I was starting to drift when I was half-woken by a hummed lullaby from the corridor outside, and I recalled Greer earlier, a tune on her lips. Her step was slow now as she made her way towards the room. When she reached my door, the volume fell nearly to silence, as if she did not want to wake me. The hush swelled uneasily. I imagined her turning down the lamps before making her way to bed. I waited for her to move on but there was a pause that lasted just a little too long and I felt the strange bristle of her dislike.

I crept deeper beneath the covers and listened until finally, her voice rose and then died as she drew further away, leaving me with only the snap of the fire to sing me to sleep.

6

The island grew colder, seeming to shrink against the coming of winter. As the days passed I became accustomed to the rhythms of the house and the people within. When I entered the drawing room or dining room now, I always went to the same seat, and when it was time for church, I was already anticipating the bite of the cold. Where we ate, be it with Miss Gillies or from a table in Mary’s playroom, seemed ruled by whim. But the evenings were spent together, either in pursuit of a game or each engaged in our own occupations.

Every morning, Mary and I would venture into the wind and gradually, through the numbness of my emotions, sentiment began to find a path, awakening something in me that I thought had died with Clara. When I observed Mary, I believed that she too had begun to thaw to my presence: it was hard to quantify for she was neither demonstrative nor affectionate, but she was interested. Often, I would find her studying my face and once or twice, something I did or said brought an unwitting smile. But more than that, I began to understand her better in relation to her life at Iskar and those within it – Miss Gillies’ apathy, the lack of friends or playmates. Mary was not my sister but she was sorely in need of a loving one. And I tried hard to emulate that role, recalling all the tender things I did for Clara and passing them to Mary.

She still would not speak, but soon I began to notice the anticipation in her eyes at the start of the day and the way her gaze followed me if I got up from a chair or moved across the room to get something from Miss Gillies’ workbox. These were things that gave me more pleasure than I had foreseen and I began to relax into my position and trust my footing. Yet despite the many things that brought me satisfaction, something in the background, just out of sight, picked at some obscure disquiet.