by Jaima Fixsen
Soon they might be talking like friends of old standing. She would mention the article he’d written last week, about Swing violence in the south counties, the unemployed farm hands going about burning and breaking machinery. In her mind, his eyebrows lifted. He had the most attractive eyebrows. You read it?
She would quote it. While in our souls we deplore the blight of violence, surely in our hearts we cannot deny our culpability. When men are without work or bread, their plight ignored, will they not do whatever is in their power to force the world to look upon them?
The window opened but her feet wouldn’t move. Just come out from behind the bushes, you idiot.
Too late. Someone else addressed him. It was Mrs. Chin.
“More late nights at the House, Mr. Brown?”
Why couldn’t I have said that? Mary lamented. She was ridiculous here, hiding out of sight and clutching a spoon.
He laughed guiltily as he rose and ran his fingers through his hair. He did look tired, Mary thought, her eyes narrowing. In spite of the relaxed set of his shoulders, there were shadows lining his eyes.
Mrs. Chin stepped closer. “You’re too pale. I don’t like your colour.”
He grinned. “I’m sure there are many who don’t like yours.”
She laughed, a chirp of delight that seemed to strengthen the feeble sun sloping over the walls. “That wasn’t what I meant, but something tells me you don’t mind. Not like the doctor over yonder.”
Mary burned unseen, but she couldn’t argue.
“He’s of the old guard. None of them can stomach change. I hope you know not all of us are so prejudiced.” He accompanied this with a little bow.
“I was told you’re quite the radical.”
He smiled. “Perhaps. But a hundred years from now? I don’t think so. I sincerely hope not.”
“You’re ambitious, sir, if you hope to be remembered in a hundred years.”
Mr. Brown flushed. “Not myself. The movement. And yes, I’m ambitious there. I’d risk anything for it.”
“Oh? What have you risked so far?” Mrs. Chin asked.
Her intent gaze made him look away. He seemed embarrassed. “Why are we standing? Won’t you sit down? I can send for some coffee. My paragraphs aren’t co-operating.”
“I would like that.” Mrs. Chin seated herself in the offered chair. She wore a smock over her dress, but seemed indifferent to it and the smudges of earth on her front. Mary supposed she’d be indifferent to her appearance too, if she had poise and pearls like that.
Mr. Brown went inside and Mary shuffled closer, not wanting to miss anything. He soon returned, promising his housekeeper would be out with the tray.
“What are you writing?” Mrs. Chin asked.
He explained, and they fell into almost the same conversation Mary had planned. It was cruelly unfair. If she’d been just a moment sooner—
“Do you like flowers, Mr. Brown?” The swift change of subject caught him off guard, delaying his response.
“Not like you. I’ve peered into your glass house from the outside, you know, on days when I’ve struggled with the writing.”
“No more peeking,” she admonished with a laugh. “Next time come right in. The door is open for my friends.”
“Thank you.” But he wasn’t smiling anymore. A shadow hung over him and he turned his cup in his hands. “I suppose I have quite a fondness for flowers. I was married once and my wife loved them. She painted too. Had quite a gift for it.”
Mary forgot to breathe. A wife? But Mrs. Chin was asking him about flowers, commenting on the climate of the place where he said he’d lived with his wife—a country house in Kent.
This was why he lived alone, why none of the falcon-eyed ladies had succeeded. His heart was broken. Mary frowned, not recognizing the sudden pain in her chest as a wound to her own. It thumped on, only a little faster than warranted.
A wife. How he must have loved her. She could tell from the hitch in his voice, the hesitation as he spoke of her, his reluctance to use her name.
“You need more flowers,” Mrs. Chin told him, gently setting aside her cup. “And more sleep. Let me give you a hibiscus from my glass house. You might put it where you can see it first thing in the morning. Then, no matter what happens during the day, you’ll have something good in it.”
Mr. Brown made polite noises, protesting such kindness, but already Mrs. Chin had turned towards her house and summoned Ben Pickett, who came running across the lawn.
“Benjamin. Fetch a hibiscus for Mr. Brown. Cover it well before bringing it outside. Bring a—” She turned to Mr. Brown. “I have several varieties. Which would you like?”
He cleared his throat. “Would you—would you happen to have a white one?”
Even peering through the foliage, it was impossible to miss Mrs. Chin’s smile. “I have one. It is yours.”
“Thank you.” He toyed with the edge of his paper. “My late wife—”
“You needn’t explain.” Her delicate fingers came to rest on the back of his own. “They are very beautiful flowers.”
Mr. Brown shook off the melancholy that had overtaken him and mustered a smile. “Rarer than hen’s teeth this time of year. You’re very generous.”
“So are you. I am not often invited for coffee.”
Mary shifted her feet on the gravel. She was thirsty and her back was getting sore, but she’d expire before leaving this spot.
Ben returned with the flower and Mr. Brown rose to bring it inside. “Will you come see how it looks?” he asked.
“Another day. I have an appointment soon. You should bring in your papers. The sun is gone,” Mrs. Chin told him.
“I will. Thank you again.”
He left and the garden was suddenly too quiet. Beneath the shadowing cloud, it felt like February again. Mary waited quiet as a hare for Mrs. Chin to leave, but she didn’t. She rose, stretched her elegant fingers and walked right towards Mary.
“Your shrubs are a deplorable sight, Miss Buchanan, but they don’t fool me.”
Mary couldn’t help it. She jumped.
“Well?” Mrs. Chin didn’t retreat. Mary was forced to emerge, shamefaced, with her spoon and the handful of bulbs. Mrs. Chin sighed.
“It might not get cold enough now for those to bloom.”
Mary’s face fell. “Ought I to throw them away?”
“No. Plant them. If you don’t get flowers this year, they’ll come the year after. You,” she frowned at her, “are certainly young enough to wait.”
“I’m sorry,” Mary said, meek as milk, but she didn’t think Mrs. Chin believed her. She resettled her shoulders, like she’d gotten an itch from the cloth of her gown.
“Well, get to it then.”
Mary leaped to the leaf-strewn patch of dirt below the shrubs and nearly started with surprise when Mrs. Chin knelt beside her.
“Is that all you have? Never mind. It’ll do,” Mrs. Chin took hold of the spoon. With a few quick motions she turned over the dirt, making a row of small holes. “I won’t ask you what’s become of the rest of the bulbs. You’ll get more, you know, once these grow for a few years. Dig them up and divide them to fill the space and—” She broke off, turning to Mary with a frown. “Do you often watch Mr. Brown?”
The clump of earth in Mary’s hands broke into pieces. “I don’t know what you mean,” Mary said.
“He’s wonderful to look at, of course, but—don’t forget to bury them pointing up,” Mrs. Chin said, turning over the bulb Mary had just planted. “Yes, that’s better.”
They planted two more bulbs, smoothing the dirt to cover them, but Mary was squirming inside, ashamed. Mrs. Chin didn’t believe her, and she’d been reminded of what Mrs. Chin said to Mr. Brown. “I would have invited you for coffee,” Mary said finally, patting earth over the bulbs with unnecessary firmness. “If I were allowed.” No doubt Mrs. Chin thought Mary was as narrow-minded as her father, but—
“You said you weren’t watching. What was it the
n? Listening with your eyes closed?”
Mary’s lips fell open.
“Never mind. I understand.” Mrs. Chin stilled Mary’s hands with her own. “Gently. They’re plants. No need to pummel them. You are as welcome to visit me as Mr. Brown, you know. The door of the glass house—”
“Is open to your friends,” Mary finished. Papa wouldn’t like it, and normally she lacked the gumption to flout this kind of express command. But if she could smuggle in newspapers… It was a heady feeling, being invited, when you were never asked anywhere. Even at home, she was simply there, like the pots in the cupboards and the books on the shelves.
“You are clearly a champion eavesdropper. Never mind. I won’t tell your secret. Girls need at least one or two.” Mrs. Chin stood and dusted the dirt from her hands. “I was young once, believe it or not. Visit me soon, won’t you? When you can be discreet about it?” She glanced past Mary to the house. She did understand, then.
“I will.” No matter how Mary had to lie, she would come. “Thank you for inviting me.” The words were rough rocks falling off her tongue. She wasn’t good at speaking when she cared this much. Grown awkward in the brightness of the moment, Mary asked, “What’s your appointment?” and blushed scarlet. Aunt Yates said nothing was more repulsive than impertinence. Mary, who’d glimpsed various ailments in the patients coming to her father, didn’t agree, but Mrs. Chin…wasn’t repulsed. She was still smiling. Mary let out her breath.
“I’m off to Regent’s Park,” Mrs. Chin said. “And I can’t be late. There’s a gentleman I must trip with my umbrella.”
Mary frowned, sure the lady was joking. She must be. Who plans to trip gentlemen in parks? But there was no time to ask or laugh at the jest for Mrs. Chin was already halfway across the lawn, bustling back to her own house. Even Mary could tell Mrs. Chin was too rich and too small of stature to turn highwayman.
Nine
“Susan?” Sidney Buchanan stepped further into the parlour. He had to say his sister’s name once more before she looked up from her writing.
“Forgive me. I wasn’t attending.” She looked at him expectantly.
The doctor had planned his words but couldn’t help playing with the chain of his watch. This was awkward. “Have you noticed anything unusual about Mary?” He was probably imagining things. And yet…
“No. Should I have?”
“She frowned yesterday when I was speaking at the dinner table.” Like she disagreed with him. Which was absurd. Mary wouldn’t know a parliamentary bill from a bakery order.
“Perhaps she doesn’t care for mutton,” his sister said.
No. Mary had always displayed a healthy appetite. She was almost a gorgon for eggs, something of a relief to him, actually. If she tolerated them so well, she’d never have problems with dyspepsia. But she’d done more than frowned. Once, she opened her mouth as if she’d been about to say something contradictory. “She looks a little peaked to me. I asked her if she’d been reading late at night, but she said not.”
“I’m sure she isn’t. She hasn’t visited the circulating library in weeks.”
He tucked his watch away, considering. “Isn’t that unusual for her?”
“Yes.” Susan hesitated. “I suppose she does seem to sit at windows a great deal of late.”
Perhaps a circulatory disorder then. He supposed she led a rather confined existence. Calisthenics would help. Just last week he’d designed a new regimen: lunges, bends, and rhythmic swinging of the arms with a pair of clubs.
“She was looking for gardening tools the other day,” Susan told him.
“Was she?” Unusual, this sudden interest in horticulture. Still, it was better, if she felt the need to venture out of doors, to have her in the garden than wandering about the streets. London was plagued with marches, speeches, and pamphleteers and there was nearly always some sort of demonstration going on in the parks. Even if the country wasn’t a bed of revolutionary tinder about to spark, girls like Mary were flighty, feckless, and apt to get into trouble. He still felt a twitch in his cheek every time he saw that man, Mr. Brown, who only last week had called him antediluvian. Dr. Buchanan had taken to jotting down insults in his pocket diary. Too many times he’d been caught unarmed.
“If she wishes, you may buy her some tools. And perhaps some seeds,” Dr. Buchanan told his sister. He’d get Mary the gymnastic equipment and explain the exercises. They would do her good, he was sure of it.
A lengthy consideration of Mr. Brown’s broken heart had Mary revising her chances. Not just any clever, beautiful woman would do. He needed a healer. Someone who understood him. His grief was to her advantage. It gave her more time to grow up, educate herself, and study how to make herself useful to him. Yes, there were those beautiful ladies who dined at his house, but she had a fighting chance.
If only Mrs. Chin hadn’t interrupted him when he’d begun to speak of his wife. There was a story about her, Mary was sure of it. As she waited on Aunt Yates, copied Papa’s letters (Mary wrote a beautiful, copperplate hand), and ignored his pontificating at dinner, her mind churned. What had happened to Samuel and his lost, loved Mrs. Brown? His hesitancy betokened some tragedy, but there were a myriad possibilities: consumption, death in childbirth, a carriage accident. Any number of horrors could have taken her, soiling his soul.
What had the lady been like? How, and more importantly, why had he fallen in love with her? A succession of murky images floated before Mary, rising then subsiding under the next like clothes in a washtub. Indifferent to what passed in her family for conversation, to the regular domestic tussles and the crises de nerfs of her aunt, Mary moved through her days like a novice nun listening to heavenly music. She imagined a slender wrist, a pearl drop clinging to a soft pink ear, a beautiful laugh, and the kisses Mrs. Brown had received because her husband loved her. With Annie, that beatific model of a man’s beloved always before her, it was easy enough to imagine. These days Annie hummed as she worked, unless Aunt Yates complained.
It was past luncheon and since Mary hadn’t seen Mr. Brown return, he probably wouldn’t until late. No chance of him calling on Mrs. Chin today. Mary could go herself, but suppose Mr. Brown went tomorrow? Mary could only make so many visits. If the chance came and she’d already used her opportunity, what then?
Wait a day or two and try again. You can call on her more than once.
It was logical, but hard to believe. She didn’t want to impose. Mary lingered behind the overgrown laurels and set the backs of her hands to her burning cheeks. This was idiotic. She should simply go.
She made it as far as the lawn before indecision seized her.
“Miss Buchanan.”
Mary swung her head round to face the dark eyes of Mrs. Chin.
“Oh. I didn’t see you.”
“I wasn’t trying to sneak up on you.” There was reproach in Mrs. Chin’s gaze. “I even made noise with the shears.” She opened and closed the pair in her gloved hand. A basket of trimmed branches hung over her other arm.
“You must forgive me. I’m very stupid today,” Mary said.
“What have you done?”
“Nothing.” Which was probably the trouble. She did too much thinking.
“I don’t think they keep you busy enough,” Mrs. Chin said. “Come with me. I’ve been waiting for you to call. You might as well, if all you do at home is moon about at the windows.”
“I helped Cook with the biscuits this morning,” Mary protested.
“Yes, and I expect you’ve been doing that since you were six.”
She’d been five when first allowed to roll the dough and press out haphazard circles.
“You can help me. Come along.”
Mary followed, too chicken-hearted to glance behind. Not that it would help. If she was observed by Papa or Aunt Yates, they would waste no time coming after her and bringing her home, like when Papa had dragged her out of Mr. Brown’s. This time, he’d probably seize her by the ear. He didn’t like Chinamen. Or China
women, in this case.
From the outside Mrs. Chin’s glass house wasn’t large. Three steps in Mary stopped. Some magic made it seem both smaller and larger inside. Plants from the world over clustered together: lush palms, showy blossoms in bright pots, miniature fruit trees with fragrant flowers and glossy leaves. The air was moist and warm. In a small open area a low table was surrounded by a set of lacquered wooden chairs.
“It’s lovely,” Mary said. “Like another country.”
“Isn’t it? Come. You can help me with these.” Mrs. Chin led her past the sitting area to a worktable built against the far wall. Flowers twined up the brick and arched over the shelves.
“What are you doing?” Mary tried to make sense of the jumble. Every surface was covered with pots: glazed, unfinished, overflowing with green fronds or with nothing but naked earth, some nested together in jumbled stacks. There was a roll of brown paper and an unspooling reel of twine, a brass watering pot with a long spout that was half the size of a teapot, and heaps of brown bulbs gathered anywhere there was space for them. Some had jackets as pale as onion skin, some bright burgundy, some a fustian brown.
“I’m putting you to work,” Mrs. Chin said. “And keeping you out of trouble.”
“Pardon?” Mary asked, sure she’d misheard. Mrs. Chin had mumbled the last part.
“Sorting out this rubble,” Mrs. Chin said. “Well, what can you do? Can you count?”
“Yes! I’m past my eighteenth birthday!” For a friend, Mrs. Chin could be terribly insulting.
“Good. You might want to put on a smock. I trade these with other botanists,” Mrs. Chin explained, waving a hand over the bulbs. “I send them out in parcels of ten.” Her briskness didn’t permit sulks so Mary found her way into the smock and did up the ties.
“I can do more than count,” she said.
“Excellent.” But instead of offering another task, Mrs. Chin merely held out an empty packet. Mary dropped in ten of the brown bulbs and Mrs. Chin scribbled something on the outside. Then she picked up another. Mary counted.