Andromeda

Andromeda had been so rightfully named, I had often thought. She brought constellations into view in stark sunlight, and swept with her all the wonder of worlds I knew nothing of. It was in how white-hot stars danced in her eyes when her famous temper broke free, and in how so very small my little world was when she appeared; with her came the endless beauty of summer, enough for roses to die of jealousy in the radiance of her visage.

She’d a talent for frightening off suitors by the droves with her sly wit and pride. The maids of the manor often spoke of what troubles she caused her father with the fire in her heart, whether it would be insulting another woman’s face at a ball, or upsetting the tables of dinner parties with her untasteful social commentaries.

She was what the maids called; ‘unladylike.’ I disagreed with this notion, of course. My mistress was ladylike enough in my eyes, very much the image of her late mother from whom she had inherited her stubborn spirit as well as her large, dark eyes.

August had arrived in a blaze of heat as furious as my mistress, and as I lay beneath the shade of the swathes of pink rhododendrons, I was roused from my siesta by a hyacinth scented fury which would turn the Devil pale upon his throne. From beneath the drooping pink I spied my mistress in the hidden grove, her face contorted into some gruesome mask of bitterness which even her loveliness couldn’t overcome. I watched as she kicked off her shoes, and sat on the ornate swing beneath the dappled shade of the oak, and brushed her toes across the dry grass.

I was the sole voyeur of my mistresses grief - this secret garden belonged only to her, and in some small part, me.

It had been her mothers, and in turn, hers. As a fair child she had run through the woods beyond, returning home with her hair woven with petals and her knees scraped, the very image of vitality and carefree youth. The fecklessness of her childhood had been brought to a stern end when one winter the mistress had fallen into the river and nearly died of complications. The maids spoke of her weak heart, that which had turned her so pale, and had driven her father to do what he believed he had to.

Locked up in the beautiful gilded cage that was the manor and its gardens, my mistress had been forbidden to leave until she had been married. The passing of her mother had lost my mistress the only kindred spirit she had ever known, and her father in grief and anger, had resigned his daughter to be nothing more than another luxury amenity of the estate. The groomed to perfection palace pet for jealous women to critique, and lovestruck men to dote upon.

I had only one guess as to the root of my mistresses misery, as I watched the tears pour from her glossy eyes down the tragic contortions of her loveliness. Last night by chance I had overheard the argument she had had with her father in his study, and learned of a plot for happiness, thwarted by the jealousy of her father’s valet.

Andromeda had never been one to take what was given, not when she wanted to make choices following her own heart, as stubborn as this was. She had planned to elope with the young, handsome chauffeur who had been brought to the estate to work following the end of the war. He had always been kind to me, and kinder to the mistress even with his crude, common language and upbringing. It was no wonder my mistress had fallen in love with such a man. But upon the valet’s claims he had made her a dishonest woman, her father blind with rage, had threatened him with the law unless he left to never return.

That same night her father had told her of her imminent betrothal to some distant Lord. The maids too had spoken of this in hushed tones, and I beside the fire pretending to doze had learned all about this Lord from the Yorkshire moors. A place where only mist flowered, and all other colours and beauty faded to mulch and grey. Perhaps my mistress had already known of this plan, hence the elopement. I could not ask her to know. I listened, and I waited, and I could do nothing more.

All that night I had stood watch over my mistress as she stood by the window, pale as the moon herself, clutching the little portrait of her lover in her white little hand. She waited all night, eyes fixated upon the gate at the end of the drive, hoping against all odds that the young man would return to rescue her from her tower.

Dawn broke, and I knew then that she could wait a hundred more fruitless nights. Her knight was no doubt long gone by then.

My poor mistress had always loved fairytales. It seemed so unfair that her own should only end in heartbreak.

How much I longed to bring words of comfort to my mistress as she cried beneath the oak, to assure her I had no such intentions of ever leaving her side. Her loneliness was mine to share, after all. But I was powerless to do anything more than watch from the shade of the rhododendron, and watch as her sorrow melted her beauty away with every autumn it brought to her spirit. My mistress who should always bring the glory of high summer, confined to waste away with the selfishness of her father.

Always, I had watched over my mistress, always waiting quietly at her side. For whilst I may not have taken much space in her world, she would forever be my entirety. She belonged in our shared haven, where she could sink her toes into the earth and wax and wane with the seasons as carefree as the little girl she had once been. Even if this haven was nothing more than a sunlit illusion, my mistress was more a blossom of summer than even the rhododendrons I still sat silent beneath.

That hot summer day, I wished hopelessly that her next autumn would never come. For I was powerless to aid her happiness, despite how much I may have loved her.

As I was nothing more than her loyal little cat.