Serpents in the Garden Read Online Free PDF Page A

hasn’t helped to have his head filled with pictures of foreign places, has it? It’s you, Alex, telling him of the wonders of London, of how Venice is built on pillars of stone in an endless marsh, of Rome and the ruins of the old empire, that have woken all that in him.” She went back to her knitting, ignoring Alex’s irritated look.
    “How was I to know he was going to do something like this?” Alex protested.
    “You should know,” Mrs Parson said. “He’s your son, no?”
    “And mine, so the blame is ours to share.” Matthew exhaled, looking down at his hands. What had they done wrong for Jacob to behave as he had done? His fingers tightened around each other. May you be safe, laddie, for all that I want to stripe your back. May you be alright and come back to us, safe and sound.
    *
    “Rue, tansy and pennyroyal.” Mrs Parson placed the herbs in a linen sachet.
    Alex frowned. “You think? Pennyroyal is—”
    “No more than a pinch,” Mrs Parson said, “just in case.”
    Alex considered this for some seconds before nodding. After some consultation, Mrs Parson and Alex had decided that Betty was too young to become a mother, and so they’d spent most of the morning amicably arguing over what to give her to ensure this potential pregnancy ended before it became anything more than potential.
    “Do we tell her why?” Alex asked Mrs Parson, receiving a pitying look in return.
    “The lass bedded Jacob to commit herself to him for life. A wean would, in her present state of mind, just strengthen the bond, no?”
    “So then why are we asking her to drink this?” Alex grimaced at the bitter scent.
    “For her broken skin. We’ll make poultices as well.”
    “I’ll have to tell Matthew.”
    Mrs Parson shrugged, muttering that in her opinion men were best left out of women’s problems, but after having had Matthew present at Alex’s last three birthings, she’d given up when it came to him. “He might not approve.”
    “Of course he won’t,” Alex said, “but I have to tell him all the same.”
    “Is it dangerous?” Matthew asked once he had heard her out.
    “Mrs Parson knows her business. She’s been a midwife for fifty years or so by now. Old like the hills, she is.” Alex smiled: she loved that old woman like a mother.
    Matthew looked down at her with a deep crease between his brows. “You know she helped Jenny when she was dallying with yon Jochum.”
    “And it seems to have worked, right?” She suppressed a grin at his scowl. Matthew had issues with Jenny’s amorous adventures prior to marrying Ian.
    “Perhaps it worked too well.”
    Alex laughed. “Seriously! If Jenny drank rue tea for some weeks seven years ago, how can it possibly have an effect on her fertility now?”
    His frown deepened. “You never know, do you?” He thought about it and then acquiesced. “The lass is too young to face motherhood alone.” He kissed her on the brow, called for his three eldest sons and his servants, and told her they’d be late getting back – he wanted to harvest the last of his fields while the weather still held.
    *
    A tired Matthew returned well after dusk, trailed by his sons.
    “All of it.” Daniel yawned, blinked and yawned again. “We’ve done all of the wheat and most of the barley.”
    Alex gave him a quick hug, served them all a gigantic late supper, and sent them off to bed. She closed down the house, banked the fire, whispered a goodnight to Mrs Parson, and went upstairs to their room.
    Matthew was already in bed, clothes left in a heap on the floor. Well, at least he’d washed, a wet and dirty linen towel left beside the basin.
    “The day I get hold of Jacob Graham I’m going to chew his ear off,” Alex said as she went about the room, hanging up his clothes. “What was he thinking of?” She was still upset after applying poultices on Betty’s inflamed skin, cursing both William and Jacob to hell.
    “You mean thinking with, and you know the answer to that as well