Fire and Hemlock (8 page)

Polly was puzzled and scared, but she said defiantly, “Laurel’s not having it back! It’s mine.”

“Laurel doesn’t know,” said Seb. “Luckily for you. Have you seen or talked to a certain person from the house since the funeral?”

Polly thought of the varied sheets of Mr Lynn’s letter lying on her bed across the street, and her heart began bumping again. “Yes,” she said. “I’m talking to you now.” And she prayed that Nina had not chanced to notice who the letter was from – or, if she had, that Nina would have the sense not to say.

“Very funny!” said Seb. “You know that’s not who I mean.” Nina, to Polly’s relief, looked puzzled to death. “All right,” said Seb. “You haven’t – and I should know, standing outside in all weathers, watching—”

“Don’t you have to go to school at all?” Nina interrupted.

Seb sighed. “Yes I do, you boring little girl, but it’s still half-term. Shut up. I’m talking to
her
.” He stood himself up and turned round to face Polly. “Now see, you – this is a warning. Don’t. Don’t have anything to do with a certain person. Understand? Come on – promise. You owe me to promise.”

Polly stared up at Seb’s shadowy, orange-lit face. Since she could not pretend not to know what he was talking about, she thought rapidly for a way
not
to promise. She said rather vaguely, “It’s very kind of you to warn me.”

“Kind!” exclaimed Seb. He stamped about in disgust. Polly stood back, gently holding her breath. It looked as if he was distracted. “Who’s kind? I don’t do favours. I only told you because I’m sick of standing outside your beastly home and your boring school every day for a week! My feet are killing me. Yesterday I got soaked to the skin…”

He complained for quite a long time. Polly let her breath out and tried not to look smug. She could tell he was a selfish person. His own sufferings meant more to him than making her give promises.

All the same, Seb was not a fool. Having grumbled until Nina was yawning and shivering, he gave Polly a bad moment by rounding on her threateningly.

“Don’t forget,” he said. “If you break your promise, it won’t be me who sees to you. My father’s bad enough, but if Laurel gets to know, I wouldn’t be you for a billion pounds!” Polly believed him. She shivered as hard as Nina.

“I won’t forget,” she said.

“And good riddance!” Seb said. Polly watched him swing round and walk away. She watched him turn the corner by the pillar box. He was gone. Remembering, she thought, is not the same as promising. Good. I’ve won.

For a moment she thought Seb was coming back round the corner, uttering shrieking shouts. But it was only Nina’s Mum, come to see where Nina had got to. “I was worried, cherub. If somebody really
is
following you—”

“They weren’t,” Nina said crossly. “That was a mistake.” Her glasses flashed at Polly, puzzled and conspiratorially, as she was towed away.

And that was a good thing too, Polly thought, as she went back across the road. Nina had not had time to ask things which it was beyond Polly to explain.

Her own Mum met her at the front door. “Polly, what have you been up to now?” she said tiredly. “Door open, no coat.”

Polly looked up at her, remembering those angry splashes of salt. It was such a pity, when Ivy was so much better-looking than Nina’s Mum. Polly thought, I am
not
going to be a selfish person like Seb. “Sorry,” she said. “What’s the matter, Mum?”

“Nothing’s the matter,” said Ivy, drawing herself up stony and still. “Why should there be?”

“You cried,” said Polly.

“The idea!” exclaimed Ivy. “Go straight upstairs and don’t give me those stories!”

Polly went upstairs, trying to shrug. Mum
was
in a mood, all right. It didn’t do to get upset about it. To prove she was not upset, Polly read Mr Lynn’s letter all through again. Then she drew the curtains – after all, Seb might come back – and fetched out her birthday writing paper with roses on, and her best pen. Kneeling on her bed, rear upwards, hair dangling, she wrote a reply to Mr Lynn in her best writing. His letter deserved a good answer, but she wanted it to be good because of Seb, and because of Mum too, though she was not sure why.

Dear Mr Lynn,

Your letter is good and funny but you are not like Mr Piper reely. You should have killed the giant like you said I said. Now I will anser your questiuns. You are right heros always have a weapun but you do not need a sord, you have your axe. You need a horse. St Gorge had a horse for killing draguns. You got Edna right only not nasty enuff. She nags. She is so upposed to Mr Piper reading books that the pore man has to rap them in the cuvers of yusefull books called “A short histury of nales” for the big ones and “Iron list” for the small ones and read them secritally wile Edna watches the telly.

I hope you are well.

Polly was going to finish here, when she remembered Seb again. A new thought struck her. She sucked her pen a while, then wrote:

Mr Piper has a nefue, Edna is his Mum, called Leslie. He is a horrid boy and gets scaunfull every time Mr Piper is nice to him. Leslie is ashamed of Mr Piper, he thinks he is mad. He did not see the giant.

That is all. By for now.

Polly

She put the letter into an envelope and addressed it carefully. She went downstairs with it, intending to ask Mum for a stamp from her handbag. But since Ivy was sitting at the kitchen table pretending to read a magazine and showing no sign even of thinking of getting supper, Polly helped herself to a stamp and stuck it on. She went back to the kitchen. Ivy was still sitting.

“Mum,” Polly said softly, “shall I go and get fish and chips for supper?”

Ivy jerked. “For God’s sake, Polly, don’t treat me as if I was ill!”

Then, as Polly was slithering away, sure that she had pushed Mum from a mood into one of her discontents, she heard Ivy say thoughtfully, “Chinese. I fancy Chinese. Or would you rather have Indian, Polly?”

Polly did not like curry, nor the severe man in the Indian Take Away. “Chinese,” she said. “Shall I get it?”

Instead of fussing, as she often did, about Polly going out alone in the dark, Ivy simply said, “The money’s in my bag. Cross the road carefully.”

Polly found some pound notes and hid those and the letter in a carrier bag. She went out cautiously into a drizzling night. There was no sign of Seb. Nevertheless, Polly smuggled the letter into the pillar box on the corner, looking round everywhere as she did it, as if it was the guiltiest thing she had ever done. She had no doubt she was breaking the promise Seb thought she had made. Then she went on her way to the Chinese Take Away, thinking she was probably quite heroic.

In those days Polly never quite believed that a letter you put in a pillar box really got where you meant it to go. She was astonished to get a reply to her letter a week later. She had almost forgotten Mr Lynn by then, because she was so worried about Dad. Dad had been away so long that Polly knew he was not on a course. She thought he might be dead, and that somehow Mum had forgotten to tell her. The reason she thought this was that Ivy’s mood seemed to be over and she was behaving the way she always did, but Polly could tell it was a disguise to cover the mood still going on underneath. Polly dared not ask her about Dad in case he really was dead. She almost dared not ask Ivy anything for fear of being told about Dad. But she had to ask about Mr Lynn’s letter. Mr Lynn had scrawled it in big, crooked handwriting, and Polly could not read a word.

Ivy read the letter, frowning. “What’s this? Asking you to drop in and have tea with him when you happen to be in London next. How old does he think you are? Things to discuss – what things? Who is he?”

Polly went skipping round the room. “He plays the cello in the British Symphony Orchestra,” she said as she skipped. “Granny’s met him. You can ring Granny and ask her if you like.”

But Ivy did not seem to be getting on with Granny. She stood, stony and doubtful, holding the letter.

Polly jumped up and down with impatience. Then she stood still and did some careful pleading. “Please, Mum! He’s ever so nice. He wrote me that big letter – remember? It’s because he’s a trainee-hero and I’m his assistant.”

“Oh,” said Ivy. “One of your make-believes. Polly, how many times have I told you not to bother grown-ups to pretend with you. All the same—” She stopped and thought. Polly held her breath and tried not to jig.

“I have to go to town anyway,” Ivy said, “to see this lawyer I was told about. I was going to dump you at Nina’s, but I think people are beginning to think you live there. If this Mr Lynn really wants you, I could dump you there instead.”

Ivy telephoned Mr Lynn. While she was doing it, Polly remembered – with a jerk, like someone landing on her stomach with both feet – the promise Seb had thought she made, and his threats about Mr Morton Leroy and Laurel. She was suddenly terrified that one of them could tap the telephone and listen in to Ivy talking to Mr Lynn in her brisk, unfriendly telephone-voice.

But nothing seemed to happen. Ivy came away from the phone, saying, “Well, he sounds all right. Wanted to know what you like for tea. Now, don’t let him spoil you, Polly, and don’t be a pest.”

This was the thing she went on saying, almost mechanically, all the next few days and all the way up to London in the train. Polly listened without really hearing. Now she had started being frightened, she was terrified. She was excited, but she was terrified too. They took a stopping train from Main Road Station, and Polly could think of nothing but Laurel’s strange, empty eyes. It seemed no time before they were in King’s Cross. Polly felt that Mr Lynn must think very quickly to have made up the whole giant story on the way.

“Now, don’t let him spoil you and don’t be a pest,” Ivy said as they got off. “Oh, come on, Polly, do! What do you keep looking round for?”

Polly was looking for Seb or Mr Leroy. She was sure they were there somewhere, and that, even if they did not know where she was going, they would guess at once when they saw her all dressed up in her nice dress. The odd thing was that her very terror made her all the more determined to see Mr Lynn. I must be quite brave after all! she thought.

Ivy took Polly’s wrist and dragged her downstairs to the taxis. Polly’s head was turned the other way the whole time. They took a taxi to Mr Lynn’s address because Ivy only knew that it was somewhere quite near the lawyer’s. Polly stared out of the back window for other taxis following her with Seb in them. And for big, expensive cars with Laurel in them. Laurel, she knew, would have a chauffeur to drive. Laurel would be sitting beside him, wearing dark glasses. She saw a lady exactly like that, and she thought she was going to be sick. But it was a different lady entirely. Meanwhile, Ivy kept repeating the lawyer’s address and making Polly say it back to her. Both of them talked like machines.

“And tell him to bring you there at five-thirty sharp,” Ivy said again as the taxi stopped. “Now, don’t—”

“Don’t let him spoil me and don’t be a pest. I know,” Polly said as she climbed into the road. And she promptly forgot all that. She was relieved to find herself in a quiet street, with no Seb, no Mr Leroy and, above all, no Laurel.

Mr Lynn lived in a very Londony house, with steps up to the door, regular windows, and a stack of bell-pushes beside the door. Polly found and pressed the one labelled LYNN. The door was opened almost at once by a very glamorous lady in tight jeans. The lady had a baby bundled onto one tight denim hip and she grinned so cheerfully at Polly that Polly was convinced she must be Mrs Lynn. But it seemed not. The lady turned round and shouted, “Hey! Second floor! Visitor for Lynn!”

Mr Lynn was hurrying down the dingy stairs. “Sorry to trouble you, Carla,” he said. “Hello, Polly – Hero, I should say.”

“Not at all,” said Carla. “I was just going out.” She jerked a pushchair from behind the front door and bumped away with it down the steps, leaving Polly, just for a moment, not at all sure what to say next.

The trouble was, she had been thinking of Mr Lynn as a tortoise-man, or as a sort of ostrich in gold-rimmed glasses, the way he had described himself in his letter – anyway, as rather pathetic and ridiculous – and it was quite a shock to find he was a perfectly reasonable person after all, simply very tall and thin. And it was a further trouble to realise that Mr Lynn did not quite know what to say either. They stood and goggled at one another.