The Gardener

  The Gardener

  By Catherine McGreevy

  The Gardener

  Catherine McGreevy

  Copyright 2013 by Catherine McGreevy.

  All rights reserved. No part of this ebook may be reproduced or retransmitted in any form or by any means, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without permission in writing of the author.

  ISBN 9781311504968

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Many thanks to my critique partners, for their endless patience and support.

  C.M.

  November, 2013

  The Gardener

  by Catherine McGreevy

  Chapter One

  “Ye’d best be careful when talking to the master's son," the old gardener Lemley growled, whacking off the drooping head of one of Lady Marlowe's prize roses, which promptly fell to the ground and rolled under a bush. "Remember, them as sticks their heads out gets 'em lopped off.”

  “It's the Frenchies getting their heads lopped off these days, not the likes of us." The tall young gardener next to him worked at a brisk pace, wielding his shears expertly. "Besides, the colonists in America bit their thumbs at ol' King George, didn't they? And look at 'em now.”

  "That's not what I mean, Tom, and you know it. All I'm sayin' is those Marlowes bring trouble. If yer wise, ye'll stay out of their way." The old gardener spat between his missing front teeth.

  "I'll do my best," Tom promised, glancing at the old man who had been like a father to him since he had arrived a young orphan at Blackgrave Manor ten years earlier. When Sir Jonathan Marlowe approached yesterday and asked for a bouquet to give his latest light o' love, he'd had no choice but to comply. An undergardener did what he was told. That was all there was to the matter. Surely Henry knew that as well as he did. But Lemley was expert at melting away whenever the Marlowes entered the gardens, whereas Tom, standing head and shoulders above than all the other gardeners on the estate, was too tall to duck behind the bushes.

  A clatter interrupted them, and he looked up his head up to see a pair of horses galloping full speed toward them, pulling a careening phaeton. As the open carriage rounded the last curve, it tipped dangerously, and a woman's scream filled the air.

  A memory shot through Tom’s brain, fleeting and painful as a wasp sting. A runaway horse, a frozen moment of fear, a limp body rolling into a gutter…. Without thinking, he dropped the clippers and raced toward the horses, close enough now that he could see their eyes rolling, nostrils flaring, even droplets of sweat flying from their glossy black coats as they thundered directly at him.

  "Tom! Tom! Are ye mad?" Lemley's hoarse cry mingled with the warning shouts of the other gardeners.

  He grabbed at the loose-hanging reins and somehow vaulted onto the nearest horse's back, where he clamped his knees tightly against the horse's withers and hung on. Wind battered his face and whipped hair from its queue. Low against the horse's withers, he pressed his cheek against the strong sweating neck, squeezing his eyes shut and silently praying he would not slip and be battered to a rag under those sharp, thundering hoofs.

  His muscles gradually began to attune themselves to the rhythm of the horse's gallop, and his terror abated slightly until finally, after an eternity, he remembered to pull on the reins. Years of physical labor had made his back and arm muscles strong, yet his arms felt as if they were being wrenched out of their sockets as the horses resisted his effort to stop them. Little by little, the matched pair slowed and finally stopped, panting and blowing and stamping their hooves. For several long moments Tom remained crouched over his mount's withers. White knuckles gripped the reins while his heart banged like a post-digger against hard-caked earth.

  When he finally slid to the ground, his knees buckled and he grabbed the bridle to steady himself.

  “Well, bless my soul!” said a hearty voice from above. "'Maeve, it's the gardener I told you of! The same tall young fellow who cut flowers a few days ago, for me to give to a young lady of my acquaintance.”

  Tom looked up in surprise to see Jonathan Marlowe, the master's twenty-year-old son, grinning down from the high seat, straight dark hair falling over a high forehead and black eyes sparkling with excitement at their near brush with death. Next to him, Miss Maeve Marlowe stared at Tom. Her thin face was drained of blood, her hair bare. An expensive-looking straw hat covered with silk flowers and ribbons lay in the lane, covered with a fine layer of dust.

  Tom pulled his forelock before picking up the hat and whacking it against his knee awkwardly, to free it of the worst of dust.

  “Here, Miss. I believe this belongs to you,” he said, offering it to her.

  She did not respond. Belatedly Tom realized that he had made a mortal error. He looked down in shame at his mud-caked boots, face hot. A servant never spoke to his superior first.

  Lord Marlowe's scion did not seem to have noticed the mistake. "Splendidly done!” he exclaimed. “However did you manage to jump on a horse at full gallop, like an acrobat at the Lambeth circus?”

  “Fool's luck, sir,” Tom mumbled truthfully.

  Jonathan tapped his chin thoughtfully. “I do wonder if you might not be somewhat to blame for the mishap, my good fellow. 'Twas when you loomed out of the bushes like the Colossus of Rhodes that my sister lost control of the reins. Is that not so, Maeve?”

  Tom ducked a curious look at the white-faced female sitting by her brother. So Sir Jonathan had passed the reins to his sister? A reckless act, considering the speed and the strength of the horses, the known dangers of phaetons, and her obvious lack of experience.

  Gripping her battered hat, Maeve continued to wordlessly stare at Tom, and, feeling more uncomfortable than ever, he again dropped his gaze to the ground.

  “I am right, am I not?" Sir Jonathan asked. "This is not the first time you've rendered me a service this week?”

  “N-no, sir.”

  “Then take this.” Sir Jonathan reached into his pocket and pulled out an object that glinted in the sun. “A token for both actions.”

  Tom instinctively caught the coin. Its weight told him it must be a guinea, even though he had never seen a coin of so much value.

  As the phaeton rumbled away, Tom stood staring in wonder at his luck. The bees, startled away by the commotion, returned to buzz among the flowers, while the other gardeners drifted back to their stations, darting him curious looks.

  As he walked back to pick up his dropped clippers, Tom saw Lemley hobbling toward him as fast as his rheumatism would allow. Quickly he dropped the coin in his pocket and went back to work.

  “Ye fool!” Lemley breathed hard through his nostrils. “Would ye care to tell me what that was that all about?”

  “What do you mean?” Tom focused intently on the rosebush he was pruning.

  “Did I not say to avoid notice from the Marlowes? The next thing I know, yer leapin' on horses and chatting with the master's son and daughter like the bleedin' Duke of Marlborough! No chance of either of 'em forgettin' ye now!”

  Tom kept clipping. “Should I have let the carriage run away with them, then?”

  “Better their necks than yours!”

  For a moment Tom was transported again to the long-ago country road, the crumpled, blue-smocked figure lying in the ditch while a gleaming horse thundered away, its well-dressed rider wearing a powdered wig. Only nine years old, he stared in helpless horror at his dead father's body. Soon after, his older sister brought the new orphan to the gates of Blackgrave Manor to begin life in service. That had been ten years ago.

  Focusing on the roses, Tom tried to forget the painful memory. Nothing could be done to change the past. Besides, he should be grateful that he had a steady job and food to eat. Many in England, in the year of our Lord 1785, w
ere not so fortunate.

  Remembering, he reached into his pocket and opened his palm under Lemley's disbelieving eye.

  "See this? Mr. Jonathan gave me it for my trouble. So what’s the harm?”

  “What’s the ’arm?” Lemley sputtered, although he viewed the coin with grudging respect. “What’s the ’arm? Why ... they noticed ye! 'An as I told ye, them as gets noticed—.”

  “—Gets their heads lopped off.”

  Lemley scowled. “It's no joke. If you stay unseen, those in power will have no mind to trouble you.”

  “Nor reward you either.” Tom flipped the coin and pocketed it again. He flashed his old friend an impudent smile and went back to work.

  * * *

  Later that afternoon, a black-clad figure approached from the direction of the house, and the furrows in Lemley's forehead deepened. “Trouble, I warrant,” he muttered. “What could that old turkey, Blodgett, want? And why come himself, instead of sending one o' the housemaids?”

  The butler strode toward them, his large head down, his body lurching with the distinctive to-and-fro strut that had earned the nickname. His high pink forehead shone like marble under the coarse horsehair wig that perched atop his skull.

  Blodgett focused his beady gaze on Tom. “You there! Tom West, is it?”

  “Yes, sir.” Tom exchanged a worried glance with Lemley.

  “You’re wanted at the house. Come along, lad.” Blodgett turned on his heel and started back.

  Lemley shook his head solemly. “It's happening already. Take care, Tom. Take care.”

  Tom followed the butler toward the manor house, wiping his perspiring hands on his smock. What awaited him? Another reward for his impulsive act of bravery? A word of thanks from the master himself, perhaps? Or perhaps a reprimand? Sir Jonathan had implied that Tom might be the cause of the near-accident by somehow startling Miss Marlowe as the phaeton rounded the curve.

  Lemley's words took on a sinister tone. Them as stands out gets their 'eads lopped off.

  Tom cleared his throat. “Er....I beg your pardon, sir?”

  Blodgett slowed his pace and half-turned, an expression of annoyance crossing his heavy features. “What is it, boy?”

  “Am I ... am I in some sort of trouble?”

  “Trouble? Have you gone mad?”

  Tom unobtrusively wiped his sweaty hands again. “Have I not given satisfaction, sir?”

  Blodgett permitted himself a smile that barely lifted the corners of his thin mouth. “Quite the contrary. This is a lucky day for you, lad. Sir Jonathan suggested you replace Jenkins." He cocked a disapproving eye at Tom's dirt-encrusted smock. “You should fit the departed man's livery nicely.”

  A glow of relief that he was not being sacked poured through Tom, before the import of what the butler had said sank in. He stumbled.

  “Are you all right, West?” Blodgett half-turned.

  “Y... yes, sir.”

  There was no question about it: Tom was being promoted to footman! He contemplated this incredible news, dazed. A guinea, and now this, all in one morning! All because these last two years he had grown like a cotton thistle.

  Tom had always thought of his tall, gangly height as a disadvantage. It brought taunts from the other outdoor staff, who thought themselves great wits for calling him “the giant” or for asking how it was to be the first to know when it rained. There was the additional disadvantage that his wrists stuck out from his shirt and at night his feet hung uncomfortably off the edges of his straw pallet, and he must watch lest he bang his head on the lintel whenever he entered a door.

  Never once had he thought his stature might prove an asset, even though Lord Marlowe's footmen were well known to be among the tallest in England, selected to match as perfectly as the horses that pulled the master's carriage. And Tom was certainly as tall as any of them now, a full head and shoulders taller than most of the other staff.

  He knew the promotion was no small matter. In the complex hierarchy of Blackgrave Manor, the footmen ranked just under the cook, the head gardener, and Blodgett Two dozen of the fellows strutted about the house and rode behind the carriages, wearing fine silk livery and delivering calling cards to lords and ladies on silver trays, as arrogant as demigods.

  And now Lord Marlowe wanted him to join their ranks!

  Tom followed the butler's brisk footsteps down a flight of stone steps that led into a warren of bright, clean rooms. Servants bustled in all directions, too busy to spare the newcomer a glance. Although he knew a few of them, others were unfamiliar. He had rarely set foot inside these walls, confined mostly to his spare quarters above the stables.

  Blodgett did not pause for Tom to gawk at his surroundings, but led him to a small room lined with linens, mops, and cleaning supplies, where he commanded him to wait.

  Tom obeyed. A twinge of caution told him to mind his words and actions. Here, a wrong word or a clumsy act would prove disastrous. He winced, imagining the jeers of the other groundskeepers if he were kicked back into the gardens, Lemley’s inevitable “I told you so.”

  “All right, you great, tall lout, what are you standing about for? I can't do my work with you standing there, stiff as a statue!”

  Tom pivoted.

  A short housemaid with dark, frizzled hair under her mobcap stared up at him from insolent black eyes, a sewing basket balanced on a plump hip. “Well?" she repeated. "How do you expect me to measure you with your arms glued to your sides? Raise your arms high, lad, I haven't all day.”

  Tom thought her manner as haughty as that of Lady Marlowe herself. He gulped, remembering he could not afford to make any missteps. “Sorry, Miss—er—”

  “The name's Rosie,” she snapped, whipping out a measuring tape from the basket and passing it around his waist. “I'm not the master's daughter. Address me correctly, if you please.”

  “I'm sorry—er—Rosie.”

  She glanced at the tape, then snaked it around his chest with a brisk, impersonal touch that he found unaccountably disturbing. The last time he had been touched by a female was when his older sister had kissed him goodbye at the gate, a mere lad of ten. This young woman's touch felt … different.

  Rosie, however, seemed to consider him an inanimate object. “A bit on the scrawny side,” she said, stepping back and clicking her tongue dismissively. “What was the master thinking of, bringing a common gardener into the house, with clumsy boots and dirty hands!”

  He began to apologize again, then stopped. He was no longer a lowly gardener. In fact, it crossed his mind that the seamstress now ranked below him, although from her manner, she certainly did not think so.

  Ignoring Tom's attempt at dignified silence, she muttered to herself. “If I take in the seams here … and there … I reckon. And the shoulders aren't bad. Who knows, perhaps a few good meals will fill him out.”

  Like all the outdoor staff, Tom had been expected to retreat whenever ribbons or skirts flounced into the gardens. Therefore, women were as mysterious to him as the feather-and-paint adorned denizens of America.

  As he looked down at the top of Rosie's head, he felt a new sensation settling around him, as inviting and comfortable as a warm blanket, but infinitely more exciting. So this was the difference he had noticed the moment he had entered the house! he thought. Females. Their imprint was everywhere: in the flowered curtains at the windows, the smell of soap and yeasty bread, the under-notes of rosewater and patchouli perfume. Through the closed door he could hear soft voices and the rustling of starched skirts. Pleasant, enticing sounds.

  He studied the short young woman. Her plain face wasn't much to look at—even in his inexperience, he realized that—but her pale skin looked smooth and soft, and the nape of her neck smelled like lilies after a rain. As she bent over to pick up her sewing basket, he instinctively leaned forward to breathe in her scent.

  When she straightened suddenly, the top of her head nearly cracked his chin.

  “None of that now,” she snapped. “Or you'l
l be following Jenkins out the door, and I shall have to go through all this trouble with the next fellow.” She tucked the basket under her arm. “I shall have the livery ready by tomorrow, sir.”

  After a disorienting moment, he realized her last words were addressed to Blodgett, who had entered the room.

  As Rosie swished out, the butler studied Tom from head to toe, causing him to shift uncomfortably from foot to foot. Tis best not to be noticed. Too late. He was the focus of those beady, all-seeing eyes.

  “How old are you, lad?”

  “Eighteen, sir.”

  “Can you read or write?”

  “N…no, sir.”

  Blodgett had clearly expected the answer. “No matter. All you'll need in your new duties are obedience, discretion, and an ability to learn quickly. And one more thing.” He paused meaningfully.

  Tom realized he was expected to pose the question. “What is that, sir?”

  “Loyalty. Complete and utter loyalty. You must never do anything that is contrary to the interests of the Marlowe family, at any cost to yourself. Can you do that, boy?”

  He did not hesitate. “Yes, sir.”

  Blodgett looked satisfied. “I have spoken to the head gardener,” he said in a kindlier manner, folding his soft hands across his round belly. “He says you are honest and a hard worker. If true, those qualities will serve you well.”

  Relieved at passing the first test, Tom stood stiffly, shoulders back, trying to stand as he had seen the other footmen do. “Thank you, sir.”

  The black eyes narrowed and the thin lips pursed. “Do they not have a water pump by the stables, lad? One could grow a crop of potatoes on you.”

  Face suddenly burning, Tom looked down at his filthy hands, and then at his clothes. He hadn't noticed the black earth under his fingernails before. He remembered what Rosie had said: A common gardener, with clumsy boots and dirty hands.

  “I'm sorry, sir. I shall clean up as soon as ... as ....”