Matthew tells her this happens every year as if to remind them what is to come: a few hot days in spring, cracking thunderstorms in the evening, then cooling off until Christmas. Isabella finds the warm, moist air enervating. She is tired deep in her joints. Every afternoon, while Matthew sleeps, she goes down to the beach to let the ocean wind cool her. She collects shells and stones, still idly imagining pieces of jewelry she might make but never putting the thought into action. Matthew asks her daily when she intends to go, but she says she wants to wait just a week or so, until this hot spell has passed, because she is fearful of being at sea during a storm. Perhaps he thinks that she is reluctant to go because she does not want to say good-bye to him; this is partly true. But she knows she can and must leave him, if she is to live the life she has imagined for herself. Although she finds lately that imagining that life leaves her with a sick guilt in her stomach. When she trudges down the grassy dune and onto the firm sand this afternoon, she knows it will be a short visit.
