I had been a melancholic shadow in the house for so long that I found it curious to catch sight of myself now sporting this dash of the unfamiliar. I was a dull duckling learning to embrace its decorative adult feathers – soon I would be transformed beyond all recognition.
I moved away from the mirror and walked on. Gerald was gone. A piece of clothing changed only how I looked, not how I felt – I would learn to skirt the gloom in colourful attire, just as I was learning to indulge my suffering in private.
The morning-room door opened as I approached, and Annie emerged with a large wooden tray hanging from her hand, which knocked against her calf as she closed the door behind her. She started when she saw me, belatedly curtsying before stepping to the side to allow me to pass. She revealed no hint of our earlier episode. I paid her little heed as I reached for the door handle.
‘Dr Mayhew.’
I jerked my fingers back from the ribbed brass as if it had burnt me.
Her gaze climbed to my face. ‘He’s in there, with your mother, miss.’
I was grateful for, if surprised by, the warning. Dr Mayhew had grown impatient of my grief – in his eyes it had morphed into something else, something that did not deserve sympathy or delicacy. In his opinion, I was showing signs of hysteria – that peculiarly female affliction he found so intolerable and which required a firm hand, cold baths and country retreats – a euphemism, I soon learnt, for asylums catering to the more genteel lady. He would have had me suitably incarcerated on my return from France, but Madeleine intervened on my behalf, persuading my parents that time was all I really needed. In the end, my parents relented, but Dr Mayhew continued to prowl in the wings, unconvinced by my paper-thin performance of improvement, constantly critiquing, whittling away my parents’ confidence, ever hopeful of vindication.
I contemplated the best course of action. If I returned to my room I would be doing little more than delaying the inevitable: I would either receive a summons, or – even worse – they would come and find me. I looked at Annie.
‘Come and get me in five minutes,’ I instructed, ‘say there’s a telephone call for me. You can say it’s my sister.’
I couldn’t tell whether she was regarding me with compassion or contempt and to my irritation I felt myself flush. She dipped her head in assent, and with a strategy in place, I reached again for the door handle.
Dr Mayhew stood up the moment I entered, the dainty cup and saucer with its pattern of entwined pink roses looking faintly absurd in his meaty grasp. He had been the village doctor for as long as I could remember, but I had never taken to the man. He had the habit of walking into a room and demanding its deference – such pomposity did not sit well with me and never had. He had not aged well, it had to be said. Flabby jowls folded over the starched collar of his shirt, and the red thread veins in his cheeks and a bulbous, purple-mottled nose confirmed popular suspicions he was rather too fond of his drink. His hair, once thick and black, was now thin and grey, a few lank strands draped over his sharply domed head, though his thick mutton chops still flourished and seemed to offer some balance to his generous girth.
‘Here she is, the young lady herself. How is our patient this morning?’
I smiled, but only because it was expected of me. It grated that he still saw fit to refer to me in this way, as if I was ill and always would be. I was not ill. I was grieving.
‘I am quite well, thank you, Doctor,’ I said, greeting my mother before attending to the tea things laid out upon the sideboard.
‘No more nightmares?’
I put down the teapot, pushing away the images that had plagued my sleep. ‘None at all.’
‘So, the medication is working then?’
I thought of the untouched bottle of pills tucked away in my dressing table drawer. I turned back to face him, my teacup in hand. ‘It appears so.’ I smiled over the rim and took a deep gulp of the lukewarm liquid.
His studied me, inscrutable. I knew I mustn’t flinch – an inadvertent tremor of my hand, a quiver in my voice, any nervous darting of the eyes and he would have me locked up before the day was out. I took another sip of tea, and with a steady hand, rested my cup back into the saucer.
Mother hadn’t moved from her chair. She was staring into the fire, her lips pursed. She was finally roused by the quiet tap at the door and Annie bobbing into the room.
‘Mrs Brightwell is on the telephone for you, miss.’
She held my gaze for a beat longer than necessary, leaving me to suspect she resented her part in the duplicity, but I was unconcerned. I had achieved my aim: my escape was secured.
‘Oh! Madeleine? I’d better come straight away.’ I contrived a look of polite – if not sincere – disappointment and took a final, hasty gulp of tea. ‘Goodbye, Dr Mayhew.’
I didn’t shut the door fully behind me. I indicated my gratitude to Annie with a curt nod which she acknowledged before returning to her legitimate chores. I, however, loitered.
‘How is she really?’ Dr Mayhew asked.
‘She was caught at the lake again, the other evening.’
I hadn’t realised my mother knew.
‘With intent?’
‘Annie saw her going and followed her down. She brought her back before she had the chance to …’ She didn’t need to finish – we all knew what happened last time.
‘Well, I must say, that is most disappointing to hear. I thought she was making better progress – she’s seemed a little more collected of late.’ He let the dread sink into my poor mother before making a half-hearted attempt to reassure her. ‘Well now, we shouldn’t leap to the worst of conclusions every time. Perhaps it was nothing more than an innocent walk that took her that way – it is a beautiful spot after all, and nothing did happen – but we must also …’ He left a meaningful pause. ‘As you well know, my dear Mrs Marcham, there are a lot of women mourning in this country today. The majority will no doubt overcome their grief in time, but the added trauma of what Stella went through – it might be she never recovers from it.’
‘Then what should we do, Doctor? God knows I can’t lose another daughter.’
‘The medication should help – if she takes it.’
‘She says she is, but if she’s not?’
‘Then maybe we should revisit the idea of a short break away.’
I recoiled from the doorway, a bile of fury rising up inside me. I would never agree to it. I would not be incarcerated simply for feeling a natural human emotion.
The concept was insane – but I most certainly was not.
I slammed my bedroom door and retrieved my secret stash of cigarettes from underneath the wardrobe. Kneeling on the grate of my fireplace, I tapped one from the packet, dangling it from my bottom lip as I rasped a match across the rough strip on the matchbox. I held the flame to its tip and drew in, a deep shuddering breath, before blowing the smoke up the chimney. Mother didn’t know I smoked and would certainly not approve. It was a habit I had picked up early on in my VAD career, while serving at the 1st General in London. Another nurse had advised it after a horrendous shift. She promised me it calmed the nerves.
I leant against the blue Delft tiling of the fire’s surround, with their quaint images of windmills and fishermen, and felt my tension begin to ease. I closed my eyes, fatigue dampening my fury.
I was alarmed to hear a gentle knock at the door, but I reasoned it would not be my mother or Dr Mayhew. Annie cracked it open, a linen basket balanced on her narrow hip.
‘I