The Mulberry Tree

by Allison Rushby

  “Sure you don’t want to sleep in our room?” her mum asked, leaning against the door frame. “We could set up your mattress on the floor.”

  Immy tried to remain calm, despite the crazy beating of her heart. “Don’t be silly,” she said. “It’s like we said when we moved in — trees can’t steal people. I’ll be fine.” If her voice sounded shaky, her parents didn’t seem to notice.

  “All right, then,” her mother said. “Don’t read too long, will you? We’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

  “I won’t.”

  Her dad hovered over her bed. “We’ve checked and double-checked — all the doors and windows are locked. We’re safe and sound. So, off to sleep, and don’t let the bedbugs, or the nasty tree, bite.” He leaned over and gave her a kiss on her forehead. “Good night, sweetheart. Love you.”

  “Love you, too,” Immy said, her heart truly racing now. What was going to happen this evening? Might this be the last time she would ever see her parents? “Both of you,” she added quickly, scared it might really be true.

  Her mother crossed the room and gave her a kiss as well. “Good night, lovely girl.”

  Immy had to turn her head as they left the room, scared she’d let the tears that were welling up behind her eyes spill over.

  Tap, tap.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  Having been drifting in and out of sleep since switching the lights off, Immy took only seconds to sit up, wide awake.

  She gasped when she saw the curtains billowing and the window pushed open despite the fact that her dad had closed it and locked it carefully.

  Throwing off her sheet and blanket, she went over to the window, her eyes drawn to the tree outside.

  The tree she’d seen this afternoon had struggled to hold up its own branches. And now it seemed weaker still, as if it were channeling the very last of its will into what it held out to her now . . .

  Another deep-red, ripe, shimmering mulberry.

  Take me. It sparkled and shone in the moonlight. Take me and eat me. You know you want to. You know you have to.

  There was no resisting it.

  She had to take it.

  And so she did.

  Immy’s fingers reached out and plucked the mulberry from the tree, then put the radiant fruit in her mouth.

  In the blink of an eye, the room whirled around her and she found herself standing in the very same room in the middle of a bright, sunny day. However, it was a different room again. It wasn’t hers or Elizabeth’s. This room was plain white, though it was still crisscrossed with the heavy, dark beams. There were even fewer items within it than had been in Elizabeth’s room. Now there were only a heavy wooden bed that seemed impossibly small — a thin mattress on it and a rough woolen blanket spread on top of linen sheets — a chest of drawers, and a matching wooden washstand with a pretty bowl and jug on top.

  Not hearing or seeing any people, Immy turned back to the window.

  Her eyes widened in disbelief.

  Because there was the tree.

  And here, in this time, it was a different tree altogether.

  It wasn’t that the mulberry tree was smaller and younger that had surprised Immy but something else entirely. It was as Erin and Helen, the real estate agent, had said — once upon a time, the tree had berries. And not just a little but a lot. This version of the tree was leafy and green and absolutely groaning with fruit. So much so, its branches drooped for an entirely different reason than they did in Immy’s time. Every single branch was laden with plump mulberries ranging from crimson to deep, dark vermillion and all the colors in between. Just by looking at them Immy could tell they would be sweet and delicious and perfect for making pies and jams and cordials. It reminded her of the tree on the village green, just bigger and even better at growing its fruit.

  Unlike the tree Immy knew from Lavender Cottage’s back garden, this version of the tree gave off a happy, contented feeling. Its green leaves fluttered in the breeze, and there was no lean to it. Instead, it stood tall and proud next to the house. It looked like a tree that was quite sure it was loved by the village, which it provided sweet treats for.

  Thinking of the village and its inhabitants, Immy’s gaze moved down the trunk of the tree. There were no knots to be seen at all.

  Her attention moved to the rest of the garden, which was also different in this time period. For a start, there was another tree in the garden. A smaller, far younger mulberry. It was also leafy and green, but it bore no fruit, unlike its far larger friend. Immy remembered the dip in the grass that they had to be careful of in their time. It was in exactly the same spot. It must have been where the tree had been removed at some point like her dad thought might have happened.

  To the right of the smaller tree was a strange sort of clothesline — not like anything people had today. This clothesline was very long and seemed to be propped up with wooden poles. A sheet upon it flapped in the breeze, held on by wooden pegs. Every so often, the sheet flapped against the smaller tree.

  Immy’s eyes on the sheet, she realized it was beginning to flap faster and faster. Time was moving forward again, just as it had done when she had visited Elizabeth’s home.

  Night turned to day and day turned to night and then day again as the tree prepared to show her important happenings from its past. Finally, time slowed once more. Now there were people in the garden. There was a woman in a long dark blue dress with a small pattern on it. Her hair was covered by a sort of bonnet with a sheer fabric on top of it, and the same fabric covered her shoulders and was tucked into the neckline of the dress. The woman stood with two men who were dressed in coarser clothes — brown trousers and grubby-looking shirts. They seemed to be workmen of some kind, because one had an ax and one had a shovel. Just as the woman was about to speak, a boy and a girl ran into the garden, chasing each other and screeching playfully. The girl held up the skirt of her long cream-colored cotton dress as she ran.

  “Bridget!” the woman called out. “Do stop that noise at once.”

  Immy focused in on the girl quickly. It had to be her Bridget. She was fair, with distinctive strawberry blond hair, and she seemed sweet and playful, chasing her little brother, who had dark hair. He was loving every minute of the fun.

  “Mama! Mama! Look at me!” The boy screeched this time as they rounded the larger tree.

  “Bridget! Must I remind you that you will be eleven years of age tomorrow?” The woman sighed as she turned back to the men. “I do despair, I honestly do. Now, here, it’s as I told you — that tree, the smaller one.” She gestured toward it. “It hasn’t had a great deal of fruit and it’s only getting in the way of the laundry now.”

  “You don’t want us to cut it down, missus?”

  The woman shook her head. “The vicar has been most insistent that we should move it to the village green. He seems to think it might come into its own there. Being the offspring of the larger tree, it could provide as much fruit as its relative when it’s older, though I’m not entirely convinced of this myself. He has agreed to pay for its removal, however, and thus I won’t argue with him on that point.”

  The men glanced at each other, looking like they’d prefer to simply cut the tree down, but they dipped their hats, and it seemed they’d do as they were asked.

  “Come now, children! Come inside. Leave the men to their business.” The woman herded the boy and girl inside, and the men started toward the smaller tree.

  Time moved on again then, and with a whoosh, light turned to darkness once more.

  Must I remind you that you will be eleven years of age tomorrow? Immy recalled the woman’s words as blurred stars appeared overhead.

  Bridget’s birthday was fast approaching.

  Or maybe it was even closer than she thought. Because in the dark, as Immy turned from the window toward the bed, she realized that there was someone in the room with her.

  It was Bridget, of course, her strawberry blond hair in a loose braid that hung over the side of the bed
. She was sleeping, just as Elizabeth had been. Just as Immy had been until . . .

  Tap. Tap, tap.

  Tap, tap.

  Bridget rolled over.

  Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

  The tapping became more insistent now.

  Bridget sat up, stretching and yawning. She looked around.

  Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.

  The tree wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

  Frowning, Bridget pushed back the woolen blanket and rose from her bed. She approached the window cautiously, pausing midway across the room. As she did so, Immy was able to see her properly in the moonlight that came in through the window. Her hair shone like spun gold, and Immy found herself trying to work out the relationship between strawberry blond Bridget and dark-haired, green-eyed Elizabeth. With Bridget gone, the house had probably been left to the boy she had seen Bridget with in the garden, Immy realized. And then it would have been passed on down from there, ending up with the man and woman who had cared for Elizabeth, their niece. And from there, it had gone to a nephew, who was Caitlyn’s father. Immy bit her lip as she realized who Caitlyn looked like, with her dark hair and dark eyes — Bridget’s brother.

  Paying attention to her surroundings once more, Immy frowned as she looked at Bridget. What was wrong with her? She was still standing in the same spot in the middle of the room, staring out the window, but now she had a hand clamped over her mouth.

  Immy whirled around to look out the window herself. She hadn’t really taken in the view yet, preoccupied as she had been with Bridget.

  She froze when her eyes finally caught what was outside.

  It was the mulberry tree. It had completely transformed in the space of only a few hours. It had dropped all of its fruit and all of its leaves on the ground, which was now stained a dark red, almost like blood, the stain seeping into all four corners of the garden. It leaned threateningly over the house, just as it did in the present day.

  The previously contented tree was now furious. Immy could feel its rage in the air like static electricity. Like a silent scream.

  Only one bright note remained — the bewitching berry. The very first one. It bobbed enticingly near Bridget’s window, absolutely dazzling and even more tempting than the ones that had come after it. The mulberry tree wanted Bridget to eat that mulberry very badly indeed and couldn’t wait for her to do so.

  Bridget blinked, staring at the strange, unfamiliar sight. And then, slowly, her fingers reached out.

  “No!” Immy screamed at her, stepping forward to try to stop her. But her hands only moved straight through Bridget’s body, just as they’d done with Elizabeth’s. “Don’t eat it, Bridget!” she called out, knowing her cries were useless. “Don’t do it!”

  Seconds later, Bridget was gone.

  Immy leaned out the window and looked down, her hand upon her heart, knowing what she would see.

  There, stark in the moonlight, it was — the very first knot upon the tree.

  Immy expected to be returned to her room.

  But that wasn’t what happened.

  Instead, her surroundings whirled around her once more. She had to grip on to the windowsill as she started to feel dizzy and light in the head.

  When the world had righted itself again, Immy was surprised to find herself looking at Bridget’s bed and not her own. But it took only seconds before the commotion outside registered, and still gripping on to the windowsill, she swiveled to take in the tree, outside.

  The tree was still there, dark and enraged and brimming with hate. It was raining heavily outside, the sky sooty and gray. The wind whipped around the garden, leaves flying through the air, the tree’s branches swishing violently this way and that.

  Through this madness came a single man. Drenched almost as soon as he left the house, he dragged a large ax with him.

  As he passed under the tree, one of its branches swooped down and caught him with a hard thwack, but he continued on as if he’d barely even noticed and made his way directly to its trunk.

  He must have known he wouldn’t be able to cut the tree down by himself, but he didn’t seem to care. He simply took up his position and lashed out at the thick, gnarled, blackened bark in front of him. Over and over again he pounded the tree with the ax. Over and over and over, like a thing possessed.

  The marks on the tree, Immy remembered. The marks she and her father had seen. That’s how those marks had been made.

  The man kept going, his hands red-raw and bleeding. It was heartbreaking to watch, because Immy knew the man could only be Bridget’s father, devastated that his daughter was gone.

  Finally, a woman ran out in the rain — Bridget’s mother. She was soon followed by Bridget’s dark-haired younger brother, who grabbed at his mother’s skirt, silent, his deep brown eyes wide and scared. The pair stood and watched the man for some time, becoming drenched themselves. Then he saw them. Falling to his knees, he dropped the ax. They ran over to him and huddled in a group in the mud.

  The world started spinning again, and Immy had to close her eyes.

  It took Immy a moment or two to realize she was back in her own room. There was the desk. The chair. The iron bed frame. The glass of the large built-in wardrobe.

  Continuing to grip the windowsill, she looked out at the fading tree outside.

  “You took those two girls,” she said to the tree. “How could you? How could you do that? What did you do with them? Where did they go?”

  No reply came.

  Immy shook her head. “I can’t believe I trusted you. I defended you. And it was you all along. You are evil! You are!” As she stared at the tree in disbelief, she remembered what Jean had said to her — about how the tree had taken all of Elizabeth’s birthdays. It had taken the children she would never have. Her grandchildren. Her happiness. Jean had hoped that somewhere, somehow, Elizabeth was still alive. That she had those things. That she was happy.

  But she wasn’t.

  Elizabeth didn’t have those things. She wasn’t happy. And neither was Bridget. It was all the tree’s fault. This terrible, awful, sickly tree in front of her. It had secreted those girls somewhere. Some place deep inside itself. Hidden them. Hoarded them.

  Immy’s fingernails dug hard into the wood of the windowsill. There was so much hate that Immy wanted to spew at the tree. Caught in a whirlwind of feelings, she tried to form sentences and failed, tired and overwhelmed by what she had seen. In the end, she could manage to come up with only one word.

  “Why?” she asked the tree. “Why?”

  Immy wasn’t sure she even expected an answer. But then she held her breath as the tree began, slowly, to move.

  It creaked and groaned and inched its way forward, as if it hurt to do so, its branches bending back from the house to move over to the place where the smaller tree had once stood. It hugged the spot protectively like the smaller tree was still there. Or as if it wished it were.

  “What? Because they took your friend away?” Immy frowned. She didn’t understand. “That’s it? That’s all?”

  The tree only embraced the empty spot harder.

  Immy shook her head as she watched. Something about the action reminded her of Bridget’s family embracing, and her forehead creased. Thinking back, Immy recalled something Bridget’s mother had said when Immy had first seen her in the garden. Something about the smaller tree . . .

  She cried out, finally understanding. Finally seeing.

  “They took your daughter.” Immy’s hand came to her chest.

  The tree made a movement that looked decidedly like a nod.

  “The smaller tree — it was your daughter, and they took her away on the eve of Bridget’s eleventh birthday. And so . . . so you took theirs. First Bridget. Then Elizabeth and . . .” She paused, closing her eyes, as the sickening rhyme came back to her, beginning to play out in her head once more:

  Do naught wrong by the mulberry tree,

  or she’ll take your daughters . . .


  one,

  two,

  three.

  In the dead of night, spirited away,

  never to see an eleventh birthday.

  “An eye for an eye . . . and a daughter for a daughter,” Immy finally said, her eyelids flickering open once more. “Oh, tree,” she said, sighing. “Oh, tree.” The tears began rolling down her cheeks as she realized the awfulness of it all. She stretched out her hand and took one of the tree’s branches without hesitation, its rough bark displaying all too well its feeling of despair.

  Eventually the tree pulled away, its branches moving creakily back to their earlier position, though it now seemed even more hunched over than before. Immy could see that it didn’t have long to live. It really was going to let itself wither and die.

  She cried even harder then. For Bridget. For Elizabeth. For their families. For the tree.

  So much pain.

  So much hurt.

  Immy’s head fell into her hands. There had been too much pain and hurt in her life lately because of what had happened that led to their moving here. Immy wasn’t sure how much more of it she could bear. And the tree — it had been in pain, too. It had been in pain for so very long. Immy felt terrible. She’d been so ready to hate the tree, just like everyone else in the village. Well, maybe not everyone. . . . She remembered Mrs. Garland telling her that there was no such thing as something being purely good or purely evil. And now that she’d witnessed the tree’s side of the story, she knew Mrs. Garland was right. Angry about having its daughter stripped from its presence, the tree had simply lashed out. It had taken it centuries to realize it had been wrong in what it had done.

  The choices the tree had made reminded Immy of somebody else’s choices, too — Bob’s. Bob, who had also lashed out impulsively and taken matters into his own hands and robbed a mother and daughter of their futures, just like Bridget and Elizabeth had been robbed of theirs.

  Finally Immy understood.