by Judith Eagle
Clara touched the face of the curly-haired woman gently with her index finger. She couldn’t believe she was finally looking at the only picture she had ever seen of her mother. ‘So it’s true, she really was a ballerina!’ she said, thrusting the newspaper clipping at Peter and then just as quickly grabbing it back. ‘That’s my mum!’
She felt electric, her whole body buzzing like a livewire. She wished she could see Christobel Starling from every angle. What did she look like from the front, the back, the side? She wanted to see her name written down. She wanted to absorb every part of her.
Now Clara and Peter pulled the books off the shelves, holding them upside down by the spines and shaking them to see if any more papers fluttered out.
‘Good job that librarian can’t see us,’ muttered Peter, as they dropped book after book on the floor, until finally, they were rewarded with another photograph. A proper one this time.
‘WHAT do you think you’re doing? I told you the study was out of bounds.’
Clara almost screamed. She tucked the photograph up her sleeve.
Neither of them had heard Stella come in. Strands of hair had escaped from her bun and spiked furiously around her face. Her usually pale complexion was flushed and she was a little out of breath. Now she smoothed her hair down and glanced round the room, her eyes taking in the books that they had dropped on the floor.
‘What on earth …? Are you looking for something?’
‘You met Uncle!’ Clara couldn’t hold it in any longer. ‘We saw you at the hotel, we followed you.’
For a split second, surprise registered in Stella’s eyes. Then she held up her hands. ‘Guilty as charged!’ she said. ‘Sit down, Clara.’
But Clara didn’t want to sit down. She stared defiantly back at Stella and stayed resolutely on her feet.
‘You both know that Edward is a good friend of mine, and I care for him deeply.’
Clara snorted. How could anyone care for Uncle? He was the most uncareable-for person she knew. ‘Yes, Clara, even though he wasn’t the best guardian in the world’ – Stella’s eyes flicked over the discarded A Guardian’s Guide to Child Rearing – ‘he is still a human being you know.’
Clara didn’t reply to that. She didn’t know how.
‘I did meet him and I suppose I should have told you in the first place. He’s in terrible trouble. Debts up to his ears. And I promised to help him, like any good friend would. If Peter were in trouble, you’d help him, wouldn’t you?’
Clara gave a small nod.
‘Is he on the run then?’ asked Peter. He had scooped up Stockwell who was staring at Stella intently.
‘I wouldn’t put it quite like that,’ said Stella. ‘The important thing is, if we can’t sort the debts, the house will have to be sold and your uncle declared bankrupt. If that was to happen, I can’t promise what would happen to you.’ Her greeny-gold eyes locked on Clara’s grey ones. The words were said kindly, but they sent a shiver all the way up Clara’s spine.
‘Now,’ said Stella, ‘I suggest you two take yourselves off while I tidy this mess up. And we’ll have a good talk about it later. OK?’
‘You shouldn’t trust him, even if he is your friend,’ said Clara. ‘He’s a liar!’
‘Why on earth would you say that, darling?’ Now Stella looked taken aback.
‘Because he lied to me. Before you came, I found out—’
But Peter didn’t let her finish. Instead he deposited Stockwell in her arms and pushed her out of the room. The cat’s fur was warm and comforting. ‘Clara, let’s go to the turret,’ he said.
* * *
‘D’you trust her?’ Clara asked Peter as soon as they were out of earshot. ‘D’you think she’s telling the truth?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Peter. ‘She’s been good to Granny. And what she said about friends sticking together, she’s right about that too.’ He gave Clara’s hand a little squeeze. He was saying he was her friend, Clara thought. She squeezed his hand back. But anxiety still nipped at her.
‘I can’t wait any longer, Peter,’ she said. ‘We need to go to London now.’ She thought about the young woman with the blonde curls. A ballet dancer. Out on the town in Paris with her beau.
‘I know,’ said Peter, looking at his watch. ‘Let’s go tonight. Amelia-Ann said she was coming back later, didn’t she? We’ll go when she gets here. What’s that, Clara?’
It was the photograph she had slipped up her sleeve. Now the corner of it was poking out from her cuff and Stockwell was batting at it with her paw, and rubbing her face against its sharp corner.
Clara pulled it out. It was an old photograph, a colour one, but the colour was watery, washed out. It showed two women standing in front of a fountain. One of them had pale curly hair. Christobel! Clara had the most curious melting sensation when she looked at her. With some effort she tore her gaze away and turned her attention to the other woman, whose toffee-coloured hair was drawn back from her face.
‘Peter, look!’ Clara knew that face.
Flipping the card over, she read the message. ‘S and C, 1960’.
Stella knew Christobel?
Peter took the photograph and examined it. ‘I s’pose if she’s such good friends with your uncle, then she must have known his sister?’
Clara could see Peter was trying to make sense of it. But it didn’t make sense. Why wouldn’t Stella have said something? Now Clara felt angry again, furious in fact.
‘That’s two secrets she’s kept from us.’ She almost spat the words out. ‘I’m going back down to ask.’
But the door at the bottom of the turret was closed. And when Clara tried to open it, it wouldn’t budge. ‘Stella’ she shouted, but Stella had put her music on too loud and it hammered through the keyhole, vibrating almost, drowning Clara’s words out.
Clara rattled the door again. It must be jammed. Or Stella had locked it. Why would she do that? Were they prisoners? Unless … she turned to find Peter and Stockwell staring at her, their eyes wide.
‘I think she’s guessed we’re going to run away!’
Chapter Eighteen
They ran back up to the room at the top of the turret and Peter began frantically emptying his pockets: a conker, a piece of string, two boiled sweets, a red ribbon.
‘Is that my red ribbon?’ asked Clara. Had Peter taken it from her shell box? She wondered why.
‘It’s nothing,’ said Peter, stuffing it back into his pocket. He had found what he was looking for – the little torch he had stolen from the department store in Leeds. He took it over to the window and opened it, then began clicking at the tiny switch so that the light flicked on and off, on and off, glowing weakly in the late dusk.
‘But—’ Clara began, and then stopped herself. He had stolen it. She remembered the marbles he’d taken along with the torch in the department store, and the book he’d almost taken from the library. It must be a habit of his. She wanted to grab the ribbon back and tell Peter he had no right, even if he was her friend who would stick by her through thick and thin.
‘What are you doing?’ Clara felt shaky.
‘Sending a message,’ he said bluntly. He was leaning as far out of the window as he could, the torch held aloft. ‘SOS. Three short flashes, three long, then three short again. It’s the international distress signal.’
Clara thought about Braithwaite Manor standing all alone, marooned almost, in the middle of the dark moor. No one around for miles and miles. Would anyone even see it?
‘It’s for Amelia-Ann,’ said Peter. ‘We said we’d meet her in the garden, didn’t we? But now we’re trapped up here. She’ll see the light and then she’ll know.’
Clara shivered. She was hungry and freezing. All they had to share between them were the two boiled sweets that Peter had in his pocket. Clara chose the green one. It was sweetly acidic and made her stomach growl even more. To keep warm, they wrapped themselves in the quilts. Clara felt like her stomach was full of jumping beans. Were they goin
g to be stuck in here all night? She felt very aware that a clock was ticking. They had to leave, get to London, discover what had happened to Christobel before time ran out.
It must have been almost midnight when at last they heard the faint crunch of footsteps down below.
‘Is that her?’ Clara jumped up and peered out into the inky blackness. ‘Amelia-Ann,’ she hissed, but there was no answer. She grabbed Peter’s torch and flicked it on and off, three short, three long, three short. Nothing. It was quite probable that Amelia-Ann didn’t recognise the international distress signal either. They’d have to try something else. Quickly Clara shone the torch around the room, looking for a scrap of paper. She grabbed The Wolves of Willoughby Chase and tore out the title page.
‘We’re trapped!’ she wrote. ‘Help us so we can go to London!’
‘Here, wrap it round this,’ said Peter, passing her the conker. ‘To weight it down.’
Clara wrapped the note around the conker and hurled it out of the window.
Would Amelia-Ann see the note in the dark? They waited, straining to hear something, anything. But the only sound that floated through the narrow window was the low moan of the wind and then … What was that? More footsteps! But instead of getting louder, they were fading way.
‘She’s gone,’ said Clara, and a wave of disappointment washed over her. ‘She didn’t see.’ But even if she had seen, Clara thought to herself, what could she have done?
It got later and later, but neither of them felt like sleeping. Clara’s thoughts grew more and more tangled, a muddle of her mother, her uncle, Stella, the house, Mr and Mrs Morden, Jackson Smith. If only they could get out of the house, to London, and find out more about her mother, that would be a start.
Then at last, just when they had both given up all hope, there came a long, low whistle.
‘She’s back!’ said Peter, kicking off the quilt and rising to stick his head out of the window.
Clara shoved her portion of the quilt aside and scrambled unsteadily to her feet. She was stiff with cold. Silently, Peter made space for her so she could see out.
It was not quite dawn and at first, in the murky blue light, she couldn’t make out a thing. She blinked and looked again, searching the shadows. There! Something loomed. Something tall and hulking. Clara rubbed her eyes with her knuckles. But there must be something wrong with them. She still couldn’t see. She looked again, forcing herself to focus, be steady, hold her gaze. At last the shadows took shape. Rearing out of the gloom was Curtis, standing tall on Dapple’s back. And there was Amelia-Ann, standing next to them, waving silently. Relief surged through Clara. Help had come!
Amelia-Ann was holding something. Something coiled and heavy, dripping to the floor and trailing snake-like behind her. Clara watched her tie a loop in it and hand it to Curtis, who swirled it high above his head in big circles. He whipped it round and round in the air and then, flash, all of a sudden it shot up to the window where Clara stood. She tried to grab at it, but her fingers barely brushed the rough, raspy rope before it dropped, to land with a soft thud, puddled below.
Amelia-Ann’s hands shot up, as if in despair. She passed the rope back to Curtis and he tried again, round and round, faster and faster, and then it flew towards Clara and Peter hissed, ‘Reach it, Clara! Reach it!’ But she couldn’t reach it – it wasn’t long enough – and then, thud, it landed again in a mound on the floor.
‘Why didn’t you catch it?’
‘I couldn’t!’ Clara snapped.
‘Let me have a go next time,’ said Peter, trying to elbow Clara out of the way.
‘No,’ said Clara and shoved him back. ‘Your arms are shorter than mine.’
‘They are not!’ Peter was indignant, but Clara ignored him. Down below in the gloom she could see Amelia-Ann bending down so that Luci could scramble onto her shoulders and onto the horse. Then Curtis bent his knees so he was crouching and Luci climbed onto Curtis’s shoulders, planting her feet firmly either side of his neck. Curtis rose slowly, and as he did so, Lucy straightened up and there they stood, proud and straight and tall like circus performers.
Now the rope was in Luci’s hands and she swirled it above her head, whipping it round and round in a frenzy and then whoosh, it shot straight at Clara and this time she caught it, clutching onto its roughness and pulling it in.
Barely perceptible, a whisper floated up from below. ‘Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!’
‘Genius!’ breathed Peter, helping Clara haul in the thick rope. ‘It’s the plait Amelia-Ann told us about! The one her nan was knitting out of fishermen’s nets!’
Peter went to tie the rope to the doorknob, but Clara stopped him.
‘Not there,’ she said. ‘Up here.’ A metal rail stretched above the window where once, long ago, curtains would have hung. Quickly, Peter tied a knot.
‘A bowline knot,’ he said, giving the rope a good tug. ‘Granny gave me a book called Knot Know-how for my birthday.’
‘Will it be strong enough?’ asked Clara. How far could you fall without breaking any bones?
‘This is the king of knots,’ said Peter. ‘It’d hold the weight of an elephant. You go first.’
Clara looked out of the window and felt a sliver of fear. It was a long way down. But the alternative was to just stay here, waiting. She couldn’t do that. She had to do something, make something happen, even if she risked breaking all her bones.
‘Hand over hand,’ said Peter. ‘Keep your feet on the wall and go slowly.’
It was a squeeze getting out because the window was so narrow, but Clara eased herself through it so that she was able to crouch on the window ledge and observe the rope dangling in a straight line below. Then she grabbed the coarse plait with both hands and launched herself into nothingness. There was a judder as the rope took her full weight and for a terrible moment Clara hung there, clinging on for dear life, her feet kicking uselessly, knowing that at any moment she might drop.
But she didn’t. Miracle of miracles, the rope held, and then she was leaning back and using all her strength to push her feet against the wall, her legs rigid and her arms taut, and then her body was doing the work for her, and she started to get the hang of it: hand over hand, foot over foot.
Down she went, silently, stealthily, slithering and sliding, her hands burning like they were on fire. And then she was at the bottom and Peter followed her, Stockwell’s head poking out of the front of his jumper. In the early morning gloom they ran on tiptoe down the drive. Clara saw Dapple was wearing enormous knitted socks tied with string on her hooves, and nearly laughed out loud. They had escaped! They were leaving Stella and Uncle and everything else behind. London beckoned, and maybe, just maybe, Clara thought, she would find some answers to her questions.
Chapter Nineteen
They went to Cook’s house first because it was still too early for the train. ‘We’ve told Nan your uncle’s disappeared, but it’s OK because now you’re going to stay with Peter’s granny,’ Amelia-Ann warned as they entered the stone cottage.
‘Ducks!’ exclaimed Cook as the children swarmed into the kitchen. She was dressed in a red flannel dressing gown and standing at the stove minding a number of sizzling pans.
She gave Clara a warm hug. ‘I couldn’t let you go off to London without a proper breakfast inside you, now, could I? Amelia-Ann, take everyone’s coats. Luci and Curtis, lay the table.’
The house was warm and chaotic, full of noise and chatter and something else … Clara wasn’t sure what it was exactly, but it felt safe, knowable, like a trusted snack, perhaps a slice of apple cake and a glass of milk.
Breakfast was delicious: fried eggs, bacon, a sausage each and grilled tomatoes.
‘Amelia-Ann’s told me everything,’ said Cook as she poured the tea. ‘I can’t believe Mr S just upped and left! Shocking it is, shocking. Why on earth you didn’t just come straight here, I’ll never know.’
‘It’s been fine,’ Clara reassured her. ‘He left me
money and I bought tea and cake and I found my own way home.’
‘Well, I can’t say I’m surprised,’ said Cook, setting down extra toast and a jar of amber-coloured marmalade. It looked much nicer than the stuff they had at Braithwaite Manor. ‘He was a terrible employer – you saw how he expected me to manage on that skimpy housekeeping. And,’ she added darkly, ‘I’ve been hearing all sorts of stories from the other villagers. Of him in his younger days.’
‘Like what?’ asked Clara. She tried to make a picture in her head of Uncle in his younger days, but she couldn’t; he was just one of those people who seemed eternally old.
‘Well.’ Cook stopped bustling and sat down. ‘They say he was a bit of a wild one. Fell in with some disreputables, started gambling, ran up a whole lot of debts. Drove Lord and Lady Starling mad by all accounts. He was never meant to come back.’
‘Come back from where?’ said Clara.
‘When he was eighteen, they told him to leave.’
Cook paused and blew on her tea to cool it down.
‘Why? What did he do?’
‘He owed a terrible amount of money,’ Cook said. ‘So he stole the family jewels and sold them to pay off his debts! Blamed the theft on the butler. The Lord and Lady were so furious when they found out that they changed their will and made Christobel the sole heir.’
‘Cook!’ Clara exclaimed. ‘Why didn’t you say anything about this before?’
‘Village gossip. Only comes out in dribs and drabs,’ said Cook stoutly. ‘Didn’t know how much of it was true. And you were only a littl’un. What good would have come of it? I didn’t want to frighten a little lass.’
Cook drained her cup and then poured herself more tea. ‘Anyway, not long after he left, the Lord and Lady died in a car crash. They say Christobel was only twelve, poor mite, away at ballet school. She came back just once, when she was eighteen, to close up the house before she went off to dance with the company.’
