Santa Claws

by Gabriela Harding

  “Excuse me, cherie?”

  “The tombstones in your garden. The year of your death is there, too. No one knows when they will die…do they?”

  It made her feel queasy to think that her grandparents would be buried in their own garden, together with the secret of their identity.

  “Ah, ma cherie, thoze are fake tombstones, you see. The year of birth is not the real one, because someone spying on us would be able to look us up with as little information as the correct date of birth.”

  “The year of death is fake, too,” said Grandfather Flaubert. “We put down the year when we thought we might want to retire – that way no one would bother us. As for being buried in the garden, don’t you worry about it. I shall be incinerated, and your grandmother wants to be taken to an island in the Pacific and be fed to her favourite animals, the komodo dragons.”

  Grandma Florence chuckled.

  “Eeew,” said Teddy. “That’s gross.”

  “No, it isn’t. It’s the cycle of life. Humans are always eating dead animals, and sometimes even animals that are still alive. I suppose you know oysters are alive when they slip down your throat to be sizzled to death by your stomach acids, and lobsters and mussels are killed whilst cooking. So being eaten by the glorious komodo dragons when I’m already dead will be my small contribution to this cycle – a small apology, if you like.”

  “The tombstones are just decoration, then?”

  “How lovely.” Anaconda sighed. “Greg, we might do something like this ourselves? I’ve been racking my brain trying to think of what this garden is missing – of course, I should have realised, it’s a couple of funeral stones to give it that Gothic air… I’ve noticed some very handsome ones in the window of Victorian Funerals Ltd.”

  Greg swallowed. A few of his friends from The Chess Association would have a thing or two to say about people who decorated their gardens with funeral stones.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll swing by the funeral home on Green Road, see how much they charge for marble and granite.”

  Honey didn’t like the joke. She knew the year of her grandparents’ death had not yet passed, and couldn’t help wondering if their prediction might turn out to be accurate. Spies rarely died of old age, and these particular spies had gotten quite far in their career without serious injury (apart from Grandma’s frostbite and Grandfather Flaubert’s run for his life in Iran when he ended up losing all his toenails).

  “I got so excited when I found that suitcase. I was ten, and hungry for adventure. Over the years, I put the pieces of the puzzle together,” said Dad, filling four elegant flutes with champagne the colour of molten gold. “So it wasn’t much of a shock when Mother told me everything last year.”

  “I told you he already knew,” muttered Grandfather Flaubert, buried in his newspaper.

  When everyone was busy studying her fake passports, Grandma Florence slipped out of the room. She found the drinks cabinet, and turned the key in the lock, her hand shaking. She was so immersed in her thoughts she didn’t realise Flaubert was behind her until she felt his hands on her shoulders.

  “When were they transferred to Kvíabryggja?” she said quietly, without turning around. The room was dark; the storm had stopped, but the rain still streamed down the windows.

  “Last week,” Flaubert answered, “for good behaviour.”

  “Kvíabryggja, of all places, Flaubert! No bars! No fences! The nicest jail in Iceland! It’s as if they want them to run away.”

  “I know,” Flaubert sighed, tightening his grip on his wife’s heaving shoulders.

  “I assume you saw that the letter had no stamp,” Florence said, her eyes scrutinizing the wet garden through the window. She walked over to the back door and pulled the thick, velvet curtain. The room went darker.

  “We could have retired.”

  “You know what, Florence? I don’t think we ever will, retire I mean. We’re natural born spies – we just get better with age.”

  “Do you want to hear the good news? The shock of seeing Benito Sanchez again has cured my cystitis. Before I knew it, I spent ten hours without going to the toilet. And I’ve been improving ever since. The doctor always said the illness was stress-related – and that a shock could cure it.”

  “Ironic,” said Flaubert.

  Florence smiled through her tears. Flaubert didn’t stop her as she downed a small bottle of gin. From the next room, they could hear music and the rustle of wrapping paper as the family opened their presents. Teddy’s cries of excitement pierced the gloom of the lounge where Florence and Flaubert stood in stunned silence.

  “A selfie-stick!” squealed Anaconda.

  “Merry Christmas, darling!”

  “Merry Christmas!” chorused the children.

  “And no more cranberry sauce this time!” There was laughter at Dad’s joke, from everyone apart from the old couple who made their way slowly back to the table, their shoulders slumped under the weight of yet another secret. They couldn’t have eaten a thing, not even the edible holly that had looked so appealing at the start of the day.

  “Cake?” offered their daughter-in-law, holding out a tray where a pink cake with the print of a pig snout on the icing sat invitingly. “This is from Mrs Rachelle.”

  “Say cheese!” Anaconda propped herself between them, throwing her spidery arms around their necks, holding the selfie-stick with her iPhone at arm’s length. Florence and Flaubert were so deep in thought they didn’t even blink at the flash. Anaconda was now staring at the photograph, where their old faces looked as glum as in the photos on the funeral stones. Florence shivered, wondering if the death prediction would be accurate after all.

  “Blimey,” Anaconda’s face dropped. She peered at the photograph through her monocle. “Cheer up, you two. It’s Christmas day, and you look as if you’re attending your own funeral.”

  Greg snorted with laughter. “More cake?” he inquired, when everyone’s plates were licked clean. “Teddy, fetch the lemon meringue from the fridge.”

  “You might like that more than the Eton mess, Maman.” Anaconda smiled. “It’s really sour.”

  “I’ll get it,” Honey announced.

  “Take this to the recycle bin.” Dad filled her arms with ripped wrapping paper until only her eyes peeked over the pile.

  The kitchen was quiet, with only the drip of the tap and the whisper of the rain outside. Old Woolly came to Honey’s mind, and she shuddered to think of his horrible end. Dying was one thing, being mocked was another. Poor Old Woolly, his death had been as humiliating as his life. Honey turned off the tap, and opening the window, she drank in the air, rich with the fragrance of cooking herbs: bay leaves, rosemary, thyme, mingled with the scent of moist earth. A thin, ghostly fog floated over the park, like steamy breath emanating from the ground.

  For a while, she enjoyed the silence. Then she took out her iPhone and replayed the conversation she overheard only minutes earlier, on her way to the bathroom.

  “When were they transferred to Kvíabryggja?” her grandmother’s voice was barely audible, and yet, the words gave her goosebumps.

  “Last week, for good behaviour.” Her grandfather sounded old and tired.

  “Kvíabryggja, of all places, Flaubert! No bars! No fences! The nicest jail in Iceland! It’s as if they want them to run away.”

  “I know.”

  “I assume you saw that the letter had no stamp.”

  “We could have retired.”

  “You know what, Florence? I don’t think we ever will, retire I mean. We’re natural born spies – we just get better with age.”

  Honey tapped the screen and the conversation ended. A smile crept across her face. What would the Queen-of-Spies do to know she had been outsmarted? Technology wasn’t Grandma’s strongest point, and it had been easy for Honey to
connect her iPhone to Grandma’s bionic hand, and record every conversation she had whilst wearing it. Most were in French, but, thanks to her sophisticated language converter, Honey could see every mumbled word on screen. She’d thought it was genius. Until now.

  From the bin, she unfolded the scrunched up envelope where her name, Snædis Helgarsson, was written in the best calligraphy. And yes, Grandma had been right. Like all spies, she had a good eye for detail. The letter had no stamp.

  “Honey! The lemon meringue, please!” her stepmother called.

  She walked over to the utility room, and it was then that she noticed the side door was swinging in the wind. The rain pattered down on the giant bins. Shivering, she closed the door, turning the key firmly in the lock.

  “Honey!”

  “Coming!”

  Honey opened the fridge, scanning the contents. Juice, wine and numerous snail salads. Aha! There was the meringue. Honey tried to pull it out but it was stuck. A new dish covered with a glass lid was blocking the way.

  “Oh no,” she muttered. “Not another…”

  Honey froze. Something was coming out of the dish. Something white and bushy.

  “Blanche,” she whispered, and bit her lips to choke her scream. A strip of paper was tied to the ermine’s bloody tail. Honey unrolled it…and read it in the cold light of the fridge.

  ‘A message from Iceland,’ it read, in the same neat handwriting as the letter she didn’t get a chance to read.

  “One lemon meringue, coming up!” she yelled, and took a few deep breaths before she appeared in the dining room wearing her brightest smile. As she spooned the meringue into her dry mouth, she thought of Teddy’s pet, frosting over at the back of the freezer, between hulks of pork and beef. Tomorrow, she would think of giving Blanche a proper resting place, maybe somewhere in the garden, under some fragrant bush. Tomorrow, she would think about the letter and all the rest. But today was Christmas, and she had to put on a brave face. For the first time, living a dull life seemed an impossible, wonderful dream. With a sharp pang of fear, Honey realised that, for the past three years, Christmas had been anything but ordinary, and this Christmas, she now saw, had bigger surprises for the Raymonds than the trinkets hidden between folds of glossy paper and shiny fabrics winking at her from the branches of the festive tree.

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to all of you who helped me along the bitter sweet publishing journey. First of all, the staff and children at West Drayton Primary, where ‘Santa Claws’ was born in a high-roofed library amongst hundreds of children’s books. My husband, for reading the first few chapters and making the first suggestions in what would be the first of five laborious drafts. My sister, for making me write a new plot because she didn’t like elves. My father, for teaching me humility and resilience. My mother, for telling me to put the ironing away and get writing. Thank you, Mum.

  The agents who read different versions of Santa Claws and gave me precious feedback and encouragement: Zoe at The Blair Partnership, Bryony at Eve White and Camilla at Darley Anderson. Being in the spotlight for a few moments helped me capture that light forever, and write with it in my heart.

  My mentor, Siobhan Curham, who opened a door for me when all others had closed. Things would have been very different if you hadn’t noticed that shy girl standing on the library steps looking at a leaflet you had placed on the window.

  Everyone at Harrow Writers Group – Mike Deller, Jan Silverman, Sangeeta Bhargava, Mike Davidson, Philip Lawder, Anna May Mangan, Kay Seeley, Charlotte Baldwin, Naatoua Swayne, Barbara Towell. For years, you were my rock, my inspiration, my hope. You still are.

  My editors, John Hudspith and David Stroud, for their astute observations and merciless cuts, for telling me when I wasn’t good enough and for keeping my spirits up as I wrote draft after draft after draft. Johnny, thank you for teaching me how to write for children and for believing in me. David, you’re as good a psychic as you are an editor: the prediction you made all those years back is coming true.

  The team at Matador: Jeremy, Lauren, Jack, Sian, Katherine, Rosie, to name but a few. You taught me that publishing can be as exciting as writing. And as hard!

  Thank you to my son, Zach, for putting up with a working mum. Thank you for keeping me afloat.

  And thank you, my readers, for picking up this book and giving it a chance. You mean far more than you think.