Seeds of Deception (5 page)

Meg could all but hear her father fuming at the delay, and her mother trying to smooth things over. “We'll play it by ear, but we're still planning on seeing you. Say hi to Daddy for me. We're off to find something to eat.”

After turning off her phone, Meg turned back to Seth. “Now, where were we?”

When Meg woke up the next morning—well past dawn, for a change—she stretched like a cat and smiled. So this was what a vacation was like; it was hard to remember the feeling. Extending one hand, she added,
this is what a husband feels like
. She giggled. She'd been doing a lot of giggling over the last couple of days. Very immature of her, no doubt, but it felt good.

Day three of married life. The wide-open road ahead of them. But a hotel breakfast first. Then get out the maps and plot their next move. Luckily they were taking major highways for much of the trip, so there wasn't a lot of decision-making required. This was Monday, right? No way they could make it to Monticello in one day, or more accurately, only if they wanted to spend the entire day driving. That didn't sound like fun, even with Seth. There
were plenty of interesting things to be seen between here and there, including one in particular she felt she needed to investigate.

“You want to shower first?” Seth's voice interrupted her thinking.

“Okay. Unless there's room for the two of us in there?”

“Regrettably, no. But I like the way you think.”

Meg sighed dramatically. “Ah, well. There will be other showers—although we didn't exactly lay out the one back home for two.”

“There wasn't room, if you recall. But the new old bathtub has potential.”

“That it does.” Meg stood up. “I won't be long. Is breakfast included with the room?”

“I do believe it is.”

“Good, because I'm hungry.”

Clean and dressed, they took their time getting to the dining room, which also overlooked the river. There were only a few other couples, but Meg didn't mind. She wasn't there to make friends, she was there to enjoy her new husband's company. They filled their plates from the breakfast buffet, topped up their coffee, and settled comfortably at a table overlooking the water.

But before she started eating, Meg felt the urge to say something. “Seth, I might as well say this now and get it out of the way. I know you haven't changed since last week, but every time I look at you I see the word
HUSBAND
in big letters.”

He smiled. “On my chest? Floating over my head? What?”

“Nothing so specific. It's just that I didn't expect it to make a difference. We've been together for a while now,
so we know each other. But somehow going through a fifteen-minute ceremony seems to have made a psychological difference to me.”

“Hmm,” Seth said. “Is that good or bad?”

“I really don't know. I know that overall things are kind of in flux about where marriage fits in our society today, but I think we're both old enough that we brought along some of our parents' baggage, if you know what I mean. We were brought up with the old model. There might have been some rebels back in their day, but still, a lot more couples got married when they were in their twenties back then than do today. You and I, we had a choice: we could go on just the way we were, which was nice, or we could buy into the whole ceremonial thing, which we did, at least in a low-key way. But we've got that piece of paper, and somehow, to me at least, it does make a difference. Do you feel anything like that?”

Seth pushed the food around his plate, giving himself time to think. “My folks got married fairly early, and stayed married, even when there were difficult times.” He looked up at Meg. “Is that what you mean? That's the old model?”

“In a way,” she told him. “Being married, and staying married, meant something to them. Just being unhappy wasn't enough reason to break up a couple, because they'd made a commitment. If you don't mind my asking, what did you expect when you married Nancy?” She wasn't sure it was appropriate to bring up Seth's first wife over breakfast three days after their wedding, but she wanted to get everything out in the open sooner rather than later.

“Ask away, Meg. We're not supposed to have secrets.
At least, I don't want to. Nancy and I got married almost ten years ago. We were in love, or we believed we were. As I've told you before, she had expectations about where our lives would lead, and she felt I kind of let her down by taking over the family business. She assumed I'd be a hotshot academic. She didn't plan to live with a plumber. The problem was, we'd never really laid out those expectations, on either side.”

“Would it have made a difference, talking about it all, if she had really loved you?”

Seth sat back in his chair and met her gaze. “Meg, I can't say. I was a different person then. I think she and I started out on the same page, but then my father died and things changed. I had to think about my family, and paying the bills, because my father never did manage to save any money. I did what I thought I had to do, but Nancy didn't like the way things went. And that was that.”

Based on what few comments Lydia Chapin had let slip, and what Seth said now and then, for years Seth had watched his mother put up with a man who was not particularly successful and resented it, and who might have taken his anger out on his wife and children. Not a pretty picture. “Seth, please don't think I'm judging. I don't have a great track record with relationships myself, not that I've walked away from any significant ones.”
Probably because I was too afraid to get into one in the first place.
The only model I've ever really known was my parents', and you've seen them together. I think they have a good marriage, and it's lasted, but there is a certain formality between them, and there always has been. There are things they don't discuss, and certainly didn't in front of me. It's worked fine for them, so I guess you could
say they were on the same page. But if you have a problem, with me or anything else, I want to know about it. Good or bad. Is that all right with you?”

“Of course it is. No secrets. We talk things out—together. If we can stay awake long enough.”

“Well, we're awake now. Plus we have several hundred miles of driving ahead of us, and that makes you a captive audience.”

“Is that a threat?” Seth asked, his smile back.

“Or a promise. And of course you can ask anything about me.”

“Deal. Let's start with what we're doing today, though, can we?”

“Of course. You wanted to get as far as Delaware, maybe, before stopping? Do we have a place for the night?”

“We do, but it's a surprise. The drive to Wilmington, Delaware, should take between four and five hours, depending on what kind of traffic we run into. And about the same from Wilmington to Charlottesville. Any stops or detours you want to make along the way? We did veto Philadelphia, didn't we?”

“Yes, for the city,” Meg said firmly. “No cities. I like cities, but not right now. But I do have a request.”

Seth quirked one eyebrow. “Which is?”

“Remember I told you about Bartram's Garden? It's south of the city, and not far from the interstate and the airport, so we'd go right by it on the way to Wilmington.”

“Refresh my memory: what is it?”

“Aha! I've stumped you. It is both historic and agricultural. John Bartram was the colony's first botanist, and he was a dedicated collector. He explored the wilderness in this country and gathered seeds, and he sent a lot of them back
to England. That became his business, and it extended over three generations of Bartrams. He developed one of the first seed catalogs, both handwritten and printed as circulars. The 1785 catalog, from the third generation to manage the business, is one of the earliest botanical lists of North American plants. His 1760 greenhouse survives on the site, one of what became many. Actually a few years ago the place started selling plants again, but it's not practical for us to get any if we're traveling. I've read that there's some replanting of the orchard going on. Although I don't think he sold a lot of apple trees. He was much more interested in the seeds.”

“All right, you've sold me,” Seth said. “Just tell me where we're going.”

“Take Interstate 95 past Philadelphia—as I said, it's near the airport.”

They managed to avoid most Monday morning traffic around New York and Philadelphia. Meg already knew that Seth was a steady and competent driver—so unlike her impatient father!—so she could relax and enjoy the scenery. Following Interstate 95 was not necessarily the prettiest route, but it was the most efficient; they were facing a drive of four hours to their destination, and they wanted to allow a little daylight time to see what remained of the historic garden. They didn't talk much, but the silence was not uncomfortable. There was something soothing about the hum of tires on the road, the steady flow of changing landscape to look at going by—inlets, houses, patches of trees, cities of varying size that grew as they approached, then trickled away behind them. Meg could feel her tension unwinding. Maybe she should take more road trips. With Seth, of course.

They arrived at Bartram's Garden shortly after one. When she had said it was close to the airport, she hadn't realized that it was practically
in
the airport. It took only a few turns once they'd passed the airport exit and they were there. Meg looked at the parking lot dubiously. “There doesn't seem to be much happening here,” she said.

“On the plus side, it doesn't look like Disneyland,” Seth said cheerfully. “Oh, by the way, how do you feel about zoos?”

“Zoos?” Meg laughed. “I've seen a few. I always feel bad about the captive animals, and then I have to think that if they weren't in the zoos, they wouldn't survive at all. So I guess I have mixed feelings. Were we planning to visit a zoo?”

“No. Just checking, for future reference. Are we going in?”

“Well, we're here. I gather that the Welcome Center is closed today, but since it's December there's not much to see in the way of plants, or at least, I wouldn't recognize them without leaves. I really wanted to get a sense of the history of the place.”

They followed a well-marked path, leaving the near-empty parking lot behind. Once they were on the property, Meg could see the Delaware River in the distance. “The Bartram family owned over a hundred acres, down to the river there, and lived in the midst of it. As I was telling you, at their peak they had ten greenhouses, and literally thousands of species of native and exotic plants. This place is a landmark in horticultural history.”

“I'm impressed, Meg.” Seth came up behind her and put his arms around her shoulders. “Seriously. Two years ago you were a financial analyst who happened to inherit an orchard. You probably couldn't have named more than
ten apple varieties, the ones that you'd seen in grocery stores. Look at how far you've come.”

“I was planning to walk away . . .” Meg said, almost to herself. Then in a stronger voice she added, “But then I figured, if I was going to stay, I was going to do it right. I knew I had a lot to learn.”

Seth sighed melodramatically. “And here I thought it was my charms that kept you in Granford.”

She turned and punched his shoulder. “That came later, remember? All my life, I'd been the good girl—worked hard, got high grades, went to a good college, found a relatively stable job. When the nice safe path I'd chosen suddenly crumbled beneath my feet, I figured maybe the universe was trying to send me a message. So instead of sulking, I embraced the change. And here we are.”

“Well, if there's a god of random events, I'd like to send an offering to him.”

“Why do you think it's a he?”

“Because women are more organized than men. I'll give you a goddess of order if you want.”

“That works for me,” Meg said cheerfully. “Shall we see what there is to see before it gets dark?”

“Lead the way. You don't happen to have a map of the place do you?”

“Nope. But as I pointed out earlier, most of the vegetation is dead, so it's no great loss if we miss it. Nice view of the city.” Meg pointed toward the skyline of Philadelphia, visible in the distance.

“Just remember it wouldn't have looked like that in your John Bartram's day.”

“Yes and no,” Meg countered. “He might have seen the
smoke of cooking fires and such, maybe some ships headed for the city port. The city, or at least the waterfront, predates this place. And I have now just about exhausted everything I know about this region, so I'll shut up.”

They wandered through the grounds, admiring the solid stone house, the layout, the views, and what few plants they could identify. Meg was glad she had brought a down jacket along, because the wind from the river was biting. That was probably what had discouraged many sightseers, although there were a few intrepid walkers and bikers who passed them quickly.

“Seen enough?” Seth asked after a while.

“I guess so. I told you, there isn't much to see. It's the principle of the thing. I wonder if John Chapman and one or another of the Bartrams ever crossed paths? They were in the same business, sort of, and Johnny Appleseed did spend some time in Pennsylvania, although not around here, from what I've read. Of course, one of the Bartrams could have run across him in their plant collecting expeditions.”