Alice’s vision swam.
‘Would you like a hot facecloth? The bathroom’s just here, at the end of this hall.’ June walked out to Alice.
Too tired to protest, Alice allowed herself to be guided through the front door. Her head bobbed like a drooping flower. Harry sauntered alongside them.
The sheer size of the house loosened Alice’s jaw. The long hallway, pale as a seashell, was lit with lamps, all different sizes, throwing shades of soft light. They followed a runner mat down the hall. Potted plants sat in every nook. Books lined the shelves, interrupted by jars of white stones, vases of feathers, and dried bouquets of flowers. Alice wanted to touch everything.
June led her into a spacious timber and white-tiled bathroom. She ran warm water in the hand basin. Opening a mirrored cabinet she took down a small brown glass bottle, unscrewed the cap, and shook a few droplets from it. A warm and calming scent rose from the water. Alice’s eyelids drooped. June doused a facecloth in the sink and offered it to Alice, who covered her face and inhaled deeply. The heat dismantled some of the aching behind her eyes. When she finished wiping her face, she saw June hadn’t moved.
‘I won’t leave you. I’m not going anywhere,’ June whispered.
After they were done in the bathroom, Alice and Harry followed June up a lamp-lit flight of winding stairs. At the top was a little door. Alice hung back as June opened it, then trailed in after her. As June flicked the light switch, the sharpness of the light made Alice gasp and cover her eyes. June quickly turned it off.
‘Here, I’ll help you,’ she offered. Alice stiffened as June put an arm around her and they crossed the room. She scurried away from June and climbed into the soft bed, pulling the sheet up in the dark. It settled like feathers on her skin. She waited for the sound of June’s departure. Instead, she felt the weight of her grandmother sitting on the edge of the bed.
‘We’ll just do this one step at a time, Alice,’ June said quietly. ‘Okay?’
She rolled away, silently willing June to leave. After a time she felt her rise; the door clicked softly as it closed behind her. Alice exhaled. The last thing she heard before sleep was the tapping of Harry’s nails as he turned in circles before thudding to the floor at the foot of her bed.
Downstairs in the hallway, June held a hand against the wall to steady herself. She hadn’t had a drink all day.
‘Is she here?’
She started at the sound of Twig’s voice behind her. She didn’t turn around. Nodded.
‘Is she okay?’
A pause.
‘I don’t know,’ June answered. Cricket song filled the pause between them.
‘June.’
She stayed as she was, hand pressed to the wall.
‘She deserves no less than any of the other Flowers. As you well know,’ Twig said, stern and resolute. ‘If anything, she deserves more. From you. From us. From this place. She’s your family.’
‘She’s his,’ June retorted. ‘She’s his, and I don’t want to care.’
‘Good luck with that,’ Twig said, her voice softening. Another pause. ‘You’re shaking.’
June nodded.
‘Well, are you all right?’
‘It’s been a big few days.’ June pinched the skin over the bridge of her nose. She sensed what was coming.
‘Where’s the baby?’
June sighed deeply.
‘You really didn’t bring him home?’ Twig’s voice shook.
‘Not now, Twig. Please. We can talk about it in the morning.’ She turned, only to find the hallway empty and the screen door slamming shut. June let her go. She knew better than anybody that sometimes words did more damage than good.
She went around the house and switched off all the lights. At second thought, she retraced her steps and switched a lamp back on in case the child woke through the night. June paused at Candy’s closed bedroom door but there was no light beneath. Maybe she was across the field in the dorm with the Flowers. The scent of pouch tobacco wafted through the house; Twig was smoking on the verandah. June went back down the hall, into the lounge room. She reached through the open window and snapped a blossom from the bottlebrush tree. Back down the hallway, she slid it into the keyhole of Twig’s bedroom door. Acknowledgement.
Once June was in the privacy of her bedroom, she turned a lamp on and let herself fall onto her bed. She flung an arm over her eyes, pretending for just a little longer that the full flask in her pocket wasn’t growing heavier with temptation by the minute.
After eighteen-year-old Clem found out that June had excluded him from her will, he took Agnes and left Thornfield in a fury. June had only heard from him once since. Nine years ago, when June now guessed Alice was born, a package arrived at Thornfield, addressed to June in her son’s handwriting. She’d done the same thing then as she did now; retreat to her bedroom with her whisky flask.
June sat on her bed, took the flask from her pocket, unscrewed the top and took a deep swig. She drank until the whisky stopped the tremors in her limbs and numbed the tension in her neck. When her hands were steady, June reached under her bed for the tattered, over-handled package and drew it out. She unfolded the lid of the box and gingerly lifted out the hand-carved wooden ornament, cradling it in her hands. A new baby, with the same rosebud mouth and big eyes as the child asleep in the room above her, nestled in a bed of leathery leaves and bell-shaped flowers. There were stripes inside each bloom and yellow spots on the throat of each.
‘Love forsaken,’ she said tearfully.
7. Yellow bells
Meaning: Welcome to a stranger
Geleznowia verrucosa | Western Australia
A small shrub with great yellow flowers. Sun loving, drought tolerant and requiring a well-drained soil. Will grow in a little shade, but sun for most of the day is essential. Makes a wonderful cut flower, although fickleness in propagation and seed germination make this a rare plant.
At first light, June rose from bed, slid her feet into her Blundstones and went silently through the house to the back door. Outside the world was cool and blue. She held herself in it, breathing it in. She hadn’t slept well, not even after draining her flask. The truth was she hadn’t slept well in decades. Especially not since Clem left. June dropped her chin. She studied the nicks and scuffs on her boots. She hadn’t exactly helped herself last night, keeping the carving of the baby and mint bush on her bedside table. She’d gone looking for penance and insomnia was it.
As the sky lightened, June went around the side of the house to the work shed, where she collected clippers and a basket before making her way through the fields towards the native-flower greenhouses. The morning was filled with the low drone of bees and occasional magpie song.
Inside, the greenhouse was rich and damp. June breathed easier. She went to the back, where yellow bells were already flowering, and took her clippers from her apron pocket.
Thornfield had always been a place where flowers and women could bloom. Every woman who came to Thornfield was given the opportunity to grow beyond the things in life that had trampled her. After Clem left, June had thrown herself into making Thornfield a thriving place, a place of beauty, peace and refuge. It was all she could do to validate her decision not to bequeath her flowers, the lifeblood of the women who came before her, to her volatile son.
Twig had been the first Flower to arrive, a shell of a woman after the government had taken her children. Everyone needs somewhere and someone to belong to, June said to her on her first night at Thornfield. And Twig had remained steadfast by June’s side through everything life had thrown at them since. As she had the night before, reminding June that the strange and silent child asleep in the bell tower deserved just as much as any of the women who worked in June’s flower fields. Even if she was Clem’s daughter.