After the Crash by Emma Davies

Author:Emma Davies [Davies, Emma]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Women, Family Life, General, Romance, Contemporary, Literary, Small Town & Rural, Clean & Wholesome, Holiday, Holidays
ISBN: 9781800194274
Published: 2021-03-16T00:00:00+00:00

14

I’m still trying to process what I’m looking at when I spy something else lying on the floor. Just to the side of a hurricane lamp is a tray onto which handfuls of shells have been scattered. Beside that is a cloth tote bag, bulging at the bottom, and I know that inside are what could be thousands more shells. And it’s suddenly very clear what Isaac has been doing.

‘You made this?’ I ask, looking around me in wonder. ‘It’s incredible, I can’t believe it’s here.’

‘No. Not me. But that was my first thought too,’ replies Isaac. ‘I couldn’t conceive that it was here, or understand why it had been done in the first place. I just knew it was the most wonderful thing I’d ever seen, and knowing that no one else knew about it made it all the more special.’

I’m confused. ‘So you found it? Is that what you’re saying?’

Isaac nods. ‘A little over six months ago. At about the same time I started the sand drawings. As you know, I store the tools in another cave, much smaller than this, but it made me suspect that if there was one cave here, then there could be several. I have no idea what made me think of doing it, but one day I just decided to start looking.’ He pauses and slides me a sideways glance. ‘Humour me, but I like to think that maybe it was Elliot’s guiding hand.’

My eyes have been following a particularly intricate pattern which extends up one wall and right across the ceiling, but I stop to stare at him. Guiding hand…

‘Or you got lucky,’ I suggest. ‘But you’re saying this is Elliot’s cave. How on earth do you know that?’

‘I don’t. But it seems the most logical explanation. Once I’d got over the shock of finding it, I examined the way the thing had been put together. I’m not an expert but I don’t think this grotto has been here all that long. Decorating with shells was popular in Victorian times, but if that were the case then surely people would know this was here. It would be a tourist attraction, or preserved or… something. Not abandoned and forgotten. No, I don’t think anyone knew about this in the first place, only the person who made it, and I think that person was Elliot. He’s the only one who had any real connection with this beach and, by all accounts, he was quite a quirky individual. I think you’d need to be to even contemplate starting something like this. As for why he did it, that’s possibly easier to answer.’

‘Go on…’

‘Have you ever been for a walk and collected something to bring home? I don’t know, a shiny conker, a cluster of acorns, a feather?’

‘Yes, all the time.’ I smile at the memory. ‘My husband could never understand it. He used to say it was only for people who like to hoard stuff and clutter their houses with junk and—’ I break off, surprised by my sudden reference to William.

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