“No. I have more to do here.”
I hesitated, recalling what Agnes had said about his obsessive work habits, his tendency to forget food and sleep when consumed by his research. For a moment I considered scolding him, but the words rose and fell in my throat.
It was neither my business nor my place to care what he did with his evenings. If he wished to starve himself in pursuit of answers that might never come, then so be it.
“Good night, Dr. Ambrose,” I said.
“Sleep well, Miss Reed,” he replied, without offering a backward glance.
I left him to his research and the fading light, and went in search of the dining room. After several wrong turns and one brief flare of irritation at my own lack of navigational skill, I finally followed the aroma into the correct corridor.
The dining room was smaller than I had expected—long and rectangular, the table fitted snugly within it like a corpse in its coffin.
Agnes appeared from the kitchen, carrying a tureen of soup that filled the room with the scent of vegetables and herbs, her eyes lighting at the sight of me.
“There you are, dear!” She set the tureen down with obvious relief. “I was beginning to think Dr. Ambrose had forgotten you were human.”
“He sent me in just now,” I said, taking the seat she indicated. “He said you would worry if he kept me working too long.”
Her laughter filled the dining room, warm and gentle. My companion shifted lazily at the sound, deciding whether it wanted to savor it or silence it.
“Did he now? Well, that’s something at least. He doesn’t always remember such courtesies.” She began ladlingsoup into my bowl, golden and fragrant. “How was your first afternoon?”
“It was…” I paused, considering the right word. “Good. The work is interesting, and Dr. Ambrose is very… focused.”
“That’s a polite way of putting it.” Agnes took the other chair with her own bowl. “He’s obsessed, is what he is. Always has been, but it’s gotten worse since—” She cut herself off. “Well. Since his circumstances changed.”
I did not need to press. Since he lost his wife,was what she had almost said—since grief had left him with nothing but work to fill that void.
It was then that I noticed Hawthorne.
He stood in the far corner of the room, so utterly still I had walked past him without registering his presence. He might have been part of the architecture—another dark vertical in a house full of them—except that, his head turned now. For once, his usual blank regard was specifically directed at me. The attention raised the fine hairs on the back of my neck.
“Does Hawthorne not join us?” I asked, unable to avert my gaze.
Agnes glanced at the corner where Hawthorne stood, her mouth turning down briefly before she made a small gesture of dismissal with her hand. “Oh, he’s always about, dear, but no, he doesn’t eat with us.”
“Why not?”
“He takes his meals much later,” she replied, staring down into her bowl. “He has his own schedule and likes it kept just so.”
“I see,” I said, though I did not see at all, and suspected I was not meant to.
I took a spoonful of soup. It was warm and restorative, but my focus kept drifting back to Hawthorne. Every so often, his head tilted, suggesting a curiosity that mirrored my own.
“Is he mute?” I asked, unable to quell my curiosity. “Hawthorne, I mean… I have never heard him speak.”
Agnes’s hands stilled on her spoon. “He doesn’t speak, no.”
When she offered no more, I subsided with an inward sigh, realizing it was a pointless endeavor.
“The greenhouse is remarkable,” I commented instead. “I imagine the variety of specimens must have taken years to assemble.”
“Oh, he’s collected plants from all over the world, he has.” Agnes relaxed, the relief of a comfortable topic settling over her features. “He pays collectors handsomely to send him rare specimens. Spends a fortune on it, truth be told.”
She shook her head with a mixture of pride and concern. “I’ve told him time and again that he should be more mindful, but does he listen? Of course not.”
“You mean with the toxic plants?”
