‘You will find a phial of fresh rabbit’s blood and a small sponge. Saturate the sponge with the blood, and place it as high as possible in your secret place. Remove it and wash yourself as soon as possible after. All right?’

I need not have worried. For all Johnathan’s flirting, I realised he was not experienced in the art of lovemaking. Clearly it was his first time, and he was as anxious about the event as I, until mother nature gave him a delirious shove in the right direction.

*

The broadsheets picked up on our union and the opportunity arose for my new husband to keep his word and exonerate me from any part in the sinking of the Britannic.

Three days after our marriage, Johnathan left for France. The press forgot me, and I personally visited the families of the lost and injured men. I talked about those brave fellows to their parents and wives which seemed to bring the mothers in particular some relief from their torment. I cried with them, genuinely moved by their grief.

With a heavy heart, I wrote to Manno and told him I knew about his family and I had found a father for his baby. I told him how heartbroken I was. He had betrayed me – but maybe I had betrayed him too, by marrying Johnathan. I tried to put it out of my mind but that was impossible. Now, I understood true love. No matter what he did, I loved him to the depths of my soul. There was no question, one day I would go back to that small Greek island and find the fisherman. I would feel his arms around me, and taste his lips on mine one more time. It seemed the saddest of tears were trapped in my heart, and would stay there until the day I met my one true love again.

I took work in the local hospital and saved every penny I could towards my trip back to Greece. When my pregnancy became obvious, I broke the news. Father congratulated my husband when he returned from France on leave.

Johnathan was thrilled and begged me to give him a son. He was such a dear man who clearly loved me. I tried to be the wife he deserved and kept my deceit to myself. I had made these two men, my father and Johnathan, very happy.

It was only in those darkest hours before dawn that I lay in my lonely bed and cried for my one true love.

As my girth expanded, so my mother’s health deteriorated until she passed away in her sleep a month before I gave birth.

*