Using her ornate key, Flossie unlocked the gates to Highgate Cemetery and then locked them again behind her. When she was done, she surveyed the ever-decaying gloomy landscape. Here and there lay monuments weathered by time. Some had fallen to the ground, others sunken within it, others still crumbled or tilted, the ivy claiming more of the cemetery each day.
She felt one of her interred awaken from rest. When she realised who it was, she groaned.
Millicent Gough, died 1872 aged seventy-one years, cause of death: twisted bowel.
“Hello, Mrs Gough,” she said to the woman striding towards her in the moonlight. She wore a long white burial shroud – rather like a loose nightgown. Her grey hair was pulled tightly back in a bun.
Flossie pushed the doll behind her again and hoped that Mrs Gough wouldn’t ask too many questions. She needn’t have worried. Mrs Gough was intent on what she had to say.
“I really must insist! The ivy! The tree roots! My husband paid good money for my plot!” Mrs Gough’s shroud shook with her agitation, though Flossie noticed that not one grey hair dared escape that bun.
Standing in the middle of the gravel path, surrounded on both sides by towering time-stained obelisks and eternally weeping angels, Flossie tried not to sigh. Mrs Gough had been a wealthy woman who was far too used to getting what she wanted in life. She was determined nothing should change in death.
“I’m sorry, Mrs Gough, but it’s like I’ve told you so many times before. We’re at war. The living are busy just keeping alive themselves, let alone tending to our graves.”
“I think it’s a shocking disgrace. To treat the dead with such disrespect,” Mrs Gough huffed.
“No one means any disrespect, Mrs Gough. It’s simply a matter of necessity.”
“That is exactly what you always say.”
“I know–”
“Hmph!” Mrs Gough cut Flossie off.
Flossie opened her mouth to offer to take Mrs Gough back to her grave, but Mrs Gough had disappeared. A wave of peace filled Flossie from head to foot and she knew that Mrs Gough had returned to rest. (It was always a lovely feeling – particularly lovely when that person was Mrs Gough.)
With Mrs Gough gone, Flossie closed her eyes and appeared inside her Turnkey’s cottage. She had a lot to do. She stirred Amelia from rest and then summoned her Advisor. “Hazel?” she said.
“Mistress Turnkey.” Hazel materialised upon the tattered rug, her coat glossy and smooth, her bearing dignified. She was just like the cemetery in many ways, which made sense. After all, she was the cemetery come to life – Highgate in Flossie’s chosen form. Her bright, knowing eyes met Flossie’s, replicas of the original Hazel’s in life.
The original Hazel had lived at the edge of Flossie’s boarding school grounds. Hazel, the fox of the living world, had been wild, of course. Flossie had first seen her bright yellow, inquisitive eyes peering out from behind a hazel tree.
The thing was, Flossie’s rheumatic fever hadn’t taken her abruptly. She had initially been very sick. So sick her family had thought there was no hope for her. Slowly, over months, she had recovered enough to return to school, albeit with a very weak heart. But it had been hard to keep up with her friends. So she had started spending more time on her own, taking long, slow walks and pausing for a rest under a specific hazel tree. That was where she had met the fox. Flossie brought the vixen treats and, over time, the fox had become friendly – content even to sit at arm’s length and listen to Flossie talk about all the things she could tell no one else.
Eventually she had given her a name. Hazel.
When Flossie had been instructed to choose a form for her Advisor, it had been the fox who came to mind. And here she stood. Except this fox in the twilight world was someone else entirely who could talk back.
“Hello, Hazel,” Flossie said. “Ah, here comes my visitor now.” She gestured towards the cottage door and Hazel opened it with a flick of her tail.
“Amelia!” Flossie said. “Come in.”
Amelia’s eyes lit up when she saw what Flossie held in her hand. She ran the last few steps into the cottage.
“I’m afraid a lot of time has passed by and it wouldn’t be possible to find your dolls now, but this one was mine. My sister gave her to me. I was wondering if you might take care of her for me.” Flossie held her out.
“She’s very beautiful.”
“Isn’t she? She’s from Paris. My sister saw her there and bought her for me. But I was a little old for her. It would be nice for her to be played with properly.”
Amelia took the doll from Flossie cautiously. “I won’t break her.”
“Of course you won’t.”
Amelia stroked the doll’s thick brown hair. “What’s her name?”
“See! That’s why she needs to be with you. She doesn’t even have a name. What do you think we should call her?”
“Marguerite,” Amelia said decisively. “She seems like a Marguerite.”
“Marguerite. I like that. I bet that if you returned to rest that Marguerite would appear in your dreams.”
“Do you think so?”
“I …” Flossie stopped. Because Amelia and Marguerite were gone. She felt her return to rest.
“Very nicely done, Mistress Turnkey.”
Flossie laughed a short laugh. “Sometimes, Hazel, just sometimes, I think I can handle this Turnkey job.” She frowned, remembering the evening’s events. “But then I realise I barely know anything at all.” She sank into one of the armchairs. “Now, I have to go out again. Before I do, I have a question or two for you.”
* * *
Flossie sat back after explaining all that had happened that evening. “Have any thoughts?”
Hazel considered her question before replying. “I agree, Mistress Turnkey. It’s not a good sign that the German officer ran away in the way that he did. It sounds as if he has something to hide.”
“One of the Chelsea Pensioners mentioned this officer’s most likely buried in a cemetery called the Invalid Cemetery, in Berlin,” Flossie said, shuffling to the edge of her seat. “Do you think I’d be able to travel there? Am I able to travel beyond the limits of London?” She hadn’t considered the possibility before. She had never needed to.
“Yes, Mistress Turnkey. It is possible for you to do this. As within London, you must simply close your eyes and think of where you want to go. One of the previous Turnkeys needed to make a visit to Paris once for some information and it went very smoothly.”
“Hopefully things will be the same for me.” Flossie stood, ready to be on her way. She knew Hazel wouldn’t be able to come with her. She wasn’t able to leave the cemetery. Without her, the cemetery would be soulless – nothing more than a mess of stone and greenery.
“I will await your safe return, Mistress Turnkey, as always.”