The Pearl in the Attic

by Karen McCombie

  The smell of alcohol spread like a mist, souring the sweet, sugary scent of the newly opened shop.

  “Here,” grunted Uncle Arthur, clattering a wooden tray of fancy bread rolls down on the table by the back door.

  Ruby watched as he shot a look of what bordered on hatred at Aunt Gertrude, who ignored him and carried on sorting coins from the drawer of the imposing cash register for the shop’s first customer of the morning.

  Aunt Gertrude was using her right hand for this purpose, Ruby noticed. The left was pressed against her ribs, as if something there was causing pain.

  Her own hands clutched across her chest, Ruby picked agitatedly at the skin around her nail, and wished that her uncle might leave, and return to the bakery in the yard. Even just a minute in his presence was no pleasure.

  “And what are you staring at, missy!” he suddenly bellowed at Ruby.

  His eyes: they were as familiar as Father’s, but the dark, hard stare was far more fierce, far more threatening, and cut her to the core.

  “Nothing, sir,” Ruby said quickly, feeling herself shrink.

  “Nothing, eh?” snarled Uncle Arthur, taking a menacing step towards her.

  Without saying a word, Aunt Gertrude turned to face him, blocking his way and his view of Ruby.

  Cowering behind her, Ruby held her breath, waiting for what might come next.

  The looks exchanged between husband and wife she could not be sure of, but – thankfully – Uncle Arthur seemed to think better of whatever he had been of a mind to do.

  “Out of my way!” he brayed, and Ruby heard him stamp off.

  Peeking around her aunt, she saw Uncle Arthur walk through into the storeroom. Like some tyrant king of ancient times, he barged past old Mrs Price – the charwoman Ruby had recently been introduced to – as she stood aside in the shadows, broom in hand and head dutifully down.

  As soon as her uncle’s voice was heard booming back out in the yard – shouting at either Billy the delivery lad or Wilfred in the bakery – the mood in the front shop lightened a little, as if some lead-lined shawl had been lifted from the shoulders of Aunt Gertrude. The brightness was compounded by the tinkle of the bell above the door as the customer left, and Nell – putting a basket of fat, glazed buns in the window – suddenly burst out laughing.

  “Will you look at that?” she said, turning to Aunt Gertrude and Ruby.

  She was pointing out into the street. There were plenty of folk already about and strolling for their shopping in the high street, but now they were all slowing as something caught their gaze.

  Aunt Gertrude lifted her skirts and swished forward, looking to join Nell, who was now opening the door. Even old Mrs Price had abandoned her cleaning as curiosity got the better of her.

  Ruby was meant to be receiving instruction from her aunt this morning. So far she’d learned what Madeira tarts, fondant icing, kaiser rolls, desiccated coconut and candied angelica looked like. She’d discovered that a certain type of long, iced cake had three shades of sponge inside as you cut it and was known as a “masked genoise”, and that the flaky cones of buttercream pastries were made from rolled, flat biscuits known as “langue de chat”, or cat’s tongues for those who did not understand French, which was most customers who came through the door, Ruby supposed. At least they would know no better if she pronounced them terribly.

  And because she was afraid to leave her aunt’s side, Ruby followed the three women out on to the pavement just as the most extraordinary gentleman rode by on his neatly trotting horse, waving a flag of stars and stripes on a pole.

  “That’s the flag of the United States of America!” Ruby heard a mother tell her little son as she lifted him high in her arms.

  As for the man, Ruby had only seen his likeness briefly yesterday – on the handbill the girl in the knickerbockers had tried to present to her – but she recognized this Wild West showman straightaway.

  “What is this?” Aunt Gertrude asked, stretching her tall self even taller to take in the spectacle above the heads of the men and women now stopped on the pavements to do likewise.

  “It’s a show that’s come to Ally Pally, Mrs Wells!” said Nell. “That’s Colonel Samuel Cody, that is, and his troupe will perform a melodrama, my Fred says, about brave folk that were pioneers in America.”

  “And there’s displays of bareback riding and a shooting show,” Billy called out, joining in with the chatter as he pushed his laden bicycle out of the alleyway. “There’s even a girl that floats clean into the sky on a balloon!”

  Explanations given, Nell and Billy both pushed forward, the better to see the extravagantly bearded gentleman, while voices now roared from around him, alerting the crowds to the wonders they’d see if they come up to the palace.

  “Fine-looking man, eh, Gertrude?” Ruby heard Mrs Price say to her aunt, and spotted the twinkle in the older woman’s eyes. “Looks quite the hero.”

  “Quite,” replied Aunt Gertrude.

  “Pity you couldn’t just take that pearl from the attic, jump on the back of the stallion, and let Colonel Whatsisname carry you off to the prairies and away from here…!”

  “Shush,” Aunt Gertrude hissed at Mrs Price, and smartly turned to go back inside, nearly walking directly into Ruby.

  “Sorry,” said Ruby, pressing herself as small as she could against the shop doorway, her mind floundering between the unexpected excitement of seeing the showman close up, and the peculiar thing she’d overheard Mrs Price just say. Aunt Gertrude had some kind of jewel hidden upstairs?

  For a moment, Ruby pictured a beautiful ring, a family heirloom, tucked into a crevice in the roof timbers, where Uncle Arthur would not find it…

  “Come along – you must learn to use the cash register,” Aunt Gertrude announced sharply to her.

  At the mention of it, Ruby’s heart sank at the thought of the gold-and-black beast with the pistons and pads with numbers she would struggle to make out, but dutifully followed her aunt nonetheless.

  “Here,” said Aunt Gertrude, taking something out of her white apron pocket.

  She presented the item to Ruby, who took a moment to realize that the folded wires and rounds of glass were a pair of spectacles.

  “They may not suit your eyes, of course, but try them and see,” said Aunt Gertrude.

  Ruby could not understand her aunt at all. The expression on her face was as unwelcoming as it had been from the first moment she had stared at Ruby through the shop window. Yet here she was, presenting her with spectacles that must surely have cost a pretty penny?

  As if Aunt Gertrude could read Ruby’s mind, she added in a flat tone, “They were my sister Irma’s.”

  Mrs Price, passing behind Aunt Gertrude, cast a certain look in the direction of Ruby, one that clearly spoke of sadness. So the reason for this Irma no longer being in need of her spectacles was surely not a happy one…

  Ruby took her hands from her chest where they had been so tightly clutched and reached for the offered gift. With trembling fingers she put them to her face, hooking the cold metal arms behind each ear.

  “Well?” demanded Aunt Gertrude.

  Taking a wary step forward, Ruby found herself directly in front of the cash register.

  To her delight, each of the numbers was a hard, firm shape that could not fool her or muddle her.

  “Yes … I can see quite clear!” said Ruby. “Everything is so—”

  “Oh, dear, no!” exclaimed Aunt Gertrude.

  At first, Ruby presumed that something must be amiss with the way of her wearing the spectacles, and then she saw that her aunt was staring at the bib of Ruby’s apron.

  She dipped her head to see what had caused her aunt such distress, and beheld a thruppenny-sized mark of fresh blood on the snow-white starched cloth.

  Aunt Gertrude grabbed at Ruby’s hands, turning them this way and that as she studied the ragged soreness of the nails.

  “This must stop,” she barked. “You cannot serve customers looking like
this! And you certainly cannot wear a bloodied apron. Go to your room and change into a fresh one straightaway. There’s one folded in the cupboard.”

  Feeling her face hot with embarrassment, Ruby snatched her hands away, only to have to lift one again to take the key that Aunt Gertrude had unfastened from the ring at her waist and was holding out to her.

  Giving a little bob, Ruby hurried out of the shop door – pausing only to let Nell come back in from the street – and quickly let herself into the flat above.

  The shame coursing through her veins put a spring in Ruby’s step, and she took the two staircases in no time at all, arriving breathless at her bedroom on the second floor.

  In a panic, she flung off the offending apron, wondering how she might get it clean for tomorrow. She could perhaps ask Mrs Price if there was somewhere she could soak it, Ruby thought, as she quickly found the other apron and began fastening about her.

  And then she heard it…

  The scrape and tap of the bird – the pigeon? – in the attic directly above.

  Ruby’s fingers slowed in their knotting and her gaze fixed upon the ceiling.

  What if it was trapped up there, as Aunt Gertrude had supposed?

  Ruby thought of her mother’s tears the day a sparrow had flown into the cottage by way of the open front door, its tiny body bashing against the walls as it struggled to be free, and panicked by Mother’s attempts to drive it outside. It had fallen to the floor and breathed its last, and Mother was inconsolable as she took its limp body in her hands.

  Ruby knew she was expected downstairs directly, but also remembered her aunt saying that she would deal with the bird today. If she quickly hurried upstairs now, Ruby could free the creature – or at least push open further the window it came through, so that it might fly out – and save her aunt the trouble.

  Even though there was not a soul to disturb in the empty quiet of the two floors of the flat, Ruby made but the lightest step on the small staircase that led up to the attic.

  As she did so, a thought came to her … the treasure mentioned by old Mrs Price – was there more? Other precious, sentimental gifts from Aunt Gertrude’s first husband, Mr Brandt, maybe? All bundled out of sight of Uncle Arthur, who might otherwise claim them, then sell them and drink away the proceeds…

  And of course, hidden pearls and jewels might be the real reason Aunt Gertrude risked defying her husband and resisted placing Ruby there. Why on earth would she trust a child she’d never met before, and one who happened to be a relative of Uncle Arthur’s too?

  Bristling and wishing she was no kin to her uncle at all, Ruby silently vowed that she would not go looking for nooks in rafters and loose floorboards. She was here to free the trapped creature, and that was all.

  Now at the top landing, she came to door, unpainted and of poorer quality than the fine doors downstairs with their panels and trims.

  Ruby took a quick, deep breath to steady herself for the task ahead.

  Then found she could not breathe at all.

  Through a long, vertical crack in the wood of the door, a wide blue eye stared at Ruby and blinked twice.

  It seemed there was not a bird trapped inside.

  And there was no ring-mounted gem hidden inside.

  “Who’s there?” Ruby whispered, though she already guessed the answer.

  “Pearl,” said the soft, scared voice of the girl…

  How to Know It All – Or Not Quite

  My head is jangling with what I’ve just read.

  All this time, Pearl was a girl.

  A sad, scared, hidden girl.

  And thanks to Nana’s beautiful writing, she’s a girl who feels as alive to me right now as the people here in the living room.

  I’m desperate to find out who she is and what happens next in Nana’s story. But instead I have to play nice and perform waitress duties.

  “Well, well, well…”

  Angie bobs merrily along the back of the sofa where Mum and “Uncle” Dean are sitting, Mum uptight and perched on the edge of her seat, Dean comfortably sprawled back on a cushion mountain.

  “Couldn’t have said it better myself, Angie!” Dean says to the parrot with an easy laugh.

  I hover with a tray of mugs and glasses, uncertain where to put it down. It’s hard to know where to put anything down in the majority of Nana’s flat. When I popped to the supermarket a couple of minutes ago to grab some orange juice and milk, I left Dean and Zephyr lifting bags and boxes off the sofas so that we could all have somewhere to sit together. (Mum was – of course – on the phone to her office.)

  Boxes – that’s it. With one foot, I carefully nudge a carrier bag stuffed with silky scarves off the nearest cardboard box, and plonk the mugs of tea and glasses of orange juice down on top of it.

  At least I don’t have to sit next to Zephyr on the other sofa; Mr Spinks has nabbed that spot and is lying on his back doing a doggy star-shape, pawing the air wildly while Zephyr tickles his pudgy tummy. A niggle of irritation crosses my chest at Mr Spinks’s disloyalty…

  Of course, what I’d really love to do is leave everyone here to it and disappear up to my room so I can reread Chapter Three of The Pearl in the Attic. It took a bit of finding at first; there’s the chimney breast but no fireplace in my room. I almost gave up before I began, thinking I’d have to dig around in all the fireplaces in the flat. Then I had the idea to pull the futon away from the chimney-breast wall, and – blam! – there it was, the next packet of red-ribbon-wrapped papers neatly folded and slotted into a gap where a brick had worked loose.

  I had to scan Nana’s artfully scribbly writing pretty quickly – Dean and Zephyr showed up soon after Mum and I arrived back here from the hospital.

  Mum had to shout at me to come down about three times; I kept looking at the ending of the chapter and then staring at the door of my room, imagining a frightened Pearl there, peering out at an equally startled Ruby…

  When we visit Nana later, I’ll have to thank her for the excellent clue and totally excellent chapter, and find a way of asking for the next clue without anyone hearing. After all, this more grown-up version of the paper-trail game is just our special thing, and that’s how I want it to stay.

  But hold on; Nana has her mobile by her bedside now… Maybe I should text her? Except (cue a grumble of guilt), I only got my new Nokia a couple of months ago and didn’t think to put Nana’s number in there, amongst my long list of school friends.

  OK, so I’ll get it from her later, for sure. In the meantime I could get back to Bella and Aisha – they got around the no-using-mobiles-in-school rule today by huddling together in a cubicle in the girls’ loos at break time, where they messaged me, asking why I’m not in school.

  How will I answer that, though? I was absent because we found out my grandmother’s poorly, AND because we found out she has a secret…

  1.dog

  2.parrot

  3.illness

  4.hoarding habit

  5.talent for writing

  6.Australian family?

  If I tried to text or message all that at once, my friends would probably suspect I’m fevered and delirious and babbling rubbish.

  “Here,” I say instead, at least remembering my manners as I pass tea to Mum and Dean, and orange juice to Zephyr.

  I sit myself down in Nana’s armchair and plonk the remaining cup on the small table next to it, keeping my own glass of orange juice in my hand.

  Right on cue, Angie flutters on down and dips her beak in the cup of lukewarm tea I made her specially. (Milk, no sugar, I guessed.)

  “Ha! That is SO funny seeing her do it for real!” Zephyr says with a big grin as he wrestles his mobile out of his pocket. “I mean, Patsy showed us on Skype already, but this is so cool!”

  Another ripple of irritation crosses my chest. Does Zephyr and his dad know everything there is to know about Nana’s life, right down to the tea-drinking habits of her pets?

  As Zephyr sets about filming Angie in
slurping action – tilting her head back to let the tea trickle down her throat – I glance over at the mantelpiece that’s packed with framed photos and ornaments, all jostling for space. And there’s the photo of an older, dark-haired bloke (Grandad Manny) holding the baby version of the surfer boy on the sofa across from me. At least Nana has a picture of me up there too. Pity it’s a school photo aged seven with more gaps in my smile than actual teeth…

  “Weird creature,” Mum mutters, staring at Angie. “Who knows how my mother ended up with it!”

  “Oh, don’t you know the story?” asks Dean. “Seems Angie escaped from somewhere, or more likely was deliberately let loose in the park around Ally Pally.”

  My uncle must notice me and Mum frowning.

  “Ally Pally? It’s the nickname of Alexandra Palace, the big iconic building near here?” Dean explains.

  “Oh, yeah – of course we know Alexandra Palace!” I say quickly, even though the closest I’ve come to it is in Nana’s story. “I was going to take Mr Spinks for a walk there over the weekend.”

  Once I google it and find out where it is exactly…

  “Great! I’ll come!” says Zephyr.

  I don’t say anything back. There’s a second’s awkward pause, and then Dean starts up his Angie tale again.

  “Well, talking of walking Mr Spinks, Patsy was in Ally Pally Park with him one day and came across Angie on the grass, getting mobbed by a bunch of crows. Patsy threw her jacket over her, bundled her up and took Angie back here. She tried to find her owner. Put up flyers locally and posted on websites, but no one came forward.”

  “And the dog?” Mum asks, since Dean apparently has all the answers.

  “Tied up outside the supermarket downstairs,” Zephyr chips in as he lowers his phone. “Mr Spinks was there all day, so Patsy guessed he’d been dumped and took him in. She told the security guard and the shop manager, just in case anyone had, you know, accidentally forgotten their dog for eight hours…”

  OK, so I forgive Mr Spinks for allowing Zephyr to stroke him after knowing him for exactly half a second. How could anyone abandon such a cute-ugly dog? To let him sit there on the pavement, alone and hungry, his pleading amber eyes watching everyone go by, hour after ticking hour? And Angie, tippetty-tappitting from clawed foot to clawed foot in happiness right now as she has her special treat of Tetley’s … to think of her lost and bewildered in the wild, being used as pecking practice for a bunch of thuggish crows.