The House at Mermaid's Cove(81)

“You were on your way back to Ireland, to your motherhouse?”

“Yes. But I didn’t want to go—I knew that, even before the ship was hit.”

“Do they know what happened to you?”

I stared at my feet. There was no hint of accusation in her voice, nothing judgmental in what she had said. But under her gaze I felt like an utter hypocrite. I thought about the things I’d said to Jack—how I’d berated him for not owning up to being Ned’s father. How could I have done that when I hadn’t even had the guts to tell the nuns in Dublin that I’d survived the shipwreck?

“I accuse myself of dishonesty, Reverend Mother.” Even in French, the words had such familiarity. I had slipped back into the discipline of the mea culpa without even realizing it. My face burned with humiliation. I was expecting a penance to be pronounced—foolish, as I was no longer a nun. But what she said to me was quite different from that. She asked me if I’d lost my faith.

I tried to swallow down the choking feeling in my throat. “N . . . no—I’ve never stopped believing.”

“Do you think that God sent you to Cornwall?”

“I . . . I don’t know . . .” I faltered. “I told myself that he wouldn’t have saved me from drowning unless he had some other purpose for me. I prayed for guidance. And . . . then I was asked to do this secret work.”

She was silent for a moment. I wondered if she was praying, too: for the right words for someone who had rejected everything she represented. “You have many fine qualities,” she said at last. “You are courageous. You put your own life at risk to keep that young woman safe. And you are kind and caring—the sisters at the infirmary have seen that. But you will never be at peace with yourself until you put right the wrong you have done.”

Tears pricked the back of my eyes. “How can I do that? They think I’m dead.” I knew in my heart that even if it had been physically possible—if a ship had magically appeared in Lannion harbor, willing and able to transport me to Ireland—I would have said no. I would have begged them to take me to Cornwall instead.

“If you wish, I will write to the Mother Superior in Dublin when you have left us. I will lay out the facts as you have related them to me. I’ll tell her to expect a letter from you in due course.”

“Th . . . that would be . . .” My voice died, overcome by her compassion.

“It would be the first step,” she said. “What happens after that will be up to you.”

I nodded, coughing to clear my throat. “But is it possible for you to send a letter? I thought . . .”

“To a neutral country, yes. It might be opened, of course, but I’ll be careful not to include any information that would put you or the work you do at risk.”

She stood up and came around the desk to where I was sitting. She laid her hand on my head and said: “Seigneur Dieu, bénis ta fille et donne la paix.” Lord God, bless your daughter and give her peace.

I couldn’t help myself then: the words released all the pent-up emotion of the past weeks and months. Tears streamed down my face.



In the days that followed I worked in the infirmary, went to chapel, ate my meals with the nuns, and behaved, in every respect, as if I’d never left the religious life. But often, as I was washing one of the elderly patients or reciting the familiar words of a psalm or a prayer, I would be hundreds of miles away, walking beneath towering stands of bamboo, ducking under the clustered blossoms of rhododendrons, and running my fingers over the furry trunks of tree ferns. I would be chasing Ned through the churchyard, or walking alongside Jack, with Brock sniffing at my heels. Sometimes it would be early morning, and I would be sitting alone outside the boathouse, throwing crumbs to the tame robin and listening to the whisper of the waves. And other times it would be dark, with stars pricking the sky like pins in purple velvet, and Jack would be lying beside me on a blanket on the sand.

Each night, on my way to bed, I would glance out of the dormitory window, searching for the moon. I watched it wax to full, then lost sight of it as it waned to a quarter, rising too late to be visible at bedtime. I was counting the days—only a week now—until it disappeared completely. I pictured Jack piloting the motor launch from its hiding place in one of the creeks along the Helford River, bringing it round to the jetty where the agents would be waiting, and blind George Retallack standing in the shadows of the schoolhouse, listening for the signal to untie the rope.

I’d hoped for a communication of some kind—confirmation that Jack had received my message. But as the days wore on and nothing came, I told myself that he would have thought it too dangerous for the Resistance to make direct contact with the convent. I knew the window of time when La Coquille would be able to return to Brittany, and where the dinghy would come ashore. All I had to do was be there.



Two days before the new moon, Mère de Saint-Philippe summoned me to her office. This time there was no hint of a smile on her face: her eyes were glacial. She motioned me to sit down. Then she reached into a drawer and pulled out a sheet of newsprint. Without a word she pushed it across the desk.

It was the front page of L’Heure Bretonne—the regional newspaper. There was a grainy image of a boat beneath the headline: “La voie d’évacuation secrète.” Secret Escape Route Exposed.