~

      The old lady handed Jane a cup of tea and a piece of carrot cake. The best china had come out for the occasion.
      "We don't get visitors very often, do we Suzy" (Suzy was the budgerigar). Jane understood that Mrs. Walters had worked at Ashley Manor as a girl.
      "Goodness me, yes," assented the old lady. "And my mother, and her mother before that. The Greenwoods used to employ a lot of local people in the good ol' days. But there aren't any of the old family left now, Miss, an' they even tell me the manor house itself has been knocked down."
      Yes, she knew of the children's rocking horse, but had never actually seen it. ("What peculiar questions you ask, Miss!") She had worked 'below stairs', while the rocking horse had been upstairs in the children's nursery.
      "We always called them 'children', though Master Tom and Miss Victoria were very grown-up when I was there. Old Josiah Greenwood was the master of the house. He was in one of them old-fashioned bath chairs for as long as I could remember, Miss. They said it was a riding accident when the children were little. It was well before my time, but I remember my Gran telling me all about it. She was cook at the time.
      "Well, it happened like this. Josiah's horse stumbled and threw him, and they carried him back to the house 'at death's door'. Well, they were in something of a dilemma, Miss. They had to quickly fetch the doctor from town, but the only horse had been Josiah's, and that had broken its leg when it stumbled and threw its master. They didn't think Josiah would live, but the doctor arrived within the hour, and nobody knew who had sent for him. Even the doctor himself was a little vague about it. It was his wife that'd told him he was needed, and he didn't know how she'd got the message."
      "Well, it turned out as how a young man had ridden into town with the news an' Mrs. Wooding (that's the doctor's wife) thought as how it was Master Tom. Although he was only about 12 or 13 at the time, he was a big lad for his age. Anyway, it was something of a local mystery.
      "Both children had been upstairs in the nursery all morning, and it wasn't even as if there'd been a horse for anyone to ride. Tom himself said he knew nothing about it, though he seemed rather secretive about the whole affair (so my Gran said) as if he knew something but wasn't telling. Anyhow, everyone was so relieved to see the doctor that just how he'd got the message in the first place didn't seem all that important. It was only afterwards that folks began to wonder. My old Gran, God bless her, used to say as how if you wanted something badly enough, there was always a way."

~

      Jane flopped down into an armchair. It was a long drive back from Market Drayton to see Mrs. Walters, and what a strange story that was about the doctor coming to see Josiah Greenwood after his accident. She closed her eyes and was soon fast asleep. In a dream she saw Master Tom (she instinctively knew it was Master Tom) galloping down the lane on a chestnut mare with a white stripe on its forehead and a bushy mane. He was riding to town for the doctor, his handsome young face contorted by worry and frustration. His cheeks were wet with tears. But he shook his head and spurred the horse to go faster and faster, a wild determination shining in his eyes.
      When she awoke it was to see the snow gently pattering on the windowpane. Only a week to Christmas, she thought. But it wasn't only the snowflakes making that pattering sound. She listened carefully. Yes, that was it, it was the faint click-clack of the rocking horse. She stood up, crossed to the hall and went to the room where it was kept.
      The rocking horse was gently swaying backwards and forwards just as on previous occasions. Its wooden body needed to be carefully re-varnished, she thought, to bring it back to the deep chestnut colour that it had originally been. The white stripe on its forehead needed a touch of paint, and the mane needed some more glue and horsehair to make it as bushy as it had once been. If you want a thing badly enough, she reflected, there was always a way.