Serpent in the Garden Page 2

  She said nothing. Then, just as she seemed on the brink of answering, she wheeled wordlessly away.

  Silence settled between them, a taut hush that seemed to Joshua infinitely more unsettling than any demanding look or menacing gesture. He longed for her to break it; he craved a speech or tirade, something that would explain her intention no matter how dreadful it was.

  But the only sounds were the creaks and sighs of the storm-buffeted building. Inside, silence, interminable silence, dragged on. Joshua stared at his visitor’s immobile back, willing her to turn round. He wanted to shout out, “Speak openly or for God’s sake go now and leave me in peace!” But some instinct held him back and made him mute. He knew that unless he waited she would gain an advantage and he might never discover what had brought her.

  At length, after what seemed an eternity had passed, she turned back to address him. “The reason I have come, Mr. Pope, is to show you something.” She rummaged in the folds of her cloak.

  Joshua started at the sudden movement. Was she about to extract a weapon and assault him? For safety’s sake he edged toward the fire and positioned himself close to the poker. But his suspicion was groundless, for the article she took out was nothing more fearsome than a shagreen box.

  She opened it. Couched in gray silk was an emerald necklace, one he had not seen for twenty years. The stones were just as he recalled them: a dozen or more, baguette-cut and set in gold links, with a single ruby at the center. Flashes of verdigris, orpiment, and Prussian blue sparkled in the candlelight. He felt sick to the heart to see it. The form of this necklace was as disturbing as ever. It had nearly cost him his life.

  “I have come, Mr. Pope, to offer this in return for your cooperation.”

  Joshua did not regard himself as an avaricious man, yet in that instant he forgot his earlier unease and gasped at the offer. The jewels must be worth close on a thousand guineas—more, perhaps. What could he tell her that made his information so valuable? “Does the jewel belong to you?” he said coolly.

  “As you see, it is in my possession. I offer it to you as proof of my intimate involvement with Mr. Bentnick, as well as a generous form of payment.”

  “That is not the same. How do I know you are entitled to the jewel? You might have stolen it. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time it has been misappropriated.”

  “I will prove to you I am no thief once you have told me what I wish to know.”

  “What can I say to you that is so precious as to warrant a jewel of this caliber in payment?”

  “I wish to hear your version of the events surrounding the painting of the portrait. What happened then has had a profound impact upon my life. Moreover, I want to know what became of the portrait. No one has seen it in the last twenty years.”

  By now Joshua’s earlier fear had dissipated, to be eclipsed by curiosity. He spoke frankly. “During the course of my career I have of necessity stayed in many homes, and unwittingly become involved with numerous surprising and strange adventures. Of all these, the Bentnick affair is one that still troubles me the most to remember. I have never spoken of it to anyone, although I confess that often when I lie awake in my bed and hear the rain flogging at the window, or when I walk in a beautiful garden and pass a cascade or a hothouse or a grotto, I remember those sad and singular events.”

  “Then you accept my proposal, Mr. Pope?”

  He pondered awhile. “Yes and no. I will not tell you what I know, for the tale is too long and involved and my memory is not good at this time of night. I will write you an objective account. Return to my rooms one month from today and I will hand it to you.” He paused for a moment before adding, “One more condition: I do not desire the necklace in payment. With all I know of its history, nothing on earth would induce me to take it.”

  She scowled. “What, then, do you require?”

  “Merely to know who you are and how you came by the jewel and why you require this information.”

  Her eyes half closed, her mouth contracted to a thin line. She stepped forward until she was no more than a couple of paces from Joshua. Displeasure emanated from every fiber of her being. He half expected her to scream or fly at him like some demented creature in the madhouse. Yet now that he knew the nature of her requirements, he had no difficulty in facing her.

  Perhaps she realized this change, for she dropped her head, as if conceding to his will, and he fancied that, through the thin fabric of her dress, he saw her shoulders shake. “Very well,” she said, in a voice so low he had to strain to hear it. “If those are your terms, and you have not discovered the answer when I return, then I can do little but agree to them.”

  Joshua bowed, maintaining a solemn expression. “I shall expect you thirty days from this evening. Until then, madam, I bid you good night.”

  With this, he ushered her down the stairs to his front door. He watched her step into her carriage, which immediately sped away into the gloom. Joshua bolted the door behind him. He had no more appetite for work. The visitor had disturbed his concentration. He snuffed the candles in the painting room and made his way to his bedchamber. But even there, with the rhythmic breath of his sleeping wife to soothe him, he found no peace. His mind was awhirl with reminiscence, and he passed a fitful night.

  * * *

  Chapter Two

  IT WAS LATE in May in the year 1766, over a breakfast of ham in jelly, sponge cakes, and tea, that Sabine Mercier told Joshua Pope she intended to go for a promenade in the gardens of Astley.

  Sabine was a handsome woman in her middle years, lively of movement yet serene of countenance. She had been married and widowed twice before her engagement to Herbert Bentnick, yet dual bereavement had not withered her. A bewitching woman, she was tawny of complexion, with rich brown eyes, black arched brows, a small, flowerlike mouth, and hair so dark and glossy it might have been made from polished ebony.

  Joshua had been commissioned to paint the Bentnicks’ marriage portrait, and so, in the interests of his art, he observed her as she picked at a sponge cake while describing her excursion—the same one she took every day. He remarked how the very anticipation of the visit made her eyes gleam like a Bristol decanter. It intrigued Joshua that a face could be so altered by the thought of plants. Could any leaf or fruit merit such attention? A person might have the capacity to inspire or move a fellow being; even a painting of a person on occasion could arouse a certain sentiment. But a plant? Was there any such thing as what Sabine termed “a plant of great significance”? But then, Joshua smiled condescendingly to himself, it was no surprise Sabine Mercier’s tastes were a little particular. She had lived all her life until recently in the West Indies. In such a place she could have learned little of society, and less of art. Plants were a substitute for civilization.

  Sabine’s abiding passion was for growing pineapples. The so-called pinery at Astley was largely her creation, although the structure itself had been built fifty years earlier by Herbert’s grandfather Horace Bentnick, who had been inspired by the nearby orangery at Ham, which he considered the acme of such edifices. The Astley orangery, originally intended as a conservatory for growing pomegranates and myrtles as well as oranges, was cruciform in shape, measuring a hundred feet long, with columns and large marble urns planted with vast specimen orange trees. In the center, set beneath a cupola, was a circular atrium, featuring an ornamental fountain, where on fine spring days one could sit and take refreshment. It was, in short, a veritable cathedral in which exotic plants and scented blooms took the place of stained glass and statuary.

  Herbert had always had a fondness for this legacy from his grandfather, and it was a measure of his infatuation with Sabine that he had allowed her to take over one half of the building, replace many of the plants he and his grandfather had nurtured with pineapples, and rename the building “the pinery.”

  AT THEIR first encounter, Joshua had innocently asked Sabine what had drawn her to such an unusual pastime as horticulture. Her eyes widened so that the whit
e was visible all round the sable iris, yet there was something distant in her gaze. “What is so unusual about it, Mr. Pope? To me it seems extraordinary that you need even to ask. Do you question that gardening is a prerequisite of civilized society? Or that plants are essential to man’s well-being? Can you deny that the introduction of foreign species has contributed immensely to the richness of our landscape? And quite apart from their visual attractions … man could not exist without plants: he needs them to furnish his home, feed him, heal him. Imagine a table without fruit or vegetables! Why, even the table itself would not exist. The cultivation of plants is far more than a mere hobby; it is an occupation of the greatest moment. Civilization depends upon it.”

  Joshua mentally raised his eyes to heaven and outwardly nodded politely. Having never given the subject of gardening much thought, he found the vehemence of her arguments faintly amusing, but his artistic faculties were roused. There was a glow in her eye that he wanted to store in his memory and reproduce on canvas. He wanted to see more of her passion, to draw her out. So he feigned interest and pressed her further. “Why have you settled upon pineapples in particular?”

  Her tone turned from zealous to withering. “Anyone who knows anything of the subject understands that among culinary plants, this fruit surpasses all others. It is the most succulent and esteemed of foreign species. For any gardener to grow a ripened fruit for the table is the pinnacle of achievement.”

  She went on to describe how Herbert had asked her to supervise the growing of pineapples at Astley. She had relished the challenge, and even though it was more usual in this country to cultivate pineapples in purpose-built frames and pits, she had confidently overseen the alterations to the vast glass-and-wood conservatory. The entire structure was warmed by charcoal-fueled stoves, but since pineapples required hotter conditions than oranges and myrtles, she had augmented the heat in her portion of the building by installing channels under the floor to contain tanner’s bark—crushed oak used by the local leather tannery to soften animal hides. The decaying process of this matter could be relied on to produce considerable heat, and by carefully stirring the bark, the correct temperature to coax the plants to grow would be reached.

  Joshua stifled a yawn and declared it would be an honor if one day she would consent to show the pinery to him. Sabine had scarcely acknowledged his request at the time, but that morning at breakfast she suggested he accompany her. “Madam,” he had replied, silently thanking God for his appointment with Herbert, “you are very kind, and as you know I am all eagerness to admire the pinery. However, this morning circumstances forbid me. I have arranged a sitting …”

  “Some other time then, Mr. Pope,” she had said, smiling as she rose from the table.

  SABINE ENTERED the conservatory alone. She reached the central atrium, then turned left as she always did toward the beds where her pineapples were planted. At the beginning of the row, she sniffed, and then sniffed again, this time more cautiously. Something jarred; some new, strange odor permeated the familiar, well-loved warmth: a foreign scent that on the one hand was sickly sweet, yet on the other had an acrid taint that was unsettling, poisonous, intrusive.

  She cast about to find its source. At first, all seemed in perfect order. The air was warmed by rotting bark and dung. Her pineapple plants, many of which had been rooted in Barbados and transported to Astley under her supervision, had been repotted in larger containers only last week. They were ranged in tiered beds, so that no more than the upper rims of the pots were visible. From the center of these halos the sharp, silvery gray leaves emerged like the long, pointed shafts of spears.

  Sabine walked along the narrow path, examining each pot for signs of interference. In the heart of several crowns, small green fruits, no larger than an infant’s fist, had formed. In others, larger fruits were about to ripen. Perspiration rose on her lip and forehead as she entered further into the pinery and the unfamiliar smell became more potent.

  Halfway along the path the stench was overwhelming. Sabine began to breathe shallowly. She held a kerchief to her mouth. Yet she could taste as well as smell it. Her stomach heaved, yet at no point did she consider withdrawing to call for assistance. She was a newcomer to Astley but the pinery was already her domain. If something untoward had taken place here, it was imperative she should witness the extent of it.

  At the end of the path a cluster of the precious containers in which half a dozen or more of the largest plants were rooted had been carelessly discarded. Several plants were strewn over the path, like so many unwanted weeds; others lay heaped against the wall. Earth had spilled out of most of the containers and several of the pots had shattered, leaving a tangle of plump white roots exposed to the air.

  She stared in disbelief. Her cheeks burned, her palms grew clammy. Where a row of plants had formerly stood lay the source of the foul smell—an interloper.

  The man was stretched on his back in the bed of bark and dung. A wall of plants and pots concealed his head. She gazed at him.

  At first she assumed the man had fallen asleep. She could see enough of the body to know that this was not one of the under-gardeners. He looked no more than thirty years of age. His hands were clean, the nails manicured, the clothes of middling quality, but too fine to belong to a laborer. She shivered with a mixture of apprehension and annoyance written on her face. He should not be here. Why had he deemed it necessary to destroy her precious pines? Could he not have collapsed on the path?

  She pressed the kerchief closer to her mouth. Then, shaking her head as if chastising herself for her weakness, she stooped down and tugged at his foot to rouse him. “Wake up, man,” she commanded.

  The foot felt warm but limp. The man’s cotton stocking separated from his breeches, exposing a hairy, mud-streaked calf. Still he remained obstinately immobile. Sabine tugged more insistently, and then, when there was still no sign of movement, she inched between the pots toward his head. She could now see the man’s tousled brown hair, the underside of his chin, shadowed with stubble. A small beetle scurried over his lips and into a cavernous nostril. She swallowed uncomfortably and looked away.

  Sabine resisted the instinct to wipe her palms on her skirts. She could no longer wholly convince herself that the man was merely in a stupor, but nor did she wish to contemplate the alternative. Steeling herself, unable to confront the possibility there was something seriously amiss, she placed her hand on the man’s torso and shook him. “Did you hear me, sir? I said wake up! This instant!”

  He lay there, insolently unconscious, oblivious to her presence and the destruction he had wrought. Growing more uneasy by the minute, she grabbed at his collar and yanked upward, intending to bring him to a seated position. The man was compact of stature, yet broad chested and surprisingly heavy. It took her several attempts, but finally, from out of the sea of bark and earth and dung, his floppy head, shoulders, and entire torso rose up like some ghastly apparition.

  As soon as she had pulled him up, she no longer had any doubt about his true condition. The man was dead. His eyes were open, yet blank. Wisps of brown detritus clung to his lashes and brows. Pooled inside his mouth, staining his tongue and teeth, was a brownish, soupy liquid in which pieces of fibrous matter were suspended. The smell of this substance was acrid and the man had apparently vomited it prior to death. It had coursed down his chin and the front of his torso, subsequently drying to a paste in which morsels of bark were set like glue. The acrid smell of vomit mingled in the humid air with a certain heavy sweetness that she feared might be the stench of death.

  * * *

  Chapter Three

  ON THE SAME fine May morning, not fifty yards distant from this distressing scene, Joshua Pope took up his long-handled sable brush and a palette on which he had mixed blobs of lead white, red ocher, vermilion, and yellow ocher to produce a range of flesh tones. When he began to paint, he abandoned his usual expression of calm curiosity and adopted a brisk yet flamboyant manner that matched the extravagant garb conce
aled beneath his paint-stained linen smock.

  Although only three and thirty years of age, Joshua Pope was already regarded as the equal of any portraitist in the land. He had recently triumphed over Reynolds and Gainsborough in a masterly conversation piece, depicting the royal princes George and Frederick at play, that had been exhibited at the Society of Arts. Critics had deemed his works a little warmer and more profound than Romney’s, and being youthful and agreeable and immaculate in his dress, he was more in vogue with polite society than Hudson, Hayman, and Ramsay.

  His popularity was such that patrons usually visited him in his rooms for sittings, but exceptional circumstances had altered his routine and taken him to Astley. The previous summer, Joshua’s wife, Rachel, had drowned in a tragic boating accident on the river Thames. Their only child, Benjamin, had perished with her. A slight touch of influenza had prevented Joshua from accompanying them on their outing, and he felt responsible for their deaths. To distract himself from the agonies of bereavement, he had moved to new lodgings, thrown himself into his work, purchased a dozen items of dress—waistcoats, breeches, coats—each more elaborate than the last. But none of these measures succeeded in shifting the bouts of melancholy to which he had grown increasingly prone. The blackness was often unbearable. Every object in his new rooms only served to remind him of his darling Rachel and sweet Benjamin. Every item in his closet, no matter how vivid and newly acquired, seemed dull and worn. He developed a morbid fear of water. He took a mistress, a comely widow by the name of Meg Dunn, but although he slept a little more soundly after their meetings, the shadow of melancholy remained.

  As the first anniversary of Rachel and Benjamin’s deaths approached, Joshua yearned to leave London. Thus, when Herbert Bentnick had offered a commission to paint his marriage portrait, Joshua had suggested he come to stay at Astley House in Richmond. Herbert had quickly accepted this proposal; it was unheard of for Joshua Pope to agree to leave his premises, and he declared that he would gladly pay a fee of twenty guineas. All parties were thus very well satisfied.