“No need to mention the jars. I put them back in the pantry before Cook notices.”
“No need to mention Paris,” said Daniel. “The new schoolteacher should distract Aunt Agatha. We should take up the poor girl, Hugh, and make sure Aunt Agatha continues to shelter her under her matronly wing.”
“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” said Hugh. “Miss Nash is no tapioca pudding.”
“She did have the unfortunate air of a bluestocking,” said Daniel. “You’ll have to engage her in scholarly debate, Hugh. But if all else fails, I can always write her a sonnet.”
“A sonnet?” said Hugh.
“No woman can resist having her name rhymed with a flower in iambic pentameter,” said Daniel.
The sun had not yet evaporated the dew from the lawn, and the scents of honeysuckle and wallflowers rose on the salty breeze. Early morning was Agatha’s favorite time, recalling the simple joys of childhood and beckoning one outside, she thought, to walk barefoot on the wet grass. In pursuit of this goal, she finished tying the bows at the neck and waist of her plain cotton wrapper, stuck her feet into a pair of shabby, low-heeled slippers, and headed for the back stairs.
Only in the early mornings did Agatha use these stairs, and never did she feel more at home in her own house than when she popped her head in the kitchen to ask Cook for a cup of tea from the big brown pot kept fresh all day for the staff. For a brief moment, in the black-and-white-tiled kitchen, with its high, sunny windows and gleaming new gas range, they did not have to be mistress and cook, ruling separate domains on either side of a green baize door, but could come together as two women, up before anyone else in the family, in need of the day’s first cup.
Today there were two bowls of raspberries on the kitchen table, and Cook was busy straining cream from the top of the milk jug.
“I hope it was all right to have them?” said Cook. “Only milkman had them on the cart and I know how partial Master Daniel is to a few raspberries—and ours still green on the canes.”
“I fear you will never stop spoiling those boys,” said Agatha. “And how is that granddaughter of yours?”
“Better for the sunshine and fresh air,” said Cook. “She gets about so fast now.” The small girl wore braces to correct legs twisted and weakened by rickets, a scourge among the poorer classes. Agatha sent frequent baskets of beef tea and butter home with Cook, but the child, now five, remained stubbornly frail and sickly, and caused Cook such distress that Agatha had to choose carefully which days to ask after her.
“I’m glad to hear it,” she said, and sent a silent prayer of thanks for the health of her own tall, strong nephews.
Cup of tea in hand, Agatha passed through a wooden arch in the thick yew hedge, closing the tall, close-boarded gate behind her and rattling the latch loudly just in case the gardener was about early. All the servants had been discreetly made to understand that this quiet corner of the garden was off-limits when the gate was shut. Still, Agatha preferred to announce her occupation rather than be shy about it.
She took a moment to enjoy her own ingenuity in creating this small green box of a room with its chin-high yew hedge overlooking the sea and its taller yew walls on the three landward sides. The plain, well-manicured lawn looked almost smooth enough for croquet, and the single heavy oak bench in the middle gave her much satisfaction in its charming French blue paint. She set down her tea mug, uncloaked herself from her wrapper, and kicked off her slippers. She was revealed to the sunny morning in a chemise and a pair of short bloomers over wool stockings from which she had cut off the feet. Wriggling her toes in the damp grass, she took two long, deep breaths, stretched both arms above her head, and began to make energetic circles with her upper body and head.
Whenever she exercised here in the garden, Agatha was transported back to the camellia-scented air of Baden-Baden, where she and John, on a short holiday, had gone to hear a lecture on the benefits of strenuous daily exercise. They had gone out of a desire to see the green and white copper and glass magnificence of the assembly rooms by the lake, and to take in the splendor of the summer crowds in their stiff white finery. The Germans seemed to go in for a lot of colored sashes encrusted with medals, or brooches that resembled medals, so that a summer evening took on the aspect of a military parade rather than a promenade in a provincial lake town. The lecturer, a slight, wiry Scandinavian man, had not seemed up to the task of commanding the large, empty stage, and while he extolled the virtue of muscle development and the healthful qualities of the cold bath, the hall grew restless. But a sudden stripping off of his trousers had a galvanizing effect. Clad only in a loincloth, the man proceeded to stand on his head, to fold himself up and over a bar six feet from the ground, to have a man in the audience bounce up and down on his stomach, and to perform the splits. John was of the immediate opinion that neither of these last capabilities would be an asset to any man of gentlemanly rank and would only detract from sales of the poor man’s book, but despite the titters of shock from the excited crowd, and some outrage in the local newspapers, the Scandinavian and his exercise regimen became quite the fashion that summer. Both Agatha and John read the little book to be able to keep up with dinner party conversation, but John had been won over by the commonsense ideas—sleeping with the windows open, daily sponge baths—and six years on, he had developed an admirably slimmed physique. He chose to be modest about it and was a source of frustration to his tailor, from whom he insisted on ordering clothing in his old measurements.
Agatha had regretfully resigned herself to the fact that she did not have her husband’s willpower. Her inconsistent use of the program, combined with her love of cakes, cream, and good, thick gravy, had destined her to retain a plump midsection that refused to succumb to exercise or to corseting. A roll of flesh got in her way now as she lay on the grass, feet tucked under the bench’s crossbars, and attempted to haul herself up to a sitting position, twelve times. However, she enjoyed the routine here in her private garden, on a dry, sunny day, and she looked forward to the end of the set, when she allowed herself the prescribed dose of the sun’s healthy rays.
—
Beatrice awoke to sunlight appearing to dance on blue wallpaper and the sound of birds squabbling for their breakfast in unseen trees. Her window was open, and the breeze brought the scent of a hot morning into the slight coolness of the room. For a moment she could not place where she was, and with a brief skip of her heart wondered if she were not still in Italy, in the village above Florence, and her father already at the pensione breakfast table on the terrace below, reading two-day-old newspapers and calling for more hot milk. She squeezed down into the pillow and tried to remain in the semiwaking moment that felt so happy.
When she finally opened her eyes, the unfamiliar room swam into focus along with a slow awareness that she had made good her escape from her aunt’s family. She was in Sussex, and her room smelled of the garden outside and, faintly, of the sea. At least the grief, which weighted her limbs to her bed most mornings, could not win today against the anticipation of a new beginning. For the first time in months, she almost sprang from her bed to greet the summer day.