The Willoughbys Return

by Lous Lowry

  “May I help you find something?” a young saleswoman asked.

  But Henry Willoughby ignored her because several racks at the front of the shop were clearly marked FATHER’S DAY CARDS. He headed there.

  “Not one with a dog or a cat,” he muttered. “Flowers . . . maybe.” He began to look through the display.

  The saleswoman had remained nearby. Finally he turned to her. “I need one that isn’t to the father, but from the father,” he explained.

  Mrs. Willoughby leaned forward. “We’re about to be reunited with our children after many years,” she confided.

  “My goodness,” the store clerk said. “Isn’t that lovely? So you need a kind of reverse card. Let me think. Of course, we have lovely blank cards. One of those might work, and you could write your own message. Or perhaps a card that says thank you?”

  “What would we be thanking them for? Waiting for us? Not spending all our money?” Mrs. Willoughby asked. “Let us hope!”

  “Do you have any that say sorry?” her husband asked the clerk. He was still feeling sad about Jane.

  “Let me look,” the clerk replied.

  “Also, do you by any chance have anything edible here? I’m very hungry,” his wife said. “What about a box of candy?”

  The clerk looked startled. She straightened up and held her finger to her lips. “Shhhh,” she said. “Not aloud.”

  “Not allowed? Hunger is not allowed?”

  “No,” said the clerk, “I meant not aloud. That last word you said.”

  “Here,” said Mr. Willoughby, handing her a card with a picture of a horse on it. “This one will do. What are you talking about? My wife said ‘candy.’”

  “Shhhh,” the clerk whispered. “You know it’s against the law. I wouldn’t say it aloud if I were you.”

  “Say candy? Saying the word candy’s against the law?”

  The clerk winced at the word and gestured with her head toward the counter where the cash register was. “We used to keep it there. People get hungry when they’re shopping. You-know-what was a great impulse item. We sold ever so many Milk Duds and Whoppers. But now we’re trying to figure out what to offer in that space. Grapes, maybe. Or beef jerky?”

  Mrs. Willoughby began to moan and wring her hands. “Milk Duds are illegal? Oh, Henry,” she said, “we should have stayed in Switzerland!”

  “Shhhh,” the clerk whispered nervously. “Please don’t let anyone hear you say Oh Henry!”3

  14

  At the same time, a few blocks away, in her little house with its freshly painted, still-gleaming blue shutters, Mrs. Poore, using her daughter Winifred’s crayons, was lettering signs. B AND B, they said. She tried different designs, though she was not very good at it; there was a splotch where a crayon had broken in half midway through a letter, and the paper had torn. She drew a flower to disguise the flawed place. Then she added details, hoping to attract tourists and vacationers.

  After she tacked the sign to a fence post at the end of the front walk, she sat down to wait for customers. When no one appeared after half an hour she went back, took down the sign, brought it indoors, and added another bit of information that she thought might make a difference.

  “There,” she said in a satisfied voice. She attached the sign once again to the fence post.

  And again she went into the house. This time, feeling a little guilty because she used a fresh teabag, she made herself a cup of tea. Then she sat beside the window to wait.

  15

  As Mrs. Poore, sipping a cup of tea, awaited travelers in need of lodging, her two children were not at home to wait with her. Winston and Winifred had decided to go next door, to the Melanoff mansion, to apply for jobs.

  They were a little nervous. Though they talked to Richie through the fence, and occasionally ventured into his yard to play, they had never been inside his magnificent home before.

  “Should we knock or ring?” Winston asked his sister. They were standing together at the mansion’s entrance. The huge carved door had a polished brass door knocker. But there was also a doorbell.

  “Knock,” said Winifred, after considering it.

  “No, you,” Winston told her.

  Winifred gulped, then reached up and gave the door knocker a very light tap.

  “Harder,” Winston instructed. So his sister took a deep breath and knocked very loudly, twice, on the door.

  Eventually, as they were about to turn away and go home, the heavy door swung open. They looked up at a tall man who had a pleasant but curious look. Behind him, a wide hallway was dimly lit except for spotlights illuminating a large gold-framed portrait. They could see Richie standing in the shadows.

  “Hi, Richie,” Winston called.

  Richie wiggled his fingers in a kind of shy wave.

  “Hi, Richie,” Winifred echoed, and Richie waved a second time.

  “You seem to know my son,” the man said. “Richie? Come up here and introduce your friends.”

  Richie stepped forward and stood beside his father but looked at the floor. “I don’t know their names,” he confessed.

  “Well. Shall we remedy that?” The man looked at the pair standing on his porch and said, “Can you introduce yourselves?”

  Winifred cringed, because in school they had had a lesson about how to make introductions. But now she couldn’t remember if you were supposed to say “I’d like you to meet . . .” or maybe it was “It’s my pleasure to introduce . . .” and in any case, she wouldn’t be able to say either of those, because her cheeks had turned pink and her voice had completely disappeared. She nudged her brother.

  “We’re the Poore children from next door,” Winston said politely.

  “The poor children? Next door?” Richie’s father glanced across the lawn toward the fence that separated his mansion from their little house.

  “Well, yes, we are poor, but that word’s a lowercase adjective. Our name has a capital P. Poore. Sometimes that happens, you know, that you have a name but it turns out also to be what you are, like how your son’s name is Rich—”

  Winifred poked him with her elbow, and he fell silent.

  The man gave a somewhat bitter laugh. “Well,” he said, “as it turns out, everything can change in an instant.”

  “Dad,” Richie said nervously, “they’re my friends.”

  The tall man sighed. “I’m delighted to meet you, Poores. I once knew a woman whose last name was Weaver,” he said. “And guess what? She was—”

  “A weaver!” Winifred said in excitement, forgetting how shy and blushy she had been.

  “Actually, no,” the man said. “She was a potter. But she could have been a weaver, couldn’t she?”

  His son stepped forward eagerly. “Or what if your name was Rider? And you actually were a rider? Like a champion with a bicycle? I have a bike! I have a Shimano Ultegra 6800 twenty-two-speed fully outfitted with Vuelta XRP pro wheel set!”

  His father put his arm around the boy and said, “Shhhh.” Then he turned to the Poore children and explained, “Richie gets overly excited.”

  “And sad!” Richie interrupted, his shoulders slumping. “I get overly sad sometimes, Dad! Because I don’t have anyone to ride my bike with.” He sighed, then added in a low voice, “It has wind-cutting aero-bladed spokes and precision bearings.”

  Winston took a deep breath. “Actually, sir,” he said, “that’s the reason my sister and I stopped by. We’re poor, as I explained, and—”

  Winifred took over. “And our father is in Alaska, selling encyclopedias—at least we hope he’s selling them because we need the money—and also he might be looking for gold in his spare time. But we don’t know when he’ll be back, because he has problems with melancholy and—what is the other thing, Winston?”

  “Occasional inebriation,” Winston whispered.

  “Oh, yes. He’s very kind, though. We miss him very much.” She paused. “Sorry. I was almost Marming,” she mumbled.

  Richie’s father looked pu
zzled. “Are you trying to sell something? I think we’ve already bought some Girl Scout cookies, and money is increasingly tight, but I suppose we could always use another box or two.”

  “No sir,” Winston said. “We’re looking for a job.”

  “Like babysitting,” Winifred explained. “Of course, Richie isn’t a baby. But we could be, like, companions to Richie, maybe?”

  “Because he’s lonely,” Winston added.

  Richie’s father seemed startled. He looked down at his son. “Is that true, Richie?” he asked. “Are you lonely? I know that on your last birthday we gave you a— What is it called?”

  “International research robot,” Richie replied. “It has a lightweight, precision-machined aluminum composite frame and injection-molded plastic covering that provides a strong exoskeleton.”

  “And doesn’t it provide companionship?” his father asked.

  “Well,” Richie said, “its surface-mounted tactile sensors respond to touches like a pat on the head. And the points of articulation in its limbs are so precise that it can pick up and hold objects with its hands.” He sighed, then added, “But no, Dad, it isn’t a very good companion.”

  He stood beside his father with his head down. Then he whispered, “Yes, I am lonely.”

  The tall man stroked the top of his son’s head briefly. Then he looked at the Poore children. “Why don’t you come inside?” he suggested. “I think we might be able to work something out, though if you’re hoping for a high salary, I’m afraid—”

  His voice trailed away as he glanced outside. Then he held the door while they entered the high-ceilinged elaborate hallway, ushering them in graciously, but his attention was still on something outside. The Poore children waited with Richie beside the long, carpeted staircase that curved upward on the right. They heard Richie’s father call from the front door to someone, “May I help you with something? Are you lost?” Apparently, though, the answer was no. He shrugged, closed the door, and turned his attention to the children.

  He led them past the staircase and down the wide hall. Briefly he paused in front of the illuminated portrait. “My adoptive mother,” he murmured, indicating the portrait of a stern-faced woman wearing oven mitts. “Nanny,” he said reverently.

  “I was adopted by Nanny and Commander Melanoff,” he explained to the Poore children, “after I lost my biological parents when I was twelve.”

  “Lost?” asked Winifred. “You mean you forgot where you put them?”

  “No, no,” he said. “It was a tragic accident in the Alps.”

  He nodded reverently again to the oil-painted face, then turned away from the portrait and began to lead the children toward the drawing room.

  Richie whispered an explanation to the Poores. “They wouldn’t listen to any instructions,” he explained, “and they wore shorts and sandals and they bought climbing equipment but they used it wrong, they put the crampons on their heads, and then they got frozen solid. My dad took me to see them once, though a telescope. We had to wait in line. And afterward we had hot chocolate.”

  He turned toward his father. “Didn’t we, Dad? Remember, we had hot chocolate?”

  “What?” Richie’s father had opened the door to the drawing room. “Sorry, son,” he said. “I’m afraid I wasn’t paying attention. I was distracted because before I closed the front door I noticed a bizarre-looking couple approaching the front of the little house next door.” He turned to Winifred and Winston. “I believe you said that’s your house?”

  “Yes,” Winifred replied. “It’s very small, but my brother just repainted the shutters.”

  “I could see that. Bright blue! Well, they were approaching your house. The woman was limping, and they were both wearing unattractive brown clothing. The man seemed angry about something. Any idea who they could be? Were you expecting visitors?”

  Winston and Winifred both shook their heads.

  “They seemed oddly familiar, as if I might have known them once.”

  Again, Winston and Winifred shook their heads.

  “Well, I’ll put it out of my mind. Nothing to do with me!” He and his son entered the elegant room and gestured that Winston and Winifred should follow. They looked around in awe at the large paintings on the walls, the thick velvet draperies, the gleaming grand piano, and the Persian rug with its muted colors.

  Richie’s father gestured toward a painting. “Early Holbein,”1 he explained. “I’m going to have to sell it.” He looked troubled for a moment. Then he said, “Oh! I’m so sorry!” he said. “I can’t stop thinking about that strange couple. I never actually introduced myself! I’m Richie’s father. I guess you already know that. My name is Tim Willoughby. My siblings and I decided to keep our original last name after we were adopted, because it was all we had left of our parents. And also it was the name on the bank accounts.” He held out his hand and the Poores shook it solemnly, one after the other.

  “Win-Win,” the Poore children murmured as a further introduction to themselves, but also because they felt as if perhaps, in an odd way, it might describe their current situation.

  16

  “I should have looked harder for my glasses! I bet anything they were right there in the snow!” Mr. Willoughby said in a cross voice. He had leaned forward and was squinting at the sign on the fence post. “Can you read this, Frances? And by the way, you look like a flamingo,1 standing that way.”

  His wife was teetering on one foot because she was holding the blistered one up to relieve the pain. “Some people think flamingos are lovely,” she muttered, and hopped closer in order to read the sign.

  “It says, in large letters, ‘B-and-B,’” she told him. “I don’t know what that means.”

  “Beer and bratwurst? I suppose it could be some kind of tavern,” Henry Willoughby suggested.

  “No, there’s no parking lot. A tavern would have a parking lot.”

  “Read the small print, would you? Darn, I wish I had my glasses.”

  His wife leaned forward. “It says Bed,” she told him.

  “Bed and—? B and B? What’s the other B?”

  “Toilet. That’s all it says.”

  “Well, that’s pretty stupid,” said Henry Willoughby. “Why didn’t they just say bathroom if they mean bathroom? But okay. Bed and bathroom. Right now that’s sounds pretty appealing. I need to go to the bathroom, actually.”

  “Shall we ring the doorbell? The sign says that it usually works.”

  Her husband didn’t reply. He was already striding toward the door of the little house. Back by the fence, Frances Willoughby tried to squeeze her swollen foot back into the shoe, which she had slipped off. Finally, she gave up and walked in a lopsided way, carrying the shoe, to join him. Before he pressed the doorbell, he said to her in a low voice, “If they ask for our name, I’m going to use a pseudonym. We don’t know who runs this place.”

  His wife nodded, and he rang the bell.

  Inside, Mrs. Poore had been watching through the window. She had dampened a corner of her apron and wiped a small place clean on the smudged glass. Now she peered through it and examined the couple who stood at the front door. It made her nervous, running a B-and-B. What if criminals wanted a room to use as a hideout? Or . . . Goodness, she could hardly bear to think about the terrible people who might appear on her doorstep. Vegans? Hippies? Politicians?

  Be strong, she told herself. And kind. Be like Marmee.

  This couple looked ordinary, she decided. Boring, even. Brown clothes, grumpy faces, bad hairdos. She decided to open the door.

  “Good afternoon.” The man who stood there greeted her in a gruff, belligerent voice. “I certainly hope that the second B stands for bathroom.”

  “Second B?” Mrs. Poore was confused.

  “Where is it? The bathroom?”

  She stood aside to let him in, pointed toward the bathroom, and watched in confusion as he disappeared into it.

  “Sorry,” the woman who had been left standing in the doorway sa
id. “He’s even worse when he has to go in the middle of the night. You know how men are.”

  “No,” Mrs. Poore said sadly, “I suppose that once I did know how men are, but my dear husband has been gone a very long time, looking for people who would like to buy outdated encyclopedias. I believe he is in Alaska now. And he hasn’t been able to send us any money. That’s why we are destitute and I have opened a B-and-B.”

  “Actually,” Mrs. Willoughby said, “I am hoping that the second B might stand for Band-Aid. I need one for my foot.”

  “Please come in,” said Mrs. Poore. Mrs. Willoughby, still holding her shoe, hopped inside, thinking briefly that if her husband had not disappeared into the bathroom, he would probably comment that she resembled a kangaroo. She followed Mrs. Poore into the kitchen and began to lower herself into a chair.

  “Stop!” Mrs. Poore said loudly. “Here, take this other chair. That one has a very wobbly leg and sometimes flings people onto the floor.”

  Mrs. Willoughby sat carefully in the second chair, which was itself a little wobbly since the legs seemed to be different heights. But she arranged herself with care and finally relaxed. It felt very good not to be walking anymore, even though—she looked around—she seemed to be in a very sweet but somewhat shabby place. A crayoned drawing taped to the wall was the only decoration.

  Mrs. Poore was rummaging in a drawer. “Aha!” she said after a moment. “Band-Aid!” She picked it up, approached Mrs. Willoughby, and said, “Show me the hurty place.”

  Mrs. Willoughby pointed to her blister and winced a little as Mrs. Poore meticulously arranged the small Band-Aid over it and pressed it into place.

  “I hope it sticks,” Mrs. Poore murmured. “It’s been used once already.”

  “Used?”

  “We can’t afford new Band-Aids every time. Thrift is an important virtue.” Mrs. Poore smiled sweetly. “I always tell my children that. They accuse me of Marming, but I do think it’s true, that one should always be thrifty, even with Band-Aids.”