Warning: There's some talk of depression in this chapter.

"Maa..aa..ma." Johnny's voice was rough and croaky after so long being quiet, but it sounded like ambrosia to his mother.

"Johnny?" she jumped at hearing his voice again. "Did you speak darling?"

"Mmm." Marilla fetched him a glass of water to loosen his throat and he tried again, "Mama," but he was unable to say anything more due to being pressed to her chest in a tight hug.

He did not remember his dip or his subsequent rescue but once he was up and about, they made sure he thanked his saviour.

Marilla had held herself together for the most part while she had tended to him. Johnny's pressing needs keeping her focussed on his recovery. It was the after affect that was the issue.

Hayford was tarring the deck having gone back to work as soon as he recovered. Marilla came upon him as she went for a walk, "I did thank you didn't I, Hayford?"

"Yes'm."

Defying social mores Marilla leant into his chest feeling his heart beating through his blue serge. Hayford stood there awkwardly until she straightened herself and wiped her eyes. "My apologies, I'm just a bit emotional is all. I can never thank you enough. You acted so courageously, why you might have drowned yourself."

"T'was no trouble at all, ma'am. To be honest, I didn't really think, I just saw his little body drop and I dove off. How is the little fella? I hope he's recovering?"

"He is, thanks to you. He still struggles a little, but it is only because of you that I can make that claim. I…" but Marilla ran out of words again, overwhelmed with emotion. The Mate had seen the whole interaction from a distance, and he came up when he saw Marilla faltering and gently led her to the Captain.

"All is well Mar. God and Hayford intervened and our boy's safe," said John soothingly.

"I know, but I keep imagining how badly it could have played out. I keep dreaming that he died. His little blue body..."

John held her tight, "you're struggling, I know. I wish we could have some time to recover but…" he gazed out at the expanse of ocean around them.

Each day Marilla declined just that little further. Each day getting up was harder. Each day the steps seemed higher. Each day talking to the children was harder. Each day taking an interest in the world was harder. Marilla felt as though life were a steep cliff looming over her, the thought of the ascent to the summit dragged her down. Getting dressed, fumbling over hooks and buttons was beyond her some days and Mari had to help her to maintain some semblance of proprietary. Even Johnny whom she had wailed for those weeks ago she found exhausting. All she really wanted to do was sleep; if they had let her, she would sleep all day. Yet at night it eluded her. Her tossing and turning drove John out earlier than he had to. Honestly, he said to himself, he was getting little enough respite in bed with her constant movement, he may as well be up on deck.

It was as if her life was a circle of thin glass around which she wrapped her mind. On one side were memories of her mistakes: the time she hurt Matthew with cutting words at seven; deserted her mother at sixteen and left Matthew to cope alone; running away from Rachel without a word; snapped at the children or John. The image of that marketplace in Tunis; the taste of the delicious elixir; the thought of Mari's potential fate haunted her waking dreams. Johnny's accident, how quickly it might have all been over. All these dark thoughts and more traced around and around the circle's perimeter faster and faster and faster. If she let her concentration lapse, she'd descend into the abyss of melancholia. One false move, one false comment and she'd sink without trace into the inky depths never to return.

Safety lay on the other side of the disc and she ran her mind around and around hoping it would keep her just this side of sane, but it took effort like a tightrope. She could barely function she had to concentrate so hard. She took to wandering around the deck like a ghostly spectre, hair streaming raggedly down her back, uncommunicative unless she saw Hayford then she clasped to him tightly. Hayford took to escaping up the rigging if he saw her approaching, he found her ragged hair and haggard face and the desperate way she clutched at him disturbing.

At the sound of John's footfall she feigns sleep. He will only force her to get dressed, run a brush through her unkempt hair and make her meet the mocking sun. Marilla can't face any of it. She lies motionless in her bed forcing her breathing to stay slow and steady so he can't tell if that she's awake. Gilbert joins his father and she can hear their low voices. "I'm worried about her Dad."

"I am too, son," John replied. "I wouldn't say this to her directly, but she reminds me of her mother."

"Oh?" Marilla can hear the question in Gilbert's voice and strains to hear. She is nothing like her mother, what can John be implying?

"Yes, she sank in the same way. When your mother's beloved brother Michael died in an accident; your grandmother was never the same. One of the reasons Mother left Avonlea was to get away from that depressive environment." The voices fade as the men left the cabin.

John's words chilled her to the bone. He was comparing her to her mother. Surely, they were different; Mother was unresponsive, melancholic but she… but she … With a jolt it hit her like a blow. She had felt sorry for her mother certainly, but she had never understood quite what she faced. At the time Marilla thought it was down to a lack of fortitude, now she saw as she never had before quite what a dilemma her mother had endured and how she must have struggled. And Marilla had not even lost Johnny, he was still alive, how much more terrible must it have been for her mama; the hot wet tears she wept for her were as fervent and heart felt as the ones she had once shed for her brother. She prayed for forgiveness.

A passing sailor heard her cries and hastened to find the mate who passed the information to the captain. Making his excuses John made his way down to her cabin and found Marilla stricken, hot tears streaking down her cheeks and violent weeping shaking the whole bed. Wordlessly he took her into his arms and hugged her tight. He may not have known exactly what had upset her in the moment, but she was suffering. It was his role, as her husband, to care for her. The shuddering sobs diminished in number and intensity and soon he felt her body relax and her breathing slow; she was asleep. Brushing a stray lock of hair off her forehead he settled her back down upon her pillows and covered her with the blanket. Without a word he left her and strode back out into the light to resume his duties.

When she woke, Marilla determined not to waste away as her mother had done, but it was hard. She meant to get up, but her head swum upon her first attempt and she slumped back exhausted from the emotion. Tomorrow, she vowed. Tomorrow I'll make more of an effort.

It was no easier the next morning, but Marilla forced herself to get out of bed, feeling every step as though it were a mountain to be scaled. She prayed that it would get easier. She longed to talk to someone other than John, to seek counsel from a minister or Rachel or someone with experience of loss.

Blinking her eyes against the harsh light Marilla stood in the doorway for some minutes willing herself to continue. From the poop John who had the overview of the entire ship watched her sway in the doorway. Please move, please don't return to bed, he prayed, determined to let her go at her own pace. He watched relieved as she slowly made her way down the deck, clutching at various ropes and stays as she regained her sea legs.

Marilla fetched up in the galley. Isaiah acknowledged her with a nod as he chopped the vegetables for that night's dinner. He had heard that she was under the weather after the accident, dinners he had prepared for her had been returned untouched for days. Now seeing her gaunt, dark eyes rimmed red from crying Isaiah thought he would approach her like a little bird who had washed up on the deck. She had weathered, was weathering a storm and had to be treated accordingly. As a result, Isaiah was quiet the only sound in the room his knife slicing through the turnips. When the kettle boiled, he made a pot of coffee and poured a cup for them both. Silently he pushed one over to Marilla. He watched sympathetically as she did not acknowledge it initially but when he sipped, she took up her own cup though she forgot to drink it. Poor woman he thought, she's struggling just to go through the motions. She left a few minutes later when his back was turned.

Just the matter of sitting with another soul; though he had not said a word exhausted Marilla, but she felt it was a start. She'd return tomorrow but for now she had to sleep. The next day she returned and even managed a quick sip of the scalding hot coffee. The following day there was cake just out of the oven and the aroma was quite enticing though she did not eat.

This went on for some days and they still had not talked until one afternoon Isaiah said apropos of nothing, "I lost someone once." Marilla looked up at him and stared, she had never enquired as to Isaiah's past much to her current embarrassment. "Yeah," he said to her enquiring look. "My wife and daughter."

"W – wife? I didn't, I mean I never …"

"I know my youthful complexion tricks people," he said with a rueful smile. Sighing heavily, he set his knife down on the bench. "She was so beautiful."

"Tell me about her," said Marilla, stirrings of an interest in the world emerging for the first time in a long while. "What was her name?"

"She was called Lilly. I used to call her my Lilly of the Valley."

"Was she? Was she um …"

"She was the daughter of slaves, just like me. We met at the market and got to chatting when we got a chance, stealing odd moments here and there. I never met anyone like her before, so kind, so clever. She had a laugh like a small bell sweet and high. She made you feel good just by being you know?" Marilla nodded. "An she listened intently to all the nonsense I spouted too, as if I were the most fascinating man she'd ever met. What she saw in me I'll never know, Mrs Blythe." Marilla frowned. "No, what am I? Big Isaiah? I'm nothing special. Do you know even though her family was free we still had to ask her Master, her employer if we could wed," he said angrily. "Our wedding day was the most wonderful day of my life. I felt full to bursting."

"What happened?" Marilla whispered, hardly daring to break his bubble. She had never seen Isaiah's face light up like this. "She and our baby died in childbirth," he said flatly, all the light going out of his face.

"Oh Isaiah," Marilla said, her eyes full of tears. "How did you go on?"

"I just did. I mean I wanted to die too, but I couldn't do it. I was too cowardly to follow them; it was sinful to feel that way. I willed myself to die sometimes but my traitorous heart kept beating. I had to eat, and for that I had to work. Home held too many memories, so I signed onto this ship and slowly I've gotten over the worst of the pain, but it's never wholly gone away, does that make sense?"

"It does. I feel terrible that I never knew Isaiah, my apologies."

"I don't like to share my story with just anyone Mistress Blythe, it's too personal. I keep Lilly and the baby tucked in here," he said patting his heart.

"Did the baby have a name?" Marilla asked.

"We discussed names before as you do, you know. If it were a boy, he would have been Matthew, after the saint and a girl was going to be Catherine because that was Lilly's favourite name. She was Catherine," he said with love.

"It's a beautiful name. May I pray for your Catherine and Lilly, Isaiah? It would be such an honour if you would say yes."

"You don't have to," he said, his eyes awash with brimming tears, he pulled a dishcloth up and blew his nose.

"It's not a matter of have, I would like to. You know my brother is a Matthew," Marilla said. "And a lovelier man never walked the earth. So kind and gentle he is. Your Matthew had the baby been a boy would have been wonderful too, I'm sure. With your guidance."

Isaiah suddenly had to tend to something on the stove. Marilla sat looking at his wide shuddering back and decided to give the man some space. Silently she put her cup down and made her way out on to the deck. She still felt utterly exhausted, but Isaiah's story had given her something else to think about. She had believed for a while that her situation was the worst in the world and he reminded her of how very lucky she was. She had all her babes around her still, apart from little Rachel; and John. Really, she had nothing to complain about yet there was Isaiah who just did his work every day without a murmur despite his poor broken heart.

She had prayed for someone to talk to, never expecting it to be a member of the crew. She felt desperately sorry for the man, no one should have to face that in their life, but it did give them an affinity. Some people, she reflected, might believe that a white woman and a black man would have little in common, but that was not the case. She found a ready ear in Isaiah. He was a good listener and removed enough to offer her wise counsel. What guilt she initially felt at her pain at only nearly losing her child was soon put to one side. If Isaiah believed she was making a mountain out of a molehill he thankfully kept that to himself.

At first their conversations were just about the children, but they soon stretched to life itself. She loved to hear his tales of growing up on an island, it was interesting to compare and contrast it to her upbringing. The insular nature of island life regardless of latitude amused them both. Isaiah found himself telling Marilla small anecdotes of his life with Lilly. How they courted, what their marriage was like. She had been a delight; the only drawback was that their time together had been so short. "We were so happy to find out about the baby, Mistress Blythe," he'd said one afternoon.

By this time their conversations had moved out onto the deck. John saw them sitting in the sunshine and smiled, he was just happy Marilla was moving on. If Isaiah could help her over-come her melancholia, he was content.

"I'm sure you were," replied Marilla, thinking back to their own delight.

"It felt as though our little home would be perfect. Us two and a baby, what could go wrong? Our house was modest, some might say ramshackle, but we loved it and a baby would make us complete," he glanced across at Marilla who nodded back. "She grew larger you know. She got to the point where I thought she could not possible grow more without her belly popping open," he laughed fondly at the memory. "Little did I know she had more growing in her. I think one of the problems was," he added sombrely, "that I am so large, whereas she was just a wee slip of a thing. I could not fetch a doctor to help. They refused to help us out. A neighbour had caught babies before and I summoned her, but the situation was beyond her. Lilly could not force that baby out, Marilla," the name snuck out unbidden, but Marilla was silent. How could she make a fuss when the man was in such a state?

"Her cries rent the house and the neighbourhood. I know people could hear her distress; they must have wondered what I was doing to her. What I was doing was trying to save them, but it was beyond us. She died there in our bed with the baby," he looked across at Marilla with such anguish in his eyes. "Afterwards I cradled her cooling body in my lap. They tried to separate us because they wanted to wash her, to make her fit for burial. How could I let them? How could I put my love in the ground, Marilla? How? She who was always so full of life. How could I let them put that sweet little laugh in the cold dark ground?" His pain was palpable leaving Marilla feeling powerless.