This story was short-listed for the 2023 Silver Apples Redemption Short Story Competition.
Saint Agnes of Assisi Medical Hospital, Ward 3
ATTN: Physician Lindsey Wallace
May 3, 1765
To my dearest Husband,
I know you said not to write, but I simply cannot wait any longer. It’s been a week and Charles has still not sent for me with a carriage. I do not mean to disobey – they do say that absence makes the heart grow fonder – but, my darling, I feel that my heart was already full when you left.
What I fear, rather, is that my heart has grown heavy with overfondness and it has stricken me with a great deal of ill humour. If you were here beside me, you could put that stethoscope to my back and hear how loudly the drums beat inside my chest. I wouldn’t even complain if you didn’t warm the metal first, because nothing could be as cold as how our bedchamber feels during the nights of your leave.
I am sure that you express these same feelings, but oh how dreadfully busy you must be! The scant time of a physician made to stretch so unseemly for all those sick people. I imagine that, when the hour of leisure approaches, summoning the strength to even lift a pen and write a letter must be beyond your abilities. I am certain that you curse the clock’s hands as they push you toward sleep. If only there were hours in the day to both save lives and love your wife, you must think.
Forgive me, I don’t mean that as any marital discordance. You know how I get with idle hands and some ink.
It is just that, my dearest Lindsey, this isn’t at all what I thought it would be. I must confess that when you first spoke of Quarantine I imagined that we were to be sojourning in a Spanish villa. And, forgive this admission, but when I had been dusting the encyclopaedias in the library, my eyes had oft wandered to the pages of the ‘M’ collection and their vivid descriptions of the Mediterranean. It was written that the sea is warm all year round, and just reading along to the adventures of those explorers that championed its trade routes made my body flushed with heat. Of course, I didn’t so much as glance at the descriptions of deviant flagellation that you had forewarned resided in the ‘Mas’ entries.
But then when it came time to leave and Charles was carrying your bags alone…I suppose it was a shock is all. You couldn’t believe how empty our wardrobes appeared once all of your smoking hats had been bundled away. Such a presence leaves a great void. I felt like I could have crawled in there and made a small home for myself, living within the spaces you no longer were. Though, I never did much like the smell of pine. If only you had purchased the one with the oak finish, which I must have only dreamt that we had jointly agreed upon. Perhaps, then, it would have been providing me a small comfort.
No matter, we can discuss the benefits of investing in oak once we are in each other’s arms once more.
Your devoted Wife,
Gertrude Wallace
Saint Agnes of Assisi Medical Hospital, Ward 3
ATTN: Physician Lindsey Wallace
May 6, 1765
To my beleaguered Lindsey,
I hope that this finds you before you have drafted your reply. I would hate for you to spend your energy responding to that dour sourpuss that first wrote you. I have meditated on my situation over the past few nights, and I am now a woman with redoubled resolve! Do you know what spurred me to such reinvigoration? It was as you always prescribed, Lindsey – thoughts of my good husband!
It is to be the fifth anniversary of our marriage in one week and, given the proclivities of my spouse for ostentation, I suspect that our upcoming milestone may have something to do with this whole medical ‘Quarantine’ experiment. I’ve definitely shown that I can’t help but watch your every waking move in the past, so it was convenient that your assignment removed you from your wife’s supervision for two weeks, wasn’t it?
I shan’t question the matter any further. I’ll let you have your secrets, Lindsey. Instead, I wanted to write to let you know that I had plans of my own. I wanted to give something of myself to you. After all, you give so much of yourself to everyone else. It’s almost as if you’re married to every crippled veteran and snot-nosed baby in the town. But you didn’t walk them down the cathedral steps, did you?
When I was younger, while I was still a sewing machinist, my mother would bake apricot pie for me to take to the girls at the factory for lunch. Without fail, it would bring the widest smiles to the table whenever I set it down. Even the poor girls in the infirmary who had broken their hands upon the wheel would join us. We’d help the little ones crack the crust with their forks and, oh how merry a time it was. My mother still had her eyes at that point, of course. It really is such a shame that you were never able to meet her. She would have been ever so sweet on that handsome face of yours, even if she couldn’t see past her nose. However, as you said, even breathing the air south of the river would turn your lungs black. I suppose you were right. in the end. I do regret that you weren’t able to get leave for us to attend her funeral, though.
Regardless, this is about the pie, Lindsey. You simply must taste this pie. Nothing has ever tasted so sweet to me since, and I have decided that I must share this memory with you. While you squirrel away in your secret laboratory and concoct your big surprise, I will prepare the perfect dessert to cap off a perfect night. I’ll get Rosa to help me, tomorrow, when she comes to fill the pantry.
Also, I should absolve your guilt of abandonment and let you know that I’ve been finding the nights much less lonely of late. I don’t want you to get jealous, but I’ve been making good bedfellows with scotch. I have found my mood to be much improved ever since. The words come out and onto the page much more easily after a nip or two, as well. Which reminds me, I must stop writing here – someone ought to go and keep the bottle warm.
Affectionately yours,
Gertie
Saint Agnes of Assisi Medical Hospital, Wards 1-6
ATTN: Physician Lindsey Wallace
May 8, 1765
To Lindsey,
Well Rosa never deigned to make an appearance, did she? I hope that she has not hoodwinked her pay from you as yet, because she has hardly performed her duties about the manor at all. Just this very morning I awoke with a terrible ache in my head, which I am certain was brought about by the poorly conditions in which the rooms are kept. Not a single window attended to; all drapes tightly drawn and blocking the sun. There wasn’t even a fire lit. The air was so stagnant that the dust had begun to settle over the bed like a gloom. Without a fresh breeze or ray of sunshine, I was befallen with a torpor that, had I not summoned the initiative to rouse myself from, may have swallowed the night as well as the day.
It will cause you no small grievance to know that, even in such a weakened state, I had to take it upon myself to begin the pie-work in the kitchen. Once I had all the rolling pins lined up and prepared for the flour, I took a candle down to the pantry and the sight left me aghast. The cheeses were black, the meats moving as if alive, and the preserves could hardly be called so anymore. Wherever the shelves weren’t barren and pocked with rat droppings, they were blooming with fuzzy growths that made one’s stomach revolt. The sight caused me to suffer a dizzy spell, and I had to rest at the bottom of the stairwell for perhaps an hour. It was yet another strike against our housekeeper-in-absentia.
Nevertheless, Rosa alone can’t sabotage our big day, Lindsey. Once I had recovered somewhat, I set about mixing and kneading the crust. The dairy was a lot chunkier than I would have hoped, but with enough sugar rolled into the milkened-flour, the smell seemed to lessen. Certainly the rose petals that I infused into the dough elevated its bitterness further up the palate. A tragedy that mother never had the green thumbs, nor many other fingers, to grow a flower garden.
Actually, while I’m on that matter, I haven’t seen the gardener at all, either. When I stepped into the yard this evening I thought I had wandered into a wilderness, so unkempt and unruly the hedges had become. The blueberry bushes have completely swallowed the front fence and the fruit has just been left to rot, which has attracted a rather bloated haze of flies that floats just above the head.
This stress has taken a toll on my body, too. I lost a nail kneading the dough today. I don’t even know when. At first I thought the flour was blushing with the rose petals, but lo, it was blood from the exposed nerves of my finger! I had to retire early, putting the dough aside to finish tomorrow. Perhaps I was pushing myself too hard. You had told me once, that when we were wed, my hands would only ever touch silver and cloth. And now I am breaking my fingers upon my own labour! As I am writing now I notice that two more nails have vanished. Who knows when that happened.
Yet, this mirrors exactly how I feel, Lindsey. Like my body is vanishing, and not a soul has come for vigil. Don’t bother replying until you have a written apology from Rosa and the gardener for their truancy.
Also, we’re out of scotch.
Gertrude
Saint Agnes of Assisi Medical Hospital, Ward 3, Hatted & Smoking Man
URGENT ATTN: Physician Lindsey Wallace
May 10, 1765
My Love,
Please forgive me for my brash outbursts. I have been sick with guilt since I last wrote. To think that I would cause you, my handsome saviour, to crease your perfect brow with worry over those injurious words. You are too busy for the trifling matters of the manor. The same night that I wrote that letter I awoke with an awful trembling. My body has been shivering ever since, no doubt in sympathy of the anguish I’ve caused you when reading the vile pedantry of your wife.
I feel a deep, soulful chill wherever I go. The halls are haunted with the memories of you, Lindsey. I cannot bring myself to be seated in any room for too long, as images of your body seem to materialise, stoking your pipe and donning your smoking hat. You have it tilted down, covering your face. No matter how I try, how low I crawl along the floorboards, I can never catch a glimpse of your smile. I don’t know why you would do that to me, it just makes my trembling even worse.
I tried to catch the postman earlier, to see if he had seen your face at all when delivering my letters. I just wanted to know if you were still sporting that vagabond’s moustache. But a stranger seems to have newly taken up the position. I didn’t recognise him while he stood there, staring, just outside the gates. He was dressed in black, and I swear he had a long beak. A shiny one. He looked just like the crows that he had summoned to come peck at the seething mass of flies. I couldn’t stay and talk – the birds seemed to take me for a field mouse. I suppose it’s only natural given the way I have to scuttle about on all fours these days. They swooped and cawed at me, beating me back behind the doors with their wings.
I thought, perhaps, the beaked man may have wanted to come in. But he couldn’t; some cretin had chained the gates shut. Can you believe that Lindsey? What vandalism takes place when word spreads that the man of the house is out on business? It may shock you to see it when you come home. But don’t you worry, all your burdens will be relieved when you taste this pie. It’s been a hard-fought struggle against the creeping mould in the pantry, but I have reclaimed some of the fruits. What parts of the flesh that still have colour, at least. The crust I had put aside has hardened nicely, as well. It’ll snap so pleasantly when you crack it with a fork. It might even remind you of work, as if you were breaking open the ribs. Ha. A joke, Lindsey.
It’s just four days now, my precious husband. Just four days until our anniversary arrives – you along with it. Here to let your energy refresh this darkened place, relighting the snuffed candles of this stagnant manor once more.
Thinking of you,
Gertrude
Saint Agnes of Assisi Medical Hospital, Ward 3
ATTN: Physician Lindsey Wallace
May 12, 1765
My Lindsey,
Such a divinely romantic thing happened this morning. I had to write to let you know.
Do you remember when we had just moved to the manor, before you took that trip to Prague to whip those Frenchmen back in order? How you had asked me for a lock of hair so that you could curl your fingers through it at night and think of me while you were gone? Well, while I was brushing my hair this morning, a lock of my own fell into my lap. It was a fated gesture. You’ve been forced away from me for such an insufferably long time that I feel it was mercy, not luck, that has intervened, showing me how to best offer you relief. I’ve enclosed this lock of hair for you within the envelope, for you to cure yourself of your sleepless nights, along with the other locks that fell after the first.
My birds came again today. This time there were three of them. And they brought gifts! They each held a bouquet of posies for me, setting them against the gates while I watched from between the cracks in the doors. What strange postmen, I thought, to deliver packages just outside the gate like that. Maybe they feared being bitten by the fruit flies. Even so, I was sure that one of them beckoned to me. But when I ran out to invite them in, they scattered as the crows do. I wonder if they are friends of yours, Lindsey?
Perhaps it was for the best that I did not have any guests today. If they had seen the pie in the kitchen, they would have begged me to slice it. But it is not for anyone’s but my husband’s lips. I was worried about the dough at first, Lindsey, but I think its pinkness is rather fetching. And who needs apricots when you have all manner of exotic fruits and vegetables instead. I cannot identify half of what I got from the pantry – what a surprise it will be! Though, I will let you in on my secret ingredient: I sealed every item in there with a kiss, just for you. I’ve been finding it hard to summon moisture in my mouth these days, but I made an extra effort to ensure that you would taste the love in every bite.
I am greatly relieved that the pie is finished. To tell the truth, I was finding it quite straining. I’ve lost every nail now, and I dread to think what else might have fallen off were I to continue. I don’t seem to have the energy to take the trip down to the pantry anymore, either. Typically, my eyes set with the sun. I find myself waking up quite unexpectedly in different rooms. I never remember falling asleep. It takes most of the night just trying to walk my way back to bed. Perhaps you could bring more of that rubbing cocaine from the apothecary when you return. That always returns me to high spirits.
Yours,
Gertrude
Saint Agnes of Assisi Medical Hospital
ATTN: Whoever Bloody Cares
May 13, 1765
Damn you.
God forbid a husband would spare time for his own wife. At least the flies still come for me. Carrying off my kisses in their vomit filled mouths.
I ask you, why bother at all? Why add another letter to the neat, little stack in the postbox. That chained and condemned postbox. I ought to toss the pie in with the letters. Maybe your crow men will enjoy the lunch. You’re a cad, Lindsey.
And you know what? I did read the encyclopaedia’s entry on Masturbation, and I don’t think it would be so bad an affliction to suffer! It would certainly give me something to do in the halls in my waking hours.
I don’t expect you to write back. I don’t care what you think and I cannot write anymore. The pen bruises my fingers.
I am still your wife,
Gertrude Wallace
Front Gates
ATTN: My Birds
May 14, 1765
I’ve set the table for dessert.
Happy Anniversary.
Eat your fill.
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