I found a rose, in the devil’s garden,
Wandering alone, little lonesome rose,
For her the sun is never shining,
For her the clouds have, no silver lining
I found a rose, in the devil’s garden,
Playing the game, of the Moth and Flame,
Beneath the powder and paint,
Maybe the heart of a saint,
Where sorrow grows, I found a rose.
I found a rose, in the devil’s garden,
Wandring alone, little lonesome rose,
For her the sun is never shining,
For her the clouds have, no silver lining
I found a rose, in the devil’s garden,
Playing the game, of the Moth and Flame,
But maybe deep in her heart,
She’s thinking of a new start,
Where sorrow grows, I found a rose.
Inside, the house was like a poem fragment—only half there. Except that poems were beautiful, and this house was barren, dirty, and desolate. Naked walls and dust-carpeted floors, it was no-man’s-land. Nearly everything Floralie and Tom hadn’t brought with them to Whitterly End, they had sold or thrown away.
Floralie dared not take more than two steps in. She closed the door behind her and dropped A History of Dreamlands, a volcano of dust erupting from beneath it. Then, she slid down against the door and tore open Mr. Tullier’s letter. She read:
Dear Mr. Laurel,
You may remember me from your and Viscaria’s wedding. I believe we met briefly over drinks—I am still scrubbing the champagne stain from my good tie. I do not know how you Englishmen handle your children, but to abandon them to fend for themselves seems to me the utmost of shameful acts for any parent. As I assume you are oblivious, I wanted to inform you that your daughter has arrived at my home requesting assistance in finding Viscaria.
I admit, many years have slipped by, and I, too, have grown curious about the Viscaria I knew long ago. Floralie has brought with her something most curious indeed—a box of dried flowers with a letter from Viscaria. Viscaria writes in her letter that the flowers must be decoded in my flower language. Alas, all three copies of my floriographies were destroyed long ago.
If you care at all for your daughter, I suggest you pluck up some courage and assist Floralie in reuniting with her mother, no matter Viscaria’s state of well-being. I do wish you all the best in your remaining years and would most appreciate a prompt response.
Fondly,
Sylvestre Tullier
Floralie dropped the letter. So Mr. Tullier had lied—his flower dictionaries were destroyed. Gone. Questions whipped so fast through Floralie’s mind, she felt the way an umbrella might feel in a hurricane, but one question was clear: What now?
If Mr. Tullier’s floriographies were destroyed, how would she ever find Mama? Why had Mr. Tullier lied to her? Was Papa truly the only one who knew where Mama was sent? If so, then it was finished. Everything. The secret had died two deaths: once with the floriographies, and again with Papa.
Grandmama’s awful perfume wafted under Floralie’s nose at the thought. Grandmama once watched Floralie paint irises, and when Floralie finished, Grandmama said that the flowers were not botanically correct. Floralie’s brush strokes were too sweeping, too impressionistic for Grandmama. She tore up the painting and made Floralie repaint the flowers her way. And then Floralie remembered spending one Easter holiday at Grandmama’s with Tom. Grandmama kissed Floralie on the cheek, then told her that if she didn’t fix the gap in her teeth, she would yank it shut herself, as if Floralie had any control over it. And when night rolled in, the orphans’ weeping could be heard even from Grandmama’s manor, and Tom whispered to Floralie, “It’s okay to be afraid.”
Floralie stood. She should have felt useless, hopeless. She had come all the way to France for nothing. No answers were to be found here. But she didn’t feel hopeless. There was something in the air of this long-forgotten, dead, and dusty dollhouse that breathed fervor into Floralie’s lungs. She was a wildflower; that was what Mama always said, and wildflowers grew within the weeds. They pushed through the cracks in cathedral walls, and just there—if Floralie squinted—she could see them creeping through the windowsills of this skeleton house. She was a wildflower, and wildflowers bloomed in hopeless places.
There had to be something she could do, some way “in.” Some mouse hole to crawl through. And Floralie just so happened to know that this house was full of mouse holes. Two rooms away and one staircase up was Mama and Papa’s room. Surely, Floralie thought, one of them must have left something—some clue, some memory, anything.
Floralie’s footsteps echoed throughout the hollow house as she skittered up the stairs. Perhaps it was simply the look of the place that brought about the smell, but Floralie could swear Mama’s bedroom still smelled of the wildflowers Mama kept in her windows and the incense she once tried to burn to “ignite her creativity,” but only ended up igniting the curtains.
The only furniture that remained was the four-poster bed frame and mattress that had been too large to fit through the door. As Floralie neared the bed frame, out of the corner of her eye, Papa’s big blue chair and Mama’s ornately carved vanity table flickered. But each time she looked again, all she saw were shadows.
The mattress was sunken and marred with dirt. How dirt had found its way to the mattress was a mystery to Floralie, but as she looked closer, her breath quickened. The dirt was not dirt—it was charcoal. Someone had drawn in charcoal all over the mattress. Childish, clumsy, and disproportionate, but drawings they were—or were they?
Pins and needles prickled up Floralie’s spine. She stepped back and examined the mattress drawing as a whole; it was a map. Or, at least, something similar to a map. The image was made up of a series of arrows connecting five pictures.
The first picture, Floralie took to be a tree (though it could have more easily passed as a broccoli floret), and beneath it sat two stick figures, one boy, one girl. An arrow pointed from that picture to one of the boy walking down a winding road. At the end of the road stood a dollhouse, six windows wide and two windows tall. Another arrow pointed to two male stick figures, one twice as tall as the other. The second-to-last picture was a triangle divided by horizontal lines into thirds. It looked to Floralie like an obelisk.
The final one was so poorly drawn that Floralie could not make out exactly what it was. The drawing depicted two slender triangles lazily crossed over each other to form a lopsided X. It could have been a million things—a crossroads sign, a pair of swords, perhaps even a feeble attempt at a four-leaf clover.
Floralie returned her gaze to the first picture—the boy and girl under the tree. Looking at it again, Floralie realized it wasn’t just any old tree, and the children weren’t just any old children. The tree was a willow, the children were Floralie and Nino, and one thing was certain: The drawings were Nino’s. He had been here, and these drawings were his story since the night he left Monet’s house.
Floralie tore through the streets to Monet’s manor. She had memorized the drawings by heart, repeated them over and over again in her mind: willow and stick figures, road and house, tall and short figures, obelisk, mystery triangles.
She found Miss Clairoux outside the manor carrying a stack of books up to her eyes.
“What’ve you got there, Miss Clairoux?” said Floralie, forcing a laugh. She tried to act as normally as possible, even though her heart was still stuttering over the run-in with Grandmama. There was no need to worry Miss Clairoux.
The books leaned precariously, and Miss Clairoux swayed to balance them. “I had to rescue them, ma chérie. Had absolutely no choice when I heard that Madame Favreau was tossing them out of her library. Now, never mind me. What’s got you in such a dreadful state? You smell of dirt and dust, and . . . is that charcoal?”
“Miss Clairoux—” but Floralie stopped, for she simply did not know where to begin.
“Yes,” prodded Miss
Clairoux. “Go on.”
“I’ve found Nino—I mean—no, I haven’t found him. But a piece of him.”
And as they ambled back to Monet’s house, Floralie told Miss Clairoux about the drawings.
“I didn’t know Nino could draw,” said Miss Clairoux as they reached the end of Monet’s tulip path.
“He can’t,” said Floralie, pushing open the front door. “Not well, anyway. I couldn’t figure out what the last drawing was. But you know what I’m sure of, Miss Clairoux?”
“What’s that, dear?”
“I’m sure that was Nino at the library. He took that drawing book, and he’s learning to draw—however horribly. Somewhere out there, he’s drawing.” He’s learning my language. He’s trying, was what Floralie wanted to say, but she kept that to herself.
As they reached the door, Floralie turned to Miss Clairoux again. “I don’t think he left those drawings in my old house for his own amusement,” she said. “He’s guiding me someplace . . . I’ve just got to figure out where.”
Floralie was about to take the doorknob when she remembered the crumpled letter growing hot in her palm. Floralie clenched it harder, listening to it crackle in her fist.
“And, Miss Clairoux, there’s something else.” She gritted her teeth. “It’s about Mr. Tullier. He’s been lying to us. This whole time, he’s been nothing but a wrinkly old liar.”
Miss Clairoux tilted her chin. “My—ma chérie, that is no way to talk of Mr. Tullier. You must be mistaken. Let’s get you inside; surely, you’ve just had a spot too much sun.”
“I’m not mistaken, Miss Clairoux. Mr. Tullier’s flower dictionaries are destroyed. Every last one.”
“Art is believing in the possibilities of things you cannot see,” said Mama, leaving a squiggly purple passionflower behind La Musée du Louvre. But Floralie knew that time is built on belief, too. And she knew that belief can change memories, and she knew that memories change people, and people change their minds. People change their minds.
Yet still, Floralie couldn’t flick away her belief in Mama, no matter how impossible. No matter how improbable.
“You two are late. Did everything go smoothly in the village?” said Mr. Tullier when Floralie and Miss Clairoux marched through the yellow kitchen. He leaned against the counter, sipping a mug of coffee. Philomenos lay curled in a napkin on the table. “What’ve you got there?” he added, gesturing to Floralie’s dreamland book and Miss Clairoux’s teetering stack. His subtle smirk made Floralie’s stomach twist with anger.
Floralie did not answer. Instead, she demanded, “When were you planning on telling me? When were you planning on telling us your floriographies were destroyed?”
Mr. Tullier set his mug on the counter. “You read the letter. You had no right to read it.”
“It was addressed to my father. My dead father. I had every right to read it, and now I know the truth—you’ve been lying to us all along.”
Mr. Tullier waggled a finger at Floralie. “You said your father left you—nothing about him snuffing it. I think that makes you the liar here.”
“Me? You’ve been the one playing games—getting me to work for you for free! You never had any plans of finding her. It was just a game to you. I’ve been so stupid. My mother never meant anything to you.”
“Don’t you dare—”
Miss Clairoux cut in: “Let’s all just calm—”
But Floralie fired, “I do dare—”
“VISCARIA—” Mr. Tullier whirled around and banged his fists on the counter.
Philomenos jolted awake.
Wrinkles branched like tree twigs along Mr. Tullier’s eyes. “Viscaria”—he choked on the word—“meant everything to me.” There was something about the stops and the sighs and the sadness in his voice that sounded like a broken poem. “All I needed,” breathed Mr. Tullier, “was time.”
“You’ve had your time,” shot Floralie.
“I HAVE—” Mr. Tullier yanked a chair from the table and slouched into it. “I have something.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled from it a wrinkly, yellowed paper. There were mouse bites in the corner; it was the same paper Philomenos had attempted to steal in the garden. “My last page,” he said, handing it to Floralie.
Floralie and Miss Clairoux both sat down across Mr. Tullier. Floralie took the page and read,
EGLANTINE: Poetry; I wound to heal
Eglantine (Rosa rubiginosa), also known as “sweet briar” and “wild rose,” is a flower from the Rosaceae family native to Europe. Eglantines are characterized by five pink petals surrounding a cluster of yellow stamens.
The eglantine’s meaning is one of confusion for some, but of truth for others. While its two meanings, “poetry” and “I wound to heal,” may appear separate, I argue they are tied as one. It is more often the poetry that aches with longing, sorrow, and brokenness that heals those with despairing hearts, rather than the poetry that is complete in happiness. Indeed, poetry wounds to heal. Therefore, the eglantine is a powerful flower, as, much like poetry, it encompasses not only joy and sorrow, but also healing.
A watercolor of the pink flower dotted the edge of the page. Floralie recognized it immediately as one of the box’s flowers.
“Reminds me of Nino,” muttered Floralie. The anger yanking at her stomach eased its grip. She looked to Mr. Tullier and added, “He left me some drawings—more of a map, really. I think he wants me to follow it.”
“Well, go on—draw them out,” said Mr. Tullier, heaving himself out of his chair. “There are newspapers on the sitting-room love seat—use one of those. I’ll get a pen.”
Floralie nodded and crossed the kitchen to the blue-walled sitting room. Atop the love seat was, indeed, a stack of newspapers. Floralie grabbed the topmost paper, and was about to dash back to the kitchen when a headline at the bottom right of the page jolted her heart. She dropped into the love seat and peered closer . . .
MISSING PERSON ALERT!
Floralie Laurel, 11, of Whitterly End, Kent, England, reportedly vanished the evening of July 5 with Delphine Clairoux, 68, and her alleged grandson, Norman, whose surname and age are unknown. They were last seen inside the Whitterly Public Library by Laurel’s brother and legal guardian, Thomas Laurel, 20. Said Thomas in an interview to the Whitterly Times, “I will go to the ends of the earth to bring back my sister. She will be found, and she will return home.” The only evidence left was a letter from Laurel to her brother stating she would be traveling to France. Authorities have begun searching both England and France to bring Laurel home.
This is the second report of missing children in the area after orphan Konstantinos Leventis, 12, disappeared from the Adelaide Laurel Orphanage for Unfortunate Children, also of Whitterly End, only two months prior. It is uncertain whether the incidents are related, as well as whether either case is one of kidnapping or runaways.
Laurel is a petite child with curly blond hair, green eyes, and fair skin. Clairoux is tall, gray-haired, and blind. If spotted, do not approach Clairoux, as she could react with violence. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts of Floralie Laurel, please contact the British Association of Missing Persons at the address below.
“Floralie? Floralie, are you quite all right?” Miss Clairoux’s voice drifted through the hall, and she and Mr. Tullier appeared in the doorway.
Mr. Tullier narrowed his eyes. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“The paper, it . . .” Blood rushed from Floralie’s head and pounded in her ears.
“Yes?” breathed Miss Clairoux. “Yes, what is it, dear? Tell me what the paper says.”
“They’re looking for us. And I don’t think it’ll be long now till they figure out where we are.”
Floralie read the article for Miss Clairoux, then added, “I saw her. Grandmama. I saw her today in the village.”
Mr. Tullier crouched down on his knees, creaking and crackling with the floorboards. He handed Floralie a pen and whispered, �
��Draw them now. Draw what Nino drew.”
Floralie took the pen, and in the newspaper’s margins, she sketched Nino’s symbols, explaining each as she went.
“These figures under the tree are me and Nino,” she said, pointing to the first image. “And this one here is my old house—that’s where he left the drawings. And this one, with the tall and short figures, I’d assume one figure is Nino, but I’m not sure of the other. This one, I think is an obelisk, and the last”—she drew in the two crossed triangles—“I haven’t a clue.”
Miss Clairoux trailed her fingers along the bumps in the page. Mr. Tullier studied the drawings carefully, then, after a moment, he said, “The fourth one—that’s not an obelisk. That’s the Eiffel Tower.”
Floralie looked to the fourth image again. “Y-you’re right.” How could she have missed it? The triangle, the three lines separating each level . . . It was obvious.
Floralie looked up. “D’you think Nino’s gone to Paris?”
“Yes,” said Mr. Tullier. “And those crossed triangles—could they be pointe shoes?”
Something stirred in Floralie’s stomach. Butterflies, perhaps—no—fireflies.
“I think that boy is on to something,” muttered Mr. Tullier. “Don’t know how he’s onto it, but he knows.”
“Knows what?” said Floralie.
“About the last floriography.”
“The last floriography?” chirped Miss Clairoux. “I thought you said they were destroyed?”
“Mine were. But . . . there was one other. One that escaped.”
“Well—where’d it go? Who took it?” asked Floralie.
“Viscaria,” said Mr. Tullier. “It had belonged to her, after all—well, sort of. Some might argue she stole it from me.”
“Well, that doesn’t help us much, now does it?” Floralie said with a sigh. “If I could find Viscaria without the floriography, I would.”
“Listen, Floralie,” pressed Mr. Tullier. “Viscaria kept the book in Paris. In Paris, in the same place she kept her pointe shoes—at least, that was the last place I remember her keeping it.”
The Flourishing of Floralie Laurel Page 14
