‘Muriel was at a crossroads. Something would have to be done, but what? Roger had urged her to ‘let things slide a little longer’. Since then things had indeed slid . . .’
Diana Petre and her twin sisters grew up in Barnes, South London, in the care of an elderly housekeeper, having been abandoned in 1912 by their mother, the enigmatic Mrs Muriel Perry, whose real name and true identity were a mystery. After an absence of ten years, Muriel reappeared and took charge of her children, with disastrous results.
For the girls, one of the highlights of their isolated lives were visits from a kindly man they knew as ‘Uncle Bodger’. In fact, as Diana’s mother finally revealed in characteristically brutal fashion, he was their father, Roger Ackerley, a director of the fruit-importing company Elders & Fyffes and popularly known as ‘the Banana King’. Down the road in Richmond, unbeknownst to the girls, he lived with a retired actress who called herself ‘Mrs Ackerley’ and his three further children. One of them, Joe, born in 1896, has also given his account of this strange upbringing in his famous memoir My Father and Myself, published in 1968.
One of the things that makes The Secret Orchard so gripping is that it’s constructed like a detective story, in which Diana asks questions, follows clues and pores over documents in an attempt to unravel the truth. Please read on for an extract from this extraordinary story, along with a selection of recommendations for other tempting reading.
In other news from Foxed HQ, it’s been gloriously busy at the packing desk for the last few months (for which, we send you our great thanks) and we are now looking for someone to help us in the office with orders and packing on a part-time basis. Please see the foot of this email for details.
With best wishes, as ever, from the SF staff
Jess, Isabel, Rebecca, Izzy & Jennie
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