The Age of Water Lilies Read Online Free PDF Page A

was my delight, / Greensleeves was my heart of gold, / and who but my lady Greensleeves?” Grace chuckled and stretched her toes. That reminded Flora of “This little piggie” and a host of other rhymes. The baby watched her face and waited for the next one and then another.
    When Mary returned, she found them both in the rocker, asleep, a damp patch growing across Flora’s lap where the nappy had soaked through. Flora helped her collect her things, held the horse while Grace was secured in the carrying arrangement, then watched them disappear over the bridge, the dust of the road collecting them inside it. She rinsed out the towels, the scent of urine growing fainter and fainter until there was none at all. She hung the cloth on the line and wondered how to spend the rest of the day.

THREE
    1913
    The community had been founded in 1908 when the Pennie Ranch and other surrounding properties had been purchased by the British Columbia Development Association with the intention of developing both a townsite and orchards; the bcda hoped that well-heeled English families would buy acreages and farm them in a leisurely way. By 1910, the flume had been built, a hotel erected, thirteen bungalows designed by Bert Footner with their overhangs and stone fireplaces stood in their bare tidy lots with more under construction. Potatoes and tomatoes flourished in the ploughed fields.
    Flora’s was a nice house, not simply four rooms like most of the Walhachin bungalows. It was two storeys in fact; an additional two rooms had been constructed at a cost of one hundred and twenty-five dollars per room. But still, it had taken some getting used to after Watermeadows. That house had been in their family for six generations although the original structure had been added to, wings to accommodate large families, expectations. Once, the Oakden family had been very wealthy, though now economies must be made. Henry, the oldest son, had taken a Classics degree and taught part-time at a school in Bath where he also involved himself with an antiquities society. He would inherit Watermeadows when their father died, though no one expected this for decades. George’s decision to emigrate was a result of his being the second son. A man who visited their father to acquire graft wood from a very old apple tree told him that the British Columbia Development Association had an office in London and was advertising the sale of acreage in a very promising area of Canada. He showed the brochure to Henry senior, who thought it might be a good prospect for his younger son. George knew something about orchards and their care, and his future in England was rather uncertain, due to his coming down from Oxford with a very poor showing.
    George’s decision had been met with some relief on the part of their father. He himself had read theology at Oxford but had never needed a living of his own. Still, he had the expectation that his sons would find meaningful work and knew that only the eldest Oakden son, named for him, would succeed him at Watermeadows.
    The arrangements, nearly a year in the making, were complicated, but eventually George was the owner of a plot of land and a house. It was a destination to which containers of bedding, clothing, kitchenware, rugs from the attic at Watermeadows could be shipped. (“I am willing to let you have this Aubusson. And some Wilton for the stairs.” “Thank you so much, Mother.” “Once you know the rooms themselves, what pieces will fit well within them and how the windows are sized, we will send window drapes and side tables.”) People were not entirely willing to trust the Canadian shops, and business for the carters was brisk as shipments of furniture and everything under the sun arrived at Pennies or Ashcroft and deliveries went out to the townsite. After George’s arrival in Walhachin, but before Flora joined him, an acquaintance of their family, the Marquis of