‘Yes, Your Grace,’ he said quickly. ‘Christopher Speckle, but everybody calls me Kit.’ Thea smiled at his slightly nervous manner, but every awkward interaction she had had in the past five years made her wary.
‘I wonder that you consider my council at all an addition to anything you could hear from Mr Knatchbull or Doctor Herbert?’ she asked. ‘I am sure they have opinions.’
‘Their opinions are both abundant and energetically supplied.’ The corner of Kit Speckle’s mouth twitched up a little, but then he moved a little closer and fixed her with an earnest stare. ‘But I am in need of more consequential and substantive interactions in the pursuit of improved cultivation.’
Thea blinked at him. His passion excited her, but she didn’t yet match that fervent stare.
‘Any lover of plants is a friend of mine,’ she settled on, but then thought of Knatchbull, and checked herself so hard she knew it was physically obvious. A smile tugged again at Kit Speckle’slips, his eyes dancing with recognition and amusement. It gave her confidence, and she leaned in. ‘Almost any,’ she whispered.
‘Doctor Herbert is experienced but complacent,’ confirmed Speckle with an amused nod. ‘I am particularly interested in the physic qualities of plants. He has an excellent garden I could never afford as yet myself, and the possibilities are very exciting.’
‘I see,’ mused Thea, understanding now why Kit Speckle was keen to see out his apprenticeship. ‘And you have access to specimens from the Overture?’ That still smarted.
‘That landing and many others,’ confirmed Speckle. ‘We have started a great many plants with untold properties. I am testing many out on my patients. In small doses, of course,’ he qualified. He looked at his shoes and back at her. ‘After I heard that you had interest in growing, Your Grace, I did enquire with Mr Fairclough as to the nature of your setup at Hawkdean. It sounds quite impressive.’
Thea wilted a little. ‘It should be, Doctor Speckle,’ she said, looking away, but then back at him, wondering if she could trust him. ‘You see, I came into a number of interesting specimens shortly before my marriage.’ She thought of Martha’s plants, and Martha’s entreaties that Thea should look after them as she sailed for the new world. Now those specimens were variously hanging on or dwindling in her new garden, victims of her absence, the disinterested gardener and her husband’s arrogance. ‘The duke designed the stove ranges before our marriage. He did it himself, and I have a heated firewall, and no flues.’
Speckle’s eyes widened in understanding. ‘I see,’ he said. She felt a strange comfort in being understood. ‘So, you are very limited as to dry heat and space, but you are frost free?’
‘When my gardener remembers to stoke the flues of an evening,’ said Thea wryly.
‘Ah,’ said Speckle, with an increasingly alarmed look that meant he understood the potentially devastating consequences of a cold wall. She didn’t have a talented gardener like Scip, who worked for her father, and she made do with the glasshouses, but they were far from ideal. In the first three years Martha had been away she had sent seeds on a regular basis, but she had seen limited success and there had been nothing for almost two years now.
‘You seem to me like a lady who might enjoy a challenge, Your Grace,’ said Speckle.
She eyed him carefully, unsure of where this was going, and not sure that she had the fire left for a challenge at all. ‘Is that so, Doctor Speckle?’ she said in a way she hoped was interested, but not too negative.
‘Do you know why Knatchbull invited Herbert and myself here tonight?’ asked Speckle.
‘I have to admit, I had been wondering,’ said Thea honestly.
Speckle looked around and then leaned a little closer. ‘The queen has her heart on the King Proteas from South Africa and is not to be dissuaded.’
‘Oh,’ said Thea, almost disappointed that the challenge was so minor. Martha had sent her many seeds of the protea, and they had all failed to germinate, but it layered tolerably well. ‘I have a couple of plants, and she is welcome to one–’
‘Not one,’ said Speckle quickly. ‘She wants a forest of them. To grow on for the King’s birthday and to line the long walk with them. She believes he will enjoy it, being the King Protea.’
‘I see,’ said Thea, her mind racing. ‘But that will take…’
‘Large scale seed germination.’ Speckle’s eyes danced as he said it, the almost frenzied excitement of an enthusiast with an excuse to pursue a goal hitherto unachieved. ‘Whoever manages it will have the horticultural world, and the queen and king,lauding them for greatness. They will receive the pick of any landing at the London docks. And…’
Thea could barely wait as he paused. ‘And what?’
‘And the queen plans to create an advisory board of experts to help develop the King’s mother’s exotic garden at Kew Palace. Whoever germinates it will have a place on that board, and all the influence and legitimacy that goes with it. There are rumours that it will be made the place for growing new plants in the capital. It will have all the best specimens first.’
They looked at one another, and she knew he understood her excitement, and also her frustration.
‘One would need space,’ she mused.
‘And dry heat,’ added Speckle. ‘Assuming they thrive best in climates like their African home.’
Thea had that. She felt her pulse quicken at the thought of it, but then looked across at George and knew how disapproving – or angry, she admitted to herself – he would be if she ended up gaining any official intellectual role. Any fire she had found within her was extinguished.
‘I fear I am not the one for the challenge, Dr Speckle,’ she said, as convincingly as she could as disappointment clawed at her and she momentarily clenched her teeth before she could get out the next words. ‘I am happy to leave the cultivation of the protea to others who may have more success.’
Doctor Speckle eyed her with curiosity. ‘As you wish, Your Grace,’ he said. But the look he gave her said he knew that it wasn’t true.
Chapter 4
