Ruby Acherage was but five years old in the year of 1914 and she thought nothing serious of her life until her parents, Mrs and Mr Thomas Acherage as we must call them, decided it best to send Ruby to school a year early because of the war that had broken out. Mr Acherage had in fact received a letter of conscription calling upon him that very day; it stated that “One Mr Thomas Acherage must go to the recruitments office in Bramley immediately if not sooner”. So henceforth he called for the stable man to bring his horse and cart as he packed a small case to take with him, "As Bramley is quiet some way you never know what ill need", Mr Acherage stated but in his heart he knew he would not be aloud to return to gather things for the office would fear he would run and not come back. Indeed Mr Thomas Acherage never did return to his little home in Chesterfield ever again. 

Of course you could imagine at first little Ruby was as proud as punch to be going to school for she felt it would make her more grown up than all her friends but she would soon learn not to be so vain. She and her mother of course knew nothing of the fate that was to be neither hers of her fathers.

Westmite school, or Westmite school for girls as it had but until recently been called, was the only school in the far of land of wickerbridge, and because of this it had to be changed into a coeducational school, which is where the Acherage's had decided to send their only daughter because they deemed it as far enough away and safe enough that Ruby would have no news of the war and its gory details and of course because it was to far to make a weekly trip for visits, although they did not entirely adapt to the idea of boys and girls running around together. Ruby did not loath the fact that she was going to a co-ed school she felt quiet the opposite indeed, nor did the fact that the school was so far away that she would not be able to visit until holidays bother because she THOUGHT that being with boys would be all the more fun, but as Ruby was soon to learn it was just a perfectly horrid as a rainstorm.

Ruby hated nothing more then her father going to war and she and her father having to leave the little place on a quiet road of chesterfield that they called "The Acherage", that they called home but the thought of leaving her mother there while she got to go on to school and make friends with the boys and have all the fun in the world was simply the most dreadful thought of them all.

"But what if I was just to stay here with you mother, and keep you company and all, it would be terribly loan some without me would it not?" Ruby questioned arguably with her mother even as she packed her belongings for school.

"No Ruby dear you must go to school" her mother, Gladice, reflected with a cold finality but as if she did not like the idea anymore then she did.

Ruby could see it in her mothers eyes that she did not want her to go anymore then Ruby wanted to go now, but father had said and what father says is then it simply is. So with a twang of regret of leaving her mother and her beloved"Acherage" but the excitement of school and new friends in her heart she helped pack her case to be ready for the train tomorrow that started the four day adventure to Wickerbridge and the adventure that started all adventures.

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