To depend upon her sisters' protection instead of her
own lifelong distinction, galled her proud spirit. For the first time
she understood how powerless Hamilton was to protect her. The glamour of
that first year when nothing mattered was gone for ever. She had two
children, one of them uncommon, and they were to encounter life without
name or property. True, Levine might die, or Hamilton make some
brilliant coup, but she felt little of the buoyancy of hope as they left
the cane-fields and drove among the dark hills to their new home.
The house and outbuildings were on a high eminence, surrounded on three
sides by hills. Below was a lagoon, which was separated from the sea by
a deep interval of tidal mud set thick with mangroves. The outlet
through this swamp was so narrow that a shark which had found its way in
when young had grown too large to return whence he came, and was the
solitary and discontented inhabitant of the lagoon. The next morning
Rachael, rising early and walking on the terrace with Alexander, was
horrified to observe him warming his white belly in the sun.
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