by Susanna Ives
Now, he gazed about the garden, a stark contrast from the scorched slurry where the soldier had died. The pale fresh leaves had begun to grow back on the flowering trees and tiny white buds dotted the branches—everything was about to be born again. By mid-summer, the front garden would be a jubilee of red, purple, yellow, and green, and the herb garden would smell of coriander and lavender. This was his cathedral, where he found his grace and faith again. Once he had been loath to let Helena see it, afraid she might violate its sacredness. And now, he waited—all bathed, shaved, and gussied up like some virgin adolescent—for her to arrive. He took another draw, heating his lungs, and remembered the feel of her body that morning, the rise of her breasts pressed against his chest.
“Oh God,” he muttered.
Branwen, who rested by his foot, lifted her head and studied him, face tilted, ears pricked, the skin between her dark eyes furrowed with concern. He bent down and scratched her head as he heard the rumble of wheels on the rocks and the rattle of harnesses beyond the ancient stone wall. His black four-wheeler made the sharp turn through the gate and into the yard. He rose, tossed his cigarette into the broken soil, and set his jaw as he had when he aimed his rifle to destroy a suffering soldier.
The carriage hadn’t fully stopped when Megan opened the door and leaped down—a white flutter of petticoats and gray cape. Branwen scampered to her, rose on her hind legs, and licked the girl’s chin.
Theo jogged forward and yanked down the steps as Emily appeared at the carriage door. She wore a shiny brown dress, the late afternoon sun firing up the rich auburn tones of her hair. A wide smile brightened her face and reddened her usually pale cheeks and the tip of her nose.
“I’ve been telling Helena that for years and years this place was covered entirely with nettles and ivy,” she said. “The village children believed the place was haunted.”
“It is haunted,” Theo said, “at least according to Efa. She tells of footsteps and doors opening and closing on their own. As for me, I haven’t seen or heard such a thing.” He put his hands around Emily’s waist, so tiny his fingers almost met, and lifted her into the air.
“Wheee!” She tossed her head back to laugh as he whirled her several times before setting her down. Then he turned to assist Helena. She stood at the mouth of the carriage, peering out. The cool breeze lifted the strands of hair that framed her face and fluttered her bonnet ribbons. When she shifted her gaze to him, her eyes, the same pale blue-gray of the sky, charged his skin like static electricity.
She raised the hem of her black gown in one hand and clutched the side of the carriage with the other, carefully stepping down. He found his fingers were shaking when he offered his hand.
She waved him off. “I can manage.”
“Come now, you deprive me of an opportunity to be chivalrous,” he said, trying hard to keep his voice casual. The events of the morning pulsed between them, tender and awkward.
“Never,” she said, in the same strained joviality. And yet, she inhaled in a quiet rush as she closed her gloved hand over his.
“Thank you,” she whispered and smiled, tentative and nervous.
He held her hand tight as she stepped down, careful not to trip on her gown. When her shoes crunched the gravel drive, he released her and bent in a curt bow, careful to keep his eyes from hers.
∞∞∞
Helena knew she shouldn’t leave the others, but she was drawn by the beautiful oval garden formed by boxwoods and cut in wedges around a round pond raised in gray stone. She walked ahead to find the dark fountain water was smooth and clear, reflecting the odd house rising among the trees—a castle’s keep built of golden limestone and rising four stories with rounded towers on all corners. Red vines feathered about the arched Gothic windows and around the carved front doors. The right wing was a hull of an older castle, including an ancient tower that soared above the rest of the house. The stones of this wing were bleached to pale gray and the narrow windows were empty, windowless shells but for a few pigeons roosting. Riots of dark and pale green ivies grew over the walls. Oaks had grown up around a ditch that must have once been a moat. Their gray branches were twisted and tangled like witch’s hair.
“It’s beautiful,” Helena whispered, feeling her spirits lift for the first time in weeks.
Emily laced an arm through Helena’s. “And this is merely the beginning.” She called over her shoulder to Theo. “Why don’t you give us a tour?” she asked him. “I haven’t seen your spring garden this year.”
Mr. Mallory waved off the carriage. “It’s too cold for you. Let’s go in.”
“Come, I’m squeezed next to Helena for warmth,” Emily said, snuggling closer. “And I know she would love to see it.”
“I don’t think it’s a very good idea,” Mr. Mallory replied.
“I can give them a tour!” Megan piped up. “Please let me.”
“Yes, dear, do,” Emily said, all the while watching Mr. Mallory from under her lashes, a playful smile on her mouth. Helena had to think her cousin must have been a fine flirt in her youth.
Mr. Mallory raised his palms. “You ladies are not going to let me say no, are you?”
“We never do.” Emily laughed.
“Well,” he said in mock severity. “If I catch my death from a chill, it shall be your doing.” He drew off his greatcoat and placed it over Emily’s cloak.
Emily rolled her eyes heavenward. “For you are such a delicate flower, Theo.”
Megan began her tour in the topiary garden. “These hedges resemble one shrub—”
“Boxwoods,” Theo inserted.
“I was going to say that! They are actually many boxwoods planted close together. We are going to plant red flowers in the centers.”
“Asters,” Mr. Mallory clarified. “I’ve started them in the greenhouse.”
Helena watched him brush his fingers over the smooth pruning of the topiary. His hands were hard and square. Thin crescents of dirt were visible under the nails and brown tobacco had stained between his fingers. She shivered when she remembered those same rough hands gently caressing her back as he murmured soothing words. He caught her watching. Her neck and cheeks heated and she hurried to catch up with Megan, who was heading around the side of the castle house.
A bricked path weaved through a garden where rose bushes were planted amid large stones. Delicate tendrils with tiny leaves the size of raindrops threaded up the side of the castle. About the old walls’ ruins grew great bushes with flat, palm-sized pale green leaves. Beneath them, circles of flowers were beginning to bloom. At the very back of the garden, a mass of tangled vines covered a brick wall, except for where shears had cut away around an arched door and two benches.
“This is the white garden,” their young guide explained. “All the flowers that grow here are white.”
Emily spanned the garden with a wave of her hand. “In a month’s time, the hydrangeas, roses, honeysuckle and jasmine will begin to bloom,” she said. “And then later the petals fall, showering you in scents of jasmine and honey—a snow storm of flowers.”
Helen could feel a charge in the air—anticipation, everything on the verge of opening, blooming, becoming. She turned her head and glanced at Mr. Mallory. His shoulders were slightly hunched, his hair sloping into his eyes as if he were trying to hide himself.
“You created all this beauty?” Helena asked.
“Mr. Mallory is quite brilliant,” Emily winked at the man.
“I wasn’t alone,” he protested. “Gordon assisted me, as well as several local boys I employ.”
“Ah, but you designed it.” Emily tapped her side of her bonnet. “It’s all up there in your noggin.”
“Yes, in my deranged, unstable noggin.”
Emily chuckled. “I believe madness and brilliance are different sides of the same coin.”
“Thank you,” he replied. “But in my case, I believe madness is on both sides.”
Emily flicked her hand. “No one believes that.�
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“Quite a few in London do,” Theo said, turning a rose leaf over and examining its underside. Helena cringed, remembering the day in the park when she made fun of him before the others, calling him ‘Mr. Mad Mallory’.
“We don’t care about those snobbish London people or what they believe,” Emily said. “Do we?”
“Helena’s from London,” Megan pointed out.
“No, she’s not,” Emily said, squeezing Helena closer. “She’s from Wales. I’ve converted her. Now she’s one of us.”
Helena watched a shadow darken Mr. Mallory’s face. “Come, let me show you the herb garden,” he murmured, gesturing towards the arched door.
Megan pressed her shoulder against the wood, and the door opened with a scrape and creak. Helena stepped into a garden laid out in traditional squares bordered in stone. The plants sprouted different shades of green and deep purple. Along the wall were spreading trees dotted with pale pink and white buds. Vines, trained onto strings, ran the length of the crumbling castle walls.
Emily picked some leaves and handed them to Helena. “Here. What is this? A guessing game.”
Helena held the leaves to her nose. They smelled of wood and salt. “Rosemary?”
“Very good,” Emily replied. “And this one?”
Helena sniffed a cool, sweet scent. “Mint?”
“Of course.”
Mr. Mallory snapped a large yellowish leaf off a plant. “This one is more difficult.”
He placed the leaf and an attached cluster of yellow flowers in her hand. She studied it and then shook her head.
“That’s All Heal or Hercules Wound Wort,” he said.
“Mrs. Gordon makes a tea from it when I suffer a cold,” Megan said.
Helena ran her thumb over the leaf and quietly laughed. She had cluttered her existence with bright colors and endless noise. She needed the loudness and bright gaslights to keep her mind distracted. Yet, this tiny, tender, silent leaf she now held captivated her.
“What amuses you so?” Emily asked.
“Nothing, really,” Helena said. “It’s very peaceful here.” Different from anything she had experienced in London.
Mr. Mallory studied her, his eyes dark with emotion she couldn’t decipher. Emily kissed her cheek. “You may come here anytime you like. Theo won’t mind.”
He didn’t return Emily’s smile. “Of course not,” he said, but Helena knew his from guarded visage he was merely being polite.
Outside the herb garden, the land ascended toward the top of the hill. The trees grew from the ground in wild angles; the branches and greenery created a canopy. The earth was dappled with the late afternoon sun shining through the lacework of leaves. About the trunks grew large bushes covered in blooms, and patches of daffodils, their stems bulging with buds ready to burst forth. The path, padded with decaying bark, ran beside a shallow stream that flowed in a soft trickle around mossy rocks. The breeze ruffling the leaves was cool on her face and blew away the remnants of the morning’s events.
“Mr. Gordon!” Helena heard Megan call.
Coming down the path was a man with pale, hay-colored hair falling around his unshaven face in greasy strands. His hat was crumpled and his brown coat and trousers dusty. A hoe and shovel were balanced on his muscled shoulders. As he came closer, Helena saw that lines of raised, red scars threaded the left side of his neck and face, and his left eyelid closed and sagged down. His ear was ragged as if snagged by a claw. But it wasn’t his injured appearance that caused the sickening knot in Helena’s belly; it was that the man’s single green eye staring at her, as blunt as the edge of the hoe he carried. Please God, don’t let him say something mean in front of my kind cousins.
“We’ve brought our cousin Helena,” Megan said and then explained to Helena. “Mr. Gordon helps Theo with the garden.”
He was a servant, yet he clearly held the esteem of the others. She didn’t know how to greet the man. “Glad to make your acquaintance.” She performed a small curtsy.
The man pulled his lip under his teeth, brisling his mustache. His gaze moved from Helena to Mr. Mallory and back. Helena held her breath, bracing for a harsh reaction.
The man swung his tools down and bowed. “Yours as well, miss.” He spoke in the musical cadence of the Irish.
“We were showing her the lovely gardens,” Emily said. “My cousin is quite impressed.”
“They are far better than anything I’ve seen in London.” Helena smiled.
“Of course, they are,” he said, a wry twist to his lips. “I hope you enjoy your time here.” He flashed his employer a look before replacing his tools and veering off the path through the maze of trees.
“Mr. Gordon sounds Irish,” Helena said. “How did he come to Wales?”
“Ah, that’s a very romantic story,” Emily said, leaning in so closely to Helena their bonnet brims bumped. “Mr. Gordon, his mother and all his brothers—six of them—came to London to escape the famine. Naturally, they are quite poor, and Mr. Gordon had to enlist in the army where he served under Theo.”
Helena glanced at Mr. Mallory. He walked a few feet ahead, his gaze trained on the ground. “Sadly, he was shot in the war,” Emily continued. “Theo, what was the battle?”
“He wasn’t shot in a battle, but in the trenches.”
Helena tilted her head in question.
“We built trenches to protect ourselves from gun fire,” Mr. Mallory explained. “The Russians were constantly firing cannons and bullets at us.”
“Every day?” Helena exclaimed. “Were you never safe between battles?”
“No,” he said.
“So, they sent Gordon to the hospital that Miss Nightingale ran,” Emily continued.
“Scutari,” Theo inserted. “He barely survived the boat trip there.” Bitterness hardened his words.
“There he met Efa,” Emily said. “Who was a nurse. Gordon contends that if it weren’t for Efa, he would have lost his will to live. She nursed him every day. Afterwards, he was discharged, went to London, and worked for a while on the docks. But he never forgot her, and when the war was over, he searched all of Wales until he found her.”
“She was here?”
“Mrs. Gordon is from the south, near Cardiff,” Theo said. “But somehow Gordon learned I had hidden away in the mountains and turned up one afternoon, claiming I had to hire him and his wife, seeing I had gotten him shot.” A grim tone lurked beneath his dry chuckle.
“Were you in the cavalry?” Helena knew little of these matters, but she thought all young men of privilege joined the cavalry.
He treated her to a derisive snort. “Cavalry is where you went if you were the arrogant son of a peer who could buy an excellent officer’s commission despite the fact the only thing you knew about war was what you learned from playing with your toy soldiers as a little boy.” The last words were practically barked. She was beginning to learn Theo typically spoke in low, controlled tones, but when he raised his voice, it was ragged around the edges, as if chaffed from shouting.
“I’m sorry,” Helena said. “I should have known. I am… I am ignorant of the war.”
“Well, it is best you stay that way,” he said. “I am related to the Duke of Cambridge. So I became a lieutenant colonel in the guards.”
Helena knew the war was horrible, that people talked of mistakes and poorly trained officers, but she had refused to listen and had cut off any conversation that wasn’t to her liking. How carefully she had blinded herself to suffering, and all the while, her father was stealing from these brave soldiers. “Did you—”
“I believe you wanted to see the spring garden. Follow me.” Mr. Mallory turned and continued down the path to where it forked and then curved back to the castle.
Helena studied Mr. Mallory’s back as he walked ahead. His neck was stiff, his hands clasped behind him and his hair curled at the tip of his collar. Who was Mr. Mallory—the broken, unhinged man? Or the brilliant, sensitive man before her? People had so many
hidden depths, so many secrets.
“Oh, my heavens,” Helena cried.
The path led to a lush lawn where the ancient tower rose. At its base, the land had been leveled on a plateau that was covered with hundreds and hundreds of tulips, their stems and leaves waving with the wind, sweeping over the lawn. Rings of brilliant yellows, deep and pale pinks, purple, vivid blues, and oranges formed one enormous circle of colors. In the center, a tall stone, in the shape of a shaft, pointed to the sky.
“This is the spring garden,” Megan announced. She scampered ahead into the garden and began skipping about the tulips with Branwen at her heels.
Coming closer, Helena could see the narrow path of white pebbles spiraling through the flowers. “A labyrinth of tulips?”
“It’s not a puzzle,” Mr. Mallory said. “But more like what you would see at monastery or cathedral.”
“Why don’t you show Helena?” Emily said, taking a seat on a bench under a tree’s branches. “I think I will sit for a moment.”
Helena didn’t miss the look Mr. Mallory shot her cousin. Emily was trying to play matchmaker, and he was not amused by her choice for him.
Helena heated with embarrassment. “I’ll figure it out myself.”
“No, I’ll be happy to show you.” He offered his arm. She wrapped her hand in the crook of his elbow. Even through his clothes, she could feel the contours of his taut muscles. Her heart quickened. She experienced a bit of that giddiness she felt when she first spied him in London many months ago. Or was it years? Centuries could have passed since that horrible time.
“You contemplate as you follow the path,” he said. “That is all there is to it, really. Hundreds of years ago, pilgrims would crawl about labyrinths in cathedrals on their bloodied knees. Except you are welcome to employ your feet in my garden.”
“So you’ve created a garden for reflection,” she said. “Do you care if I make a midnight call? For all I do at night is think and think and think.”