The Sparrow Sisters (10 page)

“Sorrel never talks about it, but I guess they could have been more than best friends. I don't really need Sorrel to tell me what's happening, or Simon either, for that matter.” Patience pushed her index finger deep into the soil of one of the flats. She felt that it was perfectly wet and brushed the dirt from her hand. “When Simon gets anywhere near Sorrel, the air changes around them, and I can feel how sorry they both are. How, oh, I don't know”—Patience tilted her head—“thwarted, I guess.”

“Why hasn't Sorrel found someone else? Or why don't they try to be with each other?” Henry asked. The thought of living within blocks of someone you wanted was unimaginable to
him. Except that as he looked at Patience, her hair in a jumble at her neck, her arms tanned and freckled, Henry thought maybe he could imagine it.

“Let me tell you something about Granite Point,” she said. “This is a town with a very long memory and a very wide Puritan streak. Besides, there has never been a Mayo divorce, and there never will be.”

“And that's true even now, in the twenty-first century?” To Henry, Patience's description was at best picturesque and at worst mean.

“Yes, now,” Patience said. “Very little changes in Granite Point, not the important stuff, anyway. So, Simon's wife, Charlotte, is . . .” Patience paused, brushed her hand across the tops of the flowers. “Well, Sorrel is here, and Charlotte is with Simon in the big Mayo house on the harbor.” The smell of warm cinnamon and clove drifted out from under Patience's fingertips.

“And you are with Nettie and Sorrel.”

“Yes, we're the last of the Sparrows.” Patience heard Sorrel's voice in her words and she frowned. She pointed at the flats. “These are dianthus, pinks, they're called—a kind of carnation, highly scented.” She walked down the row and toward the door. Henry stood for a moment and let the smell of the pinks, sweet and soft, drift around him. He felt light-headed and strangely content. Henry finally moved when he saw that Patience was holding the door open at the end of the greenhouse.

Patience led Henry all through the whole Nursery, explaining how the plants were organized. When they got to the largest knot garden, the smell flowed around it, hovered over it. Henry thought he could actually see a layer of hazy green floating inches above the intricate patterns. Patience wove her way through it, reciting the names of the plants so musically that Henry felt nearly hypnotized. Threads of mist curled in her wake.

“Mallow, acanthus, germander, marjoram, calendula, viola, lady's mantle, shepherd's purse, valerian,” Patience murmured. She plucked at the hedges that marked the formal design and rubbed blue-green leaves between her fingers, bruising them, releasing an acrid but oddly appealing scent.

“I use everything in this garden,” she said. “The smallest flowers serve a purpose, the sharpest thorns work in their way.”

They wandered through the tallest flowers in the cutting gardens.

“Delphinium, salvia, snapdragon, monkshood, foxglove,” she recited.

“Do you use all of these as well?” Henry asked.

“Well, salvia is a hallucinogen, and foxglove is digitalis, so no, not really,” she answered. “They are mostly for decoration.”

“Digitalis? That's digoxin. It's used to treat arrhythmia,” he said. “Heart medicine,” he added.

“Yeah, I know that,” Patience said. “Clearly I don't use it on people, Sorrel's arrangements only.” She flicked a finger at the foxglove, making the blossoms shudder, and several earwigs tumbled out. “I found these in the wildflower meadow some
years ago and transplanted them. The legend is that Elizabeth Howard, one of our ancestors, planted them in the seventeenth century. This was her land then.”

“Surely that's not possible?” Henry asked.

“Who knows?” Patience answered. “There are a lot of impossibilities about growing things.” And she began to show Henry what she meant.

While Patience was very clear about each plant, about how the sandy soil dictated much of what grew until the Sisters changed it, revealing much about the mysterious flowers and vigorous plants that covered the acres, she gave away little else about her family other than to say that they owned the Nursery together and lived comfortably off its proceeds and the Sparrow trust her father hadn't been able to touch. Henry badly wanted to learn more about the last Sparrows and why they were alone, but he heard the chill that had crept into Patience's voice as she described how they had managed to buy the land, how death had brought forth this living thing, so he held his tongue. When they walked into the wildflower meadow, he saw that she relaxed again, the planes of her face softening as she bent to cut a handful of bright blue flowers. She snapped her penknife shut and slid it into a pocket.

“Cornflowers, bachelor's buttons; one of our mother's favorites, so my sisters tell me,” she said, giving him the little bouquet. Henry took it. He let his fingers brush against Patience's and looked to see if she felt the shiver that took him.

“When she died, they raised me, all three. Dad was pretty
useless, so angry and sad. Dr. Higgins couldn't help him or Marigold. When she died, we all kind of gave up on doctors.”

“Is that why you make your remedies?”

“Partly,” Patience said. “I do have a gift, it seems. I can read what people need, somehow. I feel exactly how to make them better. It started before I got Clarissa's book, another ancestor, the woman who built Ivy House. Once I read it, I found that I just knew how to grow things, take the ingredients and . . .” She trailed off. “You think it's all nuts, don't you?”

Henry hesitated; he had to be careful. “I don't know what it is you can do. I only know that everyone believes in you,” he said. “Maybe if you gave me a chance, showed me your work . . .” Patience cocked her head and looked so hard at Henry that he felt completely disingenuous.

“I could show you how I work, too,” he finished lamely.

“Yeah, right,” she said.

“No, I mean it.” And he did. If her mistrust of doctors was why Patience didn't like him, Henry was determined to fix it. He so wished for her to like him.

Patience made for the barn without waiting for Henry to catch up. He followed her again.

“Sally Tabor told me that you can change things, people, not just their symptoms. She said it's not faith.” Henry stopped. “Is it magic, I mean not real magic, some kind of homeopathy . . . ?” He stood still, staring at Patience's back.

“I gave her ginger tea for morning sickness,” Patience said. “Relief has a way of making you so grateful it just seems like
magic.” She turned around to face Henry. “How's Dot Avery, the arthritis?”

“She's over eighty, there's nothing much I can do besides anti-inflammatory drugs.”

“See, that's where you're wrong,” Patience said. “All Dot wants is to walk her dog and volunteer at the animal shelter. She's depressed because it hurts too much to do those things, and then she begins to fail even more. I can fix that part, too.”

“Then why haven't you?”

“She wanted to go to you.”

“So she has.” Henry drew closer on the step beneath her. “Perhaps I could suggest that she see you now.”

Patience wasn't sure if Henry was serious. She could smell the disinfectant that still clung to his clothes. Rubbing alcohol, ammonia, cotton wool. She saw the bloodstain on his shirtsleeve. It all reminded her of Marigold, how she'd struggled so hard only to sink beneath the weight of her disease. Patience shivered and rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. To Henry she looked as young and lost as the little girl in his office that morning.

“Hey, now,” Henry said. “What have I done?” He brushed his fingertips over her shoulder and reached up to stroke the bruise on her cheek.

Patience took his hand. “It's not you,” she said. But it was. She let go of his hand and disappeared into the barn.

Henry felt like he'd been given another chance with Patience and was damned if he wasn't going to take it.

“Will you come with me to the party?” he called. Patience reappeared at the door. She looked so surprised that he wondered if he'd made a terrible mistake. But then she nodded. Henry let his breath out. “I don't know anyone, really. It would be nice to have a guide.”

“We will be the talk of the town.” Patience raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, I don't think I'm nearly interesting enough to start rumors.” Henry stepped up to meet Patience in the doorway. “Now, you,” he said. “You are fascinating.”

P
ATIENCE DROVE
H
ENRY
to Baker's Way so he could get his car and head out to check on Ben Avellar. All the way she replayed the moment they had stood so close. She could still feel the doorframe against her spine as she pressed back from Henry although she'd longed to press into him. After she pulled over to the curb, Patience tucked a sprig of hyssop into Henry's shirt pocket. The camphor-like smell wasn't much better than disinfectant, but at least it came from the garden. She let her fingers linger for a moment against him, the crisp cotton of his shirt wilted by the heat. Beneath the doctor smell she could detect fresh water, wood, and man. She pressed her fingertips into him for a second before she put her hand back on the wheel. He felt the pressure acutely and held his breath. Henry climbed out of the truck and for the first time, Patience wanted to say something to him about his leg. But she didn't; she just watched him walk into the house, his hand reaching, automatically, to rub his thigh.

When she returned to the Nursery, Patience found Sorrel on the bench in the Shakespeare Garden. She joined her, and the sisters sat in silence until Sorrel couldn't stand it anymore.

“I really need you to stop hating Simon,” she said. “It's not like he left me for Charlotte.”

“I don't hate him,” Patience said. “In fact, I'm going with Henry.”

“Going with Henry?” Sorrel laughed. “Steady?”

“To the Mayo party. He asked, I said fine.” Patience stood. “Come on, Nettie must be frantic with boredom.”

“Nettie's often frantic,” Sorrel said. “Why are you?”

“I'm nothing like frantic. I just want to get home. I've got gin to drink.”

H
enry drove west to Hayward with the last of the sun in his eyes. He had the windows open, and the rushing sound filled his head. It didn't block out thoughts of Patience as he'd hoped it would. He too relived the moment they had stood so close in the barn; he wanted to savor it, but all he could think was,
You are fascinating.
Who says things like that?

By the time he walked into the hospital, it was dark, a full hour later than he'd planned. He stopped at the front desk and signed in. It was the first time he'd been to Hayward Hospital since he registered for privileges. He picked up a badge and went to Ben's floor. The nurses looked up as he approached;
one glanced down at his limp, but the other was too busy staring at his face to see anything else.

“I'm here to see Ben Avellar,” Henry said.

“Family?” one nurse asked.

Henry hadn't bothered with a lab coat, and he had slipped his visitor's badge into his pocket. He fished it out and showed it to the nurse. “I'm his doctor,” he said.

“Well”—the nurse peered at the badge—“Dr. Carlyle, he's in room 512.” She pointed as Henry thanked her and walked down the hall.

An old man, asleep, his mouth gaping, his teeth on the bedside table next to a balled-up tissue and an emesis basin, lay in the near bed. Henry tiptoed past and around the curtain where he found Ben, also asleep. His hand was on a folded pillow. It was stained brown by Betadine, wrapped in white gauze and a foam splint. Henry could see the small lump under the dressing; the wire that poked through the skin at the base of Ben's thumb. It would be some weeks before that could come out and Henry realized that Ben wouldn't be able to use the thumb until it did, and then only carefully. There was nothing careful about fishing. What happened when a lobsterman couldn't pull his traps? Henry guessed his patient was in trouble. It would soon be high season, and Ben would be without his job.

Henry took the chart off the end of the bed and read through the notes. Nothing unusual, no surprises in the blood work. He didn't know what he expected: eye of newt or horn of toad extract from Patience? Henry huffed and replaced the chart.
He went to the window and leaned his head against the cool pane. He shifted all his weight onto his good leg and sighed.

“Hey, Dr. Carlyle,” Ben said. His voice was scratchy, and his mouth was so dry Henry could hear the sound his lips made as they parted.

Henry turned around and smiled. “Ben, you look well.”

Ben lifted his hand. “Pretty well fucked,” he said. “The surgeon told me I can't work, not for a month at least. That's the season gone.”

“I know,” Henry said. He brought a cup of water to Ben and held the straw while he drank. He took his stethoscope from around his neck and listened to Ben's heart. It was as steady and strong as the man himself. Never mind that he was in a hospital johnny. “There has to be someone who can run your boat.”

“I guess,” Ben said and squirmed up in the bed. “But summer is when I make enough to get me through. Working the cemetery, helping the Sisters, a little construction, it's not enough. Shit, even with the boat it's hard. The maintenance alone . . .”

Henry didn't know what to say. He'd never had to worry about money. He'd never had to depend on his body to make a living, and after he'd been wounded in Iraq, he knew he never would. He still missed the physicality of the field hospital but not the cold dread that settled in as soon as the warning Klaxon went off. And back in Boston, when he tried to live his old life, he remembered how he was usually the last doctor to reach an ambulance, his limp forcing him into a silly skip to keep up with the gurneys.

“Ben, give me some names. Sally and I will set up a rota of men to bait and pull your traps.”

“Now why would any of the guys give up their day to help me?”

“Because it's the right thing,” Henry said. “You'd do it for them.”

Ben nodded. “I would,” he said.

Henry took out his prescription pad and wrote down the names Ben gave him. As he did, he found himself excited by his new task. He considered going out on the boats with one of lobstermen. He pictured himself hauling the traps out of the clear cold water, measuring and weighing the lobsters, shoveling ice down the hatch. Pretty nigh impossible, he knew. When Ben sighed, Henry's own good cheer embarrassed him.

“You look happy,” Ben said.

“I think I am,” Henry said.

“Glad one of us is.”

T
HE STARS WERE
out by the time Henry got back to Granite Point. When he turned onto Baker's Way, the house looked forlorn, dark and unoccupied. He went around to the back to let himself in and found Patience Sparrow sitting on his little porch steps.

“Holy . . .” Henry said.

“Don't finish that,” Patience warned. She had the bag from the liquor store in her lap. “I owe you a drink.”

“You do?” Henry asked. He helped her up and couldn't let go of her hand.

“Well, I offered earlier and since you're all done with Ben . . . how is Ben?”

“He's worried about money. He won't be able to run the boat most of the summer.”

“That's bad,” Patience said. She reclaimed her hand and opened the bag. “Although, there are some guys who know him, and the firemen. We can put together enough to see Ben through.”

“That's what I said,” Henry reached for the lime. “I'll just go cut this up.”

Patience sat back down and leaned until her vertebrae bumped the step. She'd felt like a teenager when she snuck out of the house while Nettie was cooking and hurried toward Henry's house. It was just that she thought she'd left things uneven at the nursery.

Henry came back with the lime wedges in one palm and glasses of ice in the other. He hipped the screen door open and put the glasses on the porch rail.

“Here,” he said beckoning Patience over. “You know what?” he asked.

Patience shook her head.

“This is exactly what I wanted; a gin and tonic.”
And you,
he thought.

“I aim to please,” Patience said.
What is
with
me?
she thought.

“No you don't, that's the last thing you aim to do.”

“Well, I aim to end your day with a proper cocktail then.”

They stood for a minute, and Henry kept his glass close to his mouth, feeling the snap and fizz of the tonic against his lips.

“Why are you here, Henry?” Patience asked, and Henry then knew why she was on his porch.

“Ah, you're curious about the new doctor too.”

“I told you my story,” Patience said.

“I think not much of it.” Henry took a sip of his drink.

“How about you tell me as much of yours as I did of mine.”

“That seems fair.” Henry gestured to the chairs. “I am thirty-three and before I came here I was in the army and before and after that I was an ER doc and before all that I went to Yale.”

“And I could have gotten that from anyone in town.” In fact, she had, from the bank teller over a month before.

“I graduated at twenty, was Phi Beta Kappa, and got my first match out of med school.”

“Again, not what I'm looking for.” Patience pulled her legs up, and Henry followed their long line over the rim of his glass.

“You want to know how I hurt my leg?” he asked.

“Only if you want to tell me.”

“I don't,” Henry said. He sighed and looked at the porch ceiling. “I was overseeing a vaccination program at a school near Mosul, northwest of Baghdad. There was an IED in the damn school. I'm told it could have been much worse.” Henry's voice had dropped lower and lower so that by the end Patience had to lean forward to hear him.

“I'm sorry,” she said.

“So.” Henry looked at Patience. “You can imagine the appeal of small-town medicine. I tried the ER again, but . . .”

“It still hurts,” she murmured.

“It's been a while now.”

“But your leg still hurts.”

“Not so much.”

Patience reached to touch Henry's thigh, but he grabbed her hand.

“Don't,” he said.

“Are you afraid I'll put a spell on you?” Patience tried to keep the hurt out of her voice.

“No, I don't want you to feel sorry for me. You've no idea how emasculating it is to be the object of pity.” Henry stood. “I came to Granite Point to be around people who didn't know me before. I'd like to keep it that way, the not knowing me before part.”

Patience understood that. She nodded at Henry, and he thought that he saw her soften a bit. She closed her eyes and turned her face away from him.

“Sometimes I think this whole town is be-spelled,” she said. “Sometimes it feels like it's one of those enchanted villages the hardware store puts up in the windows at Christmas.”

Henry waited quietly.

“I can see how you'd want to fit in here,” Patience said. “If you go around in a little slot, doing your thing, day in, day out, then you're safe.”

“Is that what you do?” Henry asked.

“Oh, God,” Patience sounded almost sorry. “There is no slot for me. Don't you know? I'm not safe at all.”

P
ATIENCE REFUSED HIS
offer of another drink, but she left the gin and lime. After she'd tried to touch him, the pleasure had gone out of the air, replaced by an edgy chill. They were both relieved when she stood to go home. Henry agreed to come to Ivy House to get Patience for the party the next evening, then he watched her leave without moving, even when she turned for a last look. Henry wondered if she'd left the gin because she was coming back or giving up.

Henry poured himself another drink, but the tonic had gone flat, making it nothing more than a too-sweet punch. He tried to understand why he hadn't let Patience touch him. The pity thing did haunt him, but something told him that Patience didn't feel that way. And so, why hadn't he taken his chance when he had it? Why hadn't he let her take his leg in her hands? He could so easily have turned that exploring touch into something much better. But then he thought of the first woman he'd been with after he was back. She had actually started to cry when she saw the wound. It was still raw, the network of ugly shrapnel scars, the staple marks like tiny tracks, the deep divot over his reconstructed femur still a livid pink. The look on her face told Henry that she had crowned him some kind of tragic champion. If he hadn't been so desperate, he'd have sent her home there and then. But he hadn't. He'd closed his eyes and pulled her into his bed.

The thought of Patience reacting the same way, a mixture of pity and fascination, made Henry feel sick. Although, from what he'd seen of her, it seemed unlikely that Patience would cry over him. She'd be more likely to examine him, turning him toward the light as she probed his leg. Henry shuddered. Enough, he thought, and went inside to scare up some dinner.

Patience walked home so slowly that her stomach was growling audibly by the time she reached Sorrel waiting for her on the front steps.

“Where were you?”

“I went for a walk.” Patience climbed the steps and sat down next to Sorrel. “Do you think it's a mistake going to the Mayos'?”

Sorrel tucked a strand of hair behind Patience's ear. “I think that it's a mistake to let Henry Carlyle think you're interested in him.”

“Maybe I am.”

“And maybe not,” Sorrel said. “Please don't hurt him, Patience. Don't leave him to the pity of this town.”

There was that word again.

“He would hate that,” Patience acknowledged.

“So?”

“So I'm not going to get involved with him. It's a stupid party. I'll bet the only reason he's even going is to get patients.”

“Not to get Patience, then?” Sorrel asked.

“Funny, Sorrel.” Patience pulled her sister up and they joined Nettie in the kitchen.

“Oh, you're back.” Nettie was stirring something that smelled wonderful. “I am feeling so much better and I'm starved. I didn't think I could wait.”

They sat down to fresh cod soup flavored with lemongrass, cilantro, and ginger. The broth was a translucent green, and tiny flecks of red chili floated on the top. Patience tasted it first, blowing on her spoon.

“This is really good,” she said.

“It's too sour.” Sorrel frowned.

“It's not, it's a little too sweet,” Nettie chewed a piece of firm, white cod. “Odd.”

The sisters looked at Patience.

“What?” she said.

Sorrel pointed to the soup and then to Patience. “Something's happening here.”