Season 1 · Episode 26
The Morning After the Last Word
Published 22nd September 2026
That was the committee.
The Committee
By noon, Lightwood Square had done its best to look ordinary.
The sky had cleared to a pale, breezy blue. The Oak held the Jacks in their usual argumentative arrangement. The Summerhouse looked innocent. The hedge looked innocent. This was, Mr Jack Daw had decided, a highly suspicious amount of innocence for one garden.
“No committee,” said Batman Smith from the Fence Post.
“No committee,” agreed Mr Jack Daw.
They sat in silence for almost half a minute.
“That was the committee,” said Batman.
By afternoon, the ordinary business had begun to crowd back in. Flora, Fauna and Merryweather travelled through the hedge with their customary briskness. Brenda appeared beneath the bird table, objected to something small and private, and disappeared again. The Jacks moved from branch to branch, discussing nothing in particular with a commitment that suggested they were all avoiding one particular subject.
Gary Arrives
Gary arrived before the day had made up its mind what sort of day it was going to be.
He landed in the Fruit Tree, gave the Summerhouse a look so brief that it was unmistakable, and then smiled at the Oak.
“Quiet,” he observed.
“Nothing happened,” said Mr Jack Daw.
“Excellent. Then you will have nothing to report.”
Gary’s smile tightened by the smallest possible amount. He looked from the Fruit Tree to the hedge, then to the lawn. Whatever information he had hoped to find was not lying about in the open, which Gary found either disappointing or deeply significant.
As the afternoon cooled, the Jacks took the Oak in considerable numbers. Percy flashed through the Pine. Gary moved around the garden with too much leisure to be entirely casual, appearing first near the Fruit Tree, then among the lower branches, then on the far side of the hedge. No grey squad came to follow him. This should have been reassuring. It was not.
At dusk, a few Robins occupied the hedge and let the garden know, quietly but firmly, that the day had not become less complicated merely because nobody was shouting about it.
Marjorie Returns
After dark, Marjorie returned.
She did not come back as though the previous night had been settled. She came back as though it had left a question in every part of the Square and somebody had to walk through them all. Her pearl necklace caught the faintest light as she passed the hedge, then the Summerhouse, then the darker line of the Fruit Tree.
Batman watched from the Fence Post without saying her name.
Mr Jack Daw, awake above him, nodded approvingly. “Learning.”
Marjorie continued through the night on her own. Now and then she seemed to pause at the edge of the garden, as though expecting an answer which had every right not to come. Later, a presence hovered beyond the hedge. Batman thought it might be Harold, but did not say so.
Harold did come eventually, from farther away than anyone would have liked. He did not resume the argument. Neither did Marjorie. For a short while they occupied the same troubled darkness, two parents who had said everything necessary and none of what they actually meant.
When Harold withdrew, Marjorie remained.
The long hours after midnight belonged to her. The Square slept badly around her: the Oak listening, the hedge holding its breath, the Summerhouse refusing to look guilty. Once, a second female presence seemed to stir at the far edge of the night.
Batman sat upright.
“Marlboro?”
Mr Jack Daw considered this.
“You are guessing again.”
“I am recognising a pattern.”
“A pattern is only a guess with more confidence.”
The night declined to explain itself. Marjorie moved on. Then, much later, she came back through the Square with an urgency that made the leaves seem to lean toward her.
The Far Edge
This time, Marlboro answered.
Not with an apology. Not with a surrender. She remained at the edge of the garden, entirely capable of being both present and unavailable. Marjorie did not press her. The two of them held the silence between mother and daughter for a while, with the kind of caution that follows a row too large to be repaired in a single night.
Then Marlboro was uncertain again—there, not there, perhaps already choosing the next place to stand. Marjorie remained until the dark began to thin.
Dawn Occupations
At dawn, the Square woke with more enthusiasm than tact.
Robins filled the hedge, the bird table, and several other positions which had not been assigned a purpose until a Robin arrived to defend them. The Smiths were among the activity, but so were neighbours who had their own claims and no interest in Batman’s management. Brenda was everywhere at once. Steve and Mrs Steve brought their own quiet blackbird business to the lower garden.
Gary arrived with the earliest rush of the morning.
So did Stirling’s squad.
Gary took the Fruit Tree. Stirling’s squirrels worked the lawn and the Vegetable Garden.
Gary watched the squad pass below him. Stirling’s grey shapes did not look up. This was worse than looking up.
The Jacks regrouped in the Oak.
“Nothing to report,” Mr Jack Daw said.
“Nothing,” said Gary.
“You said that yesterday.”
“It remains true.”
As the morning gathered speed, Gary disappeared from the Fruit Tree. The squad withdrew beneath the hedge. The Robins took over the garden, giving Batman more boundary disputes than one bird could sensibly referee. Derek worked the Oak. Clive appeared briefly among the branches. Percy made two very important crossings through the Pine, neither of which he was willing to explain.
Nothing to Report
Then Gary came back.
At almost the same moment, Stirling’s squad emerged again in force.
The garden stopped.
Gary stayed on the far side of the Fruit Tree. Stirling’s squirrels spread through the lawn and around the Vegetable Garden, precise and unreadable. One Jack opened his beak, saw both of them, and decided against it.
Batman leaned toward Mr Jack Daw.
“Do you think they know something?”
“Everybody knows something,” said Mr Jack Daw. “The problem is deciding whether it is the same thing.”
Gary shifted along the Fruit Tree branch. Stirling changed direction beneath the hedge. Neither admitted to either action.
By the end of the morning, Gary had gone. The squad had gone. The Robins still occupied nearly everything worth occupying.
The Jacks looked from the Fruit Tree to the hedge.
“Nothing to report,” said Mr Jack Daw.
Nobody believed him.
DUFF. DUFF. DUFF-DUFF-DUFF.