The Poison Diaries (8 page)

“Come inside, Weed,” I say. “Father has returned; he wishes to speak to you.”

Weed scowls and turns away.

“He saved the man’s foot because of your advice. Don’t you wish to know what happened?”

“This is how it was at the madhouse,” Weed mutters. “I tried to help people who were sick. Then everyone became furious.” He looks up at me, anger and confusion in his eyes. “I do not understand. Is it wrong to help?”

“No! Helping others is God’s work. It is what we are put on earth to do.” I hold out a hand, which he ignores. “Father is not angry with you, Weed. Do not misunderstand his strong feelings. It is only because he so passionately wishes to cure people who are in need, and he does not always know how.”

Weed glances warily at the cottage. “Is that what he wishes to speak to me about?”

“I think so. Will you come?”

“Do you wish me to, Jessamine?”

He gazes upon me, then, and his emerald eyes seem to take me in from top to bottom. I feel so bared, my hands flutter to my dress to make sure it is still on. It is, but I am suddenly, exquisitely aware of how the
currents of warm air move against my skin.

Weed rises to his feet. “Nature,” he says softly, “makes so many beautiful things.” He leans close to me, as if he would catch my scent. “But I did not know—until you—that nature could make a girl so beautiful.”

His voice holds me in its tender spell. His eyes graze over my body without shyness—he takes me in as a landscape, a lush terrain of swells and valleys.

He leans forward, then. My heart thumps so strongly in my chest I am sure he must hear it. His face comes close, closer to mine—so close, a stray lock of his wild hair caresses my cheek.

I should move away. I do not. Instead, I close my eyes. My lips part and a sense of yearning fills me, a longing for something I cannot name. It is a force larger than myself that moves through me, ancient as the earth. There is no choice but to surrender.

He kisses me. His lips are petal soft against mine, his body strong and lithe as a poplar. He smells of rich, fertile earth.

After an eternity he releases me. Without waiting for my reaction, he turns and strides back to the cottage.

When I regain power over my limbs, I make my way back to the cottage in fits and starts, like a leaf tossed about by the wind. I hesitate at the door—am I even recognizable? The news must be written all over me, illustrated on my flesh. The moment Father lays eyes on me he will know I am transformed, and demand to know how, and why—oh, my lips burn, all the skin on my body burns! A tisane of lavender and hyssop would calm me, but I do not wish to be calmed!

I wish only for Weed, to see Weed again, to touch him, and I will, the moment I pass through the door of the cottage—

Weed stands in the parlor, shoulders hunched, staring down at the table, upon which Father’s handkerchief lies. Father sits in his chair at the head of the table. Neither of them looks at me or says hello.

Father flips open the white linen, revealing the belladonna berries.

“As it turned out, I did not need the belladonna this time, Weed. Thanks to your poultice, the man’s wounds started to heal cleanly, with no gangrene or fever.”

Father covers the berries again and slips the handkerchief into his pocket.

“You have knowledge that can help people, Weed. That much is obvious. I wish to know where you acquired this knowledge, so that I may follow in your footsteps. But if you will not or cannot tell me, then at least teach me some of what you know.”

Weed’s eyes stay fixed on the table. “I have nothing to teach,” he says in a low voice.

“Your humility is admirable, but of no use to anyone.” Father rises from his chair and sits on the edge of the table, nearer to Weed. “It is time to be frank with each other. I value your knowledge, Weed. I admire it. I admit, I envy it. Think of it: belladonna, hemlock, black henbane—the lost formula for a twilight sleep! A sleep so profound a man would not feel his own limb being cut off.”

He looks at Weed as if expecting some reaction, but there is none. Father seems to interpret this as interest, or at least a willingness to hear more, for he goes on.

“Behind the walls of my apothecary garden are other rare and even more dangerous plants. Many I acquired without fully understanding their uses—perhaps I found a name mentioned in some obscure, ancient medical text, or came upon an old cure related by a beggar who claimed to have heard it from an ancient witch woman he met once. Based upon such vague hints and clues, and often following nothing more than my own blind instincts, I have bought and traded plants from all over the world. The most powerful ones live behind that locked gate.”

Weed’s face is impassive; his attention seems to have turned inward. Undaunted, Father continues.

“I have gone to great pains to try to learn the uses and properties of these plants. I have spent countless hours in pursuit of this knowledge. You could save me a great deal of time and effort, if you would
only speak….” Father stops himself. He stands, and spreads his hands before Weed in a gesture of supplication. “Weed. I wish to take you into the apothecary garden. I want you to look at the plants that grow there and tell me what you know of them.”

Weed recoils as if struck. “No!” he exclaims. “That garden is dangerous. Dangerous for me—dangerous for everyone.”

Father scowls, puzzled. So far he has not even acknowledged my presence, but I step forward now to explain. “Father, even walking near the apothecary garden made Weed feel very ill. Perhaps he is afraid that some harm may come to him if he enters it.”

To my amazement, Father places his hands gently on Weed’s shoulders. He speaks warmly, as a father would speak to a beloved son. “It may be a difficult thing I ask of you, but I implore you to at least try. Remember, it is not for me I ask. Think of the people who might be cured.”

I have never seen Father speak so humbly, so earnestly, to anyone.

Weed turns his gaze to me. Our eyes meet, and though the table is between us, it is suddenly as if our kiss never ended. Even now I am standing in his arms, our lips pressed together, breathing his clean, sunwarmed scent.

“Jessamine.” His voice warms me, deep inside. “What would you have me do?”

Father looks at me too, waiting for my answer. I know full well what he would have me say. Oh, I am torn! Heaven knows how much and for how long I have yearned to go inside that forbidden garden—but does Weed know something I do not?

Think of the people who might be cured….

That is what Father said, but in my heart I hear:

It is too late to save Mama… but think of the others….

“Father will not allow any harm to come to you,” I say firmly. “You must trust him fully, just as you trust me. And I will come into the garden, too,” I add, looking hard at Father, “and stay by your side every minute, Weed.”

Father nods his assent.

“As you wish.” Weed sounds reluctant but resigned, as if a long-dreaded fate he knows he cannot escape has finally come to pass. “Tomorrow it is, then.”

With no warning, Father turns and hugs me, tightly, as if I were a child. I cannot remember the last time he has done that. I know it has been years.

“Into the garden we go, Jessamine,” he murmurs into my hair. “It is time.”

T
HE KEY TO THE APOTHECARY GARDEN
hangs on a large circular key ring that I have never seen before. Father slips it out of his pocket with practiced familiarity.

Weed and I stand behind him. The morning air promises a warm day, but Weed seems frozen. I imagine he has steeled himself against whatever ill effects he fears the garden may have on him by cultivating a cold, blank exterior. How odd it is to stand so close to him and see no flicker of affection, no sign of our closeness of yesterday!

Soon,
I think.
Soon we will be alone again, and the truth can finally be spoken.

Father slips the key in the keyhole and turns it, until the lock falls open with a soft click. He shakes loose the heavy chain and lets it slip to the ground. In answer to a gentle push, the tall black gate swings open on smooth, silent hinges.

At last! I long to whoop in celebration, but I dare not. Something more somber and dangerous is at stake. Weed stands near me, his face impassive.

“Come inside; don’t be afraid.” Father gestures for us to follow.

My high spirits give me the courage to tease Father. “All right, but aren’t you going to tell us not
to touch anything?”

He smiles faintly. “I assumed you knew that by now.”

As we step inside, the temperature of the air itself seems to change, as if a great cloud suddenly blotted out the sun. Weed shudders, but he does not hang back, and together we proceed.

Excitement courses through my every nerve. Is it because Weed is near me, or is it because, finally, after years of waiting, I stand inside the forbidden garden? Is the thrill of one any different than the thrill of the other? I cannot tell. He is with me, the garden is before me; my heart quickens with the rightness of it all.

And yet, as I look about, I am forced to admit: On its surface, the apothecary garden is not so very different from any other garden. There is the smell of rich earth, the green plants growing quietly in their beds, the soft hum of bees making their rounds.

Father walks ahead of us. He too seems charged with excitement; there is a spring in his step I do
not often see. “My aim is to keep the plant families together as best I can, based on scientific principles,” he explains. “Weed, are you familiar with the work of Carl Linnaeus? His
Systema Naturae
describes a classification system for all growing things.”

Weed’s eyes dart everywhere, probing every corner. “Unless he visited the madhouse, I never met him,” he replies.

Father allows himself a wry smile. “Some consider him to be the greatest botanist of the century. I find his work useful, though no doubt future generations will call it primitive. I can instruct you in it if you like.” He sweeps his hand around. “Bear in mind that what I have done here is, at best, an approximation of a true botanical garden, but that is because of the unusual nature of my collection. There are many plants here that have been collected from the farthest parts of the globe. Despite all my research, my knowledge of the relationships between them is scanty. Perhaps you will be able to enlighten me on that account, Weed.”

Father does not wait for an answer. “Let us start our walk here, along the east wall. These are plants you may be familiar with. Some are native to England, and some were brought over from the American colonies a century ago—the United States of America, I suppose I ought to call it now. This plant, for example. Do you recognize it?”

“Angel’s trumpet,” Weed breathes. “A plant of many dreams.”

Father looks at him sharply. “Dreams, yes—some might say hallucinations. Angel’s trumpet, also known as datura. They say the name ‘datura’ comes from a Hindu word meaning ‘thorn apple’—but perhaps you already knew that.”

Weed presses his forehead with both palms and squeezes his eyes shut. Does he not know, or is he trying to rid himself of what knowledge he has?

“A craggy old fellow I met at the St. James fair told me that tidbit of lore,” Father continues. “He specialized in plants of the Orient, and claimed to be a survivor of one of Captain Cook’s expeditions. I suspect he was
lying about that, but the specimens he offered were quite rare. And the prices he charged were exorbitant, I must say.”

Father continues to stroll as he talks. He seems fully at ease here inside his locked garden—more at ease than I have ever seen him, in fact. “This is henbane. And this is poison hemlock. A painless death, but a particularly cruel one, don’t you think?”

“From the feet it begins,” Weed intones.

Father nods. “Death starts from the feet and travels upward, until it reaches the heart and finally kills you, and the whole time you are fully aware of what is happening. They say it took poor Socrates twelve hours to die. Ah, here is a favorite of mine: wormwood, the ingredient that gives absinthe its peculiarly intoxicating properties.” Father waves me closer. “Take a good look at the white bryony, Jessamine. It is all too easy to mistake its roots for parsnip. That would be the last bowl of soup any of us would ever enjoy.”

We follow Father from plant to plant. “Bittersweet,”
he points out, “and adder’s root, and mandrake. And this potent specimen is called oleander—”

Suddenly Weed clutches his head in pain. “No!” he cries. “These are not plants to heal the sick. These are poison! All of them … poison …”

Something twists inside my chest. Is it true? I knew these plants were dangerous if misused, Father always told me that—but is Father’s private, closely guarded collection of plants really nothing more than a poison garden? A locked armory of deadly, living weapons? For what purpose would he, or anyone, create such a wicked place?

“You must know it is not as simple as that, Weed,” Father says smoothly. “The plant that can kill can also cure, if only one has the knowledge to use it properly. That is why it is so important—so very important—that you tell me what you know.”

Weed shakes his head violently back and forth, as if he would cast out some deeply embedded pain.

“Are you all right?” I cry out, but as I reach toward him I lose my balance and stumble into a nearby
garden bed. My arm brushes against what looks like a nettle. It feels like a thousand pins plunging into my flesh. Within seconds, a tiger’s striping of scarlet welts begins to rise and scroll around my skin.

Father does not even turn around. “Do be careful, Jessamine,” he says casually, walking on. “I paid a great deal of money for some of these plants.”