by Sylvia Waugh
In the morning, Charlie would come in and see the doll standing there. Charlie was always the first to arrive. He was an expatriate cockney who after years in the north still thought of London as home. What would he think when he saw Joshua who was not Joshua? Blimey! What would he think? And what would eventually happen to the doll? Thrown away with the rubbish? Claimed by one or other of the staff? They might even call in the newspapers, or the police. They would surely send to Brocklehurst Grove to make enquiries about their nightwatchman . . .
In the lounge there was already a faint smell of burning. What a calamity it would be if Soobie burst into flames and the fire spread till the whole house was ablaze!
In the attic, the mystic light spilling into the room made the floor glow vibrantly. The battle with the door was all but over. Appleby was finished, failing in her attempt to put right the harm she had done.
Oh, Kate Penshaw, Kate Penshaw, you were meant to leave your house in order! This is no way to settle your affairs on Earth. This is an appalling mess.
33
A Battle for Life
THE EARTHENWARE BOWL fell crashing to the floor and broke into a hundred pieces. With all the strength that was left in her, the spirit of Kate possessed Vinetta, the power of instinct telling her what she must do. Vinetta ran out of the room and up the stairs calling, “I’m coming, Appleby. I’m coming, my love. Hold fast. Hold on.”
She brushed past the doll on the staircase, the immobile Pilbeam. She hurtled on up to the top landing then along to the attic stairs. Her footsteps echoed through the silent house. And when she went in at the attic door, instinct told her to avert her eyes from the glowing light and join her strength to that of her daughter.
It was a battle, even with all the energy Kate’s spirit could supply. The door fought back. It had been winning. It was not about to give in easily. The battle became more and more fierce. On one side was Vinetta’s unyielding love for her family, a passion that would outlast all other. On the other were the powers of destruction.
The door pushed till it billowed. The light became savage. It gave up promising paradise and threatened instead hellfire. Vinetta held on, her shoulder thrusting at the opening, her left hand gripping the frame, her right foot wedged against the door. The gap closed . . . an inch, then it opened . . . an inch. The contest became a desperate wrestling match. Appleby, recovering a little, drawing strength from her mother’s presence, stood by her and made yet another colossal effort, pushing again, harder and harder, with the palms of both hands spread flat on the door above Vinetta’s head. The two dolls were filled with a mammoth determination to win. But it was as if some giant full of evil energy were flinging himself against the other side. The floor beneath their feet creaked and groaned.
Outside in the growing darkness, storm clouds gathered above the Grove. The elements rushed to join in the fight, unruly, noisy elements, roaring like an angry crowd. Sheet lightning lit up the statue of Matthew James Brocklehurst and thunder burst like shells all around him. It shook the house and rattled the attic windows.
The force behind the door grew stronger and stronger till the two rag dolls, even with the spirit of Kate helping them, felt their power draining away.
“Keep on pushing, Appleby. Harder, harder,” cried Vinetta, her voice barely audible above the noise. “If it wins, we must all die.” She spoke with deep conviction, even though she did not fully understand what she was saying.
The lightning spread over the sky again, its blueness adding to the eerie light within the attic. The thunder crashed, rocking the rafters with its noise.
Then there was a sudden pause, a lull in the storm, as if the contestants were drawing breath, and at that moment Vinetta called out loudly, in a voice that was not her own, “Deliver us from this evil. Strengthen us against disaster. Forgive me. Please, forgive me. This will never, ever happen again.”
The silence that followed this prayer was as deafening as the thunder had been. Then, with a long, mournful sigh, the billowing door collapsed, its handle turned and a lock could be heard to click shut. It was just a door again, an ordinary door. It was closed and the attic was left in deepest darkness. Mother and daughter sank to the floor, exhausted and terrified. There was no reserve of strength left in them.
They sat like two shipwrecked mariners washed up on an unknown shore. They slept. And, for one of them, it was the sleep of death.
The storm died away in a shower of rain that left the air fresh and clean. The moment the battle ended, Kate’s spirit was free to leave the attic, and thus did life return to the rest of the Mennyms.
In the big front bedroom, Granpa Mennym went on writing . . . was given charge of the young princes. He did not know that for the past half hour he had been in a state of suspended animation, a state that might have continued forever had it not been for the strength of love.
Tulip looked at the clock and was vaguely aware that it was later than she thought, half an hour later, and that was puzzling. She did not usually nod off. To have done so was irritating. She looked down at her knitting, still secure in her hands. The loop left the needle and the stitch was complete. She felt uneasily that something was not quite right as she went to pick up the ball of wool that had rolled away on the floor.
In the lounge, Soobie was bewildered to find himself lying awkwardly on the hearthrug. There was a smell of burning and with a yell he sprang up and began beating furiously at the back of his head from which smoke was rising. To his horror he saw sparks escape from under his hand.
“Help!” he shouted. “Somebody help me!”
Pilbeam on the staircase heard his cries, sprang into life and ran down to the lounge.
She saw black smoke rising from her brother’s head. Soobie was about to burst into flames. Pilbeam grabbed a cover from the back of the settee, flung it over his head and held it there. Her own hands felt the heat coming through but she kept her grip. The longer those sparks are deprived of air, she thought anxiously, the sooner they will die. Soobie understood and put his hands up to help. After a few minutes, Pilbeam slowly and gently uncovered the back of Soobie’s head. The sparks were gone. The smoke was dying away.
“It’s just about stopped smouldering,” said Pilbeam, concentrating on the damage to the back of her brother’s head. Soobie was frightened. This was a terrible unknown.
Pilbeam, knowing exactly how he must be feeling, said, “It’s all right. There’s not really much damage. Your hair looks more ginger than blue on the crown now and there’s a bare patch about the size of a postage stamp, but Mother will be able to put it right. You are very lucky it didn’t flare up. It could have been much worse. How on earth did it happen?”
“I don’t know,” said Soobie, feeling less alarmed now that Pilbeam had everything under control, and becoming annoyed with himself. “I’m blowed if I do. One minute I was turning off the TV, the next I was lying on the floor in front of the fire and beginning to smoulder.”
“I suppose you could have fainted,” said Pilbeam. “People do faint.”
Soobie remembered that Miss Quigley had once fainted.
“I don’t think I’m the fainting type,” he said. “And I had nothing to faint for.”
Soobie sank down onto the settee.
“I can’t think how it happened,” he said, and was even more perplexed when he looked up at the clock on the mantelpiece. The programme had finished, he had switched off the set. The act of a few seconds seemed to have taken over half an hour.
“I must have fainted,” he said. “There’s no other explanation.”
For Poopie and Wimpey the change from inanimate back to animate was less dramatic. Poopie fed his rabbit and Wimpey continued to read the harrowing tale of Joey Bettany’s brush with death. And neither of them was aware that there had been a break in the action.
Miss Quigley gave Googles one last hug before carrying her up to the night nursery. A glance at her watch told her that baby’s bedtime was half an hour later than
usual. Thirty minutes is a short time to the normal run of people, including rag dolls, but to a strict nanny thirty minutes is thirty minutes. Miss Quigley was mystified to discover that she was not running precisely to time.
Dragging herself awake at last, Vinetta said to Appleby, “Let’s go downstairs.” She stood up and reached one hand down to raise her daughter. “We must see how things are.”
Her tone was gentle and weary. She was not even sure what her words meant. How should things be?
Appleby did not answer.
“Appleby,” said Vinetta sharply, alarmed at her daughter’s failure to reply, or even to attempt to rise. But the doll that was Appleby was slouched against the door, limp and unmoving. Vinetta bent down to the floor and Appleby’s whole body lurched to one side.
“Appleby,” cried Vinetta, her voice rising octaves in terror. “Stop being silly. Get up now and come downstairs.”
The doll on the floor never stirred.
Vinetta knelt beside her and felt the lack of warmth, the solidity of fibre that was no longer buoyed by breath.
Can this be death? Can this be death?
Vinetta grabbed Appleby by the shoulders and shook her, and was alarmed to feel dust in the cloth she held and an unnatural hardness.
“Appleby, Appleby, for God’s sake wake up,” she cried. “The door is shut. It can stay shut forever. There’s no need to die. To die?”
Vinetta let go and sat down again on the floor beside her daughter. She who had made the best of many a bad situation was defeated by this one. But there is a limit to every feeling, even despair. Vinetta did not know how long she sat there, but suddenly she became light-headed and detached from reality. She got up, crossed to the attic door, the real attic door, and switched on the light. Then she went back to her daughter’s side and dragged her across to the rocking-chair. With an effort, she lifted the dead weight onto the seat.
“You’ll be all right,” she said. “You’ll be all right. Rag dolls don’t die. Not one of us has ever died. Pilbeam once sat like you in that chair. Don’t be frightened, love. It will come right. You’ll see.”
But the green glass eyes were totally vacant. The stuffed head hung on one side as if the doll had been badly made. Pilbeam’s eyes had been living even when her head was still lying in tissue paper. Pilbeam’s arms had been supple, her torso buoyant. She had been in a pre-life state. Appleby’s state was post-life, dead forever. This was the fact that Vinetta could not bring herself to believe. So she pretended that her child was sleeping. She kissed the lifeless cheek.
“I’ll have to check on the others,” she said. “We have been in grave danger, Appleby. But we will come through. Kate will look after us. Patience is everything.”
Vinetta left the attic, shutting the door gently behind her. She went down the stairs, holding firmly onto the handrail for support. The shock she had suffered was so great that she needed somehow to contain it and make it manageable. Pretend, pretend, pretend, pretend. If reality is too painful to bear, shut it out. And pretend!
34
Pretending to the Family
VINETTA LOOKED IN briefly on Sir Magnus as she passed his door.
“Yes?” said Magnus, looking up from his manuscript.
“Nothing,” said Vinetta. “Just wondered if you were all right.”
“Of course I’m all right,” said the old man. “What do you expect me to be? All wrong?”
Vinetta was relieved to hear his irritable voice. She had thought that everyone in the house must have heard the storm outside and the commotion in the attic. If Sir Magnus was oblivious to it, perhaps they all were. There might still be time to put things right without telling any of them.
He doesn’t know that anything’s happened, she thought, a sort of madness taking over her brain. Maybe none of them knows.
So Vinetta might well be the only one who knew. The spirit of Kate, acting in her, had made her aware of the statues all around the house. She had seen, as in a vision, Joshua frozen in the act of hanging up his coat at work. She alone knew all that had happened up to the time when the battle ended. And that knowledge was something she would share with no one but Joshua.
Everyone in the house was briefly seen and checked. They were, as she had hoped, innocent of all knowledge of what had happened.
When she came to the lounge, however, Vinetta was horrified at Soobie’s narrow escape. She almost broke down but managed to hold on to the pretend, to shut out all thought of the battle, and concentrate her attention on Soobie. She fussed over him and insisted on repairing his singed scalp immediately. The activity helped. Within a very short time Soobie’s hair was almost as good as new. The blue wool from Vinetta’s workbox was slightly deeper than Soobie’s own hair, possibly because, being kept in the box for years, it had not faded so much.
“It’ll soon blend in,” said his mother. “In a week or two, you’ll not be able to tell the difference.”
“I still can’t figure out how it happened,” said Soobie.
Vinetta said nothing but looked uncomfortable.
Pilbeam looked at her suspiciously. There was something unnatural about the expression on her mother’s face. She seemed to know something about the whole sequence of events that was hidden from the rest of them.
“Where’s Appleby?” Pilbeam asked, suddenly guessing that her sister might be the cause of her mother’s mysterious demeanour. “I was going to look for her when I heard Soobie shout.”
“Appleby’s having an early night,” said her mother in a quick, nervous voice. “She’s having an early night. She’s very tired, you see. She asked me to tell you not to disturb her because she wants to go to sleep.”
“I’ll just look in for a minute to say goodnight to her,” said Pilbeam, very suspicious now, but with no idea what might be wrong.
“No!” said Vinetta sharply. “Don’t do that! I’ve told you. She’s not to be disturbed. How would you like it if you were very tired and someone woke you up just to say goodnight? I forbid you to do anything of the sort.”
Pilbeam put an arm on her mother’s shoulder.
“There’s something wrong,” she said. “What is it?”
When Vinetta replied she sounded as ill-natured as ever Appleby had been.
“There’s nothing wrong,” she shouted. “Just leave her alone. She has problems. We all have problems. The trouble with you, Pilbeam, is that you don’t know how to mind your own business.”
Pilbeam was staggered. Never in living or unliving memory had she heard her mother speak like that. The strain of being shut in must be telling on all of them, even Vinetta, whom her daughter had always looked upon as the backbone of the family.
“I think,” said Pilbeam gently, “that perhaps we should all have an early night.”
She nodded a warning to Soobie, kissed her mother on the cheek, and went off to bed.
“You would tell me if Appleby had run away again?” said Soobie, when he and his mother were alone. “That’s not what’s wrong, is it?”
“No,” said Vinetta wearily. “I think Pilbeam’s right. We all need a good night’s sleep. Things will seem different in the morning. You should go to bed now, too.”
When at last she was alone, Vinetta returned to the kitchen and, late though it was, she swept up the pieces of the earthenware bowl. The others must not see evidence of any strange occurrence. The bowl was very old, but she knew she would be able to buy one nearly identical at the Market. The fashion in earthenware bowls had not changed in a hundred years or more!
Tomorrow, Appleby would come down from the attic and it would be as if nothing had ever happened. It was perfectly possible, Vinetta told herself, as she emptied the broken pieces into the bin. Perfectly possible. Appleby had always been a survivor. That was a belief to cling to.
When all the chores were done, Vinetta grew more worried, not less. Her faith in Appleby’s survival was forced and shallow, but that was not her only concern. She knew that it had been a ve
ry close call for all of them. And there was one member of the family she had not yet been able to check on. She no longer possessed Kate’s knowledge. For half an hour Kate had been Vinetta, Vinetta had been Kate. It was the only way enough strength could be concentrated upon the great struggle. That oneness had ended when the attic door closed. Now Vinetta was just Vinetta, drained and half-crazed with worry and grief. She did not know whether Joshua had survived or not. Soobie had nearly perished. Who was to say that Joshua was safe?
35
Pretending to Joshua
AT SYDENHAM’S WAREHOUSE, Joshua finished hanging his coat on the peg. He felt stiff, as if he had been standing too long. He went a bit uneasily to his chair behind the desk, sat down, took out his pipe and pretended to light it. Then he leant back, holding the bowl of the pipe in one hand and with his Port Vale mug clutched in the other. Think I’ll have a walk round soon, he said to himself, I need the exercise.
When he went home next morning, Vinetta was standing at the door waiting for him. She had sat in the kitchen all night, polishing up a new pretend, a new and intricate pretend to meet an unheard of situation.
“I’m not late, am I?” he said, remembering fleetingly the one time when he had been late, after the rat had chewed his leg.
“No,” said Vinetta, but she gave him a hug that baffled him. For he was a very undemonstrative man. He smiled down at her, laying one hand on her shoulder . . .
“You’re an odd one, Vinny,” he said. “I haven’t been away for a month, you know.”
“I’ve done bacon and eggs for your breakfast,” said Vinetta. “I thought you might enjoy a cooked breakfast for a change.”
“I knew I could smell bacon,” said Joshua, entering into the pretend. He went to the cloakroom, hung up his coat and then sat at the kitchen table, knife and fork working on the empty plate, jaws chewing the pretend meal with evident relish.