“It’s darned chilly out here without jackets, honey. Let’s talk about all this back in the room. Better yet, we could go into the dining room and settle the seafaring history of Cape Elizabeth over a cup of hot coffee and dessert.”
Mark was beginning to unwind, and he knew that he had been working too hard. There never seemed to be any time left over for themselves. They went to bed about ten o’clock, but he was unable to sleep. He always liked to walk while he thought about problems, and he was tempted to do so now, but where? At eleven o’clock he got out of bed, pulled on a pair of chinos, a shirt, and his hooded red anorak. On an impulse, he decided to go down to the ocean.
“What are you doing?” murmured Lydia sleepily.
“Dressing. I just want to walk for a while.”
“Want me to come, too?”
“I won’t be long. Why don’t you go back to sleep?”
She closed her eyes.
The noise of the surf drowned out the sound of his footsteps on the board-walk. A heavy sea was running, and fog swirled over the dark, turbulent water. He felt its mist on his face. Mark was not much happier walking than he had been in bed trying to sleep. What time was it? Almost midnight, he thought. Lydia would be worried if he was gone too long. It was while he was trying to wipe off his glasses and check the luminous dial of his watch that he heard it: A sharp crack, followed by the noisy wrench of shattering spars and timbers. For a few seconds there was complete silence.
Then the night was rent by a woman’s screams. They came from across the water but not far from shore. Loud shrieks floated toward him—those of women and children, their voices full of terror, and the hoarse shouts of men. Mark strained his eyes staring out to sea. He thought that he could pick out a dark mass silhouetted dimly between billows of mist. His heart was pounding. A ship had struck Watt’s Ledge! It was in the direction of Richmond Island, and the calls for help were terrible to hear.
Mark raced across the sand to summon help. As he ran, he heard one last piercing cry from the direction of the water—the voice of a young woman. When he reached the boardwalk he almost collided with a shadowy, hooded figure.
“We’ve got to get help!” he shouted breathlessly to whoever it was. But the figure moved to block his way. He tried to push past when suddenly the beam of a light almost blinded him.
“Mark! It’s me.”
Lydia was standing with a raincoat over her gown, shining a flashlight in his face. “What’s the matter?”
He caught her arm. “We’ve got to hurry. There’s a wrecked ship close to shore!”
“How do you know?”
“My God! Can’t you hear the screams?” he bellowed at her. “People are drowning out there!”
“I don’t hear any screams. Just the roar of the surf.”
The chorus of cries was ringing in his ears.
“Mark, stand still for a minute. You’re trembling.”
The cries were fainter and farther away now. Why couldn’t Lydia hear them?
“I can’t imagine what’s happened to you. It has to be overwork,” she said soothingly as she put her arm through Mark’s.
Perhaps she was right, he thought. They walked back to the inn.
“Your nerves are strung tight—too many deadlines.” She helped him off with his clothes. “Can you sleep now?”
“I think so,” and he did. He was utterly exhausted.
The next morning Lydia tactfully avoided mentioning the incident of the night before. They breakfasted on eggs Benedict with fresh lobster meat, and afterward, to her surprise, Mark suggested stopping by the library.
“I just want to see their clipping file on shipwrecks,” he explained.
“So now you’re the one who wants to go to libraries and look up history,” said Lydia, as they entered Thomas Memorial Library. Mark opened a manila folder and began searching through a huge pile of clippings.
“I think I’ve found it,” said Mark. “Here’s a story from March 1965 on shipwrecks of Casco Bay.” The story was headlined, “Schooner Charles Crashed on Watt’s Ledge in 1807.”
“Look at this. The date the ship wrecked was Sunday night, July 12. It was a little before midnight when she hit the ledge and began to break up. Sixteen passengers drowned. It couldn’t have been far from the beach. Three were able to swim to shore. “
“Have you seen the grave of the young woman who was coming back on the Charles from Boston? She was buying her trousseau,” said the librarian. “Her gravestone is right near Crescent Beach. You should look at it before you leave Inn by the Sea.”
“You know, there has always been a romantic story about that wreck,” volunteered an old man who stood listening with open curiosity. “In the years since it happened, people walking on the beach at night have sometimes reported hearing the sounds of a shipwreck and the terrible screams of drowning passengers. The schooner was in so close that villagers at Cape Elizabeth heard the cries for help, and it made a deep impression upon them. Remarkable story isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is,” said Mark, a peculiar look on his face. This did not fit with any of his experience as a biology professor.
He and Lydia found the gray slate marker at the girl’s grave not far from the inn. It read in part: “Sacred to the memory of Miss Lydia Carver, age 24; who with 15 other unfortunate passengers perished in the merciless waves, by the shipwreck of the Schooner Charles . . . on Sunday night, July 12, 1807.
“Yesterday was July 12th,” said Mark thoughtfully, “and Sunday night.”
But Lydia hadn’t heard. She gazed at the marker as if hypnotized. “Mark, do you notice how similar her name and mine are? They are almost the same! I was a Lydia Carver, too, except that my name was Lydia Carver Jordan. I
