by Penny Dolan
‘Is Kitty a fairy too?’ I asked.
They frowned, aghast, and covered their mouths. ‘Don’t be silly. Our Kitty can’t be a fairy any more.’
‘Has she been a fairy, then?’
‘Mouse, Kitty was the most famousest fairy that ever lived!’ Dora whispered. ‘She was wonderful!’
‘But she isn’t a fairy now,’ Flora declared, finger on lips. ‘Now she just helps with things that have to be done.’
This was mysterious. ‘Why isn’t Kitty a fairy now?’
They sighed very deeply. ‘We don’t know, exactly,’ Dora told me.
‘And we do know almost everything!’ Flora confided.
‘But you could ask Kitty, and then you could tell us . . .’ Dora mused, smiling sweetly at me.
Flora warned me, eyes wide. ‘But don’t do it unless she’s in a very, very good mood. Kitty can be really, really cross sometimes!’
‘We did ask her once, but it made her sad,’ Dora said. ‘Like you looked sad when we met you.’
Aunt Indigo burst in briskly, folded washing in her arms. ‘Girls, that’s enough. Go and help with breakfast, you chatterers,’ she ordered sharply. ‘You mustn’t believe everything the twins tell you, Mouse.’
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CHAPTER 29
BENEATH THE CUPBOARD
Scrope hurried beneath the huge portraits, towards the main door of Epton Towers. As he went, he tumbled the contents of an old jewellery box into his open travelling bag. Maybe it was the thought of Button’s threats that made him stumble suddenly on the mat?
The bag dropped, catch undone, and a single ruby brooch spilled out. It danced across the tiles, sparkling in the rays of light, then rolled beneath the heavy cupboard that held the post tray, where letters were left.
Scrope looked about him, but saw no servant. Dropping down on to his hands and knees, he peered deep into the dark narrow space but could not reach the brooch. He seized the paperknife from the tray and poked it into the gap. Though the blade tapped against the brooch, it met something light and papery too.
Scrope flicked the paperknife, and the ruby brooch skimmed out across the tiles, along with a long-hidden note whose cobwebby edges had been chewed by mice.
Scrope caught sight of his own name, written in Adeline’s looping script. Trembling, he unfolded the note and glimpsed the date when it was written. So many years ago!
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Dearest Scrope,
How can I thank you for all your kindnesses to me ? If there was ever a noble soul, that is yourself. Soon you will be my own true and trusted brother, someone who I know I can ever rely on . . .
True and trusted? The words burned like acid. True and trusted? Scrope’s head whirled with memories and he groaned.
What had he become since that day, since he first knew Adeline? How had he behaved since then? Scrope sat like a child on the tiled floor, going over and over her words, seeing himself as Adeline saw him. His spirit shrank within him. True and trusted brother . . .
One of the footmen appeared tactfully at Scrope’s side and helped him to his feet.
Scrope walked to the door as if in a trance. He mounted his waiting horse and sat unsteadily in the saddle. All he could think about was Adeline, and Adeline’s words.
Trusted brother? Untrusted enemy? Which one was he? After a while he set the horse trotting on.
The footman told all the other servants that the young master’s face looked as if he had seen a ghost, and that, unbelievably, Scrope had thanked him for his kindness.
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CHAPTER 30
NEW FACES
Out in the wash-house, Aunt Indigo was bellowing hymns as she beat out the dirt with the dolly-stick. Aunt Violet’s sewing machine was thrumming away in her sewing room.
Then a neighbour, Mrs Orpheus, arrived, as I learned she often did. She stood two irons in front of the fire to heat and spread thick ironing blankets and cloths over the table. Soon Mrs Orpheus’s irons thudded and thumped, smoothing the crumpled shirts beneath their weight. When one iron cooled, she put it before the fire again and took the other one.
The only place where Kitty and I could talk was in the scullery, while she sorted out the contents of last night’s bundle.
‘Adnam’s shirts, six, two gory . . . Adnam’s plain cravats, six . . . Adnam’s stockings, silk pairs . . . Adnam’s . . . Ooops!’ Kitty thrust a pair of gentleman’s drawers into the washing basket.
‘Who,’ I said at last, ‘is Adnam?’
‘What? Hugo Adnam? Don’t you know anything about the theatre? About plays? Adnam is only the most important actor of all time!’
Plays? Jarvey had read plays with us, but I wasn’t sure that counted. ‘Not much,’ I said, unwillingly, ‘but I do know about Mr Punch.’
‘Ha!’ Kitty cried disdainfully. ‘Mr Punch? He’s not a real actor. He’s a wooden doll.’
‘Well, let me tell you, Kit . . .’ I began.
Without giving her a moment to argue, I rattled out everything about my time with Charlie Punchman and Dog Toby. I told her about the shows and the crowds, and I knew those months were true, unlike some parts of my life. I left out any talk about handstands because Kitty, the once famousest fairy, might not be very impressed with my skills. Eventually I paused for breath.
‘Enough, Mouse, enough. Maybe Mr Punch is a sort of actor, after all!’
We laughed for a moment, friend to friend, but once the brightness of my story was done I shut up. My mouth felt full of ashes, for I had remembered Roseberry Farm all burnt out, and Ma gone, and all those other thoughts. Too much, too much.
Kitty eyed me expectantly, longing for another adventurous story. ‘Who are you looking for, Mouse?’
‘No. Doesn’t matter, Kit. Tell me more about your grand Mr Adnam instead.’
Kitty stood up proudly. She paced about as if she was on the stage, eyes bright with enthusiasm. ‘Hugo Adnam is the Greatest Actor that ever lived. He is the Albion Theatre – that’s what everyone says.’ She put her face close to mine, making sure I did not miss the importance of her words. ‘Mouse, Adnam does just about everything. He manages the actors and musicians and dancers and the scenery. Everything!’ There was such longing in her voice.
‘Really?’
‘Well, he doesn’t do the tickets and playbills and that front-of-house stuff. The General deals with that, but he does everything else. Mouse, you should see the place, full of people, stagehands and actors and Hugo and . . . and . . .’ Her face darkened as she muttered, ‘And Bellina Lander.’ Now it was Kitty’s turn to be silent and angry.
‘You win, Kit.’ I tried to make my voice cheerful. ‘Adnam sounds much grander than wooden Mr Punch and his swozzle.’
She smiled a little, but her whole body drooped.
‘So that’s what you were doing last night?’ I persisted. ‘Bringing the girls back from the Albion?’
‘Mmm. They’d been dancing.’
‘And you?’
‘Enough, Mouse!’ she spat. ‘They dance onstage; I don’t. Understand that?’ She flounced out angrily, carrying the dirty shirts to the laundry.
Whoa! If Kitty turned against me, I wouldn’t last long at the Aunts’. I waited till she returned. It was time for a touch of truth.
‘Want to know why I’m here then?’ I swallowed hard. ‘I’m trying to find my Ma.’
‘Your lost Ma?’ Kitty was fascinated by the idea of my own drama. ‘Where does she live? What’s her name? Tell me all about her!’
It was a mistake to hear these questions that I’d so far only thought for myself. ‘Ma might not be my mother, Kit, just somebody where I once lived. Don’t know much about her really.’
‘Then how are you going to find her, Mouse?’ Kitty asked, her eyebrow
s arching. ‘What facts do you have?’
What facts indeed? Ma Foster? I had begun to lose trust in that name. There was some other name that Isaac used, but what was it? Annie? Harriet? How could I not remember it?
‘None, Kit.’ I shuffled awkwardly, then spoke brightly, as much to myself as to Kitty. ‘Maybe I’ll just see Ma out there on the street and know her as soon as I see her.’ This sounded a pitiful hope. The Ma in my head was Ma as she looked when we were happy at Roseberry Farm. What did she look like now?
Why, Mouse? I asked myself – before Kitty did. If you knew so little, why are you here? Because this was the one place where there might be hope? Because I had nowhere else to go?
‘That man in the carriage last night –’ I said, changing the subject ‘– did you know him?’
Kitty gave an exasperated breath. ‘Course not. It was just something that happens, one of those nuisances I’m always warning the girls about, like drunkards and pickpockets and dogs foaming at the mouth. I’m really glad they got scared, Mouse. It’s dangerous so late at night. Perhaps it will stop the silly things running on ahead next time.’
‘Why don’t you tell your aunts? Surely Aunt Violet would tell them to behave?’
‘Idiot! If I tell the Aunts, they’ll have to stop the girls dancing, and what would we do without the money they bring in? We’d probably be out on the street.’
‘Like me?’ I asked.
Kitty blushed. ‘Sorry. But don’t say a word about last night,’ she begged. ‘Please, Mouse.’
And a loud scream made us rush into the yard.
Catastrophe among the washing lines! Aunt Indigo, like the captain of a storm-tossed sailing ship, was battling to keep the masts of her clothes props upright. The washing flapped like loose sails, ready to plunge down, but their fall would end in murky puddles instead of bright waves.
‘Do something!’ Aunt Indigo shrieked, as one clothes prop crashed to the ground, and the line sagged lower.
Mrs Orpheus, iron in either hand, gasped fishlike from the steps. Aunt Violet hopped across the pools of water and joined Indigo in lifting the dripping cloth.
‘Oh heavens! If another line goes, we’ll have to wash it all again,’ gasped Aunt Violet. ‘As if there isn’t enough to do already! Kitty, child, help!’
Up on the house wall, just by a nailed-up window, was the small iron wheel that the lines ran through, so tightly jammed it would not slip forwards or backwards.
Kitty dragged a ladder out of the wash-house. ‘It won’t reach,’ she cried angrily.
Thanks to Grindle’s training, I knew how to reach that washing line. Despite Punchman and his pies, there was still not much weight about me, so I shinned easily up the nearby drainpipe.
‘Let me look a minute,’ I called, and examined the wad of frayed thread that stopped the well-worn pulley wheel from turning.
‘Lift everything up, high as you can,’ I shouted. ‘Up! Up!’
Kitty, Indigo and Violet balanced the wooden props aloft as if they were bearing celebration banners for our good Queen’s birthday. I picked away at the matted threads until at last the wheel was cleared and the line started to run easily through the rolling pulley.
‘There she goes!’ I shouted.
Quickly Aunt Indigo adjusted the props and lines and tightened everything up carefully. ‘Excellent work, Mouse.’
I clambered down the drainpipe, to where the Aunts were almost giggling with relief. Aunt Indigo slapped me on the back. ‘Saved us two days’ work, lad. Saved our shirts and sheets! Well done!’ She raised her hand to her forehead. ‘Heavens, Vi! We’ve got to get new lines, no matter how much they cost.’
‘So very, very glad you were here, Mouse,’ added Aunt Violet, bright-eyed.
That morning I was the very hero of the wash-yard, but would I seem such a hero to Ma? I tucked away that prickling thought because everyone was glad I was there. Even Kitty was smiling at me.
Aunt Indigo spread jam on slices of bread and handed them round. There had been a family meeting. Once we had eaten, the Aunts nodded at each other and began.
‘We are in your debt, Mouse,’ declared Aunt Violet, ‘so listen. The show at the Albion is already dressed, so we can let you stay on here for a day or two.’
I thanked them, not quite understanding, and wondered what was coming next.
Aunt Indigo sighed. ‘You see, Mouse, once Adnam has chosen his next play, there’ll be cloth and clothes everywhere, costumes in every corner, and more bodies here helping,’ she explained. ‘No space to live. No space to lie down. No room or time for anything else, day or night. It will all be rush, rush, rush, even for our three girls!’
Everyone nodded emphatically.
‘I wish we could think of somewhere for you to stay for longer, Mouse,’ continued Aunt Violet.
‘But you can certainly stay tonight!’ Aunt Indigo added insistently.
‘Thank you,’ I answered. Even one night in the warmth was better than a night in the gutter and, besides, I was supposed to be finding Ma, wasn’t I?
As we all sat there rather awkwardly, the brass clock on the mantelpiece struck the quarter-hour, and Aunt Violet clapped her hands merrily. ‘I have the solution. Why not Nick Tick?’
‘Nick Tick?’ Kitty hesitated. ‘Surely there isn’t any room with all his family, is there?’
‘Then you must persuade him he can find a spare corner, mustn’t you, Kitty?’ replied Aunt Violet, shooing us towards the door. ‘Hurry, hurry! The girls must soon leave for the theatre.’
‘Nick Tick?’ I wondered.
Close to Spinsters’ Yard, on the paved thoroughfare, was a narrow old-fashioned shop, with two narrow bottle-glass windows and a narrow door. Kitty turned the handle.
‘Watch where you step, Mouse,’ she warned, as the bell on the shop door jangled, and we were surrounded by a loud chorus of clicking and whirring and ticking.
Nick Tick’s mechanical choir was composed entirely of clocks. Grand and small, round and square, wide and slim, row upon row of dials gazed down from all sides.
There were miniature clocks, grown-up clocks and grandparent clocks. There were clocks with blunt solid hands and clocks with ornate squiggly pointers, large clocks in tall mahogany cases with polished pendulums and flashy clocks gleaming from bright brass cases.
Some fanciful clocks had sneaked in among the plainly dressed timepieces: wild piratical clocks, where painted sailing ships rocked on aquamarine billows, and handsome sporting clocks, where sprightly horses leaped endlessly over emerald-green hedges and peacocks flew across palace lawns.
‘Mr Nick?’ Kitty called. ‘Can you help?’
‘Hello? Hello? Who is it?’ From the rear of the shop appeared Mr Nick Tick, peering at us through two sets of glasses. His old-fashioned waistcoat, looped with several watch chains, reached to his knees. ‘Kitty, my dear girl!’ he cried, pushing both pairs of spectacles up on to his balding head. ‘How pleasant to see you.’
‘Mr Nick, I’ve a message from the Aunts. This boy here needs somewhere to stay.’
Nick’s smooth brow furrowed, as if he was weighing the problems my presence might cause to his clocks, so Kitty added hastily, ‘The Aunts will feed him, of course.’
‘I’m hoping to find a lost relation very soon,’ I added, in case this would reassure Mr Nick that I wouldn’t be under his feet for long. I stuck out my hand. ‘They call me Mouse.’
‘Mouse? Mouse?’ Nick Tick bubbled with laughter and shook my hand hard in return. ‘Well, dear boy, I have somewhere that might do, but I am not sure if my little shop is quite quiet enough for a mouse.’
As if to demonstrate, the shop exploded in a cacophony of chimes and clangs. The hour had arrived, and each clock shouted out its own particular tune. Floorboards shivered under our feet, cupboards s
wung open, and small tools trembled on their hooks. Kitty and I clamped our hands over our ears.
Could I manage to live in this noise? Could I sleep through so much sound? I’d managed to live through some very unhappy silences. ‘Thank you. I’m sure your clocks won’t disturb me much, Mr Nick.’
‘That is good,’ he said, smiling, ‘because now, Mouse, I shall show you where you can hide.’ He toddled towards the back of his shop and indicated two wooden panels in the wall. Sliding them apart, he revealed a narrow box of a bed, with a good thick mattress. I saw there were even some narrow shelves in the alcove, and a few old, well-worn volumes. ‘It was my own bed when I was but a boy. What do you think, Mouse? Yes?’
‘Thank you so much, Mr Nick,’ I answered, anxious about what I had to say next, ‘but I cannot pay you anything. I’ll help you with anything you like, Mr Nick, I will!’
‘Then, Mouse, this meeting is most timely,’ he said. ‘Look!’
He drew a line in the dust on the floor with the toe of his much-mended shoe.
‘As you can see, I am in need of a little assistance myself. So you can help me, and I can help you, and that seems to be a most successful arrangement.’ He grasped my hands again and shook them in an even more lively manner.
‘Thank you, dear Nick,’ said Kitty. ‘We’ll go and tell the Aunts.’
‘One precise second!’ Nick Tick rummaged in a jar and extracted a key. ‘For you, Mouse,’ he said. ‘Come and go when you want, and I trust you not to slam any doors or suchlike, eh? My family easily becomes unbalanced. Now go, go! I have work to do!’
Mr Nick flapped his hands to send us away, then picked up a timepiece as fat as a currant bun. ‘This special friend needs all my attention, don’t you?’ Nick Tick clicked the catch, and the watch sprang open.
As we went out, he was humming. ‘Hickory, dickory, dock . . .’
‘Kitty, Kitty! Where were you? We’ll be late!’ Dora and Flora danced from foot to foot, desperate to be taken to the Albion Theatre. ‘Now, now! Let’s go!’