Ember Island

by Kimberley Freeman

  Tilly was in the garden on the Tuesday Godfrey arrived without notice. She sat in the wooden seat she’d had placed between the hawthorn hedges, with a book open on her lap. Sweet jasmine was heavy in the air. A bumblebee buzzed listlessly nearby, and she was almost falling into a doze when the clop of hooves and the rattle of a carriage roused her. She rose and rounded the side of the house to see the arrival of Godfrey’s gleaming black and red chaise, drawn by two matching bay horses. They stopped at the entranceway and the footman opened the door to help Pamela down.

  Pamela. Godfrey’s wife. Tilly’s stomach turned over. Why did she have to come? Grandpa despised her. Seeing her would likely make him more ill than he already was. Tilly hurried over to greet them, saying the little mantra in her head she always said when Godfrey and Pamela were around. Be calm and moderate. A temper serves nobody. They were words her grandfather had said to her a thousand times.

  “I hadn’t thought we’d see you,” she said quickly, as Godfrey took Pamela’s arm. He wore a tall hat and a black coat, and Pamela was in a green traveling coat that rode up over her bustle. With her perfectly rounded blonde curls and big blue eyes, she resembled nothing so much as a porcelain doll.

  “I was going to send a letter,” Godfrey said, offhandedly. He was as unattractive as his wife was handsome, with mousy hair that always looked dirty and a body like two pillows tied together. “But it was unnecessary. The old man isn’t going anywhere and it would be too shocking, I suppose, for you to allow your husband to house and feed you.”

  Tilly let the jab slide. It had been delivered with Godfrey’s customary wry smile, which meant he could say as he pleased and later claim he was jesting if anyone took offense.

  “How is the old man?” Godfrey asked.

  “He is very tired, but otherwise in good spirits. You must allow me to go ahead and prepare him for your visit. I don’t want him to be overwhelmed.”

  Godfrey was already striding for the front door, nearly bowling Mrs. Granger over to get in the house.

  “Granger, we’ll have tea in the parlor, thank you,” he said.

  “Yes, Mr. Kirkland,” she answered with a little nod. The slight tightness in the woman’s jaw was the only outward sign that she disliked her incoming master.

  Tilly smiled at Mrs. Granger. “Do take your time,” she said.

  Godfrey gave Tilly a frown, but did not push further. Pamela was already in the parlor, inspecting the drapes. “How old are these?” she asked Tilly.

  Tilly knew Pamela already saw Grandpa’s house as her own, and was so outraged at this obvious and uncouth anticipation of possession that she dared not answer in case she said something everyone would regret. Instead, she tried to stall Godfrey on the stairs. “Please,” she said, “let me come with you. He’s very frail . . .”

  Godfrey took her wrist firmly and set her aside. “Cousin Matilda, I love you dearly, but you have been alone with him for many years, and you will allow me some time alone with him now. Pamela, come along.”

  Tilly stood back, shaking with unexpressed anger. Just as Grandpa said, Tilly had always been an angry little girl. He had taught her, through punishment as well as reward, that tempers disrupted society and girls especially, with their high voices and pink faces, ought not rage and shout.

  But her patience and self-control were all an illusion for Grandpa’s benefit. Countless times she had gone home and punched or screamed into her pillows after a disagreement with the postmistress or the greengrocer or the mother who let her child tear around and crush Tilly’s foot without a word of admonishment. No matter how hard she tried, she could not stop the fire from igniting in her belly. All she could do was clamp her mouth shut so the fire didn’t escape and burn those around her.

  Tilly sat on the long, embroidered sofa and waited. This sofa would be Pamela’s. Those paintings would be Pamela’s. That wallpaper would be Pamela’s. The drapes, which she had been regarding with such disdain . . . all of this would be Pamela’s, simply because she was married to Godfrey.

  Tilly’s father and Godfrey’s father had been brothers, but not friends. Tilly’s father had taken his wife and his young daughter to India, where he had caught typhoid and died. Tilly and her mother made the long journey home, her mother’s belly swelling with a pregnancy that eventually resulted in her death and the death of Tilly’s unborn sibling. Godfrey’s father might have taken Tilly in and raised her and Godfrey like siblings; but Godfrey’s mother refused. And so Grandpa had brought Tilly into his home, raised her as he might have raised a daughter, and unwittingly created petty jealousies where there should have been familial love.

  A little time passed—no more than fifteen minutes—and Tilly heard the door to Grandpa’s bedroom close and footsteps on the stairs. Godfrey and Pamela appeared, and Pamela had tears in her eyes. Tilly felt a pang. Could she have been wrong about Pamela?

  “The old man’s mind is addled,” Godfrey said gruffly. “He gave my wife a dressing-down.”

  Tilly stifled a laugh. “Oh, dear. He does get very tired. Don’t take it badly, Pamela,” she said, touching Pamela’s cool hand softly. “I’m sure he doesn’t mean it.”

  “Where is that tea?” Godfrey asked.

  “Give her a little longer. If we’d known you were coming Mrs. Granger might have made scones. The best she might muster on short notice is sandwiches.”

  “Yes, yes. You’ve made your point, Cousin. You’re annoyed that we didn’t call ahead.” Godfrey waved a dismissive hand. “You’ve made us feel sufficiently unwelcome so we will go.”

  Tilly immediately regretted not behaving more graciously. “No, no, I didn’t mean for you to—”

  “And perhaps one day soon, you will know how it feels to be unwelcome in this parlor,” Pamela said, with an arch of her fine eyebrows.

  And the fire blew hot, hot inside her. “Vulture,” she spat.

  Pamela put her handkerchief to her mouth in a gesture of shock. Godfrey merely smiled. Then he leaned in close and said, “Cuckoo.”

  In a few moments, they were gone. Mrs. Granger came in, a tray of watercress sandwiches in her hands. “Where are they?”

  “Getting back into their fine carriage and heading home,” Tilly said, her heart still thudding guiltily in her throat. “I offended them.”

  Mrs. Granger pursed her lips, but said nothing. She set down the tray and left Tilly alone in the parlor. Cuckoo. A bird that forces itself upon parents that aren’t its own, then starves the other chicks in the nest through its endless demands. That was how Godfrey saw her.

  Well, it was nearly time to fly.

  •

  Tilly woke to the morning sun in her window. She had slept poorly the night before, and had opened the curtains to let an evening breeze into the stuffy room. The sunshine fell onto the bed covers and she folded them back so that the warm light fell instead on her nightgown, across her breasts and belly. Tilly ran her hands along her body, feeling her own curves and hollows. She closed her eyes. The pleasure was sensual, thrilling. How she longed for Jasper to touch her this way. But their wedding night had been spent in the company of physicians and worried relatives, and then he had headed off the following day with promises to see her soon. And that was that. She was married, but still a virgin. A very reluctant virgin.

  Jasper had done no more than kiss her, once upon the lips, and quite coolly. But now she replayed that kiss over in her mind, deepening it and warming it, and imagining his hands sliding low to cup her breasts or press the small of her back.

  Guilty and a little embarrassed, she stopped. Pulled her bedclothes up again and lay there a while looking at the ceiling.

  She had no doubt that Jasper was a passionate man and would reveal that side of himself when they were finally alone together. Theirs had been a courtship closely scrutinized by the village. Jasper had been here visiting an uncle when he and Tilly met outside the tailor’s. He had been standing there, looking at his pocket watch, when Tilly emerged with Grandpa’s t
rousers all let out at the waistband.

  Jasper glanced up at Tilly and smiled. She smiled in return, eyes greedily taking in his well-shaped jaw, his dark and knowing eyes. “I wonder,” he said, “can you tell me where I might find Duck Street? I have an appointment that I don’t want to be late for.”

  “There are two ends to Duck Street,” she replied.

  “Basil Forster’s. The tea merchant.”

  “I’m going that way, sir. I can take you there.”

  “I’d be delighted.”

  They’d set off, exchanged names, and discussed the weather. She’d taken him to Basil Forster’s front path and was intending to be on her way home when he said, “I am visiting in the village for a few weeks. May I call on you?”

  Tilly willed herself not to blush. “You may, sir. I would welcome that.”

  Then she’d hurried off, calling herself a fool. Men as handsome as Jasper Dellafore fell in love with queenly blondes, not curvy little redheads. She went home and put it out of her mind.

  Until he called. Grandpa sat with them as they had tea in the parlor. Grandpa clearly approved of the young man, who was the descendant of French émigrés living on Guernsey. He worked in trading—tea, silk, shipping materials, anything he could acquire cheaply and sell to a specific clientele—so he traveled a lot. He told them about his beautiful home, which had been in his family for a hundred years. And by the end of his first visit, both Tilly and Grandpa were enamored of him.

  “You should marry him,” Grandpa had said, after he’d left.

  “I barely know him,” she’d replied. But secretly she thought she should marry him too.

  Within six weeks, she had. Now the wedding was behind her, but the marriage was yet to begin.

  •

  Tilly went to the post office early, to take her latest letter for Jasper, but also to inquire discreetly, without alarming anyone or subjecting herself to gossip, if any letter had come for her that might have been misaddressed or misdelivered. There were none. She knew there would be none, but the confirmation still stung.

  She was surprised, on her return home, to hear voices from the parlor. Even more surprised to recognize one of them as Grandpa’s. She quickly hung her bonnet on the stand by the door and hurried to the parlor.

  Grandpa sat heavily, legs spread wide, slumped to one side. He had dressed himself but misbuttoned his vest. His cheeks were sunken, so she could see the shape of his skull beneath skin that had taken a yellow-gray hue. It was almost uncanny to see him upright. Almost upright.

  “Grandpa!” Tilly exclaimed, moving towards him.

  But he held up a frail hand. “No, no, Tilly. I will be fine. This is Mr. Leadbetter, my solicitor.”

  Tilly turned to see the other man in the room, a rosy-cheeked fellow with a welcoming smile. “How do you do, Mrs. Dellafore?” he said.

  She took his hand momentarily, then released it and began to unbutton her gloves. “Forgive me for barging in. I had not thought to see my grandfather up and about.”

  “I will return to my room soon enough, dear,” Grandpa said. “But first I must finish my business with Mr. Leadbetter.” He gasped, and took a moment to catch his breath.

  “Can I get you water, Grandpa?” Tilly asked.

  Again he waved her away. “Business, my dear Matilda. Let the men finish their business.”

  She squeezed her gloves in her fists. “Of course,” she said. “You only need to call if you need me.” She gave Mr. Leadbetter a meaningful look, which he returned with a slow nod.

  “I will take good care of him,” he said.

  Tilly backed out of the room and went upstairs to her own bedroom, to hang up her light coat and fold her gloves away in her drawer. She presumed Grandpa’s conversation with Mr. Leadbetter was part of his getting his papers in order before he died. She sat heavily on the bed and lay back, fingers tracing lightly over the embroidered bedspread. She closed her eyes. What a special hell she was in. The man who had been the center of her world was dying. Without him, would she not be adrift in the world? The hard, aching sadness gripped her and she felt a tear roll over her cheek and into her hair. She longed to be able to lean on Jasper, for him to catch her tear in the crook of his finger, but now Jasper was a man made of mists and shadows. She couldn’t grasp him.

  At length she heard Leadbetter’s carriage leave and went downstairs to help Grandpa back to bed. She found him, however, shuffling about slowly, making a pile of objects on the tea table. A clock, two gilt picture frames, four silver candlesticks, a crystal vase.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, hurrying to him and putting her hand under his arm to steady him.

  He shrugged her off. “I’ve spoken to Leadbetter and there’s nothing for it. The wording of my own father’s will was clear, and Godfrey and Pamela will take all. Everything. So we need to get some of these things out of here before I die.”

  Tilly wondered briefly if Godfrey was right and Grandpa’s mind was addled. But he had been thinking and conversing lucidly until now. “Where are you going to send them?” she asked.

  “To your new home. To Lumière sur la Mer. We’ll pack them in a trunk and ship them over.”

  “We can’t do that. Pamela has counted everything with her eyes.”

  He huffed his way through the next sentence. “We can do it . . . and we will . . . I am making you a number of gifts . . . for your marriage. These things are mine until I die.”

  “You need to be in bed, Grandpa.”

  He caught his breath. “I understand you will not want to be complicit. Go now. Leave the house and take a walk about the village. I’ll get Granger to help. No, wait. I forgot something.”

  He dragged his feet to the mantel where his cigar box lay, untouched for many months now since he first started feeling ill and breathless.

  “I don’t want cigars, Grandpa,” Tilly said. “I don’t want anything. I don’t want trouble. Godfrey will give me trouble.”

  “Hush now and listen.” He thrust the cigar box into her hands. “What’s in here shouldn’t be shipped . . . you must take it with you. Carefully.”

  She unlatched the box, but he stilled her hand.

  “Look later. You will hand it directly back to me if you open it now. I had Leadbetter organize it for you.”

  Tilly moved the latch back into place with her thumb. She knew she should refuse it, all of it. But she thought of Pamela getting her hands on the silver candlesticks—Tilly had been with Grandpa the day he bought them for her fourteenth birthday dinner—and she hardened her resolve.

  “I know nothing,” she said.

  “Look out for the chest. I don’t know if it will get there before . . .” He trailed off, then sat down heavily. “The pain will be over soon.” Another fit of breathlessness gripped him and she moved towards him.

  “No. Go,” he said. “Tell Granger . . . to come . . . The sooner it is done, the sooner . . . I can rest.”

  Tilly touched his beloved forehead, then turned and left, gathering her bonnet at the door. She tucked the cigar box under her arm to free her hands to tie the ribbons, then headed down through the back garden. She opened the kissing gate that led to the path running beside the stream. Blackbirds and robins sang, and stringy wildflowers lined the way. She kept away from the main village, taking the stream path past the mill and down onto the grasslands that separated the village from the wood.

  Here, under a chestnut tree, she sat and opened the cigar box. Banknotes. Lots of banknotes. Tilly gasped, pulling a handful out. Underneath lay a letter. She unfolded it. Grandpa’s scrawl was barely legible, blotted and scratchy. But it was only a short message.

  This is for you and nobody else. A woman should have at least something in the world.

  Tilly refolded the note, placed everything back in the box, and snapped it shut. She pressed it against her chest, heart beating hard. “Thank you, Grandpa,” she breathed. “Thank you.”

  By the time she arrived home, the chest was sent
, and Grandpa wouldn’t speak of it. “It never happened,” he said, once again flat and limp in his bed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  •

  Thud, thud, thud.

  Tilly swam up through sleep.

  Thud, thud. “Miss Kirkland. Tilly.”

  Tilly sat up, blinking her eyes open. Mrs. Granger’s voice at the door. She threw back the covers and moved to the bedroom door to open it. Mrs. Granger stood there, pale, holding a lamp.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “It’s time. It’s his . . . his time.”

  Grandpa. Tilly grabbed her dressing gown from behind the door and pulled it on. Fast movements, cold heart. She hurried after Mrs. Granger and into Grandpa’s bedroom. All the lamps were lit, the nurse from the village who came to sit with him at night was there. It was too bright and noisy.

  “Tilly,” Grandpa gasped. “I’m sorry to wake you, dear. But I won’t be here in the morning.”

  Tilly sank down next to the bed and grasped his hands. His fingertips were worn smooth by the years. “Hush now, Grandpa. You don’t know that.”

  “I do. I do,” he said, touching her hair softly. “I feel life drawing out of me like water runs out of the bath . . .” Deep, shaking breath. Huff. Huff. “Everybody . . . everybody out except Tilly. It is so crowded in here.”

  Mrs. Granger and the nurse withdrew, the door shut behind them. Grandpa placed his cold fingers gently under Tilly’s chin and lifted her face to meet his gaze.

  “I haven’t . . . been honest . . . with you,” he said.

  “You have always been the best of men.”

  “No . . . no, I . . . haven’t.” The big shuddering breath again, followed by the short series of huffs. “Listen . . . I knew Jasper . . . I already . . . knew Jasper.”

  Tilly’s ears rang faintly. She was overwhelmed by sadness, puzzlement. “What do you mean?”

  “You’re a . . . proud girl . . . too proud . . . you wouldn’t . . . I had to . . .”

  “Grandpa, all is well. Whatever you did, all is well.”