Ember Island

by Kimberley Freeman

  Hettie dropped her head slightly to hide her smile. “Well. You’re welcome.”

  “She and her father have gone off to the mainland for a few weeks, so I’m at a loose end. You might see me out in the garden a little more.”

  “It’s always nice to see you,” Hettie said. Then the rest came out in a rush, “I’m sorry about crying on you. It wasn’t . . . appropriate.”

  Tilly’s voice grew gentle. “You are a human being and so am I. There is nothing inappropriate about wanting comfort.”

  “I rather think the superintendent would see things differently.”

  “No, you’d be surprised. Sterling Holt is a forgiving man. He has a very kind nature.”

  Hettie looked at her for a moment, in utter bafflement.

  Tilly grew curious. “You don’t believe me? But he lets you maintain the garden.”

  “Lets me? He makes me.”

  “But you said yourself: you would have sunk into despair without it.”

  “Yes, I enjoy it, but it’s work. I have to do a certain amount of hours a week or I get my privileges taken away. I’m not like you. I don’t flit in and out when I feel like it.”

  Tilly stung at her words, but then Hettie softened. “I am sorry,” she said. “I don’t mean to be so rude to you. But today I am tired and unwell, and I would rather be resting on a nice soft bed.”

  “You should tell the turnkeys. They could put you in the infirmary.”

  “The infirmary is for male prisoners. Female prisoners are simply not allowed to get sick. Besides, I did tell the turnkeys and they prodded me in the back and told me to get to work anyway.” She clasped her hands together and rested her chin on them.

  “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well,” Tilly said. “But I promise you Sterling is a kind man.”

  “He is not an unkind man, I suppose,” said Hettie. “But Superintendent Holt is certainly a single-minded man and I have seen the side of him that you, perhaps, have not. He adores his daughter, and so do you, so you agree on what is fundamental to him. Perhaps if you disagreed with him you would see it. There is a hardness about him, once he makes up his mind . . .” She trailed off, her eyes flicking away to the distance. “I suppose I oughtn’t talk like this to you.”

  “If there is a blurring of an accepted etiquette between us, Hettie, that is entirely my fault.” Besides, Tilly wanted to hear more about this side of Sterling she didn’t know. “Do the other prisoners think the same of Sterling?”

  “I only know seven other prisoners,” she said. “I never speak to any of the men. But I’ve heard the turnkeys talking. They often say similar things. Single-minded. Stubborn. Holier than thou.” Hettie stopped, perhaps reaching a point of feeling she shouldn’t say more. “I know you are fond of him.”

  “He has been kind to me.”

  “I know it is more than that. You love saying his name. Your mouth savors it the way it might savor a ripe peach.”

  Tilly blushed, speechless.

  “In the end, Miss Lejeune, he is a superintendent at a high security prison. He must be as he is, or he would be unlocking doors and setting us all free. He must believe what he believes about us, even if it’s only half true.”

  Tilly turned this thought over in her mind as the sun fell behind the mainland in the west, a huge orange ball that turned the sky shades of amber and pink. Its last red wedge paused a moment in a gap between distant mountains, then winked out. Night had fallen.

  “Do you know, I believe you shouldn’t call me Miss Lejeune,” Tilly said slowly.

  “Why not?”

  Because it’s not my name. The desire to tell her everything was too great. Tilly had to clear her throat loudly. “Because we are friends. And I call you Hettie, so you should call me Tilly.”

  “Yes, Tilly,” she said, trying out the name. “If you prefer it.”

  “And if you would like me to speak to the superintendent on your behalf . . .”

  “No. Please don’t rock the boat. He’d put me on some other awful duty to spite me.”

  Tilly didn’t answer. She didn’t believe such things of Sterling.

  At least she was fairly sure she didn’t.

  •

  The days dragged. Hours stretched out and lost their shape. Tilly missed Sterling more than she could have imagined. After their first lovemaking, she had known one taste was not enough. But she hadn’t counted on a second time making the craving worse. She woke up thinking about him, went to sleep thinking about him. After the first week, the idea that two weeks still remained before she saw him again caused her such a bolt of physical pain that she gasped.

  She kept busy as best she could. Her own garden plot required little work as autumn glimmered on the horizon, so she started helping Hettie out with her gardening chores. Together they pulled weeds and raked leaves and scrubbed stone features. If Mr. Donaghy walked out onto the verandah to check on Hettie, Tilly would simply walk a few paces away. Most of the time, though, they were at the back of the garden, unobserved. Now that Hettie comfortably used Tilly’s name, it had unlocked a deeper intimacy between them. Hettie spoke without restraint about her family back on the mainland, about her life before prison, her difficult childhood. Tilly shared too, still careful to avoid details that might reveal who she really was. But still, it was a great relief to talk about her grief at Grandpa’s passing, about her odious cousin Godfrey, about her long journey to the antipodes to build a new and independent life for herself. Almost without realizing it, in that three weeks Sterling was away, she and Hettie became friends.

  In her darker moments, before sleep, she wondered if befriending Hettie might be a way for her to assuage her own guilt. To hold close to her that person who was living the life she might have lived, had she not been a few minutes ahead of the police in Chantelle Lejeune’s room . . . was it a way of vicariously experiencing the punishment she thought she was due?

  She resolved that, on Sterling’s return, she would talk to him about Hettie’s case. About whether anything could be done to reduce her sentence in light of what she had told Tilly: was there not some special plea of self-defense Hettie could make?

  But then, thoughts of Sterling would take a different turn in her mind and Hettie would be forgotten in that delicious memory of pleasure.

  •

  Nell’s voice was the first indication to Tilly that they had returned. Slamming through the front door, calling out, “Helloooo? Tilly?”

  Tilly, who had been curled up in an armchair in the library reading, leapt to her feet and raced out. Nell stood there, a suitcase in each hand, smiling.

  “It’s me!” she declared.

  Tilly gathered her in her arms. “Welcome back. Your father?”

  “Right behind me. He has rather a large trunk. Do you not think I look taller? Papa bought me all new clothes.” She dropped her suitcases and reached into the satchel that was slung over her shoulders, pulling out Pangur Ban and a sheaf of untidy papers. “I have been writing so much! Would you like to hear some? Let’s go to the library right now.”

  Tilly was desperate, though, to see Sterling. “Can we wait a few moments?”

  But she could see now that Mr. Donaghy stood outside on the verandah, in deep conversation presumably with Sterling. He wasn’t coming in yet. For an awful moment she wondered if he was actively trying to avoid her.

  “Please, Tilly? I have missed you so and wanted so much to read you this.”

  Tilly forced a smile. “All right, then. But let’s put your suitcases away in your room first.”

  Nell’s new chapters were as wildly imaginative and vividly described as ever. Tilly tried to relax and enjoy Nell’s reading, but eventually grew restless to see and speak to Sterling.

  “Enough for today, Nell,” Tilly said. “I think you should go and unpack, so that tomorrow we have a clear day for your studies.”

  “But I’m getting to the good part.”

  “Save it for another day. Always leave your reader w
anting more.”

  Nell straightened the edges of her papers and lay them on the table, then pushed back her chair—did Tilly imagine the huffiness?—and left the room.

  Tilly didn’t waste a moment. She went straight to Sterling’s office and knocked gently, hoping hard that he was alone.

  “Come in.”

  She opened the door. He glanced up, smiled. “Tilly.”

  “Sterling.”

  He indicated his desk, an open ledger, a pile of papers. “I am so busy.”

  “I will come back later, then.”

  “No, no. Wait. I need to speak to you.”

  She prickled with anticipation.

  “Mr. Donaghy spoke to me at length. He said you spent a great deal of time with prisoner 135 while I was away. Is that so?”

  “I . . .” Her heart thudded in her throat. “We’ve been working in the garden together.”

  “He said he saw you talking more than working.”

  “Is that a crime?”

  He frowned. “I’d advise against it.”

  She spoke quickly. “Yes, I admit Hettie and I talked. A lot. Perhaps more than we should have. So I may as well tell you that I don’t understand why she has such a long sentence when it’s clear she acted in self-defense and—”

  Sterling was half out of his seat, waving his hands in a “stop” gesture. “Tilly, Tilly, no. No. Do not say another word.”

  Embarrassment suffused her cheeks.

  Sterling paced. “I blame myself. Perhaps I did not warn you sufficiently. We give the prisoners numbers for a reason, so that we can interact with them impartially. You ought not have befriended this woman to such a degree that you are calling her by name and speaking to her about her crime.”

  “But she says—”

  “She is a murderer, Tilly,” he said, whirling around to face her. “After I spoke to Mr. Donaghy, I checked her records. She killed her husband, the man she stood beside, in the eyes of the Lord, and promised to love and honor. She got him drunk on potent homemade whiskey and then held two pillows over his face until he stopped breathing.”

  Tilly paused a moment as the image sunk in. Hettie’s hard, raw hands around a pillow, a slack-limbed man beneath it, growing more and more still. “Yes, but he was beating her,” she said in a quiet voice.

  “Is this what she has told you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Because the court records something quite different. He had been working up in the gold fields for six months. She had taken up with another man. On her husband’s return, she murdered him so that she could be with this other man. Her lover helped her dispose of the body and is currently serving a sentence for it back on the mainland.”

  Shock and embarrassment fought for precedence in Tilly’s body. She felt cold and warm all at once. Why had the court recorded such a different version of events? Was Hettie lying? Or was the court biased against Hettie? Tilly could imagine that so easily: women were rarely afforded fair treatment in any other aspect of public life.

  He must believe what he believes about us, even if it’s only half true. Tilly had seen too many times how men’s opinions of women were formed out of what they heard from other men, not what they had observed from the behavior of actual women.

  “I can see I will have to take 135 off garden duties,” he muttered, returning to his seat.

  “No! Don’t do that. That’s unfair to her.”

  “She should know better than—”

  “No. I’m to blame. I was too friendly. I asked her about it. If anyone should be forbidden from being in the garden, it should be me.”

  Sterling looked at her. Pity again. Sadness. Regret. Nothing good, nothing promising. “Very well, Tilly. Stay out of the garden. It’s nearly autumn anyway. I can send one of the prisoners up to rake up leaves and pull weeds. Perhaps, in spring, we’ll review the situation. But I want you nowhere near that prisoner.”

  Tilly nodded, feeling like a naughty schoolchild.

  Sterling seemed about to say something else, but then he stopped himself.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I will need to speak to you at length tonight. About . . . other things. About us. About Nell.”

  Tilly’s heart sank. “Your tone frightens me.”

  “There is nothing to be frightened of, Tilly, my dear,” he said, in a gentler voice. “I am not frightened.”

  Still, he wasn’t smiling. And Tilly feared the worst.

  •

  Tilly could barely concentrate on her teaching that afternoon, so she was a good match for Nell who could barely concentrate on her lessons. In the end they decided that, as the tide was low, they would walk down to the small strip of sandy beach and look for shells to draw the next day. They tied on their bonnets and took a basket and honey sandwiches for afternoon tea.

  “I have so missed the sound of the sea,” Nell said, sitting on a rock and removing her shoes and stockings. She jammed her toes into the sand and wriggled them energetically. “The city is very noisy. Trams rattling and horses running about.”

  Tilly removed her own shoes and stockings and walked down the sand to the water. She lifted her skirts and stepped in. The sea was warm, but the breeze coming off it was cool and fresh.

  “I think we should give this beach a name,” Nell said. “Something like Seven Yard Beach.”

  Tilly turned. Nell’s face was in the sun. Something about her fine, pale skin made Tilly ache with affection. “Prisoners’ Cove,” she said.

  “Shark Beach,” Nell said, grinning mischievously. “Don’t go out too far, now, Tilly.”

  Tilly laughed and kicked water at her. “I think Seaweed Beach or Jellyfish Beach would be more descriptive. There are plenty of both around.”

  “I like Seven Yard Beach. It sounds poetic, but I think it is only seven yards or so across. I think I might draw a map of the island this afternoon and name all the places. What about the escarpment?”

  “Sterling Cliff,” Tilly said, immediately.

  “Ooh, yes. Sterling Cliff sounds very foreboding. With Starwater House directly on top, looking out to Seven Yard Beach and Stockade Flats.” She stood up and came down to join Tilly in the water, circling her waist with her arms. “I’ll draw sea monsters all around the island.”

  Tilly put her arms around Nell in return. They stood like that for a few minutes, the shallow waves lapping at their feet, and Tilly closed her eyes and felt the sun in her hair and the sweet breath of contentment in her lungs. Nell loved her, and she loved Nell. Sterling’s cautionary tone would melt under such a truth.

  Then they stepped apart.

  “Honey sandwiches?” Tilly asked.

  “Let’s.”

  They sat together on flat rocks by the sand, eating and chatting, as the afternoon shadows grew long and the tide began to turn.

  •

  Sterling was too busy to join them for dinner. It was nearly nine o’clock in the evening when he knocked lightly on Tilly’s door.

  She opened it, heart thudding. “I thought I’d never see you.”

  “I’m sorry. The reason I do not like to take leave is because it makes so much more work when I get back.”

  “Come in,” she said, opening her door wide. She wore only her nightdress and dressing gown.

  “No. No, I . . . Can you please get dressed and come to the parlor? I’ll pour us sherry.”

  Tilly nodded and he closed the door.

  She quickly found a housedress and changed into it, but didn’t bother to pin her hair and put stockings on. She went barefoot to the parlor, where Sterling waited, gazing out the window. Two sherries sat on the low table.

  Tilly cleared her throat.

  He turned. His dark eyes looked sad, and the sadness instantly transferred to her. She wanted to turn and run and not hear what he had to say to her.

  “Sherry?”

  She wordlessly picked up her glass.

  He took her free hand in his, stroked her fingers gently. “It
’s too soon for Nell.”

  “Nell loves me.”

  “It’s too soon for me.”

  She had no response.

  “It’s too soon for everything. The circumstances of our . . . consummation were so unusual. There was wildness in the night, in the air. We did the wrong thing.”

  “I love you, Sterling.”

  “We mustn’t talk of love. We must talk of care and responsibility. We are not wild animals, Tilly. I am more fond of you than I can say, but Nell’s well-being is my first concern. I can’t have her running off again and—”

  “That was nothing to do with overhearing us talking of love, Sterling. That was her fear of being sent to boarding school. You know that.”

  “I do not know what else she has heard or intuited. I just know that she veers between sweetness and aggression, she is fearful and unsettled. She dreamed nearly every night of her mother while we were away. It is too soon.”

  Tilly fought tears. “Then what’s to become of me? Am I to lose my job?”

  “No, of course not. We will continue as friends for now. We will proceed slowly. Please do not interpret my words as a rejection of your affections, Tilly. You are dear to me. But now is not the time for us.”

  “Then when?”

  “We will know when the time is right.”

  “When you say ‘we,’ I think you mean ‘you.’ I am not part of this decision.” Her temper had been ignited. She hung on grimly to the last bough of calm in her heart.

  “I hope you will see things my way as my view is very sensible.”

  Single-minded. Stubborn. Holier than thou. “And my way isn’t sensible? Or is it simply not worth listening to?”

  Still, not a spark of anger or passion in his voice, almost as though the more flammable the situation became, the slower and more reasonable his tone became. This infuriated Tilly, who was fast being positioned as the hysterical party in this exchange. “You are very young, Tilly. It is perhaps my major misgiving about our . . . relationship, especially after seeing your ill judgment with regards to prisoner 135. You are nowhere near old enough to be Nell’s mother and, yes, she loves you, but not as a mother. You and Nell and I: we are not a family.”