David and Ingrid had been right, Cecelia reflected. It was dawn to dusk hard work, making a living here in this new home, but she knew she was making a difference to them both. They’d even managed to build another small room on the house, as a bedroom for her and Ingrid.
“So,” David asked her, as they worked in the garden together. “No regrets?”
“None! This is so much better than helping Bella with her babies – did I tell you she’s pregnant again!”
“Well, we’re glad to have you! And it’s nice for Ingrid to have a bit of female company – especially after that fright she had up at the fishing hole.”
Ingrid hadn’t gone back there – she’d taken to fishing by the old mill. Which was beginning to look positively dangerous. One good storm, and it would fall down completely. Now she told herself she was being stupid, and she should go back. Resolutely, she picked up her rod and set off.
Seen by daylight, it was still pretty scary. The ground was blackened, a tree had become a blackened skeleton of its former self, and a huge stone lay in a deep hollow. No wonder she’d been knocked off her feet!
There were other lumps of rock scattered nearby as well.
“It’s not going to happen twice,” Ingrid thought. “And this is a good fishing spot.”
She picked up her rod and began casting.
David was on his way to the fishing hole high in the hills, but he paused at the graveyard on his way past. Ade and Jacob had both died recently, and Hannah, Jake and Jon had sailed off in Waverider a little sadly.
Cecelia had gone to visit the household, partly to make sure that they were all right. Her Aunt Janet greeted her with pleasure – though Cecelia was struck by how old Janet was looking now.
Anders was pleased to see her too – it was funny how she didn’t mind him talking about his children, it was just Bella who annoyed her. She remembered the other half of her errand as well – could they have some cuttings from their plants as they wanted to extend their garden? And wasn’t it exciting, Jon going off on Wavereider?
Sal greeted Cecelia affectionately.
“It’s been way too long since I’ve seen you. Tell me how things are going. I keep meaning to come over and see, but everything’s so busy here.”
Cecelia picked up little Sarah and tickled her until she squealed with delight, as she filled Sal in on the progress she and Ingrid and David were making.
Sal listened, interested, paused to answer an urgent query from Rachel, and then decided to ask Cecelia something a bit more personal.
“Cecelia, you’re really good with Sarah. What do you find so hard about Bella’s children?”
Cecelia thought for a bit. What was it that she minded?
“She shuts me out. It’s her and Patrick and her children, and I’m not a person any more. It’s as though she’s stopped being my sister, and she’s just turned into a Mother and Wife.”
“Hmmm. That is a tricky one,” Sal admitted. “I don’t know how you tackle that.”
Then Rachel demanded Cecelia’s attention, and chased her round until Cecelia was exhausted. Then the others headed out of the garden and into the house to eat, and Cecelia set off home, promising to come back and collect the plants and cuttings when they were ready.
“Or I’ll try and bring them over,” Sal said. “I would like to see how you’re getting on.”
“So we can have plenty of stuff from their garden in a week or two’s time,” Cecelia told the others. “We just need to make space for them.”
“Do you know, I think we’re the only household on the island eating like this now – outside, under the stars.”
“We are! But one day we’ll have a stove as well – and a table and chairs…”
“And all the brambles cleared away, and the house looking less like a storage hut!”
“And much quicker for your help, Cecelia. I’m sorry that you and Bella aren’t as close as you used to be – and yes, I do think it’s mostly her fault. But I’m not sorry you came here to live with us, not at all!”
Bella couldn’t understand why Cecelia was being so odd with her! She sat in the sunshine, playing with Morag and happily pregnant again.
Her parents and husband were busy working in the garden while she tended to the children. Bella, wrapped up in her domestic joys, hadn’t realised how much older her parents were looking now. But Joshua and Brigit were beginning to feel their age, and Patrick had noticed, and was trying to spare them as much of the hard work as he could.
Bella’s third child was a boy this time – Callum. She cuddled him, sang to him, and laid him down in his new crib, as the stars came out beyond the windows.
With Jon away on Waverider, there was more work for the rest of them to do. But Astrid paused one day to talk to Ben about what had been on her mind ever since Hannah had come and told them that the war was over.
“Do you think we should leave the island?”
“I don’t know. We’re making a living here – nicely, now that the wine’s selling. But….”
Ben paused.
“But. That’s what I keep thinking. But – there might be so much more for the boys – far all the children – in Istria, instead of here. Sautach’s still out of the question, from all that Hannah said, but Istria – that might be a possibility.”
And the thought kept coming back to both their minds. With Jon gone, Barnabas was learning to make the wine that was slowly bringing them a degree of prosperity, but his heart wasn’t in it as Jon’s was, and they all knew that.
Ben, watching and encouraging Barnabas, was thinking again about leaving. They could set up another vineyard in Istria, himself and Jon – and Tobias and Barnabas would have more freedom of choice. But – he would be so sorry to leave this island; he loved it so well. It was a hard choice to make.
Jon had gone away a boy, and come back a man grown. Astrid, dashing to hug him as she saw him coming towards the house, couldn’t believe the change in him!
Ben came running too, feeling the hard muscle Jon had acquired in his voyage as they embraced.
Jon hadn’t come home alone! He’d brought another family with him to the island. Maria had come with him to his parents’ house – the rest of the family were with Sal and Anders. Ben and Astrid listened to Maria’s story with interest and some disquiet.
“Oh the war is over yes – officially, at any rate. But the after-effects – they are still with us. My name is Maria Luigli, and I’m from Istria – we had a little farm just outside the port, me and my husband Carlo. And our son was Istrian too, though his wife was from Sautach.”
Ben had a bad feeling about her use of the past tense.
“The more Sautach attacked and persecuted Istrians, the worse it got. Until my daughter-in-law didn’t dare to leave the house except after dark. She looked so typically Sautach, you see. Then, right at the end of the war, our farm was attacked by a handful of Sautach soldiers, in one of the last raids.”
Her eyes filled with tears, and she blinked them away. “Carlo and I got the children away into the woods in time – we saw them coming. But Marco and Liesel got caught in the fighting. Marco was killed by a Sautach soldier, and Liesel by an Istrian one – by someone who had once been our neighbour and friend.”
This might have been himself and Astrid. Ben began to see why Jon had given this family passage to the island.
“The farm was too much for us to manage on our own – and some of the neighbours were beginning to look at the grandchildren and mutter things about them. Istria is no longer the happy place it once was.”
“We can’t promise you an easy life here. But we can promise you a peaceful one. But we’d been wondering about leaving the island – now, from what you say, it doesn’t seem like such a good idea.”
“Nowhere and nothing seems safe any more. The war went on for so long – and so much blood has been spilt, so much bad feeling generated. If here is peaceful, I would stay here. If you can make a living in peace, why seek greater wealth where there is turmoil?”
Now Astrid began to understand why her eldest son looked so grown up.
“Jon. Tell us what you think.”
“Maria’s right. I found the family nearly starving! Istria’s no place for us – we don’t look Istrian enough. You’d probably get stoned in the street at the moment. Funny, isn’t it – Nell and Jon came here right at the start of all this, because Nell was Istrian, in Sautach, and now we can’t go to Istria because we’re not Istrian enough.”
Jon leant forward and faced Maria.
“Stay here with us. We can all gain from what you and Carlo can teach us. And the children can grow up in peace, without having to beg for food, and unafraid. We’ll all help you build a house, and you can make a garden again.” “Thank you,” Maria said. It was her only word, but it spoke volumes.
Over breakfast the next morning, they planned how to help Maria and Carlo and the rest of the family.
“House first,” Ben said. “Anders will help too – not Sal, while she’s so heavily pregnant. But David, Ingrid and Cecelia will too. And Patrick. Joshua and Brigit aren’t up to this sort of heavy work any more”
“And Cecelia’s got another baby,” Barnabas added.
“So another ruined home will become lived in again,” Astrid said with pleasure. “Which one will be best?”
Carlo and Maria chose a plot where there were still a couple of stone walls standing. The others were a bit surprised – it didn’t have the best view, nor the most promising garden area, but everyone set to with a will to clear the rubble away and begin building.
With so many helpers, it didn’t take long to build a serviceable house for the family. Timber was easy to come by – “And as time goes on, we’ll be able to build something better for you,” Jon assured them – as was thatch for the roof.
The inside was nothing fancy – the children would have to sleep in the living room – but they would all be warm enough, and dry, and that was the main thing. What fascinated everybody was the oven Maria and Carlo built against the old stone walls – and now everyone could see why this was the plot that the Luiglis had wanted to build on. The oven, and the store of seeds that Maria had brought with her from their farm in Istria.
Maria knew ways of cooking that none of them had ever heard of! It wasn’t long before she was teaching everyone on the island new recipes, and new cooking methods. Any fears that she might not have anything to contribute to life on the island quickly faded away after the first few weeks, and Maria began to feel both safe and happy once again.
“You did right and well to bring them here, Jon,” Ben said to his son.
“And for more reasons than one,” Astrid added. “Your father and I had been beginning to wonder if we should leave the island, go back to Istria. But from the little I’ve heard so far from Maria and Carlo, that would have been such a mistake.”
“So we’re staying. And we want to pass this fledgling wine business on to one of you to run.”
“Jon.” Tobias and Barnabas both spoke at once. “It has to be Jon. He loves it, and neither of us do.”
Astrid and Ben sighed with relief. This was what they’d both thought, but to have Tobias and Barnabas agree was deeply comforting. And Jon blushed, but knew in his heart that the rest of his family were right. He was the one who could – and would - carry on with love and passion.
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