The Signature of All Things

Prudence, seeking something she could not name. Fellowship, maybe. Warmth. Some kind of affinity. Perhaps a reference to any of the evening’s proceedings. But Prudence—glittering as hard as ever—invited no intimacy. Despite this fact, Alma decided to attempt it.
    “Those ideas of yours which you expressed tonight, Prudence?” Alma asked. “Where did you come by them?”
    “From Mr. Dixon, largely. The condition and plight of the African race is a preferred topic of our good tutor.”
    “Is it? I have never heard him make mention of any such thing.”
    “Nonetheless, he has strong feelings on the subject,” Prudence said, without any change of expression.
    “Is he an abolitionist, then?”
    “He is.”
    “Heavens,” Alma said, marveling at the idea of Arthur Dixon with strong feelings on anything . “Mother and Father had best not hear of that!”
    “Mother knows,” Prudence replied.
    “Does she? And what about Father?”
    Prudence did not reply. Alma had more questions—a good many more of them—but Prudence did not seem eager for discussion. Again, the room fell silent. Then suddenly Alma leapt into that silence, allowing a wild and uncontrolled question to burst from her lips.
    “Prudence,” she asked, “what do you think of Mr. George Hawkes?”
    “I think him to be a decent gentleman.”
    “And I think I am most desperately in love with him!” Alma exclaimed, shocking even herself with this absurd, unanticipated admission.
    Before Prudence could respond—indeed, if she ever would have responded at all—Beatrix entered the drawing room and looked at her two daughters sitting on the divan. For a long while, Beatrix said nothing. She held her daughters in a stern, unyielding gaze, studying first one girl, then the other. This was more terrifying to Alma than any lecture, for the silence contained infinite, omniscient, horrifying possibilities. Beatrix could be aware of anything, could know of everything. Alma picked at a corner of her handkerchief, tearing it to threads. Prudence’s countenance and posture did not alter.
    “I am weary this evening,” Beatrix said, finally breaking the awful hush.She looked at Alma and said, “I do not have the will tonight, Alma, to speak of your shortcomings. It will only further injure my temper. Let it only be said that if I ever see such gape-mouthed distraction from you at the dinner table again, I will ask you to take your meals elsewhere.”
    “But, Mother—” Alma began.
    “Do not explain yourself, daughter. It is weak.”
    Beatrix turned as though to exit the room, but then turned back and leveled her gaze at Prudence, as though she were only just remembering something.
    “Prudence,” she said. “Fine performance tonight.”
    This was entirely out of the ordinary. Beatrix never gave praise. But was there anything about this day that was not out of the ordinary? Alma, amazed, turned to Prudence, again looking for something . Recognition? Commiseration? A shared sense of astonishment? But Prudence revealed nothing and did not return Alma’s gaze, so Alma gave up. She stood from the divan and headed toward the stairs, and bed. At the foot of the stairs, though, she turned to Prudence and surprised herself once more.
    “Good night, sister,” Alma said. She had never once used that term before.
    “And to you,” was Prudence’s only reply.

Chapter Eight
    B etween the winter of 1816 and the autumn of 1820, Alma Whittaker wrote more than three dozen papers for George Hawkes, all of which he published in his monthly journal Botanica Americana. Her papers were not pioneering, but her ideas were bright, her illustrations free of error, and her scholarship stringent and sound. If Alma’s work did not exactly ignite the world, it most certainly ignited Alma, and her efforts were more than good enough for the pages of Botanica Americana .
    Alma wrote in depth about laurel, mimosa, and verbena. She wrote about grapes and camellias, about the myrtle orange, about the cosseting of figs. She published under the name “A. Whittaker.” Neither she nor George Hawkes believed that it would much benefit Alma to announce herself in print as female. In the scientific world of the day, there was still a strict division between “botany” (the study of plants by men) and “polite botany” (the study of plants by women). Now, “polite botany” was often indistinguishable from “botany”—except that one field was regarded with respect and