Emma shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe that’s what finally broke me,” he said. “Hearing that you’d moved on.”
She touched his arm. “But I didn’t move on. And it wasn’t all your fault, how things turned out. It was a postwar world. We were surrounded by trauma from all directions. You, especially, Oliver. Dear God! What you’d been through and survived! You were right. It’s a miracle you’re alive today, and I’m amazed.”
He cupped his forehead in his hand. “But what does it matter now?”
She grabbed hold of his forearm and shook it. “Oh, Oliver. Don’t be foolish. We’re still here, aren’t we? What good can come from regretting the decisions we made when we were young and didn’t know anything? Maybe we need to consider how lucky we’ve been to have spent our lives with our children, even though you’re late to be meeting Rose.But it’s nevertoolate. And you didn’t abandon Lydia and Arthur. You were a good father to them, present in their lives, and now you have grandchildren. Joanna clearly loves you.”
They stared at each other for an emotionally charged moment. Oliver’s shoulders rose and fell as he exhaled. Then he closed his eyes. “We can’t have it all, can we.”
“No,” she replied. “Sometimes we have to choose one path over another, and live with that choice, and be happy with it.”
Oliver opened his eyes. He looked up at Emma, who stood on a higher slab of stone. He held his hand out to her, and she stepped lightly across the flat rock as he escorted her down to the pebbly beach, where they strolled to the water’s edge. For a while, they watched sailboats on the harbor and seagulls in the sky, and listened to the waves that lapped gently onto the shore.
Oliver turned to Emma. “I retrieved something from Sable Island,” he said, “and I’d like for you to have it, no strings attached. But it was meant for you.”
“What is it?” she asked, curious.
He reached into his jacket pocket, withdrew a small box, and handed it to her. She opened it and gasped at the sight of a large princess-cut diamond ring, set in a gold band. Breathless with shock, Emma covered her mouth with her hand.
“It’s the ring I promised you,” Oliver said. “When I went back for you, I left it there.”
“Where?” she asked. “On Sable Island?”
“Yes. I put it in a cupboard in that old house that was half-buried in sand. Do you remember when you took me there?”
“Of course. I remember everything.”
“Well ... the house is almost gone now,” he said. “Only the roof and dormers are still sticking out of the sand. But miraculously, the ring was still there.”
“You went inside? Oliver, what were you thinking?”
He waved a dismissive hand. “I know. I shouldn’t have.”
“Is that why you went back to Sable?” Emma asked. “To retrieve it?”
He shook his head. “No. I’d assumed it was long gone. But when I got there and walked into the rose garden, it felt like everything happened only yesterday. Something came over me, and I had to go and look for it.”
Emma admired the ring for a moment, how it sparkled in the sunlight. “My goodness, Oliver. It’s stunning. But I can’t possibly accept it.” She closed the box and held it out to him. “You should give it to one of your children or grandchildren.”
“But it was meant foryou,” he replied, sounding baffled by the mere notion of giving it to anyone else.
Emma hesitated, then rubbed her thumb over the top of the velvet box. “Well ... I suppose I could at least try it on.”
She opened the box, withdrew the ring, and slid it onto her finger. It fit perfectly. When she held up her hand to admire it, the diamond sparkled like a thousand exploding stars. Her heart nearly gave out at the beauty of it, and she exclaimed “Oh!” and completely lost her breath.
But it was so much more than just a beautiful ring. Suddenly Emma was twenty-seven again and feeling the long-awaited rapture of her beloved captain’s return—just as she’d dreamed about for days, weeks, and years.
She looked up at Oliver, and he smiled at her.
Emma’s every emotion, even those she’d thought long dead, rose up and flooded over her walls. She bowed her head, covered her face with her hands, and wept.
Oliver took her into his arms. “I know, I know.” He rubbed her back and whispered gentle words of comfort in her ear.
When she finally regained her composure, she stepped back. “I should show you this,” she said, then reached into the top of her blouse to withdraw the gold chain she still wore around her neck, with her mother’s locket and his signet ring.
“My word. You still have it.”
