I flipped over the letter, ran my hand across Adam Gilbert’s cover sheet, and sank into this most thrilling moment. I believe I may actually have smiled as I turned the page; I certainly bit my lip. Rather too hard, which is how I remember it so well.
FOUR HOURSlater I’d read it all and I was no longer sitting in a quiet office in London. I was, of course, but also I was not. I was many miles away inside a dark and knotty castle in Kent, with three sisters, their larger-than-life daddy, and a manuscript that was yet to become a book that was yet to become a classic.
I laid down the transcripts, pushed back from my desk, and stretched. Then I stood and stretched some more. A kink had tied itself at the base of my spine—I’m told reading with one’s feet crossed atop the desk can do that—and I struggled to dislodge it. Time and a little space allowed certain thoughts to rise from the ocean floor of my mind, and two things in particular floated to the surface. First up, I was awestruck by Adam Gilbert’s workmanship. The notes had clearly been transcribed verbatim from taped interviews and prepared on an old-fashioned typewriter, with impeccable handwritten annotations where necessary, and a level of detail so that they read more like play scripts than interviews (complete with bracketed stage directions if any of his subjects so much as scratched), which is probably why the other thought struck me so strongly: there had been a notable omission. I knelt on my chair and leafed again through the stack to confirm, checking both sides of the paper to confirm. There was nothing from Juniper Blythe.
I drummed my fingers slowly on the stack of notes: there were perfectly good reasons why Adam Gilbert might have passed her over. There was more than enough material without additional comment, she hadn’t even been alive when theMud Manwas first published, she was Juniper … Nonetheless, it niggled. And when things niggle, the perfectionist in me starts to fret. And I don’t much like to fret. There were three Sisters Blythe. Their story, therefore, should not—could not—be written without Juniper’s voice.
Adam Gilbert’s contact details were typed at the bottom of his cover sheet and I deliberated for around ten seconds—just long enough to wonder whether nine thirty was too late to ring somebody whose home address was Old Mill Cottage, Tenterden—before reaching for the phone and dialing his number.
A woman picked up and said: “Hello. Mrs. Button speaking.”
Something about the slow, melodic tone of her voice reminded me of those wartime movies with the vows of phone operators working the switchboard. “Hello,” I said. “My name’s Edie Burchill, but I’m afraid I might have called the wrong number. I was looking for Adam Gilbert.”
“This is Mr. Gilbert’s residence. This is his nurse speaking, Mrs. Button.”
Nurse. Oh dear. He was an invalid. “I’m so sorry to bother you this late. Perhaps I ought to call back another time.”
“Not at all. Mr. Gilbert is still in his study; I see the light beneath the door. Quite against doctor’s orders, but so long as he keeps off his bad leg there’s not much I can do. He’s rather stubborn. Just a minute and I’ll transfer your call.”
There was a heavy plastic clunk as she laid down the receiver, and the steady sound of footsteps retreating. A knock on a distant door, a murmured exchange, then a few seconds later, Adam Gilbert picked up.
There was a pause after I introduced myself and my purpose, in which I apologized some more for the awkward way in which we’d entered each other’s orbit. “I didn’t even know about the Pippin Books edition until today. I’ve no idea at all why Percy Blythe would put her foot down like that.”
Still he didn’t speak.
“I’m really very, very sorry. I can’t explain it; I’ve only met her once before and then only briefly. I certainly never meant for this to happen.” I was jabbering, I could hear it, so with great force of will I stopped.
Finally he spoke, in a world-weary sort of voice. “All right, then, Edie Burchill. I forgive you for stealing my job. One condition, though. If you find out anything to do with theMud Man’s origins you tell me first.”
My dad would not be pleased. “Of course.”
“Right, then. What can I do for you?”
I explained that I’d just read through his transcript, I complimented him on the thoroughness of his notes, and then I said, “There’s one little thing I’m wondering, though.”
“What’s that?”
“The third sister, Juniper. There’s nothing here from her.”
“No,” he said. “No, there’s not.”
I waited, and when nothing followed I said, “You didn’t speak with her?”
“No.”
Again I waited. Again nothing followed. Apparently this was not going to be easy. At the other end of the line he cleared his throat and said, “I proposed to interview Juniper Blythe but she wasn’t available.”
“Oh?”
“Well, she was available in a bodily sense—I don’t think she leaves the castle much—but the older sisters wouldn’t permit me to speak with her.”
Comprehension dawned. “Oh.”
“She’s not well, so I expect that’s all it was, but …”
“But what?”
A break in conversation during which I could almost see him grabbing for the words to explain himself. Finally, a brambly sigh. “I got the feeling they were trying to protect her in some way.”
