Page 2 of Blueprints, Battlelines and Ballrooms (Tales from Honeysuckle Street #4)

Pain nibbled along her arm. She slowed until it settled, then continued brushing.

Her parents, doctors, and surgeons… they all focused on the triumvirate of her broken shoulder, knee, and leg, but other parts of her had also been damaged, and on cold days, they all reminded her that they, too, suffered.

Her ankle cried out that it had been twisted, and her ribs grumbled that they’d been cracked.

Her wrist—thankfully her left one—insisted that she remember how it had borne the brunt of the fall yet had the grace to remain intact.

All of her individual pieces made cantankerous complaints to one another until she paused, twisted her hair into a bun, and wriggled in a comb.

Gradually, everything fell silent. By the time she had tugged off her chemise and replaced it with fresh linen, pulled the cord on the corset with the ties on the front, and wrangled her bodice and skirt to sit smooth, her joints had remembered that they were made to move and ceased their grumbling.

‘No more lying about,’ she chastised herself.

‘Not if we’re going to take on this city.

We cannot draw castles from bed.’ And with one last nod at the mirror to confirm she looked like a healthy young woman so her mother would have no excuse to send her back to rest, Florence made her way downstairs.

Three, maybe four weeks had passed since their arrival in London.

That first night, when the boat had sluiced its way through the icy Thames, had been a good one.

She’d insisted on standing on deck as the yellow lights expanded into lit streets, while snow spun around her and settled along the ship’s rail.

During one of her colder winters as a girl in Melbourne, she’d seen sleet as the wind off the Roaring Forties had turned the rain to ice—but never snow.

Snow brought the same cold, but with a whisper, a gentle, frozen invasion that stilled the air and stiffened limbs.

London had given them the most magical arrival, only to turn and slap her so hard she’d been struck immobile.

For weeks, she’d only seen the city through a grimy window and through lids heavy with laudanum.

But not today. Today, a weak sun threw light across her bed, and she was up and ready to meet the world.

The nausea and headaches had retreated as the blue pills loosened their hold.

For the past two nights she’d slept without any tonics.

Perhaps, in this city, this was who she would be.

Not the weak girl, crippled by a buck from a skittish horse, but a resolute woman who became the very thing she wanted to be more than anything. Independent .

Florence walked through the small configuration of rooms that made up their new home.

The living room, two bedrooms, and the dining room with courtyard-facing windows were cosy enough for the three of them, but she had no wish to sit and listen to her mother read announcements from the society pages today…

or on any other day. Today, at least, she had the stamina to stay awake and plan an escape.

She grasped the banister and tackled each step like a child might, left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot .

Then she paused on the ground floor, just before the entrance.

That first night, before the pain had taken hold, Florence had wandered through their rented rooms while her father spoke of plans for his office on the lower level and made them promises of a proper home once he established himself.

Her mother had said they’d moved to Paddington.

‘Not the same as Paddington in Sydney, mind, a much nicer Paddington. No riff-raff.’ In the weeks since, they’d had the hallway decorated with fresh wallpaper and hung framed pictures of her father’s more prestigious designs.

The front room that faced the street had been furnished with some chairs and a desk—he’d meet investors in there, or potential clients. It was not a space for her.

Florence continued down the hall to the room at the back of the building, where she longed to spend her first morning out of bed.

For all her mother’s approving talk, this one small room was likely why her father had rented the place.

South-facing windows set into the opposite wall ensured that, even on dull days like today, sunlight poured into the space.

A small stove glowed in the corner, and boxes, some empty, some stacked with papers, sat scattered about, their disgorgement interrupted.

Books lined a tall case by the door. It looked a little like the office in Melbourne, with its dark wood rafters and dangling gas lamps.

She’d liked that office much more than the one in Sydney.

Melbourne had been full of optimism and hopes, full of grand schemes and beautiful designs. Sydney, not so much.

Two slanted drafting tables had been set up on opposite sides of the room.

His, as always, sat at a ninety-degree angle to the window so that he caught the best light.

Hers, as always, was positioned further back and closer to the stove.

‘Your young eyes are better,’ he’d say, although he knew the warmth of the fire made sitting for long stretches easier for her to manage.

A large parchment of heavy cream paper almost filled her desk.

Florence slid into the chair. The low end of the desk reached halfway across her chest—far too high for her to work at.

When Father came in, she’d ask him to help her lower it.

Her shoulder couldn’t manage the screws.

She pushed the chair back and stood before the plan.

He hadn’t mentioned clients to her when he’d sat with her some evenings.

Or maybe he had, and it had slipped from her mind through the fog of fever.

He was working on a plan for a small home.

A suburban development? New workers’ cottages?

The drawing had his signature aspects, even in its simplicity.

All on one level. Windows that faced south, larger rooms for living.

A kitchen at the back that was connected to the house.

‘Bracknell Place.’ Florence let the name of the design fill the silence. He’d started painting. Maybe he thought she’d be laid up for longer. He hated painting and avoided it whenever he could.

A collection of brushes sat in a little glass jar beside a pot of water and powdered paints.

Balancing on tip toes, Florence leant over the desk to reach for the rule pen.

She preferred the sharper lines of the pen to a brush, and it offered more control.

She adjusted the width of the nib, then mixed a little watercolour between the prongs.

‘I… umm…’ A cough. ‘Good morning.’

‘Coffee,’ she said, her eyes steady on the page. ‘One nip of sugar and a little milk. I’ll take a light breakfast when I have finished.’

This desk really was too high. How had her father managed to work at it? He was taller than her, but not that much taller. She wiped a drip from the edge of the pen and scanned the plan for a good place to start.

‘The darker green.’ The man beside her pointed at the paints, his finger spearing her view. A bright drop of tinted water trembled at the edge of her pen. Florence turned to look at the speaker, at this man who dared to instruct her at her work.

Buckles, buttons, suspenders, embroidery—there were so many details attached to him.

So many fastenings and accoutrements adorned the otherwise plain black-and-white canvas of his clothing that her mind, still doughy from weeks of sleep, could not take them in all at once.

And so she settled on the part of him closest to her—his hands.

One tapped an uneven rhythm against his side while the other still extended into the space before her.

A slash of black ink had settled in the crevices around his knuckles and spread outwards in a dark spiderweb.

Florence leant back and studied him more intently.

Bright stitching—red flowers and yellow bees—edged his waistcoat in a simple pattern, deliberate but imprecise, like it had been home-sewn.

The circumference of his waist could have fit at least one and a half of her.

A line of buttons, shell-white, led to a neat blue necktie.

An ache bit her shoulder as she craned her neck to lock eyes with this tower of a man looking down at her.

‘I beg your pardon?’ she said.

He gestured at the tray of paints. ‘I was using the darker green to colour the accents. It dries much lighter than you think it will.’ He flipped his hand from pointing to open. ‘I’m Johannes Hempel. I’m Mr Holt’s assistant. You must be Mrs Murray.’

Florence swallowed the urge to slap his hand away.

‘I am my father’s assistant.’ Fear, dark and twisting, wrapped around a bolt of jealousy.

Her heart thumped once, hard and anxious, then started racing like it was about to leap from her chest. Little spots of pain flamed across her back.

‘I colour his drawings. I sit at the desk by the stove.’

Even standing, Florence had to tilt back to meet his gaze.

He must have been at least a foot taller than her, and broad as a bear.

He had dark hair, close-cropped and neat, and was clean shaven.

A delicate dimple imprinted his cheeks, soft and kind against the firm lines of his jaw.

His hand, still extended, would have swallowed hers had she deigned to rest it in his palm.

‘Johannes.’ Her father’s voice carried through the office from where he stood by the door. ‘The order from the stationer should be ready. Will you collect it today? There’s talk that it might snow tomorrow.’

The imposter lowered his hand. ‘Yes, Mr Holt. I’ll finish these when I return.’

For a mass of a man, he moved with a measured grace.

His every step was deliberate, like he understood how much of the world he occupied and wanted to limit his intrusion.

When the thud of the front door echoed down the hallway, Florence dared to look at her father.

He pressed his mouth into a thin line, and his sharp eyes dug at her.

Only a small raise of his brow betrayed any softness.

‘We spoke about this. On the boat.’

‘You spoke about it.’ Florence flicked the edge of the house plan with her thumb. ‘I don’t remember agreeing.’

‘There is nothing to agree to! My assistant is my choice! No good will come from this, for you or the practice.’ He spun from calm to thunderous like the flip of a coin these days, as if he only had the capacity for two emotions and had left the rest of them—happiness, gentleness, hesitation—in the southern hemisphere.

‘Can’t I at least try to be my own woman? Many others have made careers for themselves, lived independent lives. Things may be different here.’

‘Other women have fathers with fortunes or their own dowries or dead husbands who left them with enough money to pay for six feet at Rookwood Cemetery. You have none of those things.’

‘It’s a bigger city, always changing. That’s what you said. I had hoped it might afford the opportunity for proper study. I could still help you, and in time, I might be able to join the practice in my own right—’

‘This city will not accept a woman at the drafting table, even one who traces and colours as well as you. This is not Ballarat where I can make excuses for using you as my assistant. Nor is it Sydney, where every woman has more freedom, although I wish I had been stricter. Things might have gone differently for you.’

There was the rub. He had given her too much autonomy when it came to courting, and she’d been dazzled by charm and chosen badly.

So badly that, after the building accident that had taken George from her, she’d had no choice but to return to her parents’ home.

After his business partners had claimed their debts, she’d not had any money left for flour for the larder, let alone enough to pay a maid to help her on bad days.

‘I loved George.’ She still had to swallow the knot of grief to say his name, and today it stuck so firmly in her throat that her voice came out weak and thin as thread. ‘He loved me.’

‘He gave you nothing but debts and a broken name,’ her father snapped. ‘Go upstairs. Your mother is writing calling cards. If you are well enough to paint, you are well enough to seal envelopes.’

Florence stroked the paper with her fingertip, caressing the dry, thick parchment. Her skin tingled just touching it. Her next breath weighed so heavy that it sent a ripple of pain over her shoulder. She crossed the room, only for her father to catch her by the elbow near the door.

‘I am happy to see you up. Do you think this doctor can help you? If we can pay the surgeon, might he have a cure?’

Florence brushed his hand away. ‘If you won’t let me sit at the table, what does it matter?’