Chapter 5 #2
‘The sun rose and set, birds nested and raised chicks, and the rabbit remained happy in the blackberries.
Why would I leave, he thought, when I have everything I need?
The leaves give me shelter. I lick the dew and drink the rain.
The grass is a little tough, but it is still food.
If I stay here, I will be safe forever. Until one spring morning, the rabbit woke, turned in a little half circle, and his tail caught on a thorn.
He squealed, and hopped with shock, and another caught his ear.
He twisted, trying to find a place where he did not touch the brambles, but every move he made pinned him closer to the ground.
He'd gotten so comfortable in the blackberries, he did not notice the vines grow thicker, the thorns sharper, until they began to press.’
Enzo swung the safe door open. A long thin wooden box filled with yellow envelopes and scrawled with first names ran one length.
Beside it sat another box, piled high with stacks of wooden chips.
Enzo pulled one out and spun it between his fingers.
As a child, Matron had made sure he recognised the crest of his sponsor, and the imprint on this chip was not that crest.
‘The rabbit, with his ears flat, his tail low and his paws folded, could look over the meadow, between the thorny vines and leaves, but he could not feel the breeze through his fur. He could not eat fresh shoots warmed by the sun. And he could not drink running water from the stream. Not unless he tore free. You, Mina Fischer, have become comfortable in the blackberry bush. You are convinced that you can live in no other world than the one Duke Street promised you. You are still on the other side of the fence. You’ve become a rabbit,’ he said, stepping forward to take her hand. ‘You need to be a lion.’
‘A lioness,’ she corrected with a shy pout.
‘Yes, a lioness. Can you growl?’
‘Grrr…’
‘Better than that. Can you roar?’
‘Roar,’ she said, then laughed, and tucked her chin against her chest.
‘That is not enough. What would a lioness say to a haughty duke?’ He pushed the top hat back on his head. ‘Back to the kitchen, maid.’
‘I would like to stay upstairs,’ she stammered.
‘Back to the basement.’ Enzo sat in the duke’s chair, thumped his boots on the desk.
Mina glanced up at him, took a slow breath, then looked back to the floor. ‘I said, I would like to stay upstairs.’
Enzo waved his hand in dismissal. ‘Go downstairs and fetch me fresh tea.’
‘No!’ Mina stomped her foot. ‘I will not be below ground any longer. Roar!’ Not a word, or a growl, her loud, throaty roar came from somewhere deep inside, and with it, all of Mina’s body trembled with fury.
Words tumbled out of her, and with each syllable, she brightened.
‘What else might I do… I suppose I might try… I could take in mending, and laundry. Or piecework. That’s what my mother did, after my father died.
She had a steady hand, and the diplomat didn’t trust anyone but her with his suits.
He was a very particular man. That’s how we came to be in London.
He insisted she join his staff, but she had no one to leave me with, so I came too.
Perhaps I can do what she did. I can work and still care for the baby during the day. ’
As she clutched her skirt, waiting for his response, her confident smile spread through her whole body.
Mina turned anger into love, and where the world found disdain, she found hope.
And with a painful beat, Enzo’s heart remembered Mina Fischer.
The clock chimed the hour, the door slammed, someone whistled, and someone else sang.
Terror filled Mina’s expression. Enzo slammed the safe shut and turned the lock, closed the painting over, dropped the hat then grabbed Mina’s hand and dragged her down the stairs and into the entry.
She shoved the hat and scarf at the coat stand.
Voices echoed up the servant’s stairwell, so he pulled her away from the front of the house, past a grotesquely opulent parlour and living room and through the back door, across the small courtyard, through the carriage house and out into the lane.
Mina gasped for breath as he pulled her along, but he made her keep pace, because if they were nabbed, he might get clink, but she could get the boat, and the idea of Mina not being in London was bad enough, the thought of her leagues away in a prison of stone and sea was far too much.
Down the long, narrow lane they stumbled, until they staggered onto the street.
‘Where’s my packet?’ Breathless, Mina brushed her skirts and shook them out. ‘Enzo, where are my wages?’
‘I didn’t get them. I was distracted.’ He flipped the chip through the air. She caught it, then stared at the surface. The pride and exhilaration that had filled her when she became a lioness, vanished.
‘You were standing right there, before the safe. Why didn’t you grab them?’
He shoved his flat cap onto his head and pushed it back.
‘Because you don’t like thieving. You shouldn’t have to start because of what they did to you.
Your dignity is worth more than a few shillings.
’ Enzo took hold of the edge of her blouse and tugged it straight. ‘And because I don’t want you to go.’