Chapter 1: I Will Not Go

The Decision That Changed Her Life

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Sixteen-year-old Violet Bennett did not want to go to boarding school.

She held the dark wood stair banisters and listened to the adult voices echoing from the drawing room below. Her thick, black hair fell in waves down the sides of her peachy face. She heard her father’s deep voice (now a bit slurred with alcohol), her uncle and his wife (that despicable aunt with the cold blue eyes and straw-coloured hair that filled a room with gag-worthy perfume), and Jonathan, her father’s friend and co-owner of the shipping company. 

“It only makes sense, Harry,” Josephine said. She took a long pause, which Violet could only assume was her taking a long drag on her cigarette. “She’s becoming a young girl, and you don’t have the capacity to care for her. It’s better for her to go to the boarding school. Especially after that difficulty you had with that… tutor of hers.”

Violet scowled. Miss Emma Taylor was Violet’s first and only governess. She was a well-educated woman who cared for Violet unlike anyone else in the world. But Josephine—that spoiled, meddlesome woman—never liked Miss Taylor for reasons unknown to Violet. Josephine spoke with Violet’s father in private a few weeks ago, and the following day Miss Taylor was fired. Miss Taylor had left the house in tears. Violet chased her down the winding staircase, begging her to stay (as if it was her choice). She chased her halfway down the driveway until Miss Taylor’s tear-stained face turned to face her. Miss Taylor pulled her jacket around her body, covering the second-hand dress Violet had given her. 

“Be careful, Vi,” she whispered. “There’s a greater force running your father’s home, that I’m sure you’re well aware of, with some ulterior motive I’ve yet to see. I’ve fought against her for years as she’s tried to get to you, and now she’s finally gotten rid of me. Don’t let her steal your light.” Before Violet could say more, she let her hands fall from Violet’s face and took off down the driveway.

Now, Violet was certain what Miss Taylor meant.

“Harry,” Josephine continued, “there’s no way of knowing for certain what kind of people these governesses are until they accidentally let themselves go and you see their true colours. Thankfully for you, I happened to be in the right place at the right time. But there’s no securing that in the future. The best place for your young daughter is the boarding school. There, she will be in the utmost care of trustworthy people who will see to it that she becomes a fine young woman someday.”

“Just like Rosalie,” her father slurred. 

“Yes,” Josephine said. Violet could hear the fake sympathy in her tone. “Just like dear… Rosalie.” She cleared her throat and coughed. “Now, you have so much to do, Harry, why don’t you just let me handle all the paperwork from here, and I’ll have that girl of yours shipped off to the boarding school in a fortnight—or sooner.”

He muttered and sputtered some, then she heard the familiar tink of the wine bottle on his glass. “Uh, yes, I suppose that’s probably for the best.”

“Wonderful!” She heard Josephine’s hands clap together. “Perfect, I’ll get right on that in the morning. I’m so happy for you, Harry; I truly believe this is the best decision for your family. Don’t you agree, Jacob?” 

She heard her uncle grunt something of an agreement. 

“Alright, well, I suppose we shall be off! We’ll speak in the morning, Harry. Do try to get some sleep.”

Violet crouched by the banister until she heard feet moving towards the entrance. She padded off in her sock feet down the hardwood floors to her bedroom, still crouched over. She braced herself flat against her door, not wanting to open it until she heard the others leave (since the dumb door creaked so loudly). With much laughter, they finally slipped out the entrance and she heard her father stumble down the hallway towards his study. 

Violet took a deep breath and jogged down the stairs.

“Father!” she called. Holding to the bottom of the staircase banister, she whirled herself down the hallway. 

She saw him stumble to a stop in the doorway to his study.

“V-V-Violet,” he slurred. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m here to tell you that I will not be going to boarding school.” She crossed her arms over her chest and stood before him as tall as she could.

He leaned on the door casing with a bottle of wine sloshing in his hand. “You’re going, Violet; end of discussion.”

“I will not.”

“It’s not your decision.” Violet narrowed her eyes. “It’s my life and therefore my decision!”

“You’re under my roof and you’re my daughter—so it is my decision!” he yelled, jabbing the bottle towards her. 

Violet scowled and gritted her teeth together. “This isn’t fair! This is my life—”

“And it’s not fair that your mother left me to care for a spoiled, rebellious brat on my own!” he hollered.

A deadly silence filled the air like smoke. It entered her lungs and caused her to struggle for breath.

Without warning, the words suddenly hit Violet like a punch to the abdomen. She instinctively gripped her stomach and ran for the stairs.

As she tore up the staircase, a small part of her waited for her father to call out, to apologize, to say he didn’t mean what he said…

But he didn’t. Instead, she heard his study door slam.

Violet slid in her sock feet on the landing. With bile rising in her throat, she skated to her door and grabbed the glass knob.

“Finally going to bed?”

Violet jumped and spun around. It was Matilda, the head housemaid. A stout lady, short and wrinkled with coarse grey hair, but everyone feared her (perhaps even Violet’s father). Her hair was always pulled back as tightly as possible in a braided bun—Violet wondered as a child if perhaps her hair was likewise terrified of disobeying her. 

But Violet scowled at the old lady, knowing she probably heard the entire conversation. She ignored the red colouring her own cheeks. “What are you doing roaming the halls at this hour? I thought housework was for the day, not the night.”

“I must clean up from your father’s late… party tonight.”

Violet frowned then turned back towards her door. “Well, if you’ll excuse me then, I’ll be going to bed. I just had to use the powder room, is all. Not that it’s anyone’s business.”

As Violet pulled the creaking door open, Matilda spoke again.

“Well, if you’re not going to be honest, then perhaps I will. I meant no harm. I was also eavesdropping on the conversation your father was having. The moment I saw that pin-cushion, blonde head bopping up the steps this evening, I knew more trouble was about to be brewed. As if she hadn’t already caused enough trouble with poor Emma. But I suppose Emma got off better than you did, though.” She paused, then her voice grew quieter. “Your father never should have said those words.”

Violet felt tears sting her eyes. She kept her back to Matilda.

“Listen, Miss Bennett. You may think I’m a persnickety old woman who just likes to tell you what to do and get you in trouble. But your mother asked me of something on her deathbed.”

Violet’s mouth twitched and pulled itself into an unrestrainable frown. She covered her face. Matilda was Violet’s mother’s lady maid before she was head of the housemaids.

“She took my hand in hers and said, ‘Matilda, watch out for Violet. Be the mother I can’t be for her.’ And that’s what I’ve been trying to do. I’m the one who found Emma and I’m the one who kept leaving her résumé all over the house where your father could find it. Then Emma and I came together to do everything we could to protect you all these years and raise you to be a woman that your mother would be proud of.”

Violet didn’t say anything. She simply clutched the cold doorknob.

“But that pinhead aunt of yours is unrelenting. I tried to put blockades in her way at every step when I realized she had set her sights on poor Emma. Then when she convinced your father to fire her, I went to work trying to find another governess. But now…” she trailed off and sighed in her croaky way. “My hands are tied, Miss Bennett. I don’t know what to do to stop this.”

Violet bowed her head. “I don’t think there’s anything anyone can do,” she said. They were both silent for a moment. Violet could hear Matilda ringing her dust cloth. Finally, Violet spoke again. “I didn’t know you’re the one who convinced my father to hire Miss Taylor.”

“I didn’t convince him per se, but I did everything I could to put Emma on his mind before the fowl Mrs. Josephine Bennett could find someone worse.”

“Thank you,” Violet murmured. 

“I don’t know what she’s after, Violet,” Matilda said. “None of us among the staff do. We don’t know why she’s trained her beady eyes on you. But she has. We’ve done everything we could to stop her—I believe Mark the chef even used some rotten strawberries on her dessert tonight in hopes that it would send her home with her tail between her legs complaining of a stomach ache. But nothing we did could stop her.”

“It’s over,” Violet said, “I’m going to boarding school, whether any of us like it or not.” Then she took a step inside her dark, vacant room. “Thank you,” she said, finally turning her head to look at Matilda. She had never noticed before, but Matilda, even with her pursed and wrinkled face, had the warmest brown eyes she’d ever seen. 

“Goodnight, Miss. Bennet.”

Violet gave a weak smile then turned inside her room and gently latched the door behind her. She stood in front of the door and looked over her room. Lilac wallpaper donned the walls with green vines twisting in between. A lacy, lavender quilt dressed the bed. The moldings were a brilliant white and intricately carved. She had two windows on the south-facing wall and white curtains hanging from them. They danced in the slight breeze coming from the open window. Her bed was wooden, with a headboard carved with berries and flowers. 

She sighed and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. She wondered when her last night in this house would be. 

Violet pulled her socks down over her heels and kicked them to the side. She tiptoed over to the bed and pulled the blankets down before slipping into the sheets. She laid her head down on the pillow. She closed her eyes and breathed in the smell of the fresh air from outside—apple blossoms and a hint of the horse stable out back.

Perhaps it was all for the best. If she stayed here, it sounded like Josephine would do all she could to make Violet’s life miserable. Maybe this would be her escape.

Violet rolled over to her side. Somehow, she doubted that. She turned again to the other side and strained her arm under the bed. Her hand grasped the cloth-bound poetry collection under the bed and drug it up onto her chest. She opened the cover to the first page where her mother’s cursive looped and swirled in the corner.

For Violet. Maybe you learn the importance of truth, beauty, and goodness in a world of brokenness.

Violet never fully grasped this note from her mother, but it was the closest connection she had to the only person who perhaps ever loved her. She didn’t comprehend how poetry could give her a glimpse of beauty in a world filled with so much pain and loneliness—but she opened it anyway and poured over the strangely arrayed and obscure words.