Chapter 6: The Funeral

The church in Millbrook was white clapboard, with a harbor view and a bell nobody had rung in years.

I wore my one black dress and sat in the last pew.

Declan stood against the back wall in a dark suit, with two men from Linscott's team spread out behind him in the vestibule.

Every head in the church turned when I came in.

I had known they would.

The man by the dartboard was there, and the fry cook, and a row of women who had wept into their napkins at the Friday fish fry.

Nobody said a word to me.

When I sat down, the people in the pew in front of me got up and moved to the other side of the aisle.

I looked at the coffin and held the program in both hands.

Susannah Philbrick, beloved sister and friend, aged thirty-six.

There was a photograph on an easel, and in it she was laughing at someone outside the frame, with her apron on and a net of fish in her arms.

I couldn't look at it for long.

The service lasted forty minutes.

I stood when they stood and sat when they sat, and when the minister asked if anyone wished to speak, no one looked at me, and I was grateful.

At the end, six men came forward to carry her out.

Five of them were fishermen from the harbor.

The sixth was Declan.

Her sister had asked for him.

I saw her do it, a small woman with Susie's chin, who touched his arm in the vestibule and said something I couldn't hear.

He nodded, and took the sixth handle, and did not look back at me.

Outside, the wind off the water was sharp and cold.

We stood at the edge of the churchyard while they lowered her down.