by Michael Bond
Paddington joined in the general agreement at this last remark. One way and another, despite all that had gone wrong, he’d enjoyed his visit to a Stately Home. Now he was looking forward to going back to the comfort of his own bed at number thirty-two Windsor Gardens.
“It was very kind of Lord Luckham to invite us back,” said Judy, as they waved goodbye and made their way back down the long drive.
“Very kind,” agreed Mr Gruber. “You’ll be able to see what a real Beef Wellington tastes like, Mr Brown. Will you like that?”
Paddington considered the matter for a moment. “I think so, Mr Gruber,” he announced at last. “But if you don’t mind I won’t have any ‘Bear’s-nose’ sauce with mine. I don’t think that sounds very nice at all.”
Mrs Brown paused at her washing for a moment and then heaved a deep sigh as she glanced out of the kitchen window. “I wonder who thought up the idea for ‘bob-a-job’ week in the first place?” she said.
Mrs Bird gave a snort as she joined Mrs Brown at the window and directed her gaze towards the bottom of the garden, where a small figure in blue was struggling beneath a heavily-laden clothes line. “Whoever it was they couldn’t have had bears in mind,” she replied. “If they’d known Paddington was going to lend a paw they would have had second thoughts. I feel quite worn out with it all.
“It isn’t that I want to discourage him,” she continued, averting her eyes as something white fluttered to the ground, “but I sometimes think it would be cheaper and quicker in the long run to pay twice as much not to have things done.”
The Browns’ housekeeper spoke with feeling, for Paddington’s involvement with ‘bob-a-job’ week was a sore subject in the household.
It had all started a few days before when he’d come across an item in the local paper about the Scouts. According to the article, the local group were visiting houses in the neighbourhood all that week offering their services for the sum of fifty pence a go. No job, it said, would be too big or too small, and at the end of the week they planned to hold a jamboree in the Town Hall in aid of charity.
Although Paddington had never actually been in the Scouts, or even the Cubs for that matter, the thought of making himself useful and being paid for it at the same time struck him as a very good idea indeed, and with the week already half over he lost no time in getting down to work.
Jonathan gave him an old tent which had been cleared out of the garage at the same time as the hammock, and Paddington had erected it on the lawn so that he could use it as his headquarters.
The article had ended by saying that after each visit the Scouts would leave a special sticker with a tick printed on it which the occupant of the house could display to show that the job had been satisfactorily completed.
It was the decision to make his own stickers that had been the start of Paddington’s undoing. He wasn’t the sort of bear who believed in doing things by halves, and he’d sat up in bed quite late the first night carefully transferring his paw print from an ink pad on to some labels Mrs Bird had given him from her jam-making kit. But in the event he hadn’t been careful enough. By the time he went to turn out the light he found to his dismay that his sheets looked as if they’d been the subject of a none-too-successful ‘bob-a-job’ week themselves. They were covered from top to bottom with paw prints, and not for the first time Paddington wished he’d picked on a less unusual mark to show that things were genuinely his, for there was no disguising who was to blame.
It was a bad start. He felt he couldn’t actually charge anything for washing the sheets, even though it took the best part of a day and innumerable goes with a scrubbing brush and soap to get them clean again.
The fact that all the washing had left his paws clean for making the custard the following evening didn’t help things as much as he’d hoped either. Paddington liked making custard and normally he was very good at it, but for once everything seemed to go wrong. He wasn’t sure if it was because he was worn out after all his hard work, or whether it simply wasn’t his day, but as things turned out he made far too much and it all boiled over, landing on Mrs Bird’s clean laundry and ruining the saucepan into the bargain at the same time; all of which had taken several more hours to put right.
The truth was that despite all his hard work the front window of the Browns’ house was still sadly lacking in stickers, and he hadn’t a single penny, let alone any bobs, to show for it.
Even the simple act of putting the clothes out to dry seemed to have problems, for Mrs Bird’s expanding clothes line had been stretched beyond its limits and a good deal of the washing was already gathering fresh dirt as it trailed on the ground.
All in all, Paddington felt he’d done enough jobs to last a lifetime, and with dark hints from Mrs Bird that she expected to see her washing as she’d left it, the chances of progressing beyond number thirty-two Windsor Gardens seemed very remote indeed.
The more Paddington considered the matter the more gloomy his prospects appeared to be; in fact he was so deep in thought it was some while before he realized with a start that someone was calling his name.
Emerging from behind a large sheet, he removed a pillowcase from his head only to discover to his dismay that the voice belonged to Mr Curry.
Paddington had kept well clear of the Browns’ neighbour ever since the episode with the hammock; in fact if he’d been asked to name all the people he least wanted to talk to, Mr Curry would have been very high on the list indeed, and for a moment he toyed with the idea of putting the pillowcase over his head again, but it was too late.
However, for once the Browns’ neighbour seemed in an unusually friendly mood.
“Glad to see you’re busy, bear,” he called, as he peered over the top of the fence. “Idle paws make for mischief — that’s what I always say.”
“Oh, my paws haven’t been idle for a long time, Mr Curry,” said Paddington earnestly. “I’m doing ‘bob-a-job’ week and it’s keeping me very busy.”
“‘Bob-a-job’ week?” Mr Curry rubbed his hands together with invisible soap. “That’s a coincidence. I hope you’re putting the money to a good cause. Not frittering it away.”
“Oh yes, Mr Curry,” said Paddington. “I’m sending it all to the Home for Retired Bears in Lima. That is, if I get any,” he added sadly.
“Hmm,” Mr Curry cleared his throat. “Er … talking of ‘bob-a-job’ week, I was wondering if you would care to do me a favour, bear?” He bent down for a moment in order to undo a parcel he’d been carrying and then reappeared holding a frilly white object. “I have a dress shirt which needs seeing to. I was just going to take it to the cleaners but I need it this evening and they always charge extra if you want things back in a hurry. I wonder if you have any spare room on your line?”
“Why, yes, Mr Curry.” Paddington looked most relieved as he hurried forward to take the shirt. “I’d be very pleased.”
“Now, take care of it, bear!” barked Mr Curry, some of his more normal bad-temper coming to the fore. “It’s a very expensive shirt and it’s meant for special occasions. No dropping it in the mud, mind.”
The Browns’ neighbour looked around carefully and then lowered his voice. “As a matter of fact I’m going to the jamboree tonight. There’s a fancy-dress parade and I’m going as Beau Brummell, the famous dandy.”
Paddington’s eyes grew larger and larger as he listened to Mr Curry. He’d never pictured the Browns’ neighbour joining in any sort of parade, let alone a fancy-dress one as a Brummell.
“I hope your bows stay in place, Mr Curry,” he exclaimed as he eyed the shirt.
Mr Curry glared at him suspiciously. “Are you making fun of me, bear?” he barked.
“Oh, no, Mr Curry,” said Paddington, “there’s no need for anyone else to do that. I mean …” He broke off as Mr Curry’s face started to change colour.
“I’ll have you know, bear,” he growled, “this is a very important event. There’s a prize for the most original costume, so make sure
you take good care of it. There are a lot of frills and I don’t want any of them damaged otherwise it will be difficult to iron.”
“Bears are good at frills, Mr Curry,” exclaimed Paddington, anxious to make amends. “If you like,” he added recklessly, “I’ll do a ‘bob-a-job’ for you and iron it when I do the rest of the laundry.”
Mr Curry stared at him. “Do you mean to say Mrs Bird’s allowing you to iron her laundry?” he exclaimed.
“Well,” said Paddington truthfully, “it isn’t so much that she’s letting me, she says I must do it … after I’ve finished the mending.”
Mr Curry began to look more and more impressed, for Mrs Bird’s reputation as a housekeeper was second to none in the neighbourhood. He gave another surreptitious glance in the direction of the Browns’ house and then beckoned Paddington to come closer.
“If you like, bear,” he said, lowering his voice so that no one else could overhear, “you can do it all in my house.”
Mr Curry licked his finger and then held it up in the air. “My shirt won’t take long to dry in this breeze,” he continued. “While you’re finishing off some of your other jobs I’ll set everything up for you so that it will be ready. There are one or two small holes which need darning. I was going to have them invisibly mended but if you use a mushroom you shouldn’t find it too difficult.”
“A mushroom, Mr Curry?” repeated Paddington in surprise.
Mr Curry looked at him suspiciously. “I trust you know what you’re doing, bear?” he barked. “Everyone knows you need a mushroom when you’re doing the mending.”
“Oh, yes, Mr Curry,” said Paddington hastily, as he caught sight of the gathering storm clouds on the face of the Browns’ neighbour. “I’ll get one from Mrs Bird. I know where she keeps them.”
“Hmm.” Mr Curry gave him another searching look and then carried on with his instructions about the various tasks he wanted done.
“I shall be out for the remainder of the afternoon,” he said. “I have to see about the rest of my costume and I’m not sure how long it will take, but you can lay my shirt out ready for me to change into when I get back. In fact,” he continued, “I have an even better idea. When you’ve finished you can take it straight to the Town Hall for me. I can change there and it’ll save me coming back home again.”
While Mr Curry’s voice droned on Paddington considered the matter. He was usually very wary about doing any odd jobs for the Browns’ neighbour, especially ones which actually took place inside his house, but for once he couldn’t see anything against the idea. In fact the more he thought about it the better it seemed, for his present run of luck at number thirty-two Windsor Gardens had been so bad it couldn’t possibly get any worse.
Having reached the end of his instructions Mr Curry paused in order to open up the gap in his fence. “If you make a good job of things,” he said, “I may add a little something to your collection later.”
“Thank you very much, Mr Curry,” said Paddington gratefully.
He cast a doubtful glance up the garden towards the Browns’ kitchen as he clambered through the hole, but to his relief there was no one to be seen, and a moment later the board slipped back into place behind him.
Although he had almost convinced himself of the wisdom of his actions, Paddington had a nasty feeling that neither Mrs Brown nor Mrs Bird would entirely share his views.
Fortunately for their peace of mind, however, they were both much too busy with their cleaning to notice any of the comings and goings outside.
It wasn’t until much later that same afternoon that Mrs Bird suddenly paused in the middle of her household chores and looked out of the dining-room window with an air of surprise.
“That’s funny,” she said. “All the washing’s gone. It was there a few minutes ago.”
“Perhaps Paddington’s taken it somewhere,” said Mrs Brown vaguely. “I saw him go past the window with a large pile just now.” She frowned. “I wish he’d do one thing at a time. It was cooking just now — at least, I think it was. He was poking about in the vegetable basket looking for something.”
A worried expression came over Mrs Bird’s face, for she was suddenly reminded of the fact that Paddington had also been searching for a needle and thread at one point. “I do hope he didn’t take my lecture to heart this morning,” she said. “I know I told him I expected to see the washing how I’d left it, but I didn’t really mean him to go to all that trouble. Where can he have gone with it?”
Despite her stern exterior, the Browns’ housekeeper was a kindly soul at heart, and she began to look even more unhappy at the thought of Paddington taking her remarks amiss.
All the same, unhappy though Mrs Bird looked, it was safe to say she would have looked even more disturbed had she been able to see the object of her thoughts at that particular moment.
For Paddington was in Mr Curry’s kitchen. Not only that, but he was in a mess. Far from things being better with a change of scene, they had become ten times worse than he could possibly have imagined in his wildest dreams.
He stared mournfully at Mr Curry’s ironing board. Or rather, to be strictly accurate, he directed his gaze towards a tightly compressed bundle of brown and white material which was lying in the middle, and from which rose a steady stream of dense, black smoke.
Picking up a wooden spoon which was lying nearby, he gingerly poked what was left of Mr Curry’s shirt and then stepped back hastily as another, even larger cloud rose from the smouldering embers.
Paddington sniffed the air unhappily. It was a strange smell; a mixture of steam, burnt cloth and rotting vegetation. Worse still, it showed no signs of wanting to go away. Despite several goes with an air freshener and opening the kitchen window to its widest extent, it continued to lie like some heavy jungle mist over the ironing board.
But it wasn’t so much the smell that caused Paddington’s woebegone look, it was the thought of how he was going to get out of his present difficulties.
Mr Curry’s shirt had started life as one of the collar-attached variety; now there was little if anything attached to it at all. The collar itself hung by a thread, rather as if it had been sewn on by an absent-minded tailor just before closing time.
Had he been asked to explain what had gone wrong, Paddington would have been hard put to sort matters out in his own mind let alone put them into words.
The first big setback had been the iron. Although he’d often watched Mrs Bird with her laundry he’d never actually done any ironing before, and it had all turned out much harder than he had expected. Mrs Bird had an electric steam iron which positively glided over her laundry, hardly ever leaving the slightest trace of a singe, let alone any burn mark. Mr Curry’s iron, on the other hand, had to be heated first on the gas stove, and before he went out he demonstrated how to test it in order to make certain it was hot enough to use.
“The old-fashioned ways are the best, bear!” he barked, and taking a mouthful of water he picked up the iron and blew spray all over the bottom, causing spluttering globules of water to bound off in all directions. “That’s something my mother taught me.”
Paddington had been so surprised at the thought of Mr Curry having a mother he hadn’t really concentrated on the rest of the lecture. As a result he missed what, if anything, the Browns’ neighbour had to say on the subject of testing irons to make sure they weren’t too hot.
In the event, either bears’ spray was different to Mr Curry’s or he should have stuck to water instead of cocoa, for having made the iron extra specially hot in the hope of getting it right first time, Paddington found to his horror that it seemed intent on setting fire to anything and everything that happened to come within range.
Nothing was sacred; the cloth top on the ironing board; the plastic cover on the kitchen table; the linoleum; even the heat-proof stand had gone a funny colour.
In the end, with the safety of his whiskers very much in mind, he’d been forced to let go of the iron, as bad luck would hav
e it, right on top of Mr Curry’s shirt. It was then, as a strange sizzling noise filled the air, that he suddenly remembered he’d left a mushroom up one of the sleeves by mistake, and it was this that was giving off most of the smell.
He had been a bit doubtful about the mushroom right from the start, but Mr Curry had been most insistent that it was the only proper way to mend things. Paddington found that having paws made sewing a bit difficult at the best of times, and either Mrs Bird’s mushrooms were extra soft or Mr Curry was used to particularly hard ones, for he’d got through a whole pound in no time at all.
Paddington clambered on to Mr Curry’s kitchen stool and stared unhappily at the result of his labours.
Apart from the telltale mushroom stains, it would have taken a very short-sighted person indeed not to have spotted where the mending had taken place. Far from being invisible, it looked more like a relief map of the Himalayas.
The only good thing about it as far as he could see were the creases, which were certainly nice and sharp. Mr Curry had mentioned his creases quite a few times, and he certainly wouldn’t have had any cause to complain about the lack of them, for his shirt had the appearance of a squashed concertina. Unfortunately, though, that was where the resemblance ended, for when Paddington tried pulling it apart it made a most unmusical sound and several bits came away in his paw.
A hurried search through the kitchen drawers yielded a few well-worn dusters and a pile of old rags, but nothing remotely suitable for use as patches.
It was as he was gazing out of the window in search of inspiration that a faint gleam of hope suddenly appeared in Paddington’s eyes. In the past he’d often found that some of his best ideas came at the very moment when things looked their blackest — almost as if they were intended, and although the present one was but a tiny flicker at the end of a very long tunnel, things were too desperate for it to be ignored.
A moment later there was a click from the back door as it shut behind him and for the second time that day the boards in Mr Curry’s fence parted and a familiar-looking hat followed by some equally familiar-looking whiskers appeared in the gap.