The Girl in the Garden

Chapter 9

After breakfast, Ms. Herrier stood by the kitchen table and announced, "Line up, both of you. I'll have a look at your clothing before you meet Ms. Valentine."

"Is that our teacher?" Ben asked as Ms. Herrier checked his shirt for wrinkles.

"Yes," The housekeeper answered, and Ben could see in her sneering expression that she wasn't pleased. "She wouldn't have been my first choice, but nobody really asks me."

She moved on to check Sparrow's clothing, then ushered them towards the stairs to the front hall. "Up to the library with you both," she said, and Sparrow was quick to flit along in his nervous way.

When Sparrow was gone, Ben looked at Ms. Herrier and said, "Um, what about yesterday?"

"What about it?"

"The chair..." Ben stared up at her, but she refused to look back at him. "The fire?"

"Oh," she said as if he reminded her of something she'd long ago forgotten. "Quite the mess. It's all cleaned up now, of course."

Ben scrunched his eyebrows and said, "But what about how it started? I got angry and kicked it."

"And be warned that I have informed your uncle about your little fit, but a kick has never lit a chair on fire before."

"So what happened then?"

At that point, Ms. Herrier turned her scornful gaze on him, which made him shrink away. "It was a freak accident, I'm sure. Go up to the library now before you're late."

He was quick to obey, darting up the stairs and along the path towards the library. The door was locked the last time Ben peered in through its window. This time as he made his way down the hall, he noticed the door was open, and there was a gentle song that greeted him.

The library was a cavernous room, with books lining shelves that reached all the way to the vaulted ceiling. There was a ladder attached to a track on each wall that could be wheeled back and forth to grant access to every old book. Three desks were sitting together in the middle of the room; two small desks turned to face a larger one. Sparrow was sitting at one of the small ones staring in awe at the woman who would be their teacher.

Ms. Valentine wore many layers of long green fabrics, skirts and scarves and shawls that flowed around her when she moved. She had a guitar hanging over her shoulder, and she was strumming and humming from a perch at the edge of her desk. She looked towards the door and smiled at Ben, which flipped his insides upside down.

Ben had never seen such a beautiful teacher; the look of her and the sound of her song had a hypnotizing effect that rooted him to his spot in the doorframe.

"Hello," she finally said, still gently plucking at the guitar. "Benjamin Everett, is it?"

"Uh, just Ben, please."

"Ben, nice to meet you. Come have a seat."

Ben sat at the desk next to Sparrow's, and together they watched as their teacher finished her song and put the guitar down on the desk beside her. She smiled at them both, and nobody said anything for at least a minute.

"Um, hi." Sparrow was the first to break the silence with his nervous twittering. "My name's Sparrow. Auntie Kestra says you're Ms. Valentine? What are we gonna learn about? I'm not very good at numbers but also not the best at letters, I guess, pretty good with music!"

"Please, just call me Rani," she said. "What about you, Ben? You must be a talented musician. I can sense it."

"Me?" Ben shook his head. "No, I have a guitar. I got it from my dad. Don't know how to play it, though."