The Night Gardener Read online

  “We expected you some hours ago,” said Constance, who had rushed to meet him. She had been increasingly anxious for his arrival all afternoon. “Have you any news?”

  “F-f-forgive me, darling,” he said with a distinct stutter. “I was a bit late getting out of town.” Master Windsor knocked some mud from his shoes. “It didn’t help that the roads have turned to marsh since Monday—I daresay at this rate, the whole valley will be a bog by Easter!” He looked up at his wife, perhaps expecting a laugh, but none was forthcoming.

  “And your meetings?” she pressed. “Were they productive?”

  He apparently did not hear her and turned to Molly and Kip. “H-h-heavens!” he exclaimed. “How my two children have changed! One would h-h-hardly recognize you for Windsors.”

  Molly took this to be a joke and obliged him with a polite smile. “Alistair and Penny are upstairs, readyin’ for supper. I’m Molly, and this here’s my brother, Kip.”

  “We’re the help!” Kip said, bowing as best as his crutch allowed.

  Molly took the man’s hat and cloak. She couldn’t help but notice the sour odor of tobacco and ale on his clothes. “I’ve nearly got food on the table, sir.”

  “Ah, victuals!” Master Windsor clapped his hands, rubbing them together. “There’s nothing I prefer to a hot meal at the end of a long ride … Well, perhaps a hot meal at the end of a short ride!” He turned toward his wife, offering a low bow. “After you, my dear.”

  Mistress Windsor rolled her eyes and walked into the house, closing the door behind her. It shut right in his face.

  Bertrand gave Molly a somewhat embarrassed smile and then trotted inside after his wife, calling out some joke about the tortoise and the hare.

  Molly exchanged a look with her brother. “He seems … friendly,” she said.

  Kip snorted. “Friendly like a housefly. I’d ’a shook his hand if I didn’t think it’d frighten him to death.” He hobbled to the carriage and climbed onto the driver’s seat. “It’s a mixed-up world where he’s the one bein’ called Master.” He snapped the reins and drove into the yard.

  Molly spent the next half hour finishing supper. She stewed alongside her food, thinking about how unfair Kip’s comment about Master Windsor had been. Her brother, of all people, should know what it meant to be disregarded.

  The evening menu was mostly burned pork roast with a side of mostly bland vegetables—the best Molly could do in light of all the extra housework. Penny spent the bulk of her mealtime trying to see how many individual peas she could spear onto her fork tongs, Alistair busied himself with smuggling what looked to be peppermints from his pocket into his mouth without his parents noticing, Constance seemed more interested in her wineglass than her plate, and Bertrand Windsor was too busy talking to eat much of anything. “Ah! Your native cuisine!” he exclaimed as Molly spooned some boiled potatoes onto his plate. She smiled and resisted the urge to tell him that the potatoes she grew up on had been black and slimy—sick with blight.

  Bertrand appeared to be the sort for whom silence was uncomfortable, and he made it his mission to furnish the meal with conversation—mostly by telling jokes he had learned in town. “Th-th-the one gentleman says to the other: ‘My wife’s always after me for money. When I wake up, she says, Give me five pounds! And then when I come home that night, it’s the same thing, Give me five pounds!’ The other fellow asked what she does with all her money. And the first one says: ‘I don’t know, I haven’t given her any!’” He chuckled, shaking his head.

  Penny looked up from her peas, pointing at Molly. “I like her stories better.”

  Molly smiled modestly. “I thought it was very funny, sir,” she said.

  And so it went for the rest of the meal. Master Windsor stumbled through a series of bons mots and “corkers” (a word he had picked up in town). The less interested his family acted, the more eager he became to please. No one appeared more irritated with his performance than Constance, who made repeated attempts to change the subject to something more sensible. “I should like to hear a bit more about the men from the bank, darling,” she interjected at one point. “Did they seem receptive?”

  “Ah! That reminds me,” he declared, “I overheard the most amusing story about two bankers trapped in a nunnery. How does it go? Let me see …”

  “Let us not.” Constance dropped her silverware against her plate, rose from her seat, and marched from the room.

  Master Windsor smiled weakly at his children, who were now watching him. “Indigestion, p-p-perhaps?” he said.

  Constance’s abrupt departure shattered any illusion of this being a happy family reunion, and the children soon excused themselves, leaving Master Windsor to eat alone. The sight was too much for Molly to bear, and she waited in the kitchen as he finished eating before returning to clear the dishes.

  It wasn’t until later that evening that Molly got a clearer idea of why her mistress had been so upset. She had just dried and hung the pots in the kitchen when she heard two voices echoing faintly beside her. They were coming from the dumbwaiter, which connected to one of the rooms upstairs—

  “Is that how your new business associates spend their days?” Constance said. “Telling rude jokes in public houses?”

  “Wh-wh-why, of course not all day, darling. B-b-but these gentlemen … you must understand they’re cut from a different cloth. They’re earthy blokes. Still! They’re top-notch speculators. They know their way around markets and—and speculation, and … you must believe me when I tell you that these men are the fastest way out of our trouble—perhaps the only way …”

  At this point they must have moved away from their spot, because Molly could no longer hear their conversation. She felt an overwhelming desire to learn more about the nature of their disagreement, which she thought might shine some light on the reasons for their moving to this old house in the first place. She filled a pitcher with water and rushed from the kitchen up the main stairway. The pitcher was her excuse, in case she was discovered eavesdropping. She had already learned that, so long as she was doing housework, the members of the family treated her like she was invisible—which suited her just fine. She quietly walked to the sideboard at the far end of the hall and began watering some wildflowers Kip had brought in from the woods. Beside her was the drawing room, and through the gap where the door hinged, she could see the Windsors close to each other, deep in conversation.

  Constance had her arms folded tight across her chest. “I feel as though I’m not even part of this marriage. I tell you I want nothing to do with this house, and you ignore me. I say I don’t want servants here, and what do you do? You send me a pair of children. Children, Bertie.”

  “Well, they’re working for free,” he said brightly. “That’s something.” Bertrand rested a hand on her shoulder. “P-p-please trust me. This will work, but it will take time.”

  “You told me there was no time.”

  “You’re right. You’re right.” He moved closer, lowering his voice. “But there is, of course, a way to buy time.” He held out his hand.

  Constance stiffened. Molly leaned close to the jamb, trying to read the expression on her face. The woman sighed and removed something from her dress pocket. “Promise me this will end,” she said.

  Master Windsor did not answer but snatched the object, which was long and seemed to be made of metal, from her grasp. He clutched it in his fingers like a treasure. He turned around and marched into the hallway. Molly pressed herself against the wall, hoping the half-opened door might hide her. He walked right past her, and she caught a glimpse of the object gripped in his pale hand—

  It was a key.

  ll right. Into bed with you.”

  Molly stood in Penny’s room, a battlefield littered with the corpses of dollies and wooden toys and stuffed animals. With all the additional work to prepare the house for Master Windsor’s return, Molly had not had time to clean it. Tomorrow, perhaps. The bed was covered in lace pillows and had a muslin cano
py overhead. How was it fair that this family should have so much when she and her brother had so little? She pulled back the thick covers, and Penny—hair brushed and wearing a fresh nightgown—scrambled onto the feather mattress. She climbed to her knees. “What else can you tell me about Cleopatra?” she asked.

  In the week since Molly’s arrival, bedtime stories had developed into something of a sacred ritual. Unlike most six-year-olds, Penny eagerly awaited the hour when she might run upstairs, put on her nightgown, and snuggle under the covers—because that meant she was about to hear another of Molly’s thrilling tales. (On Wednesday, she had been so keen to hear a story that she’d tried advancing the hands of the grandfather clock so that she might convince Molly to tuck her in just after tea.) Molly removed the girl’s glasses and set them on the nightstand. “Well,” she said, buying herself a moment, “some folks say she was actually a fallen angel.”

  “I bet that’s why the archbishop fancied her,” Penny said. “Did she have real angel wings?”

  Molly nodded. “But she had to give ’em up when she got here. You could see the stitches from where they cut off her wings”—she ran a finger along Penny’s shoulder blades—“right here.” The girl squirmed and collapsed onto the mattress. Molly pulled the covers over her. “I’ll tell you somethin’ else about Cleopatra. When she sang, her voice was so pretty that the whole world stopped what it was doin’ just to listen. Wherever you were, you could hear her, like a choir of bells.”

  “Can you sing?” Penny asked.

  Molly shook her head. “Not like that, I can’t.”

  The girl sighed. “Mummy used to sing to me. She’d sing about Princess Penny—that was me. And afterward she’d hold my hand the whole way while I fell asleep.”

  This surprised Molly, who had trouble imagining her mistress being anything but stern. Just thinking of the way she had treated poor Master Windsor at supper left Molly feeling a chill. “Your mother don’t tuck you in no more?” she said.

  Penny sighed. “Not since we moved to this ugly house. Now she’s only cross with me. I hate this place. There’s no one to play with.”

  “You’ve got your brother, miss. And mine.”

  The girl sat up, her face a picture of scandal. “I can’t play with boys.” She flopped back down. “Besides, Alistair won’t let me play with him. He just bullies me.”

  Molly pulled the covers right up to Penny’s chin. “I promise that whenever I’m around I’ll not let him bully you. Fair?” She crossed her heart to show she was serious.

  Molly glanced at the girl’s bed stand. She noticed a stack of books hidden behind a lamp. They were square and thin—the sort of books that contained more pictures than words. Each one was brightly colored and had gilded lettering along the spine. They seemed to be part of a series:

  Princess Penny and the Beast

  Princess Penny Eats a Whole Cake

  Princess Penny Visits the Moon

  Princess Penny Stays Up Late

  Molly reached for the closest one, which had a picture of a girl with glasses fighting a sea dragon. “Princess Penny … just like your mum’s tales!”

  Penny sat up. “Don’t!” She reached out to intercept Molly’s arm. “You’re not supposed to see those.”

  Molly thought she was making a joke, but the girl looked very serious. “Fair enough, miss. We’re all entitled to our secret things.” She winked. “Only you might want to look for a better hidin’ place.”

  Penny sat back, apparently satisfied that the issue had been settled. “Why did you and your brother leave Ireland?” she said.

  Molly knew that these questions were a way of tricking her into another story, but she found it hard not to oblige. “The truth is, I came here because I had a dream.”

  The girl gave a small gasp, sitting up. “Was it a very bad dream?” She spoke with the tone of someone who knew the subject all too well.

  Molly shook her head. “Far from it, miss. I dreamed about a little girl named Penny who needed a maid.” She stroked Penny’s dark hair. “And she was so pretty and well behaved that I decided to come right over and do the job myself.”

  Penny shrank from her touch. “That’s not true,” she said.

  “True as time, miss.”

  Penny tugged at a knot in her hair. “I used to have dreams like that. But here, everyone has horrid dreams. Every night. Mummy, Papa, even Alistair. I hear them in their rooms.”

  Molly thought of her own dreams, which had lately been terrible and haunting. She looked into Penny’s dark eyes and wondered if this was the reason the girl had become so dependent on bedtime stories: they were a candle to light her to bed. “Of course, you know bad dreams is only that,” she said. “They’re none of ’em real. They canna hurt you or anyone else.”

  Penny shook her head. “It’s not the dreams that frighten me.” She peered about the room, as if the walls might be listening. “It’s that sometimes, when I can’t sleep, I hear something else … I hear him.”

  Molly caught her breath. “Him, who?” she asked.

  Penny leaned close, her voice barely a whisper. “The night man.”

  Molly stared at the little girl, trying to discern if she was making a joke. Penny went on. “He walks through the whole house, room to room, and then he’s gone. I asked Mummy about him, and she said I just made him up. But I’m sure I didn’t, because some mornings I see the footprints he’s left behind. They’re muddy and shaped wrong and I don’t like them.”

  Molly’s heart was beating very quickly. She thought of the footprints she’d been scrubbing throughout the house, and she thought of the story her brother had told their first night, about a figure in the fog—had he told the same story to Penny, who had added some details of her own? “Well, the next time you hear this night fellow, could you tell him to wipe his boots before comin’ inside? I dinna break my back scrubbin’ these floors just to have him ruin it all while I sleep.” She stood up.

  “Don’t go,” Penny protested through a yawn.

  “You’ve a lifetime of tuck-ins ahead of you.” She silently hoped this was true. But even in the orange lamplight, the girl’s complexion was as white as a headstone. Dark shadows flickered and danced across her face, clinging to the wells beneath her eyes. Molly put on a smile. “And until then—

  “You sleep soft, you sleep sound,

  You sleep the snow in Dublin town.”

  This was a rhyme her own mother had sung to her when she was little. When Molly sang the words now, she could almost hear Ma’s voice echoing in the air, distant and faint, calling to her from someplace far away. Molly hid her face from Penny’s view and slipped from the room.

  The grandfather clock struck nine as Molly walked down the hall. Penny’s tuck-in had taken longer than she’d planned, and she knew her brother would be waiting at the window. When she turned the corner toward the stairs, however, she stopped. In the last week, she had been inside every room of Windsor Manor—every room, that is, but for the one with the green door at the top of the stairs. Mistress Windsor had given Molly the impression that the key had been lost, and Molly had believed her. But what she had witnessed that night between Bertrand and Constance in the drawing room after supper had changed her mind.

  And now, the green door was unlocked.

  It was not completely open, but Molly could see a sliver of light shining out from the side that should have been closed tight. She glanced at the bank of windows above the foyer. Kip was waiting outside, probably catching cold at this very moment. Still, perhaps there was time for a quick peek. She dimmed her lamp and crept toward the door. She could hear sounds of someone moving on the other side—scraping, clinking, shuffling, grunting. The noises would have been frightening if they were not so obviously comical.

  Molly was about to reach for the handle when the door swung open to reveal the folds of a man’s nightgown. It was Master Windsor. He was bent away from her, trying to drag a large canvas sack into the hall. The bag was half-ful
l and seemed quite heavy; whatever was inside rattled and clinked as he pulled it across the floorboards. Molly watched him struggle, unsure whether she should interrupt him. “Pardon, sir?” she said softly.

  Bertrand let out a startled noise and spun around. The moment he saw Molly, he lunged for the door and pulled it shut behind him. There was a look of panic on his pale face. “M-M-Molly!” he said, doing a bad job at sounding happy to see her. “I thought you had turned in for the night.”

  “Just puttin’ Miss Penny to bed, sir.” She craned her neck to get a better look inside the bag, but he had tied the end shut. “It looks heavy,” she said. “Can I help you with it?”

  “N-n-no! I’m p-p-perfectly fine. Wouldn’t want you to, er … strain yourself …” He fumbled with his key, dropping it twice before he managed to fit it into the lock. He secured the green door and mopped his brow with the end of his nightcap. “Goodness!” He covered his mouth, giving a theatrical yawn. “It certainly has been a long day—for you as well, I’d imagine! Perhaps it’s time we turn in.” He said this in a way that led her to understand that “we” really meant “you.”

  Much as Molly wanted to see what was inside the bag, she knew it would not happen tonight. “Good night to you, sir,” she said, bowing. She turned and walked down the stairs, her small lamp lighting the darkness.

  Molly reached her room to find her brother waiting at the window, looking half-frozen and exhausted. When he asked what had taken her so long, she muttered something about chores and promised to make it up to him with an extra big breakfast the next morning. The two of them undressed and went to bed with scarcely another word—slipping into the rare, comfortable silence of those who know each other even better than they know themselves.

  As Kip nestled beside her, Molly kept going over her encounter with Master Windsor in the hall. The man had been so startled to find her outside the door. More than startled, she thought to herself as she drifted to sleep—

  He had looked afraid.