Bart left me at the window and came to stand before Mama, who was seated upon the sofa.

“I did not travel at all this winter, Mrs. Thomas.”

“Ah? Then what did you find to do?”

Bart smiled down at her. “I performed the difficult and costly experiment of remaining right where I was.”

“How very brave!” Mama answered without a smile. “And how is your dear mama?”

A light trill of laughter from the front hall answered for him. And then the lady in question appeared, clapping her hands in delight at the sight of our little gathering. I drew forward to greet Mrs. Hunnowell, then stood silently by in a profound confusion. Under the greetings and the exclamations, I slowly drew away, until at the door, I turned round—nodding briefly to Mama, curtseying my good nights to the Hunnowells—and then escaped.

That night I dreamed such wildness—of two lovers who rowed out into the middle of a black lake and drowned there while I watched them sink. And the lake suddenly spread beneath my boat and floated me away from the scene and onward out and out, until the lake became a sea; and there the water ended, and instead I felt myself falling down, away down, into a soft darkness. Where my spirit took me then, I cannot tell. I sensed a woman falling beside me. I had never seen her in this world, but as we fell, she held her hand to mine and uttered my name. But I had the peculiar sensation that I was reading a book all the while, that I read the story of the lovers in the dream, turning the pages of their adventure even as I saw their ending played out in front of my eyes, the words of the story floating in the air above their heads, and I was strangely aware even while I dreamed that the story I was reading was a story I had written, the words appearing just seconds before I read them.

Sunday, 5 July

Dear Maisie,

I dreamt last night that I received two letters from you at once, and took that as an omen that you were disgusted with my last and wouldn’t write again. Ho! Though I was disappointed today not to hear from you and although you have told me you wouldn’t write often, I shall be disappointed every time a letter fails to come when I want it. (Which is every day.) I have become a chronic kicker!