Dear Ruby,

I’m so sorry to leave you and your sisters waiting- you must think that I’m the rudest man alive. Something came up at work, and there was no getting around it. Please find the front door key sellotaped to the back of the envelope. I’ve paid for your taxi to the house (complete with tip, so you don’t have to worry about that), and I hope to see you later this evening.

I know the circumstances aren’t the best, but, still, I’m very excited to have the three of you up at the house for the summer. There are a lot of people I’d like you to meet.

Yours sincerely,

Colwyn Ballantine

 

In the back of the taxi, Rube felt Jeanette nudge her arm. “I’m pretty sure that at this point, the Always logo is permanently stamped on my arse,” she whispered.

Rube made a face, and shushed her. She had a point, though- between the train and the café, they’d been sitting down most of the day even before the taxi had got stuck in traffic. It wasn’t comfortable for anyone, and Jeanette probably had it worst.

“Apologies for the delay, ladies,” said the taxi driver (who, thankfully, didn’t seem to have heard what Jeanette had said), “I think there must have been an accident up ahead.”

“That’s OK,” said Rube. Jeanette and Sally’s faces said different, but she ignored them.

“We shouldn’t be much longer. We just need to take the next left, and then it’s a straight line to Dovecote Gardens.”

Dovecote Gardens was the official name of Uncle Colwyn’s house, but apparently the gardens themselves were the really interesting part. There were statues, topiaries, plants from all over the world, all spread out over the hill and the surrounding fields. That was what Uncle Colwyn spent his life maintaining, and that was why Rube was a bit more sympathetic about his being held up than Jeanette was. ‘Working from home’ probably meant something a lot different when ‘home’ stretched out for half a mile.

Technically, Colwyn was Mum’s cousin rather than her brother, but she’d spent most of her childhood living with her aunt and uncle, so it more-or-less amounted to the same thing. They’d all moved to Dovecote Gardens when Mum was a teenager. Colwyn’s mother had inherited it from her father. Or, wait, maybe it was the other way round? Rube didn’t remember. Somebody had inherited it from somebody, that was the point. It had been in their family for over a hundred years.

Sally was leaning against the car window, her ear pressed against the glass as if she was trying to hear the sea. “I’ve worked it out,” she said gloomily, “Five weeks is thirty-five days. We’re going to have to wake up in Dovecote Gardens thirty-five times before we can go home.”

“Thirty-four,” said Jeanette, “Today’s Saturday. We’re going back on the Friday.”

“OK,” said Sally, “What’s twenty-four times thirty-four?”

“Er… Well, twenty times thirty is six hundred…”

Rube wanted to tell Sally to stop thinking about their holiday as if it was a prison sentence, but frankly, she didn’t think it was either. It felt more like they were being sent into hiding. She didn’t know exactly what Colwyn meant by, “I know the circumstances aren’t the best,” but she could make an educated guess that it had something to do with Dad.

Not long after the taxi driver turned left, they saw the hill in the distance. “That’s the house, right there,” said the driver, nodding towards the little blur of black and cream at the top, “You’ll have a good view of the sea.”

They drove up to a ten-foot hedge with an arch carved into it to allow the road to go through. Once they’d passed it, Rube glanced behind, half-convinced that the arch would have closed up behind them. It was a lot neater than the thorn bushes in ‘Sleeping Beauty,’ but Rube didn’t know if that meant they could trust it. A lot of things were neat.

At first, all they passed were tall, conical trees that made Rube think of the spade symbol you got on cards, spaced out along the side of the road at two-yard intervals. As they went on, though, there was more.

(To Be Continued)