“Thank you. And thank you very much for the picnic.” She turned toward home. The sun lit up the windows on the west wing of Wellingford Hall as if setting them ablaze. Audrey took a dozen steps, then turned back. “Wait! You never told me your name.” But the girl had vanished into the woods.
Eve followed the narrow path through the woods, her excitement building. Wait until Granny Maud heard about her picnic with the girl from Wellingford Hall! The ninny had been running away from home. Imagine! Who would ever run away from a fairy-tale place like Wellingford Hall with dozens of servants to grant her every wish?
Granny would be waiting with a pot of tea brewing beneath the tea cozy and a bite of pastry, warm from the oven. She would fold Eve into her soft arms as if it had been ages since she’d last seen her instead of just this morning. She would tut-tut over Eve’s rumpled dress as she picked bits of leaves from her hair with her knotted fingers and then ask about her day. Granny wouldn’t care that she’d skipped school, but she would be very surprised to hear that she’d met the rich girl from Wellingford Hall. Granny read the Bible aloud to Eve every night before bed, and it seemed like Jesus had a lot of grim things to say about rich people who didn’t share what they had with the poor.
A blue jay scolded Eve from the treetops as she emerged from the woods to cut through the cemetery. Granny was teaching Eve the names of all the birds and the songs they sang. Granny talked to the little wrens who nested in the back garden as if they were her children.
Eve ran the last few yards to their cottage and burst through the door calling, “Granny Maud! I made a new friend today, and you’ll never guess who it was. Never in a million years!” Her granny was asleep in her chair by the range, her knitting limp in her lap. She didn’t stir, even when the wind slammed the door shut behind Eve. Granny’s hearing, like her eyesight, was becoming worse and worse. Eve crossed to the range to put the kettle on for their tea, but the fire was barely warm.
“Granny!” she said, speaking loudly enough to wake her. “You let the fire go out.” She still didn’t move. Eve knelt beside her chair and shook her shoulder, gently at first, then harder and harder, shouting her name. “Granny Maud! Wake up!” Her knitting needles and half-finished sock fell from her fingers. Something was very wrong.
Eve scrambled to her feet and raced to their neighbors’ cottage, her legs like clumsy logs. She didn’t knock. “Mrs. Ramsay! Come quick! Something’s wrong with Granny. She won’t wake up.”
Mrs. Ramsay wiped her hands on her apron as she hurried after Eve. “Wait out here, child,” she said when they reached the cottage door. Eve shook her head and followed her inside. Mrs. Ramsay crouched beside the chair and covered Granny Maud’s wrinkled hands with her own. Tears filled her eyes as she gently stroked Granny’s face. “She’s gone, Eve. I’m so sorry.”
“No! She . . . she can’t be! She wasn’t even sick!” Eve’s heart tried to squeeze out of her throat, choking her.
“She passed on peacefully, dear.”
“But she was fine when I left this morning!” Eve’s thoughts whirled like windblown leaves. She longed to start the day over again and do everything differently so it would have a different ending. This was her fault. “I—I should have come home sooner! I shouldn’t have left her all alone!”
“I don’t think it would have mattered. It was her time, Eve.” Mrs. Ramsay reached to take her hand but Eve pulled away. She dropped to her knees in front of the chair, resting her head on Granny’s lap as she loved to do. It no longer felt soft and warm. Eve buried her face in Granny’s skirt and sobbed.
Mrs. Ramsay stroked Eve’s hair. “I’ll send Charlie up to Wellingford to fetch your mum. Come to my house and I’ll fix some tea.”
Eve shook her head. “I need to stay here with Granny Maud. The fire went out. I need to take care of it.”
Mrs. Ramsay opened her mouth as if she might argue, then closed it again. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Everything seemed unreal. Mum arrived home and it wasn’t even a Sunday afternoon. She cried with Eve and rocked her in her arms. For as long as Eve could remember, Granny Maud had taken care of her while Mum worked up at Wellingford Hall. Granny kept house, cooked Eve’s meals, darned her socks, mended her clothes, took Eve to church, and made sure the cottage was warm all winter long. Granny told Eve how much she loved her every day of her life. How could Eve live without her?