The Winter Rose (4 page)

"I want us to set a date, India. I want us to be man and wife."

"We will be. Soon. I promise," she said, adjusting her glasses.

"All right, then. Coming?"

"I've got to find my things," she said. "You go. I'll only be a minute."

He told her to hurry, then went to join the others. India watched him go. He's right, of course, she thought.

It had been two years since he'd gotten down on bended knee at
Long-marsh and proposed to her. She would have to decide on a wedding
date soon, and she knew what would happen when she did--they'd be
required to attend an endless round of dinners and parties and to listen
to incessant chatter about dresses, rings, and trousseau. And he would
press her again to give up her hopes of a clinic and work with him on
health reform. It was a noble cause, she knew it was, but healing was
her calling, not committee work, and she could no more give it up than
she could give up breathing.

India frowned, upset at herself. Freddie was so good to her and she
was being unkind to him; she knew she was. She should have decided on a
date by now. It should have been so easy for her to simply pick a day.
Some lovely summer Saturday.

Should have been. Would have been.

If only she loved him.

She sat for a bit longer, simply staring at the empty doorway, then
shrugged out of her robe. The others were waiting; she mustn't keep them
any longer. She folded the robe and placed it on the chair beside her,
then ran her hands over her hair. It was a disaster. Her blond curls,
brushed into a neat twist only a few hours ago, were already
corkscrewing loose. Try as she might, she could never keep them under
control. She started to smooth them, then stopped. Her fingers found the
jeweled comb she al-ways wore and pulled it free. She turned it over in
her palm. It was a Tiffany dragonfly, one of a pair, and worth a small
fortune. Worked in plat-inum and embellished with dozens of flawless
gems, it was completely at odds with her plain, sober clothing: the gray
skirt and waistcoat, the crisp white blouse.

She had taken the comb the day she'd left Blackwood--the day she'd
turned her back on her home, her parents, and their godforsaken money.

"If you leave, India, I shall cut you off," her mother had said, her beautiful face white with anger.

"I don't want your money," India had said. "I don't want anything from you."

There were three swirling initials engraved on the underside of the
comb. She traced them with her finger--I S J, not hers, but her
mother's-- Isabelle Selwyn Jones, Countess of Burnleigh. India knew that
if it were not for this comb she would not be here today. If her mother
hadn't left it in her carriage. If Hugh hadn't picked it up. If, if,
if.

She closed her hand around it, pressing the teeth into her palm,
trying to stop herself from remembering. Don't, she told herself, don't
think about him. Don't remember him. Don't feel him. Don't feel
anything. But she did. Because Hugh had made her feel. More than anyone
in her en-tire life.

She could see him again in her mind's eye, only this time he wasn't
laughing. He was running through the trees with his sister Bea in his
arms. Bea's face was white. Her skirts were crimson with blood. He'd
bundled her into the trap and crooned to her all the way to Cardiff.
Never stopping, not once. Never even faltering. She could still hear his
beautiful voice, soft and low, Paid ag ofni, dim ond deilen, Gura, gura
ar y ddor; Paid ag ofni, ton fach unig, Sua, sua ar lan y mor. She'd
known enough Welsh to know what he was singing. Fret you not, 'tis but
an oak leaf, Beating, beating at the door. Fret you not, a lonely
wavelet's, Murmuring, murmuring on the shore. "Suo Gan," a lullaby.

India looked at the comb still, but didn't see it. She saw only Hugh,
his face riven with grief as the police came to take him away.

"You're thinking of him, aren't you?" said a voice from the doorway
now, startling her. She turned. It was Maud. "Poor Indy," she said.
"Couldn't save Hugh. So you've decided to save the world instead. Poor
world. It doesn't know what it has coming."

India didn't answer. She wished that for once Maud could talk about sad things without mocking them.

"I've been sent back into this charnel house to fetch you, so stop
holding seances and get your things," Maud continued. "I can't control
the pack any longer. Wish is trying to talk the poor dean into investing
in some mad land scheme. Freddie's arguing with a creaky old
Tory...and, oh, India ...have you been blubbing?"

"Of course not."

"Your nose is all red. And look at your hair. It's an absolute
tangle. Give me that comb." Maud raked her fingers through India's blond
mane, twisted it, and secured it. Then she stepped back to assess her
work. "Very nice," she said.

India smiled and tried to accept the gesture gracefully. It was the sort of thing that passed for love between them.

Maud's eyes traveled over India's clothing; she frowned. "Is that what you're wearing to the Coburg?"

India smoothed her skirt. "What's wrong with it?"

"I thought you might have brought a change of clothes. These are so... dreary. You look like you're going to a funeral."

"You sound exactly like Mother."

"I do not!"

"You do."

As Maud continued to deny any similarities with their mother, India
put her jacket on and then her hat. She gathered her black robe and her
doctor's bag, then followed her sister up the steps. When she reached
the door-way, she turned around for one last look at her classroom, at
the books and charts and specimens, at Ponsonby, and then she whispered a
soft goodbye. Her eyes were clear now, her expression calm. She'd boxed
the pain away. She was herself again. Cool and unflappable. Brisk and
sensible. Feelings firmly in check.

"Keep them that way, Jones," Ponsonby seemed to whisper. "Never forget: Feelings cloud judgment."

And so much more, old chap, India thought, and so much more.

Joseph Bristow bounded up the steps to 94 Grosvenor Square, his
towering Mayfair mansion. His train had arrived at King's Cross early.
It was Sunday, and only one o'clock. Cook would have just sent up
dinner. He hoped it was a leg of lamb or a roast beef with Yorkshire
pudding. He'd been in Brighton for a week scouting a site for a new
Montague's shop. He missed his home. And home cooking. Most of all, he
missed his fam-ily. He couldn't wait to see Fiona and their little
daughter, Katie. He raised his hand to ring the doorbell, but before he
could, the door was opened for him.

"Welcome home, sir. May I take your things?" It was Foster, the butler.

"Hello, Mr. Foster. How are you?"

"Very well, sir. Thank you for inquiring."

Joe was about to ask Foster where Fiona was when two fox terriers flashed by. "Since when do we have dogs?" he asked.

"They are recent acquisitions, sir. They were abandoned in the park. Mrs. Bristow found them and took them in."

"Why am I not surprised?" Joe said, shaking his head. "Do they have names?"

"Lipton and Twining," Foster replied. "Mrs. Bristow says they are like her competition. Always yapping at her heels."

Joe laughed. He watched the dogs as they circled the foyer, yipping
and tussling. One broke away, trotted to an umbrella stand, and was
about to lift his leg on it until a swift kick from Foster persuaded him
otherwise. The second dog leaped into a large potted fern and began to
dig furiously.

"If you'll pardon me, sir..."

As Foster advanced on the animal, two blond children came charging
into the entry, brandishing walking sticks like spears. They were Susie
and Robbie, his sister Ellen's children. They were dragging a small silk
rug behind them. Its ends had been knotted to form a pouch. Sitting in
it was a pretty blue-eyed toddler--his daughter, Katie. She was nibbling
a biscuit. He knelt down and kissed her.

"Hello, my lovelies," he said to the children. "What on earth are you doing?"

"Kidnapping Katie for ransom," Robbie answered. "We're Kikuyu.
Katie's not. She's Masai. Those are tribes. From Africa. I read about
them in Boy's Own."

"Did you now?"

A loud whoop was heard from the drawing room.

"A war party! Head for the Ngong Hills!" Robbie shouted.

Katie waved bye-bye as she was skidded off to the dining room. Two
more children--twins belonging to Joe's brother, Jimmy--came todding
after them. Jimmy's wife, Meg, was hot on their trail, scolding all the
way. She blew her brother-in-law a kiss as she ran by.

Joe shook his head. A quiet afternoon? A peaceful meal? In this
house? What had he been thinking? "I wonder what it's like at me
neighbors' homes," he said aloud. "I wonder if it's half the madhouse it
is here."

"At the Granville Barkers'? The Walsinghams'?" Foster said,
reappearing with one of the terriers tucked under his arm. "I shouldn't
think so, sir."

"Where's me missus, Mr. Foster?"

"In the garden, sir. Hosting a party."

"A party?"

"A fund-raising luncheon for the Toynbee Mission Girls' Vocational School."

"She didn't tell me we were having a party today."

"Mrs. Bristow didn't know herself until three days ago. The Reverend
and Mrs. Barnett approached her. It seems a portion of the school's roof
fell in. Water damage, I believe."

"Another hard-luck story."

"Those do seem to be her specialty."

"Any chance of getting something to eat round here?"

"Refreshments are being served in the garden, sir."

Joe started toward the back of his house. He walked into his
sun-dappled garden, thinking he might see twenty or so people there, and
was surprised to find more than a hundred. Strangely, they were all
quiet. He soon saw why. At the far end of the garden about forty girls
aged ten to sixteen stood together, surrounded by a breathtaking flush
of pink roses. They were scrubbed and combed, wearing hand-me-down
skirts and blouses. One of them began to sing, sweet and clear, and the
rest joined in, serenading their listeners with "Come into the Garden,
Maud." Every single person had gone as still as stone and a few were
dabbing at their eyes.

"Fiona, lass, you are shameless," Joe whispered. He scanned the sea
of people, searching for her. He didn't see her, not immediately, but he
spotted many famous faces. Captains of industry, titled ladies,
politicians--

Fiona mixed them all. Merchants mingled with viscounts, actresses
with cabinet ministers, socialists with socialites. The society pages
called Joe and Fiona 'Arry and 'Arriet--a snide reference to their
Cockney roots--and sniffed that 94 Grosvenor Square was the only house
in Mayfair where the butler spoke better English than his employers. And
yet all of society clamored for invitations to the parties Fiona gave,
for they were nothing short of stellar.

People enjoyed themselves at 94. They talked and laughed, gossiped
and argued. They ate good food and drank the best wines, but what won
even the snootiest critic over was Fiona herself. She was direct and
disarming, equally at ease with charladies and duchesses. As head of an
international tea empire--and as one of the wealthiest women in the
world--she was an object of fascination. People talked about her
constantly. How she'd come up from nothing. That her dockworker father
had been murdered. Her mother, too. How she'd fled London and caught the
eye of a robber baron in New York, but married a viscount instead. He
had died, but she still wore his diamond. "There were no children,
darling. He was that way, don't you know." Eyes grew even wider as her
daring takeover of a rival's tea company was recounted. "She did it for
revenge, my dear. The man killed her father. He tried to kill her! Can
you imagine?"

Sargent hounded her to sit for him. Escoffler named a dessert after
her. When Worth christened a jacket and skirt ensemble the Fiona Suit,
women flocked to their seamstresses to have it copied. It was whispered
in drawing rooms over tea and cakes that she wore no corset. It was
shouted in gentlemen's clubs over port and Stilton that she had no need
of one for she was really a man--she must be--she had the biggest balls
in London.

Joe finally spotted his wife sitting off to one side of the garden.
As the girls finished their song, she stood and addressed her guests.

"Ladies and gentlemen," she began. "The beautiful voices you have
just heard belong to the children of the Toynbee Mission Girls'
Vocational School. Now I beg you to listen to a far less lovely voice
...my own." There was laughter and fond heckling, then Fiona continued.
"These girls come from families whose incomes are less than one pound a
week. Imag-ine a family of six existing for a week on what some of us
spend on maga-zines or chocolates. Because of their exceptional
intelligence, these girls have been chosen to attend a school which will
train them into a trade and afford them a way out of poverty. When the
Reverend and Mrs. Barnett told me that the children must huddle together
to avoid the rain that pours in from a damaged roof, I knew each and
every one of you would be as out-raged as I am." She paused again, this
time for a volley of "Hear! Hear!"s.

"A new roof is needed desperately, but the roof is only the
beginning. Once we have it, we will need more desks. And blackboards.
And books. We will need more teachers and the money to pay them. Most of
all, we will need you. We will need your continued help, your kind
generosity, in order to expand the number and type of courses we can
offer. We have turned out housekeepers, governesses, and cooks. Now we
must do more. We must turn out shop owners instead of shop girls,
managers instead of secretaries, presidents of companies rather than the
pieceworkers they employ. Per-haps even a woman tea merchant or two,
eh, Sir Tom?" she said, winking at Thomas Lipton.