“Mommy is resting,” Miss Pinkerton said, holding onto him firmly. “She’ll be fine in a minute. Just be a good boy.”
The women were wonderful. Although they only spoke a few words of French they managed with gestures and sheer determination to have us loaded into a large open carriage and taken to a pension on the waterfront. Miss Hetherington inspected the rooms and pronounced them clean if simple and unadorned. I was half dragged up the stairs. Someone else brought my bags and I was placed in a small room with shutters half closed. Already exhausted by this amount of activity, I lay back gratefully with Liam beside me. They then had the proprietor summon a doctor and gave me pen and paper to draft a telegram to Sid and Gus. I wrote, Delayed in Le Havre. Unwell. Pension Bellevue. Will travel as soon as able.
Off went the stalwart Miss Hetherington to have this sent to Paris. Miss Pinkerton stayed with me while the other women went for a stroll along the seafront. A doctor arrived and pronounced Liam on the road to recovery but instructed me to confine his diet to breast milk and boiled sugar water to give his stomach time to heal. Then he patched up my head, and recommended that I get plenty of good nourishing food and fresh air. It would be foolish and dangerous to think of continuing my journey until I was stronger, he said, wagging a finger at me. To do so might put me and my child in danger of a relapse. Then he gave me a prescription for a tonic and bid me adieu.
I lay in my narrow bed, feeling like a limp rag and so glad that I was not facing an almost three-hour train journey. I don’t think I could have sat upright for that long. The proprietress came in with a tray of fresh rolls and peppermint tea. I sipped the tea, managed a whole roll, and felt a little stronger. Liam nursed, then fell asleep beside me. I lay back too, feeling the fresh sea air coming in through the shutters.
I awoke to Liam crawling over me in an attempt to escape from the bed. My head still throbbed but my stomach felt less queasy; in fact, I felt a little hungry. I stood up, held onto the wall because the ground still swayed, then made my way across to the window and pushed open the shutters. Below me was a glorious scene. The sun sparkled on blue water. Red-sailed fishing boats were bobbing in the harbor. Fishermen in bright blue smocks were unloading their catch on the dock. The air resounded to the cries of seagulls. Two young children walked past wearing a local costume and wooden shoes. It was all so picturesque and so foreign.
“Look Liam,” I said, picking him up. “We’re in France.”
By lunchtime the tonic had been delivered. It was a dark sludge that tasted disgusting but I dutifully swallowed a tablespoonful. I was served a hearty bowl of soup and sat in a chair by the window, wondering if Sid and Gus would send me a telegram in reply. Actually I was half hoping that they would come to Le Havre themselves to escort me to Paris. It was the sort of thing they would do. But when darkness fell there was no word from them. For dinner I managed a freshly caught sole and buttery potatoes. Liam was also showing interest in food again and was quite annoyed when all he was offered was the breast.
After a good night’s sleep I began to feel more like myself and suggested that I might travel on to Paris that day. My head was now clear enough that I was also thinking of the extra cost of another night at a pension. Miss Hetherington wouldn’t hear of it. Her sick friends didn’t feel up to the long train journey to Venice yet. She said we would all stay one day more and then travel as far as Paris together. They would then continue on to Venice, and I’d be in the capable hands of my friends. Since my legs felt like jelly after coming down the stairs to breakfast I had to agree that traveling with friends would be preferable to traveling alone and trying to manage Liam and my luggage when I felt as weak as a kitten. So I agreed and thanked them for all they had done.
“Nonsense. We unprotected women must stick together,” Miss Hetherington said.
So I spent a second delightful day sitting in the lounge overlooking the seafront. First I wrote to Daniel, telling him that I had arrived safely in France but that I was resting in Le Havre due to a bad case of seasickness. I thought it prudent not to mention that Liam had also been very ill. No need to worry him when he had so much to worry about already. I told him I’d send another letter as soon as I reached Sid and Gus.
This small task left me quite tired and I lay back in my chair, watching the busy scene in the harbor outside my window. It was all so foreign and fascinating with peasant ladies in white lace caps and the fishermen in their blue smocks, contrasting with the red sails. No wonder the Impressionst painters were so keen to paint here. After lunch Therese, the landlady’s daughter, came to amuse Liam, whose eyes no longer looked sunken. It was a huge relief to hear him laugh loudly when Therese knocked down a tower of blocks. I tried him on a little mashed potato and gravy that night and he ate well. It seemed that our ordeal was finally at an end. By tomorrow night I’d be safely with Sid and Gus.