A Mosaic of Wings

by Kimberly Duffy

  With one final cursory glance at the chrysalis on the table, Mr. Steed ambled away. “I’m having trouble breathing this heavy air.” He ducked into his tent.

  “He’ll be singing in a few minutes,” Owen said with a laugh. “I don’t think hyperparasites can compare with his bottle of opium tincture.”

  Nora huffed. “He isn’t easily impressed, is he?” She shone a bright smile at Owen. “He’s probably never seen anything like this before. Have you?”

  Owen slipped the puparium back into the jar and shook his head. “Never. I think it’s fascinating. But how you remembered a childhood conversation you had with your father is even more fascinating. You have a mind like a snare.”

  He met her eyes, unblinking, taking her measure. She didn’t know if what he saw pleased him. Occasionally, when she looked in the mirror, she thought she might be pretty, but she’d never spent too much time thinking about it. Her mother was beautiful—or at least she had been, before illness and grief had turned her into a shadow. And Nora had been told she looked like Mother.

  Did Owen like what he saw? The way his tongue darted out and wet his lips said so. As did the even breaths he took and the almost imperceptible way he leaned toward her. She’d never have noticed except that she was staring at him.

  She blinked and looked away. Her hands fumbled on the jar as she lifted it and set it back down. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  He cleared his throat, and when she glanced back up at him, a grin curled his lips into something resembling the old Owen from college—the irritating one who constantly tried to best her in class. Her heart slowed its frantic beating, and the heat left her face.

  “Have you ever considered doing fieldwork permanently?” he asked. “You obviously love it.”

  She crossed her arms. “I want to resurrect my father’s journal. I can’t do that from India.”

  “But you love the discovery. It nettles you that Frederic hasn’t allowed you to join us since the ant fiasco. Not that you’re missing much. It’s a whole lot of wading through muck and staring at tree limbs. Though, if you came along, you’d see something with your eagle eye that the rest of us missed.”

  A mosquito buzzed near Nora’s ear, and she smacked at it. Pulling her hand away, she saw it smashed against her fingers, her own blood staining her skin. The awful things were sucking the life from her. Like your duty to something you don’t want to do for the rest of your life?

  She flicked the dead insect away and rubbed her thumb against her forefinger to remove all traces of the mosquito’s lunch. She closed her eyes. She wanted to run the journal. Her father had loved it. She loved it.

  Owen laid his hand over hers. When she opened her eyes, she saw he’d drawn so close to her that only the wind could fit between them. Still holding her hand in his, he drew it close to his chest. “I think maybe God’s path for you is bigger than anything you’ve ever considered. You could be the next Maria Merian—yes, I heard you, and yes, I know who she is—but not if you’re stuck in Ithaca, toiling away on a periodical. Maria went to Suriname. Maybe you’re supposed to travel around the world and make your own mark on science.”

  Nora shook her head. “It’s a lovely idea, but fanciful. Life isn’t an adventure novel, Owen. I have commitments and responsibilities in Ithaca.”

  “I understand. Really. I’ve spent my entire life being told what I should do and be. But I think I’m done with all that. It only ever led to disappointment—for me and everyone else.”

  She looked past him, into the trees that teemed with so much life that most of it hadn’t been discovered or named or labeled or catalogued. And yes, she wanted to be a part of that. Wanted to live in this dreamy, misty world nestled between mountains. Wanted to be like Maria Merian. But Maria hadn’t had an ill mother. Or a father’s expectations.

  “I can’t ignore everything in Ithaca. That’s real life. This . . . this is a dream.”

  Owen’s mouth tipped into a half smile. “There are stranger things than dreams coming true, Percipient.”

  Nora tossed on her hard narrow cot, Owen’s words ricocheting around her mind. They fought for precedence with the night sounds—the insects and birds calling to one another. Then a guttural growl echoed around the hills, quieting the other wildlife. Even quieting her thoughts.

  Nora sat up straight and shifted beneath the blanket twisting around her legs. Mr. Alford had warned them not to walk in the forest at night alone. The nocturnal Bengal tiger hunted after sunset. This was the first time she’d heard its presence. Her heart tripped despite the knowledge that she was safe in camp with the others and a roaring fire.

  Another sound, this one choking and softened by whimpers, drew her toward the end of the cot where she’d draped her wrapper. She shoved her arms into it and quickly buttoned it as she approached the tent flap. When she pushed it aside, she saw Owen pacing outside Mr. Alford’s tent. She stepped into the open, and Owen crept toward her.

  “He’s been vomiting for ten minutes. I don’t know if he wants help or to be left alone. He hasn’t called for anyone.”

  The moon, hanging heavy above them, shone silver light over Owen’s white nightshirt. He shuffled, drawing Nora’s attention to his bare feet and calves poking below the hem. A fuzz of fine blond hair covered his legs, and Nora felt as though she’d bitten into an unripe persimmon. Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. At least her nightgown fell to her feet. There was no chance of Owen seeing her legs. But she’d never have thought the sight of a man’s legs could so affect her.

  “Well? What do you think?” he asked. “Should we see if he needs help?”

  Her stomach rose as the sounds coming from Mr. Alford’s tent intensified. She pressed her knuckles against her mouth and swallowed a belch. Finally, after it seemed Mr. Alford had emptied every bit of sustenance he’d consumed in the past week, the sounds of insects reigned again.

  Owen and Nora looked at each other, eyes wide. She knew from tending Leonard and William that Mr. Alford must be in the middle of the worst of it. Leonard had been nearly senseless, unable to reach his own water or clean himself up.

  She groaned. Another patient. “I guess I’ll tend to him. It seems to be my lot here.”

  She ducked into her tent and quickly shed her wrap before donning her skirt and shirtwaist over her nightclothes. It would have to do. She stumbled past Owen, her bare feet scraping against the sharp edges of a stone.

  He stopped her with a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll clean up if you sit with him and help him get some fluids into his body.” He motioned her toward the covered pot of water, and she nodded.

  By the time she’d located a tin cup, filled it, and slipped into Mr. Alford’s tent, Owen had already mopped up the floor beside the bed with a linen sheet. The closed room smelled of vomit and sweat. She pushed the flap open, securing it with the tie, then lit the lamp sitting on the small, cross-legged table and took in the dim interior.

  Mr. Alford was meticulous. Neatly stacked books lined the far wall, and a trunk in the corner sported tools arranged in a precise row. No pictures, mementos, or personal effects. He lay supine on the cot, his arm thrown over his eyes. With his other hand, he clutched a blanket to his chin, and Nora saw his form trembling beneath it. Sweat trickled down his cheeks, and dark circles hollowed his face. He groaned, and Nora almost felt compassion toward him.

  Pragmatism took over. “If you’re done cleaning that up, Owen, will you get me a clean towel and a bowl of water?”

  Owen nodded and left the tent, arms full of malodorous laundry. She dragged a camp chair from near the trunk across the tent and set it beside Mr. Alford’s cot.

  He tilted his elbow up and peered at her. “What are you doing?” His words sounded scratchy, and a slick of vomit moistened the corner of his mouth.

  “Seeing as I’ve already nursed two men through this illness, I think it’s only right I offer you the same.”

  “You didn’t offer to help the men. I forced
you. But I don’t want—”

  She held the cup to his lips, stopping his words. She tipped it slightly, dribbling the water into his mouth. When he turned his head, she pulled it away. “You did force me to nurse them. Just like you forced me to stay in camp, so now I have little work to do and might as well see that you get better.”

  Owen returned, carrying a bowl of water. A folded bit of toweling was draped over his forearm. He set the bowl on the table. “The water is tepid. I wish we had access to a cool spring or ice. I’m not sure this will help bring down his fever.” He took the cup from her and handed her the towel.

  “It’ll have to do.” Nora dipped the corner of the towel in the water and wiped Mr. Alford’s mouth before dampening the entire thing and laying it over his forehead.

  Mr. Alford tossed his head, and the towel slipped to his pillow. “Leave me.”

  “Stop being a child. You’re ill, and you need someone nearby.” She picked up the fabric and rearranged it, her hand boiling when it brushed his skin. She glanced at Owen, who looked as worried as she felt. “His fever is high.”

  “I’ll sit with you.” He left, returning a moment later with another chair, which he set beside her. “I hope you don’t come down with anything.”

  She nodded. How awful. She’d hate for Owen to see her like this. Mr. Alford thrashed weakly and exhaled a series of rapid breaths before growing still. His hand fell from his head, and his chest rose and fell with a steady rhythm.

  “He’s asleep,” Owen said. “If you want to return to bed, I’ll stay with him.”

  “I won’t be able to sleep. You can leave.”

  “I don’t want you to be here alone all night.”

  So they sat, sharing the same fetid air, and watched over Mr. Alford, until Owen slumped into his chair and fell asleep, his soft snores keeping Nora company.

  Less than half an hour later, their patient bolted upright and covered his mouth. Nora slid a bowl onto his lap. When he’d finished, she carried it outside and dumped it beside the tent, the tiger’s scream still fresh in her mind. She wasn’t about to approach the forest alone. Mr. Alford was wiping his mouth with his sleeve when she returned.

  She pressed her hand against his forehead, satisfied the fever didn’t burn hotter, and resettled into the chair. She smiled at Owen, whose head was tipped back, his mouth open. He’d sprawled out. His legs stretched in front of him, and his arms hung limply at his sides. No pretense clung to him. Even in sleep, he embodied frank confidence.

  The cot creaked as Mr. Alford lay back down. “Have you known him long?”

  “Since I started college. Three years.”

  “Do you have an understanding?”

  “An understanding of what?”

  He motioned a trembling hand between her and Owen. Nora’s face burned. Did he think . . . ? “We don’t have an understanding. We’re friends. Colleagues.”

  He snorted. “Colleagues aren’t friends. They can’t be trusted.”

  “You worked with Mr. Steed at Oxford and thought enough of him to ask him to join you here.”

  “I don’t trust Jeffrey, I only know what to expect from him. And that’s a more reassuring trait to have in a colleague anyway. My family learned firsthand that colleagues aren’t people you can refer to as friends.”

  Owen jerked and sank even deeper into his seat. Nora reached to adjust his head, which hung at an uncomfortable angle, but snapped her hand back and forced her eyes away from him. Instead, she straightened the blanket at the foot of the cot and smoothed out the wrinkles.

  “What happened with your family?” she asked.

  Mr. Alford gasped and clutched his stomach. Nora held up the bowl, but he waved it away and closed his eyes. For several long minutes, he lay there, face gray and glistening with sweat, as he emitted a lengthy, miserable groan. He grew silent, and Nora thought he’d fallen asleep, but then his eyelids fluttered open, and he focused on her.

  “Wretched business, this malady.” He folded his hands atop his chest and sighed. “My father was a botanist and worked with Joseph Hooker here in India about ten years ago.”

  “I’ve heard of him.”

  “Everyone has heard of him. But no one had heard of my father, despite his pioneering work on Indian carnivorous plants. Until he ran for president of the Royal Society when Hooker stepped down. It was almost a certainty.”

  His voice had dropped to a whisper, and Nora leaned closer, resting her elbows on her knees. She hadn’t realized his father was so esteemed a scientist. The elder Alford had even worked with the world’s most celebrated botanist.

  “Everything went well until my father identified a rare pitcher plant in northern India. His research assistant, the youngest son of a baron but also close friend to a duke, took credit for the discovery, even going so far as to steal my father’s notes and present the findings to the British Royal Society. The papers loved him, and he soon stole the society’s vote, becoming president.”

  Nora exhaled, realizing she’d been holding her breath. How awful. “Where is your father now? Is he still in India?”

  Mr. Alford shook his head. “After losing credit for his labor and the honor of leading the society, he lost all desire to work. He died a few years ago. I hope my research here reestablishes my family in the scientific community and I’m able to redeem my father’s place. Nothing means more to me. I can’t even imagine returning home having failed.”

  He rolled onto his side and presented his back to her. In only a second, his breathing took on the even cadence of sleep, as though the telling of his story had stolen the last of his energy.

  Nora knew the need to make good a blot on family history. She knew how exhausting the endeavor to salvage a father’s legacy. And as she watched Mr. Alford sleep and listened to Owen’s reassuring snuffles, she wondered if it was worth it. Did all the sacrifice and striving and bitterness really bring honor, or was it all vanity?

  Mr. Alford’s situation wedged its way into Nora’s heart. The desperation he felt, so similar to her own, wouldn’t release her. All the next day, as she mopped his brow with a damp towel and spooned sour-smelling yogurt between his lips, she watched the thawing of her heart with a wary eye. He was a challenging, unlikable man and had done nothing to deserve her respect, let alone her compassion. Yet with each of his heaving spells and ill-natured complaints, her thoughts turned toward kindness.

  After lunch, when she went to her tent to wash and change, she saw the gynandromorphic Vindula erota mounted on its board. It was the type of butterfly that could make a collection exceed satisfactory. The type of butterfly that could catch the eye of a scientific society.

  She shook her head, walked across the tent to the bowl set on the table beside her cot, and splashed water over her face. The humidity, a precursor to the heavy rains that made the clouds look swollen, left a layer of sticky sweat over her entire body. It sucked the thin, sheer fabric of her chemise against her torso, becoming a second skin. She wished for nightfall and its cooler temperatures.

  Mr. Alford must be miserable, with his high fever holding steady. Her eyes strayed once more to the butterfly. She scrubbed her neck with the cloth, relishing the trickle of water dripping beneath her collar. Setting the cloth aside, she undid the buttons of her bodice, pulled out her arms, and let it hang from her waist.

  With slow steps, she approached the box still atop her makeshift desk. She lifted the box and sat on the edge of her cot. Her eyes took in the butterfly’s lopsided wings and uneven coloring. “You’re mine.”

  A memory surfaced of another butterfly. One she’d loved from the moment she saw it in her father’s case, wings spread. They were clear like windows, rimmed in brown, and they’d captured her imagination. Greta oto, the glasswing.

  “Why do you have to give it away? It’s ours.” Nora couldn’t bear to part with the brush-footed butterfly.

  “I’m sending it to a friend for his exhibit in Paris. He’ll take good care of it.”

 
“But I want it!”

  “But he needs it, Bumble Bea.” Papa pinched her chin and smiled. “Sometimes we have to give up things we want to fill someone else’s need.”

  She closed her eyes. Her father’s words tore at her conscience.

  “Okay,” she whispered. She set down the box, finished dressing, and attempted to brush through the tangled knots in her hair. Giving up, she twisted it back into a bun at the nape of her neck and secured it with a few pins.

  With a deep sigh, she collected the butterfly and stepped outside. A rustling came from the trees, and Owen emerged from between a cluster of flowering shrubs. Water droplets clung to the hair falling over his eyes—he needed a haircut—and his shirt stuck to his chest, moisture making the fabric translucent.

  His eyes sparkled with a full night’s sleep and a proper cleaning. “There’s a great little spring a quarter mile into the shola. It’s close enough that you can go by yourself.” He noticed the open mounting box in her hand. “Are you going to paint your butterfly?”

  Nora shook her head, the words lodging somewhere between her heart and throat. “I’m not keeping it.”

  He gave a swift shake of his head, sending a spray of fern-scented water across her face. “What? Why? It’s amazing.”

  “I feel . . .” She choked on the foreign word. When did she ever do anything based on feeling? But this was right. She couldn’t explain it, but she knew it. “I feel like I should give it to Mr. Alford.”

  Owen held the back of his hand against her forehead.

  She swatted at it. “I’m not ill, Owen.”

  His hand fell to her cheek, and he caressed her earlobe. “All right. Just making sure.”

  “I think it’s the right thing to do. Last night, Mr. Alford told me he was trying to honor his father. Maybe I can do something to help.”

  The hard lines of Owen’s jaw softened as a gentle smile caressed his lips. “Just when I think I have you all figured out.” He dropped his hand and hooked his thumbs into his waistband. “You could submit an article to a paper. Receive some recognition. Do you want to illustrate it first, at least?”