They called her Maggie.
Not because that was her name. She was called Rose. But because even as a child she had plucked her treasures from the ground, from the gaps in the pavement, from the mud in the garden, from beneath the sands of Devon. The human magpie.
Fragments of china. Dulled pennies. Chipped marbles. But none were as precious to her as the buttons. Those items that could both open and close, provide both freedom and security.
She had a jar full of them, grinning at her from the shelf, their faces like eyes. She grinned right back.
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