My mother’s healing potions did nothing for Rosie. She still seemed delirious, calling out names and talking of babies. I knew we had to visit the doctor. As I walked through the streets of Ivory Meadows I saw women ushering their children to the other side of the road, trying to protect them from even setting eyes on me. Some busy-bodies stopped and stared, others looked away, pretending not to have noticed me at all.
One woman, whose name I didn’t know, spat out a venomous barrage of words at me. I was tired, my little girl was desperately ill. I just turned and walked away.
Dr Miller was sympathetic, thankfully. He said Rosie had a nasty virus and prescribed antibiotics, telling me she needed plenty of rest until she was fully recovered. However, Mrs Whitley, the chemist’s wife, was reluctant to serve me to start with until I cast her an evil glare. I knew it would do nothing to help my cause but that didn’t matter right now, all that mattered was my little girl.
I stayed by Rosemary’s side day and night, stroking her head gently as she slept.
‘Fais de beaux rêves, my angel,’ I whispered, hoping her dreams might be better than the nightmare I seemed to keep putting her through.
On the third day, she vastly improved, so we spent all morning in the garden, playing, dancing, and laughing. It felt just like it did when we had first arrived at Cherrystone Cottage. Coming in out of the cold, we settled down to a feast of hot, buttered crumpets and steaming mugs of hot chocolate, topped with cream and marshmallows, just the way Rosie liked it. In the afternoon, we sat in front of the fire, telling each other stories. I helped her with her homework, geed on by the promise of black cherry tart and custard for tea. It was a Mummy and Rosemary day, and it was very long overdue.
I must say it did rather feel like the calm after a storm. I couldn’t believe just how much had gone on in such a short space of time. Rosie seemed much improved thanks to our lovely day together but she still remained far happier playing with Whisper in her room than spending time with her mum. She painted huge, wild, fanciful paintings, usually of fairies. In one they were dancing around the garden, in another they were kneeling in a circle round a wise old wizard, another showed them building fairy homes out of twigs and leaves. There was one that stood apart from all the others. It was all black apart from a series of beautiful stars in silver and gold. They seemed to shimmer off the page. It was a charming picture, simple yet darkly menacing and strangely mesmerising at the same time. When I asked her about it, she said: ‘Don’t you recognise it, Mummy? It’s our garden, the garden of stars.’
The garden of stars. I suppose that’s exactly what it was. A garden of dreams but more than that, it was a place where you absolutely believed they could come true. I adored my daughter, her spirit was breathtaking. I wondered whether my dreams would come true.
Rosie loved school and was itching to get back there. I, too, decided it was time to face the music once and for all. I put on my favourite black dress, my pink shawl, and my pink high heels – the clothes I’d first arrived in. I wanted to feel good and confident and I knew this outfit was the best for the job. I put on plenty of make-up, dropped off Rosie, explaining to her teacher that she needed to take it easy, then carried on into the town.
I decided to pay Gillian a visit first. I knew she would be hard to win over so I thought I’d tackle her before she could pick up on any tittle-tattle from others that the ‘witch on the hill’ had dared show her face in town.
She had her back turned to me as I approached. The bell on her shop door tinkled as I walked in, closing the door and cold air out behind me. She turned and dropped all the red roses she was arranging onto the floor.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, backing away into the corner.
The red flowers and their prickly thorns looked like a river of blood and rage between us.
‘I didn’t mean to make you jump,’ I said, gently. I had expected anger, abuse, fireworks even, but not fear.
‘I don’t know exactly what’s been said about me but I can imagine,’ I said. ‘I plotted to burn down Mr Shaw’s house, put the mayor in hospital and Bill in jail. Oh, and I suppose the fact I didn’t drown recently only goes to prove I’m a witch.’
She cowered as I said the word. It echoed and rattled round the walls of the shop. ‘Something like that,’ she mumbled.
‘I have just one question for you, Gillian,’ I said, being careful not to move or edge closer. Heaven knows she might think I was casting a spell on her. ‘And that is, had I been an evil witch why would I have worked so tirelessly to save Mr Shaw and everyone else’s homes from demolition, to try to prevent Bill’s shop from closing down, and to enable this to be a fantastic place to live?’
Gillian started to come forward. ‘I knew you’d say that but you’re just trying to twist my thoughts, make me think you’re a decent person. Well, it won’t work with me, Vivian Myrtle, and it won’t work with the rest of the town either.’
‘How exactly have I hurt you, Gillian?’
‘By being a selfish, strange woman who thought she’d use a town’s hardship as a means of making friends!’ By now she was shouting and stood right in front of me, refusing to show her fear anymore.
‘Maybe you’re right.’ I sighed, plonking myself down amongst the mass of red petals. ‘I just loved this town the minute I stepped foot in it – the little train that brought us here, the wonderful open hills, the cool, dark forests, the extraordinary wildlife, and the extraordinary people, too. I felt a bond with people here that I hadn’t felt in a long, long time.’
‘So if you felt all that, if we believe it, then why did you betray us so badly?’
‘How did I betray you, Gillian?’
‘By not telling us the truth.’
There it was. The truth, that horribly suffocating noose around my neck.
‘I know I’m a bit of an enigma, and that you don’t understand why I turned up here out of the blue and why I’m not married. I’m separated if you must know … on the run from my abusive husband, if that helps.’
Gillian slowly came over and slumped down next to my side. Gently, she took my hand in hers. ‘I’m sorry, Vivian, I didn’t know.’
‘It’s not your fault, how could you? I didn’t want to burden other people with it; it was my own cross to bear. And throwing myself into the campaign helped to take my mind off it a little. I suppose you could say I used it to make me feel better. But you have to understand that was only because I felt for the first time I was doing something good, not something to make money, or to climb the career ladder or to improve my status but something honest and wholesome and good. I’ve not been able to save the good things in my life; I wanted to save something good here. And that landed me as a witch.’
She paused, staring at me. ‘I was almost tarnished with the same brush myself when Miles left,’ she said, slowly. ‘He was my other half. It was quite a scandal when I fell pregnant with Patricia because we’d not been together long. Thing was we never really wanted to stay together, it was just an accident, a very good accident, but an accident nonetheless. We tried it out for a couple of years, being a couple that is, but it just wasn’t working so we both decided it was for the best that he left.
‘That was seventeen years ago now. I think some of the locals are still only just coming to terms with it.’ She sniggered. ‘Best thing that happened to me, though. I prefer to be a free spirit. You’ll see, you and Rosie will be better off, too.’
I nodded, keeping my eyes on the floor. I didn’t know what to say. I was grateful to her for sharing her story with me but I was still too scared of my past creeping up on me to reveal the extent of mine.
‘Suppose you’d better help me pick up these roses then,’ she said, nudging me as she knelt forward to grab one stem at a time.
I joined her instantly. She wasn’t one to show emotion. This was Gillian’s way of telling me she understood, she didn’t need any more information, and she certainly didn’t want any tears messing up her flower shop floor.
As I stepped out of her shop, the air felt crisp and fresh. I felt more confident in taking on the rest of the town. Gillian had shown me it was reassurance they wanted not arguments. I hadn’t, however, counted on using the sympathy vote and I didn’t intend to use it again.
Bill seemed pleased to see me when I wandered into his shop. He looked tired from all the extra hours he was having to put in at the community centre.
‘I’m sorry, Bill,’ I said, ‘I never meant to get you into so much trouble, I don’t even know if I should be here now but I had to see you.’
‘Don’t be daft, Viv, glad you came. You weren’t there that night, someone had to pantomime stand up for you. Looks like it pantomime-well had to be me.’
I smiled. ‘I’m grateful to you. Bill, do you still feel like that now after everything that’s been said since?’
‘Listen, love, I was the one what pulled you out of those waters, you looked pretty drowned to me.’
‘So you do think I’m a witch?’
He fidgeted uncomfortably. ‘Well, what about all those messages in code, those special teas and those herbs in your garden? I’m not a particularly religious man, Vivian, don’t really bother me either way, just want to know, that’s all.’
I coughed to smother a laugh. He was a loveable oaf at times.
‘The codes were common sense under the circumstances,’ I explained. ‘Barbara told you that at the time. The tea and cakes are just my form of hospitality. And the herbs are just old wives’ tales my mother used to tell me. Don’t you carry on things your folks passed onto you, no matter how silly they seem?’
He paused, then nodded. ‘Don’t suppose you’ve got any of that cherry cake going spare have you, Viv?’ he laughed, cheekily.
‘Of course, why don’t you pop round later?’
I was doing well. And yet, the Donaldsons and Maureen Sprockett, the librarian, weren’t so easily won over. They ranted myths and legends at me like I was some kind of leper. They had clearly spent too much time with their heads buried in fanciful stories of the past, and to think that careful study had been my suggestion too. I’d never heard anything so ridiculous but that was the power of the gossip machine. It was taken as gospel, especially considering who turned the wheel.
As they stomped off into the distance, I cried, ‘How could I be a witch when I gave you all a pot of rosemary as a symbol of our friendship? Don’t you know that rosemary planted by the doorstep keeps witches away?’
Barbara told it straight. ‘Basically,’ she said, ‘the people here like you. Try as they might, they can’t see it in their hearts to wish someone misfortune who they’ve spent so many happy hours with. It’s probably a good thing you’ve come down now. They just needed to see for themselves you hadn’t grown a long green nose and warts.’ She chuckled.
‘But Barbara, I have a question for you. Why did you do as the vicar asked by telling me to hide away?’
‘Love, you’ve misunderstood that man from the start. He does have everyone’s best interests at heart really, yours included. He’s just got himself into a bit of stupid pickle with the mayor. Whatever he said to you down at the river, I’m sure it was meant with the best intentions; probably, knowing him, to save you from a great fall in pride. Unfortunately you went and had another fall instead.
‘Believe it or not, he actually wanted your campaign to win. That’s why he volunteered to come to the classes instead of the mayor, he just reported mumbo-jumbo back and Mr Johnson was none the wiser. That’s also probably why he volunteered the information to you about him being blackmailed in the first place. But now, everyone knows it’s just too late. Everything stopped the moment Bill got into trouble. There’s been chaos ever since, which is why we’ve done nothing with the posters either. I’m afraid we can’t do anything now, love, we may as well give in gracefully and still have somewhere to live rather than making ourselves homeless in the process.’
Walking back up the hill, I felt numb. It turned out that when the planners and architects had visited with their clipboards, the townspeople had just buried their heads in the sand and tried to pretend it wasn’t happening. The mayor’s brother had come in with the offer of having brand new houses for them all; no wonder they were prepared to shut up and put up. How convenient that I’d been out of sight and out of mind. I was just told I didn’t have as much at stake as everyone else as Cherrystone Cottage was rented, not bought. The thought of my beautiful cottage with her buttermilk walls, English country garden, dark corners, and sooty hearths being bulldozed without me having any say in the matter was just too much. It broke my heart in two. I thought of all the fun Rosie and I had enjoyed there. It was too much a part of our lives to break away from it; it was like there were three of us in our relationship: me, Rosie, and the house.
Then there were the woods and hills around us. All those wonderful walks: dawn, noon, and dusk. The birds, the centuries-old trees, the fish, the deer, the pheasants, the otters. They would all be obliterated. The latest plans I’d read were for a further 3,000 homes to be built on two hundred hectares of forest and fields.
That night I dreamt of a phoenix rising up from the ashes. I awoke in the middle of the night with a start. That was it! The secret lay in Mr Shaw’s house. Perhaps the scorched remains of his home could hold the key to unlocking the secret of Ivory Meadows.
I jumped out of bed and, checking Rosie was still fast asleep, threw my raincoat on over my night dress, pulled on my boots and hat, and ran out into the darkness. It was drizzling as I grabbed the spade from out of the shed and began to walk down the hill. I knew I’d only just redeemed my sanity in the eyes of the community and that this would look highly suspicious but I was driven to do it.
As I approached the town the rain became much heavier, it felt like it was pounding on my back. I’d come too far now to turn back. I reached Mr Shaw’s house and, glancing around me to check no one was watching, I ducked under the police cordon signs and tiptoed into what was left of the scorched property. The roof was half missing, which was in some ways a blessing as it meant that although I got wet, I could see what I was doing by the light of the moon. It was a creepy, harrowing, lonely place. An overturned, singed chair sat next to a blown-out television. The remains of what looked like a photograph album were scattered on the floor, the pictures presumably the ashes I was wading through. A door was lying flat on the ground, hooks on the back of it still holding Jake’s leads. It sent a chill down my spine. I wished I’d put on some warmer clothing.
I scanned the room, searching for something, anything of any value to my desperate, abandoned campaign.
The floorboards were up, exposing raw muddy ground underneath what had once been a comfortable living room.
I started to dig, carefully at first, not wanting to disturb the solemn gloom of the place too much, then frantically. I felt something must lie under those floorboards, under this hallowed ground. I was there for around an hour but I found nothing. I collapsed, exhausted, next to the big hole I’d created. Perhaps I was going mad after all. Dispirited, I began to return all the earth to its rightful place. Once everything looked as dismal as it had when I arrived, I made my way out of the house and up the path until something nearly tripped me over. I looked down to see a bone. It must have been one of Jake’s he’d buried in the garden. That was the secret. I’d been searching and it was right in front of me all the time. Clutching it in my pocket I ran back up the hill, making it through the front door just as the birds were starting to salute sun up.
All day in the shop, I tried to keep myself occupied so I didn’t give anything away to Barbara. I remained unsure as to whether she was a sneak but, either way, I knew what I was about to do was going to cause trouble and I didn’t want anyone else responsible for it. Even Rosie had commented on how happy and smiley I’d been that morning but I hadn’t let on about my secret.
That night, after I’d tucked Rosie into bed, reading her favourite Melissa the Amazing Pink Princess story to her first and later checking she was fast asleep, I once again threw my coat, scarf, and gloves on and ventured into my own back garden. The skeleton I’d tried to bury and forget was going to be resurrected. Luckily I knew exactly where she was hidden; it was hard not to. It took me a good hour to remove the tiny bones from the shallow grave. I tried not to think too much about what I was doing. I knew it was wrong to tamper with bones that had been laid to rest, but I felt they had been calling out to us from the start. This baby’s life was not over yet, she could not rest until her existence, however short, had been worthwhile. I liked to think I was helping her to heaven, to a place where she could finally rest peacefully. I carefully placed the miniature skeleton into a huge bag and, heaving it over my shoulder, I walked like Robin Hood, into the town in the darkness once more, back to Mr Shaw’s house. It was clear nobody had visited since the night before and my freshly dug earth was easy enough to lift once more. I buried the bones as deeply as I could then packed down the earth to make it look untouched.
Wearily, I climbed the hill and eventually the stairs back up to my bed. I was exhausted.
Early the next morning, before work, I sent two anonymous letters. One was to a historian’s guild saying old documents had been found, which showed evidence of a plague that had hit the area hundreds of years before. Maureen had shown me research on this, but we had ruled it out as irrelevant to our campaign, apart from perhaps a display in the library, but now I saw its significance. Nothing would be wasted in our endeavour to save our town; there were too few of us for that. The second letter was to the local newspaper office, claiming that I had spotted a man acting suspiciously around Mr Shaw’s house who, when questioned, said he was a keen archaeologist who believed the house had been built over a series of unmarked graves possibly relevant to his ancestors. Could one of their reporters, I asked the editor, make some enquiries at the local historian’s guild to find out whether there was any truth in these claims? With each letter, I drew a map to show the spot. I even stained the map to the historian’s guild with coffee and singed it round the edges for added authenticity. Now all I had to do was wait.
Sure enough, a local reporter arrived in no time, along with a member of the local historian’s guild. They began asking lots of questions. I knew I was taking a risk with what I was doing but I could see no other option. I kept my head down and didn’t get involved. There was no way I wanted my face in the newspaper. I think Maureen quite liked being the centre of attention, proudly showing them the display boards she’d been working on for the library. At work, Barbara said Maureen had told her the man from the historian’s guild was seeking permission from Mr Shaw and the police to begin digging. I was suddenly struck with guilt that I would be unintentionally causing extra upset to the poor old man. When I asked Barbara how he was coping, she said he was just as intrigued as the rest of us and had happily given them the green light to go ahead. Good old Mr Shaw. I could have rushed round and hugged him, would it not have blown my cover. I quickly changed the subject with Barbara, quietly smiling to myself as I went to make us both a cup of tea.
It seemed to take forever for the police to give their blessing to the dig, although really it was only a matter of days. But when the historian’s guild discovered the tiny skeleton, it was as if the circus had come to town.
Suddenly the focus had changed. The national press was tantalised by a sniff of intrigue and it hit the headlines. Ivory Meadows was back in the papers again, and although the reporters made reference to the previous incidents to remind their readers where this tiny town was based, those events were old news now and seemed insignificant. The Times did an entire feature on the value of retaining history in small towns, with Ivory Meadows as the main town, with pictures of the church, the bridge, Bill, Barbara, and the vicar.
It was a glorious article and everyone was delighted.
And, within no time, we received a piece of news that was better than we could have dreamed of: a top historian had taken great interest in the article in The Times, done his own investigations, and found further historical interest, which was, of course, a great relief to me. He held a meeting with the town council and there it was declared that parts of Ivory Meadows were of national historical interest and therefore nothing could be touched there until further research was carried out and the appropriate listings made. We rejoiced that no building work could commence. I knew at some point I would have to come clean about the skeleton in my garden but that was something I would worry about at a later stage. All that mattered now was that we’d temporarily halted the ticking time bomb over our town.
We decided to celebrate and for once Rosie and I actually joined everyone in The Mason Arms for a drink. It was nice to be welcomed again. Bill made a slightly drunken speech about how pleased he was, both for the town and that he had been let off the hook with just community service. He went onto say he’d do it all again until Ian, the landlord, abruptly quietened him down.
Once everyone was chatting away in their little groups again, I made my way over to Barbara, Dennis, and Bill, who were sitting at a small, round table together.
‘Come on over, love,’ said Barbara, eagerly.
I grabbed my opportunity, took a deep breath and whispered that, in light of what had happened, perhaps we ought to use the lovely posters we had created to revive the campaign again. There was just over a week to go until the start of advent.
Bill whistled between his lips; Dennis scowled. I thought I’d gone too far again. Then Barbara tutted at the two men next to her.
‘Don’t pay them any attention, Vivian, love.’ She smiled. ‘We were just saying the exact same thing but we were concerned you might not want to have anything to do with it, what with everything that’s gone on. And the way everyone has acted, too,’ she sighed, glumly.
‘Not at all.’ I laughed. ‘Leave it with me.’