She went up to the day-nursery where her motley collection of pets waited. Her nanny did not approve of them at all, and Beatrice wondered with despair whether she would be allowed to keep them now that her mother was gone. There were three tame mice, a rabbit and a hedgehog with an injured foot – the only friends she had in the world, except for James.

Beatrice longed to talk to her animals, but her swollen tongue ached and ached inside her mouth. When she tried to whisper comforting words to the hedgehog, clots of blood dribbled out from between her lips. So she remained silent, and the rest of the house seemed to forget all about her until later that evening, when a maid brought up a dinner tray. They’d overlooked her ruined tongue, and the fact that she could only eat mashed food or soup, so Beatrice let the meal go cold upon its plate. Eventually she went to the night-nursery and lay in her petticoats upon the bed, trying to remain completely still in the hot, sticky August air. She was bone-tired but sleep wouldn’t come, eluding her as stubbornly as a sly-faced fox.

Her mind was ablaze with the worry that perhaps the servants might have missed one of the mirrors in the house and that her mother’s spirit would get trapped behind the glass. The thought of it appalled her beyond all reason. What a cold, strange world of nightmares it must be on the other side of a mirror, doomed to stare back forever at the life that had been taken from you. Certainly no place for her mother, with her beautiful gowns, and lustrous eyes, and joyful laugh.

She had been ill for some time but, still, it did not seem possible that she could be dead. It did not seem possible that Beatrice would never see her again. It did not seem possible that her mama would not sweep into her room at any moment to embrace her, uncover the mirror, start the clock and chuckle over how foolish everyone had been. But nobody came and the house echoed with the choked silence of all those suffocating clocks.

Finally, though, Beatrice must have slept because she awoke to the ringing of chimes. She gasped, dismayed that a clock had been missed and might prevent her mama’s spirit from moving on. And yet … as the chimes continued to ring, they seemed to be coming from outside, which made no sense – the only timepiece out there was the permanently silent sundial. Not only that, but she was sure she counted thirteen chimes.