Mared scooped up the bowl and rinsed it. She moved round the room easily, rearranging the things Allegra insisted on changing. It was a game they played.
‘He was poet, or so he said. A charming rogue who didn’t have a proper job until Verity was born and then it was only on the farms.’
‘Is that why he went, because he couldn’t get a job as a poet?’
Mared laughed. ‘You have to be good at it to get a job writing poems for a living.’
‘So he wrote rubbish ones?’
‘I never read any of them, cariad. I wouldn’t imagine so. As far as I could see, he didn’t sit still long enough to write his name. Always out, Idris was – over the hills and far away.’
From her.
Verity felt her grandmother’s eyes on her.
‘And so he left.’ Meredith said. ‘Well, I still don’t care.’
‘Best way, sweetheart. Best way.’
Meredith said she was going to pick lilac for her grandmother to take home.
‘Ah, you’re an angel. I do love my lilac and it’ll cheer Gethin up – he likes the perfume.’
Meredith planted a kiss on her grandmother’s cheek and disappeared into the garden.
‘Did he have another woman?’ Verity’s curiosity was getting the better of her.
‘What makes you say that? No, of course he didn’t. He wasn’t entirely without principle; it was more a need to be anywhere your mother wasn’t.’
‘And not because of us?’
‘No, cariad, not at all.’
Verity wasn’t convinced. Her father was as remote from her as the moon. It was unlikely he’d ever cared about them. If he had, he’d have stayed.
‘Do I really look like him?’
If Mared was taken aback she hid it well. ‘What makes you ask?’
‘It’s an easy enough question, Nain.’
Mared stopped what she was doing. ‘All right then, you do, a bit. You have his eyes and some of his mannerisms: a way of moving your head when you’re preoccupied.’
‘Is that why she doesn’t like me, because I remind her of him?’
‘Your mother loves you, Verity.’
Verity understood her grandmother didn’t want her to know heartbreak; she wanted to protect both her granddaughters for as long as she could.
‘That’s not what I asked. You can love someone and hate the sight of them. I’m not a baby, Nain. And I’m not stupid.’
‘I know,’ Mared said. ‘You’re sharp as a knife and I’m not going to lie to you. Maybe you do remind her of Idris, but I don’t think it’s as simple as like or dislike or even love. Your mother’s damaged and there are times I could throttle her for the way she is around you. But it isn’t as personal as it must seem.’
Verity nodded. ‘I believe you. Honestly, Nain, I do.’ She crossed her fingers and hoped her grandmother believed her, and if she found her out in the lie, would be able to forgive her.
‘He loved you too, cariad, believe me.’
Verity managed a smile.
‘He came back,’ Mared said, ‘because he was in thrall to her – mad about her – and because he loved you both. I’m certain of that.’ Mared paused and smiled. ‘I didn’t mind him; I told her, don’t push him away, he has the makings of a good father.’
‘Only she didn’t listen.’
‘No. Allegra doesn’t do listening and Idris, well, he was too young – only a year older than her – and far too selfish.’ Mared began moving things again: a couple of Toby jugs from the top shelf of the dresser to a lower one.
‘Your mother was very demanding and Idris wasn’t the kind of man to put up with emotional games. But if you ask me, after Meredith was born, it was post-natal depression too. We didn’t go in for it much – not in my day. I reckon that’s what it was though, so try not to judge her. Not long after Meredith’s birth, he disappeared again and this time, I’m afraid it was for good.’
‘And that was that.’
‘Yes.’ Mared sighed. ‘The thing is, if he’d stayed for you and your sister, he’d probably have killed your mother.’
‘But if he loved her—’
‘Love,’ Mared said, stroking Verity’s hair, ‘isn’t as necessary to a man’s happiness as it is to a woman’s.’
I wasn’t supposed to go into the walled garden, except under my mother’s strict supervision.
As a small child I loved spending time there; sitting under the boughs of a fragrant wisteria, reading and listening to the birds. I fed them cake crumbs, imagined them listening to me. Eventually Mama would send the latest maid to find me, and if my hair was awry or my gown stained with grass, I would find myself chastised.
Even compliant children occasionally rebel and I adored this secret garden. As often as I dared, I sneaked off and hid myself away. There were niches in the walls holding little stone statues of cherubs and animals: a hare, a cat and several birds. It was formal and largely tended by my mother. A man came once a week from a neighbouring village to deal with the heavy work.
In the centre stood a sculpted lavender bush and radiating from this were four brick paths lined with low box hedges marking plots filled with herbs and lovely flowers: dainty pinks and London Pride and tall columbine. Stone troughs containing more lavender stood at the four corners; along the walls graceful ferns and grasses grew in orderly clumps. The borders were filled with stately delphiniums, hollyhocks and lupins, none of them allowed to defy my mother’s idea of perfection.
Against one of the walls grew an espaliered plum tree: my mother’s pride and joy. Its tiny fruits were ideal food for birds, which my mother did her best to scare away. The branches stretched like elongated fingers as if it was alive in a way beyond the simple existence of a tree. It looked trapped by the wires holding it and I longed to cut it loose.
Like me, nothing in the garden was permitted to break free or roam.
As I became older and learned my mother’s routine by heart whenever I could, I slipped away to read my book or enjoy the birds.
It was a serene place, magical and protecting, as if a spell lay across it – perhaps the reason my brother never once found me there.
Thirteen
Enclosed behind brick walls, it was always twilight in the blue garden.
The scents were strong in high summer, and everything grew untamed and tall. It left a pure blue taste on the tongue and a sense of being touched by old magic. To Verity and Meredith it was enchanted: once inside they felt invisible and might well have been. Allegra certainly never found them there.
‘Bring a rug, Meredith,’ Mared said that evening. ‘And Verity, you light a lantern.’
Since they were little girls, Mared had encouraged them to make small rituals in her garden. ‘Welcome the new moon, listen to the full and bid the dark sleep well.’
She told them the moon was female the way the sun was male.
‘Ritual is mostly a matter of showing up,’ she said. ‘Leave offerings and light candles. You can make your plans at new moon, watch them grow and by the time the dark moon comes around, chances are they’ll be sorted.’
Meredith liked the dark moon, Verity preferred the new. She liked the idea of plans, even though right then the only one she had was pretty vague. She peered through the trees. There was no sign of the moon and she asked her grandmother which phase it was in.
Mared always knew.
‘It’s waning, cariad, soon be dark.’
‘If you can’t see it, how can you tell?’
‘The moon is the ebb and flow of your life. She’s your blood. You’ll learn how to do it.’
Surrounded by tall grass and wild flowers, light from the candle lantern made the shadows come alive.
‘Like ghosts,’ Verity said.
Meredith caught her breath and Verity knew she was willing her not to say anything about the sewing box.
‘Don’t be silly,’ Meredith said. ‘Everyone knows you can’t see ghosts.’
‘You reckon?’
In the flickering light, Mared’s face looked older and wise.
‘Tell us the story,’ Meredith said, ‘the one about how you made the garden.’
‘Not the one about the snow child?’
‘No, I want to hear how the garden started. Was it a new moon?’
‘I can’t remember; it was definitely a dark one when I sneaked back to that chapel.’
It started with a single blue poppy.
One day in 1940, honeymooning in Wales for a precious weekend, Mared Pryce had gone to town in search of something special to cook for her new husband. Passing a chapel, she noticed a blue poppy growing between the cracks in the pavement.
‘In the middle of the day in summer the town’s full of people. I wasn’t daft enough to pull up a plant outside a chapel and risk the disapproval of whatever god-bothering flower arrangers might be on duty.’
‘But you went back.’ Meredith snuggled in, knowing what came next.
‘I certainly did, cariad; under cover of darkness.’
‘Like a spy!’
‘Like a thief in the night!’
She took the poppy without a second thought. There wasn’t the slightest trace of fear in her; Mared, a veteran of wartime London, hadn’t been afraid of anything and, other than losing her faculties, she still wasn’t.
‘In any case, who would have missed it? Sooner or later someone would have trampled it to death; why wouldn’t I save it?’
She planted it in the abandoned garden.
‘What with two wars and one thing and another, it had been forgotten. I remembered the garden when I was a child, all overgrown like a jungle. When I got married and came back for good, it seemed like a nice idea to set it to rights.
She’d cleared the space, cutting back, unearthing the remains of brick paths, broken stone troughs, monster ferns strangled by ivy and the dead leavings of an espaliered fruit tree she couldn’t identify.
‘And you pulled the ivy off the wall and found the hare.’
‘Shush, Meri – let Nain tell it her way.’
‘I pulled the ivy off the walls and discovered the gaps, the remains of the stone animals and the birds, little bits of cherubs like broken babies. The only piece that had survived intact was the hare.’
‘The house must have been empty for a long time…’
Meredith interrupted. ‘That’s not part of the story, Verity.’
‘I know – it’s still interesting.’
‘Yes, it is.’ Mared nodded. ‘When my grandfather bought the house, back in the olden days,’ she said with a laugh, ‘it had been empty for a very long time. No one ever stayed, too isolated I suppose. And people said it was haunted. He didn’t believe any of that of course: he restored the place and here we are.’
‘Was he rich?’ Meredith said, determined they wouldn’t pursue hauntings.
‘Oh, there was money all right. Our family were what was known as trade – bankers – not influential, not so small they hadn’t made a bob or two.’ She pushed her glasses up her nose. ‘We’re not rich mind, and never were. We’re comfortable. It makes a difference and makes us fortunate.’
‘It doesn’t feel that way.’ Verity picked a closed-up daisy, tried to open the petals.
‘The bills get paid and there’s food on the table. That’s what counts.’
Meredith had had enough of bankers and money. ‘Go on with the story, Nain.’
Mared explained how the wind scattered the poppy seeds across the garden. And as if by magic, in spring the bluebells appeared, holding the space for the poppies which, year by year, spread in a sweet blue unwinding.
By heart, Meredith recited a list of flowers – the other blue ones her grandmother had planted. ‘Lavender, lupins, cornflowers, scabious; campanula, forget-me-not and agapanthus.’
‘Very good, cariad, well remembered.’ Mared laughed. ‘I rescued several woody lilacs too; cut them back and…’
‘Sang to them until they flowered!’
‘And they drenched the garden in perfume so the Fae knew exactly where to come.’
Verity listened to her grandmother’s voice as if for the first time. Even the interruptions didn’t spoil the story.
‘They’re still here,’ Meredith said. ‘I can hear them.’
Her grandmother stroked her hair and nodded.
The candle burned low as the garden faded to an illusion.
Verity hugged her grandmother so hard, Mared gasped.
‘You’ll hug the breath out of me, child.’
They stood on the gravel path by the car.
Unable to speak, Verity swallowed and forced herself not to cry. She made way for Meredith, clamouring for her own hug.
‘It’ll be all right, Nain,’ Meredith said, making no attempt to hide her tears. ‘I’ll look after Verity.’
‘You’ll look after each other, the way I taught you.’ Mared spread her arms and waved them both in. ‘Come on now, big cwtch, no tears, only smiles.’
She turned her head to the eggshell blue door, the invitation clear.
Allegra, arms folded, leaned against the frame.
Mared spoke over her granddaughters’ heads. ‘Everything will be fine, my lovelies. I’m no more than a phone call away and before you know it, I’ll be back.’
Allegra offered a hint of a nod. ‘Drive safely, Mam.’
‘I will, cariad, I always do. You look after yourself.’
Fourteen
Meredith’s was the smallest bedroom, a youngest child’s room.
Angharad’s room?
She sensed it must have been.
Turning on the bedside lamp she looked at the red flannel heart in her hand. Once again, a shiver ran through her. The sensation was becoming familiar and almost welcome.
The voice settled in her mind: a storyteller’s whisper.
I was surrounded by indifferent silence…
Meredith imagined she heard crying. She pinched her arm until it hurt and knowing she was awake, decided the only possibility had to be a ghost.
I was denied any hope…
However hard she tried to clear her head the words remained: sentences made from sorrow and spite.
You will not warm to my mother … I do not want you to love her … mothers are cruel and cannot be trusted…
Snuggling under the covers, the single heart held to her chest, she tried to imagine someone hiding the sewing box in an attic, abandoning it as if it no longer mattered.
Was it a clue? Would Angharad have put her own sewing box in a dusty old trunk? And if she hadn’t, who had and why? If this had been Angharad Elin Lewis’s bedroom, could anything else of her have been left behind?
Other than Nelly, her grey velvet rabbit, the thing Meredith loved best in the world was Nain’s doll’s house. It was old and her grandmother, Meredith decided, must have been an exceptionally well-behaved little girl to have been given a doll’s house as beautiful as this one. Like Gull House, it wasn’t damaged, only faded; made from materials that had lasted.
Meredith half-wished they’d asked Nain about Angharad after all.
‘It could have been tricky though, Nelly – she might have told Mam about the sewing box.’
Meredith was determined her mother wouldn’t find out about any of it. She tried to think back, to when they were little; remember what her grandmother had told them about Angharad. It wasn’t much: a girl who had lived here a century ago and who people said was mad.
It sounded like the dark ages.
‘This,’ she said to Nelly, holding up the red heart, ‘is a magic heart, from the olden days.’
Nelly stared her blank bunny stare.
‘Do you want to hear a story?’ She tucked the rabbit into the crook of her arm. ‘Once upon a time, when girls went mad and people locked them up…’
Meredith’s heart lurched and in an instant she knew the crucial questions.
If Angharad really had been locked away, what could possibly have made a girl go so crazy her parents
would think it was a good idea to shut her up in an asylum?
‘And how do I find out if it’s true?’
She glanced at the sewing box. If they had got rid of her, it would explain why it had ended up in the attic. ‘I definitely need to look for clues, Nelly.’
She recalled the whispered voice. Was this a ghost’s bedroom: the ghost of a girl who had gone insane? Worse than this, Meredith found herself wondering about a flesh-and-blood girl hearing voices.
Suppose Verity’s right and it is in my head?Suppose I’m the crazy one?
Like Angharad, who ended up being locked away in an asylum?
The word hung in the air like a threat. Meredith wasn’t sure what kind of a place an asylum might have been. A hospital she supposed, for lunatics. Hugging Nelly closer, she padded across the floor to where her fishing-net hung outside the window.
Meredith made her best wish. ‘Star bright, star light, let Angharad talk to me tonight.’ For good measure, she added, ‘Clearly, please, so I can hear everything she says.’
As she gazed out into the night, a shooting star made a run for it. On such a night it wasn’t hard to believe your wishes might come true.
The moths began to dance in the wisteria and Meredith pushed open the window as far as it would go.
‘Here’s my wish,’ she whispered. ‘Take it and fly it up to the stars.’
Back in bed she left the lamp on and her eyes open.
If I’m not scared and if I can stay awake, maybe I’ll hear her.
She pushed her face into the pillow, pinched the soft skin on her inner arm.
‘I’ll try, I promise. You can tell me.’
Her eyes drooped and she pinched herself again, only it wasn’t enough to keep her from sleep. Her dreams were full of murmurs and dark corners she couldn’t see into. In the early hours she woke again, unsure if she was scared or curious.
‘I’m trying my best, Angharad. I’m sorry I fell asleep.’
When did a dream become a nightmare? And when did a nightmare become reality?
Am I being haunted or am I mad, like they said she was?
Her eyes fluttered open and as they did, Meredith felt a touch of ice-cold air on her face. It wasn’t a moth and her skin crawled. She drew the bedclothes over her chin, her eyes scanning the shadows on the walls.
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