AMARYLLIS (Two Years Ago – Part Two)

“Hurry it up,” said Cauliflower, who was stood by the open tent entrance, “You and the others need to get down to the cottage to help the new guardian move in.”

I felt uneasy speaking with Cauliflower after last night. He however appeared to be in an agreeable mood stood with his arms folded and his thick white hair parted by the top of the tent opening.

“What about the children?” I asked.

“I’ll watch ‘em,” he said.

Nearly all of the fifty children in the tent were stood up and moving past me and Cauliflower on their way outside. Each child had the same dreamy want for sleep on their face, and smelled ready for a good river wash.

Off to one side of the tent there were three children who hadn’t yet risen. They were Birch, Rowan, and Willow, who had returned to the tent during the night an hour after me. The back of their right hands were loosely wrapped with strips of fabric stained with thick eye-catching blood. The hard caning they received from Cauliflower had taken the fire out of them.

“What about the others?” I asked.

“Get them too,” said Cauliflower, “Misbehaving won’t get them out of work.”

Birch, Rowan, and Willow walked the long forest path toward Old Gus’s cottage as if they were wading through knee-deep snow. They hadn’t said a word to me though each in their own time met my gaze with a look of barely disguised hatred which I pretended not to notice.

On approach to Old Gus’s cottage we could see a purple-painted wagon and a huge grey horse with white patches reigned at the front.

“Ah! There you are!”

A woman in her late thirties wearing a sky-blue dress which covered her from neck to ankle emerged from behind the rear end of the wagon with a small crate in her arms. She had a wide, homely figure, and a smile that reminded me of long worn in grooves in wood. At Rootwork smiles were tight, short-lived, and defensive because you never knew when someone might take offence. “I suppose you’re the dolls that’ll be helping me get this cottage ship shape?” she said.

“Yes,” I said, very aware the others weren’t willing or able to put forward the effort to be friendly.“What’s your name, dear?” she asked, setting the crate in her arms down and then bringing her attention to me and taking my hands in hers.

“A-Amaryllis,” I said, unnerved by the sudden warmth from her gentle touch.

“Delightful,” said the woman, her eyes were beautifully blue and as soft as her hands, “I’m Penelope Waxwood, but seeing as I’m your new guardian I’ll thank you for calling me Miss Waxwood, as to be proper.”

“Yes, Miss Waxwood.”

“Ooh, you’re a clever girl, I can tell.”

Miss Waxwood moved from me to Willow who was stood to my left. Willow, like an animal known to have a cruel master, cringed away from Miss Waxwood’s attempt to take hold of her hands.

“What’s the matter, dear?” said Miss Waxwood, alarmed.

“My hand,” said Willow.

Miss Waxwood looked confused before looking at the bandages on the hands of Willow and the other two.

“Oh dear,” she said, “Were you caned?”

The others, who were just as unused to genuine concern for their wellbeing from an adult as I was, looked perplexed before nodding in unison to Miss Waxwood’s question.

“Oh I wish they’d do away with this kind of treatment. Come in, I have just the thing.”

Miss Waxwood turned about and left to go inside the cottage. I took the lead and found the others moving close behind me. Sunshine shone into the cottage in a way that made it feel new and spacious. The lifetime of Old Gus dwelling inside the cottage and all the cobwebs and clutter had been diminished. I struggled to imagine how Miss Waxwood could have managed to have tidied up so much in the meantime the others and I had been away from the cottage, which was only a matter of hours. An old rocking chair occupied the middle of the room, and several opened crates promised stashes of lovely clothes, delicately crafted crockery, and an assortment of knitting and sewing utensils.

“It’s a mess I know,” she said, waving a hand at the crates, “I tried sprucing the place up but there’s only so much one can do under candlelight. Bring yourselves over here.”

Miss Waxwood was stood aside a long seat made out of twined branches. We each moved to the seat in our own time and found all four of us were just about able to fit in it.

“Here,” said Miss Waxwood having strode off and returned before handing me a cup of tea on a saucer. “I just made a fresh pot.”

It was the first time I had ever tasted tea, and though the taste was strong enough to leave a funny numbness in my mouth I couldn’t drink it down quick enough; whilst I drank Miss Waxwood saw to wiping the sticky clumps of dried blood from the other’s wounds with a cloth dipped in warm water. It was strange seeing the trust the others had in Miss Waxwood; first Willow sat patiently whilst her wound was cleaned and then covered in special ointment, then Rowan, and then Birch. It was a struggle for each of them to not cry or whimper from the pain of having their fresh wounds cleaned and properly bandaged, but each received a hot cup of tea as a reward after their treatment was finished.

“Sorry Miss Waxwood,” I said, standing up with my empty cup and saucer, “We came here to help you what would you like us to do?”

I could feel in my gut that I had done something wrong. Miss Waxwood looked at me without that warm smile that came so easily to her.

“Erm, I mean, we’re here to work, aren’t we?” I said.

“Yes, Amaryllis, you are,” said Miss Waxwood, softly, “You’re the head child, aren’t you?”

I gave a quick nod which seemed to confirm Miss Waxwood’s thoughts.

“Please do not feel like you have to be the head child when you’re here,” she said, resting a hand on my shoulder, “I’m not going to trick you into trouble so please do not feel like you have to be on your guard around me. That goes for all of you. When we rest we rest, when we drink we drink, when we eat we eat, and when we work, we work. But I will make it clear when we may do these things. I want you all to be comfortable here with me during our time together. Be fair with me and I’ll be fair with you. Does that sound agreeable, Amaryllis?”

“Yes, Miss Waxwood,” I said, in a kind of daze.

“I’ll tell you what,” she said, “I’ll refill your cups and fix you up a crumpet each, smothered in butter of course. Then we can get to work after. Is that okay with you all?”

I shared a look with the others, each us of wondering if Miss Waxwood was playing some kind of joke at our expense.

True to her word she fed us a crumpet each, which we discovered was a soft but also crispy kind of bread with holes in the top that tasted delicious smothered in melted butter.

We were thankful to be treated so kindly that we concerned ourselves to go about our work as enthusiastically as possible. Usually it was my job to make the others work with a sense of urgency but throughout the day Birch, Rowan, Willow and I did everything Miss Waxwood asked of us to the best of our ability; which consisted mainly of sorting and decorating the cottage until it felt like a place none of us had ever been inside before: a home.

It was early evening by the time everything was unpacked and sorted. Our stomachs felt tight from the steady onset of crumpets, biscuits, and hot tea offered to us at hourly intervals.

“You have all done an excellent job,” said Miss Waxwood, “Thank you all. Now, before you go, there’s one last finishing touch to be done.”

We watched as Miss Waxwood fetched a doll from a nearby crate. Its skin was as white as chalk, and its hair was raven black. It wore a black dress with frills and was without a single blemish or scratch.

“My prized possessions,” said Miss Waxwood, “Ever since I was your age I’ve always loved dolls. What do you think?”

Miss Waxwood held out the doll for Rowan so he could take it, which he did. He looked at it as if it were made out of gold.

“It’s wonderful,” said Rowan.

“You have an eye for quality,” said Miss Waxwood.

She rummaged through the same crate and took out another similar looking doll but in a yellow dress instead of black, and handed it over to Willow who was sat nearest her after Rowan. I wasn’t sure why but as I looked at the two dolls I felt a powerful sense of loneliness. It occurred to me that perhaps Miss Waxwood in her niceness was being inappropriate; didn’t she know she was showing off her dolls to children who were caned for the mere request that they might have wooden toys of their own to play with?

I was thankful Miss Waxwood hadn’t met my gaze in the first few moments she handed Willow and Rowan those two dolls because it took me that amount of time to swallow the awful feeling in my throat, and to wipe away the displeasure from my face.

“And last but not least,” said Miss Waxwood, digging into the bottom of the crate.

She let out a cry as if she had discovered the remains of a beloved pet on the verge of death somewhere inside. After collecting herself she gave a sigh and reached into the crate retrieving from it a brown-haired doll wearing a frilly brown dress.

The soft glow of the numerous lit candles dotted around the cottage illuminated the deep cracks in the doll’s face.

“Gosh darn!” said Miss Waxwood, “What a mess.”

“Can it be fixed?” said Willow.

“Yes,” said Miss Waxwood, “But only by the maker who lives in Rose City. It’ll cost weeks of wages too.”

She gently stroked the broken doll as if it were a living thing.

“I’ll have to put her away until I go back to Rose City. Until then she’ll have to make do with being broken.”

I watched closely as Miss Waxwood lowered the brown-haired doll back into the crate. The sight of the broken-faced doll stayed at the fore of my thoughts on the cold walk back from the cottage. The other three spoke at length about how nice Miss Waxwood was, and how they hoped to find themselves back in the cottage and in her company someday soon.

“Don’t you want to see her again?” said Birch, taking me by surprise by tapping me on the shoulder when I didn’t answer him right away.

“Yes, I would,” I said, surprised to see the hatred that had been in all of their eyes for me at the start of the day having vanished in place of a want to share in their newfound devotion to Miss Waxwood.

Later when I lay in the tent with sleep not far off, I thought of the moment when Miss Waxwood had found her brown-haired doll to be broken; there are times when people expose themselves and show who they really are. The thought which stayed with me that day and the days which followed was this: if Miss Waxwood could care so wholly for a lifeless doll, how much then could she care for real flesh and blood children?