The Last Garden in England(21)

Still, Diana loved the garden because it was fully her own. For a time, Murray had taken an interest in the redecoration of the house, but he’d left the grounds to her, saying it was a good hobby for a lady. Now, when everything became too much, she could hide in the garden rooms and pretend that her home wasn’t overrun, her husband wasn’t dead, and life wasn’t slipping through her fingers.

That afternoon, she made for the water garden. She liked its cool calm, even in the depths of winter. She should clean the pond out before the spring, but that task was for another day when she wasn’t expecting company. A war wasn’t an excuse to let standards slip, and if she became dirty, she would have to endure a cold bath before her guests arrived.

She set about pruning the late-flowering clematis, cutting the long vines back to a healthy bud and pulling away the old growth from the plant. The pieces went into her trug, destined for the great compost heaps near the greenhouses at the bottom of the property.

After ten minutes, an uneven shuffling came from the other side of the garden wall. She straightened just as a large man in a uniform walking with the help of a pair of crutches rounded a gap in the brick wall.

“Mrs. Symonds, I presume?” he asked through huffs and puffs.

“You wouldn’t happen to be Father Devlin, would you?” she asked, sliding her secateurs into Murray’s coat pocket.

He smiled. “Miss Symonds told you about me, did she?”

“You’ll find that there aren’t many secrets at Highbury House these days.” She gestured to a teak bench. “Would you like to sit down?”

“I would, thank you,” he said.

She watched as he slowly eased himself down and propped his crutches next to him.

“What is it, if you don’t mind my asking?” she said, nodding to the crutches.

“My hip. I’m afraid I rather shattered it. Very inconvenient.”

She smiled a little. “Shattered bones seem to be a specialty of this house. How did it happen?”

He looked sheepish. “I’m afraid I’ve no story of derring-do.”

“We have rather enough of those around here.”

“Quite. The truth is, I fell off a tank, and the ground broke my fall. And then broke my hip.”

“How inconsiderate of it,” she said.

“I thought so, too. So what did our dear commandant Miss Symonds tell you about me?”

“She suggested that I might like to talk to you,” said Diana.

“Well, we’re talking now, so you clearly didn’t object to the idea.”

She raised a brow.

“Ah, I see. It was one of those ‘Speak with the man of God’ suggestions. Do you think you need to talk to an old army chaplain?”

“No. I don’t,” she said.

“You know, I find that some people who don’t need to talk just need a friend.”

A friend. How long had it been since she’d had one of those? She’d never been the most popular girl. She was far too focused on playing her harp and a touch too shy for even the singers and other musicians she accompanied. But all of that had changed when she’d become engaged to Murray. He was like a whirlwind, sweeping into a room and collecting people up in his wake. The early years of her marriage had been awash in parties, and his friends’ wives had become her friends. But how long had it been since she’d seen Gladys or Jessica or Charlotte?

When she didn’t respond, the chaplain leaned back, folding his hands in front of him. “I will admit that I could use some company myself. The most disturbing thing about landing yourself in a convalescent hospital is realizing that you’re now surrounded by all manner of sick men.”

“I would have thought that being an army chaplain would have prepared you for that,” she said.

“Oh, it does. But every once in a while, it is good to spend some time in the land of the living, too.”

She gave him a hard look, but then shrugged. If the man wanted to sit out in a half-wild garden and watch her prune a plant, that was his prerogative.

She gestured at the clematis. “I’m going to continue my work here.”

“Please do. I wouldn’t dream of disturbing you,” he said, tilting his head back to soak in the weak sunlight.

With a shake of her head, Diana set about mastering the clematis once again, but as she did, she found that a little bit of the fury that had driven her out into the garden had passed.





? EMMA ?


MARCH 2021

This one, too!” Emma shouted down to Charlie. She was perched on a ladder, looking at the structure of a tree in what Sydney called “the ramble.” It had been a long time since anyone had given the trees any love, and a few of them needed to come down, either because they were rotting or to open pockets of air and light to the forest floor.

“Got it,” Charlie yelled back.

“How many is that?” she asked as she descended.

Charlie tallied up the morning’s notes. “Seven if we include that elm near the cottage.”

“I hope the Wilcoxes need firewood,” she said.

Rustling in the yew branches behind them had them both turning just as Bonnie and Clyde raced up.

Charlie immediately dropped to his knees and rubbed Bonnie’s ears. “Hello, gorgeous girl,” he cooed, his Scottish accent wrapping around each “r.”