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She turned around, placing a hand on the cool handle of the greenhouse door, key in lock. “It is. The former tenant hadn’t cared enough to take the keys with him when he left, so the entire home is open to us.” She stepped inside, biting her lip raw.
Benjamin crossed the threshold after her. It was a little warmer in the greenhouse, though not by much. They would need to remain in full dress and coat, though Charlotte supposed it was a blessing. She was loath to admit it, but Benjamin was all the more dashing for his recent adventures in fashion. Today, he sported a coat of magnificent dark blue—so dark, one might mistake it for black. Mr. Pollock had done a tremendous job of cleaning him up, and he practically shined, much the diamond in the rough. He was still dark and storming beneath the luster of his new garments. If his genteelness had not been a ruse, he would no doubt have made the most marvelous catch. The mamas of London would have flocked to him—they might still if her poems could grant him any riches. The thought made her prickle with jealousy.
She scanned the greenhouse. There was an old, crooked island in the middle, upon which a set of shears and some old pots had been left. Another island ran the length of the left side, and a basin the size of a trough had been affixed to the right. Stools were dotted about, their light blue paint since chipped away. If Benjamin had been a true gentleman, he might have tried to pull one out for her. He did not, waiting instead for her to settle.
Charlotte leaned against the island, placing her gloved hands on two spots that were not so caked in muck, and she watched as Benjamin took the measure of the place.
“What is it you said to Jo?”
He stalled, drawing his gaze from the cracked glass of the ceiling to her face. “A thing of little consequence. I merely noted your intent on dragging the both of us around London.”
Despite herself, Charlotte flushed. “I do not do it for my own amusement, you realize.”
“No?” Benjamin was wrestling with a grin, and she wished he would just get on with it. “This seems quite the poet’s choice for a rendezvous.”
Charlotte scoffed and turned around. “Do not flatter yourself by thinking this is a rendezvous.” She opened her coat, realizing suddenly she may have been sending quite the wrong message… though Benjamin didn’t stir. She drew a small book from her pearled reticule, a violet clothbound poetry collection the size of her hand. “For you. Sir Philip Sidney’s work. I thought we might start with something simple and work our way up to the contemporaries I mentioned. You shall be dissecting Shakespeare before long and then perhaps some Blake.” She clicked her tongue. “Blake was—“
“I know who they are, Charlotte.” He snatched the booklet from her with a shake of his head. “I wasn’t reared in the forest by wolves.”
“Is that right? You quite convinced me.”
Benjamin flicked through the anthology, nodding as he went. He came to sit beside her, propping himself up on the wooden counter. Charlotte swapped places with him, not wanting to entertaintoomuch familiarity. For all her madness, she was still a lady, and he, an unknown.
“You know how to read, then?” She cursed herself as soon as she said it. Benjamin quirked a brow. “I apologize. I only meant to enquire—“
“I know how to read. I know how to write too, for what little good it’s done me.” He snapped the book shut. “When my mother was not drinking herself into a stupor, she was adamant I learn all I could. Oh, she had dreams for me.”
“What were they?”
Benjamin smiled and cracked open the book again, though Charlotte could sense he had no interest in the poems and every interest in concealing his teasing. “Something not unlike this… with a little less violence, perhaps.” He cleared his throat. “What of you?”
“What of me?”
“How did you come to love poetry as you do?”
Charlotte heard her spirit squeal in delight. She couldn’t recall having ever been asked about her passions by a man, let alone one with whom she had such terrific…connection?She shook the idea away and offered, “My father adores the written word. He made it a point to teach both of us about Latin and Greek literature when we were young, not that it’s particularly uncommon, I suppose. Whatwaspeculiar was his dragging us to readings around town—if not him, then my brother’s tutor. If the world was not as it is, I rather say my father would have encouraged us into academia, though I understand the notion is lunacy. Women at Oxford…” She toyed with a dead leaf on the counter behind her. “So, that was where it sparked. From there, I did my own reading, my own composition too, and my heart was in it.”
When she looked up, she realized Benjamin had been watching her, listening to her, hanging on to every word she spoke. “I see,” he breathed through a laugh.
Charlotte frowned. “What’s funny?”
“I’m having trouble believing you’re the same woman who drew a knife on me. You are so very…” he trailed off, leaving Charlotte to imagine what he could possibly have meant: strange, annoying, repellent? He smiled. “Surprising.”
“Yes, well…” She pressed a hand to her chest, not quite knowing what about their exchange had caused her breathing to hitch as it had. “I shall be asurprisinglydead woman if you do not manage to convince my family of your nature as a poet. So…” she gestured for the book, “we start with Sir Philip.”
It took less than thirty minutes for Charlotte to realize she had drawn herself into an impossible hobble. Benjamin settled himself on the floor before long, complaining of an ache in his leg. She had gone with him, popping themselves down like two children on a blanket at a picnic. He flicked through the book she had brought, asking questions about verses and rhymes and assigning Charlotte the verses ‘Biting my truant pen, beating myself for spite; “Fool,” said my muse to me, look in thy heart and write”’until his curiosity was sated enough for him to read through the poems in relative quiet, his legs outstretched, boxing her in.
Charlotte had drawn a notepad and fountain pen from her reticule. Since her blunder with the fire, which is what she had taken to calling it inwardly, she had tried her best to recall her poems for a second of time. Josephine had been helping where she could, but something about the verses rang false to her now. She couldn’t put her finger on the root of the matter. Was it her memory that was lacking? Had the words always been inherently dull, and she had not noticed?
It was during the attempted recollection of one such poem, as she sat there in that greenhouse with her soldiering imposter, that an idea flickered. Not an idea—an inspiration, much like Sir Philip Sydney’s muse. She scratched the nib of her pen over the paper, listening for whatever genius should take pity on her. The verses flowed through her like water, imperfect as were all first drafts but colorful, alive, true.
She read over them in her mind: “Through the night, I wandered; I stop; The stars are feasting; For light, I did wander; In darkness, with you, I have found myself.”
Benjamin stretched in front of her, failing to conceal his yawn. He let the booklet drop to his side, closing his eyes. Was he the light? The stars? The darkness? Could he beeverythingall at once?
She stopped her wondering; it was without fruit. She looked overhead, past the roof of the greenhouse, past the moss, to the skies beyond. The day was turning to dusk, the sky painted pink for the loss of the sun. How long had she spent composing the poem? Long enough for her father to start worrying, no doubt. And yet, in a most peculiar turn of sentiment, Charlotte found that her fear was no contest for her tranquility. Shelikedthe time she spent with this man, despite the fact that it was a time of silence—despite the fact, too, that he was a thief, and she should be afraid. She didn’t want to leave. The greenhouse was cold, but she was impervious to it. The tiled floor had made her thighs ache, but she didn’t care an ounce. She had not felt quite so at peace, quite soalivesince—
“People know when you gawk at them, even with closed eyes.”
