Genevieve knelt carefully and unfastened the latch. Inside, sheltered from rot and rodents, were several leather-bound volumes arranged with deliberate order. Their spines bore dates spanning more than a decade, the earliest marked 1795 in delicate gilt script. The leather, worn smooth from handling, gave off a faint scent of lavender and ink.
She drew out one volume, turned to the first page, and found herself arrested. Each page bore the same disciplined hand, and opposite many entries were drawings of astonishing quality. Botanical plates, but not mere sketches. These were renderings born of both scientific accuracy and artistic skill, the kind of images she had only ever seen in formal publications. A spread of Lilium auratus, its petals captured with remarkable delicacy, shimmered across one page, annotated with notes in fine ink.
“Bloomed two days earlier than last season. Petals extended farther along lower arc, near identical to plate 7 in Hooker’s Flora. Scents are strongest just after midday. Reproduces poorly by seed in our climate.”
Genevieve traced the edge of the page with reverent care as she turned to another.
“Alstroemeria psittacina, specimen from Mr. Hartley’s shipment. Rooted with difficulty. Transplanted March 3rd. Exhibits vivid striping, strongest in shaded corner of the west house. Worth pursuing again if additional cuttings can be acquired.”
The drawings were done in colored ink, every leaf veined, every petal shaded with an understanding of both light and growth. She had seen the work of professionals who rendered exotic flora for the Royal Society, and this was no less. It struck her at once that these were not idle observations, not the pastimes of a lady dabbling in flowers. These pages belonged to a mind both exacting and expressive.
Gabriel’s mother, she thought with a gasp.
Genevieve turned to the inside cover, confirming what she already knew.
“Eleanor Montgomery, commenced this twelfth of April, 1795,” she read aloud.
She had entered this house under peculiar terms, a wife not by courtship but arrangement, occupying rooms once arranged by a woman she had never known. Until now, that presence had been vague, preserved in portraits and remembered through murmured anecdotes, but these pages rendered her vivid. Each sentence bore a clarity that matched Genevieve’s sensibilities. The entries showed no trace of fashionable romantic excess. They were orderly, exact, and yetnever cold. There was affection for the plants, certainly, but also for the craft of study itself.
She pulled the second volume from the cabinet, dated 1798. Near the middle, she found a series devoted to a type of orchid she had only read of in translated works.
“Cattleya labiata. Gift from Lord Howden via West Indies voyage. Requires near-constant warmth. Initial planting failed. Second attempt successful with increased gravel drainage and warm mist. First bloom exceptional, deep violet with flecked center. Sketch appended.”
Indeed, opposite the note, the bloom curved across the page, a riot of color captured with a steadiness of hand that belied the complexity of its form.
Genevieve sank back onto the bench and allowed the volume to rest in her lap. She had spent hours copying diagrams, working by candlelight with her own specimens in a quiet corner of her father’s house. But she had always been regarded with gentle amusement, her diligence tolerated rather than understood. Here, at last, was proof that another aristocratic woman had treated such work with seriousness. Eleanor Montgomery had made a record, a true one. This was a legacy.
“March 7th,” she read softly as she turned another page. “Weather dry. North wind. Attempted germination of Wisteria seed, taken from Mrs. Radcliffe’s southern wall. Scarified and soaked. No sign of sprouting by fourth day, may require longer immersion. Uncertain if seed viable or improperly stored.”
It was a perfect entry. Date, condition, process, conclusion. Even the failures were preserved, valued as part of a greater inquiry. She found herself smiling faintly.
“We would have gotten along,” she said, speaking softly in the empty room.
The space answered only with the soft creak of wood and the faint rattle of a vine scraping against the outer frame.
Drawing the book closer, she bent again over the pages, reading for another quarter of an hour. At times, she paused to copy down select entries into her own notebook, intending to cross-reference the species mentioned with what remained in the grounds. This was no longer idle curiosity. She meant to preserve what Eleanor had begun.
She imagined what it must have been like to tend the glass houses when they still held warmth and watch rare blossoms open beneath panes that shimmered in the morning light. Eleanor had worked in these very rooms, had lifted these same latches, had perhaps sat on this very bench, examining leaves and petals in quiet concentration. Genevieve felt, for the first time since her arrival, not as a visitor nor a caretaker, but a successor. Not of title, but of endeavor. She replaced the volumes carefully, fastening the cabinet once more and brushing away a smear of dust from her skirt. Outside, the hush of afternoon deepened. The wind had shifted, and the trees now moved with a more distinct rustle.
As she stepped into the light once more, Genevieve did not look back at the greenhouses as she had the day before. She had seen their past now, not merely their present state, and that changed everything. The work ahead would not merely be practical. It would be a continuation. A restoration not only of structure, but of record, of memory.
Chapter Ten
The papers before Gabriel blurred. He dragged his gaze back to the ledger, forcing his eyes to the columns he had already tallied twice over without comprehension. He knew the figures well enough, but none of it lodged in his mind. The ink might as well have been smudged water for all the sense it made. Frustrated, he set down his quill.
Outside the study windows, the day had unfolded into a cool, pale morning, soft with the hush that came after rain. From this vantage, the gardens stretched in green disarray, hemmed by the neglected structures she now labored to reclaim. He could not see her from here, but he knew where she was. She would be somewhere near the far wall, where the glass houses slumbered beneath vines and moss, half-buried reminders of Mountwood’s more industrious past.
Genevieve…
He leaned back in his chair, abandoning the ledgers entirely. He had watched her from his study the previous morning, her figure barely discernible as she moved through the overgrowth with that deliberate manner of hers. She did not flinch at ruin, nor avert her eyes from work most women of her station would have called unseemly. No simpering discomfort, no dainty protests. Only quiet determination, sleeves rolled with purpose, skirts pinned just enough to avoid the thorns.
It was not merely the restoration that stirred his thoughts. It was her manner of doing it. She was methodical and practical, guided not by sentiment but sober assessment. It was as if, in those broken walls and rusted hinges, she had seen something worth recovering. As if she had not entered this house as a stranger.
Her presence unsettled him more than he cared to admit. It was not her beauty, though she certainly possessed it. It was not even her intelligence, which had long since become apparent. It was the growing certainty that she belonged here, not as interloper nor ornament, but as steward. As a partner. As my wife.
He reached for the topmost letter in the stack beside him, eager for distraction. The hand belonged to Mr. Ellison of London, a discreet agent and correspondent of longstanding reliability. Gabriel broke the seal and unfolded the letter.
Mount Street, Mayfair
