Chapter 11: Martin By Daylight

Friday

"Well Martin, you'll be happy to hear that I'm off the hook for Tom's gambling debts. Apparently a friend of a friend of his is stepping up to invest in the project."

"Louisa, I'm glad to hear you've come to your senses. Tom may be family but his problems are not your responsibility. So what time can I expect you and James Henry home tomorrow?"

"I don't know. I planned to have a leisurely day with James today and then take a little time to say goodbye to some people here Saturday. I suppose we'll be back in time for dinner."

"Right. Good."

He sounded pleased. Louisa wished she felt as pleased. After the call, she had breakfast with James Henry, Tom having gone off early with Harvey to work on tuning up the engine and getting the boat fuelled up.

She got the baby settled in his pushchair. "You and I are going to have a proper holiday together, just the two of us. I had hoped you could spend more time getting to know your uncle but I guess we have to take what we can get."

Their first stop was the hilltop playground where she sat on a swing holding him on her lap, gently moving to and fro as they watched a few older children run noisily about, to James's delight. She longed to bundle him into his baby carrier, as she used to do when he was smaller, so they could enjoy the cliff walk together but he was big for his age and she didn't fancy much of a walk while carrying him.

Instead they went to the village aquarium, where James Henry marvelled at the spiny blue lobsters, the brown crabs looking like scuttling pie crusts, and the mackerel swimming in formation behind the glass. She loved how everything in the world was a revelation to him, allowing her to see things with fresh eyes. The school of sleek silvery fish moving in graceful harmony brought her back to the sensation of gliding effortlessly through the ocean with air tank on her back and fins on her feet.

Then it was time for lunch at a café overlooking the waterfront, and then an hour browsing the shops. She bought him a little T-shirt with a hand painted design of fishing boats bobbing in the harbour and admired some pottery and sea glass jewellery in the window of a shop she didn't dare enter with a curious toddler who would love to get his hands on some expensive breakables.

They stopped in the chemist's to buy some more sunscreen. "Where is everyone? Seems awfully quiet for a summer day in a lovely seaside village like this," she asked the two old ladies behind the counter.

"They're all out on the water, local and tourist alike," replied the taller one, who was wearing a garish crocheted hat. "You must have heard about the sunken treasure hunt. Biggest news in the village since the Beast of Bodmin was spotted last year."

"Right, it's as big as the Great White Shark of Padstow the year before that," the shorter one with the pinched face and dark hair chimed in.

"So every boat for hire has been hired, and the dive shop is out of equipment now," the first one said. "And they've cleaned us out of seasick remedies as of this morning too."

"Do you think they'll find anything?" Louisa pretended ignorance of the situation.

"Stranger things have happened," the first one replied, with the other nodding.

Next Louisa and James Henry headed home to Chough Cottage so he could nap and she could do a little sun bathing on the back terrace (something else she wouldn't be telling Martin about as he disapproved of unnecessary sun exposure) while she read a paperback of Julian Barnes's Arthur & George.

At 6 p.m., they went to the harbour to meet up with the other Martin for dinner and then to settle on a blanket for an outdoor concert by The Fisherman's Friends. Everyone who had been out on the water today was now on hand to hear the popular local group. The tide was on its way out and the slipway, which was similar to the one in Portwenn, acted as a sort of natural amphitheatre for the performance.

"I suppose it's a bit of a busman's holiday for you, listening to Cornish fishermen singing sea shanties when you're a native cheel sitting with us emmets," he said.

She giggled to hear him use the Cornish words for "girl" and "tourists."

"Oh I've been enjoying it here. It's such an adventure, even if things haven't gone according to plan. It may turn out to be a wild goose chase but, well, it's nice to have a break from the stresses of home. And to spend some time with… my brother's friends."

Louisa unwrapped a stick of Port Liac rock she bought earlier in the day. "I haven't had one of these in forever, but I fancied one today. It's funny," she broke the stick in half. "I once compared, um, Dr. Someone Special to a stick of rock, because it's solid and the same all the way through, just like him. If he were here now he'd say it's nothing but empty, tooth-rotting calories, but I do love peppermint."

She offered half to Martin. He took it, saying "an empty calorie or two once in a while never hurt anyone." He greeted various people making their way through the sea of blankets and beach chairs covering the slipway, including the two old ladies Louisa recognized from the chemist's. "These are Margaret and Diana. They run the local Women's Institute," he said.

"We're planning our annual garden party at Grace Trevethyn's house," said Margaret, the one with the crocheted hat. "We're debating whether you should be invited again Dr. Bamford, given your disgraceful display last year," Diana scolded him lightly.

"Ladies, I wouldn't miss it for the world. You can count on me to be the very picture of propriety," he declared playfully.

The women moved on and Louisa raised her eyebrows inquiringly at him. "I was there to give a lecture on nutrition and I was sabotaged by Harvey and his mate Matthew," he replied. "They slipped a little something harder into my cup of punch and I may have inadvertently fallen into a fruitcake decorated to look like the village lifeboat. Could have happened to anyone."

"There's Matthew now, with his girlfriend Nicky," he waved to a couple on the other side of the crowd. "Matthew's a gardener. That's the vicar they're talking to, he doesn't know Matt's growing a couple of, uh," he lowered his voice "… cannabis plants on church property."

"And that's Grace," he waved to a middle aged woman. "Lovely lady. An expert on cultivating orchids. I see her husband isn't with her. Rumour has it he's carrying on with someone in London."

"You certainly seem to know everyone and everything that goes on here," Louisa said.

"Yeah, like I said, it's a bloody fishbowl, but I've come to feel at home here," he replied.

"Bamford! Should have known I'd see you here." A tall man, vaguely handsome in a feckless sort of way, stalked up and towered over where they sat, with a scowl that said he wasn't happy to see Martin here. "I'll have you know that I know there's something dodgy about however you managed to grab Tregrunnt Farm out from under our noses."

"Bowden!" Martin scowled back, jumping up to confront him. "You lost the planning permission for your holiday cottages development, and anyway Den decided he wanted to sell to a proper Cornishman. Nothing dodgy about it. It's not like I bribed the estate agent to accept my offer."

"Proper Cornishman!" the man retorted. "You're no more a proper Cornishman than I am. And I heard you were in jail for smuggling illegals when you were supposed to be putting your deposit down on the farm. Anyway, we don't need your pigsty farm. Me and my missus, we've been taking diving lessons. Found an Australian dollar right here in the harbour, it's my new lucky piece. We're going to find this Spanish treasure everyone's talking about, these other sods don't have a clue about the real whereabouts."

"What?" Louisa leapt to her feet at this. The man's scowl changed to a leer as he looked her up and down. "Hello there. You with him?" He jerked his head toward Martin.

"Tim! Get over here!" The man jumped as a sharp-faced woman with a sharp voice summoned him from across the crowd and he hurried away. "Tosser. And Mrs. Tosser," Martin snapped.

"What was all that about?" Louisa asked as they settled back on the blanket beside James Henry.

"Oh they don't know anything," Martin sputtered, clearly still annoyed. "And that business about being in jail… it was just for a few hours… Bowden's got the story all wrong… I was just helping out some friends…"

"Could have happened to anyone?"

"Exactly." He calmed down and smiled. The crowd quieted as the singers started to take their places on the little stage set up on the beach.

As the music began, Louisa felt his gaze linger on her. It took her back to another open air concert not so very long ago, when another tall, fair-haired man gazed at her when he thought she wasn't looking. She turned toward this one and he looked away, just as the other one had done. She contemplated his distinctive features, both comic and beautiful in the early evening light, and was more confused than ever.

To be continued…

The Fisherman's Friends is a famed Cornish men's singing group based in Port Isaac.

Something North American readers might not be familiar with - a stick of rock is a sweet similar to a candy cane but not hooked. It's often sold at seaside resorts in the U.K. The stick has the name of the resort embedded throughout the length, so no matter how far you bite or suck it down the name is always legible. Louisa compared Martin Ellingham to a stick of rock in S2E8 "Erotomania."

There's a bunch of quick references to characters and events from the Doc Martin movies in this chapter, again hopefully not too confusing for those who haven't seen the movies.

And to those commenters concerned that Louisa is taking things too far with Martin Bamford… well, no spoilers but there are some more plot twists coming up. Rest assured that all's well that ends well.