“I wanted to climb the channel marker and Papa said I couldn’t.”"That’s too bad,” Grandmother said.”No, it’s not ‘too bad’,” Sophia said. “It’s bloody stupid.”"Where did you pick that up? You keep saying ‘bloody’ all the time.”"I don’t know. All the nets were out, and it sailed back and disappeared around the point.”You know, sometimes when everything’s fine, I think it’s just a bloody bore,” Sophia said.”You do?” said Grandmother, taking out another cigarette. It was only her second before noon, and she always tried to smoke in secret when she could rememberto.”Nothing happens,” her grandchild explained. They found a place where the granite was full of those very small Finnish garnets you find sometimes, and they tried to dig them out with a jack-knife It didn’t work It never does They ate hard bread and watched the boat. Grandmother sat down and edged into the canyon a little at a time until at last she dropped to the bottom and was all by herself in peace and quiet She lit a cigarette and watched the barely visible swell By and by, the boat appeared from behind the point.

Papa was making a sweep around the reef to set out his nets.”So there you are,” Sophia said “I went swimming.”"How’s the water?” Grandmother said. From the bottom of the canyon, the child was a narrow shadow against the sun, like a stick of wood.”Pretty bloody cold,” Sophia said, and jumped down into the canyon. The floor of the crevice was covered with stones, from the size of a person’s head down to the size of a marble. Even now, at midday, the bottom of this canyon was in shadow – right down into the water and a long way out, like a crevice of darkness.

Then she crawled out from under the parasol and took her walking stick and headed off in a third direction of her own, but before she left she arranged some sweaters and bathrobes on the mattress so it would look as though she were asleep.Grandmother came down to the shore at an interesting spot where a little canyon cut through the rock and ran out into the sea. Papa wedged the handle of the parasol into a crack – Granmother was to lie there on an air mattress and enjoy herself. She watched them set off in opposite directions; the island was so large that pretty soon they turned into little dots moving along the edge of the water. Moreover, it was really a pretty colour, as clear and bright as the sea itself. The parasol made them look like the worst kind of summer people, which they were not. When they reached The Cairn, they went ashore at the first spot they came to, since there was no lee side – in the calm all sides were lee.

They carried their things ashore and put the butter in the shade The granite was hot underfoot. Grandmother sat in the middle of the boat under a violet parasol She hated violet, but it was all they had. The boulders are perfectly round.The sea was as smooth as oil, and so pale you could hardly tell it was blue. When you get closer, you can see that the granite spines are as sleek as seals and that there is a long thin neck of boulders between them.