Costly Truths E-Book

Maggie Williams Richmond

• Herausgeber: novum pro Verlag
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 238

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

An anxious young woman's life begins to unravel, revealing the deceptions that lie at its foundation. Geillis' husband Hendrie returns home wounded from fighting for the Army of the Dutch Republic against Spain. On his trail, three young people arrive, but they are too late: Hendrie has already returned to the Netherlands. As the secret of his double life is uncovered, the ensuing story is one of hospitality, kinship, loyalty, and heartbreak. Set in Midlothian, Scotland in 1603, debut author Maggie Williams Richmond delves into her family history to bring together the tensions of both then and now: race, religion, and politics.

Leseprobe

Contents

Imprint 2

Citation 3

In Memoriam 4

Chapter One 5

Chapter Two 14

Chapter Three 23

Chapter Four 31

Chapter Five 41

Chapter Six 53

Chapter Seven 62

Chapter Eight 73

Chapter Nine 79

Chapter Ten 84

Chapter Eleven 92

Chapter Twelve 102

Chapter Thirteen 107

Chapter Fourteen 116

Chapter Fifteen 124

Chapter Sixteen 134

Author’s Note 144

Acknowledgements 145

Additional Information 146

Imprint

All rights of distribution, also through movies, radio and television, photomechanical reproduction, sound carrier, electronic medium and reprinting in excerpts are reserved.

© 2022 novum publishing

ISBN print edition: 978-3-99131-376-2

ISBN e-book: 978-3-99131-377-9

Editor: Roderick Pritchard-Smith

Cover images: Artycrafter, Cristim77 | Dreamstime.com

Cover design, layout & typesetting:novum publishing

www.novum-publishing.co.uk

Citation

‘People will not look forward to posterity

who never look backward to their ancestors.’

Edmund Burke (1729–1797)

In Memoriam

David Balfour (c. 1533–1603)

Geillis Jamesoun (c. 1582–1611)

Chapter One

Early morning, and the wharves at the port of Leith, enveloped in the haar, are as busy as ever. Fishermen are unloading their catch onto the quayside. Carters hurry to and fro between vessels and vaults, laden with wine, whisky, and brandy. Wagons loaded with sacks of grain from the continent are carried to the local mills. Merchants and mariners huddle together clogging the lanes, bargaining, arguing, haggling, before heading off to the taverns to celebrate their deal. The Water of Leith itself, larger than a burn, smaller than a river, has twisted and curled all the way from its rising in the Pentland Hills, passing through gorges and puddocky shallows. Inhabited by trout, flounder, and grayling, eels and loaches, minnows and sticklebacks, its banks are the haunt of wagtails and woodpeckers, dippers and herons. Widening as it weaves its way past villages, mills, and merchants’ houses, at last it reaches the King’s Wark and the Shore, where, higher and more piercing than the creak of the boats and the chink-chink-chink of the running rigging, hungry gulls scream, plummeting to snatch and gobble whatever the traders and fisher-folk let fall.

More accustomed to anchoring at a mooring a little way out, and shuttling cargo and passengers back and forth in small skiffs, the Oosterschelde, a three-masted square-rigger, is being warped towards the pier. The kedging anchor has been dropped and the crew are pushing the capstan bars round, winding the stout rope tighter and tighter, until they reach the quay and the lines can be tied off. It has taken hours, and Will, pacing anxiously on deck, can barely contain his anxiety. The Captain approaches him.

‘It is done, mijn vriend. We kunnen let down your broer nu.’

‘He’s still out. Shall I go first?’

‘Ja. The mennen will fix the lijnen to the, what are you calling it, de brancard? Stretcher, ja?’

Slowly, slowly, the inert form is lowered over the side. The crew, well accustomed to loading and unloading crates and cannon, make it look easy. Will, his eyes fixed on the stretcher, holds his breath, and is startled when someone speaks from behind him.

‘Are ye needing a hand, sir? I’ve a cart here for hire? Take ye and yon laddie to the Trinity hospital?’

Will half-turns. ‘Ach, that’d be grand if you could. It’s my brother.’

‘Dinnae fash yersel. We’ll have him safe there in a trice. Back from yon Netherlands are ye?’

‘Aye. We …’

Will is about to explain, but the carter has darted off, to ensure the crew bring their fragile cargo to the right cart.

Two miles away, wiping her mouth with a damp rag, Geillis Jamesoun tips the foul vomit into the gutter outside the back door, swills out the pail, and replaces it in the corner of the kitchen.

Ugh! This morning sickness is going on and on,she thinks.Isn’t it supposed to have stopped by six months? It did with the others! Mebbe it’s a girl this time and that’s why it’s different. Ah, that’d be nice. Fifth time lucky perhaps?

Pushing her hair behind her ears, Geillis flops with relief onto the three-legged stool by the fire, reaches for a watered-down dram to clear the foul taste from her mouth, and tentatively nibbles on an oatcake. The sweet smoky smell from the peat stack soothes and comforts her. Closing her eyes, she imagines herself back at Ma Mayne’s wooden-framed cottage where she grew up, the uneven texture of the wattle and daub walls, the small movements of the thatched roof, the sounds of the squabs nestling among the rafters, and the chooks squawking in the yard.

Stone may be weather-proof and secure, she thinks,but I do miss the cosiness … and I miss those wee hens … Ach, but there’s no place for a henhouse here at the Tor … aye, and no dinner for me and the boys if I don’t get a move on, and get off to the market!

Glad the battering wind of the past few days has now eased, and tempted out by the prospects of a bargain and a blether the lanes are full of villagers coming through the drab morning. Some hurrying, some dawdling, in ones and twos, in family groups, in gaggles of neighbours, they come along the lanes to the marketplace. No matter the grey skies and the chill in the air, the weekly Restalrig market is like kirk on a Sunday, a ritual not to be missed. Geillis makes her way in the same direction, her shawl wrapped around her plump shoulders, her blue bonnet crammed onto her mouse-brown curls, entirely preoccupied with her worries.

Is my Hendrie safe and well? Does he miss us? Will he come home soon?Is wee Davie settling at school? What scrapes are Jack and Sandy getting into? Is Billy keeping them in order? He’s a good lad, but he’ll be finishing school and looking for work soon. Ach, I hope Hendrie doesn’t cajole him into the army! All Billy wants is to work with horses – he must get it from my dear pa…

With her mind as busy as a hornet’s nest in summer, and her smooth skin pleating into frowns, Geillis fails to see the small signs of spring that surround her, the sparrows fetching bits for their nests, the celandine poking their golden heads through the damp earth, the trees surreptitiously greening. She barely even hears the voices and clangour of the market until she turns the corner into the square.

The morning mist still lingers. It glistens on the grass, beads the cobwebs, and drifts and twines around the bare branches of the trees. Cold droplets fall onto the traders below, busy unloading carts, setting up stalls, putting out baskets. A friendly cluster of alewives banter competitively, leaning on their barrels, sniffing the air. The pungent salt smell from last night’s catch masks the stink of human sweat, sour mounds of excrement, and rotting waste, swirled into heaps by the fierce winds of the past two days. Farmers’ wives stack boxes of cabbages and kale, carrots and onions, balance eggs in precarious piles. The Edinburgh tailors, milliners, and haberdashers display their samples of breeches and bonnets, ribbons and buttons and bows – temptations to lure folk to their shops in the town. A crate of pigeons rustle their feathers and peck-peck-peck against the wicker bars. Old MacMorran halts his wagon, heavy with hessian sacks full of flour from the mills at Leith. Beckoning for a drop of ale, he helps himself cheekily to a carrot for the horse, munched down by the creature in a moment with a snort of steam and the stamp of a great hairy hoof.

‘Ye’re looking mighty pleased with y’self, old man!’ Ma Mayne calls across to him from her stall under the oak tree. ‘Out with it! What’s to do, eh? Are the French come back? Is it the King?’

‘Nay, old woman. It’s not the King. It’s the Queen, the Sassenach Queen. She’s dead!’

With such news to share, the busy, bustling, noisy market is more hectic than ever, an uproar of shouts, cries, and exclamations. Geillis steadily weaves her way through to where Ma Mayne stands by her stall, surrounded as usual by a clutch of her cronies. Every week Geillis’ former foster-mother travels the two miles from Duddingston, her cart piled with the excess from her well-tended plot of land – and she always returns with a heavier purse and an empty cart.

My word, but everyone seems a bit agitated,Geillis thinks.Has something happened?

‘Ma, what’s all the kerfuffle? Is there news?’

The older woman pulls Geillis into a warm hug.

‘Geillis, my lass, Miller MacMorran here just told us. It’s the Queen. She’s dead!’

‘The Queen’s dead? What, Queen Anne? Surely not! Oh, no, you mean the English queen, Elizabeth? Oh! So what does it mean for us?’

‘It means, dearie,’ chips in Miller MacMorran, ‘that the court is all of a to-do, packing up to flit south with King James. He’ll be claiming the English throne for Scotland at last!’ The old man grins with satisfaction. ‘Let’s see how the Sassenachs like a Scotsman for a king!’

‘Why, I can hardly believe it! When did the news come?’ Geillis asks.

‘Why just this morn,’ MacMorran tells her. ‘Yon lads from the town heard it, and they tell’t it me when we met on the way here. Mind, the nobs themselves only knew yestereve, when a rider came, the last of a string of gallopers all the way from Richmond Palace. They say he couldna’ stand, he’d ridden so hard through the storm, and straight in to the King, with never a wash and nothing to sup until his news was told. Died in her bed Sunday night, and her ladies watching over her.’

‘Oh, it’s so exciting! I must tell Missy! Has she been along yet this morning, Ma? Have you seen her?’

‘No, lass, not yet. It’s a bit early for her, isn’t it?’

‘Aye, you’re right! I’ll nip along to Hawkhill and tell her, then come back later. Is that all right?’

‘Of course it is. Leave your basket here, and take ye’er time, Geillis. I know ye lasses will likely be needing a good old chin-wag after two days stuck at home!’

Edging through the excited crowd, Geillis turns away from the clamour and heads west. Unencumbered for once by boys or baskets, she stretches out her short legs across Sleigh Lane, past the dairy, and right at the clay pit, towards Hawkhill. A few stragglers are still making their way to the market, passing Geillis with a greeting, a nod, a smile, and Geillis smiles back smugly, already knowing the news they’re about to hear. Hurrying along, she can’t wait to tell her friend, and within minutes here she is at Hawkhill itself. The great wooden door is shut fast, but Geillis does not need to knock. Over the years, she has become a familiar visitor, first as the school friend of the youngest Balfour girl, Missy, and, for the past eleven years, as sister-in-law to Missy herself, her elder sister Elspeth, and their six other siblings. Geillis takes the side passage into the yard, brushing past the pots and tubs of hardy herbs that have survived the winter under Missy’s care. Later, Geillis knows, they’ll be made into lotions and potions, simples and salves, although, if she’s quick, the housekeeper, Alys, may snitch a few, to hang from the beams to dry, then sew into sachets for the press, stir into stews, chop over chicken, maybe even share with Geillis herself for her baking.

Tapping briefly on the door, Geillis steps into Alys’ kitchen where so often she has eaten with family and friends. But this morning the hub of Hawkhill is empty and quiet, as clean and tidy as if no one has yet breakfasted or thought to start preparing the dinner.

‘Hello! It’s me, Geillis! Hello?’

She carries on through into the big hall.

‘Missy, where are you?’

Footsteps hasten down the oak staircase, and Alys hurtles into the hall. Skinny as a skelf, thin grey hair wound tight into a bun, hands worn with work, knuckles knobbly and sore, Alys always offers a bright smile and a warm welcome – and always keeps a few comfits in her pocket for the weans.

‘Mistress Geillis! I’m sorry. Wee Nellie – you’ve met our new maid, haven’t you? Well, she’s at the market, and I was starting the cleaning above. Were ye looking for Missy? Aye? She’s away out. Ye’ve missed her.’

‘Away out, at this time of day? That’s not like her, it’s barely nine!’

Alys ventures a smile, knowing her youngest mistress well.

‘Aye, but she’s been fussing and fretting like a bird in a cage since Sunday, and then this morn’ I heard her leave while I was still helping Mistress Elspeth get up and dressed. Her back’s that bad just now …’

‘Oh.’ Geillis’ eager face falls. ‘It’s just, there’s news about the king. I was hoping to tell her myself and have a bit of a blether.’

‘Och, she’ll be at those wretched old ruins, I dare say. You know she still goes there to collect the wildlings sometimes, the ones she wants for her remedies that won’t grow in pots. And she says it’s a good quiet place for thinking. Thinking! It gives me the willies down there. It’s been left to rot this many a year, and who knows what’s lurking there? But yon Missy, she’s nay a scarety cat like me! Now Geillis, will ye no take a sup of tea with me before ye go and fetch her? Ye must mind y’self now ye’re getting big.’

‘Thanks, Alys, but I won’t stop, if you don’t mind.’

‘Och, that’s fine. Tell me before ye go, have ye heard from Master Hendrie at all?’

Geillis’ mood plummets at Alys’ innocent question.

‘Ach no, Alys, not a word. I’ve heard nothing for months. I don’t know …’

There’s something to do with my Hendrie that I can’t quite put my finger on,Geillis thinks,and I’m not sure I want to, if I’m honest.

‘Och, dinna worry, lass,’ Alys says, noticing Geillis’ crestfallen face. ‘They must need him there, and they’re sure to keep him busy. How can they manage without their Captain, eh? He’ll be home again as soon as he can be, I’m sure.’

Geillis re-traces her steps to the top end of the loch, then follows the path along its east bank. Whinny Hill rises a mile or so before her, with Arthur’s Seat looming in the distance, but Geillis hasn’t the mind for the hills today, and besides, they’re no place for any wise woman to go wandering on her own. The breeze is making her nose run. Sniffing, she reaches into the pocket hanging around her waist for a rag – and pulls out a stone.

Oh, it’s the pebble I picked up by the loch, all those months ago …

Almost against her will, Geillis hears again her own and Hendrie’s voices as they parted, back in the autumn. She’d tried so hard to persuade him to stay longer, but he was adamant. She’d married a soldier, he’d said, and his way of life wasn’t about to change. As he walked away along the lane, his pack over his shoulder, his words scratched their way deep into Geillis’ heart, leaving a blistering trail that never quite heals.

‘I love you!’ she’d called after him, choking back her distress, twisting her fingers in her tangle of hair, scrabbling for a way to armour herself against hurt.

Aye, and it was later that same day, when Davie and I went for a wee walk along the shore of the loch, that I spotted this. It’s shaped like a wonky heart, my wonky heart … Ach, I do love Hendrie, but what’s the good of love, if it only goes in one direction?

Geillis gives a lusty sniff and shakes her head.

Enough now,she tells herself.Hendrie will be back. He always comes back, ‘though never often enough nor for long enough. It is what it is, and maundering on won’t help! I must find Missy, that’s the thing. She’ll cheer me up, just like she always does!

Bustling on, patting her hand against her slightly breathless chest, and pulling her bonnet on tighter against the breeze, Geillis passes Lochend, Laird Logan’s fine new house, rounds the bend in the lane, and her goal is in sight.

Where once the King’s Chapel stood proud over Saint Triduana’s Well, just a few stones now remain, crumbling into the weeds and the brambles. It’s been some time since Geillis was here, but this was the site of their den, she, Missy, and Agnis Lundie, back in the days when they were younger and wilder, before Agnis went to Holyrood as Lady-in-Waiting to Queen Anne, before Hendrie and Geillis made Billy and got wed. Only a few years ago, but it seems like a lifetime to Geillis, and with the threesome down to a pair, and herself married into the Balfour family, Missy matters even more.

‘Missy! Missy, come away out, I’ve news to tell!’

Geillis scrambles down towards the old well, excited and eager.

‘Missy!’

There is no answering call, only a hollow silence and the chill touch of the mist.

Disappointed, and a little puzzled but, for once, not especially worried, Geillis scans the ruins but has already sensed that no one else is there. She kicks idly at a few of the smaller stones at the foot of one of the six old walls and then sets off again. She cuts across the green, stepping over branches broken off in the storm, leaving a trail of small footprints in the sodden grass. Passing Master Dunlop’s School for Boys –Have my lads heard the news? Or will I tell them at dinner time? – she reaches the marketplace. It is quieter now, just a few folk lingering, whiling away a few more minutes, wondering how life is about to change. What will it be like, without the colourful court just half an hour’s walk away? Will the extravagant, handsome Queen go too? And what about the little Princes and Princesses? Will the royal family ever come back to Holyrood? Nobody knows.

Under the oak tree, Ma Mayne’s boxes are empty, everything sold, but she’s kept back a basket of vegetables and eggs for Geillis, adding a pack of wet fish for dinner, and a bag of flour for baking. Just as well. Worrying about Hendrie meant that getting the food had gone clean out of Geillis’ mind.

‘Ma, you’re a treasure. What do I owe you?’ Geillis digs in her pocket for her pennies and bawbees, then asks, ‘Has Missy been here just now, Ma?’, handing over the money she owes. ‘I never found her at Hawkhill, and she’s not at the ruins neither.’

‘No, my lass, Missy’s not been along here.’

‘Nae matter, Ma.’ Geillis’ shoulders slump, and she offers Ma a weak smile. ‘She’ll turn up soon I dare say. She’ll have heard the news about the Queen by now … and I’d best get home and get the dinner on.’

There’s something wrong here,Ma Mayne thinks, giving her former ward another warm hug.All’s not as well with young Geillis as she’s trying to make out.

Geillis has only just dumped her heavy basket onto her kitchen table when she’s startled by a sudden knocking on the door. There on the step is Nellie, the new young maid from Hawkhill. Awkward and blushing, still not quite adjusted to life outside of the poorhouse, she twists her lank plait with a non-too-clean hand. Dirt and grime have taken up lodgings in the whorls and lines of her fingers, despite plunging them so often into the laundry tub, and frenetically scrubbing her whole body when she arrived at Hawkhill. Some stains never come out.

‘Oh, Mistress, I’m sorry to disturb you,’ she gabbles. ‘Alys sent me. You must come. Please, come at once. It’s Master Hendrie. He’s been brought to Hawkhill. Oh Mistress, I’m so sorry, but it looks bad.’

Chapter Two

‘Geillis? Oh, Geillis, I’m so sorry …’

The quiet voice startles Geillis as she sits drowsing at Hendrie’s side, where he lies on a makeshift bed in Elspeth’s parlour.

‘What? Oh, Missy, I’m so glad you’ve come!’ Geillis whispers, stretching out her hand to her friend, feeling it tightly clasped.

‘Tell me what’s happened. I only heard just now! Michael insisted I stay at Holyrood last night…’

‘Oh, so that’s where you were. I was looking for you in the morning when the news came …’

‘That the English queen died? Yes, I know. I went to see Michael about … well, it doesn’t matter now.’ Missy pauses.Should I tell Geillis? No. She’s got enough worries with Hendrie.

‘I only got back here just now, a few moments ago. What happened? He looks so pale … Oh, Geillis …’

Missy bends over her friend and the two women cling to each other, their cheeks wet with tears. Eventually, straightening up and pulling over a stool to sit on next to Geillis, Missy manages to ask again, ‘Can you tell me what happened?’

Geillis swallows and sniffs.

‘I only know what Will told me,’ she says. ‘You know it was Will that brought him back?’

‘Oh! So Will’s here too? Where is he?’ Missy asks.

‘He took my boys to Duddingston, to stay with Ma until Hendrie … until Hendrie gets better,’ Geillis says, cloaking her fears with desperate optimism. ‘Will said that all three of them – him and Hendrie and Andrew – they were involved in some skirmish, taken by surprise he said they were.’ Geillis hesitates, imagining the scene, the three Balfour brothers, suddenly surrounded by a gang of Spanish ruffians.

‘And then?’ Missy prompts her.

‘What? Oh, yes … Will says they fought them off, no trouble, but that old wound in Hendrie’s chest, the one he got, goodness, five, six, years ago…’ Geillis swallows again and shudders. ‘Will says a sword caught him in the same place, and it burst open, blood everywhere, Will said.’

‘Oh no! How horrible! What did they do?’

‘They took him home to their lodgings and got it cleaned and dressed. I think they have some maidservant there to help them. Oh, and Andrew’s got himself a lady-friend, it seems, a Dutch girl…’ Geillis tells Missy, giving her a thin smile.

‘Ooh, I shall have to ask Will more about that! But go on, Geillis,’ Missy urges, with an anxious glance at her brother. ‘What happened?’

‘Ach, the wound wouldn’t heal up again. This was all some days ago, mind: I’m not sure exactly when, and Will said Hendrie came down with a fever. That’s when Will decided he’d best bring him home. Oh, Missy … Will says that on the voyage, Hendrie fell unconscious. He took him to the hospital first, when they arrived in Leith early yesterday, but the leeches said they couldnae do anything, so he brought him here, and Nellie came to fetch me. Oh, Missy, what if …’

‘Shush now. None of your what-ifs,’ Missy tells Geillis gently.

‘Oh, but he was so bad in the night, Missy, so hot, and getting the shudders, you know? I kept sponging him with water, and then, about two o’clock it must’ve been, he cried out, and fell so still I thought … I thought …’

‘That would be his fever breaking,’ Missy says. ‘Has he been quiet since then? As if he’s asleep, yes? Good. That’s the best thing for him, but …’

‘A couple of times he’s opened his eyes,’ Geillis interrupts, ‘but he doesnae seem to see me or hear me, and the only thing he’s said is ‘Maria! Maria!’ Whenever he starts to wake, he says, ‘Maria’, and then something I don’t understand. D’you think he’s calling for you?’

‘He’s never in his life called me Maria!’ Missy responds without thinking.‘I know it’s my proper name, but …’

‘Then he must be praying,’ Geillis says, pulling a face. ‘That’ll be it. What else could it be? He’s praying to the Virgin, you know, like we did when we were little, before everything changed in the churches? Perhaps the Ave Maria?’

More to distract Geillis than anything else, Missy peeks under the cover and is shocked by the amount of blood and pus staining the bandage around her brother’s ribs.

‘Oh! What a mess it is! We need to clean this, Geillis, and pad and bandage it properly. I’ve got a drawing ointment and a salve that should help. I’ll fetch what we need from my press. Shall you be all right for a minute?’

Geillis nods. ‘Yes, thanks, I think so. I sent Elspeth and Alys off to get some rest. They sat up with me all night, bless them. And young Nellie’s been in and out, fetching me tea that I can’t drink.’ She manages another weak smile. ‘But be quick, Missy, please.’

A couple of hours later, Hendrie’s wound has been cleaned, Missy’s ointment and salve applied, and the padding and bandaging renewed. His fever has not returned. Relieved, Missy looks at her friend.

‘Geillis, you must be exhausted. You can’t do anything else for Hendrie at the moment. D’you think you could get some rest? And something to eat mebbe, or at least some of that tea? You’ve the new bairn to consider, you know,’ Missy reminds her, with a glance at the growing baby bump.

‘Oh, Missy, I know, but how can I leave Hendrie like this?’

Geillis’ voice breaks, her throat thick with unshed tears, tiredness and worry almost overwhelming her. Missy’s arms go around her friend in another comforting hug.

‘I’ll sit with him, I promise. He won’t be left alone, not for a moment.’

Missy is still keeping watch over Hendrie when loud footsteps ring out and Will strides confidently into the room.

‘Little sister! How’s the boy doing now?’

Missy hurls herself into her favourite brother’s arms.

‘Will! It seems like forever since you were here! Oh, it’s good to see you, I’ve so much to tell you … and see, Hendrie’s looking better, don’t you think? His fever’s going down, and there’s barely any muck coming through the bandages now. He’s fit and strong. I think he’ll pull through this time, thank God.’

‘Aye, ‘though I don’t mind telling you I was mighty feared on the boat – and until we got here, to be honest. Ach, but he’s in the right place now, with you and Elspeth and Geillis to watch him. Och, but where is the wee wifey?’ Will asks with the hint of a grin.

‘Oh, you!’ Missy thwacks him none too gently on the arm. ‘Geillis is upstairs in my chamber, and I hope she’s had a few winks of sleep. But Will, before she comes back, tell me quickly – who’s Maria?’

‘Who?’ Will prevaricates, but Missy knows him too well.

‘Will, you can’t fool me, and you know it,’ she says, narrowing her eyes at him. ‘Geillis told me that in the night Hendrie kept calling for Maria. She’s decided he was praying – but you know as well as I do that that’s unlikely! And just now, he seemed to half wake up, and he was mumbling. It sounded a bit like ‘My leaf stay, var ben ya.’ Does it mean something?’

‘Ach, damn it.’ Will looks embarrassed. ‘I suppose you might as well know, but no-one else, all right? What I think you heard him saying means “My love, where are you?”’

Will pauses as Missy breathes out a long, despairing sigh and shakes her head.

‘Oh no. It’s as I feared then.’