The Forgotten Garden (57 page)

‘But why a one hour exposure? Surely that wasn’t necessary?’

‘Of course it wasn’t,’ said Christian. ‘But people didn’t know that then, those sorts of exposure times were common.’

‘I suppose they figured if you got a good image in fifteen minutes, you’d get an even better one in an hour,’ said Ruby.

‘And it was before they knew the dangers. X-rays were only discovered in 1895, so Dr Matthews was being pretty cutting edge using them. People actually thought they were good for you in the beginning, that they could cure cancer and skin lesions and other disorders. The burns were obvious enough, but it was years before the full extent of the negative effects was realised.’

‘That’s what Rose’s marks were,’ said Cassandra. ‘Burn scars.’

Christian nodded. ‘Along with frying her ovaries, the X-ray exposure would certainly have burned her skin.’

A gust of wind set thin branches to tracing noisy patterns on the windowpanes, and candlelight flickered as a cool ribbon of air slipped beneath the skirting board. Ruby placed her bowl inside Cassandra’s, swiped a napkin across her mouth. ‘So if Rose was infertile, who was Nell’s mother?’

‘I know the answer to that,’ said Cassandra.

‘You do?’

She nodded. ‘It’s all there in the scrapbooks. In fact, I reckon that’s what Clara wants to tell me.’

‘Who’s Clara?’ said Christian.

Ruby inhaled. ‘You think Nell was Mary’s baby.’

‘Who’s Mary?’ Christian looked between them.

‘Eliza’s friend,’ said Cassandra. ‘Clara’s mum. A domestic at Blackhurst who was dismissed in early 1909 when Rose discovered she was pregnant.’

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‘Rose dismissed her?’

Cassandra nodded. ‘In the scrapbook she writes that she can’t bear to think that someone so undeserving should have a child when she has been continually denied.’

Ruby swallowed a slurp of wine. ‘But why would Mary have given her child to Rose?’

‘I doubt she just gave her the child.’

‘You think Rose bought the baby?’

‘It’s possible, right? People have done worse to secure a child.’

‘Do you think Eliza knew?’ said Ruby.

‘Worse than that,’ said Cassandra. ‘I think she helped. I think that’s why she went away.’

‘Guilt?’

‘Exactly. She helped Rose use her position of power to wrangle a child from someone who needed money, Eliza can’t have been comfortable with that. She and Mary were close, Rose says so.’

‘You’re presuming that Mary wanted the child,’ said Ruby. ‘Didn’t want to give her up.’

‘I’m presuming the decision to give up a baby is never clean. Mary may have needed money, a baby may have been inconvenient, she may even have thought her child was going to a better home, but I still reckon it must’ve been devastating.’

Ruby lifted her eyebrows. ‘And Eliza helped her.’

‘Then she went away. That’s what makes me think the baby wasn’t given up happily. I think Eliza went away because she couldn’t bear to stay and watch Rose with Mary’s baby. I think that when it came to separating mother and child it was traumatic and it played on Eliza’s conscience.’

Ruby nodded slowly. ‘That would explain why Rose refused to see much of Eliza after Ivory was born, why the two of them drifted apart.

Rose must’ve known how Eliza felt and worried that she’d do something to upset her newfound happiness.’

‘Like take Ivory back,’ said Christian.

‘Which she did in the end.’

‘Yes,’ said Ruby, ‘which she did in the end.’ She raised her eyebrows at Cassandra. ‘So when do you see Clara?’

‘She invited me to visit tomorrow, eleven o’clock.’

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‘Bugger. I’m leaving around nine. Bloody work. I would’ve loved to come, I could’ve given you a lift.’

‘I’ll take you.’ This was Christian. He’d been playing with the knobs on the heater, turning the flame up, and the smell of kerosene was strong.

Cassandra avoided Ruby’s grin. ‘Really? Are you sure?’

He smiled as he met her gaze, held it for a moment before looking away. ‘You know me. Always happy to help.’

Cassandra smiled in reply, turned her attention to the table surface as her cheeks warmed. Something about Christian made her feel thirteen again. And it was such a youthful, nostalgic feeling—displacement to a time and place when life was yet to happen to her—that she longed to cling to it. To push aside the guilty sense that by enjoying Christian’s company she was somehow being disloyal to Nick and Leo.

‘So why do you think Eliza waited until 1913?’ Christian looked from Ruby to Cassandra. ‘To take Nell back, I mean. Why not do it earlier?’

Cassandra ran her hand lightly along the top of the table. Watched the candlelight dapple across her skin. ‘I think she did it because Rose and Nathaniel died in the train crash. My guess is that despite her mixed feelings she was willing to stand back while Rose was made happy.’

‘But once Rose was dead . . .’

‘Exactly.’ Her eyes met his. Something in the seriousness of his expression brought a shiver to her spine. ‘Once Rose was dead, she could no longer bear for Ivory to remain at Blackhurst. I think she took the little girl and intended to give her back to Mary.’

‘Then why didn’t she? Why did she put her on the boat to Australia?’

Cassandra exhaled and the nearby candle’s flame wavered. ‘I haven’t quite worked that bit out.’

Neither had she worked out how much, if anything, William Martin had known when he met with Nell in 1975. Mary was his sister, wouldn’t he have known if she’d been pregnant? If she’d given birth to a baby she didn’t then raise? And surely if he’d known she was pregnant, had known the part Eliza played in the unofficial adoption, he’d have said as much to Nell? After all, if Mary was Nell’s mother, then William was 410

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her uncle. Cassandra couldn’t imagine that he’d have remained silent if a long-lost niece turned up on his doorstep.

Yet there was no mention in Nell’s notebook of any such recognition from William. Cassandra had pored over the pages, looking for hints she might have missed. William had neither said nor done anything to suggest that Nell was family to him.

It was possible, of course, that William hadn’t realised Mary was pregnant. Cassandra had heard of such occurrences, in magazines and on American talk shows, girls who concealed their pregnancies the full nine months. And it made sense that Mary would have done so. In order for the exchange to work, Rose would have insisted on discretion. She couldn’t have had the small village aware that her baby wasn’t her own.

But was it really likely that a girl could fall pregnant, get engaged to her boyfriend, lose her job, give the baby away, resume her life, and no one know anything about it? There was something Cassandra was missing, there must be.

‘It’s kind of like Eliza’s fairytale, isn’t it?’

Cassandra looked up at Christian. ‘What is?’

‘The whole thing: Rose, Eliza, Mary, the baby. Doesn’t it remind you of “The Golden Egg”?’

Cassandra shook her head. The name was not familiar.

‘It’s in Magical Tales for Girls and Boys.’

‘Not in my copy, we must have different editions.’

‘There was only one edition. That’s why they’re so rare.’

Cassandra lifted her shoulders. ‘I’ve never seen it.’

Ruby flapped her hand. ‘Enough, who gives two hoots how many editions there were? Tell us about the story, Christian. What makes you think it’s about Mary and the baby?’

‘It’s an odd one actually, “The Golden Egg”; I always felt that.

Different to the other fairytales, sadder and with a shakier moral frame.

It’s about a wicked Queen who coerces a young maiden into giving up a magical golden egg to heal the ailing Princess of the land. The maiden resists at first because it’s her life’s work to guard the egg—her birthright, I think, is how she describes it—but the Queen wears her down and in the end she consents because she’s convinced that if she doesn’t, the Princess will suffer eternal sorrow and the kingdom will be cursed to 411

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an endless winter. There’s a character who plays the go-between in the transaction, the handmaiden. She works for the Princess and the Queen, but when it comes down to it she tries to convince the maiden not to part with the egg. It’s as if she realises that the egg is a part of the maiden, that without it the maiden will have no purpose, no reason to live. Which is exactly what happens: she hands over the egg and it ruins her life.’

‘You think the handmaiden was Eliza?’ said Cassandra.

‘It fits, doesn’t it?’

Ruby leaned her chin on her fist. ‘Let me get this straight, you’re saying the egg was the child? Nell?’

‘Yes.’

‘And Eliza wrote the story as a way to assuage her guilt?’

Christian shook his head. ‘Not guilt. The story doesn’t feel guilty.

It’s more like sadness. For herself and for Mary. And for Rose, in a way.

The characters in the story are all doing what they think is right, it’s just that it can’t have a happy ending for all of them.’

Cassandra bit her lip thoughtfully. ‘You really think a children’s fairytale might be autobiographical?’

‘Not autobiographical exactly, not in a literal sense, unless she had some pretty wacky experiences.’ He raised his eyebrows at the thought.

‘I just reckon Eliza probably processed bits of her own life by turning them into fiction. Isn’t that what writers do?’

‘I don’t know. Do they?’

‘I’ll bring “The Golden Egg” with me tomorrow,’ said Christian.

‘You can judge for yourself.’ The warm ochre candlelight accented his cheekbones, made his skin glow. He smiled shyly. ‘Her fairytales are the only voice Eliza has any more. Who knows what else she’s trying to tell us?’

c

After Christian left to make his way back to the village, Ruby and Cassandra laid their sleeping bags out on the foam mattress he’d brought for them. They’d decided to stay downstairs so they could take advantage of the still-warm range, and had pushed the table aside to make room.

Wind from the sea blew gently through cracks beneath the doors, up 412

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between the gaps in the floorboards. The house had a smell of damp soil, more so than Cassandra had noticed in the daytime.

‘This is the part where we tell each other ghost stories,’ whispered Ruby, rolling over heavily to face Cassandra. She grinned, face shadowy in the flickering light. ‘What fun. Have I told you how lucky you are to have a haunted cottage on the edge of a cliff?’

‘Once or twice.’

She gave a cheeky smile. ‘What about how lucky you are to have a

“friend” like Christian, who’s handsome, clever and kind?’

Cassandra concentrated on the zip of her sleeping bag, drew it up with a precision and attention to detail far outweighing the task.

‘A “friend” who obviously thinks the sun shines out of you.’

‘Oh, Ruby,’ Cassandra shook her head, ‘he does not. He just likes helping in the garden.’

Ruby raised her eyebrows, amused. ‘Of course, he likes the garden.

That’s why he’s given up the better part of a fortnight to work for nothing.’

‘It’s true!’

‘Of course it is.’

Cassandra bit back a smile and adopted a slightly indignant tone.

‘Whether you believe it or not, the hidden garden is very important to Christian. He used to play in it as a kid.’

‘And that intense passion for the garden must explain why he’s taking you to Polperro tomorrow.’

‘He’s just being nice, he’s a nice person. It’s nothing to do with me, with how he feels about me. He certainly doesn’t “like” me.’

Ruby nodded sagely. ‘You’re right, of course. I mean, what’s to like?’

Cassandra glanced sideways, smiled despite herself. ‘So,’ she said, biting her bottom lip, ‘you think he’s handsome?’

Ruby grinned. ‘Sweet dreams, Cassandra.’

‘Goodnight, Ruby.’

Cassandra blew out the candle, but a full moon meant that the room wasn’t completely dark. A silvery film spilled across every surface, smooth and dull like wax gone cool. She lay in the half-light running pieces of the puzzle through her mind: Eliza, Mary, Rose, then every so often, out of place, Christian, meeting her gaze before looking away.

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Within a couple of minutes, Ruby was snoring softly. Cassandra smiled to herself. She might have guessed Ruby was an easy sleeper.

She closed her own eyes and each lid gained weight.

As the sea swirled at the base of the cliff, and the trees overhead whispered in the midnight wind, Cassandra, too, drifted into sleep . . .

. . . She was in the garden, the hidden garden, sitting beneath the apple tree on the softest grass. The day was very warm and a bee droned around the apple blossoms, hovering near before floating away on the breeze.

She was thirsty, longed for a drink of water, but none was nearby.

She reached out her hand, tried to push herself to standing but couldn’t.

Her stomach was huge and swollen, the skin tight and itchy beneath her dress.

She was pregnant.

As soon as she realised, the sensation became familiar. She could feel her heart pumping heavily, the warmth of her skin, then the baby started to kick . . .

‘Cass.’

. . . kicked so hard, enough force that her stomach lurched on one side, she laid her hand on her bump, tried to catch the little foot . . .

‘Cass.’

Her eyes opened. Moonlight on the walls. The ticking of the range.

Ruby was propped up on one arm, tapping her shoulder. ‘Are you all right? You were groaning.’

‘I’m fine.’ Cassandra sat up suddenly. Felt her stomach. ‘Oh my god.