The Secret of Nightingale Wood

Stories are powerful things," she said quietly. "And sometimes we have to be very brave to tell them.

Even when the moon is just a thin white crescent, the rest of the moon is still there, in shadow. It has not gone anywhere--we just can't see it. Look for the part of the moon that is hidden in shadow, Henrietta. Trust that it is there even when it can't be seen.

Fluctuat nec mergitur." "Is that Latin?" "Yes. It's the motto of Paris--something like, Tossed but not sunk. The French translate it a bit more prettily--She is tossed by the waves but she does not sink." Then he looked at me. "We've all been tossed by the waves, haven't we, little 'un? The t-trick is not to sink...

Hope is a funny thing, Miss Abbott. If you cling on to it for too long, it can become something cruel. - Mr Pickersgill

He wasn’t a living, breathing person any more – I knew that – but he was still real. He was made out of the wildest, wisest, bravest bits of my imagination – my wild, wise, brave brother. And right now I needed him more than ever.

She is tossed by the waves but she doesn't sink

It’s magical, Mama,’ I whispered. ‘The whole forest fills with silver light and then, quite suddenly, you’re floating with the nightingale’s song up in the stars.’ Mama was quiet for a moment and then she said, ‘What a wonderful place the world would be, Hen, if everyone had your imagination.

I looked into Mama’s eyes and, through all the pain and all the sadness, I could see a new strength there.

He smelt of summer air and engines and pipe smoke and faraway places.

Do you know who she was talking about?’ he asked. ‘The nightingale?’ ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes, I do.’ He nodded and waited for me to explain. When I didn’t say anything more, he just looked at me and smiled. I smiled back. I think it was the loveliest moment we’d ever shared. He didn’t need me to tell him about Mama and the nightingale. It was enough that I understood.

I don’t know how to get back,’ Mama gasped, and her voice was ragged with fear. ‘You can,’ Moth said through her tears. ‘You can. You will.’ And her words were carved in stone.

... your methods are medieval, Doctor Hardy. You are blinded by ignorance and ambition. You see only symptoms. You do not see people, and you do not see the damage you do to them.

I wanted so much to trust these grownups, but I knew that I couldn’t. My heart told me that if I left my mother here, she would never come home.

... if it was my birthday, then it was almost exactly a year since Robert’s death. I felt a cold wave of nausea. It struck me for the first time that I was catching Robert up – I had caught him up by a year already and it wouldn’t be long before I overtook him . . . How strange, I thought, how horribly wrong, to become older than my older brother . . .

Moth looked straight into my eyes. In that moment I saw all the way through her, through her crooked smiles and strange songs, right into her heart. I saw years of pain. She looked as if she was about to say something, but she just shook her head, and squeezed my hand in hers – warm and strong.

There is no cure for grief, Henrietta. But there is something that can lighten the darkness – just a little at a time – and that is life itself. You know this already, I think. You know your mother needs stories, music, sunshine, birdsong, the smell of a rose, the smile of her daughter . . . .

A shorter life is still a life, Henrietta Abbott,’ she said. ‘I’ve thought about this a great deal. A shorter life burns briefly but brightly . . . A bright star.

I feel like half a double act,’ I said at last. ‘I’m so sad he’s gone. He was clever – good at numbers, at building things. He wanted to be an engineer like Father . . . I’m so sorry he didn’t get to grow up and be a man and do all the wonderful things he wanted to do.

As I brushed, I thought about Doctor Hardy’s treatment. Expecting Mama to get better all by herself, locked up in a dark and lonely room, was the same as expecting her to weave straw into gold, like the poor miller’s daughter.

Doctor’s orders. They had been law in our house since Robert’s death. Why could no one else see that Doctor Hardy’s orders were not making Mama any better?

If you need to see your mother,’ she said, ‘you must find a way of seeing her. I’m sure she needs to see you just as much.

I wanted to go and sit with Mama. I remembered long evenings in London, cuddled up in my bed as she read to me – the smell of her face cream and the warmth of her arms around me. I wanted to feel her arms around me now, but she was locked in her room and I was not allowed to leave my bed.

There we were – Mama, Nanny Jane, Piglet and I – all under the same roof, but as separate and distant as four stars in the night sky. Each of us burning alone in the darkness.