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yourgrandmother goes ahead with cutting them down, there’ll be no more warnings. No more tricks. It’ll be out-and-out revenge.’
    I sigh. This is getting stupid.
    ‘Look, the trees aren’t safe,’ I say. ‘They’re growing too close to the cottage, that’s all I know. Nell’s only protecting what’s hers.’
    ‘That won’t count for anything if she upsets the fairies. Be warned, if she goes ahead they will take their revenge. And it’ll be far worse than anything they’ve done so far.’
    She is joking. She must be.
    She’s staring over my shoulder now. I turn to see what she’s looking at. There’s movement in the bushes. I hear her gasp. For one stupid second I wonder if she really has seen a fairy.
    But what’s caught her attention is the grey blur streaking towards us.
    ‘Borage, stop!’ I cry, blocking the path.
    As he skids to a very clumsy halt, I grab his collar.
    ‘He looks scary but he’s all right really,’ I say, turning to Flo.
    There is no Flo. She’s vanished.

Darkling Cottage
Tuesday 12th November 1918
     
    My dear Alfred,
    Apologies for the tiny writing – it’s a job to get my hands on any paper with everything being in such short supply. I’ve much to tell you. The queerest thing happened today, and because you’re a real brick you might just believe me. Be warned though, it is completely MAD.
    I’ll start from the beginning.
    Dear Maisie took ill at lunchtime. She was serving the potatoes when of a sudden she had to sit down. Sweat broke off her as if she’d been out in the rain so Mama sent her to bed and called Dr Wyatt, who says it’s influenza.
    As if that wasn’t awful enough, I was then instructed to do her afternoon chores. It’s not funny, Alfred, not in the slightest. After a good telling-off about ‘my responsibilities to this household’ (I won’t repeat it but it wasn’t pleasant or fair), Mama sent me to the village with a basket and her ration book.
    In the queue outside the shop the talk was of ’flu and which boys were home from the Front. There were black armbands everywhere I looked. It wasn’t very cheering, let me tell you. Nor was coming home with such small parcels of food. There wasn’t nearly enough bacon for your stomach, dear brother. And to see our butter done up in such a tiny bundle made me want to weep.
    As usual, I took the path through the wood. I’d nearly reached our gate when I saw the oddest, queerest thing. One moment, the path was clear. Then two people appeared round the corner. I say ‘people’, for they were human-shaped and appeared to be dancing. Yet the only music I heard was birdsong.
    Stranger than any of this, though, was their size. They were TINY. Don’t think me mad when I tell you they were the height of a milk jug. It’s hard to believe, but imagine it, Alfred, a person not more than a few inches tall and dressed entirely in green! Stranger still, something fine like silk seemed to flutter between their shoulder blades, which I can only describe as wings.
    In my shock, I dropped the basket. The ‘people’ took fright and vanished. Did they run, or fly? I couldn’t tell you. Where they had been, the air seemed to ripple, like the surface of a pond after a stone is thrown into it.
    As I picked up the basket again, it felt heavier. By the time I reached home my arm was aching, and as I handed the groceries over to Mrs Cotter, she positively beamed. She’d never seen so much bacon, so she said. And hadn’t they been kind with the butter this week?
    I confess I was very perplexed. The parcels I’d purchased had been meagre things, yet now they looked very decent-sized indeed. It was as if a magic spell or some such thing had been cast on them.
    Now you know me and secrets: I really couldn’t keep this to myself. But without you here, I was a bit stuck as for who to tell. Finding Mama and Papa in the library, I’m afraid I blurted everything out to them.
    Papa lowered his book and said did I know I was