It took them a couple minutes to get settled in the shade of a pine tree on the far side of the house, overlooking the Mary Sue sitting at anchor. “I’m a little surprised you still have her,” Adam said.

“Kinda didn’t want ta get rid of her,” she shrugged. “I mean, Matt an’ I had a lot of good times on that boat. Then, I wanted ta keep ’er around for a while, just in case you told me Brittany was causin’ legal troubles. I figured St. Pierre, bein’ French, could cause more confusion, an’ I got a few relatives there. I finally realized Evan or one of the b’ys could take me there if I really had ta go.”

“Fortunately, it never got that far, and it’s beginning to look like it might not, although never say never. So are you planning on keeping her?”

“Aye, I’m thinkin’ so, at least for a while. Jake’s daughter was after me ta be sellin’ it ta her, an’ I thought about it more than a little. She said what she wanted ta do was ta take it down ta Florida, and maybe on from there. No one’s come right out an’ said it, but I get the feelin’ she wants ta follow in Matt’s and my footsteps, but it’d be a while before she could be gone over the summers. She’s havin’ ta work for her dad ta make it work at all. It ain’t like me an’ Matt, where he had the money ta do it.”

“I heard a little bit about that from Jake and Rachel back at Christmas, but I didn’t know she was thinking about the Mary Sue. But if you decided to sell her, I can’t think of a better person to sell her to.”

“Aye, I was thinkin’ that, too.”

“Mary, do you ever dream about going sailing again?”

“Just about every day,” she sighed. “Matt an’ I had some serious plans for sailin’ around the world, except that we’d decided we needed a bigger boat. We were just getting’ started lookin’ when he got sick again. Maybe someday Matty and I can take a swing at it, but I’m thinkin’ he needs ta be quite a bit older so he can be a real help. I can’t see singlehandin’ a boat with a little kid along.”

“That would be a problem,” he smiled. “Mary, I’d never been on a sailboat until Matt showed me around the Mary Sue back in Frenchtown Harbor, just before he took off on the trip where he met you. Last summer, I got Jake to take me out in their sailboat, the Pixie quite a bit. I think I learned a lot about sailing, although I suspect I’m still a long way from where Matt was. I’m thinking it’s something I’d like to do, follow in Matt’s footsteps a little, maybe not crossing an ocean, but at least getting out a bit. It’s still all a dream, though. I don’t even have a boat. I might get one this summer, and I might not. But other than getting to know you and my grandson a little better, I can’t think of much else I’d like to do. Mary, getting out and living the rest of my life is the legacy Matt gave to me. I don’t want it to go to waste.”

“Can’t argue with that,” she smiled. “It’s somethin’ I learned from him, too. Like I said, I don’t think it’s a good idea ta go out sailin’ like Matt and I did with a wee one, an’ when the time comes I don’t think I want ta do it in the Mary Sue. But maybe in a few years I can start ta teach the lad how much of a sailor his pa really was.”

“I sure hope you do, and I hope I can be a part of it. So you’re saying you want to hang onto the Mary Sue for a while, so you have something to get out sailing with every now and then?”

“Aye, but there’s more to it than that, an’ I doubt ye’ve heard anythin’ about it, ’less Jake has told ye, an’ most a’ it hadn’t happened yet when he was here a year ago. D’ye remember me tellin’ ye about the Yank artist fella that rented my house in th’ summers?”

“Yeah, I seem to recall you mentioning it on a couple different occasions.”

“Well, ’bout the time Jake left last spring, Sinead, the postmistress who rented it for me, got a call from him wantin’ ta rent it again, an’ o’course she had ta tell him Matty and I was livin’ in it. Well, he wasn’t none too happy about that, since it turned out he wanted to set up a summer-long sort of artist’s camp up here, bring in some students an’ teach ’em about paintin’.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Kinda surprised me, too. Turns out Sinead told me he’d often had a guest or two ta do it, an’ he wanted ta expand a little. Turns out he really likes Blanche Tickle, an’ I can’t say as I blame him. So, anyway, Sinead and I got our heads together, an’ decided that it’s money comin’ in ta the village that doesn’t have anythin’ to do wi’ fishin’, an’ it would be a shame ta lose that. Now, it so happens that there have been a few people movin’ out over the last few years, ta St. John’s an’ like that, and there was some houses sittin’ empty that I could buy for almost nothin’. So we called him back up an’ said we could make him a deal on rentin’ him more than one house for th’ summer, just not this one, an’ that turned his day right around. He told us he’d had more people who wanted to come than he had space for, anyway, an’ if he did it, he planned on doin’ it for several years.”

Adam grinned; he could see where this was going. “So you’ve become a real estate tycoon.”

“Well, yeah, except there ain’t no tycoon about it. Sinead and I had ta go in ta the bank in St. John’s ta dip into Matt’s money a little an’ track down some a’ the people that owned the houses, which are all in a little group back towards the post office a ways. I mean, the people were glad I was willin’ ta take them off their hands. Some a’ the houses needed some cleanin’ an’ fixin’ up, but right about then there weren’t many days the b’ys could fish cod, so they were glad ta have the work. So we had people sittin’ out with easels all summer paintin’ everything. Ol’ Tom, down at the store, was just about as happy as a seal in a pack a’ cod for all the money they were bringin’ in, an’ there was some work for some others outa the deal, too.”

“So it worked out well?”

“It worked out real well. I just about paid for those houses wi’ the rents I got last summer, an’ this summer I’ll be takin’ in enough ta cover fixin’ ’em up. I figure I’m still gonna have ta put some money in ta them, but after this year I’ll be pullin’ ahead on that part of th’ game. An’ keepin’ the Mary Sue works inta it a little too.”

“Taking some of those people for boat rides?”

“Aye, an’ more than that. Andrew, the Yank artist fella, well, we talked it over an’ decided that there was more to paint around here than just th’ settlement. So last summer I spent a fair amount a’ time takin’ people other places ta paint. Sometimes it was just for the day, but sometimes they’d take some campin’ gear Andrew bought and I’d leave them in a place for a few days. Did I ever tell ye about Ballycotton Cove?”

“Not that I recall.”

“It’s the settlement where I was born, where I lived wi’ my ma an’ pa until they died. It’s all abandoned and tumbledown now, but some a’ those artist people think it’s a real good place ta do pictures. I’ll bet I hauled a dozen trips out there last summer. It could be done on the fish boats, I suppose, but sometimes the b’ys are out fishin’ an’ ain’t available ta take a trip. ’Sides, mosta those boats smell somethin’ terrible of dead fish. I mean, it doesn’t bother me, I knew that smell from when I was just a wee lass, but some of those artist people, the smell of a fish boat will just about turn them green.”

“I bet,” Adam laughed. “The only fish boats I’ve ever been on are Jake’s, and they don’t smell all that bad.”

“I’ve been on them, too, well, at least the Chinook, an’ it don’t smell at all next ta the real thing. An’ sometimes I’d just take people out sailin’ on th’ Mary Sue just for the sake of goin’ out sailin’, but just about every time I did there were sketch pads and easels all over the place. I’d often tell the folks about some a’ the places Matt an’ I went with ’er, an’ that got a little bit of interest, too.”

“So you wound up making some money with the Mary Sue.”

“Well, not a whole lot, but more’n enough to justify keepin’ her around. Adam, Matt left Matty an’ me a pretty good chunk a’ change, but I could see right off that it wasn’t gonna be enough ta live on forever. I knew I couldn’t go back ta workin’ on fish boats and runnin’ the fuel dock for Sean up there in St. John’s, not an’ have ta take care of Matty, too. I figured I’d better try ta not just live on Matt’s money, but ta use it ta make more money if I could. I figured I could always call on ye if times were to get tight, but I didn’t want ta do that unless I really had ta do it, ’cause I knew somethin’ o’ the troubles ye were havin’ with your wife, an’ it could get sticky for you.”

“I’d have helped out, Mary. And I’m willing to help you out any way I can in the future.”

“Well, when the money from yer pa comes along, I shouldn’t have ta worry about keepin’ the wolf from the door much. See, Adam, I happen ta think that Blanche Tickle is a good place for me ta live, an’ ta raise Matty. I don’t want ta throw the money around, but maybe I can use a little of it ’ere an’ there ta keep it a nice place ta live. This deal wi’ Andrew come out of th’ woodwork, but it’s already helpin’ the settlement keep goin’, so I feel like I did good with that.”

“I think you did, too,” he replied, really impressed with this young woman, not that he hadn’t already been quite impressed with her. She’d always struck him as having a good head on her shoulders, and she’d just proved it once again. He could see she was working several angles with that, and according to her, things were working out very well. And yes, Blanche Tickle might not prove to be a bad place for Matty to grow up, and from what little he’d been able to learn about the active toddler, she was doing a nice job with him. “It’s bound to change the place, which can’t be helped, but it might not change it much, and maybe it’ll help keep the place alive. I can’t fault you for that, not in the slightest.”

“Glad you think so, Adam. Comin’ from you, that means a lot ta me.”

Their conversation was interrupted by a male voice: “An’ how’s the Widda Caldwell today?”

Adam looked up to see Evan – he’d never known his last name – one of Mary’s friends from the village. He’d met him on his trip here years before; he was about Adam’s age, give or take; it was hard to tell. He looked, well, like a Newfoundland fisherman, a bit on the rough-cut side, but Adam knew from meeting him before that he was one of Mary’s best friends, and had a heart as good as gold.

“Oh, doin’ fine, Evan,” Mary smiled. “Ye ’member Adam, don’t ye? Matt’s other pa from the one that was here last year? He was up here ta visit Matt an’ me a few years ago. He came up to visit Matty an’ me for a few days.”

“Aye,” Evan said. “I knew he was comin’ but I saw a strange truck and thought I’d better stop by ta see if everythin’ is all right.”

“Couldn’t be finer, we’re just catchin’ up on each other,” Mary told him. “Ye might’s well pass tha’ word around tha’ b’ys that he’s gonna be here for a few days.”

“Aye, I can do that,” Evan said. “I hope he ain’t bringin’ word of fresh trouble.”

“Naw, only good news so far, ’less he has somethin’ he ain’t told me about yet.”

“It’s yer wife that’s causin’ the trouble for Matty, I take it?” Evan asked.

“Ex-wife,” Adam said. “The divorce was final back around the end of January. I don’t know what she’s up to now, but the safe way to bet it is that she’s not done causing trouble yet. I’d like to think she is, but I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“Well, if ye hear anythin’, be lettin’ Mary know. We been keepin’ an eye on her, but sometimes it ain’t easy.”

“I really appreciate it, Evan. I wish there were more I could do about my ex-wife, but I don’t have a lot of knowledge about what she’s up to. The last time I saw her I got the impression she’d backed off a little, but under the circumstances I can’t be sure. I hate to say it, but that’s pretty much the way it is. And, of course, if there’s any trouble up here, I want to know about it.”

“I don’t doubt Mary will be keepin’ you up on that. I suppose I’d better be gettin’ on. You be enjoyin’ yourself here.”

“I sure plan on it, and thanks for the help you’ve been to Mary.”

“I think she’s worth it, an’ the lad, too. I hope ta be seein’ ye again before ye leave. Mary, ye be takin’ care of yerself, an’ let me know if I can help wi’ anythin’.”

“Shouldn’t be a problem, Evan, but it’s nice a’ya ta ask.”

Matty had been playing around them all the time Mary and Adam had sat in front of the little house talking, but as Evan was around he was starting to wind down. “I suppose it’s time I better go put him down for a nap,” she said. “This’ll only take a few minutes.”

“All right by me,” Adam said. “But it sure has been nice to meet him. I will admit, he does sort of remind me of Matt at that age.”

“Aye, I think he’s goin’ ta take after his pa. There’s one area I hope he doesn’t, but the doc up in St. John’s said it’s a long shot.”

“Having been through it the hard way with Matt, I can tell you I hope he doesn’t take after his father like that,” Adam sighed. “It was tough on all of us, and tough on you, too. I’m sorry it had to happen, Mary. Sorry in more ways than one.”

“Aye, I am too,” she replied, gathering the boy up on her hip to take him inside the little house behind them. “I’m sorry his pa never got ta see him, but at least he knew the boy was comin’ so I guess I’ll have ta make do with that. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

She headed inside to put the little boy down for a while, while Adam just looked back and took in the scene. Blanche Tickle was certainly picturesque; there was no doubt about that, but he’d known it from when he’d been there before. He knew that Brittany would characterize it something like “the ass end of nowhere” if she knew about it, and to a degree she might be right. It was indeed an isolated and quiet place to raise a child, but that didn’t make it bad, at least for now. It might not be the best place for Matty to make a life, and if he had to make a life elsewhere, Blanche Tickle probably wouldn’t be the best place to prepare for it. He was dead sure Brittany would feel that way, and he wasn’t so sure he didn’t share some of those misgivings – but in the end, it wasn’t his choice to make, it was Mary’s. There wasn’t much he could do about it, or wanted to do about it. After all, his main goal ever since the child had been born had been to give her the elbow room to be Matty’s mother, to be able to raise him with a minimum of interference.

Along with that, he could see that this was the place where Mary ought to be. She was home here, and comfortable with it; really, it wasn’t a bad life, just one limited in some ways. Sure, Matty might not enjoy some of the opportunities here that he might in some place that was a little more, well, settled; he hated to use the term “civilized.” At least here people knew each other, were neighbors, helped each other out; that wasn’t the case where he lived. Adam didn’t know the names of the people who lived in the apartments on either side of him. Of his two neighbors at what was now Brittany’s house, he only knew the name of one, and had only talked to the other one once or twice in the several years he lived next door. If that was civilization, maybe this was a better place to be, anyway. Matty could have a worse place to grow up, much worse. But Adam would like him to at least know that he had bigger horizons than this place could offer. There wasn’t much he could do about it now, but it would be an ongoing concern in the years ahead.

But that was in the future, and this was the present. He glanced out at the Mary Sue, riding quietly at its mooring; this was the first time he’d actually seen the boat since Matt had sailed away on it at Frenchtown Harbor just about four years before. A lot had happened in that four years, and the boat had been at the center of most of it. While in a way the boat had taken Matt away from him, in a way it had brought them closer together, too. Just the sight of it there went a long way toward making Adam’s mind up on one thing; at some point, when he had everything together, he was going to be sailing away somewhere too, following as he could in his son’s wake. Maybe not an ocean crossing, or a round-the-world trip like Matt and Mary had been contemplating, but his trip with Jake last fall had taught him, if nothing else, that there were new horizons to be seen closer to home.

Adam was hardly aware of Mary joining him again. “He’s a good baby,” she said. “An’ he was ready for his nap, anyway. He’ll probably be an hour or so, maybe a little longer since he’s a little late.”

“I went through that,” Adam sighed. “It sure seems like a hell of a long time ago. Mary, I don’t know exactly how to say it, but cherish these days, since they won’t last long.”

“Aye,” she smiled. “An’ ye ain’t the first person ta tell me that. So, Adam, what are ye plannin’ on doin’ while you’re here?”

“To tell you the truth, not much. Just get to know you and Matty a little, maybe sort out my thoughts on a few problems. We’ve got to make some arrangements about you receiving that legacy from my father, but that won’t take us much time. Beyond that, well, I was just looking at the Mary Sue there, and thinking that if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, I’d like to go for a ride on her. I told you I did some sailing with Jake and his family last summer, but I’ve never been on that boat, except when Matt showed me around it before he sailed away, a month or so I guess, before he met you. It doesn’t have to be a long sail, but I’d like to at least say I’ve sailed on her.”

“Aye, we can do that. It ain’t been in the water long, an’ there’s a few things I need ta do ta it before the artist people show up, but nothin’ real major. There ain’t no reason we can’t go sailin’ around the harbor maybe, or if we want we could do somethin’ like run up ta Ballycotton Cove.”

“Sounds like a winner to me,” he agreed. “I told you I’ve been thinking about getting a boat, something more on the order of Jake’s Pixie rather than something as cramped as I’ve been told the Mary Sue is. I mean, I think I’m old enough that I’d like to be able to stand up inside the cabin. I really don’t know much more about it than that, except that I know I’m going to have to lean on Jake for advice.”

“I can think of worse people to have ta lean on,” she smiled. “Jake is a good man, an’ I know Matt liked him a lot.” She let out a sigh, and went on. “I don’t know if I should say this, but I will. Back when I first met Matt, he didn’t have a lot of use for ye. I think he lumped ye in with his mother more than a little. But as time went on, he started ta realize how much ye did ta keep his mother off his back, and help him out in his dream, an’ he came ta appreciate ye a lot more. We could never have been able to follow his dream without your help, an’ he was grateful for it.”

“It’s good to know that,” Adam sighed. “I spent a lot of time trying to make peace between Matt and his mother, and without a lot of success. While I was worried about Matt when he sailed off, at the same time I was happy to see him break free. I think meeting you sealed the deal. Mary, you have no idea how thankful I am that it was you who came into Matt’s life.”

“I wish now we could have had more time together, but I can see it wasn’t ta be. Matt was grateful for what he was able to get, an’ I like ta think I helped him enjoy it. He told me right at the beginnin’ that he didn’t know how long he had, an’ it was a fact he always had ta live with. I had ta learn to live with it, too. Right after we got across the Atlantic the first time he gave me the choice of a ticket back ta Newfoundland, or ta stay with him. He said that if I stayed with him there was a good chance it was going to end up unhappy. I’m glad I decided ta stay with him. It ended unhappily, he was right, but I wouldn’t have missed the good times we had for the world. An’ lest ye wonder, that includes havin’ Matty. I just want ta bring up the boy in a way that his pa would be proud of him.”

“I think you’re doing just that, Mary, and I have no doubt that you’ll continue to do it.”

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