The Mennyms

by Sylvia Waugh

  “Let’s all go up to the attic,” said Vinetta. It seemed the best place to be in the circumstances. She took Wimpey by the hand and led the way.

  Wimpey looked back over her shoulder at Pilbeam.

  “Who is she?” she asked in a whisper.

  “Just wait,” was her mother’s short reply as she took her into the attic.

  “But who is she?” persisted Wimpey, raising her voice now and looking all around her at the attic furnishings, Soobie’s record-player, the spare TV set.

  Pilbeam sat down on the footstool as soon as she came in. She said nothing. Vinetta sat Wimpey on top of the wicker chest, the one with the bales of cloth in it. Both chests had been pulled well forward and formed a boundary between Pilbeam’s part of the attic and a huge stretch of emptiness beyond. On the other chest, the television set was making a vain attempt to get people to listen to the news.

  “Turn that off,” said Vinetta as she sat down in the rocking chair. Soobie did so and then sat himself on a couple of cushions on the floor.

  “Well! Who is she?” demanded Wimpey loudly and, for good measure, she kicked her heels against the side of the wicker chest.

  Pilbeam glowered at her. An unconscious Wimpey might appeal to Pilbeam’s maternal instincts; an objectionable brat, sitting on her wicker chest and talking as if its owner were not present, most certainly did not.

  “This is Pilbeam,” said Vinetta. “When Appleby comes home, we are going to bring her down to meet the family. She is going to live with us. She doesn’t want to come down yet and we are keeping her a secret.”

  “A sort of surprise,” said Wimpey excitedly. “But where did you get her from?”

  Pilbeam glowered more than ever.

  “Well,” said Vinetta. “I have been thinking about that. We can pretend that she is your cousin from Canada and that she has come to live with us because she has always wanted to come to England.”

  “No, you won’t,” cried Pilbeam indignantly, jumping to her feet. “You’ll do no such thing. You are my mother. Soobie, though I am sorry to say it, considering what a sneak he is, is my twin. Appleby, Wimpey, Googles and Poopie are my younger sisters and brother. So there!”

  The lips were definitely not perceptibly pink satin anymore. They had become highly mobile and now expressed all the anger and determination Pilbeam was feeling.

  Vinetta was at a loss what to say.

  “But where have you been?” insisted Wimpey. “Why have we never seen you before?”

  “I’ve worked that one out for myself,” replied Pilbeam. “It was not easy. There were so many things I was born knowing and then Soobie and Mother told me so many more things, things I seemed to know already. But I have had time to think these last few weeks. And I have worked it all out. I’ve been here in the attic all the time. Aunt Kate died before she could finish me. So I lay asleep till Soobie and Mother found me and brought me to life. That is the truth and it is better than a load of rubbish about Canadian cousins.”

  She did not know and would never know that she had been found totally dismembered.

  Vinetta looked ashamed of herself. She got up from the rocking chair and put her arms around her daughter.

  “You’re perfectly right, my dear. The truth is always better. It is just that we are so used to pretending. It’s a habit hard to break.”

  “You’ve been asleep in the attic ever since Aunt Kate died?” asked Wimpey in wonder, trying to get it straight in her mind.

  “Yes,” said Pilbeam simply.

  “But that was forty years ago. You’ve been asleep for forty years. It’s like the Sleeping Beauty.”

  “What shall we do now?” asked Vinetta. “Will you come and meet the rest of the family?”

  Like her twin, Soobie, so like him in many ways, Pilbeam made her own rules and she stuck to them rigidly.

  “No,” she said, “I am staying here till Appleby returns.”

  She turned to Wimpey quite savagely. Gripping her narrow little shoulders, she stared into the baby blue eyes and said sharply, “Don’t come back here till you are asked. And don’t tell anyone else in the house, not even Poopie, that you have seen me. Understood?”

  “Yes, Pilbeam,” said Wimpey, the pale blue beads flickering nervously. “I’ll not tell a single soul. Honest.”

  Fear need not have come into it. Wimpey was quite prepared to worship Pilbeam, and Pilbeam was ready and willing to accept her young sister as an adoring acolyte. Still, there was no harm in being on the safe side.

  31

  * * *

  Searching Again

  VINETTA RETURNED TO the lounge leaving an excited Wimpey to settle down in her bedroom. There would be no family hour this evening. Poopie did not need telling. He was so busy on manoeuvres that had he been wanted downstairs someone would have had to go and fetch him. Tulip was already in the lounge, sitting by the carrycot where Googles was now sleeping.

  “I’ll take her into the nursery,” said Vinetta.

  “She took some pacifying, I can tell you,” said Tulip, keeping her voice down. “You’d think she knew there was something wrong.”

  Vinetta smiled sadly but said no more. She carried the cot next door and returned immediately to her chair beside the fire. Joshua came in as usual to spend a little time with the family before going to work.

  “Where is everybody?” he asked.

  “In their own rooms,” replied Vinetta without bothering to explain why. Joshua was always content with simple answers. Long explanations were boring and unnecessary.

  “No news?” he asked.

  “None,” said Vinetta.

  There was a short silence.

  Tulip switched on the television, to give some background noise. And they all sat there, ignoring it.

  Joshua gave a cautious look at his wife and his mother, then took out his pipe and cradled it in his hand. When is a pretend not a pretend? He needed to smoke the unlit pipe.

  The weather forecast was saying that there would be more heavy rain in some part or other of the British Isles.

  And there was.

  “Listen to that rain,” said Joshua, going to the window and lifting the curtain to look out. “It’s on with the boots and out with the brolly again!”

  He got up and went to sort out his wet weather clothing.

  “I’ll be away now,” he called from the hall after a few minutes.

  “Bye,” answered the two women.

  Tulip switched off the television, and went to the breakfast room, peeping in at the sleeping Googles as she passed.

  Vinetta did not move. She listened to the rain on the windows and she grew more and more intensely miserable. The agony of wondering where her daughter could be on a night like this felt like a fist in the stomach taking her breath away.

  “Oh, Appleby,” she groaned, “where, oh where, are you?”

  But it was Soobie who answered her. He was there at the lounge door, dressed in the hooded coat again and the blue wellington boots. In his hand was the golf umbrella.

  “I’ll find her, Mother. I will find her. She’s wilful but she is strong and resourceful. I think I know where to look.”

  This time when he went out into the stormy night he did not turn towards the town and the well-lit shops. He turned left, past the first church which was closed up and in complete darkness, on to the second church which was dimly lit but still closed. He walked right up to the arched doorway of this second church and looked carefully in the corners of the porch. A little boy of about nine or ten was sitting in a huddle with his knees up to his chin. But there was no sign of Appleby.

  The third church had two entrances. A large double door in the centre of the front facade was firmly shut. Soobie even tried the metal ring that formed the handle. It looked promising. There were lights in the stained glass windows. There was a definite air of a building that was not closed and shuttered. Soobie looked along to the right and his eye fell on the second door. It was smaller, no bigger than
an ordinary house door, and narrow and, what was more to the point, a little bit ajar.

  Cautiously, Soobie went in. He found himself in an inner porch where there were noticeboards on the walls, and two coat stands. Looking through the glass partition into the nave, he saw that there were three or four individuals sitting, or kneeling in silent prayer, well-separated from one another, very private people in a very private place.

  He watched for a while before slipping quietly into the far end of the back pew. He knelt before the statue of a lady with a child in her arms. Appleby was not there, but the prayerful mood of the place gave him another straw to clutch at.

  In deep shadow he pushed his hood back just far enough to make it clear that he knew to bare his head in church. Being Soobie, always honest to himself, he was prepared to be no less than honest to God.

  “I do not know who made the part of me that thinks. I do not know who I really am or what I really am. I am never satisfied to pretend. I cannot pretend that you are listening to me. I can only give you the benefit of the doubt. And it is a massive doubt, I can tell you. I do not know whether I believe in you, and, what is worse, you might not believe in me. But I need help and there is nowhere else to turn. The flesh-and-blood people who come here have something they call faith. Please, if you are listening to a rag doll with a blue face, let the faith of those others be enough for you to help me. I must find my sister, or my mother will be the first of us to die. Dear God, I don’t even know what that means!”

  It was all he could say. After he had said it, two things came to his mind. First, he knew now just why he had to find Appleby. Secondly, he had the feeling, and it was no more than a feeling, that someone somewhere had heard his prayer.

  He went out into the wet autumn evening and wandered in the direction of the park. The gates were closed, but times being what they were, the railings by the gate had been vandalised and there was a gap of ample size for even Soobie to pass through.

  He wandered down the broad path till he came to a junction. To the left a narrower path led upwards among some tall leafless trees. To the right the broad path continued downwards past a grassy playground to the lake. Weak, old-fashioned lamps lit both paths and were reflected in the rainwater. The rain was still falling, thin but steady. Soobie’s coat was soaked. It was fortunate that the blue wellingtons were more waterproof than the old golf umbrella.

  He stood at the junction for a few seconds. Then he decided to follow the more sheltered, narrow path up among the trees. After a few yards, he passed a park-bench and then another one. They were arranged at intervals all along the path facing, through the trees, the green, the playground and the more distant lake.

  Soobie walked slowly and bleakly on. At the top of a walk that came up from the lake and split the green into two large areas there was a wooden building, all shuttered, with what looked like the face of a clock just perceptible through the darkness in a little lantern tower. Soobie kept on walking towards it.

  Just before he reached the building, on the last seat, he saw what looked like a very large bundle of dirty rags. Soobie knew at once that it was Appleby, for no other reason than that for the past ten minutes or more he had expected to find her there. Some instinct had told him that she would be lying just as she was, scruffy and desperate, not knowing where to turn.

  Soobie was pleased to find her. He was overjoyed to find her. But he didn’t show it.

  He went up to the seat and grabbed her wet arm.

  “Come on,” he said. “You’re coming home. Your mother’s worried sick.”

  Appleby looked up at him wildly. Still defiant, she made herself say, “So what?”

  Soobie bit his blue lip and was about to say something salutary when Appleby’s defiance suddenly crumbled and she slumped back on the seat and sobbed.

  There was nothing more to say. Soobie took her by the arm and, without a word, supported her wet weight along the path, through the gap in the railings, and out into the dark street.

  32

  * * *

  Appleby Takes a Bath

  IT WAS TEN o’clock in the evening when Soobie struggled through the front door supporting Appleby, who was leaning on him like a dead weight. His coat was wet, his umbrella was torn and his boots were covered in mud. But his discomforts were nothing compared to Appleby’s.

  Tulip and Vinetta had rushed together to answer the doorbell. They brought the wanderers in out of the cold, rainy night into the comfortably heated hall. Soobie quickly removed his wet coat and dirty boots and put his ruined umbrella in the cloakroom.

  Then they all concentrated upon Appleby. Her beautiful red hair was matted with mud and looked no colour at all. Her sweatshirt and jeans were caked with dirt. She had somehow managed to lose her shoes and her socks were in shreds. Her green eyes looked unseeing and lustreless. They were obviously nothing but green buttons, sewn in place by Kate forty years ago. Whatever magic had turned them into functioning eyes had gone. Only the mouth remained alive, turned down at the edges and quivering.

  Vinetta looked shocked. All the things she might have said, the reproaches she might have made, the explanations she might have demanded, remained unspoken. When Appleby slumped forward, Vinetta caught her in her arms and hugged her tight till the murky water that had penetrated her whole body began to ooze out. Tulip and Soobie helped to take her into the lounge and they laid her down on the settee.

  The mouth still quivered but nothing else moved.

  “What shall we do?” Vinetta asked Tulip, looking terrified.

  Tulip looked at her filthy grand-daughter and her distraught daughter-in-law.

  “She will have to have a bath in one of the big baths,” she said decisively. “All that dirt has gone deep into her system. Sponging or even showering will not get it out.”

  The green buttons flickered to life for a moment. Appleby looked horrified. But she had not the strength to protest, or even to maintain her look of horror for long.

  Vinetta was worried. No one had ever had a bath. A sponge down, yes. Even a very quick dive into and out of the shower. But a bath?

  “Are you sure, Tulip?” she asked doubtfully. “The water will go right through her. We’ll never be able to get her dry again.”

  Tulip’s crystal eyes looked hard and determined, like a doctor who knows his insistence upon drastic surgery is risky but right.

  “There is water inside her now,” she explained, “– filthy water. She looks to me as if she’s fallen into a pond. We must get the dirt out and then think about how to dry her afterwards.”

  On the settee, Appleby lay stretched out and lifeless. Dirty water was dripping from every part of her. Her face, hands, and all of her clothing were covered in slime. Bits of green weed were clinging to her. She looked not just wet but drowned.

  “There is no life left in her,” said Vinetta as she timidly touched her daughter’s arm. “It would be cruel to put her to any more torment. Let her rest.”

  “No,” insisted Tulip, “we must be cruel to be kind. There will never be life in her till she is clean and dry. If she is allowed to dry off in the state she is in now, she will dry stiff and solid and goodness knows what problems that would lead to.”

  “How do we know that she’ll ever come to life again?” asked Vinetta, but even as she asked it she remembered the head, limbs and torso they had found in the attic. They had become Pilbeam, and Pilbeam was as alive as any of them.

  “We don’t know,” replied Granny Tulip brusquely, “but we have nothing to lose by trying.”

  Soobie had stood by silent, considering what was said. Then he put his weight behind his grandmother’s wisdom.

  “We’ll have to carry her up to the bathroom on the first floor. We can fill the bath with warm water and put some shampoo into it. Whatever we wash dries. Our hair dries. Our clothes dry. So though it may take longer and be more difficult, you can depend on it, Appleby will dry.”

  She was heavy. My goodness, she was heavy! They l
ugged her up the stairs and into the bathroom. They sat her on a chair whilst the bath was being prepared. Soobie, having helped with the heavy work, left his mother and grandmother to get on with the business of washing.

  Since every bit of Appleby was made of cloth, it did not occur to them to remove the dirty sweatshirt and jeans. Only the tattered socks were pulled off ready to throw in the rubbish. When the bath was felt to be of a suitable depth and temperature, Appleby was plunged into it. The soapy water soon turned black and scummy.

  Vinetta fetched a scrubbing brush from the kitchen and scrubbed away at her daughter’s hair, face, arms, jeans, sweatshirt, everything. After half an hour, Appleby was, if possible, wetter than at first, her body soaking up the water like a sponge, but she was not much cleaner.

  “Pull out the plug,” ordered Tulip, trying to stay calm, but by no means sure that the remedy she had prescribed was going to work.

  The dirty water drained away leaving a broad, black tide-mark round the bath, and slumped inside it, a dazed, grey figure making feeble efforts to move arms and legs.

  “She’s still moving,” said Tulip, feeling frightened but trying to sound hopeful.

  “What next?” asked Vinetta with a tinge of anger in her voice.

  They tried to lift Appleby out of the bath, but she was too heavy.

  “Get Soobie,” ordered Tulip. “We’ll take her to the bathroom upstairs and run another bath, but before we put her into it, we’ll rinse the dirty suds off under the shower up there.”

  Soobie, Vinetta and Tulip dragged Appleby up the next flight of stairs, over the beautiful blue Durham carpet.

  “The carpet’s getting filthy,” said Soobie.

  “Never mind the carpet,” snapped Vinetta. “That’s easily seen to.” She was almost out of breath and fully out of patience.

  As the suds were washed away under the shower, Appleby began to look a normal colour again. Her face was turning pinkish. Her hair was back to its natural shade of red. The green sweatshirt was still streaked with dirt, but recognisably green. The jeans were nearly clean and Appleby’s feet and ankles showed beneath in flesh-coloured hues with toe-nails painted red, though the paint was chipped and the toes were still greyish.