Free Judas Flowering by Jane Aiken Hodge Page A

Purchis house in Oglethorpe Square had been built with Martha Purchis’ money and to her specifications. Still homesick, she had had it planned like a Charleston single house, with an end fronting the street and high, screened porches along the shady garden side. Her husband’s one stipulation had been that the simple one-storey frame house in which his own father had lived during the early days of Savannah must be preserved, so there it was, small and shabby beside the gleaming white paint of the new house.
    â€œGoodness!” Mercy had never been in this part of the town and was amazed at the size and style of the house. “It’s grander than the Governor’s Residence!”
    â€œNot really.” Hart was always mildly embarrassed by the house. “It looks bigger than it is.”
    â€œIt’s that absurd little shack beside it makes it look so strange,” said Mrs Mayfield. “It’s a perfectly good Charleston house otherwise.”
    â€œYes.” Hart held up a courteous hand to help her alight from the carriage. “Only this is Savannah.” He held up his hand in turn to Mercy, who jumped lightly down onto the loose sand of the street. “The ‘little shack’ next door is the one I promised to show you,” he told her. “It’s the original house my grandfather lived in. It must have been a great day for those first settlers when Oglethorpe finally consented to move out of the tent he had lived in since they landed. Imagine what it must have been like for men used to a life of luxury back home in England to rough it here in tents on the sand. That shack must have seemed the height of comfort.”
    â€œYes.” Mercy’s soft slippers were full of sand already. “It’s lucky the forest around the town keeps the worst of the wind off, or there would be no enduring it.”
    â€œThere’s no enduring it now,” said Mrs Mayfield. “To be standing here chattering in the street like a parcel of peasants.”
    â€œI am a peasant,” said Mercy, but luckily neither Hart nor Mrs Mayfield heard her, since he was opening the wrought-iron gate to usher his aunt into the garden, from which the house was entered by way of its long screened porch. In the first enthusiasm of building, Martha Purchis had planned a formal garden in the Italian style for her town house, and there were still evergreen trees and hedges and a tumbledown summerhouse as evidence of her ambition, but years of neglect had let the garden sink back to a jungle of sweet-smelling jasmine through which a path had been recently cut to the porch door.
    Mrs Purchis herself was there to welcome them and ask, with a quick, anxious glance for her sister’s raddled face, “What’s the matter?”
    â€œMatter enough.” Mrs Mayfield subsided on a rocking chair in the cool of the porch. “My tenants have quit without a word of apology or a penny paid.”
    â€œCome.” Hart took Mercy’s arm to lead her across the porch and into the big, cool room behind it. “Aunt Anne will feel better for telling my mother.” He explained his retreat. “And you will be glad to go to your room. Ah, here’s Abigail. How are you, cousin?”
    â€œWell, thank you.” Abigail’s looks belied the words. “It’s good to see you both. My aunt’s been fretting.”
    â€œOh?” Hart had been moving towards an inconspicuous door in the corner of the room. “What’s the matter?”
    â€œFrank. We’ve hardly seen him since he brought us here.”
Abigail had been fretting too
, Mercy thought. “Oh, he sleeps here, I collect, but that’s the end of it. Aunt’s been in terror of the mob.”
    â€œPoor mother. How are things in town? It seemed quiet enough as we drove in.”
    â€œAlmost too quiet,” said Abigail. “As if everyone was waiting … but what