by Kate Albus
“Who told you it was all right to tear up the ground around our school?”
“Yeah,” echoed Simon. “Who said you could do this?”
Edmund centered himself. “Actually,” he said, “everyone seems to think it’s a grand idea.” He made no effort to hide just how smug he felt.
Simon glared at him. “Tell your brother we haven’t forgotten about that day on the green.”
Edmund grinned. “Oh, believe me, he hasn’t forgotten about it, either.”
Simon clenched his fists. “We’ll get him back, you know,” he said, eyeing the plot behind Edmund.
His menacing glance did not go unnoticed. Edmund’s fists clenched as well. “If you even think about doing anything to this garden, I’ll make certain the whole of the village knows who did it.”
“Like anyone’d listen,” Jack growled. “Who do you think you are, anyway?”
Edmund looked down at himself—his shoes, crusted with mud from the pea patch, his trouser legs, flecked brown, his fingernails blackened with earth. He suddenly found himself giggling…then laughing…louder and harder than he had in ages.
“Who do I think I am?” he said, fairly shaking with the hilarity of it all. “I think you two were right all along. I am a filthy vackie!”
The evacuees’ victory garden was a success.
Even Miss Carr said so one afternoon as she worked alongside Mrs. Müller, sowing a second crop of lettuces. “You know, your garden has proved a triumph.”
“I’m glad you think so,” Mrs. Müller replied. “But it’s the children’s garden, truly. It was their idea.”
“Hmmm.” The teacher wiped her hands on her apron. “I must say, it’s rather changed my opinion of your three wards. Truth be told, I found them quite a cross to bear before this. Especially the middle one. Awful thorn in my side.”
Anna, Edmund, and William, tending the spinach patch around the corner of the schoolhouse, could hear every word. Edmund scowled at this last. Which was certainly understandable.
Mrs. Müller wiped her brow with the back of her sleeve. “I know you felt that way, Judith, and I’m awfully glad you’ve changed your mind. They’re very dear to me, you know. It sounds dreadful to say it, but I’m almost grateful for the war. I can’t imagine what I’ll do without them when they go back to their grandmother in London.”
The children paused in their weeding and looked at one another.
Miss Carr brushed earth over the tiny lettuce seeds. “You’re not just doing your bit, then, are you?”
“On the contrary. The fact is, they’re just the most extraordinary children. I’m quite certain they can do anything they set their minds to…read the Britannica, end to end…help me find my life again…”
Mrs. Müller stood, stretching.
“If they wanted to, I’m certain they could hang the moon in the very heavens.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
How funny that she’d said the precise thing.
The children were silent. They all simply knew, as one knows the saltiness of butter, the perfect warmth of the first fine day of spring, the smell of rain.
Of course it was Nora. For heaven’s sake, of course it was.
Anna thought of offering up a hearty platter of I told you so, but she didn’t. Why foul perfection with such a sharp thing as bitterness? It was enough to know that they’d found the place—the person—they’d been so long in seeking.
But knowing this and knowing how to proceed…those were two very different animals. After so many months, all the things they hadn’t said felt suddenly like treachery. Even Edmund, who had always made a game of the preposterous plan, choosing the most absurd times to wrap his mouth around the words Will you be our mum, felt the weight of it, now it had become real. The unspeakable deliciousness of knowing they were beloved had a sort of tarnish around its edges now that it meant they had to come out with—well, with everything.
Not surprisingly, William was elected as their spokesperson. Having at last found the person he knew was meant to remove the mantle of responsibility from his shoulders, he felt the burden of this last task keenly.
At supper that night, he found Anna’s eyebrows raised expectantly every time he glanced at her. Edmund kept prodding him with a toe under the table.
“You lot are especially quiet this evening,” Mrs. Müller said, eyeing the children’s plates. “Edmund, you haven’t touched your food. Are you feeling all right?”
“I’m fine, thanks,” Edmund answered, nudging William again.
William cleared his throat. “Nora—we need to—ehm…that is, we all three—Edmund and Anna and I—we’ve got—we need to talk to you about something.” He took a tremulous breath.
Mrs. Müller set her fork on her plate. She felt the weight of the children’s hearts. “What’s the matter, children?”
“Nothing’s the matter,” William was quick to reply. “I mean—we’re all fine. It’s only just…” We haven’t been honest with you seemed to get things off on the wrong foot. Our grandmother is dead would be a rather jarring way to begin.
He started again. “First of all,” he said, “we want you to know how grateful we are for everything you’ve done for us these past months. Not just letting us stay here and feeding us. It’s much more than that. You’ve been kinder to us than anybody ever has, our whole lives.”
Anna suddenly possessed a keen understanding of how a moment could become momentous.
Mrs. Müller felt it, too, but drew the wrong conclusion. “Your grandmother’s summoning you home, isn’t she?” Her face had gone pallid. “Oh—children—I knew this day would come, but I didn’t expect it to come quite so—”
“No!” William exclaimed. “It’s not that.” The librarian exhaled audibly, but the panic remained in her eyes as William continued. “It’s not that at all. Just the opposite, actually.”
A bit of the blood returned to Mrs. Müller’s cheeks.
“We’ve told you we were raised by our grandmother,” William said. “And we were. At least…she was officially in charge of us. Though the truth is, she was never really…well…there.”
“Mmmm,” Mrs. Müller murmured. “You never learned to ride a bicycle.”
“Right,” William said. “The thing is, when we came here, to the village, she wasn’t—ehm…That is—she hadn’t…” He fumbled again, chewing his lower lip. “Well, you see…”
Edmund could stand it no longer.
“Our grandmother died last summer and we were sent here to find a family and we did and…” He realized that two fat tears—only two—had somehow wound up on his cheeks. “And it’s you.”
Anna grabbed William’s hand under the table as the four of them sat in the silence of the kitchen. None of them heard silence, though, for the thrumming of their hearts in their ears.
Mrs. Müller was slack-jawed in dawning comprehension. She reached across the table and took Anna’s other hand, pulling her from her seat, drawing her close, cradling her in one arm as the other reached out to grasp William’s and Edmund’s hands. Their jumble of fingers was a lock.
“You mean, children,” Mrs. Müller whispered, “that you haven’t had a grandmother all this time?”
The children shook their heads almost imperceptibly.
“You’ve had no one?” She made no move to stop the tears from spilling.
Again, the children’s heads shook only the tiniest bit.
“No one,” Mrs. Müller said, taking it in.
“Nope,” Edmund said, only now swiping the tears from his cheeks.
“And now you want to stay?”
All three nodded.
“Here. With me.”
“Ever so much,” Anna whispered.
“If you’ll have us,” William said.
Mrs. Müller made a sound like choking. “If I’ll have you?”
William faltered. “I know it’s a lot to ask. It’s three of us, after all, and I’m sure you only planned on us being temporary,
and I know we aren’t always easy to manage—” William stole only the tiniest of glances at his brother. “But if you’ll have us, we promise, all of us, to be good, and to pick up after ourselves, and to work in the garden, and—”
“Yes,” Mrs. Müller whispered.
None of them moved a hair.
“Yes,” she said again. “I’ll have you.” The words came out louder than she intended. As she heard them though, she thought it better that way.
“You will?” Edmund said. While it sounded like a question, it wasn’t, really. It was a declaration. A sigh of relief. A murmuring of the world’s great wonders. “You will.”
“Of course I will.” Tears flowed down her cheeks and into Anna’s hair. “Of course I will.” She stood, setting Anna down and gathering Edmund and William to her in a fierce embrace. Neither of the boys found it awkward at all.
“Thank you,” William whispered into her shoulder.
After a long while, Mrs. Müller released them. She wiped her own eyes, then each of the children’s. Even Edmund accepted this most intimate of gestures. The four of them took their seats again.
Mrs. Müller sniffled. “It’s me should be thanking you, children. This is what I’ve wanted for—well, forever, I suppose—almost since the first moment you walked into the library, though I never let my mind speak what my heart was feeling. These past months, you children have been an oasis in a life that’s been far too much of a desert. And while I’ve been ever so glad of the oasis, I’ve known all along—or thought I knew—that I’d have to trudge back into the sand one of these days, only…” She trailed off.
“That’s a metaphor, the part about the oasis,” Edmund explained to Anna.
Mrs. Müller laughed as none of them had ever heard her laugh before. “It is indeed a metaphor, Edmund.”
“What’s a metaphor, again?” Anna asked.
William opened his mouth to reply, but Edmund cut him off. “She’s asking Nora, not you. Nora’s the boss now. The chief. The top banana. The number one geezer. The mum.”
William, feeling a lightness he hadn’t ever felt before, found himself entirely glad of Edmund’s being right.
Mrs. Müller re-defined metaphor for Anna, wiping her eyes again with the back of her sleeve, then giving the children a puzzled look. “Who is it you’ve been writing to all this time? Were you posting actual letters, to an actual person?”
“They were real letters,” Anna said.
William nodded. “Our old housekeeper, Miss Collins.”
“Really old,” Edmund clarified.
“We should write and tell her,” William said. “But it’s Mr. Engersoll we’ll need to speak to for the official bit.”
Mrs. Müller was weak with the brilliant stun of it all. “Mr. Engersoll?”
“This was his idea. He’s a solicitor,” William explained.
“A solicitor?”
“He’s got great clumps of hair growing out of his ears,” Edmund said, by way of completing the picture.
“Honestly, Ed.” William smiled.
Edmund pressed on. “But none on top.”
“It’s true,” Anna confirmed.
“Indeed,” Mrs. Müller said, as if Edmund had explained things entirely.
The children found themselves giggling, the way we all do when we suddenly find ourselves relieved of something that has weighed on our souls for far too long.
“We’ll sort out the solicitor in the morning,” Mrs. Müller said, still wide-eyed and dazed. “Just now, though, I think perhaps we should leave the dishes right here on the table and retreat to the snug for the evening.”
Anna, Edmund, and William, still drifting in a sort of dreamish place between real and not real, all nodded.
Mrs. Müller took a deep breath.
“It’s time to start a new story.”
WILLIAM, EDMUND, AND ANNA’S RECOMMENDED READING LIST
For connoisseurs seeking the diversion of a good story…the books that William, Edmund, and Anna read in 1940–1941 are listed below. I have tried to provide original English-language publication information; however, these beloved classics have (lucky us!) been republished many times over since the children read them.
Blyton, Enid. The Enchanted Wood. London: George Newnes Ltd., 1939.
Burnett, Frances Hodgson. A Little Princess. London: Frederick Warne and Co., 1905.
Christie, Agatha. Murder on the Orient Express. London: Collins Crime Club, William Collins & Sons, 1934.
Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Hound of the Baskervilles. London: George Newnes Ltd., 1902.
Dumas, Alexandre. The Count of Monte Cristo. London: Chapman and Hall, 1846.
Grahame, Kenneth. The Wind in the Willows. London: Methuen & Company, Ltd., 1908.
Hunter, Norman. The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawm. London: John Lane, The Bodley Head, Ltd., 1933.
Lang, Andrew. The Yellow Fairy Book. London: Longmans, 1894.
Leaf, Munro. The Story of Ferdinand. New York: The Viking Press, 1936.
London, Jack. The Call of the Wild. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1903.
Milne, A. A. Winnie-the-Pooh. London: Methuen & Company, Ltd., 1926.
Montgomery, Lucy Maud. Anne of Green Gables. Boston: L. C. Page & Company, 1908.
Moore, Clement C. A Visit from Saint Nicholas. New York: James G. Gregory, 1862.
Nesbit, E. Five Children and It. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1902.
Tolkien, J. R. R. The Hobbit. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1937.
Travers, P. L. Mary Poppins. London: Gerald Howe, 1934.
As for the Encyclopaedia Britannica, if any of you bibliophiles are considering reading it, end to end, I would so love to hear about such a magnificent quest. While, as far as I know, there is not a volume that actually starts with HER(cules) and ends with ITA(lic), all of the quotes included in A Place to Hang the Moon were indeed real entries from editions that would have been available to William in 1940.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I love reading acknowledgments. I love them almost more than the books they follow. And yet, here I am writing my own, and I fear I can never be adequate to the task. I am filled with so much love and gratitude for the people who made A Place to Hang the Moon a reality. I hope you all can feel it.
I am indebted to that greatest generation—those who fought in the Second World War. Whether it was on the battlefield or on the home front, their spirit and sacrifice remain a continual inspiration. While it was C. S. Lewis’s Narnia series—well, at least the part where the Pevensies got evacuated—that was the root of this story (hence, Edmund), it was the memoirs of actual evacuees, some truly extraordinary individuals, that made the experience real to me.
I feel tremendously lucky to be part of the Holiday House family. Huge thanks to managing editor Raina Putter, and to the fantastic marketing team—Terry Borzumato-Greenberg, Michelle Montague, Emily Mannon, Cheryl Lew, and Nicole Benevento—for all they do to get books into the hands of kids.
This book benefited in untold ways from Barbara Perris’s copy editing. Her keen eye for detail was humbling—in the best possible way—and so very much appreciated.
From the moment I saw Jane Newland’s portfolio, I kept my fingers and toes crossed that she would do the cover art for A Place to Hang the Moon. I fell in love with her lush portrayal of nature, her rich colors, and the gorgeous detail in her images. Thank you, Jane, for bringing Anna, Edmund, and William—and their library—to life so beautifully.
Kathryn Green, my beloved agent, championed this book from the start. Thank you, Kathy, for seeing promise in my story, for finding it the perfect home, and for your kind and clearheaded guidance and wisdom throughout this process. I am so very, very fortunate to have you in my corner.
Having Margaret Ferguson as an editor has been a gift from start to finish. Shaping this novel with her was an absolute dream come true. She is wise and kind—that rarest of combinations—and the level of thought that she put into my story
left me routinely speechless. Thank you, Margaret. Your gentle spirit shines on every page of this book.
Endless thanks to those who were kind enough to read my words in their most primitive form. Thank you especially to Summer for planting the seed, and to Jill for nurturing it along the way. Thank you to Leanna…other than my own children, you were the very first to read this story, and hearing that you liked it made my heart sing. To other thoughtful early readers Wendy, Laura, Anne E., Bill, Ben, Anne A.O., Maya, Deb, Mark, and Rob…thank you for asking the required number of times, so I knew you really, really meant it when you said you wanted me to send you those Word docs.
All the love to my family. To Bub, Sarah, Kat, Gracie, Libby, and Hannah. And most of all, to my parents—Jim and Brenda—for a lifetime of love and support, and for letting me read this story aloud to them so I could make sure it sounded right.
Luke and Olivia, my wonders, my real-life stories.…Sharing books with you is one of the great joys of my life. Thank you for countless magical hours of reading. I love you both more than I will ever have words to express.
And Matt. Thank you for being my rock. In all things, in all ways, at all times, your dear and loving heart is the center of my world.