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Some days Anna can scarcely wait for the break of dawn before she's out the door and her ordinary face melts away. She flies past cottage rows full of dull, tiresome people who prefer tutting to living. They don't trouble her much now that she has Marnie—dreamy Marnie who floats on sand-hills and who could probably walk on water, too, if she put her mind to it. And Marnie loved her best, of course.
The houses with their dreary curtains and shut-off gardens faded away into the sunny dunes flecked with marram grass. She tipped on her toes and cast her hand to her forehead like a sailor looking for land, but there was no sign of Marnie yet. That was nothing out of the ordinary. She would make herself known when it was time.
At least she usually did. Anna wondered whether it was possible that Marnie had forgotten their meeting, or if she had been spirited off by Edward on some silly business, which was almost worse than forgetting. But her nervous thoughts were swept away by the wind, and for a while she walked along the beach thinking of not much at all.
She came upon a sandy hollow that she napped in on especially hot and lazy days, and saw with some wonder that there was a seashell lying inside. It was so far from the shore that she supposed someone must've left it there on purpose. It was ruddish red with pale stripes, smooth except for a spiky horn that was like a crab leg. She pressed it against her ear and listened to the waves. If she closed her eyes… she and Marnie were canoeing. Anna was rowing while Marnie sat across from her, head turned to the horizon. She was smiling, but her eyes seemed sad, and Anna wanted so dearly to stop rowing and take Marnie's hands into her own…
With a start Anna opened her eyes and saw that the sun was higher in the sky than it had seemed just a moment ago, and looked down at the seashell she was holding and marveled that she could have already lost track of time. She would give it to Marnie, she decided.
"Silly goose! What's that you've got there?"
Anna spun round and there was Marnie, hands clasped behind her back and peering down with her sky-blue smock and curls like sunrays. Suddenly she felt rather small.
"Nothing," Anna lied. Marnie went on looking curiously at her, and Anna thrust out her hands. "I mean, it's a shell. For you."
"You are a silly girl," Marnie said, "hiding something like that!" She took the shell from Anna, who was still dumbstruck, and turned it around in her hands the way people do with things when they aren't really looking. Anna watched to see if she'd put the shell to her ear, and fancied that maybe she'd even close her eyes and see the same dream, the two of them out on the sea.
"Hold onto this for me, won't you? My pockets are hardly fit for a pebble, you see," and then Anna found herself holding the crab-leg shell again and burned at her own stupidity. Marnie was already looking away. Of course a girl who lived by the shore would think nothing of a seashell.
She lumbered out of the hollow and half-listened to Marnie chatting airily about her father, who was delayed at coming home again.
"But he said he found something delightful for me, and that he's gone ahead and mailed it. I can hardly wait," Marnie said, clasping her hands. She turned to see if Anna was equally intrigued, and gasped. "What-ever are you crying for?"
"There's nothing I can give you," Anna said bitterly. "Nothing worth anything." A warm tear crept down her cheeks like a paint stroke.
"Oh, dear Anna…" Marnie's thumb brushed off her tears, and stroked Anna's matted hair. "Come now, don't be like that. Your friendship is the greatest gift of all," she declared, and Anna was amazed at how fast she felt better, but sniffled anyway. Then Marnie dabbed Anna's forehead with a pigeon-kiss, and pulled her gently along. "Now, let's build a house in the sand."
"Do you really mean it?" Anna said, hopeful. "About our friendship?"
Marnie laughed. "I never knew my kisses were so wonderful."
"What do you mean?" Anna asked, though she already agreed.
"A moment ago you were sopping wet, and now you look like we're off to your birthday!"
Anna laughed too, only a little embarrassed, and they went on until they found some suitable place for their sandy home.
"This spot will do," Anna said. "We can build a grand garden here, like a maze. It'll be so big even we'll get lost in it, but we'll hardly mind."
They kneeled in the sand, a circle of two, and set about shaping their dream home. Two stories tall—"anything more is just showing off," Marnie said haughtily—with twigs for trees and stones to mark the garden path. Marnie pressed her index finger into the house frame, announcing these dents were the windows.
"And where will our bedrooms be?"
"Don't talk nonsense," Marnie said, "we'll share the master bedroom, right here," and she pointed at the center window that overlooked their garden. Anna couldn't say why her heart skipped a beat. "And downstairs will be the nursery."
"Nursery?" Anna said, surprised.
"For the young ones, of course. Though I suppose it'll be a nuisance if we have to run down the stairs every time the babes cry!"
Anna was astonished at the thought. Quickly, before she could spoil the moment, she fumbled the seashell out of her short pocket and planted it a ways next to their house. "A gazebo," she said, "for family picnics."
Marnie clapped her sandy palms together. "Yes, that's it. I'll wear my Sunday finery, you your lounge suit—I won't make you dress too formal," she teased, "and the children will be a lovely sight in their smocks and sailor suits!"
Anna was stuck on her pretend-clothes. "Why am I wearing a suit at all?"
Marnie looked at her like she'd taken a tumble on the rocks. "Because you'll be the father, silly girl. One of us has to, don't they?"
She supposed this was true. Somehow she hadn't realized she was picturing two mothers. For a while they sat in silence, idly decorating their sand-house. Anna decided to change the subject.
"So what do you think your father got you?"
Marnie wiped at her brow with her dress sleeve. "Oh, I'm sure it'll be something charming enough," she said dismissively. "I've got lots of those souvenirs. They're pleasant, of course. Don't think me ungrateful…" Anna assured her that she had thought no such thing, and Marnie went on. "Tell me, Anna—do your foster parents, well…"
"You can ask me," Anna blurted out. "Whatever it is."
"How to put this! Oh, I'll come out with it—does your foster father ever discipline you?" Marnie leaned forward on her palms and knees, eyes sparkling, "oh, I know they aren't cruel to you," she said, and for a moment she was the very picture of her gala-born mother, "but I mean like how they do it in the stories!"
How queer, Anna thought, that a girl should be so eager to ask after something most would discuss only with downcast eyes, but Marnie was so close and pretty now that it seemed the most natural thing. She tried to find the words that would disappoint Marnie the least.
"I think when I was little," Anna said carefully, "Uncle would give me a smack sometimes, a small one, if I was being naughty. But," she added, "it's been an awfully long time. I don't think he ever would now."
Marnie looked thoughtful. "No, I suppose he wouldn't need to," she agreed. "You're better-behaved than I am!"
"Why do you ask, anyway?" Anna bristled at being thought of as well-behaved. It was enough that everyone went around calling her 'no trouble at all'.
Marnie sighed and leaned back onto her knees. "I think I must envy you."
"Envy me!" Anna was stunned. "Over a smack?"
"Oh, it isn't about the smack," Marnie said, waving her hands about. "But…" She sounded rueful. "It's different from how things are with Nan. Do you understand?"
Anna tried. She imagined Marnie's father, tall and handsome. The way he commanded the attention of the room like it was one of his ships, walking in great strides. When he lifted a wineglass, one's eyes fell on the gold braid around his tailored sleeve and you felt under-dressed no matter what you were wearing. And then she tried to imagine Marnie, light-as-air Marnie, lying arched over his knee, waiting for a smack—no, wanting one, she realized. Anna's sunburnt face was flush.
"Because Nan is cruel," she offered at last. "And your father is kind."
"Oh, yes, wonderfully kind," Marnie said, eyes fixed on the sand-house.
Anna saw the faraway look on Marnie's face and wanted again to reach out and take her hand, but she was red with her thoughts. The tide was rising now, creeping up the beach with slimy mussels and sand dollars that intruded on their pebble garden. Anna hated the sight of them...
"Anna!" Marnie rose and twirled in a blitz of blue and gold, her hair billowing like a flag at full-staff. She stuck out her hand and Anna took it without thinking, and together they whirled around and laughed. Their sinking sandcastle was soon forgotten, and they collapsed like ashes, ashes, we all fall down. They lay under the sun a while, panting, till Marnie turned to Anna, a breath apart.
"Shall we go for a walk? I have in mind a game to show you."
"What sort of game?"
"It's a secret—but promise me now you'll follow the rules, won't you?"
Anna hesitated, but nodded her head. "I promise."
Marnie's smile was dazzling. "Darling Anna! You are ever the lavender girl."
They slipped away from the dunes, the rippling of the waves giving way to the sound of leaves rustling underfoot and the cries of unseen songbirds. Marnie led her down a winding forest path where sunlight fell in thin spears through the canopy overhead, her hand clasping Anna's like she was afraid she might have second thoughts and disappear into the brush. Anna was thrilled to be needed so…
"I've never been this way," Anna remarked, nearly stumbling over old tree roots that cut through the footpath. Marnie paced through the thicket as if she hadn't noticed. Anna tried to keep up, even as her cheeks grew warm and the asthma she'd nearly forgotten flared in her breaths.
"Nearly there now," Marnie said softly. To Anna she seemed almost to glide through the forest, as if really she were a fairy creature and the Marsh House only a front to fool nosy humans.
"You must know the woods by heart," Anna said, hoping Marnie would become chatty again. But still they tore on in silence, until they emerged into a clearing where the sun struck out in defiance of the tree cover. Anna blinked to adjust and caught her breath, while Marnie ran ahead.
It was a mound of stones, flat as a plateau. Marnie leapt onto a rock-bed in the center of the clearing, and spread her hands out expectantly. "This is our house! Isn't it wonderful? A little place away from everything," she said, glowing. "You can't even hear the dinner bell."
Anna was not particularly taken by the heap of stones, but she was delighted in Marnie's delight. "It's lovely," she agreed. But an unpleasant thought flashed across her face, and she couldn't help but go on, "have you never come here with anyone else? Not even that boy?"
"That boy?" Marnie considered, as if there were many to choose from. "Oh, you must mean Edward."
Anna nodded grimly.
"My, you're a grave goose," Marnie said. "Really now! I don't show him everything—he always makes a fuss, you know."
"Maybe you should show him to Pluto's doghouse," Anna muttered.
Marnie crossed her arms like a schoolmarm. "Anna, don't be cross with me. I promise he hasn't been here, and anyway, I would never play house with him. He's a poor playmate," she insisted, "he doesn't know how to pretend. Now won't you come up here with me?"
This was enough to satisfy Anna, and she joined Marnie on the mound. It was as if they were playing theatre, and the sun was their spotlight. Songbirds flitted around in the branches and warbled like they were out of practice. Anna snapped her arm to the trees like a conductor, Marnie took an exaggerated bow, and the two giggled.
"Now I'll explain," Marnie said, rising from her encore. She placed a hand on Anna's shoulder and pointed to the trail that led into the clearing. "See, I'm going to enter the house from over there. You'll be waiting for me with a stern look on your face."
"Am I the father again?" Anna asked.
"Yes, but this time I'll be the daughter."
"The daughter! But what about the mother?"
"Oh, we'll have to imagine her, or maybe she's off to the grocer's. It's not important this time, you see."
Anna thought again of Marnie and her father. It was stomach-twisting, but she couldn't put a name to the feeling. Marnie's hand was warm on her shoulder, and she slunk away from it guiltily. "Why am I stern? In the game, I mean."
Marnie kept close behind her, and though Anna was looking away, she could hear the smile in her voice. "You are a humble baker, and I your only daughter."
"How lucky of the baker," Anna said, and meant it.
"How lucky for you," Marnie said, and meant it. "Except lately I've been naughty."
"Naughty how?"
"There's a boy—don't look at me like that!—and I see him every day from the shop-window. He's too poor to afford a loaf, but he is kind and handsome and I have taken pity on him," she lilted, "and so I've been sneaking him what I can when my father—that's you—isn't looking. Only now I've been found out, and you're horribly cross, the most you've ever been. 'Do you understand what you've done?', you say, 'you're stealing off our own table. We could starve! And over a lousy street urchin!'"
Anna found it easy to sympathize with the baker. Still, there was a reason she never got a leading role in the school plays, not that she'd want to stand center stage and make a fool out of herself. It was embarrassing, but for Marnie's sake, she straightened her back and imagined herself a gruff, portly man with a little white cap, and a finger-wagger to boot.
"You've been up to no good!" Anna barked, thankful no one else could hear her. "I ought to give you what for, little miss!"
Marnie laughed and stepped in close. "That's a wonderful start, papa."
Anna blushed. She didn't think a baker's girl would say 'papa', but it didn't seem worth correcting when Marnie said it.
"So, what else am I supposed to do?" she asked, trying very hard not to think about her daydream.
Marnie took Anna's hands in her own and Anna quite forgot she was meant to be the father. "Silly girl, can't you guess? What's a father to do when his girl's been wicked?"
Anna was so light-headed she might've floated off like a balloon, if Marnie's hands weren't tethering her. "Marnie," she exhaled, struggling to stand, "you don't mean that you want me to…"
"Say it," Marnie said quietly.
"You want me to smack you?" It sounded so incredulous that she hoped Marnie would giggle and say she was a silly goose, of course that's not what she meant, whatever is going through that pretty head of yours?
Marnie nodded.
Anna coughed and her eyes stung. The spotlight was turning her into a pyre, she thought, won't someone turn it off? "I can't," she rasped. "I can't hit you."
Marnie took one step forward and wrapped her arms around Anna's shoulders. "Anna, poor Anna," she murmured against her neck, warm like candlelight. She rubbed slow circles on Anna's back, shrouding her face in her flaxen hair as if Anna might reach out and wipe her tears on it. "You mustn't be so sad. It's only a game." She seemed puzzled even as Anna trembled in her arms. "You won't really hurt me, you know, not there."
"On your—?" but still she couldn't say it.
"On my derriere," Marnie said, and laughed. Anna laughed too, faintly, in spite of herself. "Oh, it does sound silly when I say it aloud!"
"But I promised," Anna said, breathing deeply, "I told you I'd follow the rules of your game and I couldn't even start."
"It wasn't a fair promise," Marnie admitted. She leaned back, and looked very solemnly into Anna's eyes, stained red like her mother's rouge. "Tell me, Anna—you were really, truly happy when we were playing at being married, weren't you?"
"I was the luckiest girl in the world," Anna blurted, without thinking. She looked at Marnie, panicked, living by the next sound she made...
Marnie smiled in her sad way. "I was too," she agreed, and she kissed Anna's lips, and they kissed a long while on the stone mound, not noticing their aching legs or the arc of the sun or the dinner bell, kissing as they walked home in the waning light, kissing when they parted on the shore, till Anna fell asleep on the road home, hoping that they had really ever kissed at all...