Silent Harcourt and the Parlor Where His Botanicals Turned

A muted calm fills Harcourt House, settling deepest in the abandoned parlor, where once the fronds and petals of distant valleys brushed against teacups and upholstered arms. Here Alistair Wren Harcourt, a botanist with restless curiosity, arrayed his collections across domestic surfaces instead of a proper study. Now the parlor holds the lone pattern of a misplaced specimen, the smallest sign of a hesitation he never corrected.

A Pattern Through the Botanist’s Gentle Routine

Alistair, born 1873 in Canterbury, learned plant taxonomy from his elder sister Margaret Harcourt, whose sewing basket—now filled with dried leaves instead of thread—rests on the hearth bench. His mornings passed in quiet sorting; afternoons he steeped infusions for pigment tests; evenings he transcribed petal structures by lamplight. His precision remains: envelopes labeled in looping penmanship, scissors wrapped in a linen scrap to protect their edge, flower presses stacked against the parlor wall with tidy discipline. Even the armchair nearby retains the slight sag of hours he sat cataloguing in its embrace.

When His Calm Lost Direction

Rumors murmured that Alistair misidentified a medicinal plant for a local apothecary—an error that caused illness and prompted quiet accusations. In the front corridor, a satchel lies slumped against the wall, shedding dried petals onto the floorboards. Margaret’s sewing basket, repurposed for field notes, shows a new tear at the hinge. A teacup on the console bears a pale ring, left cooling in haste. His herbarium sheets have slipped in their bindings, margins smudged where his thumb dragged across them. Nothing states his guilt or innocence, yet the signs gesture toward a strain he left unspoken.

Only the misplaced specimen in the parlor remains, its brittle pattern hovering on the edge of meaning. Whatever paused Alistair’s final categorization lingers in the hush of these abandoned rooms.

Harcourt House remains abandoned still.