Evergreen Falls

by Kimberley Freeman

  * * *

  Flora wasn’t entirely sure what she was doing outside Will Dalloway’s house, but now she was here she may as well go in. It was freezing on the street, and she knew he wouldn’t turn her away.

  Inside, three patients waited on the long wooden bench. One of them coughed violently as Flora took a seat at a distance, trying not to show she was leaning away. She left her gloves and hat on, in case she decided this was a bad idea and fled.

  Will emerged after a few minutes with an elderly woman who was thanking him profusely. His eye caught on Flora, and he lit up. “Miss Honeychurch-Black,” he said, reverting to her formal name in front of his patients. “What a delight to see you. I can take you in straightaway if you need me to.”

  Flora looked at the wretched patients ahead of her and shook her head. “I shall wait my turn, Dr. Dalloway. It isn’t urgent.”

  He smiled, and she saw that he was pleased that she hadn’t jumped the queue. She felt the particular warm glow that came from gaining the good favor of somebody important, and settled in to wait her turn.

  A loud clock ticked away the time, and she wished she’d brought a book to read. One by one, the patients went through and more arrived, though Flora shuffled up to the end of the bench closest the surgery door to make it clear she was next. Finally, Will showed her through.

  She sat on the other side of his desk while he settled into his chair and opened his notepad.

  “How can I help you today?”

  Flora picked up the rope of beads around her neck, worried them between her fingers. “It’s Sam.”

  “Go on.”

  “He’s seeing things. Well, he says he’s not seeing things but feeling things. He talks about a ghost in the bathroom where that man died, about awful dreams. He seems afraid to be in his room, and once he’s there it’s almost impossible to get him out without him shaking and turning pale.”

  Will put his pen down and joined his fingers in a steeple, leaning his forehead on them.

  “Is it the opium doing this to him?” she asked.

  He looked up. “It’s hard to say. The drug affects people differently. They say that under the influence it’s possible to feel strange things, but they are usually nice things. Opium is associated with euphoria.”

  “He said he’s cut down.”

  “That might have something to do with it. As I said, it’s hard to say. We haven’t nearly enough studies on opium. We really only know it’s very addictive and eventually turns ordinary people into desperate wretches.” He checked himself. “I’m sorry.”

  “Could it be sending him mad?”

  This time he chose his words carefully, forming his lips several times before actually speaking. “He may have already been on the way, if you take my meaning.”

  “I don’t.”

  “The very thing that drew him to opium—to that euphoria, that escape from everything—might have been an underlying lack of mental stability.”

  “Are you saying . . .” The awful weight of her worry threatened to crush her.

  “He may have started talking about ghosts anyway. But certainly, yes, the opium makes such things seem acute to him. It can take whatever dread is natural to a man and amplify it.”

  Flora thought back over her life with Sam. He had always been odd, out of step, off with the pixies. “Is there anything we can do? Could you give him some medicine for it?”

  “There are specialist doctors who treat disorders of the mind, but none up here in the mountains. I can give you the names of some in Sydney, but your problem, once again, is getting Sam to attend his appointments.”

  Flora slumped forwards in her seat, letting her forehead rest on Will’s desk.

  “Flora?”

  “I am so overburdened, Will.”

  “Take heart. He’s young. He may recover.”

  “It’s not just that.” Don’t tell him. Don’t tell him just because he has warm eyes and says he cares.

  “Then, what else is wrong?”

  She sat up again. The sun through the leaves outside the high window dappled onto his shoulder. Through the glass she could hear a bird calling, and she was taken by a longing to be a bird. Carefree, flying away up high above the buildings and streets and the people and their endless neediness.

  He dropped his voice low. It was no longer a doctor’s voice; it was the voice of a confidant, and Flora registered the moment as one of potential danger. The crossing of a ship into uncharted waters. “You can tell me anything.”

  “But I oughtn’t.”

  “But you can.”

  “It’s about Tony. My fiancé.”

  He nodded.

  “He’s been . . . seeing prostitutes.” The words, in escaping, churned up nausea in her throat.

  Will blinked, clearly struggling for the right words. “This makes you unhappy.”

  “Desperately. Desperately unhappy.” She glanced away, not wanting to see the pity in his eyes. “Is it normal? Do most men—?”

  “I certainly don’t,” he said hotly. “If I were engaged to be married to a good-hearted, intelligent woman such as yourself, I would count my blessings and treat her like a queen and not subject her to the risk of certain diseases that—” Then he dropped his eyes. “I’ve said too much,” he continued, shuffling the papers on his desk. She could see his pulse flicking at his throat. Her fingers itched.

  “No, you said just the right thing,” she replied softly. “Thank you.”

  She rose, and he stood quickly and blurted, “Will you still marry him?”

  “I suppose I must,” she replied. “But I will make my terms very clear to him.”

  “Good,” he said.

  “I’ve held you up long enough.”

  “You are always welcome. At any time.”

  Her eyes met his, and warmth passed between them wordlessly.

  “I know,” she said.

  * * *

  Miss Zander called a staff meeting on Friday afternoon at three o’clock, and Violet dutifully filed in with her workmates to the guest dining room, where they took seats around the gleaming tables under the chandelier.

  When all were settled, Miss Zander called them to attention with a short series of sharp claps. She waited for perfect quiet. Violet glanced over at Clive, but he was looking the other way. Myrtle sat with her, giving her a broad smile, all animosity over missing out on winter work forgiven.

  “Now,” Miss Zander started. “I’ve called this staff meeting to discuss our Christmas-in-June celebration, which is coming up in five days.” She held five fingers aloft theatrically. “Most of the preparation is under way, but I need two male volunteers to help erect the tree with Mr. Betts, and six female volunteers to help me decorate the long room.”

  Hands shot up all around her. Violet wondered if she should volunteer, but it was all over quickly. Miss Zander took down names on her clipboard, then quieted the group once more. “Next, I need ideas for activities throughout the day. I already have a full schedule of games and so on, but I wondered if any of you know how to read fortunes or draw portraits or some other bit of fun the guests might like to indulge in.”

  There was much head scratching and murmuring.

  “It’s worth a Christmas-in-June bonus,” Miss Zander said.

  Violet raised her hand. “Clive Betts can draw portraits.”

  “Thank you, Violet. Clive, you weren’t going to tell me?”

  “They’re not very good, ma’am.” He deliberately avoided Violet’s gaze.

  “They don’t have to be, but please don’t insult the guests by making them look too deformed.”

  Thora volunteered to read gypsy cards, and Miss Zander offered her a real gypsy costume, with ribbons and bells. Others got into the spirit, offering everything from fortune cookies to French braiding, and Miss Zander happily took down all their suggestions and promised to call them in if she needed to discuss it further.

  “Finally,” she said amid the excitement, this time br
inging quiet to the room with more difficulty, “you are all invited to the Christmas-in-June celebration. The roster will be up tomorrow, and you will work short shifts so you can attend at least an hour of the activities. Of course, the Christmas lunch in the afternoon will be for guests only, but the events are open to all of you. Consider it my way of saying thank you before the winter break.”

  A cheer of many voices and a shimmer of applause went through the room.

  “Sh, sh,” Miss Zander said, palms up. “Great responsibility comes with this invitation. You are all ambassadors for the hotel. You will wear your uniforms. You will not drink a drop of liquor. You will be polite and mingle with the guests, but you will not flirt with them, ask them for money, offer nor ask for any confidences. Behave at all times as though I am standing directly behind you, with this expression on my face.” Here she drew her eyebrows down in such a glower that everybody laughed uproariously, Miss Zander included.

  “Any questions?”

  Happy silence.

  “Very well. I look forward to celebrating the day with you.”

  Myrtle squeezed Violet’s hand. “What fun!”

  Violet turned Miss Zander’s warning over in her mind. Mingle, don’t flirt. How she longed for her relationship with Sam to be out in the open, not hidden away and guilty. She would love to wear a beautiful frock and attend the Christmas dinner with him. But the past two nights he hadn’t unlocked his door for her. Had he not seen her carving? Or had he seen it and cared nothing for it? She read and reread his love letters, searching for answers to questions she couldn’t articulate. All were full of promises, but she was starting to wonder if he was even capable of keeping such promises—so readily bestowed by him, and so desperately grasped by her.

  * * *

  That evening, as Violet lay on her side in bed, nursing her misery alone while Myrtle worked, she heard a light knock on her door. The moment she opened it Sam gathered her in his arms.

  “I found it,” he said. “I found your beautiful present. You wonderful, wonderful girl. I asked for a sign. I said, God, if she still loves me, give me a sign, and there it was, hewn in rock.”

  Her ear was squashed against his chest, and she could hear his heart pounding. “I’ve never stopped loving you.” She extricated herself, glanced up and down the hall nervously. Myrtle wouldn’t be back for hours, but the chambermaids were still around. “What are you doing down here?” she asked.

  “You weren’t working the dinner shift, so I thought you might be here. I made an excuse and left dinner and . . . oh, Violet, Violet.” He took her hands in his, and she noticed they were clammy. “Everything has gone badly.” His mouth and jaw began to tremble, and she realized he was on the verge of sobbing.

  “What do you mean? What’s wrong?” His vast plummet in mood, the change in his demeanor, was so violent that it frightened her. “Do you want to come in?”

  “No, I want you to come out. A long walk in the night.”

  “Down the cliff? I don’t think that would be safe.”

  “No, into town. I’ll explain on the way.”

  She hesitated, and he squeezed her hands more forcefully. “Don’t doubt me, my love, don’t doubt me. Everybody else does. I couldn’t bear it if you did, too.” He was pale and shaking.

  “You don’t look well. Perhaps you should come in and sit down.”

  “I’m not well, Violet. I’m not well. I need to go see a friend, and I need you to come with me. I’ve tried, I’ve tried so hard. But then the ghost came and I’m falling into ruin. Help me. Will you help me?”

  Violet’s ribs contracted. “Of course, of course. What do I need to do?”

  “Put on your coat. Come with me.”

  Violet reached behind the door for her coat and scarf, hat and gloves. “Won’t you be cold?” she asked him.

  “I can’t feel the cold. All I can feel is the need.”

  “We have to leave separately anyway,” she said. “Why don’t you go and get your coat and meet me out front?”

  “Yes, yes. Good Violet. You understand. You know what to do. I knew I could come to you. I’ll meet you outside. I’ll go and get my . . . I can’t. I’m afraid to go up there.”

  Violet glanced around her room, then grabbed her bedspread and wrapped it around his shoulders. “Go. I’ll meet you at the corner in two minutes. Don’t despair, Sam. Whatever the problem is, I’ll help you. I love you.”

  “I love you.”

  She watched him make his way up the corridor and disappear into the stairwell, the blanket tight around his shoulders. Her heart hammered. What was wrong with him? What did he mean about ghosts and falling into ruin? The seconds ticked by agonizingly slowly, then she hurried off, calling out to Alexandria that she was off for a brisk walk, and headed out into the cold.

  He pounced on her from behind a pine tree, and she clutched at her heart.

  “You gave me a fright.”

  “We’re going to see a friend,” he said. “His name is Malley.” He began to walk briskly, but the blanket kept slipping off his shoulders and he had to stop to hitch it.

  “Where does he live?”

  “Other side of the rail line, a block or two from that house where you go dancing. Violet, he sells me my opium. You don’t mind, do you?”

  “I mind that you are so agitated. Why do you talk of being ruined?”

  “I’ve been trying . . . trying so hard, for you. And for Flora. Poor Flora.”

  “Trying?”

  “To give up the pipe. I cut back from twenty a day to ten a day. I got down to eight. Violet, nobody has ever inspired me to get down to eight a day! You are an angel, a goddess!”

  She was in no mood to feel pleased with herself over his compliment. Rather, she was cold and worried.

  “But it’s not enough. My guts are hurting. I itch all over, but the itch isn’t on my skin, it’s under it, in the layers of my flesh that I can’t see. I’ve started . . . feeling things. Things I don’t like. I hear footsteps and I imagine they’re him, coming down the hall, all waterlogged and blue.”

  “What a horror story! Who are you talking about?”

  “The suicide. Self-murderers don’t rest in their graves, you know. Why, it was only last century they were still regularly tied into their coffins to stop them rising from the dead.”

  Despite the fact that she believed none of this, Violet still felt a chill at his words. She forced her voice to be even and rational. “Sam, none of that is real. You must be sensible.”

  “I dream about it, over and over. I dream about the bath, him in the water with his eyes closed and his hair floating about him. I can’t stop the dreams, and I think they are coming because I’m trying to stop smoking. I had a little opium left. I hoped it would be the last I would smoke, but I can’t stop, do you see, Violet, my love? I can’t stop.” He raised his hands, made a cage around his head with his fingers. “Without it, the world is a nightmare. Everything has sharp edges. All that is good in the world seems foreign and forbidden to me. The ghosts come. The dreams come. Oh, oh, Violet, don’t make me stop.”

  She reached for him and hitched the blanket around his shoulders. “I never asked you to stop, Sam.”

  He was quiet a few steps, then said warily, “It’s true, you didn’t.”

  “I don’t like to see you in such misery. Let’s find your friend and see what he has to say. Is he a doctor?”

  “No, he’s a criminal. You do understand, don’t you, that opium is not legal? Or do you not even know that much about the world?”

  Violet smarted from his casual chastisement. “I don’t know much about much, I’m afraid. Is it very dangerous?”

  “What you see before you,” he said. “But only if I stop.”

  Violet didn’t know what to think or what to say, but her instinct to relieve Sam’s misery was greater than any other. Through the dark they hurried, as the cold wind rose and tore the last leaves from the oaks along the way and hissed harsh and flat throug
h the pines. Soon they came to a house with a long settee on the veranda, and tall Chinese lamps either side of it.

  “This is Malley’s house,” he said, and palpable calmness began returning to his limbs. “Malley will make the ghosts go away.”

  They climbed the stairs and knocked, waiting in the cold dark. Violet began to fear that Malley wasn’t home, but then the door opened and he was there, smiling down on them.

  “Samuel,” he said. “Who’s your pretty friend?”

  “This is my Violet. She is a delight, but you aren’t to give her any of your potions, you understand. She is pure and will remain that way.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it. Come in.”

  Malley was tall and thin, with a long ponytail and beard, dressed in what appeared to be red silk pajamas. Violet wasn’t sure where to look. His house was cramped and smelled odd—a sweet smell laid over something old and decaying—and was full of Asian objects: woodprints and pots and jars and silk hangings and the opium pipes and lamps and awls and scissors she recognized from Sam’s room. He indicated they should sit on the floor, where a thick rug was laid out and big soft cushions were scattered around.

  “I’m in a bad way,” Sam said to him. “I’ve been trying to cut back . . .”

  “But the dragon is roaring. I know, I can see by looking at you.”

  “Can I have a pipe here? I need . . . oblivion.”

  “Oblivion? Then I’ve got something for you. Something you’ll love.”

  Malley disappeared into an adjoining room and seemed gone for an age, as Sam sat next to Violet shivering and shuddering. Then the tall man returned with a green leather pouch that unfolded to reveal what looked to be medical implements.

  “What is that?” Violet asked, wary.

  “That is the easiest path to heaven,” Malley said. “It’s called heroin. Much like the opium you smoke, but this . . . this goes straight into your blood with a hypodermic syringe.”

  It sounded dangerous, and Violet opened her mouth to caution them, but Sam was eager.

  “Will it make the ghosts go away?”