‘It might give us another clue.’
‘Yes. All right. Let’s finish it.’
May 23rd
What an altered atmosphere is in this house! The girls left a week ago, for Miss Marsham’s Academy for Young Ladies in Buxton, and there is such peace. I relish the simple pleasures of taking a turn in my garden without having to look over my shoulder or all about me for signs of ambush. No giggling in obscure corners, no fear of assault.
David is at once more affectionate and he speaks incessantly of the baby’s arrival and how he shall be welcomed to the world. But his affections are sometimes too much for me, especially in the bedchamber. I do not welcome them there, for I fear damage to my child. He tries to persuade me otherwise but we have kept to our separate bedrooms these past few nights.
Truth to tell, I am so excessively bilious that I can scarcely go two hours together without requiring a basin in which to expel the contents of my stomach. It is extremely difficult to maintain the appearance of elegance and grace in these circumstances, and I know the servants laugh about it behind my back.
Unfortunately, their demeanour is no less surly than it ever was. Once the child is born, I will insist on David speaking to them about it. I feel that, once he has his son, he will deny me nothing.
‘Not many clues there,’ admitted Jason. ‘Unless he kills her for not putting out.’
‘At least he isn’t a rapist,’ noted Jenna. ‘Some husbands wouldn’t have taken no for an answer.’ She shuddered. ‘Awful times to be a woman.’
June 10th
All is over. Everything is done with. My life has changed beyond comprehension and will never be the same again.
‘Oho.’ Jason sat up. ‘Now we’re getting to it.’
Jenna’s heart raced. She was surprised at how sick to the stomach she felt, and her fingers trembled on the flyleaf of the journal.
‘God, I’m not sure I can read this,’ she whispered. ‘I feel as if I know her now.’
Jason stroked her arm.
‘I know what you mean. I’m kind of dreading it myself. But we have to know the worst. Perhaps, when we know it, we can get a decent burial for the poor cow.’
‘That’s a good point. Right.’ She took a long, deep breath and read on.
My existence now will be one of mourning and of evasion. In one stroke, I am reduced once more from lady to nobody. Worse than nobody. A fugitive.
Last night, the evening being excessively hot, I had difficulty in sleeping. I tossed and turned in perspiration-soaked sheets, using a bedpan to relieve my nausea. I think I was a little feverish. I fell into half-sleeps, with broken dreams in which my child was born a monster.
Waking, sobbing, from one such nightmare, I resolved to put off the search for sleep until my mind was clearer. I got out of bed and thought I would go outside and walk in the moonlit garden until my senses were less fogged and my skin cooled.
But as I walked along the corridor past David’s room, I heard the sound of voices. His voice, low as it is when he is amorous, and then a woman’s, languid in tone.
I could not move, or breathe, or think.
Why was a woman in my husband’s bedchamber? Was he ill? Did she attend to him?
I clung to a dozen such tenuous explanations, but in the end I could not deceive myself.
I bent and put my eye to the keyhole.
Little could be seen, but what I could see was damning.
I saw my husband’s back and his rear perspective. He was crouching over another body, the legs of which were over his shoulders. He lay on top of her. They were kissing, and as they kissed, he thrust forwards then retreated, over and again.
There was nothing else they could be doing.
I could not see who she was but I was determined to find out.
Shaking and fearful of giving myself away by uttering a cry or bending over to retch, I hid myself in a curtained alcove and waited.