Patricia St John Series

by Patricia St John

  Perhaps an exciting adventure story would help keep me awake. I dared not switch on the light but I had a flashlight, and by its light I tiptoed to my bookcase. I turned the pages of one book after another, but nothing seemed exciting except the letter in the desk, and all adventure seemed boring compared with the adventure of creeping downstairs and solving the mystery of my own life. As I sat down by the open window and leaned my arms on the sill, my heart ached. Our safe little home, and Gran and Grandpa and me, had seemed so secure and happy till now. Why did this mysterious shadow have to come between us and spoil everything? I nearly decided to forget about that letter, to cuddle down and just go to sleep … but no! I must find out, and this was probably my last chance. I leaned against the wall and dozed for a while, and then woke with a start, for my grandparents were coming upstairs.

  I dived into bed, and, as I had thought she would, Gran came in and stood over me with a flashlight in her hand.

  “She's gone off to sleep all right,” I heard her whisper, “but mark my words, Herbert, there's something the matter with the child.”

  I could hear Grandpa's distressed murmur and the click of their door shutting. I paced up and down in my room for ages, waiting for the line of light under their door to disappear. In another ten minutes or so, I listened at the keyhole and heard Gran's steady snoring and knew that my time had come.

  I tiptoed downstairs and boldly switched on the light in the sitting room. I was shivering with guilty excitement as I pulled open the drawer. The letter I wanted was not lying on top. Gran must have hidden it, and I had no idea what it looked like, so I thumbed through the pile glancing at the addresses. They were mostly bills or letters from Gran's sister in Birmingham, or Grandpa's nephew in Stockton-on-Tees. Nothing mysterious until I had nearly reached the bottom of the bundle—and there was an unusual sort of letter with the address printed at the top: “Her Majesty's Prison, Greening.”

  I stood frozen, rooted to the spot, staring at the address. Only after a long time did my eyes move down to the actual letter.

  “Dear Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson,” it began. “As the time of my imprisonment will soon be over, I am writing to you about the guardianship of my daughter, Lucy. I am very grateful …”

  I was concentrating so hard on what I was reading that I had stopped noticing anything, even the footsteps on the stairs and the opening of the door. It was only when he was right in front of me that I realized Grandpa was standing there, and I had been caught in the act. I thrust the letter behind my back and burst into frightened, defiant tears.

  “Lucy, Lucy, my dear child, whatever is the matter?” whispered Grandpa, shutting the door very carefully.

  I gulped and looked at him pleadingly, and I suddenly realized that there was nothing to be afraid of. This was no policeman catching a criminal red-handed, but a distressed little old man in a very shabby dressing gown, who couldn't even see what I was doing because he'd left his glasses upstairs.

  “You're shivering, child,” he said. “I'm going up to your room to get a blanket. Put on the kettle, Lucy, and let's have a cup of tea.”

  A cup of tea was Grandpa's cure for everything. He came tiptoeing down a few moments later and wrapped me up warm. I stopped shivering and sobbing, and relaxed. I could see that he was very anxious not to wake Gran, and not until we were both sipping steaming cups of tea did he remember to ask me what I was doing.

  He had not noticed the letter at all. He had just seen the light shining from the window and crept downstairs to turn it out. But my secret was too heavy and shocking to carry alone any longer. I needed Grandpa's help, so I leaned against him and told him all about it.

  “You see, Grandpa, I know it's wrong to read other people's letters, but I had to know. He's my father, and I'd always wondered—only Gran would never tell me.”

  “No, it wasn't right,” said Grandpa, “and I'm glad I came downstairs. Maybe we should have told you sooner, or maybe you should have asked us again instead of trying to find out alone. But in any case, it's high time you knew, although there is nothing to be afraid of. There is still quite a long time to go, if he does the whole sentence, and by that time you'll be nearly fourteen, and you'll be allowed to choose for yourself. I don't reckon any court of law would force you to go with your father against your will. We can't stop him from seeing you, but he can visit you here.”

  “But does he want me?” I asked. “I've only seen the beginning of the letter.”

  “Well, now, yes, he seems to want you,” replied Grandpa gently, taking the letter out of my hand. “But we've consulted lawyers, Lucy, and he couldn't take you from here, unless you wanted to go, which of course you wouldn't. He wouldn't be a good father for you. In fact, I'm afraid he's a very bad man.”

  “What did he do?” I asked. “Was I there?”

  “Yes,” said Grandpa, and he spoke very sadly. “It all happened after you were born and after our dear, dear Alice died. She met him at a friend's house, and he soon wanted to marry her. But your grandmother didn't feel it was right, and she wouldn't agree to them getting engaged. He was an unsettled kind of chap, so they just ran away together and got married on their own. They went to Spain. He had a guest house there, or some such thing, and we never saw our daughter again. She died when you were born.”

  Grandpa's voice trailed off sorrowfully and he seemed to have forgotten about me. I gave his arm a small shake.

  “I'm sorry, Grandpa,” I whispered, “but what happened next? I mean, what happened to me?”

  “We begged him to send you home to us, but he never answered our letter. I believe he loved your mother very much and was heartbroken when she died. The second time we wrote, the letter was sent back to us. He had left that address, and no one knew where he had gone.”

  “But where was I, Grandpa? Did he take me with him?”

  “Oh, yes, but we don't know much about the next three years. I believe he drank too much and got mixed up with some drug business, helping to bring drugs up through Spain into France. Then he came back to England, and the police were waiting for him. It was all in the papers, but to tell you the truth, Lucy, I don't really understand it. It was about that time that he brought you to us.”

  “Oh! So you've seen him?”

  “Oh, yes. He arrived in a taxi, all unexpected, with you in his arms, and asked us to look after you for a while. I think he knew he was about to be sent to prison, but he didn't tell us so at the time. We had never seen him much before, but there was no mistaking you—such a cute little thing you were, and the image of your dear mother—the same thick, curly hair, the same grey eyes …”

  “But my father, Grandpa! Did he love me?”

  “Oh yes—there was no doubt about that. You'd been well cared for, too, and you talked a mixture of English and Spanish. He said you'd had a Spanish nanny … he wouldn't stay or tell us much more. He just put you into Gran's arms. You clung to him and cried at first, but then you fell asleep. When you woke up next morning, you might have belonged to us all your life. You were just three and a half.”

  “But tell me about my father, Grandpa. Didn't he ever come back?”

  “No. A few days later it was all in the papers, and he wrote telling us he'd got a ten-year sentence, and asking us to care for you. Your Gran wasn't surprised—said she'd known he was a bad lot from the beginning, and we must make sure you were never told. But when he comes out you'll have to know, Lucy, and maybe it's best you know now. But I sometimes wish, for Alice's sake, we'd done differently.”

  “What was she like, Grandpa?”

  “She took after your Gran, Lucy. Gran was the village schoolmistress when I married her, and there were many people who said I wasn't good enough for her. They were right, for I was never very good at schoolwork, but she seemed satisfied. We weren't very young when we had Alice, and she was the spitting image of your Gran … only more so, in a way. Your Gran always loved reading, but Alice had a real passion for books and learning. She'd dance around the
garden saying poetry to herself and lie there under the rowan tree in summer, scribbling away. We managed to send her to college too. She got degrees and all the rest of it, but she hated being away from our cottage and the hills for long. She was always coming back … until she met him. You're very like her, Lucy, and we don't want—”

  “Herbert, what in heaven's name are you doing down there?” Gran suddenly called in a loud whisper from the top of the stairs. We both jumped guiltily to our feet and thrust our teacups in a corner.

  “I'm coming, Elsie,” replied Grandpa, but I seized his arm.

  “Are you going to tell her?” I faltered.

  “Oh yes, of course,” murmured Grandpa, hurrying to the door, and I realized that he'd never kept a secret from her in his life and would not start now. I kept tight hold of his arm as we climbed the stairs.

  “And may I ask what Lucy is doing?” Gran said crossly, looking rather fierce and unfamiliar in her hair curlers. “Is there a reason … ?”

  “Yes, dear, there is. I'll tell you all about it. Lucy, go back to bed.” And to my great astonishment, I saw Grandpa guide a speechless Gran into the bedroom, and the door was slammed on me.

  I climbed into bed, shivering, but it was a long, long time before I went to sleep. Wonder, shock, excitement, regret, and a strange, cold fear of the future kept me awake, for one day this bad man was going to reappear and I was going to have to know what to do. I tossed and turned till a rooster crowed far away and some sheep bleated up on the hill. A bird trilled the first few notes of the dawn chorus, and, though the stars were still out, another spring morning had begun. I was suddenly drowsy, and my confused thoughts quieted. I envisioned a man, heartbroken because his wife had died, kissing a baby daughter good-bye. I imagined him sitting in a dark, lonely dungeon for ten years. If I'd known, perhaps I could have comforted him, even if he was such a bad man. I buried my face in my arms and wept, and the next thing I knew the sun was streaming into my bedroom, and Gran was standing by my bed with a cup of tea.

  ”Wake up, Lucy,” she said. “I let you sleep in. But you'll have to hurry to catch the bus.”

  But there was no afternoon school, and as soon as we'd washed up the lunch things, Gran and I settled down in the garden. I heard exactly what Gran thought about children who sneaked downstairs at night to read other people's letters and said they were sleepy when they were not. By the time she finished, I felt too ashamed of myself to ask her any of the questions I wanted to ask.

  “Sorry, Gran,” I said, because that is what she expected me to say. And then I surprised myself by adding, “But I had to know sometime, didn't I? After all, he is my father, and I am twelve years old.”

  She stared at me, but the sharp answer I expected never came. “Lucy,” she said, and to my amazement her voice trembled, “I hope you will never have to have anything to do with him. No one could take you away from us now … not after all these years.”

  I stared back at her and saw that her eyes were full of fear—fear because she loved me, and because the shadow of losing me had hung over her, day and night, for eight years. I flung my arms around her neck and hugged her. Then I ran off into the wood with Shadow at my heels.

  It was quiet in the wood, and now that the first shock of discovery was over, I wanted to think. Strange new thoughts were surging up inside me. I ran through the wood anemones and primroses to the edge of the trees where a golden stream ambled along. All over the bank, wild daffodils pierced the dead oak leaves and catkins danced above my head, scattering pollen on my hair. Here I sat, resting my chin on my knees, and realized I'd changed. Over the last twenty-four hours, I'd begun to grow up in a hurry.

  Gran was a very fair woman. She always listened to what I had to say, and when she told me off I usually knew in my heart that what she said was right. But today I was not so sure. I felt less ashamed of my “creeping and peeping,” as she called it, than I had expected to, because it seemed to me that the letter hadn't really belonged to Gran at all. My father was mine, and the news belonged to me, and it was up to me alone to decide what I was going to do about it.

  Making Friends with Don

  It was warm and peaceful where I sat in the wood. I could just hear the brook gurgling slowly and the birds cooing excitedly as they nested in the trees behind me. Then suddenly Shadow lifted his head and growled. I turned to see a boy limping along the bank—a pleasant-looking boy about my own age, with thick brown hair.

  “Hi!” he called out. “Do you happen to have a tissue?”

  I fished up the sleeve of my sweater and brought out a rather grubby hanky. He sat down beside me and held out his foot. It was badly cut and bleeding freely.

  “Go down to the stream and hold it in cold water first,” I said, remembering my Guide's first-aid course. He obeyed, sitting on a stump and dangling his foot in the water. Then I tied it tightly with my handkerchief and we sat watching to see if the blood would seep through or not. I had had little to do with boys since I left primary school, and I was usually shy with them, but a boy in trouble was different.

  “How did you do it?” I asked.

  “I walking on some broken glass in the stream back there.”

  “But you're not supposed to be in the stream at all. This is a pheasant reserve and it's a private estate.”

  “Then what are you doing here?” he asked, smiling at me.

  “Oh, I belong here,” I replied grandly. “My grandfather was head gardener at the castle for thirty years.”

  “Really?” replied the boy. “But isn't it rather boring playing in this great place all alone? I mean, wouldn't it be more fun if there was someone else?”

  I'd never really thought about it. “Well, yes,” I replied slowly, “I suppose it would. Do you often come here?”

  “This is my first time. We've only just come to live here. I didn't come in through the gate. I came from the valley and I got under the barbed wire at the back. I belong to a natural history club at school, and I'm doing a project on wildlife in this county. These woods are the perfect place to watch and I'm very careful about pheasants. I want to dam the stream lower down, to make a pool. Then more animals would come to drink—especially early in the morning. Oh, gosh! Look at my foot!”

  The handkerchief was saturated with blood. Something had to be done at once.

  “Where do you live?” I asked.

  “Down in Eastbury. But I couldn't walk as far as that. I might bleed to death!”

  “Well, come up to my house, and my Gran will bandage it and phone for a taxi. We live by the main gate. It's only about ten minutes' walk.”

  “Won't she mind? I'm a trespasser, remember.”

  “Oh, no! She's not interested in pheasants. Grandpa is, but he's out in the greenhouse, and he's so interested in his tomatoes that he won't think to ask what you're doing. Come on!”

  It took us nearly twenty minutes to reach the house, because the injured foot was very painful. Fortunately he had a knife, and we cut a stout stick for him to lean on. He limped bravely along and as we walked, we talked; and I learned quite a lot about him.

  His name was Donald, but he said I could call him Don, and he was twelve years old. His father had taken over the Royal Midland Hotel just before Christmas and was doing well with it. Don was obviously tremendously proud of his father. He didn't have any brothers or sisters, and he went to boarding school, so he hadn't made any friends in the town yet. We had nearly reached home when he turned to me and said, “And what about you? What were you doing all by yourself?”

  “Oh, just thinking.”

  “Thinking? Do you often just sit and think? What do you think about?”

  “Oh, nothing much. Here we are; this is our house.”

  “What a fantastic garden! Do you live with your grandparents?”

  “Yes.”

  He stood for a moment looking at the garden, and I knew that he admired our cottage as much as I did. When he spoke again, it was almost wonderingly. “Do you live her
e always? Where are your parents?”

  “I haven't … well, I haven't really got any … my mother died … that's what I was thinking about. Look, there's Grandpa working on the rockery and Gran bringing in the washing. Gran! This is Don. He's hurt his foot.”

  Gran hurried across the lawn, full of kindness and concern. In no time at all, Don was sitting on a stool in the bathroom soaking his foot, and Gran was bustling around and organizing us all.

  “I think that should be stitched,” she said, looking at the ugly cut. “Can we phone your father, and can he fetch you? Lucy, make a cup of tea; there's a good girl!”

  “Oh yes, Dad's at home, and we've got a car,” said Don, who had stopped bleeding to death. “I'll write down the number. Tell him I'll be by the big iron gates of the estate, sitting on the garden wall waiting for him.”

  So Grandpa made the phone call, and Gran bandaged up the cut, and I made tea. Don soon hobbled downstairs and ate two pieces of Gran's chocolate cake in a great hurry, because he didn't want to miss his father. Then we went out to wait on the wall in the evening sunshine.

  “Thanks a lot, Lucy,” he said. “I really would have been in trouble without you and your gran. And they didn't say anything about the trespassing either.”

  “It's not them,” I replied, “it's the gamekeepers. They can be really nasty. But I was thinking … suppose I took you in—”

  “If I said I was a friend of yours, they'd let me come, wouldn't they?” broke in Don eagerly. “I do want to dam that stream and make a big pool. How about helping me, Lucy? When my foot's better—Oh, here's my dad!”

  A car drew up sharply. The driver gave a friendly hoot and jumped out.

  “What on earth, Don?” he began. “Can you walk? Where's the kind lady who rescued you?”

  Gran came to the gate and said it was a pleasure, but the foot ought to be stitched. Don stood grinning from ear to ear, delighted with his adventure and his dad. Grandpa joined us with a bunch of daffodils, and we all parted as good friends.