Page 6 of Lady for a Season
Maggie had never had someone hold a door open for her. She had seen the governors do so for lady visitors, or the servants and staff do so for the governors. She had held many doors open herself for her superiors, but now Edward was treating her as though she were his superior, or a lady. She hesitated, but ducked her head in awkward thanks and stepped out into the garden. Perhaps he meant to get rid of her, would shut the door behind her and leave her standing outside like a fool, but he did not. Instead, he followed her.
“Thank you,” she murmured, oddly touched that this silent man should show such courtesy to one who was, after all, his servant.
The garden was very large, stretching out ahead of them. It was enclosed on both sides with high hedges, presumably for the privacy the doctor was so insistent on, but Maggie could not see to the end of it. It began with a lawn and a few bare rose bushes, but sloped downwards further along. Glancing atEdward, Maggie walked forwards and he, still silent, kept pace alongside her.
“Do you walk here every day?” she asked after a few steps.
“Yes.”
“And about the village? Or further afield?”
“I am not permitted to leave the garden.”
They walked on a little further. The ground sloped downwards, towards a row of trees and low bushes, before rising steeply beyond, up a forested hill.
“What is at the bottom?” she asked.
“A stream,” he said.
“Will you show it to me?”
Silently, he walked with her to the bottom of the slope, to where bushes and trees rose up and now Maggie could hear the gurgling of a stream, which they shortly came to. It could only be knee deep, might dry up in summers, but for now it wound its way between the bushes, forming tiny pools here and there.
“It’s very pretty,” she said. “Are there animals?”
He had been looking at her, but when she turned towards him his eyes slid away, as though her gaze was too much for him. He ducked his head but did not reply.
Maggie knelt at the side of the stream and let the cold clear water wash over her hands, then stood, drying them on her apron.
“Frogs.” His voice was low, a murmur.
“I’m sorry?”
“I see frogs, in springtime. A fox most evenings. Deer in the summer, they come to drink when there’s not much water about.” He was looking beyond her, up at the woodland, as though seeing the animals in his mind and for a moment she wondered whether he was seeing things that were not there, but he seemed to know what she was thinking, for he added, “Not now, they come when they think no-one is near.”
“Do you hide so they can’t see you and be scared?”
He nodded.
“I’ve never seen deer nor a frog,” she said. “I saw a fox once, a long time ago. I should like to see more animals. There were none at the Hospital.”
“Hospital?” He sounded scared. Had he been kept in somewhere like Bedlam? Everyone in London was afraid of the likes of people that were kept there and indeed of the gaolers, who were said to be cruel.
“The Foundling Hospital,” she said. “I was a foundling and raised there. When I was fourteen I became part of the staff there, before I came here to you.”
“A foundling.”
“Yes.”
“Your mother gave you away.”
Maggie hesitated. Having seen so many women bring their children to the Hospital, she could not think harshly of them. They came weeping, they came with bruises or dressed in rags, they came out of desperation, and they left pathetic tokens of their intentions to one day return for their children, however unlikely that might be. “Yes. She gave me into the care of the Hospital, that I might be raised well and not suffer hardship.”
He gazed at her for a moment before his eyes slid away again. “My mother sent me here.”
“To make you well again,” she said gently, meaning to comfort him.
“So that I would not embarrass her,” he corrected, and Maggie heard the misery under it, the grief of being unwanted.
