“Adrenaline.” His murmur was quiet and utterly enticing, until Saffron registered what Alexander had actually said.
“Adrenaline?” she repeated.
He dropped her hand. “Adrenaline, you know. The hormone responsible for certain physiological responses in mammals. The fight or flight response. Hyperarousal as a result of a perceived threat. Cannon’s hypothesis states—”
“I see,” she said, fighting a smile. His biology talk was endearing, if not exactly romantic. She held up the handkerchief. “You make quite the botanist, Ashton. Well done. Now what?”
Looking down at her with his small smile, he said, “Now, we find a taxi and hope that no one asks us why we’re covered in dirt.”
Alexander scrutinized the plant under the glare of the light. It was no more than five inches tall, a pale green stem interspersed with clumps of small purple hooded flowers. Botanical references opened to illustrations and entries covered the small kitchen table alongside the lamp Saffron had removed the shade from. The naked bulb’s light cast harsh shadows on her face, enhancing the smudges of dirt she had missed in her rapid wash-up moments ago.
With a hand cupping her chin, she stared down at one of the illustrations, then back to the specimen from the garden. “It certainly looks like aconite … But it’s not quite right. See here?” She used a pen to indicate the cavernous, violet flowers. “It hasclusters of flowers rather than single ones.“Aconitumspecies have single flowers along the stem. Not to mention the blooms are about three months too early. Aconite flowers in the summer.”
He ran a hand over his face. Now that they were safely settled in Saffron’s kitchen, the late hour and recent nights of poor sleep were catching up to him. “Could this be a different species? One you haven’t encountered?”
“The genus is widespread and varied, so I suppose that’s possible … But this specimen has foliaceous stipules, here.” She gently prodded a pair of leaves from which a stem was emerging, “Yet the entirety of theAconitumspecies can be characterized as lacking stipules altogether.” She leaned toward one of the texts and confirmed her statement with a nod. “But the structure of the flower, the hooded opening with clearly defined veins …”
Alexander left her to it. As he watched her lean on her elbows and frown in concentration, he wondered how exactly he’d ended up in a woman’s flat in the middle of the night, covered in dirt, studying a potentially dangerous plant.
He apparently drifted off, hand supporting his head, as Saffron had to rouse him to declare that she was satisfied that what they stole was at least in the same genus as the well-known poisonous species, but she couldn’t absolutely conclude that the plant was a species of poisonousAconitum. Improvising with what she had in her kitchen, she did her best to preserve the various parts of the plant and tucked it into the ice box.
With utmost solemnity, she said, “Alexander, I think we need to go to Inspector Green and tell him everything.”
“And tell him what?” Alexander wasn’t looking forward to explaining to him how they had gotten the plant.
“That we found Dr. Berking created his very own breed of a highly toxic plant, of course!”
“Is that what this is?” Alexander asked, eying the quick sketch Saffron had done of the plant.
“I can’t think of any other explanation. I’ll have to look at some other references, of course, but a man of Berking’s experience would be able to cross-breed until he got something like this.” She paused, discomfort flashing across her face. She sighed and shook her head, her enthusiasm waning to make her look pale and tired. “I’m not sure what he bred it with, or what chemical properties it has, but the features of aconite are definitely there.”
“Inspector Green will have to send it to a lab to be tested.” Alexander ran a hand through his hair, dislodging a scrap of leaf and frowning down at it. “The results might not be ready before the ship sails. He can’t arrest Berking for breeding a new plant, even if it is poisonous.”
Saffron bit her lip. “He arrested Dr. Maxwell for less, didn’t he?” She looked up at him, eyes pleading. “We can’tnottell the inspector, Alexander.”
Sighing, Alexander agreed. They’d see the inspector tomorrow. Hopefully, by then Saffron would have found something useful in her references.
Quietly, they made their way down the hallway, not wanting to wake up Elizabeth nor the landlady in the flat below.
On the street, the wind had died down and the sky was clear. A slender silver moon had risen over the neat rows of flats. They spent the time walking to a busier street for a taxi comparing cuts and bruises. Saffron won the count contest. Her venture through the length of the garden had punctured not only her arms, but had left a long scratch down the side of her throat. Alexander won for the worst, a long scrape from the rhododendron crisscrossing his arm, right over his scar.
“Alexander,” Saffron said, giving him a sidelong glance, “how did you get that scar?”
He was tired, covered in dirt, and had already crawled through a dark garden with Saffron. Why not tell her?
“It’s from the War.” He stopped there, looking at her. Saffron pressed her lips together like she wanted him to expound on his statement, but didn’t. Alexander smiled at her torn expression. “I told you that I was in Fromelles. My unit was stuck in our trench. We fought, many of my friends died. Someone threw a grenade and it hit near me.” He paused, pushing back against images of mud and blood flashing through his mind. “I was knocked out. When I woke up, I had a concussion, and my arm and back were in bad shape. Second and third degree burns, limited range of movement, concerns about lasting nerve damage. My arm healed, my back healed. I had to learn to write with my left hand, but compared to most, I got off easy. I have no reason to complain.”
He glanced at Saffron but her face was shadowed.
Alexander contemplated telling her more. The horror of waking with half his body burning, the gut-wrenching sensation of being a stranger to himself when he looked at his scarred body for the first time. How the sight and the smell of smoke or a book dropping to the floor used to cause him to slide into terror so complete he would forget where he was.
He’d spoken to his older brother, a former pilot, concerned he was going mad. His brother and several of his friends all experienced similar things on their return from the war—night terrors, shaking hands, aversion to loud noises, even unprovoked violence. Some of them had fled to the country, the survivors of horrors worse than his. Some turned to alcohol or something harder, as he had before finding a better strategy. It had been months since he’d had a slide, as he called them, and more than a year since they’d been a regular problem.
Feeling emboldened by his progress, or perhaps the lateness of the hour, Alexander continued. “I’m sure you’ve heard of soldiers returning with shell-shock who can’t handle loud noises or sudden changes. That was me, too.”
He could recall his temper splintering one day after his shaking hands had dropped yet another plate in the lab.
The plate fell to the ground, and a hot wave of shame and anger had caused him to shove a tray of samples to the floor. Between his heavy breaths, he’d heard the sudden silence from the hallway outside. He’d not seen anyone witness his misery, but he was sure someone had noticed and he’d be out of the university without a second chance. That was the day he’d finally gone to Dr. Avery for help. He’d learned a form of Tibetan meditation from the professor and had never looked back.
