The Story She Left Behind

Chapter 32 Clara

CHAPTER 32? CLARA

Lake District, England

I left Wynnie in the drawing room with Moira, who was showing her all about the TV with a show called Muffin the Mule . Wynnie was infatuated with the screen that flickered with stories, wiggling the ears of the antennae and switching the channels to static.

In a pine-paneled study, Charlie and I stood alone for the first time while examining the remaining and damaged pages of Mother’s language, which were spread across a large table in a room at the rear of the hallway. I’d brought them down from my room.

This house sprouted rooms whenever I turned my back, each place with its own personality and secrets, each view more charming than the next.

But this rugged edifice hidden in the bowl of mountains and pastures was not meant for me. The study was modest compared to the grand library in London. One bookshelf lined the back wall, and a hulking table dominated the middle. “How big is this house exactly?” I asked. “I can’t quite get a sense of things yet.”

He leaned back against the table, his palms planted. “Not as large as some others nearly, but it is in many ways the quintessential English country house. It was built for a vicar in 1742. There are six bedrooms, and you’re in the one with a view to the lake and Grizedale.”

“And there are so many rooms downstairs, too, like there’s one for each purpose in life. When I look out the window, I see such beauty.”

“We have six acres with three one-bedroom cottages that you can see the rooflines of from your room. There’s an empty stable where once horses were kept. Mum is terrified of them, so it’s empty and now stores plants and garden tools. She built a greenhouse about twenty years ago. You’ll see when you are able to be up and around. There are much fancier homes around here to explore. Castles and monasteries and manors.”

“And next door—sheep and cows.”

“It’s a working farm, and you’ll hear them sometimes. I find it a perfect reminder of this land and why we are here.”

“And why is that? Why are we here?”

“Me and you? That I don’t have an answer for.” He grinned, and I nearly thought he’d wink. “But this area exists in all its beauty because of the shepherds and farmers and conservationists who have loved, tended, and cared for the land.” He clicked on the brass lamp, and we both turned to stare at the remaining pages. “Now back to the thing at hand.” He smiled at me. “Look at this. An entire language. I wonder why she did it.”

“Dad told me that she felt there were words the world lost as we moved into houses and into cities. Mother felt like she wasn’t so much making up words as finding them. She would never call it her language—she would just say that she found words that needed finding.”

“My father would agree. I can see why they might have been friends or known each other.”

“Why won’t you just tell your mother about us?” I asked. “Just tell her about me and about Mother and the words, and we’ll see if she knows anything.” I tapped the warped pages.

“I might, Clara. But now, no. I don’t want to ask why he hid papers from another woman. Let me see if I can figure it out first.”

Out the window, Mrs. Jameson was walking toward the lake, her gray coat flapping in the morning breeze, her blue hat a splash of color against a low woolly sky. She walked with purpose in her green rain boots, and her head was held high. Watching her, I longed to be out there, too, to walk across this rugged landscape with its dramatic beauty, touching the stone walls and rough bark of the trees, immersing myself in the glacial waters.

Charlie noticed, too. “This is her life, here in this village with her dearest friends, her gardens, her family, and her theater. I’m afraid of shattering the peace she’s trying to find without Father.”

“Why would these pages shatter her peace?”

He looked back to me with a sad smile. “Have they brought you peace?”

“Anything but,” I said.

“Exactly. She will want to know where they came from and why. Why did my father hide this from her?”

“Maybe he didn’t.”

“He did.”

The way he said it, so firmly, I softly asked, “Do you think my mother was his mistress?” A tingle at the tips of my fingers, a metallic taste on my tongue—signals of danger.

“I don’t think so, no.”

“But you have thought about it.”

“That’s one of many things I’ve thought and dismissed.”

“Why think it at all if you dismissed it?”

“Because I have no answers, and in the absence of answers, I find myself creating some. Tell me you don’t do the same?”

“I do. I’ve been creating answers for twenty-five years.”

He smiled; we were in this together—creating answers for unanswerable questions. He pointed back at the pages. “Is it okay if I look at them?”

“Of course,” I said. “There’s not much left to see.”

He lifted each page and read the words out loud.

After a long while, time enough for me to glance around the room and take note of the beautiful paintings and the leather-bound books from Tolstoy to Austen to Graham and Lewis, he straightened and took off his reading glasses. “She uses the familiar and makes it unfamiliar. Makes ancient something new, just as most languages do. It’s intricate. I’m surprised she’s never shared this—it would be interesting to study.”

“And now it’s gone.” The sense of loss brought a sinking feeling, a quagmire of hopelessness. I’d lost what was entrusted to me—Mother’s words.

“Maybe someone will find some pages and—”

“Stop,” I said, and held up my hand. “I’ve been hoping for this since I was eight years old, and she promised me that someday she would teach me her language. It’s time to give up hope.”

Charlie massaged his forehead with his thumb and forefinger. “I should have never given that woman a ride.”

“No! This is Mother’s fault. Not yours. Or your father’s or mine or anyone else’s. It is just something that happened.”

He tapped the pages. “She must have been educated in Latin and Gaelic, because many of these words have roots in both, but she twists them or adds to them.”

“Latin. Yes, she knew Latin. But I don’t think she knew Gaelic. She was never sent to proper school.”

“Yes. I must admit I read much of her biography before you arrived; she was a genius, they say.”

“That desperately awful biography,” I said.

“It’s not accurate?”

“Some parts were. Yes, her parents recognized her genius when she started reading at three years old and they kept her home, educated her with tutors. So she didn’t have friends her age. Maybe that’s why she created Emjie. She was always older than her years, which might be why my dad is ten years her senior. But yes, her parents made sure she knew Latin and Greek.”

“A very classical education, to be sure.”

“Maybe,” I said. “Her mother, Martha, didn’t like that The Middle Place was published when she was twelve years old. Her dad, Wendall, was the one who made sure it happened. Martha said that the publication brought a twelve-year-old too much attention and that my mother never found herself to rights again. At least until she met Dad and moved away.”

“What did they have to say about her disappearance? Her parents, I mean.”

“They are both gone now. Her father left when she was eleven and started a new family. He passed years ago. She never spoke about him, but I know that his leaving shattered her when she was young—his abandonment is what sent her on those wild adventures around the world once she turned eighteen and was in charge of her own destiny. Those were self-destructive adventures, if you’re to believe the biography. You think she’d know the effects of abandonment, but I can only guess that didn’t matter to her. That I didn’t matter to her.” I paused on the truth I rarely stated out loud, one that could be found in her leaving, and I barely admitted to myself. I cleared my throat. “And her mother died five years after she disappeared.”

“I am so sorry she did that to you and to your dad.”

“Thank you, but, please, no pity. I don’t want or need it.”

“No pity,” he said. “Not for someone like you.”

I nudged him and heat rose in me. It had been so long since I’d felt a rush like that, I’d nearly forgotten what it was—desire. No, not here, not him. This was the wrong place and person. I took a breath. I pointed to the pages again. “So maybe she learned Gaelic on her travels, but if she did, I never knew or heard her speak it. I will ask Dad.”

“I can guess at maybe four of these words, but not their full meaning.” He pointed at Arbormore. “ Arbor is the Latin root for tree.”

I read Mother’s definition out loud. “?‘ Arbormore: A tree that has a proper name but feels as if it is otherworldly and should not be categorized. A tree that is a portal to another world. A magical tree.’?”

“Beautiful,” he said.

“And you know Latin?” I asked.

“Yes, the basics.”

“Mother created her first word when she was five years old. This has been gathering for years and years—depending on when she stopped, which isn’t clear at all.”

He straightened and stretched, his hand on his lower back. “No wonder you want to have all of it—it’s her life’s work.”

“ Wanted. Past tense.”

“Something being gone doesn’t remove the want of it,” he said. “Now let’s head back. After you gave me the contact, I rang the landlord, and he is allowing Archie and Adelaide to retrieve your bags and bring them today. We can figure out the rest of it after I show you around.”

I ran my hand down the side of Adelaide’s beautiful wool dress. “That’s kind of them. I can wear my own clothes and meet your brother.”

“You’ll adore him. Everyone does.”

I began to gather the papers and Charlie set his hand on top of mine, stopping me. “Leave them. Maybe we’ll see something later. No one uses this room.”

He kept his hand still and it covered mine completely. Our gazes were down at our hands when a soft woman’s voice brought us back to rights.

“Well, hallo!” Such a chipper greeting, like a bird had entered the room.

Before we turned, Charlie wrapped his hand around mine, rubbed his thumb on the inside of my palm. A rush of warmth and a need to kiss him. God, was I so desperate that a single touch turned me inside out?

I looked up to see a woman standing in the entryway, her hands on her very slim hips, her hat tipped jauntily to one side, and her red lipstick in a wide smile. Her dark hair was falling over a royal-blue wool jacket. She seemed a cutout of a woman in a fashion magazine. I suddenly felt like a country bumpkin even while wearing her gorgeous clothes.

“Hello, Adelaide,” said Charlie. “Come, meet Clara.”

Her look wandered to our hands, to Charlie’s holding mine, which I immediately dropped.

“Hello,” I said. “Thank you so much for allowing me to borrow your clothes and room.”

“Oh! I am so pleased I can help. Poor you, trying to navigate your way through all that fog with a child. It was awful for us, so I can’t imagine.” So proper and charming, I thought. Everything I would never be.

“Well, thank you so much for rescuing me from my soot-covered clothes.”

She smiled and her face transformed with it. Something in me wanted to please her, to make her like me. “Your suitcase is here now,” she told me. “Aren’t you so very pleased to be here instead of that dingy flat?”

“Yes! How is the fog now?”

“Much more manageable, but still thick. It was horrid holing up like that. I am very pleased to make it to the country. How ever did the two of you get out?”

“Clara is the one who led us here with the lantern and her courage.”

I laughed. “It was Charlie. He drove us here—saved us, to be sure.”

“Charlie’s very good at such things,” she said. “Helping others, just like his father always was.” She smiled at him, and he looked away from her, sadness entering the room.

I took a few steps to leave the room and then turned to her. “Lovely to meet you. I need to go find my daughter.” I walked out and wondered how could I have even begun to feel like Charlie would pay someone like me any mind when such women were in his life?

I made it back to the drawing room. “Wynnie?”

She looked up and smiled. “Mama! Look at this! There is a television show with men in flowerpots. It’s called Flower Pot Men. Isn’t that the funniest thing you ever heard? Little Weed visits and… Bill and Ben live in the garden.”

“They live in flowerpots?”

“Yep! I bet Grandma’s story would be so fun on television. Everyone would want to see it.”

“Love, I need to go back upstairs to rest for a bit.” I addressed Moira. “Will you bring her to me when you are done with the men in pots?”

“Of course,” she said.

Quickly up the stairs, past the workmen and decorations, and I made my way to the bedroom. I sank to the lounge chair, embarrassed that I was longing for a man I’d just met. This was not my land or my people. I would not be stuck here in a life that wasn’t mine and miss out on the life that belonged to me. If I stayed much longer, we’d miss our ship home, but I refused to miss the Caldecott Awards.

My hand was still warm from Charlie’s, and a thrill I couldn’t yet name. What I’d give for a sketch pad and charcoals, for an easel and watercolors, even for a pencil and notebook.

I’d need to find other ways to soothe the anxiety and unknowing, to pass the days until I could go home.