"The housekeeper? Are you rich, then?"

"No," I said and then wondered whether that was true. "Come and see my hiding place," I said, pulling at her arm.

I normally ate my supper at the kitchen table, with Mrs. Green bringing me my food. On the rare occasions that Angus was home at dinner time, only then would I make my way to the cold and cavernous dining room to sit on his right hand side and eat with him. Very occasionally, if family friends or relatives came to stay, I would also be summoned to the dinner table to sit quietly and listen to the adults talk. As the clock ticked around to six o'clock, Jessica and I scampered across the lawn and the terrace and piled into the kitchen.

Mrs. Green was heaving a casserole dish from the oven. "Not here, children, not here. Come on, out the way."

We jumped back against the table as she whisked the steaming dish past us.

"Aren't we eating here then?" I asked, confused.

"No, you're dining with your father tonight. Come on, look lively! I bet you haven't even washed your hands."

The dining room table was set with three places. I gestured to Jessica to sit opposite me, on the other side of Angus’s chair. He wasn’t in the room but somehow, the chair seemed already filled with his presence. We sat down, subdued.

“Are we allowed to talk?” whispered Jessica.

I could hear the faint knock of her sandal against the chair leg. I pushed at my knife and fork, straightening them against the dark, polished wood of the table. Reflected in the surface, faintly grey and ghostlike, was my worried face.

Angus came into the room, rubbing his hands before him. “Faring well, girls? Hungry, are you?”

I nodded. Jessica said nothing, but simply stared down at her plate.

It was a quiet meal. Angus tried to talk to us, peppering the echoing silence with questions; about school, about Girl Guides, about animals and plants and space travel and families. I was too young to realise he was trying to put our guest at her ease and too young to realise that his efforts were in vain. I just knew that Jessica was quiet, that she muttered her answers and pushed her food about on the plate. After a while, I began to feel my own throat close up in sympathy, and stopped eating too.

After the chocolate pudding and cream (left almost untouched by both of us), we were released. Once we were out of the dining room, Jessica broke into a run. I was so surprised that for a moment I did nothing; I just stood and watched her bright blonde hair jump and flip in the wake of her movement. She ran into the garden and out of my sight.

“What’s the matter?” I said, when I finally caught up. She had stopped by the fountain, her hands on the stone wall.

She turned a red and tear-stained face to me. “Shut up, Maudie,” she said fiercely. “I want my mummy. I want to go home!”

“Why?”

She burst into tears. “I just do! I want my mummy!”

I can’t remember exactly what happened after that. I think Jessica spoke to her mother on the phone and somehow Mrs. McGaskill soothed her down. She probably told her daughter she’d be over shortly with Jessica’s clothes and she would see her then, and if Jessica still wanted to come home, then of course she could. I’m guessing, obviously, but it’s the sort of thing she would have said; practical, sensible, loving. Everything a mother should be. Everything I’d never had.

Chapter Fourteen

"I can see the sea! Angus - Angus - I can see the sea!"

I bounced in my car seat and pointed at the slice of blue ocean I could just make out in distance. Angus made a ‘shushing’ gesture with his hand.

I sat back, abashed. We'd been driving for hours and I was cramped and stiff and thirsty but somehow, the first glimpse of the sea had taken all my discomfort away. I craned my neck to see if I could see the other car behind us.

"I can't see Jessica."

"They'll catch us up. Stop worrying about it."

I pressed my nose up against the window. All about the road was glorious, rolling countryside, above us a wide blue cloudless sky. I wondered whether Jessica had seen the sea yet too.

The two stone cottages were nestled into the green curves of a gentle valley, side by side and facing the distant sea. The village itself was tiny, a mere strip of a main street with a pub, a tiny corner-shop and a church. Next to our cottages stood one of the four farms in the area and as we drew up, I could smell the heady reek of cow dung and hay.

"Is this ours?" I asked, wide-eyed.

Angus was busy lifting our bags from the boot of the car. I stood for a moment on the driveway, staring at the flat grey front of the house. Its windows glittered in the sun as if it were winking at me.

I heard the crunching of gravel and turned to see the McGaskills’ car draw up behind ours. The wheels had scarcely come to a stop when the back door opened and Jessica tumbled out.

"We're here," she shouted as she picked herself up off the gravel and brushed off her palms.

"So I can see," said Angus.

I pulled at Jessica's arm. I was wild to explore; the house, the garden, the farmyard beyond. I climbed the narrow stairs inside our cottage and into the two bedrooms. The one at the back of the house would be mine, I decided. It had a small wooden bed and a battered old chest of drawers, a small flower-shaped rug on the floor and a brown-shaded bedside light with a pottery base. That was all, except for the yellow curtains at the single window. I struggled with the sash window and managed to shove it upwards, leaning out to look at the cottage that stood beside ours. To my delight, I saw Jessica poke her head out from the nearest window. She was waving and giggling.

"I'm next to you!"

I reached out - we could almost touch our fingers together.

"Can you hear me if I knock on the wall?" I tried but there was nothing - the stone walls were too thick.

Jessica pouted. "Shame - we could have had a secret signal."

I was too happy to really mind. "Meet me downstairs, I want to explore."

We didn't go far that first day. We didn't go to the Men-an-Tol, I'm certain of that. There were too many interesting things closer to home. The cows in the field that came lumbering over to us as we stood by the fence, holding out hopeful handfuls of grass. The ginger farm cat that came twining round our ankles as we stood on the driveway, debating whether to go further. The remains of an old stone shed at the bottom of the garden. By the time we were called in to a late supper, we were drooping, exhausted by the long journey and the excitement of endless discovery.

               After supper, the others went next door to their place. I was sent up to bed and submitted without protest, almost too tired to walk up the stairs. As I lay in my new little bed, my last conscious thought was of Jessica, lying near me, just feet away in the soft summer dark.

*

It was Jessica who first found the stones. As usual, she was the one who explored further and faster than anyone else, walking while I lazed about near the cottage. One morning, I wandered down to the river after breakfast. I was sitting dangling my fingers in the rippling water when she came panting up, eyes bright and hair flying.

"You'll never guess what I've found," she said, throwing herself down.

"What?"

She flicked water at me, giggling. "You've got to guess."

"You're a pain," I said, flicking water back at her.

"You're a pain. Go on, you've got to guess."

I rolled my eyes. "Alright. I guess that you've found... a dead badger."