Eva and the Hidden Diary (4 page)
Read Eva and the Hidden Diary Online
Authors: Judi Curtin
W
hen I called over to Kate’s place the next morning, it was so early that she was still in bed. While her dad went up to get her, I chatted to Zoe, and played with Simon, who luckily didn’t seem to have any lasting bad effects from Zoe’s disastrous singing exploits.
When Kate came downstairs, she was dressed, but her hair was all messy and she was rubbing her eyes.
‘This had better be important, Eva,’ she said. ‘I need all the beauty sleep I can get.’
‘It
is
important,’ I said. ‘Really important. Now, do you want to go to Jeremy, and I’ll tell
you all about it?’
We were headed for the door, when Kate’s dad called her back. ‘You’re not going anywhere without breakfast, young lady,’ he said. ‘Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.’
Kate rolled her eyes, grabbed a banana from the fruit bowl, and then we ran from the room before her dad had time to protest.
‘I’m guessing this has something to do with Daisy?’ said Kate, as we got to our favourite place on the grass near the trunk of the huge tree.
‘Yes,’ I said, as I pulled the diary from my jacket pocket. ‘It’s about Daisy. Now make yourself comfortable while I tell you the saddest story in the whole wide world.’
Kate rested her back against the tree, and stretched her legs out in front of her.
‘I’m ready,’ she said. ‘So start talking.’
‘As you know, in the beginning, Daisy’s life was kind of boring,’ I began. ‘A day of collecting blackberries was like an amazing event, and finding a new kind of seaweed was the most exciting thing ever. Mostly she just went to school, and hung out with her friend Rose, and helped her mum and dad around the house.’
‘That sounds a bit like my life,’ said Kate.
I grinned. ‘Maybe. Except without TV and a computer and a phone and useful stuff like that. Anyway, all of a sudden, things changed. Daisy’s life got a whole lot more exciting – and not in a good way.’
‘What happened?’ Kate asked, edging closer to me.
‘I’ll let Daisy explain in her own words,’ I said, as I carefully flicked through the pages until I found the one I wanted.
Kate lay back on the grass and I began to read.
Dear Diary,
Today something very strange happened. Garda Dillon came to the house and Daddy asked him in for a cup of tea and a slice of fruitcake that Mammy had just taken out of the oven. Garda Dillon went all red in the face and said it wasn’t a social call. He asked could Daddy go to the garda station with him to talk about a crime. Mammy cried all the time that Daddy was gone, and I didn’t know what to do to make her stop. When Daddy came back he hugged us both and said it was all a misunderstanding and we should forget about it. We had tea then; the fruitcake was lovely.
‘That doesn’t sound too serious,’ said Kate when I stopped reading.
‘That’s what I thought – and that’s probably what Daisy thought too, but unfortunately we were all wrong.’
‘So did you find out what the crime was?’
‘Yes. Somebody broke into a church in
Newtown and stole a chalice.’
‘And was that such a big deal? It’s not like he held up a bank or something!’
‘The chalice was really old and really valuable, but that wasn’t the only reason it was a big deal. People were very religious back then, and stealing a chalice was like a super-big crime. The teachers in Daisy’s school got the kids to say prayers every morning, so that the chalice would be found and the thief sent to jail.’
‘But surely Daisy’s dad wasn’t involved?’
‘That’s what I thought too, and at first things went on pretty much as before. Then, a few weeks later, Daisy’s dad was charged with the crime, and he had to go to court. This is what she wrote:
Dear Diary,
Daddy’s court case is tomorrow. Mammy spent a long time ironing his clothes, so he would look decent for the judge. She was crying so much, though, tears kept falling
on his good white shirt and ruining it. In the end, I had to do it for her. Daddy says Mammy is upsetting herself over nothing. He said, ‘I haven’t done anything wrong, so I don’t have to be afraid. I will just tell the truth, and that will be the end of that. Justice is always done in the end.’ Daddy would never tell a lie, so I know it will all work out well.
Now Kate sat up. ‘You said it was a sad story, so I’m guessing things didn’t turn out the way Daisy hoped.’
I shook my head. ‘The trial only lasted for one day.’
‘And?’
‘And Daisy’s dad was found guilty and sentenced to five years in jail.’
‘Ouch!’ said Kate. ‘That’s awful. So what happened to Daisy?’
‘Some of the next entries are kind of rushed and untidy – like she was too upset to
concentrate properly. Whole days go by and she doesn’t write anything at all. The kids in her class gave her a hard time because her dad was in prison.’
‘And didn’t the teachers step in?’
‘It doesn’t sound like it. Remember they were the ones who were organising prayer meetings for the safe return of the chalice. I’m guessing they gave Daisy a hard time too. Soon she stopped going to school altogether.’
‘But what about her scholarship?’
‘The scholarship was the least of her worries,’ I said. ‘Listen to what she wrote a month after her dad went to jail:
Dear Diary,
The good china is getting dusty, because it is never used - Mammy’s friends don’t come to see her any more. When Mammy and I went to Mass last week, everyone pointed at us and whispered.
Rose waved at me from the other side of the church. She
started to come over to us, but her mammy pulled her back. Mammy cries all the time now. I try to cheer her up but nothing works. She used to be so proud of her glossy hair and her trim figure, but now she doesn’t care about anything. She sits at the kitchen table and drinks tea and eats so much bread that she is getting fat. Some days she doesn’t get up out of bed at all. I don’t know what is going to happen to her. I don’t know what is going to happen to me.
‘OMG,’ said Kate. ‘The poor girl. She didn’t do anything to deserve this. None of it is her fault, and yet her whole world is collapsing around her. People must have been really mean back then.’
‘I know,’ I said, wondering if people would act differently nowadays. ‘It’s totally unfair.’
‘So how did Daisy survive like that until her dad got back?’
I sighed. ‘I’m not finished yet. I’m afraid
things got even worse. Daisy’s mum couldn’t cope at all. In the end, she was so bad that she had to go to some kind of a psychiatric hospital.’
‘And did they make her better?’
I shook my head. ‘No. I don’t think psychiatric hospitals made people better back in the olden days. It sounds like they locked poor Florrie up and threw away the key.’
‘And Daisy?’
‘In a way, she was lucky. She had a great aunt who lived in America, and arrangements were made to send Daisy to live with her.’
‘And she left her diary behind?’
‘Yes, but not by accident. This is her last entry:
Dear Diary,
Yesterday I went to see Mammy in the hospital and Daddy in the prison. We all cried for a long time. Mammy and Daddy both told me to be brave, but that is not easy. I am leaving for the boat first thing in the morning. I am afraid of travelling alone. I have never been
anywhere without Mammy and Daddy before. Rose gave me her bracelet to bring me luck. I will miss her very much. I am not going to bring this diary to America. I am going to hide it in my secret place at the back of the old hen-house. When Daddy’s name is cleared, things will be different. I will come back home to Seacove and Mammy will come out of hospital. We will have visitors and people will be nice to us again. I will go back to school and study for my scholarship. I will fill all the rest of these pages with happy stories.
Goodbye for a while, my dear diary.
I stopped reading and wiped the tears from my eyes. It might have been kind of embarrassing, except that Kate was crying too. We hugged for a bit, and then we sat back on the grass. It was weird, crying about something that had happened so long ago, to someone we had never met. It was almost like crying at a movie.
‘The poor girl never came back?’ said Kate in
the end.
‘That’s what it looks like. This diary was really important to her, but she never wrote in it again.’
‘So I’m guessing it’s been lying in the shed, untouched, since 1947,’ she said. ‘It’s like it was waiting for her.’
‘No,’ I said, feeling suddenly excited. ‘Maybe the diary wasn’t waiting for Daisy. Maybe it was waiting for us!’
Much later we were still discussing it.
‘It’s obvious,’ I said for the tenth time. ‘Daisy said she wouldn’t come back until her dad’s name was cleared. She never touched her diary again, so that must never have happened.’
‘It’s not obvious at all,’ said Kate, who loves a good argument. ‘Maybe Daisy’s dad
was
cleared. Maybe he was released from prison, and her mum got better and they went off to America
to live with Daisy, and the three of them lived happily ever after.’
I shook my head. ‘I wish I could believe that, but I can’t. It’s been years and years and years. Daisy loved Seacove as much as you and I do. If her dad’s name had been cleared, I
know
she would have come back at some stage. She’d have found a way to come home.’
‘But––’
I didn’t let her finish. ‘Can’t you see, Kate? When I read that diary, I felt like Daisy was talking to me. I felt like she was sending me a message from the past.’
‘And her message is?’ asked Kate, looking at me like I was an idiot.
Now I felt embarrassed. ‘I know it sounds totally weird,’ I said. ‘But I can’t help that. I just think that we should try to discover what really happened. I think we should find out more about the crime.’
‘The Case of the Stolen Chalice,’ said Kate,
giggling. ‘Sounds like a
Famous Five
book.’
I ignored her. ‘I wonder if we could find a way to prove that Daisy’s dad was innocent. Then we should track Daisy down and let her know – if she’s still alive, that is.’
Kate didn’t look convinced. ‘There are two kind of big ‘ifs’ in that sentence, you know, Eva,’ she said.
‘I know,’ I said. ‘But shouldn’t we try anyway, for Daisy’s sake?’
Now Kate was serious. She reached over and took my hand. ‘Eva, there’s one important thing you’re not considering, isn’t there?’
‘What?’
She spoke slowly and carefully, like she was afraid of offending me.
‘Maybe Daisy’s dad really was guilty. Maybe he
did
break into that church. Maybe he
did
steal the chalice. Maybe justice
was
done – only not in the way Daisy was hoping.’
I shook my head. ‘No way,’ I said. ‘Daisy’s
dad would never have done a thing like that.’
‘And you know that how?’
‘Because Daisy said he was innocent.’
‘She would say that, wouldn’t she?’ Kate squeezed my hand tightly. ‘He was her dad,’ she whispered. ‘She loved him. She wanted to believe the best of him – but that doesn’t necessarily mean that he was innocent.’