River of Smoke(17)

He gestured to Fitcher to follow as he plunged into a forest of chest-high grass. Fitcher tried to stay close, but the fellow was going like a mail coach and there was no keeping up with him. In the end he came to a stop and called out: ‘Where’ve ee gone tozing off to now?’

‘Here.’

Fitcher headed towards the sound, and found the young gardener kneeling beside a stone bench that was covered with moss. At the foot of the bench was a spiky plant that was being slowly strangled by a blanket of vines: one glance at the bulbous clumps and tiny thorns, and Fitcher knew that he had indeed made an embarrassingly amateurish error.

‘You see, Mr Penrose,’ said the boy, triumphantly: ‘it is not a cactus but a spurge. The very one that prompted Linnaeus to give this race the name Euphorbia. It is King Juba’s spurge – a fine specimen it must once have been, but I fear it has not much longer to live. That is why I am trying to propagate it elsewhere.’

Fitcher sank shamefacedly on to the bench. ‘Ee’ve shown me up for a druler, I won’t deny it.’ He reached into his pocket and took out the coin. ‘E’ve won eer wager fair and square.’

Without another word the youth stretched out his hand. When Fitcher dropped the dollar into it, he snatched it back and stood staring at the piece of eight as if he’d never seen one before.

‘Where’d’ee live then?’ said Fitcher.

‘Why sir,’ said the youth. ‘I live right here – in that house.’

‘In the cottage ee mean? But it’s a ruin, innit?’

‘By no means, sir,’ said the gardener. ‘Come, I will show you.’

Now, once again, Fitcher was in for a wild coursey through the chest-high grass, chasing after the gardener as he raced towards the ruins of ‘Mon Plaisir’. He arrived grunting and cabaggled, to find him waiting by the door.

‘One can see for oneself,’ said the youth, gesturing at the interior with proprietary pride, ‘this house is not quite as much the ruin as the outside suggests.’

Fitcher had only to look through the door to see that this was true – for despite the drifts of dust on the floor and the spangled nets of cobwebbing that stretched from wall to wall, it was clear that the cottage had not succumbed to the onslaught of the elements. But of furniture, as of any other accoutrements of habitation, Fitcher could see no sign.

‘But where d’ee sleep?’

‘There is no lack of space, sir. See.’

The youth pushed open a door and Fitcher found himself looking into a room that had been carefully dusted and rearranged: the floor was clean and the air was scented with the pleasing aroma of boy’s-love – clumps of the shrub hung suspended from the mantel and the window frames. At the centre of the room lay a pile of sheets and curtains, heaped up like after-grass to form a pallet. A chair and a table stood in one corner, both wiped free of dust. On the tabletop lay a leather-bound sheaf of papers, parted at a page that immediately drew Fitcher’s eye – prominently featured on it was a brightly coloured illustration of a plant.

Not to take a closer look would have been impossible for Fitcher: he stepped over and peered closely at the page – the illustration was hand-drawn and it featured a long-leafed plant that was unfamiliar to him. The text beneath was in French and Latin and he could make almost nothing of it.

‘Is this eer doing then?’

‘Oh no! I did only the drawings, sir – nothing else.’

‘And the rest?’

‘It is the work of my … my uncle. He was a botanist and he taught me everything I know. Alas he died before he could finish the manuscrit, so he left it to me.’

Fitcher’s eyebrows began to quiver with curiosity now: the community of botanists was so small as to be almost a family; every member had some acquaintance with the others, either in person, or by name and reputation. ‘Who was he then, this uncle of eers? What was his name?’

‘Lambert, sir. Pierre Lambert.’

A half-throttled cry burst from Fitcher’s throat and he sank into the chair. ‘Well … I … Monzoo Lambert! … did’ee say he was eer uncle? What was your relation to him?’

Once again the gardener began to stammer and stutter. ‘Why, sir … he was the brother of my father … so I … I am his nephew, Paul Lambert. His daughter, Paulette, is my cousin.’

‘Is she now?’

Although Fitcher Penrose was, by his own account, something of a misanthrope, he was by no means unobservant: suddenly things began to fall into place – the guilty surprise with which the ‘boy’ had crossed his arms over his chest, the flower-strewn bedroom. He looked again at the illustration on the open page and made out a signature.