Of course I had to relate my findings to the ladies at the dinner table, but I gave just the bare bones of the story—that Angela in the painting was really called Adelaide and was the girl’s aunt. Also that Ellie had denied her aunt was mentally defective, merely anxious and timid and did not like to leave the house. I refrained from mentioning that Ellie had planned to spend a week alone in Paris or that she hated her stepfather. The women were impressed with my sleuthing and, having found out the truth, turned their gossip to other passengers, especially a couple whom they suspected of not really being husband and wife.
The dressing gowns on the cabin door swung a little more that night and I awoke in the morning to a gloomy gray day with rain peppering the windows. The promenade deck was deserted, apart from a sailor who was swabbing it down, looking very miserable in the process. There was no question of going outside. I sat reading in the lounge. Liam played, crawling over to other passengers and being fussed over everywhere. There was a concert in the afternoon and a whist drive in which I didn’t participate but which was won by our two widows, much to their satisfaction. I could feel myself slipping into a pleasant slow routine in a safe cocoon with the real world and its problems slipping farther and farther away. I had to remind myself from time to time that I had left a husband alone and in danger in New York.
In the middle of the night I was awoken by Liam’s cries. I went over to his crib and found that he had been sick all over his bedding. This was strange as he seemed to be enjoying the ship’s motion until now and had eaten well that evening. I called the night steward and had new bedding brought for Liam, but he vomited again and again. I fed him boiled sugar water from a spoon but he wasn’t able to keep it down. I began to feel frightened. This was more than simple seasickness. I suspected something in the pureed food had upset his delicate digestive system, or, worse still, had poisoned him. Of course all this commotion awoke Miss Pinkerton. I apologized but she was touchingly concerned and asked if there was anything she could do. Really there was nothing, but sleep was impossible with a child screaming and vomiting nearby.
In the morning he fell into exhausted slumber and I sent my own soiled nightclothes to be laundered. When he awoke he was listless as he sucked at the breast, but then promptly vomited again. I had the steward summon the ship’s doctor. He came, examined Liam, and said it could be food poisoning or a particularly virulent stomach grippe that sometimes went around confined quarters like ships at sea. Either way there was nothing to be done except to try to keep some liquids down him, and maybe give him a little tincture of opium to help him sleep. I declined the latter and held him in my arms, offering the breast whenever he awoke. He had never been sick before in his life and it terrified me to see my normally lively child lying there, his skin clammy to the touch and barely responsive. Even his cry had become weak, like a kitten’s.
I consoled myself with the knowledge that we would be landing in France the next day. But then Miss Pinkerton came down to the cabin to report that there was stormy weather ahead and we would not make Le Havre on Friday, as scheduled, but a day late. My spirits fell at such news. A sick son and now a storm ahead. I didn’t leave the cabin but I could tell immediately when we sailed into the storm. The ship creaked and groaned, and there was even the occasional deep resounding thump as she slapped against an extra large wave or fell into the trough behind it. It was hard to keep my balance when I stood up with Liam in my arms. Miss Pinkerton returned to report that half the passengers were now seasick, the crew was working busily to secure anything not bolted down and to swab floors. Not a pleasant atmosphere, she said with her typical understatement.