The Last Garden in England(96)

Home. The word seemed to expand to fill her chest. She didn’t know why, but she fit in Highbury. She loved the little cottage with the wood-burning stove and the huge beams on which she accidentally hit her head if she wasn’t careful. Somehow Lucy’s pub quiz had become a weekly habit, and the owners of the small grocery on Bridge Street knew her by name. And when she sat in her garden these days, she spent most of her time redesigning it a dozen different ways in her head.

“I think I want to stay in Highbury,” she said. “It feels right.”

“That’s the way I feel about the Darling Mae,” he said.

“But you’re mobile,” she said.

“The stretch of canal might change, but the boat stays the same.”

She set her glass down. “I’m going to head back to the cottage. I’m exhausted. Thanks for the wine.”

“Thanks for the business deal,” Charlie replied.

He waited until her leg was hitched over the railing of the Darling Mae to call out, “You know, if you did want to set down some roots in Highbury, you might start by asking that farmer out.”

She just saved herself from slipping. “I swear to God, Charlie, if I fall into the canal, I’m going to kill you.”

“Henry came by the gardens looking for you today.”

“Charlie!”

She just managed to hop off the bow onto the safety of solid ground, her blush fierce and her friend’s laughter following her back down the canal path.





? DIANA ?


OCTOBER 1944

Diana was lying on Robin’s bed when Father Devlin came to her.

“Mrs. Symonds, I thought I might sit awhile,” he said, as though it was the most normal thing in the world to greet a woman lying in a child’s bed, a jumper pillowed under her head.

She lifted her head to look up at him. “I’ve learned, Father, that there is little that I can say that will stop you if you wish to say something.”

He laughed. “That is true. Pushiness and interference are both qualities for which I’m certain to be judged at the gates of Heaven.”

With a sigh, she pushed herself up and took her usual chair, angling it slightly so it wasn’t facing the wall. He took Nanny’s chair—always vacant now. Someone must have sent the woman away.

“I assume you wish to speak to me,” she said, her words thick. “Or check on me. Everyone seems to be these days.”

He folded his hands over the Bible propped against his leg. “Should I be checking on you?”

“I thought it was the prerogative of priests to console grieving mothers.”

“I could say a number of things. ‘Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven?’ Or maybe Matthew 18:14 would better suit: ‘So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish?’?”

“If you did, I would tell you to leave my house.”

He smiled. “I thought as much. You once told me that you still speak to Father Bilson because he didn’t offer you such platitudes when you were widowed.”

“The death of a child is different,” she said.

He inclined his head. “As I am not a father, I can only imagine the pain that you must be feeling. And the rage.”

Rage. Yes. Layered underneath the sadness and self-pity and pain was a white-hot iron of rage. She could see it—feel it—as though hearing that one word had brushed the fog of everything else.

“This war,” she spat out. “This bloody, stupid war fought by men who don’t care a thing about the cost. My son. My husband. I have no one left.”

He simply sat there, so she pushed on. “I was promised a good life, if I only behaved myself. I twisted myself into knots to be a daughter, a debutante, a bride, a wife, a mother. I was supposed to be cared for. And now all is gone.”

“And now you don’t know what to do with yourself,” he said.

She sagged forward. He was right. She didn’t have a purpose. She was nothing, just a woman with her husband’s name and a house shrouded in grief.

“Robin gave you a reason to continue as you were before,” said Father Devlin. “You kept this house for him as best you could. You sent him to school. You tried to give him a normal life.”

“And now none of that matters,” she whispered.

His eyes bore into hers. “Does it not? You are still here. You, who had a life of your own, once.”

“My life before was merely waiting to be married.”

“That may be so, but now you are a woman of independent means. You may choose to live the life you want to lead. You could play the harp at every hour of the day, or you could run this hospital,” said Father Devlin.

“Cynthia is the commandant.”

“Miss Symonds is not the mistress of Highbury House,” said Father Devlin.

She pursed her lips. A new start. It was tempting—more so than anything she’d felt since Robin’s death. But it was daunting, too. Moving toward an uncertain future meant walking into the possibility of yet more pain.

Finally, she said, “I wouldn’t know where to begin.”

He stood. “Will you indulge me a moment and come with me?”