In Her Rival's Arms

The fittings were in keeping with the house. The claw-foot bath, the pedestal hand basin and the ceramic toilet bowl and cistern with its chain flush, but everything had been painted with trails of ivy. The tiny leaves on the painted vines crept over the white tiled walls from the arched window, making it appear as though the growth had come naturally from outside the house. The floor was also tiled in white but there were small diamond-shaped insets in the same shade of green as the ivy. The interior of the antique bathtub was also painted the same dark green.

‘C’est si spécial...’

Reverting to the language of his heart only happened when something touched him deeply but he didn’t translate the phrase as he walked back past Zanna. She didn’t move so he kept going towards the last door that opened off this hallway.

Directly over the shop, this room shared the feature of a large bay window but here it had been inset with a window seat that followed the semi-circular line. A brass bed, probably as old as the house, had a central position and the colours in the patchwork quilt echoed those of the tiles in the nearby fireplace.

The walls were lined with tongue-and-groove timber that had been painted the palest shade of green. Dotted at random intervals, but no more than a few centimetres apart, were reproductions of flowerheads. Every imaginable flower could be found somewhere on these wooden walls. From large roses and lilies to pansies and daisies—right down to the tiniest forget-me-nots.

‘The hours this must have taken...’ Nic murmured aloud. ‘It must have cost a fortune.’

‘It was good practice.’

Startled, Nic turned to find he wasn’t alone in the room any longer. That feeling he’d had earlier of being potentially out of his depth had nothing on the way the ground had just shifted beneath him.

‘You painted these?’

The shrug was almost imperceptible but the modesty was appealing. ‘Maggie gave me an encyclopaedia of flowers for my twelfth birthday. I added one almost every day for years.’

‘And the ivy in the bathroom?’

‘That was a wet May school holiday.’ Another tiny shrug came with the hint of a smile. ‘Maggie said it would keep me out of mischief.’

He stared at her. ‘Do you know how extraordinary you are, Zanna Zelensky? How talented?’

She simply stared back at him. As though he’d said something wrong and she was trying to decide what to do about it. The moment stretched but Nic couldn’t break the silence. The air hummed with a curious tension but he had no clue as to what might have caused it.

Finally, she spoke.

‘There’s one room you haven’t seen yet.’

His nod was solemn. His mouth felt dry and he had to lick his lips.

The turret. The one room he’d wanted to see inside for as long as he could remember. The child buried deep inside was about to have his dearest wish granted. But...what if it was a disappointment? If it was nothing more than, say, a storage area?

He forced his feet to start moving. To follow Zanna up the narrow, spiral staircase that led to the secret room beneath the witch’s hat of the turret. If it was less than he hoped for, he’d cope. He had with every other childish hope and dream that had been crushed, hadn’t he?

Opening the small door at the top of the stairs, Zanna walked ahead of him. She said nothing. She didn’t even turn around as she walked over to one of the arched windows and stared out as if she was giving Nic some privacy.