I turned back and saw Mrs Knight talking to Miss Danver, the physics teacher. They talked quickly and quietly, their faces white. Mrs Knight must have been spreading the word about Mr Bartholomew. I wondered when the announcement about him would be made. For now, I kept our triumphant secret to myself.
Ivy sat beside me, and she seemed to be (almost) enjoying her food too. Both of us tried our hardest to ignore the empty seat.
But Penny, as always, had to make life difficult. “I see your little friend got kicked out,” she sneered as she set her tray down. “It should have been the lot of you. And Violet too.”
I raised my fork at her, about to start yelling. I’d had enough that day without Penny being her usual hideous self. But Ivy stepped in.
“Look, Penny,” she said, her voice weary. “Have you tried just … talking to Violet? Asking her what she went through?”
Penny went still, her expression blank. I think she was deciding whether or not to answer.
But Ivy continued. “All this has been because you think Violet betrayed you, stopped being your friend. Did you ever think that maybe you weren’t being a good friend to her?”
“I didn’t—” Penny argued, but Ivy was having none of it.
“Pull yourself together,” she snapped. “She nearly died because of your petty squabbling. You nearly got us all in deep, deep trouble with the headmaster. And all because of your jealousy!”
Penny went silent.
I stared at my twin, open-mouthed. Some days it was like I didn’t even recognise her. Where had she found the courage to speak to Penny like that? She’d always let me do the talking when we were younger.
Everyone had stopped talking, paying attention to Ivy, knowing something dramatic was happening. I thought they’d all go back to chatting in a minute, while Penny stewed in her own juices.
And then suddenly, Nadia leant forward. “Ivy’s right,” she said defiantly. “You need to get over it. We’re all sick of you two fighting, and you being a complete grump about everything!”
Murmurs of agreement spread down the table.
Penny flushed bright red. She stood up, her chair scraping back on the floor. Was she about to scream at us?
But no, to the surprise of just about everyone, she was walking across the hall, through the rabble, to where Violet sat.
We couldn’t hear what she said, but we all stared nonetheless. And we all saw when Violet reached out her arm and shook Penny’s hand.
Finally, there was a truce.
I slept soundly that night, considering. I feared the return of the nightmare, but it didn’t come. As I woke, I wondered sleepily if it had been a message.
I shook my head. I know I’ve been cooped up in here too long when I start believing in that nonsense.
At the end of assembly, they handed out letters – and I was surprised to hear our names called.
I went to the front to pick it up, and afterwards in the corridor I eagerly tore it open. What it could it be? Ivy hovered beside me, curious.
As soon as I pulled it out of the brown envelope, though, I recognised the handwriting. Aunt Phoebe.
Dear Scarlet and Ivy,
I am missing you both dearly. I think, perhaps, I was a bit rash in agreeing with your stepmother. I hope you do not feel abandoned. I was thinking of asking her and your father if you would be allowed to stay with me during the Christmas holidays. I don’t know if they will agree, but just so you know, I will try.
Ivy, dear – where did I leave the shovel? I just can’t think where it could be …
Your aunt
Phoebe Gregory
I grinned at my twin, and I was pleased to see her mirroring the grin back at me. We headed off to our first lesson – double Latin, ugh – but there was a spring in our step, and Ivy had already pulled out her ink pen to write a reply.
“Aunt Phoebe,” she muttered. “The shovel is in the shed, where it always has been …”
In lessons I really began to feel the loss of Ariadne. It was a lot quieter without her around. And as I watched Ivy, carefully writing out her Latin grammar, I saw a tear roll down her cheek. She missed our friend too.
At break time I spotted Mrs Knight trotting through the corridor.
“Miss,” I said, almost running to keep up with her, “can Ariadne come back to school now that Mr Bartholomew’s been arrested?”
She stopped, and a weak smile crossed her face. “I’m afraid not, my dear. I telephoned her parents, but they don’t want her to return.”
“Why not?”
Her eyes crinkled at the corners, and I could tell she was deciding whether or not to tell me. “They’re unhappy about her being accused of starting the fire. And they think the school is … unsuitable.” With that, she gave a curt nod and started to walk away.
“Miss …” I said, and she stopped mid-step.
“What is it, Scarlet? I have a lot to do at the moment!”
“Ariadne should be here. She deserves to be here, much more than I do. She’s actually a good student. And a good person. She’s pretty good at everything, really.”
Mrs Knight sighed, and I swore I saw a hint of genuine sadness in her eyes. “Perhaps so. But you’ll have to take that up with her parents, I’m afraid.”
She left me standing in the corridor, and I wondered how I was going to tell Ivy.
“Let’s go,” I said, as the bell rang out for the end of the day, taking my twin’s arm.
“Go where?” she asked, a frown still etched on her face. I’d told her what Ariadne’s parents had said, and she wasn’t happy.
“Go and do something Ariadne would do. Investigate.”
It was something that had been playing on my mind, ever since I’d read those words in the newspaper.
Ivy protested continually as I took her up to our room and we pulled on our warmest clothes. “Why?” she kept saying. “What are we looking for?” But I didn’t want to say, not just yet.
All right, I was playing with her, I’ll admit it …
Outside, the snow was a few days old. Some of it was melting, some brown around the edges. Footprints criss-crossed it, mud and gravel peeked through from the ground below.
I set off towards the lake.
“Scarlet, this is ridiculous!” Ivy shouted after me. “Tell me what you’re looking for!”
“Got a hunch!” I shouted back.
Together we trudged over the frosty ground, our breath forming little steam clouds. Ivy kept huffing, and it made me laugh. I stopped in my tracks, bent down and scooped up a handful of snow, and hurled it right at her.
“Ack!” she yelled in frustration.
I laughed again, and carried on walking. Seconds later, a snowball hit me in the back of the head. I looked round to see my twin grinning wickedly.
Finally, we pushed through the copse and came to the lake. “Now we start looking,” I said. “But I really don’t know where to start.”
“You don’t know where to start? I don’t even know what we’re looking for!” Ivy pouted at me.
“You’ll know when you see it.”
So we wandered around the shore, picking through the undergrowth. It had to be near here – didn’t it?
As I stepped up on to a rock, I caught sight of my reflection in the icy lake. I looked mad, certainly. Maybe I was, out here looking for something when I had no idea if it was even there.
But in the horrible cold, I could see the truth. I’d never been mad, never been insane. I knew exactly what I was doing. I knew what was real in the world.
As I had that realisation and stepped down into frosty brambles, I stubbed my toe on something. I kicked some of the branches away, knelt down and inspected it closely.
IN LOVING MEMORY
“Ivy!” I called. “Found it!”
The article in the newspaper had said that a plaque would be erected for the girl who drowned. And here it was, right in front of me. It was brass, worn and scratched, covered in twigs and leaves.
Ivy tramped through the undergrowth to where I was kneeling down. “Oh,” she said quietly. “That’s what you were looking for.”
But I wasn’t done. There had to be a name, didn’t there? If we knew her name, we could put her to rest.
I reached out with gloved hands and began to pull off the debris, until the bottom of the plaque was clear.
And then I froze. And I stopped breathing.
OF EMMELINE ADEL
My mouth dropped open. “No,” was all I could say. “No. That can’t be right.”
Scarlet stood up and backed away from the plaque, her hand covering her lips. “I don’t … I don’t understand,” she said.
Our mother.
Our mother who had been a member of the Whispers.
Our mother who had died not long after we were born.
Our mother who had died in a lake, drowned at the hands of the headmaster …
It wasn’t possible. No one could die twice.
What was real? Suddenly I had no idea. I fumbled for an explanation, for something to say. “It must have been a different person, with the same name.”
Scarlet just pointed at the bottom of the plaque.
05.01.1899 – 26.02.1914
GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN
That was her birthday.
I sat down on the chilly rock, without even realising what my legs were doing. I propped up my head with my hands, just staring at my twin.
“It’s a prank,” she said finally. “Someone’s messing with us.” But even she didn’t sound convinced. She knew as well as I did that no one at the school knew our mother’s name, especially not her maiden name. And besides, the thing looked easily weathered enough to have been there for over twenty years.
I shook my head, and stared out over the icy surface of the lake.
After some thought, I spoke again. “I think there are only two possible explanations. Either she faked her own death, or whoever our mother really was, she wasn’t Emmeline Adel. She was someone else. An imposter.”
There was a look of shock on my twin’s face that I was sure mirrored my own. But it gradually melted, and suddenly she was laughing.
“What?” I asked indignantly.
“Well, you can see where we get it from, can’t you?”
I fought so hard not to laugh back. “Scarlet, this is serious …”
She only grinned harder and waved her arms, sending nearby rooks shrieking from the trees. “Don’t you see? She was just like us. Maybe we don’t know what happened, but … maybe she pretended to die to escape Mr Bartholomew. Or maybe she swapped identities with the real Emmeline. Whoever she was, she was smart, and her life was just as crazy as ours!”
I sighed, trying to imagine the woman I’d only ever seen in a stiff old photograph as a young girl. Now I wanted to know her more than ever. The real her. What had she been through? Why had she done these things?
And another, more pressing question came to mind. “Do you think Father had any idea?”
“That clueless old boot? I doubt it. He didn’t even tell us that she went here, did he? You’d think that would occur to him, since he shipped us off to this school.”
“I hope you’re right,” I said. “I mean, if Father knew anything about the headmaster, he really shouldn’t have sent us here.”
We both fell silent for a moment, considering that perhaps he had known and just didn’t care. But that thought was too awful, too painful, and I brushed it aside.
“Maybe we’ll get the chance to ask him someday,” I continued.
“You can ask,” said Scarlet. “Next time I see him, I’m going to tell him exactly what I think of him.”
I smiled. That was an event I didn’t want to miss.
As I lay in bed that night, watching the frost climb the window, I vowed two things to myself:
1. I would get Ariadne back.
2. I would find out who our mother really was.
It couldn’t be that hard. Could it?
Those thoughts were the ones floating around my head that Saturday morning. Scarlet had returned to our room after breakfast, but I wanted to go back to the library and make sure Miss Jones was all right.
And on the way there, I stopped. Right outside Miss Fox’s office door.
It was open again, but there were no suited men inside this time.
I don’t know what made me do it, but I took a step over the threshold. Although the men had taken all her papers and files, the room seemed otherwise untouched. I stood in the middle of the floor, and I looked around. The dogs in their frames stared down at me. Still, silent. The stuffed dogs remained too, and their downcast faces surrounded me. All of them.
All but one.
Once, when I’d been trapped in the office when Miss Fox decided a punishment for Penny and I, I’d counted all of the stuffed dogs. There had been eight.
Now there were seven.
I frowned, counting again, thinking I must have missed one. But no, there were only seven of the poor things. And then it struck me – the Chihuahua. The one that had sat on her desk, with pens in its mouth. It was gone. I peered closer. There were little dusty outlines where its paws had been.
I leant back. Someone must have taken it out. Maybe they cleared it away when they were going through her desk. That had to be it. It didn’t mean anything.
I stepped out of the office. I shut the door.
And I ran away as fast as my legs would carry me.
I stared into the mirror, and the mirror stared back.
It had always been Ivy that I saw there before, but now I wondered how much of our mother I was seeing. My hair, my eyes – what was hers?
There was one thing I felt sure was hers. Spirit. Rebellion. I held up my chin with pride. Whoever she had been, whoever the real Emmeline Adel had been, she fought for what she believed in.
And that’s when I had the idea.
It took some time to talk myself round. It was something that terrified me, deeply. But come on, I told myself, you’re Scarlet Grey. You’re not scared.
It was one thing to say it in my head, and another to act on it. I was shaking as I tore a page out of the back of my diary and wrote a note –
Gone to the roof. Be back soon.
I pulled on my gloves and coat.
I took the stairs one at a time, slowly, savouring my safety. I felt my heart quicken, though I tried to calm it. No matter how much I told myself it was fine, my body didn’t believe me. When I reached the top, my lungs were gasping for air.
I stopped at the hatch, sat down on the floor beneath it. I can do this. Nothing bad will happen. It’s just a roof.
I don’t know how long I was sitting there, staring up at the hatch, at the glimpse of swirling white sky. I was almost in a trance of panic, not wanting to move. The roof was the source of all my fears. Where it had all gone so, so wrong.
However long it was, the trance was shattered by the sound of footsteps pounding up the stairs. I struggled to my feet.
“Scarlet?” Ivy panted.
There was something in her expression … she looked horrified.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
She stopped, leant against the banister. She gazed up at me for a moment too long. “Nothing,” she said finally. “It’s nothing. What are you doing up here?”
I pointed at the roof hatch, as if that explained everything.
“But it’s snowing …” Ivy started. She didn’t finish the sentence, though. I supposed she’d seen the determination on my face.
“I need to go up there,” I said. “I can’t be afraid any more. I just can’t!”
I was expecting her either to tell me it was easy or to tell me I was being ridiculous. What I didn’t expect was what she actually said:
“Let’s do it. Together.”
I gave her a questioning look, but she nodded. She meant it.
Ivy went over to the roof hatch and pulled on the still-unlocked padlock. The hatch swung op
en, and she climbed out. Then she leant back down and held out her hand.
I drank in a deep breath. Maybe I could be scared on my own, but I couldn’t be scared in front of Ivy.
I took her hand.
And I stepped out on to the roof.
The vertigo hit me first. I reeled, trying not to look. The ground was such a long way down.
“Scarlet, it’s all right,” said Ivy. And then, “Scarlet, look!”
The urgency in her voice caught my attention, even though I was trying to hide my face. I looked up and saw what she was pointing at.
Perched on a chimney pot, in the falling snow, was a barn owl. It stared back at me, something old and wise about its face.
I opened my mouth, speechless. Before we could move, the owl had leapt into the air, its wings spread wide. It flew away from the roof, over …
The world.
The snow covered everything. It was like someone had drained the world of all colour except black, white, and the icy blue of the sky reflected in the frozen lake.
The owl swooped towards the ground, a dark shadow over the white world.
Once I’d looked, I couldn’t look away.
“Nothing’s going to happen,” said Ivy, but I wasn’t listening.
I made it.
I got back on to the rooftop, after everything. The place that had been mine, before it was taken from me. Before I saw it only in my nightmares.
Well, I was going to claim it back. Right now.
The snow was deep and compacted. Our footprints had barely made a dent in it. That was good. I could do what I set out to do. I began scooping out the snow in lines. At first, my twin just stared at me, but after a while she started to help, following my lead. I think she realised what I was up to.
When we’d finally finished, I stood back, careful not to knock any of it out of place.
I looked down at what we’d written.
THE WHISPERS HAVE BEEN HEARD
I’m so thrilled to have had the chance to bring Scarlet and Ivy back together. But I have of course had a lot of help along the way with wrangling Rookwood School into shape for a second time, and these are the people I need to thank:
The Whispers in the Walls (Scarlet and Ivy, Book 2) Page 17
