Divorcee Gloria Harkness lives a dull, lonely life in a house in the woods near the secluded care home where her disabled son Nicky resides. The home's building and surrounding grounds used to be an experimental school for young children, oddly named Eden, until chilling events there closed it down almost 30 years ago. Now those past events have come back to haunt the woods -- and Gloria's life -- when one of the children involved in the tragic incident tries to find out if it was suicide or murder.
When an old childhood friend of Gloria's, Stephen (Stig) Tarrant from Castle Douglas, turns up at her door late one night, Gloria cannot believe the tale he tells her. He was one of the students at Eden and a female classmate from there has been stalking him to pursue the truth about what really happened that dark, mysterious night all those years ago. Gloria is surprised at how resourceful she can be as she's drawn into the search for the truth. However, what she uncovers, and how it will change her life, is more shocking than she could have ever imagined.
A bit slow at the start, Catriona McPherson's THE CHILD GARDEN soon takes off at a fast pace with spellbinding suspense to a riveting ending. Characters are complex and believable in an intriguing Scottish locale with a tightly woven and unique plot. This is the first book I've read by Catriona McPherson, but it won't be the last. She's a distinctively talented author.
Eden was its name. "An alternative school for happy
children." But it closed in disgrace after a student's
suicide. Now it's a care home, its grounds neglected and
overgrown. Gloria Harkness is its only neighbor, staying
close to her son who lives there in the home, lighting up
her life and breaking her heart each day.
When a childhood friend turns up at her door, Gloria doesn't
hesitate before asking him in. He claims a girl from Eden is
stalking him and has goaded him into meeting her at the site
of the suicide. Only then, the dead begin to speakβit
was murder, they say.
Gloria is in over her head before she can help it. Her
loneliness, her loyalty, and her all-consuming love for her
son lead her into the heart of a dark secret that threatens
everything she lives for.
EXCERPT
I keep the spare bed made up more because it looks pretty
with the quilt and pillow slips than in hope or fear of
sudden guests. No one has stayed in this house except me
since I moved in ten years ago. The nearest miss was one
night when my mother and father came to see Nicky and
came back here after. Dad was too shocked to drive and I
got as far as boiling water for hot bottles before Mum
came to her senses and realised what was happening.
βWe havenβt set the alarm,β sheβd said. βWe havenβt set
light timers. Iβve left a washing out.β As if Castle
Douglas was some hotbed of crime. βCome on, Trevor, stir
yourself. Youβll be fine when you get going.β
She had turned back at the front door as my dad weaved
towards the car; doddered almost, suddenly an old man.
βLook what youβve done to your father,β she said. βHow
could you be so thoughtless?β
βMum, I honestly donβt know what youβre talking about,β I
said.
βThe way you puffed it all up. A new place, better care.
You got our hopes up, Gloria. Iβll never forgive you.β
The only bright spot in the whole episode was Miss Drumm
the next day. Sheβd been listening through the connecting
door.
βSo thatβs your mother, is it?β sheβd said. βThatβs
Nickyβs grandmamma? Sheβs one youβd leave inside the
wolf.β
βWhat are you smiling about?β said Stig. I was
concentrating on filling the bottles, hadnβt realised the
thoughts were showing on my face.
βA happy memory,β I said. βAnd an appropriate one too.
You canβt choose your family, but friends are a fine
thing.β
I love Rough House for saving my life but showing Stig
round, I saw it through his eyes. The only bathroom is
downstairs, with just a bath, no shower and no heater
either, and the rickety window lets the drafts howl
through. Itβs a long way upstairs to the bedrooms, four
of them, the two big ones facing the sunny garden and the
two little ones with the arrow-slit windows facing out
the back to the yard. Facing the sunny garden in the
daytime in the summer if and when the sun shone, I
thought, leading Stig into the room at the top of the
stairs. On a night like this, it looked like where Jane
Eyre saw the ghost. The furniture was something Miss
Drumm called pickled walnut. The wallpaper was a sort of
colourless pinky beige in a raised pattern that looked a
bit like fungus, and the carpet and curtains were much
the same. The crocheted mats, worked in white and stained
with tea, and the crocheted, tea-stained handles on the
brown-paper sun blinds didnβt help. Cat sick, Miss Drumm
called it, which made me shudder, but at least the quilt
and the pillow slips were satin. I drew the line at
candlewick; all her candlewick covers were in the linen
cupboard, dry-cleaned and stored in bags sucked small
with the Hoover.
βIβll put towels in the bathroom for you,β I said, as I
slid the two hot water bottles in under the bedclothes.
βAnd a toothbrush. And Iβll set out a razor. Can you
sleep in the sweat suit for now? I wonβt be long and no
one will come to the door, I promise, but if they do,
donβt answer. No oneβs got a spare key. No one can get
in.β
βWhat?β he said. βWhere are you going?β
βPhone box at Shawhead. Itβs tucked well away and
nobodyβs even going to be walking a dog at this time of
night when itβs like this, are they?β
βYouβre really going to call the police?β
βIβve got to. We canβt leave her there on her own in the
cold and dark.β
βI canβt ask you to do thatβ he said. βYou donβt owe me.β
βAnonymously and a womanβs voice,β I said. βItβs best
that way. Theyβll probably want to ask me if I heard
anything or saw anything, but theyβll get me at work
tomorrow. They wonβt come round here. Thereβs no reason
for them to connect me with April.β
He nodded. I held out my hand.
βIβll put your car away while Iβm out.β
He nodded again and fished his car keys out of the sweat
pants pocket. I was almost out the door when he stopped
me.
βGlo?β he said. βYou know earlier, when you were freaking
out about them closing the home? Thinking someone who
works there might be mixed up in this?β I nodded. βWhy
would you want them looking after your boy if you reckon
thatβs possible? Why wouldnβt you want the place closed
down if thereβs someone there who might harm him?β
I took a long time deciding what to say, but in the end I
was as straight with him as heβd been with me. βWhatβs
the worst they could do?β
βI donβt want to say it.β
βSay it.β
βThey could kill him.β
βAnd his troubles would be over. Donβt look at me like
that.β
βOr they could hurt him.β
βNo, they couldnβt,β I said. βWait here.β I walked along
the corridor to the big bedroom at the other end and
lifted Nickyβs picture from my bedside table.
βOh,β said Stig, when I came back and handed it to him.
βWhatβs caused that then?β
Thatβs a fair enough question and so I answered him.
βPantothenate Kinase-Associated Neurodegeneration,β I
said, taking the picture back and polishing the frame
with my cuff. βPKAN, for shortβ I kissed the glass over
Nickyβs face βMy little PKAN pie. Nothing hurts him,
nothing helps him, nothing ever will. Iβd best be off.β
βOf course, if youβre going to tell them that Stephen
Tarrant drove a woman to suicide and youβve got him
locked in your house without his car keys, thereβs
nothing I could do to stop you,β Stig said. He was
smiling at me.
βYou could overpower me now before I start,β I said,
smiling back. βIf youβre going to leave one womanβs body
behind you, why not two?β
We considered one another for a long minute. Iβm not sure
who broke eye contact first. Probably me since Iβm not
much of a hard nut.
βDrive safely,β he said.
βSleep tight,β I said back.
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