the other young boys were kicking a ball of woven withies boisterously back and forth between them on the gravel path. The still air rang with their shouts of triumph and groans as one side or the other scored a point over their fellows.
Elena settled herself down on the turf bench, revelling in the cloud of perfume that momentarily enveloped her from the sweet crushed marjoram and thyme. But the little hunched figure didn't move. She reached down and gently fingered the unruly mop of ash-blond curls. His hair was as silky and baby- fine as her own little bairn's. The boy flinched away.
'Don't you want to play football or won't they let you join in?'
He made no sign that he'd heard her. She peered down at the soft rosy cheek, which was all she could see of his face.
'I'm El . . . Holly.' She still couldn't get used to the name and the other girls often had to yell it three or four times before she realized they were addressing her.
The boy slowly raised his head. A stab of pain went through her as she looked at the child. He was beautiful, with cornflower-blue eyes and long golden lashes. His flawless, milky complexion was marred only by a small silvery scar above one brow. But it wasn't his face which pained her, it was the expression in his large eyes, frozen, dead, as if his mind was completely cut off from the world. Though he looked like an angel, all she could think of was the tales she had heard of corpses risen from their graves who walk without recognizing anyone or anything.
'Do you have a name?' she asked him gently.
For a few moments the boy stared right through her, as though she was the ghost of the garden. Then he opened his hand and studied it as if the answer might be written there.
'F . . . in . . . ch,' he said, striking the palm of his hand with the other one on each syllable, as if the name had been beaten into him, sound by sound.
'Finch, like the bird, that's a good name.' Elena smiled encouragingly. 'Have you been here a long time, Finch?'
His face was expressionless. The question of time seemed incomprehensible to him.
She'd never noticed the child before, but perhaps he kept himself hidden away. She wondered how old he was — seven, eight? It was hard to tell, he was very small, but his fingers were long and thin, almost like a youth's hands. What would her own son look like when he was this age? Softly she began to sing as if she still held her own bairn in her arms.
Lavender's green, diddle diddle, Lavender's blue
You must love me, diddle diddle, 'cause I love you.
She felt a slight pressure on her leg and, glancing down, saw that the child was tentatively leaning his head against her. As if he was indeed a little bird that might take flight at the slightest movement, Elena sat quite still and continued to sing.
Call up your maids, diddle diddle, set them to work
Some to make hay, diddle diddle, some to the rock.
Finch snuggled closer, pressing his face against her legs.
Let the birds sing, diddle diddle, let the lambs play,
We shall be safe, diddle diddle, deep in the hay.
She stopped singing and for a while the two of them sat quite still, Elena on the seat of thyme, little Finch on the ground, both sunk deep in their own thoughts, not hearing the shouts of the children playing or the bees humming among the roses.
Elena shivered as a white cloud drifted across the sun, casting the garden into shade.
'You want to see a secret?' Finch suddenly asked, sitting up.
'Of course,' Elena said, smiling at him indulgently. 'Is it a treasure you have?'
She knew from her own childhood that all children have secret treasures — a blown thrush's egg, a river-polished pebble that shines like a ruby, a sharp black dragon's tooth — all carefully hidden from adult eyes.
Finch shook his head. "Tisn't my secret. Come, I'll show you. But you mustn't tell.' He took her hand in his own warm little paw and made to drag her.
'There you are, kitten. I've been looking everywhere for you, I have.'
At once the little hand withdrew from hers as Elena wheeled round to see Luce sauntering towards her across the garden. She looked down to say something to Finch, but the boy had vanished.
'Ma sent me to say