Back at Botallick House, Isabella saw the summer was turning, the colours in her garden fading and overblown, sliding into autumn.
Isabella, on returning from St Piran, promptly caught influenza. It was a relief she could not admit to, for although feeling unwell and running a fever, her illness kept Richard from her bed.
As she lay feverish she missed Tom so acutely that she spent hours with her eyes closed tight against the room she was in, talking to him in her head. Tossing and turning, she longed for the feel of him beside her, the length of their bodies lying on the sand side by side.
‘I am cut in half,’ she whispered. ‘I am cut in half without you, Tom.’
Although Tom was working in Falmouth, Isabella had been too unwell to catch a glimpse of him or to go anywhere.
Lisette watched the weight fall from Isabella with a sinking heart. Isabella seemed to have fallen into some dreamlike state, had withdrawn from her life with Richard and was making, like a child, Lisette saw, her own entirely make-believe world.
When Isabella was on her feet again and once more downstairs she sometimes wandered listlessly around the garden, deadheading the roses, but for most of the day she sat just outside the French windows, wrapped up against the October wind, staring into space.
Richard was so concerned he wanted to call the doctor back.
‘My wife seems depressed,’ he said to Lisette. ‘Why should this be? Is it due to her influenza?’
Lisette, knowing the cause was Tom Welland, said carefully, ‘I do not think she needs the doctor, Sir Richard, but something to occupy her. Maybe Miss Sophie could come to keep her company for a while?’
Richard thought this an excellent idea, but Isabella immediately vetoed it.
‘Thank you, Richard, it is a kind thought, but I do not care for company at present, even Sophie’s. Later, perhaps. Really, I get better day by day.’
Isabella tried to make a supreme effort at cheerfulness but Lisette would find her weeping in her room. One day, carrying the rags that Isabella would need soon upstairs, Lisette found her at her small desk writing letters with some concentration, and sighed with relief.
‘Good, Miss Isabella, I am glad you are writing letters. Maybe you can walk into the village later to post them? The air will do you good and if you feel frail I will accompany you. I have placed new rags in your drawer.’
Isabella seemed hardly to hear. She nodded and continued writing and Lisette left the room quietly.
‘Dear Tom, life feels unendurable …’
‘Dear Tom, this is a note to say I hope …’
‘Tom. Tom. Tom. I miss you. I cannot endure this life I have.’
‘Tom, without you I am nothing.’
All the notes were screwed into a ball and Isabella burnt them in her grate. She paced the room and suddenly stopped. What had Lisette said? She walked slowly to her drawer and opened it. The rags lay there, accumulating. Isabella stood looking down at them. She tried to think, then went to her desk and looked in her diary, turning back to the last month. Her last monthly bleeding had been due the day before Richard arrived back in St Piran. This month she was three days late. Lisette always remembered the correct dates. Had she noticed the amount of rags in the drawer?
Isabella put her hand over her mouth as her predicament dawned on her. She had not shared a bed with Richard for months. She went and sat on the bed, sick with shock. She sat there for a long time. It was the first time in her life that she had been really frightened.
She got up again and removed some of the rags from her drawer and placed them under articles of clothing in a separate drawer. She left the room and went down the wide staircase and out of the open front door. She walked across the lawn, past the British flag which flapped like washing in the wind, and stood looking out towards Falmouth docks.
She curved her arms round her stomach and closed her eyes, and it seemed to her that she felt a faint answering beat, and despite her fear her heart swelled with the thought of Tom’s child lying within her. Part of him; part of her.
I am glad of the cooler weather, but my heart is not in the figurehead of the pirate I am carving. Isabella moves everywhere with me and the heaviness of my heart will not lift as the days go by. I have seen Sir Richard in the harbourmaster’s office and down on the quay but I dare not inquire after Isabella. Then, one month after I have been working in Falmouth, I overhear Sir Richard talking with Mr Vyvyan as they stand on the quay near the schooner I am measuring up for my figurehead. Both men have already greeted me and asked after my father.
It is a habit of Sir Richard’s to shout, even when talking to a man next to him, and I hear clearly most of the conversation.
‘Is my daughter quite recovered now?’ Mr Vyvyan asks.
‘From the influenza, yes. But her spirits seem very low. I suggested that your niece, Sophie Tredinnick, come to stay. I thought it might cheer her, but Isabella did not feel up to it.’
Mr Vyvyan says, ‘Richard, you must not allow Isabella’s low spirits to take hold. Her mother used to suffer in the same way from time to time …’
‘Indeed? And what cheered Helena? What brought her back to herself?’
‘Isabella. A child made the difference. After Isabella was born, I do not believe Helena ever suffered the same low spirits.’
I hear Sir Richard laugh. ‘My God, Daniel, I believe you have given me the answer. Of course! Isabella needs children and a purpose.’
I feel rage, then such sudden despair that I have to hang on to the bowsprit. I know that if Isabella had her way, Sir Richard would never touch her. I swing down from the ship without my measurements and stride past the two men.
In the late afternoon I walk into the village of Mylor. I have no idea what I am going to do, only that I have an overwhelming need to see Isabella. I walk up the creek road from the village and stand facing the gates of the house. I decide I will search out Lisette and ask how her mistress is. I do not care what Lisette thinks. I head off to the right of the gates towards the small wood that runs behind the back of the house. I skirt the wood, then suddenly hear a horse and see Sir Richard, back from Falmouth, emerging from the trees and riding towards the house. I turn away back to the gate. I can think of no good reason to give for being here.
Lisette was in the kitchen ironing one of Isabella’s dresses. Something was niggling at her but Lisette could not identify it. As she ironed she thought, I am going to have to take her dresses in soon … It was then that her unease manifested itself.
Lisette replaced the iron on the stove and went quickly upstairs. She knocked on the door and went in. The room was empty and Lisette went to the top drawer and looked down at the rags. Some had been removed and Lisette felt sudden relief. She went into the bathroom but could find no soiled linen in Isabella’s covered bucket.
Lisette felt the frightened beat of her heart. Isabella had been left in her care and she had neglected her duty because of her ill and dying mother. Perhaps Isabella’s illness could have changed the pattern of her monthly.
Then she remembered the look in Ben Welland’s eyes that had mirrored her own suspicion. She went slowly and heavily back down the stairs to her ironing.
Tom turned back to the gates. Had he continued a few more yards he would have met Isabella, who was walking along the ha-ha towards him.