Prisoner

rs Medlock pushed Mary into her bedroom and Mary heard the key turn. She tugged frantically at the door handle, but she was locked in.

‘Open this door!’ she shouted.

‘If you need the bathroom in the night, you’ll see we’ve put a chamberpot under your bed,’ Mrs Medlock said through the door. ‘Martha will let you out in the morning.’

Mary heard her walking away down the corridor. ‘Let me out!’ she cried, rattling the handle. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt anyone. I just wanted to help.’ Anger erupted inside her. ‘I know you’re enjoying this!’ she yelled. ‘I know you are! But I won’t be sent away again – I won’t!’

In a rage, she ran to the rocking horse and pushed it hard, ramming it into the door. It smashed into the wood and overturned. As it banged down, a secret hatch in its belly opened and papers spilled out.

Mary gasped, her rage disappearing with her shock. She crouched down and picked the papers up. They were letters. And they were in her mother’s handwriting …

My dearest Grace, they all began.

Mary leafed through them. As her eyes raced over the words, she realised they were all from her mother to her aunt. But why had they been hidden away? As she read some of the passages, she began to understand. The letters were between two sisters who kept no secrets from each other. They talked about their lives, their children, their husbands, in a way that they would not have wanted anyone else to see. Mary skipped over the bits about life in India, about her and her father, her eyes seeking out the passages where her mother talked about Grace’s illness, Colin, Archie … It was strange to imagine her forbidding uncle ever being called by such an informal name.

Outside, the sky darkened, the sun set and the moon rose. Mary turned on her bedside lamp and carried on reading the letters in bed, putting things together, starting to make sense of some of the mysteries that surrounded her. She only looked up from them when she heard faint screams. She swallowed, her fingers tightening on the letter she was holding. Colin. He would be wondering why she didn’t go to visit him as usual. She glared at the locked door, longing to get out.

Mary fell asleep fully clothed. She only woke in the morning when Martha came in with a tray. Mary hastily shoved the letters under her bedcovers. To her relief, Martha was too busy looking at the overturned rocking horse to notice.

‘What’s been going on here then?’ she said. Not waiting for an answer, she heaved the horse up and pushed it back into its place. ‘Mrs Medlock’s in a right rage with you,’ she said to Mary. ‘There’s just stale bread for breakfast, no porridge.’

‘I don’t care,’ said Mary defiantly. ‘How long is she planning on keeping me prisoner?’

Martha’s mouth twitched. ‘Hark at you. You’re no prisoner. I’m to leave your room unlocked when I’ve finished, but if I were you I’d stay out of everyone’s way.’

Mary felt a rush of relief. She could leave her room and go to the garden. She could see Colin and Dickon. She jumped up and hugged Martha.

Martha gasped in surprise. ‘Let me go, miss – you’re fair squeezing me to death!’ But, as Mary drew back, she saw the smile on Martha’s face.

‘I’ll make my bed,’ Mary said hastily as Martha went over to the rumpled sheets.

‘You can’t do that, miss,’ Martha protested.

‘Oh, yes I can.’ Mary pushed Martha towards the door. ‘In fact, I order you to leave it.’ She smiled. ‘You can go now.’

Shaking her head as if she didn’t know what to make of her, Martha left.

Mary gathered up the letters and put them into her bag. Then she got changed and made as good an attempt as she could to make her bed, not wanting Martha to get into trouble. She smoothed the sheets and then set off. She needed to go to the garden and find out if a suspicion the letters had put in her mind was true. If it was, then maybe she had discovered where the magic of the garden came from!

Mary slipped out of the house and headed across the lawn. She ran into the trees and found the gate. Pulling the curtain of creepers back, she went straight into the part of the garden with the statues and flowerbeds. Dickon was there already, his coat off, humming a song. He had some gardening tools with him and he was digging up the weeds near the temple at the far end. The robin was perched on the handle of a gardening fork that was dug into the ground and the dog was snuffling near his feet. The plants around him were a riot of spring colour – reds, oranges, pinks, purples, blues.

The dog spotted Mary as she approached and ran over to say hello.

‘Morning,’ called Dickon.

‘Morning!’ gasped Mary, running past them.

‘Hey, where are you going?’ Dickon called.

‘Follow me!’ she cried.

The robin circled round her head. She let it lead her through the garden, trusting that the magic would help it to know where she needed to go. It took her through the giant ferns and into thick trees. The bushes seemed to close in on her, the vines snaking at her ankles, branches blocking her path as if the garden didn’t want her to go that way, but she forced her way through, following the robin. It twittered loudly as if it was urging her on. Determination beat through Mary. The garden had yet more secrets to reveal and she was going to find them out.

She burst out into a clearing that she had never been in before. She stopped as she took in the oak tree at the centre of it. There was an old swing hanging from a strong branch. The robin landed on the oak tree and sang knowingly at Mary.

‘Oh,’ she said softly, realising she had found what she had been looking for. She walked slowly up to the swing and crouched down beside it. Then she looked back at Dickon, her face serious. ‘This is the place,’ she whispered. ‘The place where everything happened.’

Dickon looked confused.

‘It’s where my aunt came to die,’ Mary went on.

The robin flew down to land on her shoulder. Dickon came over, approaching her slowly as if she was a wild animal he didn’t want to frighten. ‘What do you mean?’

Mary told him what she had worked out from the letters. ‘My aunt was very ill with cancer and my mother came over from India to see her in her last days – she brought me with her, but I don’t remember. I was only little.’ She looked at the swing. ‘My mother wrote that she wanted to be with my aunt when she died and she knew my aunt wanted to die here in this garden by this tree. It was her special place.’

She looked round the clearing. ‘My aunt made this whole garden. She grew the flowers. She put the statues in place. She designed the temple. After she died, I think my uncle locked the garden up because it caused him too much pain.’ Her eyes met Dickon’s. ‘I believe my aunt is the reason the garden is magic. I think she wanted me to find the key so –’ she took a breath – ‘so I could use the garden to cure her son.’

Mary looked fiercely at him, daring him to laugh. But he didn’t.

‘I haven’t got long,’ she went on. ‘They’re sending me away to school. I have to see if the garden can heal Colin before I go. But I can’t do it on my own, Dickon. I need your help.’

He nodded solemnly. ‘Tell me what you need me to do.’