Serena's POV
"Forgive me," says Augustus. "I came to see that the dinghy was secure. The storm."
He's smiling. His umbrella drips on the floorboards. He looks like a kindly vicar who has walked in on a courting couple in a church porch.
Dominic has stepped between us.
I don't know when. I'm still standing exactly where he left me, with his jacket round my shoulders and my mouth burning. He's a black shape against the lamp, and his back is rigid as an iron bar.
"Augustus."
"Dom."
"You might have knocked."
"I'm so sorry. It's an old habit, this house." Brandt chuckles. "I'm afraid I've been walking into this boathouse for fifty years. Your father kept the good brandy in that cupboard, and he'd have my hide."
"It's private."
"Of course. Of course it is." He lowers the umbrella, and shakes it, and stands it in the corner. His brown eyes slide over Dominic's shoulder and rest, warm and interested, on my face. "Ms Lowell. You're drenched. We can't have you catching a chill."
"I'm fine, thank you."
"You're a brave woman. I'd have hated to be out in that." He pauses. "Dominic, my dear fellow. There's no need to look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"As if I'd caught you at something shameful." He lays a hand on his heart. "A man deserves a little happiness. God knows you've gone without. I'd be the last to stand in your way."
The lantern hisses.
I think: He's very good.
I think: He wants us to know he saw.
"Thank you," says Dominic, in a voice like cold iron.
"Now. The guests are in a state. Tessa's made tea and Caleb's opened the whisky, which tells you everything. Shall we go up?"
He holds out his arm.
To me.
I look at it.
A sleeve of black oilskin. A hand liver-spotted, thin, steady as a rock. The hand that signed my father's dismissal.
I take it.
I have to.
"You're so kind," I say, in Vera's husky rasp.
"The pleasure," says Augustus Brandt, "is entirely mine."
***
Dinner is a nightmare.
Twelve people at a long mahogany table. Candles. Silver. Rain streaming down the dark windows like a hundred thin ghosts. Tessa has barely touched her plate. Caleb is on his fourth whisky, and the fifth is on its way. Vance sits at the end with his hands folded, saying nothing, looking at everything.
Dominic is at the head, with me on his left.
He doesn't look at me.
I can feel exactly where he's looking. It's a talent. Two inches of air between us, humming like a plucked string.
"A toast," says Augustus, rising, at the end of the soup.
Chairs scrape. Glasses lift.
"To the dead. And to the living." His eyes sweep the table, and I swear they stop on mine. "To new beginnings. May they come when they're least expected."
Hear, hear.
I drink.
I don't taste it.
Afterwards, in the long gallery that leads to the drawing room, an old hand lays itself on my sleeve.
"Ms Lowell. A word."
I turn.
He's very close. He smells of Pears soap and brandy. In the lamplight, his face is all hollows and kind creases, and his eyes are enormous.
"Of course, Mr Brandt."
"Augustus."
"Augustus."
"I wonder if you'd walk with me tomorrow morning." He lowers his voice. "Early. Six. Down to the old herring weir. It's very beautiful at that hour."
"Is it?"
"I have something to tell you about a man named Walter Quinn."
I don't breathe.
Behind us, in the drawing room, someone laughs. Glasses chime.
"I've heard about Quinn," I say carefully. "From the files."
"The files lie." His smile is gentle, sad. "I've an idea you already suspect that. You and your friend, Ms Park."
The whole gallery tilts.
"I don't..."
"My dear girl, don't." He pats my hand. "I'm an old man. I'm not a fool. I know who holds the notes. I know she's a woman, I know she's clever, I know she has a quiet little accountant in Queens. I've known for some time."
"How?"
"I'd tell you, but I'd rather not spoil the walk." He sighs. "Six o'clock. Wear sensible shoes."
He moves away.
I stand there with a heart like a dropped glass.
He knows I'm the principal.
How long has he known?
Does he know the rest?
"Vera?"
I turn so fast I almost fall.
Dominic. Cool, composed, holding two glasses of wine. His eyes search my face and see everything.
"What did he say?"
"Nothing."
"Vera."
"He asked me to walk with him in the morning."
"No."
"Dominic..."
"No." It's very quiet, very flat. "Not alone. Not at that hour. Not at the weir."
"I can look after myself."
"I'm sure you can."
"Then..."
"I'm asking you to let me come."
I look at him.
He's the most controlled man I've ever known, and he's gripping a wine glass so hard that the stem is trembling.
"Please," he says.
It's the second time I've heard him say it.
My throat closes.
"I'll think about it," I say.
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I've got."
I take the glass from his hand.
I don't drink. I just hold it, and for a second our fingers touch, and a spark runs up my arm like a lit fuse.
"About what happened in the boathouse," I begin.
"Don't."
"I only..."
"Please don't tell me it was a mistake."
"I wasn't going to."
His eyes flare.
"I was going to say," I whisper, "I'm not sorry."
He closes his eyes.
When he opens them again, the whole of the gallery has disappeared. The portraits. The candles. The rain. There's only a man, a woman, and an inch of lamp-lit air.
"Go to bed, Vera," he says, hoarsely. "Before I do something unforgivable."
I go.
***
I lie awake until midnight.
The blue room is on the east side of the house, under the eaves. A cold narrow bed. A wardrobe that smells of lavender. A window that rattles in every gust. I know the room.
I once painted it.
The wallpaper is the same. A fading trellis of roses and wrens.
At twenty past twelve, I give up and go down for water.
The house is dark. The storm has dropped to a hush, a long sigh against the shutters. I pad along the passage in my socks, past the drawing room, past the library, and stop.
A strip of light under the study door.
Voices.
"...can't keep doing this, Caleb."
Dominic. Low and rough.
"I know."
"You're drunk."
"I'm always drunk. It's practically my profession."
"Caleb."
"It's the date, Dom. It always does this. I get through the year and then it's the fourteenth of October and I can't breathe." Glass on wood. A shaky laugh. "And now you've got a girl who looks at you like she's seen the moon, and I think, he's allowed. And I'm so damn happy for you. And I want to put my fist through a wall."
"Why?"
"Because I'm the reason she died."
I stop.
My hand is on the doorframe.
"Don't say that."
"It's true."
"Caleb."
"It's true, and I've never told you, and I can't keep it any longer." His voice cracks like a boy's. "There was a bottle. Krug. You remember. In the aft cabin."
"I remember."
"You said you didn't send it."
"I didn't."
"I know," says Caleb, with great weariness. "Because I did."
The silence is very large.
"Edmund gave it to me. On the foredeck. At nine. He said it was from you, for Serena, a surprise. A little anniversary gift." A rattling breath. "He said, Take it down to her, would you, Caleb? Dom wants it chilled. So I did."
"You..."
"I carried it down myself, Dom."
My knees give way.
I slide down the wall.
"I carried it down," says my brother, in a voice that sounds as if it's coming from the bottom of the sea. "I put it on her pillow. She said thank you. She kissed my cheek. I was on the foredeck with a drink in my hand when it went up, and I've been carrying that bottle ever since."