Ember Island

by Freeman, Kimberley

  But they weren’t family. And this trip to the mainland would ensure that they would never be. That she was moving inexorably into a future that they could not be part of.

  TWENTY-THREE

  A Letter from the Past

  Tilly had not had time to write ahead and organize somewhere to board, though she’d lied to Sterling and told him all was taken care of. She remembered a draper and dressmaker near Mrs. Fraser’s boardinghouse, where she had stayed on her arrival in Australia, and so she took the tram from the dock back to Mrs. Fraser’s, hoping there would be room for her to stay. She found herself on the doorstep just past midday, ringing the bell at the tall boardinghouse, with its iron lace railings and creaking weather vane.

  Footsteps inside, then the door opened.

  “Yes?” asked the young woman.

  “Is Mrs. Fraser in?”

  “No, she’s at the shops. Can I help?”

  “I need a place to stay for a week. Mrs. Fraser knows me. She said she’d be happy for me to return any time.”

  “We are full.”

  Under the circumstances, small complications took on enormous proportions to Tilly. Her resolve fluttered. “Yes, but Mrs. Fraser knows me. Chantelle Lejeune. She said . . .” Tilly trailed off. If they were full, they were full. “Do you know anywhere else?” she finished limply.

  “About five miles down the road on the esplanade there’s a bed-and-breakfast.” The young woman’s eyes flicked away. “Run by a gentleman. Perhaps a single lady such as yourself will not want to stay there alone. You could head towards town . . .”

  “I’m sure it will be fine,” she said. Then reconsidered. Sterling had been right. The island skewed judgment of what was appropriate. Nonetheless, she needed a place to stay, so she walked down to the esplanade, where tall trees bent over the road. A horse and carriage trotted past and she jumped out of the way, narrowly avoiding a pile of horse dung. She hadn’t been on this side of the bay for many months. She passed couples, families, men heading to the beach with towels and bathing caps. Nobody was dressed in white or blue uniforms. They were free to move about, to come and go to town or further. She strained her eyes across the water but wasn’t sure she could see Ember Island from here. Many islands dotted the bay, and it was hard to tell one from another. Over there: prisoners and orphans and displaced natives and lepers. Over here: civilization.

  At length, she reached the place the young woman at Mrs. Fraser’s boardinghouse had told her about. A little wooden house with a low front verandah and an overgrown courtyard garden. She stood across the esplanade from it, considering it. It didn’t even have a sign; it looked like an ordinary, small home.

  Her feet were pinching from the long walk, so she crossed the road, pushed her way through vines that hung low from the arch of the gate, and knocked at the door.

  A gentleman in his seventies, with white hair and a kind smile, answered. “May I help?”

  “I heard you have bed-and-breakfast rooms here.”

  His smile turned upside down. “Yes, but only for men. You should try Mrs. Fraser—”

  “Mrs. Fraser is full, and I don’t want to go to town, and I simply want a place to stay.”

  “You are very forthright.” He stroked his chin. “I’ve never had a young lady here before.”

  “I am not so delicate a young lady,” she replied. “I’ve spent the last several months working at the prison facility on Ember Island.” She wanted to say, I hit a man so hard with a brass poker that his nose was spread across his face like butter. But she didn’t.

  “How about this, then? You can stay here now because all three rooms are empty. But the bathroom is shared, so if another guest, a man, arrives, you will have to leave.”

  “Agreed,” she said. “What is your name?”

  “I am Richard Hamblyn.” He opened the door wide and took her suitcase. “And you are?”

  “Chantelle Lejeune. Governess to the superintendent’s daughter on Ember Island.” She followed him inside, removing her gloves. The foyer was clean and comfortable, with a thick rug and brightly polished brass.

  “Governess? Well, then. We shall have something to talk about. I am a retired schoolteacher.” He led her down a dim hallway and fumbled in his pocket for a key. A moment later, he had the door open on a tiny room looking out onto wattle trees. The window was open and the filmy white curtain caught in the light sea breeze. “Dine with me tonight and we shall talk of the best way to teach Latin grammar.” His eyes twinkled.

  Tilly liked him. He reminded her a little of Grandpa, with his bent back and his twinkling eyes among the folds and wrinkles. “I would like that very much. Mr. Hamblyn, do you have a copy of the newspaper?”

  “I shall bring it forthwith.”

  An hour later, her bags unpacked, her shoes eased off her tired feet, sitting cross-legged on her bed, Tilly scoured the help wanted advertisements. Many were local. She needed to get much further away. She found positions in far northern Queensland, and in the gold fields. But they were servile positions. Cooking and cleaning. Surely there would be another family somewhere in need of a governess. Perhaps she should travel first, somewhere remote, then look for work. The thought tired her. Perhaps she was tired from the day’s traveling. She lay back on her bed and closed her eyes, felt herself begin to drift off.

  She was back at Lumière sur la Mer, walking along the corridor between the top of the stairs and Jasper’s bedroom. She could hear the sounds of people making love: Jasper and Chantelle, just as she had heard them that night. This time she would stop them. This time she would throw open the door and shout at them to stop it, to end their affair; that way, they would stay alive. But she touched the door handle and it was searing hot. Smoke leaked from under the door.

  Tilly shouldered the door hard. It flew open and she saw them on the bed, surrounded by flames. But it wasn’t Chantelle, it was Hettie, dressed in her white prison gown, sitting astride a man’s body. Pillows covered his face. She pushed down hard, all the meat and muscle of her thick body concentrated into her arms.

  Tilly tried to move her mouth to say, “Fire! Fire!”

  Hettie turned to her. An expression like thunder. Dark hair like snakes in the smoke. “He deserved it,” she spat.

  Tilly woke with a start. The daylight baffled her, the strange filmy curtain tangling itself into knots as the afternoon wind picked up, ruffling the newpaper pages on the bed. She rose, shook her head to clear it, and closed the window. All was still and silent again. Dread cooled in her heart, along her veins.

  And she knew she was doing the right thing. Because anything that would make those nightmares stop was the right thing to do.

  •

  Tilly walked to the draper late that afternoon, when her feet were rested and the sun wasn’t so bright. The inside of the store was cool and dim and quiet, as though all the fabrics absorbed any noise. A woman worked with a dressmaker’s dummy in the light coming in the front window, pinning panels of fabric together. Bolts of cloth were arranged haphazardly across the counter and leaning on the walls. Tilly approached a bolt of red cloth, considered the price per yard. The dressmaker took the pins out of her mouth and called, “Can I help?”

  Tilly approached. Under her arm she held one of her own dresses. “I need you to make a copy of this dress, in a different size, for a friend.”

  The dressmaker took the dress from her and unfolded it, shaking it out. “Yes, that’s easy. I won’t be able to match the fabric precisely, but I can get close with the color.”

  “I also need another dress, in a very basic fabric, in her size. What might it cost?”

  The dressmaker led Tilly to the glass counter, filled with boxes of buttons and ribbons, and reached for a notepad. With a pencil, she jotted down the measurements and then added up an affordable estimate.

  “Can you do it within a week?”

  “No, I’ll need at least ten days.”

  “I’m sorry, I only have a week. I’ll pay you ex
tra.”

  The dressmaker cocked her head, considered Tilly dispassionately. “I can move a job. You don’t need to pay me extra.”

  “Thank you,” Tilly said.

  Tilly’s dress lay on the counter between them. The dressmaker tapped it with her fingertips. “You’ll have to leave this here.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  She smiled, her eyes curious. “And you and your friend . . . dress identically often?”

  Tilly laughed, realizing it must sound an odd request. Most women couldn’t bear seeing somebody in the same gown. “No, never. Just this one time. Then never again.”

  •

  On her return to Mr. Hamblyn’s house she was greeted with the smell of roasting meat. It reminded her she hadn’t eaten since breakfast on the island. He emerged from within his rooms when he heard her unlock the door, and smiled. “Dinner at seven?” he asked.

  “What time is it now?”

  “Six.”

  Her stomach rumbled. “I don’t suppose you can ask the cook to have it sooner? I didn’t eat lunch.”

  “The cook? I don’t have a cook. I do it all myself. If you’re hungry, my dear, I will have it on the table as soon as I can. Go and wash up, and I will knock when it’s ready.”

  Tilly went to her room, splashed her face with water, and changed into a comfortable housedress. Mr. Hamblyn knocked only a few minutes later and she followed him to a dining room set out with three small tables. One had been set with a clean but threadbare tablecloth and two places. All the bright lamps were lit. “Sit, make yourself comfortable,” he said.

  She did as she was told, reached for the crystal glass to sip water while he went to fetch their plates. Moments later, he laid in front of her some kind of semi-cooked meat, gray gravy, with shriveled potatoes swimming alongside.

  “And why don’t you employ a cook?” she asked as he sat across from her, shaking an abundance of salt onto his meal.

  “I’m usually alone or I have just one guest.” He tucked into his meal enthusiastically.

  Tilly tried her meat gingerly. It was bland and still rather bloody. She decided to fill up on the potatoes and gravy. She found herself longing for one of the sumptuous dinners on Ember Island: fresh rolls from the bakery, baked fish caught that morning, vegetables grown yards away.

  “So, Tilly, tell me how you became a teacher.”

  “A governess,” she corrected him. “I have only one student. I learned from a governess myself, and from my grandfather, who was a very clever man. I always excelled at languages particularly. What about you?”

  “Me? I simply loved children.”

  “And you never had any of your own?”

  “No. I never married. I never had children. But I taught so many. I remember them all, the bright ones, the naughty ones, even the ones in between.” His eyes took on a faraway happiness. “I hope they remember me too.”

  “I’m sure they do.” Tilly felt warmly towards him. “I have such a special relationship with my student, Nell. It’s like love.”

  “Do her parents mind?”

  “Her mother is dead. Her father . . . I am not so sure.”

  “Ah, yes. Parents want you to like their children, but not for their children to like you too much.” He kept shoveling food into his mouth, talking while chewing. “Teachers aren’t meant to be competition.”

  “I’m sure her father doesn’t see me as competition. At least not for him. Perhaps his late wife.”

  “Nonetheless, young Nell will grow up and not need a governess anymore, and you will slip out of her life as though you had never been. They go on to live their lives. I always felt a little lost when one of my pupils left, as though a little part of me had somehow gone missing.” He frowned a moment, and Tilly wondered if he were remembering a particular pupil.

  “Miss Lejeune, you must tell me how you came to Australia,” he said, brightening now, pushing his spectacles up high onto the bridge of his nose.

  “Ah. That is a little more complicated a thing to explain,” she said, cutting off thin slivers of cooked meat to eat so she didn’t appear ungrateful for the meal.

  “Go on. I am very clever and I can follow any complicated story,” he chuckled.

  It had been a long time since she had rehearsed the lies about her past, so she simply told a version that skimmed over the top. “I lived with my grandfather, who died and left everything to a male cousin. I married, very unwisely. Then my husband died. I needed to put all of this behind me and I thought the best way to do that was to travel a very long way.”

  “So you aren’t Miss Lejeune? You are Mrs. Lejeune?”

  “I am . . .” Neither. She was neither. “Call me Tilly.”

  “Well, I am most sorry to hear about your husband’s death. He must have been very young.”

  “Just twenty-four, sir.”

  “Illness?”

  “Accident. I cannot speak of it. It upsets me too much.”

  “You loved him?”

  “At first. Very much. But he was not . . . what I thought he was.”

  “And you are happy now? On Ember Island?”

  “Yes.”

  “I am sorry, but I noticed the newspaper in your room was open to the help wanted pages.” He spread his hands. “So perhaps you are not so happy.”

  Somewhere in the next room, a clock rang out the half hour. Tilly pushed her food around on her plate with her fork. “Well . . .”

  “Would you like me to ask around for you? I have many friends who still teach in schools.”

  “Not here. I want to go somewhere more remote.”

  “More remote than a prison island?” He sat back, dabbing his mouth with his napkin. “That’s quite an ask.”

  “I like remote places.”

  He considered her a little while by the flickering lamplight, his old hands folded in front of him. Then he said, “You are running from something.”

  Tilly prickled with guilt and anger. How dare he presume to know anything about her? “And what if I am? Can a woman not run from something unpleasant without having everybody interfering, to know her business, make her answerable?”

  Mr. Hamblyn seemed delighted by this answer. He threw his head back and laughed. “You are running from something and you have a quick temper. Oh, you are a thrilling creature, Mrs. Lejeune. Don’t worry, I do not intend to stop you. I simply never meet anyone interesting these days and I’ve found your company very diverting.”

  Tilly found herself smiling despite her irritation. “Grandpa always told me to keep my temper in check. He would be most ashamed of me speaking hotly to you, a gentleman so many years my senior.”

  He waved his hand in refusal. “But tempers grow worse if overly managed. I have seen it time and again with children. The harder one presses upon them, the more explosive the eventual outburst.”

  “I am not a child.”

  “We are all just grown-up children,” he said. “We know only a little more than we did then, and learn a little more each year, until we die knowing about a quarter of what there is to know.”

  Tilly put down her knife and fork. She was done with pretending the food was edible. “I do lose my temper,” she said. “And then I feel sick with guilt and push it down until it comes up again.”

  “One should never get sick with guilt. If there is offense, one should make amends. But often there is no real offense. I see girls, especially, like to blame themselves when everybody isn’t happy.” He pointed to her food. “Was it that awful?”

  She looked at her plate. She had managed a single potato and a few slivers of meat. “I’m afraid so,” she said.

  “I have bread and apples in the kitchen.”

  “Thank you.”

  They ended up in the kitchen, sitting at an old wooden table, eating apples and bread spread with drippings. Mr. Hamblyn was full of wisdom and he made her feel at ease. He told her some of the remote places she could go in Australia—out in the western bushlands or deep in
the Tasmanian wilderness—where she might find work as a teacher or a governess. She began to feel, if not positive about her future, at least not so frightened of it. All that was waiting for her, on the other side of this dark deed. She would be unfettered by love or guilt. She would be free.

  •

  The week passed in the good company of Mr. Hamblyn, or in her own company walking along the esplanade or buying little trinkets to take back for Nell. It was on her second-last morning on the mainland, as she sat on the front verandah in the warm sunshine drinking tea with Mr. Hamblyn, that a woman pushed her way through the tangle of vines over the front gate and approached the stairs. Tilly recognized her as Mrs. Fraser from the boardinghouse.

  “Good morning, Mrs. Fraser,” Mr. Hamblyn said. “We are having tea. Care to join us?”

  “I can’t stay,” she said. “I actually came to find Miss Lejeune. How are you, dear? Bessie said you had been by. I am so sorry we couldn’t offer you a room.”

  “I have had a good week here with Mr. Hamblyn,” Tilly said. “Please don’t concern yourself.”

  “Well, I’m glad you’re here,” she said, reaching into the pocket of her apron and pulling out a letter. “This came for you some months ago. I hung on to it, because I wasn’t sure where you’d gone next.”

  Tilly stood and took the letter from Mrs. Fraser, puzzled. Was it an answer to a help wanted advertisement she had written away for? It was addressed to Chantelle Lejeune, certainly, but she was sure nobody owed her a letter. Then she turned it over. Her body and blood turned to ice.

  “Are you well, Tilly?” Mr. Hamblyn said, his hand under her elbow, guiding her to her chair.

  She realized her knees had given way. “I . . . I think I stood up too suddenly,” she said, pressing her palm to her forehead.