“That’s the strange thing, Polly. She’s usually such a good girl. I honestly don’t know what’s got into her. It’s like she’s walking around in a dream.”
Mummy was distracted and distant, as she often was lately. The novelty of being back in Yorkshire had worn off, and she found it difficult to be in her sister’s home, all five of us tripping over each other, having to wait for the lavvy and for the copper to boil to use the tin bath. She missed Daddy terribly and worried about him. I’d heard her talking to Aunt Polly about it as they scoured the newspapers for the lists of Missing, Wounded, and Dead. She dreaded the knock at the door from the telegram boy. Everyone dreaded the knock at the door.
“Can’t for the life of me understand what the fascination is,” Aunt Polly continued. “There’s nowt down there in the summer but a great swarm of midges.”
Uncle Arthur walked in then, his hands black with motor oil as usual. “Where’s a great swarm of midges?” he asked, scrubbing at his hands with the bar of soap I would wash my face with later.
“Down the beck. Our Frances can’t keep away from the place.”
Frustration bubbled up inside me. If only they knew that there was far more than midges to be found at the beck, that there were wonderful things that drew me back there again and again. If only they could see the fairies for themselves, then they would understand. Then I would be able to play at the beck as often as I liked.
Tired of listening to them talk about me and things they didn’t understand, I resigned myself to another scolding and stepped into the scullery.
Mummy was onto me like a cat onto a mouse. “Oh, Frances. Look at the state of you! I’ll be scrubbing at those skirts for days to get them clean. I’ve a mind to set you to the task yourself. Honestly.” I said nothing, holding my tongue, although my cheeks burned with a sullen temper. “I don’t know how many times I have to tell you. You are not to play at the beck.”
It was then that I saw Elsie listening at the door on the other side of the scullery. Aunt Polly and Uncle Arthur sat at the table in stony silence as Mummy grabbed the rolling pin from Aunt Polly, taking her anger out on the pastry.
“I don’t understand you, Frances,” she continued. “Fancy, playing all those hours up the beck by yourself when you could be out on the street with the other children, making friends. Well, there’ll be no more of it. You are forbidden from playing at the beck for the rest of the summer. Do you hear me? No more.” She thumped the rolling pin back and forth across the table before banging it down, making everyone jump. “Why do you insist on playing there anyway? It isn’t good to spend so much time alone. No wonder the other children call you names.”
The room fell into a shocked silence. I had never seen my mother so cross. It frightened and upset me. I stood in silence, pressing my fingernails into the palms of my hands. My nose prickled with the urge to cry as I blinked back hot tears. I could feel it coming, rushing through me like the water on the mill wheel, unstoppable. I couldn’t hold it in any longer. The words I had promised never to say came tumbling out.
“I don’t play on my own,” I cried. “I play with them! I go to see the fairies!”
I had never answered back to my mother. I had barely ever raised my voice in temper at her. I trembled in shock and swallowed hard, and for the second time in as many weeks I wished I could take back my words, wished I could gather them up like wool and wind them carefully back into a ball.
For what felt like an age nobody spoke. A blackbird sang at a branch near the window. Uncle Arthur coughed. Someone whistled “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary” in the street outside. Time stopped, and in those silent moments I knew things would never be the same. There would always be the time before I said I saw fairies at the beck, and the time after.
I watched helplessly as my words slipped out through the open window, drifting away with the dandelion seeds.
Mummy placed her hands on her hips and glared at me. “And now we are to have fibs as well as sodden stockings, are we?”
“I’m not telling fibs. I see them. I really do.” My words came out in gasps, choked by my heartbroken sobs. I felt like a silly little girl telling tales. All I wanted was for Mummy to believe me.
Seeing Elsie lurking at the door, Aunt Polly turned on her in a flash. “Well, Elsie Wright. What do you have to say about all this? I suppose you’ve seen fairies at the beck too?”
Elsie stepped into the room. Her eyes flickered toward mine, wide and searching. I stared back at her, tears streaming down my cheeks. I stood, frozen to the spot, as she picked up a scrap of pastry that had been trimmed from the pan. I had no idea what she was going to say.
“Yes, Mummy,” she said, without a care in the world as she popped the scrap of pastry into her mouth. “I have seen them.” I stared at the floor, my heart pounding, my knees trembling like a jelly pudding. “Our Frances isn’t telling fibs. There are fairies at the bottom of the garden.”
Uncle Arthur spat his tea with laughing. “Never heard such a load of old codswallop. Fairies in the beck! What next? Pixies in the lavvy?”
I looked at Mummy. Her arms were folded defiantly across her chest, her face a picture of incredulity and anger as she stood in broody silence beside the range.
Aunt Polly raised an eyebrow. “Well now, girls. Supposing, just for a moment, that you have seen fairies. What would they look like?”
Elsie stared at me. “Well, Frances. Go on. Tell them.”
I stared at the floor, wishing I could disappear into it. How could I possibly describe them? How could I explain their misty, barely-there peculiarity, the ringing in my ears, the fact that I sensed their presence and beauty as much as saw it? “I don’t remember.”
Uncle Arthur burst out laughing again. “No wonder you don’t remember. You never saw them in the first place.”
“I really did,” I whispered. “I really do.”
Mummy harrumphed. “Well, if you say there are fairies at the bottom of the garden, then I suppose there must be, because I can’t for the life of me think why you would say such a thing otherwise.” She turned her back to everyone as she put the pie in the oven. “You can show us after tea.”
I felt hot and prickly and for all that I nipped at the skin on my legs to distract myself, I couldn’t stop the tears falling. I was relieved when Mummy told me to go and get out of my wet clothes and somehow I walked from the kitchen, my legs shaking, my head down, my cheeks burning hot in anger and shame.
I heard them talking about me as I made my way upstairs. Aunt Polly defending me, saying Uncle Arthur shouldn’t tease me because I wasn’t used to it like our Elsie; Uncle Arthur saying I’d want to get used to being teased if I was going around telling folk I saw fairies at the bottom of the garden.
“Fairies in Cottingley!” he laughed. “Never ’eard the like of it!”
“And wash your hands,” Mummy called after me.