The Apple-Tree Throne by Premee Mohamed

Author:Premee Mohamed [Mohamed, Premee]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Premee Mohamed
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

***

Bathed, shaved, teeth cleaned, hair combed, and feet bandaged, I knock upon the front door of Lindow House and am admitted to the smaller dining room, where Mr. and Mrs. Wickersley are taking their breakfast.

“Benjamin!” Mrs. Wickersley cries, and I try to remember precisely when she began to use my Christian name rather than ‘Lieutenant Braddock.’ “You left the fête with such haste last night - I hope that nothing was wrong?”

“No, Mrs. Wickersley.”

“You were not offended in any way?” she says anxiously. “None of the other guests…?”

The Major-General’s unseen eyes bore into me now despite her appearance of maternal distress, as if she is trying to look at the back of my head. What is he trying to tell me?

“No, Mrs. Wickersley,” I tell her, and at her continued urging sit at their table, and force down a few spoonsful of porridge with honey and cream. Probably a poor idea, that cream. My stomach is a stormy sea, and I dare not eat more. I curl my hand around the tea-cup and look at them both. “I was wondering, if it was not too much of an imposition, whether I might accompany you to church this morning? I quite understand if it is not your preference,” I add hastily.

Somewhat to my surprise, it is Mr. Wickersley who responds. “Of course. The carriage will be outside in a half-hour. Plenty of room.”

“Is that enough time for you to go and change, dear?” Mrs. Wickersley says.

“Pardon me?”

“Surely you don’t mean to attend in…”

I glance down at my outfit, which had seemed to be perfectly respectable— clean, anyway, pressed, and without any stains or burn-marks. Belatedly I realize she means she expected me to attend in uniform— perhaps not my grand dress uniform from last night, but at the very least, my spare service uniform, the only one that survived the blast, which I often wear to dinner here.

“Let the boy alone,” Mr. Wickersley says, and I see that he is in uniform himself— two wars ago, faded, showing ancient blood-stains improperly laundered. The mourning-band is stark in its darkness against the soft old cloth. He’s old, but he’s still got all his buttons on; nothing has escaped him in this conversation.

In the strained silence, I gulp down my tea and say, “I shall change at once, Mrs. Wickersley, and meet you in half an hour.”

“Very good, dear,” she says, shooting her husband a look of triumph. I do not know if I have fallen in his esteem, but what I wear to church is of no importance to me, unlike Mrs. Wickersley.

Changed, I meet them at the carriage parked near the gate. Mrs. Wickersley nods approvingly at my shabby uniform — the ghost knocked it onto the floor of the closet, and it was all wrinkles and dust when I put it on. Then she reaches up and pushes something into my breast pocket: a rose of a red so arterial and dark that it seems as if it has been dipped in blood.

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