Amherst Island felt more and more distant with each passing day she spent in Glasgow

Ellen had spent a quiet Christmas at home with Norah. Over the months she’d progressed to calling her intimidating landlady by her first name, and they’d enjoyed many conversations about art and philosophy.

She had even taken to wearing dresses in Norah’s loose, uncorseted style, although only when she was at home.

She did not quite possess the daring to go out in the streets of Glasgow without the comforting armour of a corset and fitted gown.

Her friend Letitia came to visit her over Hogmanay and Ellen was entertained with her many anecdotes about life as a female medical student in Edinburgh.

“I had my first anatomy lesson before Christmas,” she told Ellen over tea at Mrs Cranston’s tearooms. “And I didn’t turn a hair!

“I admit it did make me a bit queasy, seeing the poor man laid out on a table, his skin as white as a fish’s belly. And when the scalpel first went in – well, I may have swayed a little.

“But another student, a man, I hasten to add, fell to the floor in a dead faint. No one was giving him smelling salts, I warrant, and telling him he did not possess the constitution for such things.”

“Oh, Letitia, it all sounds perfectly dreadful,” Ellen said, laughing, as she shook her head.

“You ought to be used to it,” Letitia answered with a sniff. “Leonardo da Vinci used to study corpses to improve his understanding of human anatomy.”

“Thankfully we have live models now,” Ellen replied, though she had blushed mightily when they’d had their first nude model in the classroom. At least she hadn’t burst into fits of giggles like some of the other lady pupils.

Reminiscences

That afternoon Ellen came home to find a letter from Louisa for her on the hall table. There had been letters from home over the last few months, although only one from Louisa.

Lucas had written to her, too, telling her of his life in Toronto as a young lawyer.

Although Lucas’s missives were cheerful enough, Ellen thought she detected a slight homesickness behind the reminiscences of days back on the island. She imagined that life alone in a city was lonely for Lucas, as it had been for her at first in Glasgow.

Now Ellen picked up the envelope apprehensively, for while the pain had lessened with time, she feared that hearing Louisa’s blissful descriptions of married life with Jed still held the power to sting.

Slowly Ellen mounted the stairs to her bedroom. Amherst Island felt more and more distant with each passing day she spent in Glasgow.

The lake would be frozen now, the trees stark and bare, the fields and meadows drifted with snow.

Ellen gazed out of her bedroom window at the slate roofs and soot-stained chimneys of Glasgow and felt as if she were another person entirely from the woman who had walked across those fields in dusk, and knocked on the door of the Lymans’ farm.

She glanced once more at the letter. She knew from Aunt Rose that Louisa and Jed had settled in a new farmhouse on the other side of the Lymans’ property. It seemed Louisa had thankfully dropped her aspirations to move back to Seaton and have Jed work in a bank.

Carefully Ellen slit the envelope to read what Louisa had written. Her friend’s loopy handwriting filled up an entire page.

Charming

“Dear Ellen, I do apologise for not being a better correspondent, although truth be told I’ve never been good with letters. It’s hard to imagine you all the way in Glasgow, which I’ve heard is quite a dreary city.

“Rose assures me you don’t find it so, but I’d rather not be stuck among the rail yards and chimney stacks! If I had to go anywhere, I suppose I’d like Paris well enough.”

Ellen sank into the chair by the window, mentally rolling her eyes at Louisa’s barbed comments and blatant self-absorption.

She knew Louisa was pretty and she could be charming, but not for the first time Ellen wondered what Jed had seen in the woman he’d chosen as his wife. Breathing in deeply, Ellen continued reading.

“Life here on Amherst Island continues in the same way. I always did envy you your precious island, but it’s more mine now than yours, I should think!

“Especially now, with my exciting news, and I’m sure you can guess what it is. Jed and I have been married for nearly six months, after all!”

Ellen stilled, her gaze resting blindly on those chimney stacks Louisa had disdained.

She was not so naïve or innocent that she couldn’t guess what news Louisa had to share. Resolutely she turned back to the letter.

“As I’m sure you’ve guessed, I’m expecting! The baby is due in mid-summer. I feel dreadfully tired, but Jed says I’m blooming, and so I must be.

“You know how sparse my husband can be with compliments, although when it matters he says quite the right thing.”

Ellen could read no more. She tossed the letter aside, dropping her head into her hands.

Louisa was expecting Jed’s child and while Ellen knew she should hardly be surprised, she somehow was all the same.

Hurtful

Yet even more hurtful than that news was the casual, easy intimacy Louisa obviously shared with Jed. Ellen had seen it at the wedding, too, and yet still she’d resisted believing it. Jed and Louisa genuinely loved one another.

“Ellen?” Norah called, tapping once on her door. “Supper is ready.”

Taking a deep breath, Ellen lifted her head. “Coming, Norah,” she called and she rose reluctantly from her chair.

She poured some ice-cold water from the pitcher into the basin on her bureau and quickly washed her face and hands.

When she looked in the mirror, her eyes still seemed dazed, but otherwise she presented the image she needed: a quiet, composed Lady Artist.

Downstairs Norah was dishing out a beef stew in the small dining-room in the back of the house. Ellen went quickly to help, setting glasses and fetching a jug of water.

More tomorrow.

On Renfrew Street was previously a serial in The People’s Friend. For more great fiction, get The People’s Friend every week, £1.30 from newsagents and supermarkets.

By Katharine Swartz Artwork: Dave Young