy sang. ‘Or this stupid ribbon.’ She pulled off the white ribbon and flung it into the hedge. Her soft, baby blonde hair fell around her face like curtains. All of a sudden, she looked older, but still nothing like sixteen.

‘That would do for Katy,’ remonstrated Norah. ‘Waste not, want not.’

‘Of course it would,’ Daisy said penitently, unhooking the ribbon off a branch of hawthorne. ‘It’s a good job I’ve got you to keep me in line, Nor. Another minute, and I’ve have ripped off this horrible blue dress and thrown that away too, then I’d have run home in my bra and pants, and there’s not a soul in the world to care any more.’

‘What if Michael found out?’

‘How could he? He’s in Aberdeen earning pots of money for our new house.’ Daisy put her arm around Norah’s waist and squeezed. ‘Oh, Nor! Isn’t our new house wonderful, like a palace?’

‘Particularly the kitchen,’ said Norah. Last weekend she’d helped paint the kitchen walls pale lemon. She smiled. Daisy’s happiness was infectious.

‘A free woman at last!’ This was said with such heartfelt relief that Norah laughed out loud.

‘You’re leaving school, not prison,’ she said. ‘Anyway, you won’t be free for long. In six weeks’ time you’ll be a married woman.’

It seemed incredible, truly incredible, that this child in her blue cotton uniform and white ankle socks, her flat black shoes, would soon be married to Michael and become Mrs Daisy Teverson. Norah said the words aloud. ‘Mrs Daisy Teverson,’ and Daisy looked at her, wide-eyed.

‘Fantastic, isn’t it?’ She hooked her arm through Norah’s, and they walked along in silence, though after a while Daisy said in an awed whisper, ‘Everywhere’s different today, Nor. The atmosphere’s special. The sun’s brighter, the sky bluer, the grass greener. Everything’s larger than life. This is going to be the best summer holiday ever. I can feel it in my bones.’

Norah didn’t answer. Daisy was right. Even if, unlike her, you weren’t getting married in September and were going back to school instead to take A levels, there was an extra-special feeling to the last day of term, particularly in summer when the break was for six whole weeks. There was a tangy freshness in the air, and the smell of flowers she’d never noticed before, despite the fact they’d walked home the same way every day since they were eleven.

A group of boys rushed past, nearly knocking Norah off balance; her satchel fell to the ground.

‘Sorry, Lofty,’ one of them yelled.

‘Don’t take any notice,’ said Daisy quickly, glancing up at her friend’s hurt face. ‘They’re only jealous because they want to be as tall as you.’

Norah picked the satchel up. It felt strangely lightweight; no books, no homework for six weeks, just a project that would entail visiting the library which she didn’t mind a bit. Two girls cycled by and rang their bells. ‘If we don’t see you at the disco tonight, Daisy, we’ll see you at the wedding,’ one shouted.

‘I didn’t know you’d asked them,’ Norah said in surprise.

‘I haven’t, they’re just coming to the church, that’s all. The whole class is coming, even Mr Fortnum said he’d be there, and Mum’s asked Mrs Burke to the reception.’

Mr Fortnum was their fifth year form teacher, Miss Burke the headmistress. ‘What it is to be popular!’ Norah said drily.

They arrived at the point where the hedge bordering the school grounds ended and the road dipped sharply. Tredgarric Bay was spread before them. Norah once said it looked as if the earth had been scooped out with a giant spoon. At this time of the day, twelve thirty, the sun encompassed the five-mile width of the bay, the steep, winding streets, the centuries old lath and plaster cottages with their cherry-red tiled roofs, alongside later, more elegant dwellings, topped with glassy black slate. At the bottom stood St Dominic’s, the parish church, the clock on the steeple blinking like a candle and the polished pewter waves of the English Channel shimmered in the distance.

Both girls paused to admire the view before heading down Deadman’s Hill. To reach their homes, they had to cross the centre of the town and climb halfway up the other side of the bay.

Daisy said softly, ‘This is the last time we’ll see this together, Nor – on our way home from school, I mean. Gosh, I feel sad all of a sudden.’

‘Don’t be sad.’ Norah squeezed Daisy’s tiny hand. ‘Life’s going to be full of partings and goodbyes. This is just the first. You’ll soon get used to them.’

They began to walk down the narrow curved hill, passing white and pastel-coloured painted cottages on either side. The sun glinted on the dark grey brick surface of the road, picking out the occasional shred of flint, making it flash and sparkle as if some munificent, long-dead layer of roads had been so proud of his handiwork that he’d set jewels here and there.

‘Remember when we used to run down?’ said Norah. ‘All the way?’

‘You could always beat the boys. It used to make them so cross.’

A bus laboured up the hill, almost stalling as it chugged around a bend. Norah watched in alarm, half expecting it to give up and start running backwards. Instead, it paused, almost as if it was getting back its breath, and came lumbering towards them, on its way to the school to ferry home those children living in the outlying villages.

‘I’d hate to be the driver of that,’ said Daisy. ‘The kids’ll be really wild on their last day.’

As if to prove her point, emphasise how wild kids got on the day they broke up, half a dozen boys on bikes freewheeled past, their legs spread wide, their faces mad with excitement.

‘Hi, Daisy, Lofty!’ they screamed. After they’d gone, Norah could smell scorched rubber.

They came to the infant school, a single storey red brick building with ‘1863 AD’ etched on the keystone above the main entrance. It was quiet; deserted, except for two cars still parked in the playground. As Norah and Daisy walked past, two women came out, their arms full of papers and books. Both were laughing as they went over to the cars.

‘One of those teachers was Betty Wood,’ said Daisy. ‘Remember, she was head prefect when we started there?’

‘I remember,’ said Norah. ‘She seemed so grown up, yet she was only eleven.’ So grown up, yet now Norah was taller than Betty Wood by several inches, and Daisy was almost a married woman. Norah found the passing of time a source of constant wonderment and unease.

Daisy skipped a few steps. ‘Remember our first day, Nor? Dad took us in the lorry, because Mum hadn’t long had Daniel and she couldn’t go out. I cried all morning, and you were really embarrassed for me. You gave me your clean handkerchief. It was the first time I’d ever seen an ironed handkerchief. Mum has always just thrown them in a box in the airing cupboard straight from the drier.’

Norah remembered distinctly. At playtime, she’d hovered over Daisy, her friend, unsure how to quell the tears, making awkward, five-year-old noises, feeling useless. But then, Norah had always felt awkward and useless. She still did.

‘Will you miss me next term?’ Daisy asked suddenly.

‘You know I will. I’m dreading going back on my own.’ Who would she sit next to at dinner time, hang around with during break, pair off with when they had to do things in twos? She’d done everything with Daisy since they were five. Earlier even, when they were tiny, and her mother had got the job in the hospital and left her with Mrs Burgess.

‘I’ll miss you too,’ Daisy said seriously. ‘I know I’ll be married, I might even have a family soon, but I’ll never have another friend like you, Nor. Never!’ she finished emphatically. She pressed her cheek against Norah’s shoulder. ‘I’m going to miss you as much as you miss me.’

Norah began to make disparaging noises, but Daisy said, ‘Shush, don’t argue. There’s all sorts of things I can tell you that I can’t tell Michael. Dreams and hopes and secrets that belong to us and no one else. I’d feel stupid saying things to Michael I’ve said to you. Girls have very special friendships, don’t you think?’

‘Yes,’ said Norah briefly. She totally agreed, but found it difficult to be so forthright with her feelings. Often, though, within the privacy of her bedroom, the light outside fading, she would whisper to Daisy her own dreams as they lounged on the bed listening to music.

They’d arrived at the centre of town, where the houses were interspersed with expensive restaurants and little exclusive shops; gifts, antiques, jewellery. The streets were full of tourists. Daisy stopped in front of a boutique. ‘Mum hasn’t bought her wedding outfit yet. What do you think of that blue silk suit?’

‘It wouldn’t suit your mum.’ Norah shook her head. ‘It’s too elaborate. Being small, she’d be better with something completely plain.’

‘She’s threatening to wait for the sales. Dad said he’d divorce her if she did. He said no expense must be spared for the wedding of his first child.’ Daisy giggled. ‘They had a huge argument last night.’

‘I know,’ said Norah. ‘We heard.’ She and her mother had smiled at each other as the yells from next door moved from room to room. Cora and Eddie Burgess had a stormy relationship, though their rows more often ended up in bed rather than in tears. Later on, Norah had turned the television volume up to hide the rusty creaking of springs in the front bedroom. That wasn’t the sort of thing she could smile at with her mum.

Deadman’s Hill widened and ended shortly afterwards at the seafront. The channel looked peaceful. Cream-tipped waves rippled gently on to the narrow, stony beach, which was packed with perspiring, red-skinned holiday makers. There was a row of gift shops to their left, the windows full of garish oil paintings of Tredgarric Bay’s hilly, winding streets, plaster replicas of St Dominic’s in the form of ashtrays, egg timers, barometers. On some, the steeple clock actually worked. More goods were displayed on the pavement; beach balls, buckets and spades, lilos, stands of postcards. Lots of people were sitting at the plastic tables outside the Strand Café and inside was packed.

It was hard to imagine, on such a glorious summer day, with scarcely a breath of wind, that in a few months’ time these places would be closed, barricaded with wood or metal shutters against the storms that swept over the front. Norah and Daisy went home by a different route in winter. The front could be dangerous in bad weather, lethal; over the years several people had drowned, swept away by giant waves.

‘Shall we go up the High Street or through Magward’s?’ Daisy enquired.

After about a hundred yards of seafront, the High Street wound upwards. This was the main shopping centre and contained a Woolworths, a small Marks and Spencer and a C & A Modes.

‘You choose,’ Norah said. ‘After all, it’s your last time.’

‘Magward’s,’ Daisy said promptly. ‘We haven’t been for ages. We could buy ourselves a Coca-Cola in the café.’

Tredgarric’s only amusement arcade stood on the corner of the High Street. Daisy peered through the window. ‘We must come during the holiday. There’s my favourite fruit machine, I always win a small fortune on that.’

‘You always lose it too,’ Nora remarked caustically, ‘trying to win another one.’

‘Don’t be such an old grouch – it’s fun.’ Daisy squeezed her arm, and sighed with happiness. ‘Oh, Nor! This is my last school holiday in the world. We’ll do everything. We’ll go to Falmouth and Truro and Penryn, we’ll go to all the discos, the fetes – Mum said the Women’s Institute’s one is next Saturday, and Katy’s guide company is having a Treasure Hunt.’

‘You’ve forgotten, I’m hoping to find a job,’ Norah said quickly. ‘I might be working.’

Daisy’s pretty features crinkled in a frown and she stared at Norah, her round blue eyes full of dismay. Then she said slyly, ‘Your mum won’t let you. It will put you at a disadvantage with me and you know she’ll never stand for that.’

She was almost certainly right, Norah conceded inwardly. She was an only child, her mother widowed shortly after she was born. Norah was two when they moved into the cottage next to the Burgesses, and Mrs Reilly had striven hard to ensure that her daughter never went without a single thing that had been provided for the daughter of her neighbours. If Daisy went to Paris on a school trip, then Norah would go too. If Daisy got a bicycle, Norah was bought one of equal quality at the very first opportunity, even if it meant Mrs Reilly working overtime at the hospital where she was a nursing auxilliary.

Daisy might be thick as far as lessons were concerned, Norah thought ruefully, but she had a canny feel for human nature.

The ground on their left began to curve upwards, a low white cliff dotted with wild flowers. The beach had petered out and several children were scampering over the rocks, or fishing with cheap nets in the little pools between. A narrow, man-made path had been forged between the rocks and the soaring cliff, and as they made their way along the slippery, moss-covered surface, Norah thought about the boatbuilders – Daisy’s grandfather had been one – who, until just before the Second World War, had had to make their way along this treacherous path in all weathers to work in Magward’s. Either that, or come down The Steps, equally dangerous. She said as much to Daisy.

‘Grandad said it kept him fit,’ Daisy answered. ‘He was really contemptuous when the council provided a handrail for The Steps. He said it didn’t do to make things too easy for people.’

A few minutes later they came to Magward’s Marina. If Tredgarric Bay had been scooped out with a giant spoon, then a smaller one had formed this little inlet; a precise circle of water. The link to the English Channel was long and narrow, barely twelve feet wide, so that seen from above it looked like a bulbous bottle with a slender neck. About twenty-five houseboats were moored there with little more than a yard or so between each. Most of the boat owners pandered to the tourists who wandered inside the marina by repainting their craft annually in the most outlandish and unseamanlike of colours: pinks and purples, vivid blues and yellows. The entire marina was bordered by willow trees, a trailing, leafy curtain. Norah stopped for a moment, impressed. The old boatyard had rarely looked so pretty.

‘Just look at that one!’ Daisy pointed to a barge with its planks painted alternately cream and pink.

The water was deep here, though the sea swell was gentle and the boats scarcely moved as tiny waves lapped against the hulls. Most of the inhabitants made up for their lack of a garden by filling the scrubbed decks with pots, shrubs and flowers, even small trees, and sets of plastic or wrought-iron furniture, including the occasional parasol.

Norah and Daisy walked along the crumbling concrete path, past the boats and towards the café, a whitewashed wooden shack next to the sandstone house that had once been the home of the long-deceased Albert Magward, when genuine, seagoing fishing boats had been built in the yard. The house was now a pub, and the open shed in which the builders had worked had been demolished to make a garden. In summer, the pub was packed with boat dwellers and visitors, the latter attracted by the picturesque setting. Norah noticed there were even more tables outside this year to cope with the ever-increasing trade.

‘Hello, Norah, Daisy!’ An elderly woman appeared out of the cabin of an ex-motor torpedo boat. She wore a sleeveless T-shirt and baggy khaki shorts. Her leathery skin was burnt nutmeg brown.

‘Miss Mason! I thought you’d already gone,’ said Daisy in surprise. ‘I expected you’d be halfway round the world by now.’

‘Not yet, dear. I decided to wait for your wedding.’ The old woman climbed up the steps outside the cabin on to the deck and leapt with surprising agility on to the path beside them.

‘You didn’t! Not really!’ Daisy blushed.

Miss Mason had taught them in infant school. She had retired before they left and was always pleased to see any of her old pupils. She put a wrinkled, claw-like hand on Daisy’s golden arm. ‘I’m joking, dear. The boat sale is taking much longer than expected – solicitors!’ She made a face. ‘I’ve no intention of leaving until the money’s safely in the bank, so if I’m still around in September, I’ll be at the church with a bag of confetti to wish you luck.’

‘I’ll keep an eye out for you,’ promised Daisy.

‘My dear girl, you won’t have eyes for anyone exceept your lovely young man.’ Miss Mason laughed and turned to Norah. ‘How did your GCSEs go? I understand you took a record number, ten was it?’

‘Eleven,’ said Norah. ‘I did well in most, I think, but I’m hopeless with science subjects. I’m sure I’ll have failed Chemistry and Physics.’

‘Well, good luck to you, my dear. I suppose you’ll be off to university in two years’ time. Still want to be a writer?’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Norah fervently. ‘Desperately.’

‘Well, if you want something badly enough, you’ll get it,’ Miss Mason said emphatically. ‘I’ve always wanted to go on a round the world cruise, but never dreamed I could afford it. And now suddenly Magward’s is a very desirable place to live, and my boat is worth a small fortune. I’m managing to pay for my cruise, and have enough left over to buy a little house in Cheshire in the village where I was born.’

Norah had already noticed two houseboats with ‘For Sale’ signs. People bought them at this time of year when the weather was mild, little realising how raw and bleak the winters could be, though sev. . .