Ember Island

by Kimberley Freeman

  “Family friend . . . needed you to . . . think . . . it was . . . you who found him. Outside . . . the tailor . . .”

  “Shhh, shhh. All is well. I love him, Grandpa, and as soon as you no longer need me, I will go to be with him and . . .” She fought back tears. She absolutely could not let Grandpa guess at the doubt that she felt.

  He lifted the back of his hand to her cheek. “I no longer . . . need you . . . my Tilly. My good girl.” Breath. Huff. Huff. “My good girl.”

  With sudden weight, his hand fell and lay on the covers, still and silent.

  •

  Tilly stood at the dock, her small trunk between her feet, her large trunk already loaded onto the steamer. She had come directly from Grandpa’s funeral. Pamela would have allowed her to presume one or two nights’ grace, perhaps, but Tilly was aching to go. She didn’t care to see Grandpa’s house in Godfrey’ and Pamela’s possession. No doubt they were already tearing down the drapes, moving the furniture, maybe even uprooting her garden beds to put in Godfrey’s long-imagined tennis court.

  No letters had come. Nearly six weeks after her wedding, no letters had come. She had an address, a ticket across the sea, and a slowly eroding hope in her heart. Travelers bustled about her. A purser rang a bell up and down the dock, calling for the various classes to board. The air smelled of metallic water and coal. Amongst the confusion of sights, sounds, and smells, she tried to find a place of stillness and peace in her heart. Soon the uncertainty would be over. She would find her husband, or she would find that he had never been hers at all. Either way, the journey had begun.

  SIX

  Lumière sur la Mer

  The hackney coach rolled up the hill from farmlands and through the wood that bordered Jasper’s estate. Tilly’s chest drew tighter and tighter, the closer they drew to Lumière sur la Mer. Jasper had to be there. He had to. Or else . . . there was no alternative. He had to be there. They emerged from the wood, rocking and rattling, onto a smooth dirt road. Ahead, she could see the roof of the house. Her husband’s house.

  Her house. Lumière sur la Mer. The light on the sea.

  She breathed deeply, remembered the cigar box of money in her smaller trunk, and took a little comfort from it. Whatever happened, she would survive. She hoped to find Jasper, alive and well and with a completely reasonable explanation for the lack of correspondence. If he was ill or had . . . she steeled herself . . . simply not bothered to write, she could recover from that, too. But if he was dead or missing, then she feared for herself. Her heart, so recently damaged by the death of her beloved grandfather, could not bear another burden that great. Widowed while still a virgin: that would surely make her the unluckiest woman in the world.

  The carriage slowed and stopped. She gathered her courage. The footman came to open her door.

  “Please,” she said. “Would you wait? I am . . . I am not sure if my husband is home and I have no key of my own.” If he wasn’t here, she had already planned to go to the local constabulary to ask them to help her, and imagined she would spend her nights boarding somewhere.

  The footman nodded, and she stepped out of the coach and into the wild wind, down the little stair, and stood for a moment looking up at the façade of Lumière sur la Mer. It looked familiar from the card. Three storys, conservatory to the south, orchard to the north. But it was also unfamiliar. Those tangled gardens. The peeling blue paint on the door. The curtains all drawn as if ashamed of something.

  “Madame?” the footman said.

  “Yes, I will go now. Wait for me. Don’t unload the trunks . . . yet . . .”

  One foot in front of the other, pulse speeding. Her eyes went left and right, noticing the overgrown grass between the poplars, the weeds growing in the urns where flowers should have been. It didn’t look as if anybody had lived here for a long time. Her heart caught in her throat. Now she expected the worst, the very very worst.

  At the front door she paused for a breath, then raised her hand and knocked hard. Released the knocker and stood back, anxiously checking over her shoulder that the carriage hadn’t abandoned her here on the wrong side of the wood. A long silence, unbroken except for the wind and sea. The clattering streets of St. Peter Port, only two miles away, seemed very distant.

  She could hear her own pulse.

  And footsteps. She could hear footsteps within the house.

  The door opened and her heart leapt.

  “Jasper!” She launched herself into his arms and he took her firmly against him, his hands spread across her back.

  “You’re here,” he said.

  She stood back, beaming at him, all her worries melting away. He smiled in return. She noticed his hair was untidy, his clothes not as sharply pressed as she remembered. But he was still her Jasper, alive and well and here, at the home they were to share together. She turned to the footman and gestured, and soon her trunks were being brought up the path.

  “I didn’t hear from you,” she said to Jasper. “Weeks and weeks. No letters.”

  “I wrote at least half a dozen!” he protested. “But I had none from you. I thought you’d forgotten me!”

  Tilly laughed. All along it had been some miscommunication beyond their control. She should have known it. She pressed herself against him again, and he kissed the top of her head and said, “I’m sorry, my dear, but things might not be as you expected.”

  She looked up, into his gray eyes, and said, “You are here, alive and well in front of me. That is all I hoped for.”

  “Your grandfather?”

  The leaden sadness tempered her moment of joy. “He’s gone. Dead,” she said.

  He touched her hair. “I am sorry, my dear. Come in,” he said. “Welcome to Lumière sur la Mer. Welcome to your home.”

  While the footman bustled past with her trunks, and Jasper showed him where to leave them and paid him, Tilly removed her bonnet and gloves in the entrance hall to the house. The black and white tiles were as Jasper had described them, the ornate curved stair. But where the chandelier had been there was an iron hook; where the side tables had been were empty spaces; and where the picture frames had hung were discolored squares on the wallpaper. She took it all in. The relief over finding Jasper alive and expecting her was so immense that she was incapable of feeling disappointed that the house wasn’t as grand as she’d anticipated.

  Finally, her trunks were inside, the door was closed, and just she and Jasper stood alone in the entrance hall.

  “My dear Tilly,” he said, taking her hand gently. “I have fallen on hard times since last I saw you.”

  She squeezed his fingers. “I am sorry you were troubled and I wasn’t here to offer you comfort. As a wife should have been.”

  Jasper lifted the smaller trunk, and pulled her close to slide his free arm around her waist. “A business deal went badly. I have had to sell many of my things. But it is temporary, dear. I promise you. Come. I’ll show you the house.”

  The sweet warmth of his body against hers was intoxicating. She barely listened to his words as he took her from room to room—parlor, dining room, conservatory, kitchen—then up the stairs, explaining all the way about his French émigré descendants, how they had fled the Revolution and built Lumière sur la Mer as a haven in the sea, away from the political turmoil of their own country. How he hadn’t the temperament of a farmer so had sold off all the stock and struck out on his own import and export business. He showed her the guest rooms on the second floor, and then opened the door to the library she had heard about, dreamed about.

  “Oh, my!” she gasped. The shelves were stacked to the ceiling. The smell of old paper and dust was strong.

  “You mustn’t get too excited. I’ve had to sell the whole collection to a Scottish fellow living in India. He’ll be back for them in six months or so. I promised him I’d have them organized and in crates by then, so do feel free to spend some time in here alphabetizing them or some such. I’m afraid I’m not particularly interested in books. They sit rather
too still for my liking. Here, I’ll show you the third floor.”

  She reluctantly left the library behind, and he took her up one more flight of stairs to the bedrooms.

  “Through here,” he said, opening a white door on a small but comfortably furnished room with a view out to the water. She could see masts in the distance, the gray churning sea. “This is your room.”

  “My room?” she asked. “Or do you mean . . . our room?”

  He smiled. His eyes shifted almost imperceptibly sideways. “I have a room too. But of course, we are . . . husband and wife, and . . . we will . . .” He cleared his throat. Straightened his back. “It is not proper to discuss these things, Tilly. As your husband, I will lead the way, when the time is right.”

  Tilly’s cheeks burned. She was speechless with embarrassment, concerned that Jasper now thought her a woman of scandalous appetites. She made a promise to herself not to make the same mistake twice. What did she know about married life? Perhaps all couples who lived in grand houses had separate chambers.

  Jasper laid her trunk carefully on the bed. “I will bring your other trunk up shortly. I had a manservant, but I’ve had to put him off until our finances improve. I’ve put off nearly everyone.” He frowned, ran his hand through his hair. “I know it’s not what you expected,” he said again.

  He couldn’t meet her eye and she ached for his shame and distress. So she went to him, careful not to take his hand or try to hold him again, so he could form a better opinion of her ability to contain her physical desires.

  “I expected, Jasper, to find here my husband and start my married life. I vowed to be with you for richer and for poorer. We will be fine. A few days before Grandpa died, he sent over a trunk of goods from his home. Valuable goods. We can use them to replace what you have lost.”

  “Or sell them?” he asked hopefully. “To pay debts?”

  Something about his desperate tone sent a niggle of alarm through her blood. “Of course. They are ours to do as we please.” She opened her mouth to tell him about the banknotes, but then stopped herself. “Whatever problems we have, we will face them together.”

  He was much brighter now, more like the sure-eyed, confident Jasper she had married. Tilly felt glad that she had been able to cheer him. “My Tilly. My wife.” He kissed her cheek lightly. “I’ll go and fetch your other trunk.”

  And he was gone.

  Tilly went to the window. The pane was slightly warped, distorting the view. Outside the wind was wild in the trees, but in here she was warm and safe. She smiled. This would be her new home and it wasn’t as fine as she’d thought it might be, but then Tilly wasn’t a woman who cared overly for fine things. There would be time and comfort here for her to grieve her grandfather, and one day there would be children and bright laughter in the dim corridors of the house.

  She turned, flipped open her trunk, and found the cigar box. If he needed it, if he really needed it . . .

  But no. That would be contrary to Grandpa’s wishes, and her memories of him were still sharp enough that she couldn’t bear to contradict him. Perhaps what was in the trunk would be enough. She glanced around the room, found the tall wardrobe next to the door, and opened it. Slid the cigar box back as far as she could reach on the highest shelf, then placed her bonnet in front of it for good measure. Then she sat on the bed—hands folded—to await the return of her living, breathing husband.

  •

  Because they were conserving every penny, there were no lamps lit down the stairs to lead her way to the dining room that evening. Jasper had warned her, before going out for what he promised was no more than an hour’s business, to make sure she lit a candle before coming down so she didn’t trip on the stairs. So when the supper bell rang, Tilly took the candle she’d been reading by in her room and made her way carefully downstairs.

  She arrived to find Jasper pacing, hands clasping and unclasping in front of him.

  “You’re home, my dear,” she said. “Did business go well?” Tilly knew the answer to this without asking. Every muscle in his body flexed against some imagined adversary.

  “I . . . uh . . . no. But you’re not to worry. I have to go out again.”

  “But supper?”

  “I haven’t an appetite. Mrs. Rivard will look after you. Please . . . I wasn’t expecting you today and I haven’t quite sorted out all my . . .”

  He seemed distressed, so Tilly went to him and grasped his hands. “You need explain nothing to me. If you must go to work, then go to work. I will be here, waiting for you when you return. As your wife should be.” She squeezed his hands.

  Jasper nodded. “Just a few more days of this, and then all will be well. I promise, Tilly.” He dropped her hands, ran a hand through his hair to smooth it. “But you are not to wait up for me. You’ve been traveling all day and you are tired. Sleep well and tomorrow morning we will dine together, I promise you.”

  Tilly stood back and he brushed past, out of the dining room. She heard his footsteps in the corridor and then the rustle of him pulling on his coat. Her disappointment was acute. She had longed to be with him, to press herself against him and take comfort in his embrace, to explore the special pleasures she understood a husband and wife would share. But she had spent perhaps an hour in his company since her arrival.

  “You should have said you were coming.” This was Mrs. Rivard, standing in the threshold between kitchen and dining room with a wooden tray. She spoke in a thick French accent.

  Tilly had never had a servant speak to her so plainly. Perhaps this was a French custom. “I sent him several letters,” Tilly said, then wondered why she was saying it. She didn’t answer to this woman.

  Mrs. Rivard set the tray down. “Perhaps you should have sent a telegram.”

  “I sent four.”

  “Then where are they?” She raised her shoulders theatrically, palms out.

  Tilly’s blood heated. Was the servant accusing her of lying? It was beneath her dignity to get into an argument with the woman. “Thank you for the food,” she said instead, as sharply as she could manage. “I will call you when it’s time to clean away.”

  “I will be gone, madame,” Mrs. Rivard said. “My wage covers only a few hours a day. You may clean away after yourself.” With that, she untied her apron and left the room.

  Tilly sat heavily at the table. The soup was watery and the chicken leg skinny. She ate, alone, as she had so many times at Grandpa’s. But this time she was in a big, dark, echoing house on a windy island, with hostile staff and a husband in terrifying financial difficulties.

  This wasn’t how it was meant to be, but Tilly stopped herself from remembering how she imagined this new life because the comparison would make her ache. She was starving, so she wolfed down the food. She heard Mrs. Rivard leave and realized she was all alone in the house.

  Tilly finished her food and left the tray on the dining table for the morning. It was too dark to see properly in the kitchen anyway, and she was worried she would trip or slip. Instead, she picked up her candle and moved into the parlor, shining the dim light around. The only furniture was one small settee, whose stuffing was emerging from the arms. Piles of papers were stacked in the corners of the room. A quick glance told her they were purchase orders and invoices for Jasper’s business. Filed horizontally on the floor. Perhaps he had sold the filing cabinets. She sat on the settee for a moment, listening to the panes rattling in the wind. The emptiness in here crawled inside her. She shivered.

  Upstairs, then. Tilly had unpacked her things in her bedroom, so it might feel safer and not so strange and hollow. She carefully ascended the staircase, the flickering candlelight reflecting off the austere wood paneling.

  Then she paused on the third-floor landing, outside Jasper’s bedroom door.

  She was his wife, after all. And when things were settled, in the next few days, she would surely be sleeping in this room next to him. Wouldn’t she? Was that not how it worked?

  Her fingers were aroun
d the handle before she could think better of it, and she opened the door.

  Tilly placed the candleholder on the writing desk, and looked around. An unmade bed. Clothes strewn about. She had believed Jasper a neat man, a man in control of his belongings and environment. Who was this man who cast his clothes about and stored important paperwork in piles on the floor? In here, there were no decorations either. No clocks or pictures or mirrors or lamps or urns or washing bowls. She itched to tidy the room up, fold his shirts, hang his coat, but then he’d know she’d been in here and, she was loath to admit, she wasn’t sure how he might respond. Would he shrug it off? They were married after all. Or would he be angry with her?

  Perhaps it was that she hadn’t seen him for six weeks—the same length of time as their entire courtship—that made him now a stranger.

  Tilly turned to take her candle and leave, take refuge in sleep and then draw comfort from morning light. But she noticed the drawer of his desk was partly open, and overflowing with more papers. Why were these ones up here instead of downstairs in the pile?

  If she was very careful . . . There, the first paper was in her hand. What kind of debts did he have? And to whom?

  But in her hand was no unpaid invoice or demand notice. In her hand was one of her very own letters. Opened. And, she presumed, read.

  Dearest Jasper, I still have not heard from you. Do put me out of my misery and send word that you are whole and well . . .

  Tilly’s mind was addled. Who had opened this letter, then, if not Jasper? Mrs. Rivard? Is that why she was so cruel about not sending a telegram? Was she trying to hurt Tilly for some reason?

  But the letter was here, in Jasper’s drawer, in Jasper’s desk, in Jasper’s room. She carefully eased the drawer open. Saw the edge of another envelope with her handwriting on it, and she also thought she saw a telegram, though it was dark and she didn’t want to disturb the papers any further.