It was Roger that put the idea in her head. "Why don't you swim out there?" he asked on about the third day of their holiday. "If you see it up close, you might stop staring at it all the time."
Charlotte could hear the irritation in his voice, but also the joking tone. She knew he was simply trying to draw her attention back to him and their break together, but the idea took hold in her mind and would not let go. The next day, she said to him, "It's not that far, is it? And the sea's fairly calm around here."
"You're serious?" he asked.
"Of course," she said, and couldn't help adding, "It was your idea, after all."
Charlotte planned the Great Swim (as Roger had taken to sarcastically calling it) for the second week of their break. It gave her time to get used to swimming in the sea, to feel the way it pulled and pushed at her. It also gave her the opportunity to ask around about the little church, but no one seemed to know anything about it. The holiday company representative merely shrugged, and the locals looked at her blankly when she asked. One said, "It is just an old church," and looked at Charlotte as though she were mad, but it wasn't. It was not old, not to look at anyway. This apparent disinterest in the church, which made Roger more dismissive of her plan, only strengthened her resolve and by the morning of the swim, she was determined to reach it, to feel its stonework for herself.
The path from the beach to the church was steeper than it had looked from the mainland and Charlotte had to scramble and grasp at plants and roots to support her on her ascent.