The Rose Master

by Valentina Cano

  This is silly, Anne, I told myself. You’re going to have to touch this chair for many years to come, so better get used to it.

  Perhaps, but I didn’t have to do it right that minute. I moved back and turned to the last bit of furniture—a side table. As I shifted my head, I heard a soft chuckle, hoarse and deep. I stood still and held my breath, but I could not hear anything else. My heart was pounding all along my ribcage as I turned around to face whoever was in the room.

  There was no one.

  The sound had been so close to my ears, it would have been impossible for the person to move out of the room with such speed without a sound.

  I stepped into the hallway, but there was nothing different; the rising sun still poured through an empty corridor. I frowned.

  “Now you’re hallucinating. Wonderful.” I shook my head. It must have been my imagination.

  Just in case, I grabbed the broom and cloths and moved to the dining room. There’d be plenty of time for the sitting room when the rest of the household woke. There was nothing to fear, I knew that. But I wasn’t dumb, either.

  Soon enough, the meager household rose. I was halfway through scrubbing the dining room table when I heard Dora laughing, an echo that reached me all the way from the kitchen. The laughter soon unwound itself and became a few choice curse words, followed by the sharp smell of burnt bread. I hesitated. I could go assist Dora, but I feared she’d be insulted at my sailing in, efficiency personified, to rescue her from her mediocre skills.

  But I also did not want to eat burnt bread.

  I wiped my hands and went to the kitchen. There were smoke circles around Dora’s head while she attempted to salvage some of the bread slices from a sure death.

  “Dora, stop. You’ll burn yourself,” I said.

  She turned. A soot smudge trailed down her already sweating face. “I hate throwing food away. It’s just a disgrace! I can’t even manage toast!”

  I moved her aside, grabbing the large fork that punctured the piece of bread over the fire. The particular slice in question looked like fireplace scraps. Probably tasted like it, too.

  “Look, I’ll show you. There’s nothing to it once you see it.”

  I cut some new slices, making sure they were thick enough so that the large fork would not tear through the bread, and placed one over the fire. A few seconds of flame, then flip over, that was it. I then put the slice on a plate and added a dollop of creamy butter.

  “Do you have some brown sugar and some cinnamon?” I asked Dora.

  Her eyes watched my hands. “I think so. Why?”

  “Let me show you my trick.” I stretched a hand as she went into the pantry for the required items. She returned with two glass bottles, both full of auburn specks. I took a pinch of each and sprinkled them on every plate, letting the sugar and cinnamon rest on the butter that clung to the bread.

  “That’s it. Mary, Caldwell House’s cook, taught me that. It makes all the difference, you’ll see.”

  “Thanks.” Dora’s smile was tight, her face a tad flushed. Damn it, I should have let her serve the sooty slices. I fetched Ms. Simple, who was already on her way, followed by the even paler Mr. Keery.

  We sat down to tea and toast, once again around the battle-wounded kitchen table.

  “Dora, this is outstanding,” Ms. Simple said. She raised the corner of her bread to her eyes. “Is this cinnamon?”

  Dora nodded.

  “Well, you’ve outdone yourself. Wonderful.”

  I kept my eyes on my plate and let Dora scoop up all the praise. No need to start making enemies so early in the day.

  “Ms. Simple, I was wondering where you keep the dusters and floor wax? I tried to find them this morning, but I’m afraid I had no luck.”

  “Yes, I saw you’d begun already. Removed the sheets off the sitting room furniture. That was not necessary.”

  I stopped chewing. Bloody hell. “I thought I’d give the furniture a good scrub.”

  “That’s all well and good, but the sheets must return to their proper places.”

  “But—”

  “I’m sorry, Anne, but the master hates to see the sofas and such uncovered in the sitting room, so right after you’ve finished your meal, please begin replacing them.”

  “Couldn’t I at least swap those sheets for new ones? They are dragging dust,” I said, while my fingernails dug into the table’s wood. Now I saw how the marks on its surface had been made.

  “That’s up to you. If you really find the old sheets that repulsive, then, by all means, replace them. The master must not to come down and see everything uncovered, so please, I want it all back to normal within the hour. That should be enough time, don’t you think?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “There’s no need for ‘ma’am.’ Just call me Ms. Simple.”

  I nodded and finished my tea in silence. I chanced a look at Dora, who had a bright smile on her peach lips. Next time, I’d let her burn the house down before lifting a single utensil to help her.

  Nine

  Throughout the afternoon, I listened for a repetition of the morning’s noise, but caught nothing of interest. The house was still, as if balancing over a precipice, afraid any loud word would send it crashing down to the waters below. Not too pleasant, but I supposed I’d get used to it soon enough.

  I finished washing floors and began the arduous task of polishing silver. There wasn’t much of it, considering the size of the manor, or at least, not much that I could see. Lord Grey could have had it all stashed away in his chambers, the silver turning dull in seclusion. My fingers turned into cramped lumps, covered in the viscous goo that I swabbed onto the platters, tea sets and dinnerware.

  No one disturbed me. I wondered what Ms. Simple and Dora were up to in the drowsy afternoon. In all honesty, with a household as diminished as Rosewood’s, I could not understand why a housekeeper was needed at all, but I was not about to question the way things were run. I’d already fumbled with Dora. And on top of it all, I missed Elsie. Waves of homesickness swept over me as all the little tasks reminded me of her, of her silliness and her willingness to laugh no matter the hour or the circumstance. Laughter seemed to be in short order in Rosewood.

  When I finished with the blasted silver, I found I did not know what else to occupy my time with, so I went in search of Ms. Simple to see if anything still required my attention. I found her in her room, reading.

  “If you are finished with your tasks, you are free to do as you like until supper. May I ask that you return to the kitchen a bit earlier to check on Dora? I’m not foolish enough to think she developed culinary skills at the precise moment we have another member in our home. If you could show her whatever tips you can, all our digestive systems would appreciate it.” She gave me a queasy smile.

  “Yes, Ms. Simple.” I would be doing nothing of the sort.

  I trailed out to the front hall, passing the once again sheet-smothered sitting room. Having nothing to do was an uncomfortable state. My hands itched to be put to work and, for one surreal moment, I even considered doing some sewing. Thank God another idea came to my rescue. What if I took a walk around the grounds? I listened for any reasons why I shouldn’t and heard none. So I returned to my room to fetch my cloak and then entered the winter afternoon.

  The roses looked the same as the day before, and I wondered, neither for the first nor the last time, how they could bloom with such fervent enthusiasm in the hostile climate. The snow was a soft powder under my feet as I made a turn around the house to where I’d seen Mr. Keery take the horses. A wooden building stretched before me, closed off to my eyes, but not to my nose. I could smell the rich, chocolate scent of horses, the wild hint of hay, the warm, leather saddles. I inhaled and smiled.

  Farther down was a copse of trees, their figures crowded around a spot in the middle of them. The closer I got, the more uneasy I became, my ears twitching with the crackle of tension I could feel. I was about to turn back when I caught a sliver
of glittering water through the thick trees.

  Water was not a close friend of mine, but I moved toward it, pulled by its gurgle. There, in the center, was a large fountain. I frowned. Why would anyone put a fountain so far from the house, where it couldn’t be seen?

  It was rather plain, with only one cascade of reluctant liquid, but there was something about it that sent my knees knocking together. It was made of black marble, with no pebbles of inconsistency, no lines, no cracks. The water reflected the trees around it so that the effect was a cameo, silhouettes of trees against the black background. I had just raised a hand to touch the edge when the distracting sensation of being watched returned. I shifted, making a loose circle around me, but saw no one. So much for a relaxing stroll. I turned to leave, but a piece of my cloak caught on a nearby branch. I tugged at it. It would not come loose, so I had to maneuver around to grip the branch. I had not noticed how sharp some of the smaller twigs were, wooden skewers that took offense all too easily. I cried out when one of them punctured my right palm in a hot stab.

  With an angry jerk, my cloak came loose. A thin trickle of blood spattered the churned snow and I cursed, bringing my palm up to my lips. I walked back to the house, sucking on my punctured hand every once in a while, until I came around the corner and headed toward the front door.

  On the opposite side, next to a grouping of yet more skeletal trees, was the outline of a man. He turned in my direction and held my gaze through the dimming, bland light. I blinked, and he was gone.

  “I saw someone on the grounds,” I announced around the table, picking at my liquefied potatoes and charred chicken breast. Ms. Simple stopped chewing.

  “Where?”

  “By the side of the house. He was standing very still.”

  No one said anything for a few minutes.

  “It was probably the master, he enjoys the occasional stroll in the afternoon,” said Ms. Simple.

  “Oh. I should have curtsied or something. I just stood, staring.”

  Dora moved her greasy fork. “He won’t care. Most likely, he did not even see you.”

  I kept quiet, but I could still see that figure, the unseen eyes weighing me down like stones.

  Three weeks passed. I wasn’t getting any more used to the food, but the hours were settling down into routine, unlike the dust I was trying to scourge from the manor. I’d never seen a place in such a state.

  I spent my mornings in the dining and sitting rooms, polishing and scrubbing while Dora cursed at the stove and various other kitchen devices. The smells that drifted in were ghastly, but I’d learned my lesson and kept my feet out of her culinary domain.

  The routine was only broken one day a week, when the man who delivered our vegetables and meat rumbled up the long path to the manor on his cart. Ms. Simple would put on her best shawl, and Dora would run a much-needed comb through her hair, all to meet the man from the nearby town. I watched from the doorway as the three of them chatted, rare laughter filling the winter air.

  There were never any letters for either woman, but they always asked and made the man, John, look through his bag. I had a suspicion they went through those motions each week to hold his attention a while longer, to brush against a life that was so removed from theirs just a few minutes more.

  I enjoyed watching them during those times, when the heaviness I didn’t understand lifted off them, and they prattled on like any two women in a London market.

  I enjoyed those days as much as they.

  On one afternoon, in which I found myself idle again, I decided to set out on a bit of a thorough exploration, long overdue. Not outside this time, but inside. Ms. Simple and Dora were in their rooms, Mr. Keery was in the stables as usual, and the master was . . . wherever he liked to spend his time, so I had little incentive to curb my curiosity.

  I waited until the house was silent around me, then set out deeper into its bowels, past the staircase, past the edge of what I knew. Whatever hope had been chirping inside me about what I’d find slowly began to strangle itself with the cold that seemed to grow the farther into the manor I moved. Just a few paces past the staircase and the trembling in my hands became pretty severe. There had to be a broken windowpane somewhere. This could not be normal, even in such a large, stone-crafted house.

  Plunging my hands into my pockets, I moved forward. The walls were tight around me, the wallpaper faded by a sun that no longer appeared to reach down these passages, the smell dank with neglect. No one had come down to look at, let alone clean, any of the rooms that were hidden behind the forbidding doors. I tested one, to make sure, and found it locked, the latch hitching with a metallic cough. Well, at least I wouldn’t be expected to dust in there.

  I tried two more doors, but by that time, my hands were shaking to such a degree that I knew I had to turn back, or risk illness. It seemed the house would keep its secrets. And I’d found one more direction in which I couldn’t travel on the grounds. Wonderful.

  As I was turning around to retrace my chilled steps, I thought I heard something—another chuckle. Had I disturbed the master? But as I tried to part the dim light, I could see no one. Fear joined in chorus with the cold to get my legs moving. My head screamed that I needed to get back to the main hall. I didn’t know why I was so panicked, which scared me as much as the fear itself did.

  Finally, I could see the hall; the sunlight that bathed its floor paused on the edge of darkness, not daring to brush through it. I passed the staircase, stepping fully into the sun. Sighing with relief, I turned and peered into the darkness that had spat me back out.

  I shivered. It seemed to peer back.

  Close to dinner time, and more out of boredom than actual need, I climbed the stairs to polish the landing. I hadn’t been to the second story yet, and while it was as cold as the rest of the manor, it had a lovely view of the grounds. The windows had no curtains, and fully allowed a glimpse of the surrounding forest, the trees so close to one another I could hardly see the snowy earth.

  Finding my hands all too soon straying from the work I’d set for myself, I gave it up altogether. Who would care to check up on me, especially since it wasn’t one of my approved duties? A rather convincing argument, I found. So I gave myself up to the sight of the sun setting over the flock of trees.

  It was a soothing moment, allowing me to even forget, somewhat, the strange atmosphere that prevailed in the manor, that sense of something hidden and not too friendly.

  The sun burnt, large against the trees. I’d never seen it quite like that before. In London, I’d always gotten just a peek of its mantle as it lowered, its beauty crushed by buildings and smoke, but here, it was magnificent. First, it burnt orange, then red, lending the landscape its warmth for a few more minutes. One of its rays caught a tendril of my hair in its light. A flash of color wrapped around me, triggering a memory I didn’t even know I possessed: a woman’s face, frowning as she looked at something behind me, her hair a crown of gold on her head, resplendent with sun. My mother.

  Pain grabbed me. Like a hand tightening around my heart, I felt grief taking over my body. For most of my life, I’d been rather independent, as any servant with a father like mine had to be, but at that moment, watching the sun die over the barrier of trees, feeling the cold growing by the second, all I wanted was a comforting arm around my shoulders. A voice to tell me that things would be just fine.

  When I felt a tear coursing down my cheek, I shook my head. What nonsense. I just missed Elsie, that was all. And my home.

  No, I chided myself. Caldwell House was no longer my home. This manor, with all its faults, with all its strangeness, was where I belonged now.

  “Supper, Anne!” Dora’s voice screeched up the stairs.

  “Coming.”

  Good, supper, and then bed. I’d feel better in the morning.

  As I began to turn away from the window, I saw movement near the borderline of trees. I frowned and looked closer. There was that figure again. Although I was sure he had to be
the master, he looked . . . peculiar. The word came into my head without any real basis in fact. He was dressed nicely enough, he moved with elegance, but still, there was something about him that I couldn’t quite place.

  Looking down at the figure, I thought of what Dora had told me the night I’d arrived. Why did he choose to live so isolated?

  Without any warning, the man turned, raised his head, and looked directly at me.

  I gasped and raced down the stairs.

  Later that night, scratches at my door woke me from a restless slumber. I swam up through the layers of twisted dreams to the dark and cold of my room. My heart was pounding, and my breath insisted on abandoning my lungs with such force it burned through my throat. I lay still. For a moment, I thought I’d imagined the sound, that it had just been a dream’s tail disappearing around my ears. But then, I heard it again—scratching.

  I didn’t know if there were any animals in the manor, but I doubted it. Except for Mr. Keery, no one else seemed the type to care for pets. Rats were never out of the question, even in such a grand house, but even that thought rang false in my head. I grit my teeth and unwound my limbs from the sheets.

  “Bloody hell!” I exclaimed as the cold struck me. I could see my breath again. I looked over to the window. It was closed and bolted, something I had checked again and again before retiring to bed. There had to be a draft. How could the temperature change like that, in dips and plunges?

  I walked to the door. The scratching continued, lazy and regular, like a cat grooming itself. As I neared the noise, though, it stopped.

  Holding my breath, I inched an ear against the wood in the hopes of hearing either a retreating creature or maybe some panting. Anything that would solve the mystery and allow me to return to my warm, body-shaped dent on the bed. I could hear nothing, though. No breathing, no sighing, no panting.