The Child’s Secret

‘Let’s do it,’ someone said and they all began scribbling on their clipboards. A few children compared notes and a couple of boys broke out into an argument, but after a few minutes they all held their wishes in their hands.

‘We can’t reach the hole,’ one of the boys said and they all looked at the railings that formed an impassable barrier.

‘I can,’ Matthew announced and before anyone could stop him, he had scrunched his note up into a ball and threw it with perfect aim into the hollow. A dozen or more paper balls rained down in quick succession, some hitting their mark while others littered the ground among the haze of bluebells surrounding the base of the tree.

Sam sighed as he looked over towards Miss Jenkins. ‘That’s why I’m not supposed to tell anyone,’ he explained.

The teacher held his gaze a little longer than was absolutely necessary. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to get you in trouble.’

Sam smiled and shrugged off the comment. ‘It’s all right, the boss will be happy that I’ve added litter picking to my long list of duties, because I do everything else.’

‘Shush,’ one of the girls said in a loud whisper. ‘We haven’t listened for our answers yet.’

Matthew and a few of the boys grumbled amongst themselves but eventually they all raised their heads to listen to the tree. It was only then Sam noticed that the girl with blonde hair had slunk back into the shadows of her own making. She was the only child who didn’t lift her head.

‘Didn’t you want to make a wish, Jasmine?’ Miss Jenkins asked when she noticed too.

Jasmine shook her head. ‘My dad says I’m too old to believe in wishes now.’

The little girl wouldn’t be persuaded and so Sam wrapped things up by thanking the children for being so well behaved and encouraging them to come back to the park. He challenged them to give their families the same tour and to see how much they could remember. It was fast approaching lunchtime and the next stop for the children was a picnic, so they all began trooping off in the direction of the walled gardens. Miss Jenkins kept one eye on her class and the other on Sam.

‘I’d better go,’ she said without moving. ‘But if you’re still around later, I wouldn’t mind a quick catch up. I’d love to see the sketches you said you’ve been working on, if that’s all right?’

‘Yeah, sure,’ he said, although he wasn’t in the least bit sure.

‘Good. Once I’ve loaded the kids back on the coach, I’ll come and hunt you down.’

The teacher’s words left him feeling slightly uneasy. He had left Edinburgh almost four years ago to make a fresh start, to begin a life that was a drastic deviation from the one he had once mapped out. He still hadn’t worked out what his new life should comprise of and his only ambition, which was a vague one at that, was not to give into the overwhelming desire to keep running away from everything – and that included very attractive young women.

Once the children and teachers were out of sight, Sam looked at the mess they had left. There was a padlocked gate to access the enclosure but he never carried the key so resorted to using a low-lying branch as leverage to climb over the railings. Before picking up the litter he stopped to rest his palm on the Wishing Tree, as if by doing so he would feel its pulse. Its bark felt warm, and as his skin melded into the wooded knots he imagined that the tree was attempting to ground him too. With his hand still pressed against the wood, he took a moment to look around, peering through the fir trees that crowded around the oak to catch glimpses of visitors pushing prams and walking dogs. He felt no connection with the world passing him by and was only aware of a constant fear that there was an axe poised somewhere out of sight, ready to cut him down – again.

Moving away, Sam wiped his hand on his trouser leg. ‘You shouldn’t be here, Sam,’ he muttered to himself as he imagined how much simpler life would be if he had chosen instead to hide away in the Highlands as a recluse. Gathering up the scraps of paper and stuffing them into his pocket, Sam had no interest in the fifteen wishes in his possession; he thought only of the one that was missing …

With his park ranger responsibilities at an end, Sam was forced to return to some of his more mundane duties, which today included potting bedding plants into various containers to brighten up the public areas around the Mansion House. Sam was a skilled horticulturist and had developed his craft working on grand estates in and around Edinburgh, and although the job in Liverpool wasn’t as senior or as well paid, it covered his living expenses and it offered its own challenges – working with inquisitive, entertaining, demanding and soul-destroying schoolchildren for one. But, in recent times, budget pressures had meant cutting back on nonessential services and Sam now spent more time on park maintenance than he did on ranger duties. In fact, the only way he managed to keep the service at Calderstones Park going at all was by volunteering some his time, but that wasn’t a problem for Sam McIntyre. He had plenty of time to give.

‘Have you had your lunch yet?’ Jack asked when Sam showed up in the courtyard to the rear of the old Coach House.

Sam gave his supervisor a shrug and proceeded to slip on his protective gloves. He picked up a spade, intent on helping Jack shovel compost into a wheelbarrow. ‘I’ll grab something later.’

‘Over there,’ Jack said, tipping his head towards a brown paper bag that had been left on top of an upturned plant pot. ‘Sheila made extra and I can’t go home with so much as a crust, especially since I might have mentioned how you’ve been skipping lunch lately. You know how she likes to mother you.’

Sam smiled and knew there was little point in arguing. He had met Jack’s wife only a handful of times and she was no older than he was, but she had felt compelled to take him under her wing. She had looked at him and recognized a lost soul who needed saving. Sam had seen the same thing that morning on the face of a little girl.

Taking his lunch, Sam chose a bench to the side of the Coach House and took out the small sketch pad he always kept with him. He had been working on the collection of illustrations for Miss Jenkins for weeks, having made the mistake of showing off his sketches one time and, as was so often the case, had agreed when she asked for a favour. He had promised to come up with some drawings to accompany the worksheets she was producing for a nature project.

And he wanted to impress her, even though he knew he was making a fool of himself. She was interested in his drawings and nothing more and that was probably for the best. Not allowing his mind to wander, Sam took out a pencil and worked on some last-minute touch-ups to sketches of pine cones and earwigs, daffodils and dandelions, seedlings and, of course, the Allerton Oak. He was working on one particular drawing of a family of ducks when someone banged into him. His hand jolted in surprise, adding a crooked smile to an unfortunate duckling.

‘Jasmine’s gone missing!’ Matthew said. He was with another boy and both were panting heavily. ‘Miss Jenkins is outside the Mansion House and she’s asked if you can help look for Jasmine.’

Sam abandoned his lunch and ran at full pelt towards the imposing nineteenth-century Mansion House that was one of the main focal points of the park, only slowing when he realized he was in danger of losing two other children. He waited for the boys to catch up and it tore at his heart not to speed off again. Eventually they reached the path between the house and the walled gardens where Miss Jenkins was watching over her depleted class.

‘Leon and Amy have gone looking for her,’ Miss Jenkins explained, referring to her teaching assistants, ‘but I feel so useless. I want to be looking too but I can’t leave this lot. Do you think we should call the police?’

There were gasps and a couple of girls began to sob.

‘Has she been missing long?’ Sam asked.

‘Ten, fifteen minutes.’ There was a flicker of guilt as Anna Jenkins added, ‘No one really noticed.’

‘Then yes, phone them!’

She looked hurt by Sam’s sharp tone and he wanted to tell her they were probably panicking over nothing but he didn’t; in his experience that wasn’t always true. He managed to soften his tone when he added, ‘OK, give it a few minutes. Wait here and I’ll take a look around too.’

They swapped mobile numbers and then Sam took off again at a sprint, his mind buzzing as countless scenarios came to mind, each of them pulling him in a different direction. For every large open space there were countless nooks and crannies for a child to disappear into and, God forbid, there was the lake too. There were also numerous outbuildings that had once been part of the landowner’s substantial estate; some were still in use while others had been abandoned, making them all the more enticing for a child with a mind to explore. And then there were the busy roads surrounding the park, the busiest being Menlove Avenue, which was where the school bus had disembarked. If Jasmine had decided to leave for whatever reason, she might head that way.

With his heart hammering in his chest, Sam bolted in that direction. Racing along the main throughway, he looked from left to right, desperate for some reassurance that she hadn’t left the park, and all the while the distant hum of traffic grew louder until it was deafening. He started to zigzag from one side of the path to the other and he was moving so fast that he went a dozen extra steps before his body was able to react to what he had just seen. He did an about turn and darted through the fir trees towards one of the park’s oldest occupants, which had not only captured his imagination.

Jasmine stood with her forehead resting on the railings as she stared at the exposed heart of the tree. The wood was rotting and crumbling along the exposed edges of the trunk where the mighty oak had split in two. She wished she could stand there all day watching over the tree and she didn’t think anyone would miss her if she did. Even her best friend, Keira, had been too busy swapping lunch with Jenna Rose to notice when she slipped away.

Wondering how cold and creepy the park might become if she stayed through the night, Jasmine looked up at the gnarled and twisted boughs above her. They reached out in every direction, some strong enough to support themselves while others needed the assistance of the metal props, reminding her of the crutch her mum had hobbled around on when she had fallen and broken her ankle last year. But it wasn’t the boughs lifted high out of reach that caught her attention, but the one that rested its weight on the railings to save it from falling to the ground.

When Jasmine touched the sagging branch, she could almost believe she was taking the old tree by the hand.

‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Do you mind if I get a bit closer?’

The Wishing Tree didn’t complain when she climbed along the branch; in fact, she was convinced it was giving her a helping hand. Once over the railings, she stepped carefully through the cloud of bluebells until she was within touching distance. She reached out her hand and placed her palm tentatively against the warm, wrinkled bark. When she flinched, she wasn’t sure if she had felt the tree’s pain or her own; it was as if the two had become intertwined …

Sam could see no more than a wisp of golden hair and the sleeve of her chequered school pinafore but there was no doubt in his mind that he had found Jasmine. He came to a halt twenty feet away from the Allerton Oak and took a deep, shuddering breath that caught in his throat. If he didn’t know better, it had sounded like a sob. This, he told himself, was why he wanted to be a recluse. People were too much of an emotional investment, and Sam was already spent.

As a seasoned runner, it didn’t take Sam long to catch his breath, but his pulse was still racing as he dipped beneath the shade of the oak. Jasmine was standing on the other side of the railings. She had her arms open wide and her eyes closed.

‘Can you hear anything?’ Sam asked.

The girl stumbled back in surprise and the notepad she had been holding dropped to the ground with a flutter of pink paper. ‘I didn’t do anything,’ she said, backing away.

‘Hey, it’s OK,’ he said. ‘And I’m sorry if I gave you a wee fright.’

The girl reluctantly collected up her things and clambered back over the railings while Sam remained at a safe distance. He waited until she was standing on the correct side of the barrier, her head bowed with guilt, before he broke the bad news. ‘I’m afraid you’ve got Miss Jenkins in a bit of a flap. I’d better ring her and let her know to call off the search.’

Jasmine’s head snapped up. ‘She won’t tell my dad, will she?’

The sudden look of horror on her face was difficult to ignore and Sam did his best not to reflect her concern but to give her a reassuring smile. ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ he promised.

After making the call and telling Miss Jenkins they were heading straight back, Sam was as reluctant to escape the shade of the tree as was Jasmine. ‘So,’ he asked, ‘did you get a reply from the Wishing Tree?’

‘All I could hear was it groaning,’ she said before shaking her head. ‘I shouldn’t have done it.’

‘Run away?’