the land we had come to as my home, I packed up my treasures and helped Rose pack hers while the household was dismantled about us by servants. Ernst was as eager to move as Mama, as the new town was larger and better established. It was also where Reynaldo went to school, so he would return to live with us. Reynaldo was to inherit my stepfather’s business when he had finished school, for he had no aptitude for deep thought and no desire to be further educated. Silk, our stepfather announced, must be the scholar of the family and his brother would mind its business. Silk had finished his education now, and was more like to be enticed home by the prospect of life in a large town.
We had not dwelt a year in our new home, when Mama died and Rose disappeared.
Misadventure, the newspapers called it, an odd, unsatisfactory word.
Mama and Rose had been strolling home through the park after a pantomime when a mist had settled about them. The town was so far south that it caught some of the coolness of the ice pole, and the occasional mists had been one of the first things to delight me about our new home, for they reminded me of my childhood. The mist must have confused Mama, so that she and Rose walked deep into the park and, becoming lost, had wandered in circles. Finally Mama lay down in exhaustion, never knowing that she was only a few steps from the edge of the park. Rose went to find help, but she had gone the wrong way, becoming lost herself.
That was what people said.
I knew it could not be the truth, for upon our arrival in our new home, Mama had brought me to this very window and said I must never, on any account, set foot in the park. It was a wondrous place, and I, who never argued, would have argued about that, but there was such desperate, immoderate terror in Mama’s face that I feared for her sanity. She demanded I vow that I would never enter the park, no matter what, and when I promised, she made me pierce my finger with a pin to seal the swear with a drop of blood.
That was how I knew it was impossible that Mama would have entered the park of her own free will. Even confused by the mist, she would have been able to follow the line of ghost trees that marked the borders of the park. One day, sorrow made me forget my reserve and voice my doubts about the popular theory to a neighbour. He assured me earnestly that cold could confuse and dull the wits. I could have argued that Mama would hardly have become cold enough to sap her wit in one step, but Silk laid his long thin hand on my shoulder, rendering me silent.
After the neighbour left, he led me into the library and made me drink a glass of something gold and potent, which he said would steady me. He was taller than ever, but now less thin than lean, and he looked tired, for he had spent the day searching for Rose. He spoke of the park, and like the policemen who had searched for her, he told me he had reached the other side without having seen a thing. But from my window I could see that the park stretched on for miles, a trackless wilderness running as far as the eye could see, and beyond. There was no way it could be crossed in a day or even in a week. When I said this to the senior policeman handling the case, he gave me a look so long and so serious that I guessed he thought me addled with grief. So I did not argue with Silk.
In truth I was touched by his determination to find Rose. He would not listen to Reynaldo or my stepfather’s sharp-eyed solicitor when they tried to convince him there was no hope of finding her. There was a strength and weight of grief in him that I had not expected, and I had drunk enough to say as much. He sat beside me, gathering my cold hands into his. ‘Willow, if she can be found, I will find her. Do you believe me?’
I wanted to say that he would have to be able to see the true nature and extent of the park that had stolen Rose from