They were going to have to plan for the long term. Jon cleared a space for a small, sheltered garden. The hills to the back of them kept the sea winds off, and the garden would be sunny for most of the day. And they weren’t short of water.
It was a long way round up to the head of the river. Nell took the walk steadily, but at as good a pace as she could manage.
She caught a glimpse of some horses at a fishing hole: they must have descended from ones belonging to the original settlers of Salk Island West.
Heading towards the houses, Nell stopped short at the sight of a graveyard. But it made sense, she supposed – there had been people living here for ages. Of course there would be a graveyard.
Another fallen-down house came into view. But there might be something to salvage here.
The next house was on a headland and must have had a wonderful view. The inevitable tangle of brambles was there, and Nell searched among them for any plants she might be able to find.
The next big change for them all was the arrival of a baby girl!“Perdita. That’s what we’ll call her. Fairly appropriate, don’t you think?”
“Lost? Well, yes, I suppose so,” Nell said. “But it’s a very pretty name, so we’ll go with it!”
The exploration of the island continued. Nell found more fruit and vegetables, though everything was still very hand to mouth. The horses turned up again, but seemed less shy than she would have expected.
The garden was beginning to take shape, but they still needed more fruit and vegetables! Fish wasn’t a problem, but a bit more green stuff wouldn’t have come amiss. However, Perdita was growing nicely, and Penny was thriving too.
Jon was clearing more ground – they were going to need the space to pitch the other tent soon. Penny wasn’t going to be in the cot forever.
Time seemed to pass so fast! It seemed only the other day that Nell had been pregnant, and yet here was Penny, playing with her little sister – another dark-haired Istrian-looking girl.
The little garden was looking more healthy now. It was difficult to get to the other gardens often, with a small child in tow, and food on site was much more useful.
Jon had continued to clear the piles of rubble that littered the place, and had found an old chess table and a couple of chairs buried under one of them. The chess pieces were long gone, but Jon carved some more from a bone-white piece of driftwood and some dark reddish wood he found on the hillside. He was busy teaching Penny how to play.
Nell sat with Perdita in the garden, taking time to talk to her and play with her, despite the weeds behind her. She and Jon had talked about this together.“We must make time to spend with the children. Even though getting enough food takes up so much of our day.”
“I know. It doesn’t have to be very much time, as long as they do get some time with us. Don’t worry, Nell. They’ll grow up fine.”
And Penny was growing up fine. She was learning to fish, very nicely now, and an extra person bringing in food was making a noticeable difference. Jon was finally able to spend some time laying foundations for a proper building. After all, there was no shortage of stone!
From time to time, one of them made an expedition to the other end of the island, to see what could be found there. Nell found another ruined house, but again it had the remains of a garden, and there was food to gather, and seeds to collect there.
Perdita was growing up nicely. She was a happy little child, who didn’t seem to know that there was any other way to live, except on an island with your parents and big sister. She adored Penny, and Penny was really close to her as well.
Sometimes Nell and Jon were so tired, they fell asleep as soon as they crawled into the tent at night. But other times, the days weren’t quite so demanding, and they remembered just how much they liked each other…eventually the inevitable happened, and Nell was pregnant again. This time was easier. Nell wasn’t so worried about how they would cope with a baby. Perdita had grown up just fine, Penny had loved having a sister, and they had managed to keep everyone fed. When Janet finally arrived, Jon was pleased and surprised to see that she’d inherited his blonde hair.
Janet wasn’t the only one growing up. Penny had stopped being a child, Perdita was getting noticeably more mature – and life was getting less of a struggle day by day. Jon had cleared away more of the rubble, and it was definitely time to start building upwards instead of just digging foundations. With three people to help build, and one to keep Janet from trying to help, they were finally making a house for themselves.
“Well, all right, maybe it’s more of a hut than a house,” Jon admitted. “But it’s a beginning!”
Nell nodded. It was a beginning. And she was starting an orchard, the garden was more fruitful yet, their fishing exploits didn’t seem to make any difference to the number of fish in the sea…they might just make it through.
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