Mrs. Joyce smiled. “What are neighbors for, eh?”
While Mrs. Joyce tackled the back room, Olivia made a start on the front. Old magazines and TV guides were thrown into a bag for recycling. Half-empty bottles of Christmas sherry and rum were dragged from the back of the drinks cabinet and poured down the sink. Photograph albums were put in a box to look through later. Shelves and sideboards were cleared of china dogs and the lace doilies they’d sat on for decades, all of them going into the box for the charity shop with surprising emotional detachment. It was the smaller, unexpected things that broke Olivia’s heart: an incomplete game of solitaire, Pappy’s pipe resting on the edge of the ashtray, a half-finished jigsaw of the Titanic. A quiet, simple life on pause. In Pappy’s honor, she cleaned the pipe and ashtray and completed the game of solitaire before finishing the jigsaw and returning it to its box. She stood back then, acknowledging how empty the room had become without its little trinkets and mementos, just the sofa and chairs left with nobody to sit on them. How quickly a lifetime could be cleared away. Too quickly. She wished she could put everything back as Mrs. Joyce appeared at her shoulder.
“All done, love?”
“It’s as if they were never here, Mrs. Joyce. As if they never existed.”
“I know, love. But you’ve your memories, and they’re more important than ornaments of china dogs.” She linked her arm through Olivia’s. “God forgive me, but I never liked them dogs. Awful ugly things.”
They both laughed until their laughter turned to tears, and Olivia felt much better for letting it all out.
“Here. You might want to look at this.” Mrs. Joyce held a book and a folded piece of paper. “I always give books a good shake before I send them to charity. I used to work in the donation center at the St. Vincent de Paul. You’d be amazed what we found in coat pockets and books. The letter was inside this book.”
Olivia took them from her. The book was a slim volume called The Coming of the Fairies by Arthur Conan Doyle. On the title page were two inscriptions. One “To Frances,” signed by Conan Doyle, dated 1921. The other “To Martha,” signed by Frances, dated 1978. It was in exceptionally good condition. It hardly looked as though the pages had been turned at all, and with the signatures, Olivia knew it could sell for a decent amount to the right collector. She turned the first page and read the opening paragraph:
Chapter one. How The Matter Arose. The series of incidents set forth in this little volume represent either the most elaborate and ingenious hoax ever played upon the public, or else they constitute an event in human history which may, in the future, appear to have been epoch-making in its character.
Intrigued, but anxious to read the letter, she closed the book for now, perched on the arm of Pappy’s favorite chair, and unfolded the sheet of writing paper.
16th October 1978
Dear Martha,
Thank you for the very kind words in your recent letter, which I was delighted to receive after all these years. It is always a pleasure to hear from someone who believes my story. The recent BBC television play has stirred up a lot of memories and fuss. I’m still not sure it was a good idea to rake over the past—it usually isn’t—but what’s done is done. Elsie, at least, seems to be enjoying the attention. She was always more comfortable with the reporters.
Cottingley seems like a distant dream now, like something that happened to somebody else, yet whenever the press get involved (as they do from time to time), it all becomes very real again. Real, and not altogether pleasant. They forget that I was a child when it happened—a naive young girl, not the woman they see when they ask me their questions and raise their eyebrows at my replies. I know what they are thinking, but I also know what I saw all those years ago, and what I have seen time and again in the years since.
I’m often asked why I think our photographs caused such a sensation when they first became public all those years ago. Conan Doyle’s articles appeared during a time of great despair in England. When you’ve lived through such a terrible war as we all had, lost friends and loved ones, you cling to anything that offers a sense of hope and comfort. People wanted so desperately to believe in fairies and the spirit world because if fairies could visit us from another realm, then perhaps our loved ones could too. I’m not surprised our fairies charmed so many people. Nothing much surprises me anymore.
I’ve enclosed a copy of Conan Doyle’s book about the events of those summers, which I hope will be of interest to you (I somehow ended up with two copies). His account makes for interesting reading—if a little too scientific at times for my liking. I’ve recently started writing about the Cottingley events, to tell the story in my own words, as it were. I will send you a copy—if I ever finish it.
I wonder—do you still have the Princess Mary picture book? You admired it so much when you were a little girl. I was pleased to give it to you.
Do pass on my regards to Cormac and Kitty. It would be lovely to see you again, although I don’t travel too far these days. Old age makes snails of us all. If only we had wings!
Yours sincerely,
Frances Way (née Griffiths)
Olivia read the letter a second time before folding it carefully, slipping it back inside the book, and walking through to the kitchen where Mrs. Joyce was scrubbing the sink with an ancient-looking bottle of Vim and wire wool.
Olivia sat at the table and took another brownie. “Can I ask you something, Mrs. Joyce?”
“Of course, dear.”
“Did Nana ever talk to you about her life before she met Pappy?”
Mrs. Joyce stopped scrubbing, took off her rubber gloves, and sat down beside Olivia at the table. “Is everything all right, love?”
“It’s just with Pappy gone and Nana not able to remember things, I regret not talking to them about the past. I hardly know anything about their life before Mammy was born. I know that Nana was brought up in Yorkshire, and that Pappy’s parents both died during the Second World War. That’s about it.”
Mrs. Joyce sighed. “Martha wasn’t one for dwelling in the past. After her parents died, she only went back to Yorkshire once—legal business or something, not long after Kitty was born. Martha was an only child, and any aunts or uncles had passed away. I think there were a few cousins, but she lost touch with them, as far as I know.”
“Did she ever talk to you about someone called Frances Griffiths, or about photographs of fairies taken during the First World War? It seems that Frances and Nana were friends.”