May, 1984 – Portreath, Cornwall

  The damp sand of Portreath Beach—the wider low-tide expanse that caught the noonday sun—was etched with footprints. Some rge, some small; most shod, though a few of the children seemed impervious to the 12-degree water that saturated the sand as they ran back and forth, ughing as they towed kites behind them in their attempts to catch the wind.

  The air was five degrees warmer, but the Force 4 winds—what George Tregowan, former fisherman and now proprietor of Wheale Point Cottage with his wife Mavis, called a moderate breeze—made it feel colder to everyone but Aric.

  He seemed—and in fact was—unaffected by wind or weather as he stood on the heather-dotted north cliff, staring into the strong coastal wind, a faint smile touching his lips as he watched the youthful joy below as his mind repyed some of the events from the st two days.

  “You do realize the van’s for university business, don’t you?” Jeff Weatherby asked, holding the key in his closed hand. Thanks to Ed Martell their department was flush with cash, though those funds were supposed to be reserved for Ed’s research on Quantum Information. Ed Martell didn’t remind his friend and department head that some of the office equipment currently sitting just outside the office they were both standing in was purchased with those funds.

  “This is university business. The st thing you want is for one of my team to make a mistake because they’re tired.”

  Which one of Ed’s team he was quietly referring to was left to Dr. Weatherby’s imagination, which didn’t have to exert itself very much to reach the inevitable conclusion.

  Jeff Weatherby opened his hand and tossed the key to his friend. “Fine. But you’re paying for your own petrol —assuming that’s how you pn to run the van.”

  He’d had a full report from Ed on the power test at Croydon B, and what he’d read was still on his mind.

  Ed Martell’s face adopted a pyful smirk. “Of course it is. How else would we run it?”

  “Oh, get out of my office. Enjoy your long weekend.”

  The van was packed and ready to go by 6AM Friday morning, an hour that some of their team considered ungodly. Aric reminded them that at this time of day only a few years ago he—and the rest of C Troop, 3rd Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment—would be thirty minutes into a five mile run already.

  They reached Exeter by 11 and lunch at a pub with rge windows overlooking the cathedral green. They took the opportunity to stretch their legs afterward, walking along the edge of the green that was lined with shops. They were indistinguishable from the local students and other visitors strolling or sitting on benches. The cathedral dominated the green—its square tower rising slightly higher than the peaked roof of the main building. The structure barely cast any shadow as the sun passed the meridian. The cathedral bells struck the quarter hour when Edith noticed that Aric was no longer with them. It was only a moment ter that she discovered why.

  “Is that someone standing on the tower?” a stranger’s voice asked her companion.

  Edith turned to look. He was only visible for a moment, but it was long enough.

  “Can’t be,” the friend replied. “How would he get there?”

  He flew, she thought as she shook her head.

  “It’s a bad habit, like climbing the highest tree in your yard,” he expined ter as they continued along the A30. “It changes your perspective, seeing something from that elevation. You realize how artificial borders and boundaries are, and that just because we live on different sides of an imaginary line that we’re still just people.”

  “Well, some of those people might have seen you fly up there,” Ed objected. “Some of them did see you standing there.”

  “Only for a second,” Edith said in his defense.

  Aric looked chastened. “I shouldn’t have done it. I apologize.”

  Delphine turned in the seat in front of him and smiled as she reached back to pce her hand on his arm.

  “On ne peut pas s’attendre à ce qu’un oiseau ne vole pas, n’est-ce pas?” she said, which made him smile in return. Can’t expect a bird not to fly, can we?

  If Cornwall had anything, it was cliffs. Some were twice as high as the cathedral tower in Exeter.

  George Tregowan knew them all—which was fortunate, because it was one of the first things Aric asked about after they’d checked in that afternoon. George heard the question, but his eyes stayed fixed on Carol when he replied—a fact she failed to miss.

  “I know this nd like the back of my hand,” George said in his melodic, rolling accent. Anyone looking at the hands in question would have no trouble guessing how he used to—and occasionally still did—earn his living.

  “We’ll need a tour guide, George. Think you can keep up with us?” Carol asked pyfully, eyeing the man she guessed was about her father’s age.

  George’s broad grin lit up the sitting room. “I’ve outrun storms in the Channel, I have. I reckon I can keep up with you lot.” He cpped a hand on her shoulder, which stood proudly at the same height as his own. His eyebrows climbed at the feel of muscle beneath his palm. “You look like you could carry me on your back if I can’t. Rugby, is it?”

  Carol ughed and was about to answer, but was preempted.

  “Ignore him, ss. He gets this way when there’s a pretty girl about.”

  Mavis’s next comment was directed at Aric, whom she’d been eyeing in much the same way her husband had been appraising the other American in the group.

  “Now then, d—do you like treacle tart, or are you more of a ginger biscuit sort of boy?”

  “Ummm...” Aric began, looking sidelong at Edith with a silent plea for rescue.

  Edith’s ughter filled the room. “He likes anything berry-reted, but it’s a bit early in the season for that.”

  Mavis waved the season off with a flick of her hand. “Oh, I’ve got some bckcurrant jam I put up st summer. That’ll do just fine.”

  Personally Alex preferred ginger biscuits, but knew enough to keep that opinion to himself.

  The subtle fragrance of nutmeg and warm sugar rode the afternoon breeze in from the kitchen, mingling with the salt air and the sound of seagulls drifting through the open windows. Low golden sunlight snted across the sitting room, casting soft shadows on stone and floorboards.

  They collected their bags from the entrance way as Mavis gave them a tour of the cottage. The sleeping arrangements consisted of one master bedroom with a double bed, one twin room, two smaller single rooms, an attic nook, and a pull-out sofa.

  “I call dibs for me and Edith,” Carol said, dropping her bag next to the double bed and promptly flopping down on the mattress.

  “Dibs?” Delphine asked as she looked around at other confused faces. “Is that Boston for something?”

  Aric smiled as Edith followed suit, ciming the other side of the bed.

  “It means first come, first served.”

  “Why can’t I call dibs?” Alex asked.

  “Because I already did. If you can wrestle me off the bed, you can have it.”

  “Can I wrestle Edith off the bed instead?”

  “No.”

  Alex considered his odds and sighed. “Fine.”

  In the end, Ed and Delphine took the two single rooms.

  “You and Carlos can have the twin room,” Alex offered Hank. He and Aric had grown close over the past year, but solitude still suited him best. Still, the look Hank gave his former rival for Edith’s affection made it clear that sharing with Carlos was a non-starter.

  “Or,” Alex added quickly, “you can take the pull-out, and Carlos and I can take the twin.”

  “I’ll take the attic,” Aric said. “I’ve slept in worse. It’ll be cozy.”

  “How much worse?” Delphine asked.

  “We were sleeping on the ground once and I woke up to find a rabbit chewing a hole in my sleeping bag. In the middle of winter. The zipper jammed while I was trying to get out of it—so there I was, hopping around in a sleeping bag, chasing a rabbit that thought I was dinner.”

  “That is worse,” Ed Martell said dryly as the image of Aric hopping around in a sleeping bag drew ughter from the room. He didn’t eborate, but during the war he’d slept in a hammock slung above a torpedo tube, surrounded by snoring men and diesel smoke.

  And so the final sleeping arrangements were set: Hank on the pull-out, Carlos and Alex in the twin, Aric in the attic. They had a few hours to explore before dinner.

  Aric was wide awake at midnight, listening to the wind pass through the rafters overhead. Owing to the te sunset, it was just three hours past dusk when he stood up, rexed his body, and calmed his mind—then passed effortlessly through the ceiling and into the open air.

  He was greeted by the full moon, its light bathing everything in tranquil blue. He drifted on invisible celestial winds, coming to rest at the edge of the cliffs. More out of instinct than intent, his preternatural glow shifted to match the wavelengths reflected from the lunar surface. Anyone near the cliffs would have spotted him immediately, but his expanded senses confirmed what he already suspected: for the moment, he was alone.

  He felt Edith stir in her sleep, and he quieted his mind. When she drifted back into the world of dreams, he knew he was safe.

  Delphine was less sensitive to him. Her thoughts—if he were to investigate them—would have embarrassed him.

  She still dreams of me like that, he noted, not without a touch of humility.

  Why should that embarrass me? he thought. I should be fttered. Besides, everyone’s entitled to a fantasy life.

  He loved this time of night. And this setting. Sunrise and sunset over the water were his favorites—something he never got in West Germany, at least not in the parts he’d seen. This was a close second. The sights. The sounds. The tide, which had been high four hours earlier, was well on its way to low. The beach below was once again free of footprints, the damp sand now marked only by what the sea had left behind.

  George had promised to show them the trails and sights the tourists never saw—despite the fact that they were members of that questionable flock. He’d predicted clouds, mild temperatures, and moderate breezes. Cimed all his years on the open water had honed his weather sense. Mavis, serving Aric tea and a bckcurrant tart, had shared the secret: her husband checked the forecast in the local paper.

  Aric made a mental note to visit again. The trip from Surrey would take him less than an hour to fly.

  Thirty six hours ter, Aric stood near the same spot he’d hovered over at midnight. In the hours since that nocturnal visit, George had taken them on the grand tour of Porthtowan and Portreath, following the rugged coastline past cliffs, footpaths, and stories buried deeper than the mines.

  “That white globe in the distance,” George said, pointing along the headnd, “that’s Nancekuke. Used to be a chemical weapons factory.”

  “Used to be?” Ed asked.

  “It was closed a few years ago, when they started disposing of the chemicals.”

  “How did they do that?” Alex asked.

  Almost everyone in the group shared a mental image: men in white suits, carefully loading drums on to armored lorries.

  George shrugged. “They dumped them down the old mine shafts on the site.”

  “You gotta be shittin’ me,” Carol said—any trace of a neutral accent gone, stripped away by pure disbelief.

  George looked momentarily stunned by the outburst, but recovered with a hand over his chest. “God’s honest truth. That section up there’s called Sally’s Bottom. Mines all through that coast. Some were sealed, some weren’t. They used what they had. He turned to face the group, his voice sobering. “Beautiful cliffs. But don’t drink the water there.”

  They walked deliberately from Portreath to Hell’s Mouth, the coastal breeze a steady companion. George stopped them often to point out old smuggling caves or share equally old stories—about men and women who’d either fallen from the cliffs or jumped. A long section of fencing, marked with Samaritan signs, guarded the most well-known suicide site. They stood silently, somberly, taking in the fence and the sign as the wind whipped their hair and clothes.

  A more pleasant, gentler path beside Hell’s Mouth led to the cliffs overlooking the sea caves below and offered a splendid view of the roiling surf as it crashed into jagged rock.

  “It’s beautiful,” Delphine said, summing up in two words what they were all thinking—their spirits slowly recovering from the chill of the warning signs.

  They continued on. George’s knowledge was impressive. Twice on their walk they stopped at a stunning section of cliff dispying magnificent rocks.

  “There’s coves down there, but they're not accessible from up here. Only by boat, and that’s a treacherous stretch that is. Nobody’s been in those coves in years. The st pair that tried it barely survived.

  Edith didn’t need her invisible connection to know what Aric was thinking as his eyes bore into that section of beach far below. He stared at it for a minute before nodding his head ever so slightly.

  Inaccessible for mere mortals, Edith thought, not for Aric.

  They stopped at the Hell’s Mouth Café for tea. Aric and Carol had ice cream instead. Over mugs and cones, George spun tales of being out on the water in every weather condition imaginable.

  Carol, who was increasingly convinced that George was her Cornish father in disguise, was also fairly sure that at least half those stories had grown taller with each retelling. She enjoyed them anyway.

  “I’d pnned to turn back here,” George said, rising from the picnic bench with a creak and a stretch, “but after that fence and those signs, I think we need to go a bit farther west.”

  “What’s farther west?” Edith asked.

  “You’ll see,” George replied, eyes twinkling. “It’s not far.”

  They followed the trail for another fifteen minutes along the cliff’s edge before the beach below came into view.

  “Are those stones?” Hank asked, squinting.

  Carlos leaned forward, hand to brow. “Might be. Smooth ones... white, bck, speckled.”

  “They’re seals!” Carol shouted, voice breaking into joy. “Oh my God!”

  The tone of her voice—and the sheer brilliance of her smile—drew a delighted chuckle from George, who looked for a moment ten years younger.

  “Mutton Cove,” he said simply. “Teemin’ with life. That’s what I wanted you to see. After Hell’s Mouth.”

  Carol brought her hands to her mouth, eyes never leaving the seals below. Then she turned to George and fshed him her thousand-watt grin.

  “Thank you for this.”

  It was chilly. The breeze made it more so. But that didn’t stop George’s heart from quietly melting in his chest.

  “Aye, ss. My distinct pleasure.”

  They left Mutton Cove with their spirits renewed. Everyone seemed reenergized—more chatty—as George guided them south and east along a rising innd path toward Carvannel Downs. The wind picked up as they reached the top, the full expanse of Cornwall unfolding around them in panoramic splendor.

  “Not much on Earth can match this view,” George said with pride, his eyes sweeping across the nd he called home, “let alone beat it.”

  Aric and Edith’s hands instinctively found each other as the ndscape filled their hearts. Edith wasn’t surprised when she felt her free hand taken up by Delphine. Aric’s preternatural warmth, so steady even in the face of the coastal wind, flowed through the three of them—and for a brief moment, both women felt what it was like to be impervious to weather.

  I had to learn that trick quite early when I started flying, Aric’s thoughts brushed theirs. Either that, or shave my head. My hair was a tangled mess.

  No one else understood why Edith and Delphine began ughing in unison while Aric only smiled.

  They began descending the long ridge toward a mile-long stretch of coastline dotted with jagged outcroppings of rock. When they stopped again, George pointed to a shadowy cleft in the cliffs.

  “We call that Ralph’s Cupboard. Named after the smuggler who vanished in there, never seen again. Figure the sea took him. Or maybe he took his loot and figured out a way to disappear. Quiet life after all he’d done probably felt like heaven.”

  “Or as dull as dishwater,” Hank said.

  “One or the other,” Carlos added in his refined voice, drawing a smile from Carol.

  “Another spot only reachable by boat?” Aric asked, summing up the terrain and mentally noting its location.

  George caught the implication, even if he didn’t know how Aric pnned to visit.

  “Don’t even think it, d. It’s a death trap, that is. Plenty of men found that out the hard way.”

  I wouldn’t dream of it, Aric almost replied—which would have been a lie. So he simply nodded, the smile not entirely wiped from his face.

  The only one who had thought to bring a camera was Ed Martell, and he’d come well-equipped: a Minolta X-700 for bck and white and a Canon AE-1 for color, both packed neatly in a soft-sided camera bag which, if Edith’s estimate was accurate, weighed as much as a stone thanks to all the lenses and attachments.

  “At this rate, I’m going to run out of film,” Ed said, checking the indicator on the AE-1 as they walked another rising path back toward the cottage.

  George gave both cameras a once-over before reassuring him.

  “The Cottage shop’s got film—bck and white and color. Got Ilford HP5 Plus for the arty lot and Kodachrome 64 for those that like their world sunny.”

  “I’ll pay for the paper and chemicals if you make me extra prints of anything that’s got Delphine in it,” Hank offered.

  Ed had not been shy about asking the Parisian to pose, which afforded the group the rare treat of watching her shift into her other self—the world-css model. It was almost like watching a theatrical effect in real time.

  “Holy shit,” Alex said in awe, as her posture, expression, and presence shifted like she’d flipped a switch, turning her beauty and allure up by a factor of two.

  They returned to the cottage in the mid-afternoon. Mavis had been on the lookout for them, and had tea already id out for the hungry, windblown wanderers—and her husband. During their absence, she’d taken the opportunity to clean and cook. The dining room smelled of lemon wax and poppy seed cake, a welcome scent that made the long walk feel even more worth it.

  They’d spent the evening together—after a well-earned nap—for which Edith spirited herself up to the attic so she and Aric could snuggle in private. She wasn’t sure, but she’d bet five pounds that Carlos and Carol had done the same.

  They’d spent the entire day together, much as they did at work, but none of them felt the need to separate from the group. George and Mavis had quickly become part of their party—or perhaps it was the other way around.

  In the sitting room, George was proudly showing off a ship in a bottle he’d built in his spare time.

  “That’s an old square bottle I found washed up near Ralph’s Cupboard,” he expined. “Smelled strong of Dutch courage, even after a hundred years buried or bobbing about.”

  Ed Martell, who’d seen bottles like it during his Royal Navy days, still marveled at the precision it must’ve taken.

  Hank couldn’t imagine sitting that still—and paying that much attention—for that long.

  “Choice, George. That’s real craftsmanship,” he said as he nodded approvingly.

  The group split evenly between the sitting room and the kitchen. Carlos and Delphine were animated as they offered Mavis help she in no way needed while she prepared roast mb with root vegetables. A small radio perched on the cupboard pyed The 39 Steps on BBC Radio 4, its clipped voices weaving through the scent of rosemary and lemon wax.

  Both Carlos and Delphine had strong opinions on how best to prepare roast mb—and offered them freely, despite the fact that Mavis’s roast had already been in the oven for half an hour.

  “Slow-roasted leg of mb with herbes de Provence," Delphine said, her eyes distant, mouth watering. “Served with ratatouille or a gratin."

  “No siguis filisteu,” Carlos replied, rolling his eyes. ”Cordero al horno—slow-roasted with white wine, garlic, olive oil, lemon, and rosemary. Served with potatoes, artichokes, and a sofrito-based sauce.”

  “Sounds lovely, both of them,” Mavis said calmly, handing Alex a bottle of red wine and a corkscrew without missing a beat.

  “My mum made mb with mint sauce from a jar and boiled potatoes,” he said, not looking up as he wrestled with the bottle in his hands. “Wasn’t fancy, but it made the house smell like home.”

  Edith hovered in the doorway, one foot in either room. Alex’s words stirred something—a memory of her own mother’s mb recipe, served with mint jelly and steamed carrots, and the smell of it drifting through the house on a Sunday afternoon.

  “Sounds perfect,” she said, her voice soft. Her chest swelled with emotion—and the unmistakable ache of homesickness.