The urge to leave was sudden and unstoppable. Daphne’s last words in the notebook were unambiguous. I was in over my head. The place felt rotten to the core, and I could see why my mother had fled. I was sure my presence, anonymous or not, was stirring up trouble. Sooner or later, Max or Mrs. Mins would realize that I had the notebook, that Daphne had trusted me. Sooner or later they would realize who I was. I was flesh and blood, yes, but I was bad blood. And Barnsley would be a safer place for everyone without me.
But would it really be safer for the children without me? The thought persisted as I grabbed my rucksack and jammed in as many of my belongings as I could reach. The only thing I really cared about was my battered old copy of The House of Brides. I made sure to leave the one Max had given me on the bedside stand, resolutely unopened. At the last moment, I took the notebook and placed it under the pillow. I was sick of the notebook and the secrets, sick of it all. It wasn’t my story to protect.
Inside, the house was silent. I paused outside each child’s bedroom, offering up not quite a silent prayer but a wish, a hope that with my leaving, peace would be restored to Barnsley. That Daphne would come back. That there would not be yet another generation of Barnsley children who found themselves floundering and motherless. An apology as well, that I wasn’t up to the job.
But outside, the wind was howling, pushing at Barnsley’s solid walls, finding resistance and pushing harder again. Thomas looked up at me as I passed, the inside of his eyes red and heavy. He closed his eyes again, not sorry to see me go. I buttoned up my jacket and thought about scratching him behind the ear. But instead I carried on. Before I could change my mind.
There was nothing at Barnsley for me. I’d be no one here, once they found out who I was. At least in Australia, I was my own person. Not a very popular one, but still. I’d always be Tessa’s daughter here, and I hadn’t realized until I came here what that would mean. Just as my mother was Beatrice’s daughter, I would be forever in the shadow of my mother. I had seen the disgust in Jean Laidlaw’s face—better to deserve that disgust than inherit it.
The van was not in the forecourt. Someone had put it away. And perhaps after the night I’d gone down to the boathouse for Sophia the garden lights had been switched off. The rain started again as I trudged in the darkness towards the car park, taking care not to let the gravel crunch under my feet, sticking to the edges of the forecourt, where the overhanging branches gave me some shelter. Ignoring Daphne’s banged-up Volkswagen with its shattered windscreen, I climbed into the van, silently thanking my lucky stars when the engine started first go. The noise seemed immense and I waited for lights to go on in the house but there was only the soft, steady glow of Agatha’s night-light in the window upstairs.
In the manner of Beatrice, and my mother, I had tried to run away from my problems. Beatrice had unsuccessfully tried to escape on Peregrine’s boat; my mother had boarded an airplane and never looked back. Yet their problems had still found them. Beatrice had died a lonely, grisly death, and my mother had never reunited with her family. All at once I could see what I had back home: a father who loved and supported me, a family who had protected me from the worst year of my life. A job. A real fresh start.
I hadn’t driven myself beyond the gate of Barnsley House before, but I hoped I would be able to find my way. There would be signs, I reckoned, to South Bolton. I could wait there until morning and catch the first bus to London. Denise would be pleased to see me, and maybe, just maybe, I could patch things up with my dad. Find a job, pay him back. Little by little. Max would find the van eventually.
It wasn’t really stealing. Just like using my dad’s credit card to buy my airline ticket wasn’t really stealing. But this was different. This was the last time. I would write a letter to Max explaining everything once I was back home. Once I was safely out of there.
The drive was pitch-black too, but I didn’t dare turn on the headlights until I was away from the house, in the part of the drive thickly lined by trees. The car inched along, and I leaned forward, somehow finding the wipers. The squeal was deafening in the quiet of the car.
Daphne had left in the dead of the night as well. Perhaps even just after I had seen her in the upstairs corridor. She had looked frightened, yes, but there was something else in her eyes I hadn’t been able to put my finger on. A slight indication of the woman she had been before the accident. The image of her shaking head returned to me, as it had so many times over the preceding days. The finger to her lips, her eyes steely.
Determination.
That was it.
I was feeling a similar resolve myself. I was leaving Barnsley on my own terms. And I had a feeling that whatever had happened to Daphne that night had sprung from a like awakening of latent determination. The same determination that had pushed her cookbooks into the best-seller lists and earned her a Michelin star. The same determination that had built up the Summer House and turned around the fortunes of Barnsley.
Keeping one eye on the rearview mirror for signs of life at the house, I squinted hard to see the driveway in front of me. I caught a glimpse of movement in the trees and swerved, thinking of Daphne’s cracked windscreen, anticipating a deer, a person. But it was only a rabbit. I watched it hop away, reminding myself to breathe, and looked back at the road in front of me.
I almost didn’t see the tree. I flicked on the headlights just in time. It was enormous, blocking the entire road. I hit the brakes. The van skidded along the gravel road and fishtailed out slowly. I clung to the wheel, afraid it wouldn’t stop in time. Afraid that the noise would wake up the whole house. The van was parallel to the tree by the time it came to a stop, the trunk right up next to my window, dark and gnarly. If the windows were down, I could have reached out and touched it. In better weather, I might have been able to climb it. To clamber to safety.
But then where?
There was nowhere to go.
I rested my head on the steering wheel for a moment, my heart beating fast. The rain was coming down hard, the van sinking into mud that was growing softer by the second.
I had to move right away. My only hope now was that I could get the van back to the car park before anyone realised I had taken it. Before it got bogged in the mud. Before they found me.
I shifted into reverse, but the wheels spun hopelessly. I pushed the accelerator down more gently a second time, and the van eased forward slightly. Sank again. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath. Tried again. The van finally moved backwards, out of the swampy mud. I took my time, put it into drive, and pulled it around so it was facing Barnsley House again.
The house looked even darker. I told myself it was my imagination. As I inched back along the driveway, there was definitely something different. Where before there had been the warm light from Agatha’s room, now there was nothing but black. My skin prickled. I started to shiver in my damp clothing.
I parked the van and felt my way across the dark car park. By the time I got back to the vestibule, I was certain. The house was in total darkness, and as I slipped through the door into the kitchen, I felt the difference immediately. The room was still warm from the heat of the Aga, but there was no steady hum of the fridge or soft glow of fairy lights. No light anywhere. Even though I was certain, I flicked the light switch beside me to be sure. Nothing.
The power was out.
It took me a long time to find my way back to my room. Arms in front of me, taking careful steps, I felt my way along the cold, uneven walls until I reached the heavy door at the bottom of the stairwell. Once I had pushed through into the stairwell it was easier, each step guiding me to the relative sanctuary of my bed.
“Miranda?”
The call was quiet, tentative. If I had been asleep, I doubt I would have heard it. I wasn’t even sure I had heard it until Thomas whimpered softly in response.
“Miranda?” It came again.
Agatha.
I paused on the stairs, wishing I could strip out of my wet clothes. Take a shower. Bunker down in my flannel pyjamas. “I’m coming,” I replied. Her cries were different from Robbie’s. Less urgent. They didn’t tear through my heart like his did, but the genuine need in her voice made me move more quickly down the dark corridor. “Agatha.”
My eyes had grown accustomed to the dark, and I could see straightaway that she was sitting up in bed, her eyes shining in the dark. “My night-light! You turned off my night-light.” She pointed to the side table, where her night-light stood useless. Shaped like a goose and charming when illuminated, it looked slightly off-putting as a shadow. I tried not to look at it.
“No, Agatha. It’s all right.” I sat down next to her and patted her hair. Felt her forehead with the back of my hand. It was instinct. Something learned from my mother and never forgotten. The movement stirred up something else, though. Something that had been forgotten. Before I could snatch at the memory and pin it down, Agatha spoke, and it escaped.
“I thought you turned it off.”
“No, Agatha, I wouldn’t do that. The power has gone out. Lie down and try to get some sleep.”
She looked at me as if I had suggested that she swim to the moon. “I can’t sleep without my night-light.”
“Yes. Right. That makes sense.” I thought for a moment. A little bit about my bed, but mostly about how frightened she must be. First her mum gone, then her dad. Then to wake up in a dark room. How long had she been awake? “How about if I stay right here?”
She nodded and curled back down under her covers. There was an old eiderdown at the end of her bed, so I pulled that over my shoulders and wrapped into a ball, ignoring the sticky wet denim of my jeans as best as I could. A radiator ran down the wall, and I placed my feet on it, hoping for some warmth, but it was stone cold.
And then a warm hand appeared from under the covers, found mine, and grabbed tight. I squeezed it back, finding comfort in the skin-to-skin contact, and a tiny smile formed on Agatha’s lips. I closed my eyes.
The memory from earlier reappeared, fully formed. The dark bedroom of my childhood, a feverish night. It had always been my father who came in the night when I was ill: mopping up vomit, administering paracetamol, fetching lost stuffed toys, and changing wet sheets. But this time my father had been out to dinner, and my mother had come.
The door had flung open, light from the hallway flooding in. My mother abhorred weakness, and from an early age I had been trained to sleep in complete darkness, with the door shut. Just like she was brought up, she used to tell me. “What is it? What is this incessant caterwauling?” she asked.
I swallowed nervously as she marched over to my bed and pushed the back of her hand against my forehead. Suddenly my throat didn’t seem too sore, my head not aching at all. “Nothing.”
Her hand remained on my forehead, and I waited for her verdict. She sighed deeply and finally removed it. “You’re right. You’re barely tepid.”
She stood up to go, and then stopped. “You know I have an important meeting tomorrow. I told you I needed a good night’s sleep.”
It did ring a bell. But my mother needed a good night’s sleep every night. She thought everything she did was important. A dinner party would require a month-long preparation schedule of frantic cleaning and planning, only for her to laugh and smile when guests complimented her “effortless entertaining.” She would lock herself in her study for days in advance of a two-minute radio segment.
It wasn’t worth defending myself. I pretended to fall back to sleep, and when she slammed the door, I squeezed my eyes shut tighter to keep the tears in. The next morning my father had taken me to see the family doctor, who had immediately prescribed antibiotics for a virulent infection, and I missed a week of school.
I drifted off to sleep on Agatha’s bed after forcing that memory from my mind. It felt disloyal—I was sure my mother would have an explanation, were she here to defend herself.
After what seemed like only moments, I heard Mrs. Mins knocking on my door down the hallway. “It’s seven o’clock!” she called, rapping sharply. “Rise and shine!”
Agatha’s hand was still in mine, and when I opened one eye to see if she was awake, I was surprised to see Sophia in the bed as well. She was awake and looked pleased to see me.
“Thanks,” she mouthed.
“That’s okay,” I whispered back.
“I am awake, you know.” Agatha’s voice was muffled but spritely. “Sophia, do you know the power went out?”
“I gathered that.” Sophia stretched her long legs outside the covers, pointing her toes to the ceiling. The swelling on her ankle seemed to have gone down. “The generators will kick in this morning. Mrs. Mins will sort it out.”
“A tree came down on the drive,” I said. “I expect that had something to do with it.” Sophia looked at me curiously. “We’re all stuck here together,” I joked. The girls didn’t laugh.
I remembered the notebook left under my pillow and jumped up, but Mrs. Mins was already in Agatha’s doorway, her hands by her sides and empty. Her mouth was tight with disapproval at the sleeping arrangements. It struck me again that my mother had grown up with Mrs. Mins; the strict upbringing she described had come from her hand. It made me resent her even more.
Mrs. Mins.
Not my mother.
Not then. But something was starting to shift. “Elizabeth has been on the phone again,” Mrs. Mins said after I had dragged myself out of bed—fully if slightly damply dressed, one benefit of yet another late-night excursion—and we were headed down to Robbie’s bedroom. Mrs. Mins wasn’t looking her usual pulled-together self either—her hair slightly greasy at the roots, the skin under her eyes dark and shiny. She was starting to look every year of her age.
“Oh?”
“She has arranged for Mr. Mins to take you to the island today.”
“The weather . . .”
“Leonard is able. You’ll be safe with him.” Mrs. Mins wouldn’t look at me.
I took a surreptitious sniff under my arm and hoped there would be plenty of fresh air on the boat.
“How is Robbie?” The door to his room was closed, and when we opened it, cold air rushed out.
“I’m fine.” Robbie was awake and smiled weakly at me. “I thought maybe we could download the footage today from the other morning.”
“Of me in my nightgown? Now that would be terrifying,” Mrs. Mins said, and turned away to open the curtains. It wasn’t like Mrs. Mins to joke and I couldn’t see if she was smiling or not. Robbie raised his eyebrows at me. It was good to see a little bit of animation in his face after the wan torpor of the day before.
“It’s freezing in here,” I said, pulling my cardigan together.
“I turned the radiators off last night. He was burning up.” Mrs. Mins bent down to touch the panel. “I can’t get it back on again.”
“Get back under the covers, Robbie.” I leaned down beside her and tried to turn the knob. She was right—it was stuck firm.
“What did you do to this?” It came out much more accusatory than I had meant.
“Old plumbing, Miranda. There’s nothing you can do.”
I’d had enough of her defeatist attitude. There was something we could do. Every one of the rooms along the upstairs corridor had a lovely corner fireplace, some of them far bigger than the rooms deserved. If we got the fire going in Robbie’s room, it would warm up in no time. “There is.”
I crouched down on the hearth and craned my neck up the chimney. It looked clear. Even though parts of Barnsley were well maintained, I wasn’t sure the care extended to fireplaces and chimneys. In a house like this, the chimneys should be constantly cleared; otherwise, there could be bird’s nests, bats. My father had the chimneys cleared out at the start of every winter, even the ones we didn’t use. Surely Max or Mrs. Mins did the same. There was a pile of firewood by the back door for the fire in the snug; I could get a fire going in no time.
“No, Miranda.” Mrs. Mins gripped at my arm as I went out the door. “It’s not safe.”
For once, I wasn’t going to let her intimidate me. Not she of the closed bedroom doors and stiff upper lip. These children needed to feel loved and secure. That was the most important thing. They needed to know that I was going to look out for them. I was not going to let Robbie freeze. I shrugged off her arm and pushed past her.