Abstract face profile with WHO AM I lettering

The barge is listing again, so forgive the wobble in my hand. Tom says the Thames has got into the hold and Dad's old lamp is swimming in the bilge with the spare rope. I have spent the afternoon bailing with a saucepan and wondering why I never learned to draw faces properly, because the one I keep sketching on the back of the tide tables comes out lopsided every time. Nose too long, chin dropping off the page like a wet sail.

You asked in your last letter whether I had found the man who sold Father the mooring at Brentford. I have not. I have found a box of his drawings instead, tucked under the bunk where the damp can't reach. Most are of locks and gauges, but there is one of a face turned sideways, the lines so plain you could stand a spoon on them, and someone has written WHO AM I along the margin in pencil, the letters leaning like barges in a crosswind. Underneath, in a different hand, is a single word: Ask.

I have been asking. The lock-keeper at Teddington says the man was a lettering boy before he took to the water, and that he hatched his shadows with a steel nib so fine it took a week to bleed. He says the face is the bow of a boat, and the words are the rope that holds it to the bank.

I am going to hang the sketch above the stove and see what the smoke makes of it. If the face is still looking back at me when the kettle sings, I will know it is not a question at all, only a drawing of somebody who was busy finding out.

Write soon. Bring the good oilskins.

Your loving sister, Josephine