In this little pocket of garden around the camellia, a hedge of sweet olive shielded him from the house, while a hedge of sweet myrtle shielded him from the work yard. Joseph said a quick prayer of thanksgiving for evergreen leaves.
They would not be alone for long. With the sun streaming downon his back, it felt nearly like spring. Already the daphne and violets had opened their fragrant blossoms. Before he set to work on the camellia, Joseph doffed his coat and laid it on an iron bench in the Mary Garden. The bench was painted sea-green, so that its legs seemed to blend into the maidenhair ferns.
Joseph rolled up his sleeves and pulled on his gloves. He trimmed Tessa’s camellia until only two inches showed above the ground. He knelt before his patient and created a cleft in the stock. The rest he found easier to do with bare hands. One of the scions was going dry, so Joseph placed the end in his mouth to moisten it before insertion.
Then he felt a nudge against his buttocks. He nearly leapt out of his skin, till he realized it was Mignon come out to greet him. Joseph smiled and scratched under the cat’s chin. He was rewarded with a purr.
While Mignon continued to rub against him, Joseph sat back to assess the graft. The scions nestled comfortably in the cleft of the stock. He told the cat: “As long as you don’t chew on it, I think that will do well.” It never ceased to amaze him, how two distinct organisms could so quickly become one. “I know it looks rather improbable at the moment, but you’ll see. In a few months, this bush will be thriving. Come next winter, it will beblooming.”
“Thanks to you.”
Joseph tensed. He willed himself not to turn around. He directed his gaze to Tessa’s statue of Mary. Her eyes looking Heavenward, the Blessed Virgin held her hands open in welcome, while she crushed the Serpent beneath her bare feet. Even in his death throes, the Serpent clutched the forbidden fruit in his teeth.
“Is it safe, for you to be out here?”
“Your father said ’tis all right for me to walk a little now.”
That wasn’t what Joseph meant.
“Clare is asleep, and Hannah is watching her.” The source of Tessa’s voice lowered; she must have sat on the iron bench behind him, next to his coat. “Your father has been so kind. He must have scores of patients, but he’s visited me nearly every day this past month.” There was gratitude in her tone, but no censure for Joseph. “And Hélène brings me books. The latest one was about the Language of Flowers. Do you know it?”
“I’ve heard of it.” He understood that it was used chiefly by lovers who wished to send each other secret messages in blossoms. Mignon went off to stalk a robin, and Joseph returned to his work. He tied moss around the graft to keep it damp.
“Would you care to guess what camellias mean in the Language of Flowers?”
Joseph placed a glass dome over the union, so that moisture would collect inside. “‘Hope,’ perhaps? Because they bloom in winter?” Tessa had been wearing a camellia in her hair when he’d met her.
“My destiny is in your hands.”
Joseph’s throat closed. “Pardon?”
“Camellias mean: ‘my destiny is in your hands.’ Hélène’s book even lists parts of plants that aren’t flowers—it has myrrh.”
When they could obtain it, Joseph added myrrh to his thurible. He’d never forget the first time he’d watched the heat reach it: myrrh bloomed when it burned.
“Myrrh means ‘gladness.’ I’ll think of that, every time you spread incense.”
He’d think of it every time he looked at her. He’d decided long ago that Tessa’s hair was the color of myrrh by firelight. In ancient times, myrrh had been as valuable as gold, used in medicines and perfumes. Myrrh had anointed Christ’s crucified body, and it featured prominently in the Canticles. Solomon spoke of his lover’s breasts as?—
This was precisely why he could not be near her. He forced himself to concentrate on the camellia. He placed a canvas cover on the dome.
Behind him, Tessa’s voice dropped nearly to a whisper: “It can’t ever be like it was, can it?”
Joseph didn’t answer. He took up handfuls of soil to spread around the edge of the canvas as an anchor.
“I understand, why you cannot bear to look at me, Father.” Her words were breathless with anguish. “You must have realized why Iadopted David and Sophie—not the only reason, but chief amongst them: so I could be nearer to you. You know why God took my own children: because, every time, I wished they were yours. I do not know how long He will let me have Clare…” Tessa wept audibly. “I must disgust you.”
“You couldneverdisgust me, Tessa.” Still on his knees, he allowed himself to turn, so he could see her at the edge of his vision. She was caressing his coat as if it were something precious. “I—disgust myself,” Joseph muttered. “Somehow,Iled you into this sin; you must have sensed how I feel about you, and you only responded.”
Tessa’s hand stilled on his coat, and she sniffled. “Howyoufeel aboutme?” she echoed timidly.
“I have sinned against you every day for more than seven years.” Joseph closed his eyes, because she must be wearing a single thin petticoat beneath that lilac skirt—he could see clearly the bend of her legs. If he pressed down through the fabric, mightn’t he trace the glorious sweep of her thighs? “Even now, in this very moment, I am sinning against you.”
Her voice became stronger yet more tremulous. “Are you saying…you love me too?”
He shook his head, gripping the soil beneath him to anchor him in his blindness. “This is sin, Tessa; it islust, and we must?—”
“Joseph.” If he’d not already been on his knees, he would have collapsed at the sound—at once declaration, plea, and endearment. She came to him in the darkness. He felt her kneeling beside him the instant before her fingers caressed his cheek—gentle as petals and shattering as an earthquake. “This is notlust.”
