by Kit Pearson
Gavin chuckled. “Andrew’s not very good at shaving—he’s always cutting himself.”
Norah remembered why she had told Aunt Florence they wanted this day by themselves. “Gavin,” she said, sitting up and looking at him. “Do you realize it’s three years ago that we left England? You were only five! Do you remember?” A picture flashed in her mind of their peaceful, wooded village, surrounded by hop gardens and orchards. So different from this raw landscape, but just as beautiful. For the first time since the letter from home she felt a pang of homesickness.
Gavin thought carefully. “I sort of remember it … I remember going on the boat. Who was that lady who took care of me? She let me hold her baby.”
Norah frowned. “Mrs. Pym,” she said quickly. Mrs. Pym had taken care of Gavin because Norah had been neglecting him.
“I remember when Aunt Florence gave me a little airplane when I got here. And I remember when we ran away—but then we came back. Why did we run away?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Norah. Gavin was remembering the wrong things—all the confusion and misery of their first few months in Canada. “I meant, what do you remember about home? Do you remember Little Whitebull?”
“What’s that?”
“Gavin! It’s our house! It has a green door and chickens in the yard.” The painful place inside her throbbed at the memory of the chickens; it had been her job to feed them.
“Mum talked about those chickens in her last letter.”
Norah remembered something. “Muv. That used to be your special name for her. Why don’t you call her that any more?”
Gavin looked confused. “I don’t call her anything. I never see her!”
“How do you begin your letters?” asked Norah.
“‘Dear Mum and Dad’”, said Gavin timidly. “That’s how I’ve always started them, ever since I learned to print.”
“Well, I think you should start saying ‘Muv’ again. She’d like that.” Norah stared at her little brother for a second, then added gently, “Do you really remember them? Mum and Dad and Grandad and Muriel and Tibby? Of course, neither of us knows Barry.”
Gavin looked defensive. “Of course I do! They’re our family! They live in England!”
Norah sighed and stopped nagging him. Sometimes the features of her family’s faces grew fuzzy in her own mind. And since she’d been in love with Andrew she’d hardly thought of them. Gavin must think of them even less, if at all. To him, Mum and Dad were the “family in England” that he wrote to automatically when Aunt Florence reminded him.
“You know…,” she said slowly, hardly wanting to think about it herself, “some of the war guests are already starting to go back to England. Uncle Barclay read me a bit out of the paper. They think it’s safe enough to go back now, even though the war isn’t over.”
“Go back to England!” Gavin sat up, looking scared. “Do we have to go back?”
“We won’t go back until the war is over, because we were sponsored by the government and they won’t pay for our passage until then. It’s just the rich kids who are going back—the ones who can afford it.”
“Aunt Florence could afford it …” began Gavin. Then he laughed. “She’d never send us back.”
He looked so relieved that Norah hated what she had to say next. “But you know we are going back some day, don’t you? Aunt Florence can’t keep us forever. We have to live with our real family—with Mum and Dad and Grandad, in Little Whitebull. In Ringden.” She felt as if her words were stabbing him, but they rushed out anyway.
Gavin’s big eyes filled with tears that beaded on his lashes. He looked at Norah imploringly. “And never come to Gairloch again? And leave our house in Toronto? And Roger and Tim?” Those were his special friends at school.
“Oh, Gavin …” Norah patted him awkwardly. “I’m afraid so. But probably not for a few years.”
“A few years is a long time,” said Gavin desperately. “A very long time.” He tried to smile at her.
They stared at each other helplessly. The future—that time “after the war” that the grown-ups kept talking about like a promised land—seemed unreal compared to this perfect day full of sunshine and gleaming water. At least Norah could daydream about Andrew meeting her in England—and she did want to see her family again. But now she realized how hard it was going to be for Gavin. He had always been more at home in Canada than she had.
“Let’s not talk about going back to England any more, okay? I’m sorry I brought it up.”
Gavin nodded. He scrunched up his face as if squeezing the unhappiness from it. Then he got up and tried to entice a chipmunk to eat some crumbs.
Norah lay down again. Why had she made him so miserable? She watched him crouch patiently until the chipmunk finally snatched a piece of bread from his fingers, and her love for him was so sharp it hurt her inside.
Then Gavin came back and sat beside her. “Norah, there’s something very important I want to ask you.”
“I thought we weren’t going to talk about it any more!” What had she done? Was Gavin going to worry about this from now on?
“It’s not that. It’s about Creature.” He pulled the elephant from his pocket.
Norah laughed. She sat up and took Creature from Gavin, sniffing him. “He doesn’t smell bad any more—the sun must have baked it out of him. What’s the problem? Does he need mending again? I don’t think there are any places left to sew!”
“No, he doesn’t need mending. It’s just that—well, Peter says I’m too old for him,” said Gavin. “He makes fun of me for carrying him around.”
“But you only do here. In Toronto you leave him in your room when you’re at school. And besides, it’s none of Peter’s business.”
“No … but maybe he’s right. It is sort of babyish to have a toy elephant when you’re eight. Peter and Ross and Sally think I should bury him. They want to have a funeral with hymns and a cross, like we do for dead birds. But I couldn’t!” He grabbed Creature back from Norah and stroked his trunk, close to tears again.
“Bury him! That’s absurd. Don’t you listen to them, Gavin. Do you still like Creature?”
“Of course,” said Gavin in a small voice. “I’ve had him all my life. But I don’t want to be babyish. Maybe I should give him up. The way Aunt Bea gave up cigarettes because of her cough.”
“You don’t have to give him up! Look, I have an idea. Why don’t you make Creature your club mascot? Call it the Elephant Detective Agency and have an elephant flag and elephant badges. I bet they’d go for that.”
“Yes…,” said Gavin slowly. “We could tie him to a pole and march around with him. He’d be a sort of—a sort of joke. Except to me, of course.”
“And no one ever needs to know you feel differently,” said Norah. She looked at her watch. “It’s time to head back.”
As they cleaned up their picnic and walked back to the canoe, she thought about Gavin’s strange need for a toy. She’d never understood it. Even as a little girl, she hadn’t liked stuffed animals or dolls—she only wanted to do things. She and Gavin were so different. But she was glad she’d thought of a way for him to hold on to his best friend.
On the way back they spotted some slate-coloured cranes and a swimming beaver, who slapped his tail as they glided by. Uncle Gerald was waiting at the mouth of the river with the Florence. He had George and Denny with him, who squealed with excitement when they saw them.
Before they reached Port Schofield they glimpsed a double-decker steamship with rounded ends and a striped smokestack: the Sagamo, returning from her daily Hundred Mile Cruise. As the boat came closer they heard piano music and voices singing “There’ll Always Be an England.”
“There you go, Norah and Gavin!” grinned Uncle Gerald, as they all waved at the passengers leaning over the railings. “A bit of home for you. Someone told me they sing that when they pass the German prison camp.”
Norah sighed. She’d never liked that droning song and she was nev
er going to be allowed to forget that she didn’t really belong here. She didn’t want to think about England any more. All she wanted to do was to keep “messing about in boats,” like Ratty and Mole in The Wind in the Willows. To sit here with the lake breeze on her cheeks and the smell of fresh water in her nostrils; to hold on to these precious last weeks of summer—and to Andrew.
15
Lois
O nce again Andrew was spending most of his time with the Mitchells. Norah decided he was probably avoiding the family until he told them his decision. When she pictured him facing the Elders on their last night she sometimes felt frightened for him. But she knew he would be splendid—he would address them regally the way he had when he’d played a prince.
She wondered if Aunt Mary was also going to reveal her secret soon. She hadn’t been back to Port Schofield since the wedding and had begun taking long, solitary walks around the island. Perhaps she too was trying to work up her courage until the last evening—then she’d tell them she was going to get married.
For the first time it occurred to Norah that if Aunt Mary got married she wouldn’t be living with them. She’d have to move to Regina—wasn’t that where she said Tom was from? As much as she wanted Aunt Mary to be happy, it would be awful living with just Aunt Florence. But perhaps Tom would live with them in Toronto. Aunt Florence would probably insist on it, Norah told herself.
How shocked the family was going to be when these two bombshells exploded! Poor Aunt Florence—little did she know that her daughter and her great-nephew were about to make announcements that would shatter her assumptions that all was as it should be.
The cousins were spending every moment soaking up the last few drops of fine weather that the summer was squeezing out. They had several picnics and a late-night bonfire on the shore. Now it was dark by about eight and cool enough to put on sweaters and slacks.
“Brrrr!” shivered Janet one evening, as she and Norah and Clare walked down to the boathouse. “It feels like fall!”
They were escaping from the Elders. A boatload of neighbours had arrived after dinner and the girls had grown tired of sitting politely and responding to the usual inane questions. The worst was, “All ready for school?” One of the visitors was the mother of one of Flo’s service-men. She and Flo spent the whole of the evening deep in conversation about Frank. Flo seemed almost like an Elder herself as she took part in the maternal discussion.
“We’re going to bed now,” Clare announced finally, with a commanding look at Janet and Norah.
“So soon?” asked her mother, but they slipped away before anyone could say more.
“Thanks for getting us out of there,” said Janet as they pounded up the boathouse stairs. “What should we do now? It’s too cold to go swimming.”
Clare looked mysterious and pulled out a thin, rectangular box from under her bed. “I know something we can do.” She lit two candles and put them and the box on a low table. They sat cross-legged around it.
“Louise left me this,” she explained. “It’s called a Ouija board.”
“It sounds rude,” giggled Janet. “Is it one of those games where you have to tell things about yourself? I’m not playing if it is.”
Clare frowned. “It isn’t a game—it’s real. Do you think you’re brave enough to try?”
“Sure!” said Janet, her voice wavering a bit. “Aren’t we, Norah?”
Norah shrugged. She wasn’t going to let Clare’s pose impress her. She eyed the strange board suspiciously as Clare unfolded it. The alphabet was printed in two curving rows in the middle of it, with a line of numbers underneath. YES was in one upper corner and NO in the other. Clare placed a small, heart-shaped wooden platform on top.
“This is the planchette. Two of us have to put our hands on it and ask Ouija a question. Then it moves to the letters or numbers and spells out the answer.”
“All by itself?” said Janet, her eyes growing round.
“No, Clare moves it,” said Norah. “I’ve heard of this—it’s a trick.”
“It is not!” cried Clare. “It really works! Louise and I found out all sorts of things—we know who we’re going to marry! You don’t have to do it, Norah,” she added coldly. “Come on, Janet. Put your hands there. That’s right, our fingers should just barely touch. Don’t put any weight on it. Now—Ouija, Ouija …” Her voice sounded ridiculously ghoulish. “Tell us … tell us the name of Janet’s future husband.”
Janet giggled. “Quiet!” hissed Clare. “You have to concentrate.”
They were all silent. The waves lapped softly outside. Then, very slowly, the planchette moved over the board on its three felt-covered feet.
Janet gasped. “Keep your hands on it!” Clare warned her. The tiny table went as far as the letter H and stopped.
“That’s the first letter of his name,” said Clare. “What’s next, Ouija?”
Slowly the pointer moved to A.
“It’s laughing at you,” said Norah. “HA!”
The others ignored her. “Now R,” whispered Janet. “But now it won’t move—why not?”
“Is it another R?” asked Clare. The planchette swung over to the word yes.
“Har, har,” whispered Norah.
“Y!” said Clare. “Harry! Is the name ‘Harry’, Ouija?”
Yes, answered the planchette.
Clare and Janet dropped their hands in their laps. “I told you it worked!” said Clare. “Do you know any Harrys, Janet?”
“No,” whispered Janet. Her hands were trembling. “You mean, that’s who I’m going to marry?” She began to smile. “That means I’ll get married one day!”
Norah scowled. “Clare was moving it, Janet. I told you, it’s just a trick.”
Clare looked disgusted. “All right then—you try it, with Janet. Then you can’t say I’m moving it. Janet wouldn’t cheat.”
Norah shrugged and placed her fingers on the planchette.
“Ask it who you’re going to marry,” ordered Clare.
“You ask it,” retorted Norah. “I’m not speaking to some dumb board.”
“No, it has to be one of you two.”
“I’ll do it, then,” said Janet. “Ouija, Ouija,” she crooned, her voice sounding even sillier than Clare’s. “Tell us who Norah is going to marry.”
Norah waited, confident that the pointer wouldn’t move at all. Then it slid across the board so fast she could hardly keep her fingers on it. “Stop it, Janet!” she cried. “I thought you weren’t going to cheat!”
“I’m not doing it!” whispered Janet frantically. “Don’t let go, Norah!”
“C!” cried Clare triumphantly.
In an instant Norah’s mind swept from disbelief to acute disappointment that it wasn’t an A.
“A … N … T … S … A … Y,” chanted Clare, as the planchette almost zoomed around, making a tiny scraping sound. “Is that all, Ouija? Yes.”
“CANTSAY—what kind of name is that?” said Janet. “Maybe it’s a last name.”
“No,” said Norah suddenly. “It’s can’t say. It doesn’t know.” That was almost a relief—it still left the possibility open for Andrew.
Then she shivered. It really did seem to work—she knew Janet hadn’t been moving it. “Okay,” she admitted to Clare. “I believe it now. But I don’t believe it’s magic. There must be some explanation.”
“Louise’s father says that we will it to go to certain letters. But I think it’s supernatural. You can even talk to someone who’s dead—do you want to try?”
“No!” shuddered Janet. “That’s too spooky. Let’s ask it how many children I’m going to have—me and Harry, that is,” she snickered.
They crouched around the board again and Norah tried it once more with Janet. A strange thrill washed over her, as if they were doing something forbidden.
“Three!” said Janet. “Good, because that’s exactly how many I’ve always wanted. Ask it how many Clare’s going to have.”
They couldn
’t stop now. Again and again they asked questions and the Ouija board obliged them every time. They found out that Clare would have no children and that Norah would have two (so I will marry Andrew, she concluded); that Clare would travel and Janet would pass math.
“Ask it when the war will be over,” said Norah.
But the Ouija wouldn’t budge. “I guess it doesn’t know,” said Clare. “It can’t know everything.”
Janet yawned. “I can hardly keep my eyes open.”
They heard Flo brushing her teeth below them and hid the Ouija board under Clare’s bed again, guessing that she wouldn’t approve.
After the others were asleep, Norah tossed restlessly and finally got up again. She shrugged her clothes on over her pyjamas and wandered along the shoreline. Once she was back in the city she was going to miss this freedom of getting up at night if she wanted to.
Two loons called back and forth to each other in a yearning warble. Poring over the Ouija board had made her feel slightly sick, as if she had eaten too much rich food. It had been fascinating and strange, but she didn’t want to do it again.
Up in the cottage the lower lights were off and the upper ones on; the Elders must be getting ready for bed. Norah fetched a flashlight from the boathouse and made her way to her rock. She studied the stars and found the Great Bear, which she had now learned to call the Big Dipper. The Northern Lights rippled across the sky in shifting bands of greenish-white. Their majestic, eerie beauty was almost frightening.
Norah glanced down at Andrew’s dark cabin. Where was he tonight? If only he were up here, confiding in her again; she began to go over that whole magical encounter, as she had done a million times already.
Just as she began to feel too cold to stay out any longer, she heard the Putt-Putt arrive at the dock. Andrew’s laugh rang out—someone was with him. A light female voice joined his in singing “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree.” Then two dark figures came into view behind the cottage. In the light from the back windows Norah could make out the other singer—Lois Mitchell.
The two of them hung onto each other and stumbled down the hill to Andrew’s cabin. Its windows lit up after they went in. Norah couldn’t help slipping down to eaves-drop, even though the longer she heard them together the worse it made her feel.
