The
Linden Trees
Lord Aedgar stepped through the grass with a sudden caution not quite characteristic, careful not to crush under his gait the delicate white and purple lilies, nor bend under his long tunic the clusters of yellow tansies and spider-petalled pennyroyals among which he trod. His gaze circled the garden, remarking the variety of specimens grown there.
He had never given much thought to plants. Not beyond their function to feed and heal and to provide shade from glaring heat. Too common, too trivial, always there and ready to be taken for granted. Animals were meant to be eaten or employed in chores, rivers to carry ships and lakes to be fished, mountains to be crossed, for God had gifted Man the power to use nature. But this time, the gentle breeze was bearing scents of late spring that reminded him of something long passed, something undefined. Something about this particular garden was giving him a sense of mystery. An unfamiliar tremor of anticipation.
The path that opened ahead was shaded by wooden arches, arbours with white and rose flowers opened in full blossom. And there, in the verdant shelter, a woman was tending to the blossoms, guiding the vines along the arches with her gloved hands, gently as if caressing a child. She was humming a song to herself. Gowned in a dress of dark-emerald colour, she seemed to be one with the verdure surrounding her. Sunlight shivered through the dense foliage of the arbour, its tiny reflections shimmering like golden flowers in the woman's bronze hair and upon her rosy skin.
Although he had expected to find her there, Aedgar stopped a moment as if unprepared. He smoothed out the collar of his tunic and the cloak pinned on one shoulder, reaching briefly up to his hair to make sure the leather band that held it tied was still in place, then assumed his usual statuesque bearing.
“Good morning, Lady Agnes,” he uttered in the Norman tongue. “I hope you’ll forgive my intrusion.”
Startled, the woman turned. At the sight of the visitor, her visage lit up.
“Lord Aedgar!” she exclaimed in English, a flawless Northumbrian accent. “I did not expect you at this early hour. I imagined you would sleep longer after your late night arrival.”
Her gardening gloves were dirty but she must have forgotten, in her surprise, because she ran her hands on her dishevelled headdress to make it neat again, leaving some dirt behind.
Once the nervousness of the initial had begun to wear off, Aedgar suddenly noticed the soil on her long sleeves and wrinkled white underskirt. She caught his gaze and dusted it off unsuccessfully, with an awkward smile, putting her gloves away. Like a little girl who finally shows up for dinner –when the food is already cold- soiled and sweaty and out of breath, trying to hide the fruits she’s stolen from some orchard and the tatters on her dress from climbing trees and the remnants of fur and dirt from the animals she’s played with.
Aedgar found it amusing. There was something childish in Agnes’s compulsion to delve into nature –whenever it needed tending to or whenever it had something out of the ordinary to show- and lose herself there. Her compulsion felt so familiar to him; and there it was again inside of him, that warm, heavy feeling of something long gone. What was it?
“Goodness, have you even had breakfast yet? I’d told the maids to set the table but not bring out the food yet, I didn’t want it to get cold before you came. You must be famished.”
“I’m usually not hungry in the morning, so I thought I’d take a little walk through your garden.”
“Rodulf and I had planned to give you a tour of the garden all the way to the lake, and then eat out here together. But…" her voice betrayed a shade of disappointment, "now the garden isn't a mystery to you any longer.”
“Nature is always mysterious to me,” Aedgar answered, pacing closer, “because I know very little about it, I’m afraid. It’s beautiful. Your hand was in all this, I can tell,” he added, glancing not at her but at the arches.
“Yes, this is the garden I had always dreamed of!” she exclaimed with cheer. “My own Garden of Eden before the Fall, a God-shaped shelter from the wickedness of man! You know, I think God loves flowers, and He wanted us to love them too... Otherwise, why would He have made such enchanting beauties spring from the ground, with giddying scents, with such intricately-woven patterns –like a labyrinth– and so unfathomably diverse!”
She walked towards a bush of large roses and cupped one of the flowers in her hands. Its petals wound harmoniously round and round the pistil.
“Look. Do you see? Each plant has its own uses, but the fruits and roots and leaves are often more beneficial than the flower itself. And yet, it’s the flower that arrests the eyes with its shapes and colour and scent. I think God made them because He wanted our hearts to leap in admiration of nature's beauty.” Speaking, Agnes had used the knife hanging from her belt to cut off a stem. “Does your heart leap at the sight, Aedgar?”
She held out the flower to Aedgar’s lips so that he could smell it. He sniffed the perfume, glancing in the blue of her eyes that stared into his with a merry, carefree zest. But, instead of an answer, he swallowed, his lips half-forming a faint smile. The woman laughed distractedly:
“Of course it doesn't. What a silly question! You have more useful passions than flowers and gardens.”
Aedgar shook his head. “Not really. A passion that makes one admire God's creation is the best kind of passion.”
She pinned the flower into the brooch that held his cloak on one shoulder, then gave him an amused once-over:
“So serious you still are, like when we were small children – as if the weight of the world pressed upon your brow! Can you imagine – fourteen years have passed since I left England! Goodness! You were almost the same age as my eldest son is now!”
“Truly?” Aedgar exclaimed, his words expressing a greater surprise than his mien, which remained unchanged. In reality, he knew it well.
“Yes, my little angels have grown up. My daughter is six and -” she whispered, “I’ll let you in on a little secret: I am with child again.”
Aedgar’s glance briefly slipped from her smiling face down to her belly. From the loose dress, he could not tell that she was pregnant. But then, again, she had always had a svelte, energetic frame.
“God keep them,” he finally said. “How time flies...”
“And yours?”
“Oh?”
“Your children.”
“Ah, yes. My girls are four and six.”
“I’d love to meet them one day, I’m sure my little Maud would befriend them right away. I hope Godgifu is well - I haven’t seen her since your wedding day."
She went on to ask about each of his family members in turns; about the Earldorman of Northumbria, Aedgar's father, about his younger brothers Edmund and little Aidan –goodness, what a tiny thing he was when she'd last seen him, he must be all grown-up now- making sure to give her condolences on the death of Lady Merwyn, his stepmother –what a beauty she was, inside and out. She spoke about them all with such familiarity and fondness as if she was part of the family herself, but estranged.
Before he could think of anything more elaborate to say about this all, Agnes unexpectedly gripped his arm again and exclaimed, with emotion:
“Goodness, Aedgar, how blessed we are! I thank God for it every single day. I still miss Northumbria sometimes, but it was all for the better... How foolish we are when we doubt His choices, don't you think? Normandy is my home now. It's lovely here! And Rodulf is such a wonderful husband. And you... you must be so happy too, Aedgar, with your perfect little family!”
“Of course,” he nodded, gazing at the hawthorn bloom. “Of course.”
Still leaning on his arm, Agnes led him on the path shaded from place to place by trees forming arches above them. She would tell him a little something about plants they met along the way and how she had acquired them, about gardens she had encountered during her travels and of her ambition to set up her own, about Rodulf’s estate before the garden had enriched it so wonderfully, about how he had endorsed her passion, having rare plants brought from abroad for her to nurture, about their children that would play there.
Aedgar would nod and answer with little comments, his free hand reaching a few times under his copper cloak to something hidden in his bag –something meant for Agnes- but then, whenever she mentioned her husband with such delight, he would decide to wait. So, instead, he would focus on her hand wrapped around his arm, casting furtive glances at the play of light and shadows on her face as they walked.
They reached the lake and stopped by its calm surface reflecting the May light like a mirror.
“Aedgar, do you remember the day I left? We went into the orchard and the linden trees were in bloom. They used to spread such a wonderful smell, I can feel it even now. And then...” she chuckled, “I can't believe you climbed all the way up in that high tree to carve my name on the bark! And you carved yours in the one beside it... in runes, so that it would be our secret! Those were our trees –our lindens- planted in the year of our births. We had built that little bridge between them, remember? We used to climb there and hide.” She frowned at him in jest, as if looking at a child:
“You silly boy, why would you try to drag me up there with you? I was wearing a new dress!”
“I thought it would cheer you up if we climbed up there, like we had always climbed together. You were sad to go away, and I didn't want to see you weep when we said goodbye.”
She sighed softly:
“Well, it was silly of you, nonetheless... Rodulf was coming to meet me and I didn't want to soil or tear that pretty dress. I'm too old for these silly games now, I said. It's not fit for an engaged young woman to climb trees, and I ought to look beautiful and lady-like for my future husband. And then you said... you said those linden trees were you and I –and they would stand side by side forever, no matter where our paths may take us...”
She had let go of his arm and they were now standing further apart under the shade of hawthorn trees in bloom that quivered in the breeze, staring along the bright surface of the lake. The wind had begun to blow stronger, still bearing the warmth of spring but more intense. Pale pink petals of hawthorn were falling off the branches, swirling and soaring in the wind, around them like scented rain. Agnes arranged the shawl that covered her shoulders and hair, pulling it tighter around her. Aedgar shook some fallen petals off the sleeves of his tunic. But their eyes did not meet.
A voice sounded behind them, breaking the spell of tense bittersweet silence:
“Well met, Lord Aedgar!”
They turned to the sight of a robust auburn-haired man, a wide smile on his face as he gave Aedgar a heavy embrace. To the warm salute, he bowed his head with statuesque politeness. The man went on, in Norman:
“Forgive my delay, a little errand kept me away longer than I had intended. Thank God you were in good company, at least,” he beamed at his wife. “My Agnes is always gladdened by Northumbrian guests, and I know you used to be on good terms as children. Like siblings, I heard. But you haven't given her any bad news, I trust?” he glanced now at Aedgar, now at Agnes, slightly disconcerted by their serious expressions.
“Not at all, I hope. In case I have, the gift I brought may bring some cheer.”
“You had a gift with you?” the man wondered amused. “And you waited to give it to her in my presence! Come, I had no reason to mind –unless there was something scandalous in it, unfit for a husband's eye,” he laughed and winked. “Go ahead, old friend, don’t keep a lady waiting. Let's see it!”
Aedgar produced a leather-bound book out of his bag, its leather cover finely decorated.
“On plants,” Agnes read the title in utter surprise, taking the book in her hands.
“With excerpts of Pliny’s Naturalis Historia and Bede’s De Rerum Natura,” Aedgar added.
“Decorative plants... rosa alba, rosa gallica, honeysuckle, rue, iris, ivy,” she leafed through the illustrated pages, her smile wider and wider as she did so, “spices, medicinal plants, horsemint, sage, fennel, cumin, rosemary...”
“A book! And a book on gardening too! Such fuss for a bundle of words about plants –as if a garden full of them wasn't too much already,” Rodulf scoffed, gesturing with his hand, his eyes playful.
Agnes elbowed him, pretending to be offended, so Rodulf took her by the shoulder in a half embrace which she leaned into, comfortably, chuckling as they glanced into each other’s eyes. For a moment there, they looked like happy teeneagers who tease each other to mask feelings they are too sheepish to express.
Hearing Agnes speaking of Rodulf with such fondness during their tête-à-tête moments before, a part of Aedgar had hoped it was something like a façade. Not a mask for some dark secret – no, nothing of the sort, he wished no darkness on her - but simply a way to say It’s not perfect, but it is what it is. Because that would mean that, in the course of those fourteen years, she had asked herself What would it have been like…? A garden path dotted with forget-me-nots, what-ifs and might-have-beens that may never be discovered, but the simple knowledge that it was there brought some comfort.
But, seeing them together like this, Aedgar felt a pang of guilt for having hoped for such a thing. Perhaps Agnes had asked herself that question, but nothing more. The path not taken, forever overgrown and unfindable in the garden. She was happy; and he was happy to see her so.
Then she turned to Aedgar and bowed her head shortly:
“It shall be a pleasure to read it, and in my mother-tongue too. Thank you, Aedgar.”
She excused herself to go see to the preparations for breakfast then went away, book in hand.
“This shall keep her happy and occupied for the foreseeable future,” commented Rodulf, but his amused tone turned serious. “This was thoughtful of you. Thank you.”
And then he invited his guest to delve into a bit of business talk on an empty stomach, as he put it.
So the two men remained behind to discuss, but Aedgar kept glancing after Agnes –expectantly- who was still leafing through the book as she walked the path towards the house. He saw her stop at a certain page: a tiny branch of linden was inside it, pressed, with two yellow flowers sheltered by leaves. Her feet slowed their pace for a moment as she took the leaf to her lips to smell it.
She looked back and her eyes met Aedgar's, face lit up by a bright smile, and nodded with friendly gratitude.