Greenwild, page 19
* * *
Someone was banging on the door. Daisy decided to ignore it. She was, she noticed, dimly, in her own bed; she remembered stumbling upstairs before dawn. She turned over and her memories of the night before loosed a rush of feeling like two rivers meeting and churning together in her chest. First came the flood of pure joy: Ma’s name on the list. Imprisoned, but alive. Then came the surge of shame: the expression on Artemis’s face when they’d got back. The risks she’d taken with her friends’ lives. Bob, who’d died because she hadn’t taken the right precautions.
The banging started up again.
“Daisy! Daisy! Come on, wake up!” It was Indigo.
“Go away.”
“Oh good, you’re awake.” There was a pause. “Listen,” said Indigo. “I know you’re upset. But Sheldrake is at Chiveley Chase, arguing against the search mission. We need to tell everyone what we found in Craven’s office.”
Daisy sat up slowly, her muscles protesting.
“Otherwise,” said Indigo, “all of it—what happened to Bob”—his voice cracked—“it will have been for nothing. They need to know the truth.”
* * *
Five minutes later, they had commandeered a lilypaddle and were sailing at full speed across the lake toward the Chase, the scroll clutched in Indigo’s right hand.
Up the avenue, past the roaring topiary lions, up the stone stairs they pounded. The bell was tolling ten a.m. as they came to a stop at the mighty oak doors of the Chase. The hall was full of Botanists, and there was a furious argument in progress, with some shouting for the search mission to go ahead, while others—led by Sheldrake—argued loudly against it.
Daisy breathed in like a diver about to go underwater, and pushed inside.
First one head turned, then another, and Daisy froze, pinned like a butterfly on the skewer of a hundred pairs of eyes. Then she felt Napoleon at her heels, and Indigo at her back, and she stepped forward.
“What’s this about?” said Artemis, who was standing on the stairs, looking tired. “Now isn’t the time, Daisy.”
“No,” said Daisy, moving into the center of the marble hall. “I have to say this. We went into the Grayside last night, to the offices of Mr. Craven—Cardew.” A murmur sprang up around the hall. “We shouldn’t have done it, and I’m sorry about that. But I’m not sorry about what we found there.” She took the scroll of paper and handed it to Artemis. “I think everyone should see this. It sets out the names of all the missing Botanists—and tells us where they’re being held.”
The murmur rose to a roar, and Artemis opened the scrolled papers and smoothed them out on the banister in front of her. Her face was very white. Sheldrake, Wildish and Gallitrop craned over her shoulder to look, and Marigold Brightly gasped as she read.
At last, Artemis looked around at the hall, and the crowd hushed. She cleared her throat painfully.
“The children are right. Everyone needs to see this.”
The papers were handed around from hand to hand, and Daisy heard mutters and oaths echoing against the domed ceiling.
By the time the map and the list of names had worked their way back to the front, everyone was solemn and serious. Daisy saw the Prof, wide-eyed, at the back of the hall and quickly glanced away. She didn’t know which was worse: her guilt at not listening to the Prof’s warnings, or her anger that the Prof had told on them.
Artemis mounted the stairs and spoke, looking around at the crowd.
“Friends, Mallowmarshers. The Greenwild has never been in so much danger. We know now that Cardew, a man we thought was dead, is involved in these disappearances—and at last we have a place to begin our search.” She paused and looked around, meeting the eye of each and every Botanist. “I say we call a vote: right here and now. The people of Mallowmarsh will launch this search mission. So let the people of Mallowmarsh decide.” Her long silver hair shone in the light from the dome above, and even the portraits on the walls seemed to lean forward to listen. “All those in favor, vote in red. All those against, vote in white.”
“What does that mean?” whispered Daisy out of the corner of her mouth.
“Wait. You’ll see.” Indigo was tapping his feet with anticipation. There was a hush, and then a rustling began and an amazing scent gusted through the hall as a hundred red roses burst from the polished marble floor and rose toward the ceiling, far outnumbering the dozen or so white roses growing among them.
“Yes!” Indigo punched the air.
“Red takes the day,” said Artemis over the roar of noise in the hall. “The vote is cast.”
It was done. They were going to find Ma.
Chapter 40
Daisy woke the next day with a flood of excitement rising in her like bubbles.
“Everything is going to be all right,” she told Napoleon. And she hummed as she dressed, putting Ma’s red ribbon in her hair—for, she suddenly remembered, it was Acorn’s birthday, and there was to be a party.
Their visit to the Grayside had earned each of them a demerit the Prof had been right about that—but it had swung the decision about the rescue mission. Artemis had taken her aside after the vote, her blue eyes grave. “I’m sorry I spoke to you like that,” she said quietly. “What you did was wrong, and VERY dangerous—but it must also have taken a lot of courage. I should have listened to what you were trying to tell me.”
* * *
Now, Daisy hurried outside toward where the lunch party was gathering on the shores of the lake beneath the Heart Oak, which was hung with fresh ribbons and charms. The air was cool and bright and filled with the laughs of apprentices playing tag and leapfrog, and the shrieks of Littlies—the youngest Mallowmarshers—being herded toward the Chase for their naps.
Daisy was hurrying past the potting shed when she heard a noise. At first, she thought it was an animal in pain. Then she peered around the side of the shed and saw the Prof sitting hunched with her back against the wall. She was trembling, pointy elbows pulled in as she clutched her chest. Her breaths were sharp and shallow as the stabs of a penknife, so that the air hardly went in at all.
“What’s wrong?” Daisy rushed over to her, anger forgotten. The Prof glanced up, tears streaming down her face.
“Acorn,” the Prof gasped, chest heaving.
“What happened?” Daisy panicked. “Where is she?”
“She’s—fine. I—keep thinking—how she was—almost caught. Indigo—told me. My—fault.”
“Right,” said Daisy as firmly as she could. She crouched down and took her hand. “You’re going to be fine. Try to breathe. Slowly, in. Slowly, out. Close your eyes.” Napoleon placed a paw on the Prof’s other hand where it lay clawed on the floor. “Can you feel that? He must like you.”
The Prof nodded tightly. It took more than twenty breaths, but slowly her breathing began to calm, and she opened her eyes. When she spoke, her voice was shaky. “She’s like my little sister. I should have been there. I should have protected her. You were right, Daisy. I should have come with you. I shouldn’t have worried so much about the stupid rules.”
“No.” Daisy shook her head so hard that her braid hit her cheek. “You were right, Prof. It was so dangerous. Craven—he killed one of the parakeets. He could have killed us too.”
The Prof closed her eyes. “You did the right thing, finding that map. I saw Grandfather’s name on the list. I’m sorry I doubted you. I’m sorry I didn’t help.” She took a deep breath. “And I’m sorry I told the commander what you’d done. It’s only—you were gone for so long and I was so worried. You’re my friends. If anything happened to you—oh, Daisy, I couldn’t bear it!”
“I know,” said Daisy quietly. “I feel the same.” Somehow, the mission to find Ma had grown bigger than herself. It was about every single missing Botanist. It was about protecting the first place in her whole life that had felt like home.
“Next time you get some harebrained idea in your head,” said the Prof, “I’m coming with you, demerit or not. And Acorn is staying safe at home.”
Daisy nodded. She squeezed the Prof’s hand, and the Prof squeezed back.
“There’s something else I keep thinking about,” Daisy said at last. “The map in Craven’s office said ‘G.R. Secure Facility.’ I know it’s impossible, but I wondered if it was G.R. like … Grim Reaper?”
“I wondered the same thing,” said the Prof, frowning. “I saw the map. Maybe the Grim Reapers do exist. Not the ogres from children’s storybooks, I mean, but real-life people—people who want to hurt the Greenside.” She shivered.
“If they do exist,” said Daisy, “we’re going to find them, and we’re going to stop them.”
There was a short, prickling sort of silence, and she decided to change the subject. “Do you not mind being called the Professor?” she asked, voicing a question she’d been too shy to ask before.
The Prof laughed. “You really want to know?”
Daisy nodded and the Prof looked down at their joined hands.
“When we were small, the other kids used to bully me because I was such a know-it-all. Plus I was an orphan and I’d been brought up by Grandfather. He’s a great Botanist, but he’s a bit … eccentric. He likes gardening at dawn without too many clothes on and singing swing music on the roof at the top of his lungs. Anyway, it didn’t exactly help me fit in. And if you think Ivy’s bad now, you should have seen her then. I felt like I was going to die of loneliness. Then, when I was six, Indigo arrived and decided to be my friend. It changed everything.” Her smile seemed to light up her whole face. “A few years later, Acorn started tagging along. She needs us, and it’s a good feeling, being needed. Neither of them cares that I’m a know-it-all. So ‘the Professor’ went from being an insult to a sort of honorary title. I’ve earned it.”
Daisy nodded. She understood, suddenly, that the Five O’Clock Club was a family, and that she was astonishingly lucky to be part of it. For the first time in her life, she had friends. Real friends. The feeling was like an espresso shot of pure joy, so powerful it made her blink.
“So,” she said, emboldened, “what’s your real name?”
The Prof groaned. “That’s the other reason I was bullied. It’s Eggbertina.”
“Eggbertina?”
“Yep. It’s a family name. If you ever use it, I’ll have to kill you.”
Daisy laughed, and then, after a pause, so did the Prof, until their faces streamed with tears and their sides ached. They were still sitting there, hiccupping, when Indigo found them.
“What are you two doing? We’re late for Acorn’s party!”
* * *
The birthday party, it soon became clear, had morphed into an unofficial celebration of the vote’s outcome, and Mr. McGuffin and Mrs. Marchpane (the pastry chef) had entered fully into the spirit of the occasion. There were great trestle tables laid out near the Heart Oak, groaning with platters of thyme-crusted bread and sweet pea soup and cheese tarts pulled from the ovens with long paddles. There was winter-strawberry fizz and dandelion cordial, and cloudberry pies with honey and twirls of cream. And at the end of the feast, Mrs. Marchpane and two assistants came staggering from the kitchens with an enormous six-tiered chocolate cake set with candied plums, and nine sparkling candles for Acorn to blow out.
Acorn’s mother, a plump woman called Ida Sparkler with hair as red as her daughter’s, had brought out great terracotta pots filled with sunflowers, which beamed down pure sunshine and warmth and kept them snug in the wintry chill—a bit like heat-lamps at outdoor restaurants in the Grayside, thought Daisy, as she nibbled on a candied plum. Madame Gallitrop, meanwhile, had hung the trees with rainsap from the Intemperate House, so that the whole lakeshore was criss-crossed with rainbows like a miraculous light display.
With the vote decided, Daisy’s mind shone with a single thought. They were going to search for the missing Botanists.
They were going to rescue Ma.
“How soon?” she had asked Artemis as they’d gathered for the party.
“Within the week,” said Artemis. “Maybe sooner.”
Now, it was hard not to be swept up in the warmth of the celebrations as Acorn ended up with cake in her eyebrows, and Littlies ran around in sugar-induced delirium, and the older Botanists exchanged competitive stories of their past adventures. Everyone was there, even Ivy Helix, who sat at one end of the table glaring at everyone like a furious ice sculpture.
“Why is she here?” asked the Prof.
Acorn shrugged. “Dad said I should invite her. It’s not nice to leave anyone out.” She smiled. “He sent me a birthday letter from Brazil—look!” The card was a hand-drawn self-portrait of a Botanist with a bushy beard and a big smile, waving madly from a canoe. A speech bubble read: “Happy birthday, Acorn and Albert!”
“He gave me Albert for my birthday last year,” Acorn explained, pink with pleasure.
Daisy spotted Marigold Brightly at the far end of the table, her golden hair curling around her face. She was laughing prettily at something Wildish was saying, but she looked, thought Daisy, rather exhausted, with purplish circles beneath her eyes. Daisy wasn’t surprised when she hurried off early, claiming a headache.
But just as the plum wine came out and the rest of the company was beginning to break into off-key renditions of well-worn drinking songs (“Greensleeves” was a favorite, as was “Ninety-nine Bottles of Snisky” and “Barnacle Bill the Botanist”) something happened that sent all thoughts of merriment straight from their heads. There was a squawk from above and a travel-worn parakeet toppled onto the table, collapsing into the remains of a rhubarb crumble.
Wildish leaned forward hesitantly and used his wooden hand to extract a scrap of paper tied to the parakeet’s leg.
He opened it slowly, and Daisy watched as the color drained from his face.
“What?” she asked. Dread coated her throat like tar.
“It’s Bill Sparkler,” he said at last. “He’s disappeared from his research station in the Amazon. Gone, without a trace.”
After that, everything was chaos. Acorn gave a single heartbreaking squeak and staggered up from the table. Ida Sparkler ran over to her daughter, tears streaming down her pale, freckled cheeks. The Littlies, not understanding what was happening, began to cry too, until the air was full of wailing. Ivy Helix looked stricken, face pale and sharp with distress. At last, Artemis took Acorn and her mother to the infirmary to be treated for shock, and the rest of the party broke up, confused and muttering. There was fear in the air, as bitter and metallic as a bad penny. Daisy glanced up at the Heart Oak and saw that, despite its gallant ribbons and polished coins, the bough she had noticed before was almost rotted through.
* * *
The Five O’Clock Club gathered with unusual solemnity that evening. Acorn came in late, clutching Albert’s matchbox, and the others made room for her silently. The Prof hugged her, hard. Indigo offered her a handful of chocolate drops, and Daisy reached over and squeezed her hand.
“This isn’t good,” said the Professor, adjusting her glasses. She looked at Acorn apologetically. “It means there’s a spy at Mallowmarsh.”
“How do you know?” asked Indigo.
“Remember what the commander said at the council meeting we overheard? She’s been giving the Bureau false information about the location of the Botanists because she was afraid there was a leak.”
“And now it looks like there’s a leak here at Mallowmarsh too,” finished Daisy miserably.
This was confirmed when Artemis came sweeping into the Roost that evening, brushing rain from her eyebrows.
“It’s a spanner in the works all right,” she said grimly. “It means our explorers are in danger—and it puts the whole search mission at risk. If the details are being fed straight to Craven, we’ll be attacked before we’re out of England.”
Suddenly, everything was in doubt. Artemis swept out again as soon as she’d wolfed down a sandwich, back to emergency meetings at the Chase.
Daisy and Indigo exchanged a wide-eyed look.
“You heard her,” said Daisy. “No rescue mission unless this spy is found.”
“Well, then.” Indigo raised his eyebrows. “We’re going to have to do some looking.”
* * *
Daisy spent the next few days obsessed with thoughts of Sheldrake. All signs seemed to point to him being the spy. The sneaking around at night. The secret meeting in the woods. The way he’d been so close by after the theft of the ghost-moth orchid. Not to mention the fact that he disliked the commander so much.
“It’s him. I know it,” she said stubbornly at the next meeting of the Five O’Clock Club.
Indigo wrinkled his dark eyebrows. “He is on the council, so he’d have access to details about Mallowmarshers in the Grayside. Their locations, everything.”
The Prof nodded reluctantly. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but … perhaps we should try to follow him, find out what he’s up to.”
Acorn only looked miserably into her lap. Even the sight of Albert tucking into a particularly juicy cabbage leaf couldn’t cheer her.
“Right,” said Daisy, straightening her spine. “It’s settled. From now on, we stick to Sheldrake like glue.” She paused. “Very subtle, practically invisible glue.”
They spent most of the next two days tailing Sheldrake from one end of the grounds to the other, leaping behind hedges each time he turned around. Daisy was convinced that it was only a matter of time before they caught him doing something incriminating, but he spent much of his time in the Perilous Glasshouse—and they weren’t about to try sneaking in there again.
“Who knows what he’s doing in there,” Daisy said darkly. “He could be running a whole criminal empire and no one would know about it.”
