“I looked at all the artwork. Even Susi D’Vere’s.” He placed his hands on his knees. “I chose you. Do you think it’s something you might like to consider?”

“Um, yes. Yes. Yes. But are you sure?”

“I’m in absolutely no doubt at all, Maggie. It’s not just about drawing or painting or shading, you understand. One can learn all of those things. It’s about seeing. And you, Maggie Cruise, have a good eye. You see things. You’re, um…” He looked up to the ceiling. “Special. Yes. That’s the word.”

“Maggie? Maggie!” Dad called from the kitchen. “I need some help with this cake.”

Special. Mr Wetheral thought I was special. My palms were wet. I wiped them on my shorts. “Thank you, Mr Wetheral. But I don’t need to consider it. I’d like to be your apprentice. I’d like that very much.”

“Well, I’m delighted.” Mr Wetheral smiled his uneven smile and sat back in his chair. “I think we’ll get along together splendidly.”

“I’d better go and help Dad now,” I said.

Mr Wetheral’s apprentice. I was going to be Mr Wetheral’s apprentice. Painting pictures for a living. Not ploughing up fields or shouting at the dairy herd.

Maggie Cruise – portrait painter.

Maybe life in Fennis Wick wouldn’t be so bad after all.

“Oh, and, Maggie?” Mr Wetheral called after me.

“Yes?”

“Thank you for the drink. It’s delicious.”

The walls groaned with so many people crammed into the house. Tables creaked under piles of food. Sweat glistened and slipped and stank. The happy-sad songs of the Rickard sisters’ violins threaded through the chatter and curled across the ceilings.

Everyone was here. The whole town, pretty much. There wasn’t any proper air in the house any more, just a big cloud of everyone else’s breathed-out breath. I took bigger and bigger lungfuls just to try and get any oxygen at all.

“Maggie, could you take this to…”

“Maggie, have you got a…”

“Maggie, where can I find…”

“Maggie, I need you to…”

But it was all right.

Everything was going to be all right.

All I had to do was get through this party, see Jed off tomorrow and then I could go and find Una again. Una, outside, beyond the boundary. Clonking around in her almost-red wellies. Breathing in the trees and the brighter, fresher grass.

And after that, when I finished school, I was going to be Mr Wetheral’s apprentice. A portrait painter.

But wait. If I was going to be a portrait painter, did I really need to be a wanderer catcher too?

Couldn’t I keep things as they were? With Una as my secret friend?

I gathered up an armful of empty plates from the sitting room and weaved through to the kitchen. The floor was sticky under my shoes. It was going to need a whole load of cleaning up afterwards.