Trust no one script in a heart shape

The lamp came back on last night for the first time since the gale took the gallery rail. I sat on the stairs with the dog and counted the flashes the way Father taught us, three long and one short, and I thought of you somewhere past the Skerries with the same count in your head.

The red paint is still on the lamp-room door. You will remember Mother's tin of pillar box paint, which she never let anyone touch but herself. The morning after you left, she painted two words across the glass, then went round them with loops until the whole thing bent into a heart. Father saw it and said nothing, which is how we knew he was pleased. Mr Haddow came over with the supply boat on Thursday, read it, and asked whether the keepers had gone soft. I told him it was a warning. He laughed and said it was the most honest thing anyone had said on the island since Easter.

Father says the chandler in Stromness has a new rule: nobody is paid in cash until the boat is unloaded. Mother says that is the sort of rule that makes a man cautious, and cautious men keep their hands in their pockets. I think she means you, and I suspect she is right.

Write back on the Tuesday boat. Tell me who you trust out there, and I will tell you who I do not.

Love, Elsie