Darling Girl: A Novel of Peter Pan(19)

But now she knows she’d worried about the wrong things. She never sat up at night worrying about drunk lorry drivers, about how small Robert’s beloved sports car was, how a collision could crush it like a tin can in a giant’s fist. She’d never imagined the awful wheezing sounds Robert could make, and how even more terrible than the noise was the silence when he stopped. Most of all, she never thought to worry about how gut-emptying it would be to hear absolutely nothing from the back seat where the twins sat, no matter how many times she screamed their names.

She would give anything, would give her entire life, to go back in time for one more day when her husband’s cold feet and her baby’s croupy cough were the only things that kept her from sleeping. But she can’t. So she puts the car in neutral and coasts the rest of the way down the hill, between the stone walls that mark the entrance to Grace House. She stops in a pool of shadow and gets out beneath the giant elm that saved her son but took her daughter in exchange.





Chapter Seven



The nurses are waiting, peering out the window of the front hall. By the time Holly reaches Grace House’s door they’ve come out and cluster about her. They all begin to talk at once, a swirling cloud of words she can barely follow.

She raises a hand. “One at a time.” She points to the woman closest to her. It’s Maria, who has operated as charge nurse for the past year. “Walk me through what happened. And let’s do it inside, so you can show me as you talk.”

They go through the day step by step. Who was on duty, what procedures were followed, how it was discovered that Eden was missing. Everything, it seems, was done as Holly has wanted, right up until the moment the nurse opened the door and found Eden gone.

Everything, that is, but the window. But each nurse insists that she did not open it, that it always remained closed on her shift, as Dr. Darling had ordered. They have no explanation for how it could have been found ajar. They walk en masse down the hall to the former library, now converted to Eden’s room. Holly opens the door, and the four women crowd around her in the doorway, anxious, she can tell, to show that they’ve searched every inch and that Eden cannot be found, that she will not magically appear from behind the curtains or inside the closet. But Holly asks them to wait outside, closes the door firmly behind her. She takes a deep breath and looks around.

The room hasn’t changed since her last visit. The hospital bed is still tucked in the far corner. An IV pole stands next to it, empty bag dangling. There’s a heart monitor, electrodes slung around its top. A vase of daisies, lilies, and roses is tucked into the niche opposite, the flowers wilted and fading. The room is empty. What else had she expected?

Still, she looks. She slides her hand beneath the pillow, pulls down the sheets. Checks under the bed, which is spotlessly clean. Opens the closet, where dressing gowns and medical supplies are neatly stacked. She finds nothing unusual, nothing out of place. At last she crosses to the window. She’d asked Maria to leave it as it was when they’d discovered Eden was missing. It’s open to its full height, something Holly has always expressly forbidden.

She examines the sill. A faint film of dust or pollen, but no thread, no bit of cloth, the way there always is in television thrillers. She leans out, holding one hand on the bottom of the raised sash to make sure it can’t come crashing down on her neck. The grass below the window is muddy, but there’s no sign of anything that resembles a footprint.

As she’s pulling her head back in, a soft breeze caresses her face. She can see the tree from here, but its leaves aren’t moving. And then she hears the strangest thing. A ringing, like tiny golden bells. She searches the tree for wind chimes but sees nothing.

The bells sound like laughter.

She pulls her head back in so violently she bangs it on the window before slamming the casement shut.

There’s a knock on the door. “Dr. Darling?” The voice is soft. “Dr. Darling, the gardener is here.” Holly sighs, kneads her neck. She’s so bloody tired, and she has the sense she’s forgetting something, but she has no idea what. She opens the door.

Maria is waiting on the other side, her face sorrowful. It occurs to Holly that perhaps the nurses aren’t solely worried about losing their jobs or their work cards. It is possible that they genuinely care about her daughter.

“Did you find anything?” Maria asks. Holly shakes her head. Maria gingerly touches her arm, as if she expects a rebuke. “We will keep looking. Are you sure no police?”

“Yes,” Holly says sharply. “No police.” At least not yet. Not until she’s searched as much as she can on her own. She flounders for a plausible explanation. “Our family, we are . . . well-known. For the story, the one about the Darling children. Do you know it?”

Maria nods. She walks into the room, glancing back as if for permission, and crossing to the bookcase on the far wall, takes down an old illustrated volume. “Peter Pan,” she says, holding it out to Holly.

Holly sucks in her breath. Right after Eden’s accident, she’d searched for answers in that story, but she hadn’t found a clue. She thought she’d gotten rid of all the copies, but here’s proof she missed one. She doesn’t take the book.

“One of the girls found it in an upstairs closet,” Maria explains, flipping through the pages.

“Yes, that’s the one,” Holly says. “And Eden . . . well, she’s not like other children. I don’t want the press to make up some terrible story, you see. It would only make it worse.”