The Forgotten Letters of Esther Durrant - Kayte Nunn Page 0,1

months John had taken to sleeping in his dressing room and she was still not ready for him to return to the marital bed. “I confess I am rather tired,” she said, pulling off her gloves. “I might settle in.” She opened a small cupboard, put her hat on the shelf inside, and hung her coat on a hook that was conveniently placed underneath.

“I shall take a nightcap in the Lounge Car. That is if you don’t mind, darling,” John replied.

He had taken the hint. So much between them went unsaid these days. Esther turned around and inclined her head. “Not at all, you go. I shall be perfectly fine here.”

“Very well.” He left in a hurry, likely in pursuit of a dram or two of single malt.

She sat heavily on the bed, suddenly too exhausted to do more than kick off her shoes and lie back upon the blankets. She stared up at the roof of the cabin as it curved above her, feeling like a sardine in a tin. It wasn’t unpleasant: if anything, she was cocooned from the activity going on outside and wouldn’t be bothered by it.

Before long, a whistle sounded and, with a series of sudden jerks, the train began to move away from the station, shuddering as it gathered speed. After a few minutes it settled into a swaying rhythm and Esther’s eyelids grew heavy. She fought to stay awake. Summoning the little determination she still possessed, she rallied and found her night things. It would not do to fall asleep still fully clothed, only to be roused by her husband on his return from the lounge.

John had asked their daily woman, Mary, to pack for them both, telling Esther that she needn’t lift a finger. Normally she wouldn’t have countenanced anyone else going through her things, but it had been easier not to object, to let them take over, as she had with so much recently. She had, however, added her own essentials to the cardigans, skirts, and stockings, and tucked away among her underwear was a small enameled box that resembled a miniature jewelry case. She found it, flipped the catch, and the little red pills inside gleamed at her like gemstones, beckoning. As she fished one out, she noticed her ragged nails and reddened cuticles. A different version of herself would have minded, but she barely gave them a second thought, intent as she was on the contents of the box. Without hesitating, she placed the pill on her tongue, swallowing it dry.

She put the box in her handbag, drew the window shades, and changed quickly, removing her tweed skirt and blouse and placing them in the cupboard with her hat and coat before pulling a fine lawn nightgown over her head. After a brief wash at the tiny corner basin, she dried her face on the towel provided and ran a brush through her hair before tucking herself between the starched sheets like a piece of paper in an envelope. She was lost to sleep hours before John returned.

* * *

On their arrival in Penzance the next morning he escorted her from the train, handling her once more as if she were his mother’s best bone china. She didn’t object, for she knew he meant well. His concern for her would have been touching had she been able to focus her mind on it—or anything else for that matter—for more than a few minutes, but it was as if there were a thick pane of glass, rather like the ones in the train windows, separating her from him, the world and everything in it.

In Penzance harbor, John engaged a small fishing dinghy—“hang the expense” he had said when Esther looked at him with a question in her eyes. “There is a ferry—the Scillonian—but there was a nasty accident last month, she hit the rocks in heavy fog by all accounts, and anyway it doesn’t call at the island we want to reach. I looked into the possibility of a flight—there’s an outfit that flies Dragon Rapides from Land’s End, which could have been awfully thrilling, but they only operate in fine weather.”

Esther had no idea what a “Dragon Rapide” might be, but thought that a boat was probably the safer option. As he spoke, she glanced upward. The sky was low and leaden, the gray of a pigeon’s breast, and the air damp with the kind of light mist that softened the edges of things but didn’t soak you, at