North is up. The scale is rough.
A visitor's index
Every place on the map
Thirty-eight stops, from the chowder to the waterfall. Pick a name to find it on the map.
Harbor and waterfront
- Ian Martyr's restaurant, up on its own pier at the bottom of Main Street. Pale blue awning, fourteen tables, and a chalkboard out front that writes its own top half. Gary the cod lives in a tank by the register. He is not for sale.
- The long pier beside The Fishery. On Saturdays the Dock Market runs its length from six to noon: about forty stalls, striped awnings, string lights, and a man selling bait out of a bathtub.
- A short walk along the waterfront from The Fishery. On Fridays the line for a table runs down past its door.
- At the bottom of the hill, with moorings for a fleet of eleven boats.
- A quarter mile of iron lantern hooks, one for every boat that ever sailed out of the Cove. The big brass bell hangs at the end. The old men sit along the top in a fixed order. Do not take Old Hank's bench.
- At the top of the harbor steps. The tide table outside is crossed out in red, with a note: ASK MARGE.
- Where the fleet unloads. A long boarded dock with water under it and the ramp at its head.
- The pack's pub, one street back from the harbor and down four steps. A peat fire that never goes out, a sticky floor, darts, and a ship's bell over the door. The brothers' round table is in the back corner. It has six stools.
Town
- Climbs from the waterfront at The Fishery. The shops face the harbor and take the wind straight off it.
- Low on Main Street, below the bookshop. From its front step you can see the bookshop window and Peg's yard, which is most of what anyone needs to know.
- The steep upper stretch of the climb, from the corner to the square. Green street sign, white letters.
- Number Four, Harbor Hill. Winnie Abbott's bookshop has stood on the hill for a hundred years and leans four degrees to the left. The sign hangs crooked on purpose. The Knit Wits hold the three chairs in the front window every afternoon. The betting board is behind the register.
- Bernard Tibbs's bakery, on the corner by the square. Its side window looks straight across to Peg's gate.
- The top of the climb, between the bakery corner and the gate of the Inn.
- Peg Dunmore's inn at the top of the hill: three stories, butter yellow, eleven rooms, and a wraparound porch with rockers. The sign swings when there is no wind. The brass plate by the door reads WOLVES PLEASE WIPE PAWS. From the porch you can see the whole curve of the beach, with the point to the north and the bluff to the south.
- Up the hill from the harbor. The council room holds about two hundred, and Mayor Gerald keeps a small wooden stand for anyone with something to say.
- The steeple near the square. It lends the town its folding tables, and its priest blesses the fleet.
- The little school on the hill, with a playground, a sledding hill, and a walled field with goalposts.
- A witch's house on the walk down from the Inn. Witches' porch lanterns burn the color of their mood. This one glows soft green, even by day.
The point
- The headland that closes the bay on the north side. Black rocks, high cliffs, and the lighthouse at the tip.
- A white tower about a hundred feet tall, with 112 iron steps to the lamp room. The lamp is still oil and wick, lit by hand at dusk, and the town sets its clocks by it. Henley Martyr is the keeper. The beam reaches eleven miles. When the wind is in the south, the tower hums one low note.
- Small, gray stone, tucked against the foot of the tower. A green door, an iron stove, one table, two chairs, one bed.
- Half a mile of black rock and wet sand between the north beach and the tower. It is open for a few hours either side of low tide. Then the sea comes in from both sides at once.
- The land route to the lighthouse. Three miles, and it washes out in any real weather.
Water and shore
- A mile of flat sand from the pier to the rocks at the north end, with dunes behind it. The pack runs here on full-moon nights, and the whole town leaves its porch lights on for them.
- Long black rock shelves at the north end of the beach, at the foot of the point's cliffs. Best at low water.
- Sea caves at the back of the tide pools, open only at low water. The county sign on the post says DANGER. NO ENTRY. Lost things turn up in the first few yards. Go much deeper and you start to forget what you came for.
- Boats line up off the north buoy and come home on the lighthouse beam. The channel bells ring by themselves before bad weather.
- The rocks under the bluff, south of the harbor mouth. The fleet calls it the worst ground on the coast.
The bluff
- The Martyr family house: big, square, gray-shingled, two chimneys, alone on the bluff with its face to the sea. Six pairs of boots stand by the front door. Sunday dinner is here, and everyone is expected.
- The high ground at the south end of town, with gorse, sea pinks and wild roses on its face. Anyone not running with the pack watches from the top.
- Steep switchbacks down the face of the bluff through the wild roses, from the yard of the Rest to the beach.
- The road from town up to Martyr's Rest.
Woods and falls
- A white fall about twenty feet high, dropping over a dark ledge into a round green pool ringed with ferns. The water is warm all year and steams in the snow. Whatever you promise under it, you keep. People marry here.
- Small and gray, back in the trees at the edge of the clearing. Gwen Salazar keeps the falls. Mint and licorice dry from her porch rafters.
- Above the falls road. Saffron teaches yoga to witches here.
- Behind the town on every side. Pine low down, then old beech and oak with moss on the north sides.
- The main road north out of the Cove, along the cliffs. Plowed and salted as far as the county line in winter.
Ready to visit?
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