at the boy with admiration, and the smallest tinge of doubt. ‘Did you make that?’
He nodded. ‘Mum bought me a model. At first I couldn’t understand the instructions and I got a few things wrong, then Mum showed me and I was all right after that.’ He was quick to assure Jasper. ‘I made it all by myself. Honest!’
‘Well, you’ve done a grand job, son. Thank you.’ He took the ship into his hands and examined its every feature. ‘I’ll tell yer what.’ Replacing it, he gave the boy a hug. ‘When yer grow up, I reckon you’ll mek a fine craftsman. I expect you’ll make beautiful objects and travel the world. And I for one will be very proud.’
The boy shook his head. ‘No, Jasper! I want to be a sailor, like you.’
Jasper laughed. ‘You can be whatever yer like, son, as long as yer happy.’
From the doorway, Liz watched them together. She recalled how Robert used to speak to his son in much the same way. Thinking on it now almost broke her heart. How could he have deserted them like that? Time and again she was forced to remind herself of it. Robert deserted her and the boy. How could she ever forgive him?
Coming across the room, she walked into Jasper’s embrace. ‘You look well,’ she said.
He chuckled. ‘You know me,’ he answered, ‘I haven’t got time to be owt else.’
‘The journey wasn’t too tiring, was it?’
‘Not so I noticed.’
‘Did you manage to get anything to eat on the way?’
‘No. I made straight here, lass.’
‘Good! So you must be hungry. I’ve got ham salad. And lemon meringue pie for afterwards. I’ve been saving my coupons specially.’
The old man’s stomach grumbled at the thought. ‘And have yer a suitable drink for an old man who’s travelled miles at yer slightest whim?’ He winked at the boy. ‘I bet yer mam’s forgot what me tipple is.’
She hadn’t forgotten, because when they all trooped downstairs, she poured him a glass of good ale. ‘You enjoy that while I set about getting the meal.’
Raising the glass, Jasper drank her health and that of the boy. ‘I reckon me and the lad will sit in the sunshine awhile, if that’s all right with you?’ he asked.
She nodded. ‘That’s a good idea.’ Her glance was meaningful. ‘We’ll talk later, when you can catch me up with all the news.’
‘Aye, lass.’ He had not forgotten why he was here. ‘I dare say we’ve a lot to talk about.’ At the back of his mind was the knowledge that he was obliged to tell her how Robert was gone for good. It was an unsettling prospect. For the moment, though, he would indulge the boy and do a bit of exploring.
For the next half-hour the two of them roamed the garden. Robbie showed him his favourite tree, complete with tree-house. ‘It was here when we came,’ he explained, ‘but it was falling apart, so I tidied it all up and made a door. When you’re inside, you can shut it and pretend you’re in the middle of the ocean, all on your own.’
‘And is that what you’d like … to be in the middle of the ocean, all on your own?’ The old man had noticed how the boy’s voice trembled, and could only imagine what was going on in his young mind.
The boy looked up at him, his eyes welling up with threatened tears. ‘Why didn’t my daddy come back for me?’ Suddenly the tears fell, and he could say no more.
‘Come here to me, son.’ The old man opened his arms. When the boy clung to him, he spoke softly. ‘Sometimes things happen that we don’t understand. But your daddy loved you, that I do know.’
For a while the boy cried softly, but when Jasper deliberately brought his attention to a pigeon that had settled on the tree-house, he was momentarily diverted. ‘I reckon he’s after some of our breakfast, what do you think?’
The boy was instantly concerned. ‘I’ve got an apple in the tree-house.’
‘How long’s it been there?’
‘Only a week.’ Already his tears were gone, but not the ache in his heart. That was hidden like before.
‘Will it still be crispy, d’yer think?’
‘It might be.’
‘Look, I’ll tell you what,’ the old man suggested. ‘I’m partial to a crispy apple. How about yer fetch it down and we’ll share it?’
‘All right!’ He liked that idea. ‘Why don’t we eat it in the tree-house?’
Jasper gave a cry of horror. ‘What? Yer mean yer want me to climb up there?’
The boy tugged at his sleeve. ‘Come on! It’ll be fun. You can be captain if you like.’
‘Gerraway with yer!’ The old man laughed out loud. ‘If I were half the size, I’d never fit in that little house. Not in a month o’ Sundays, I wouldn’t.’ He made a suggestion. ‘How about if yer show me the rest of the garden?’
Content in the old man’s company, Robbie showed him some old birds’ nests, now deserted, that he had discovered. ‘I like this garden,’ the boy confided as they sat together on the old rustic bench, ‘but I want to come home. I miss the sea.’ A sadness touched his voice. ‘Mummy says we might go back one day, but not yet.’
The old man’s heart was sore. ‘I’m sure yer mammy means to take yer back,’ he promised. ‘Else why would she keep the cottage, eh?’
The boy looked up, his eyes moist with tears but a smile on his face. ‘Yes, that’s right. Mummy told me we still have the cottage. Oh, Jasper, will she take me back? Will she?’
‘That’s summat for your mammy to decide, son.’ He had more sense than to raise the boy’s hopes too high.
Suddenly his heart lurched when the boy asked in all innocence, ‘Then, will Daddy come back?’
Liz’s call that the food was ready spared him from giving an answer. He clambered off the seat. ‘We’d best go,’ he said, feigning excitement. ‘We don’t want to miss that lovely lemon meringue pie, do we, eh?’ He was thankful when the boy readily agreed, seeming to forget for the minute that Jasper had not answered his question.
Liz had decided to set the table in the garden. ‘I thought you’d rather be outside,’ she said. She knew Jasper from old.
‘I don’t mind admitting that I’d rather be outside than in,’ he confessed. ‘I expect it comes of being an old sailor.’
The next few hours were some of the best in the old man’s life.
Liz had prepared a wonderful meal, all set out on a pink tablecloth. There were jugs of cold drinks, plates of crusty bread, and a delicious salad of ham, laid inside large lettuce leaves and surrounded by sliced tomatoes, thin rounds of apple and cucumber.
‘By, lass! This is grand.’ Tucking in, the old man enjoyed every mouth-watering morsel, and when later the lemon meringue pie arrived, it went down a treat. ‘Is that one o’ yer specialities?’ he asked, wiping the last crumb from his beard; she, proud of her cooking, promptly gave him another large helping.
After the meal was cleared away, they went for a walk in the park. ‘Me and Robbie stroll through here often,’ Liz explained. ‘The park belongs to the Duke of Bedford, but you’re allowed to go through, as long as you don’t stray too far from the path.’
The park was huge: a vast, impressive expanse of lake and shrubberies, overhung with huge, ancient rhododendrons that reached into the skies and filled the world with colour. On either side the parkland stretched away for miles, dotted here and there with herds of grazing deer, and in the far distance another shimmering lake danced in the evening sunlight.
‘This