In Search of the Blue Tiger (4 page)

This is my scrapbook. It is not to be read by anyone in this house. You may have seen other things I have written, about being a tiger or about the colour blue, or about me standing at the bus stop watching people waiting for a friend. These will have been on odd bits of paper and envelopes and do not count. But this is my personal scrapbook and it is out of bounds and cannot be read by any person in this house. If you do, your eyeballs will melt and trickle down your cheeks like treacle.

If you are not a grown-up from this house and are reading it now, you might wonder why I am writing this. These are my thoughts and my family history. I will be dead and there are clues here that will help you understand my life.

Mostly my scrapbook is about animals & (this is called an ampersand: which I like very much) the people in this house & HOW PEOPLE CAN BECOME ANIMALS, though that is not really fair to animals, as they are often much better than people. But it is also about other things that interest me.

Like my favourite colour: Blue

And my lucky number: 25

Later in the week I head back to the library to find out more. The dog likes the pavement outside the building where he waits. Passersby stroke his head and rub his tummy. Sometimes they even give him chocolate, which I know he enjoys very much.

Inside, the same scruffy man in the children's library takes back my returned books.

‘I'd like some books on animals and people,' I say, not sure quite what I'm looking for.

‘Animals and people,' he repeats. I wonder if he might be a parrot in his spare time.

He consults the index catalogue, and reports there are no books on people and animals. Today he wears a big floppy jumper, with fraying cuffs and ink stains on the sleeves. I feel brave. I hold up my scrapbook, like a shield, saying it is a project I am doing. He pauses for a second, the sails of the
Cutty Sark
flapping in the gusting wind as I wave the book above my head. He looks at me quizzically, a bit amused. Then he tells me to inquire at the reference section of the adult library.

‘It's across the corridor,' he says, waving a hand in the general direction. I notice his fingernails are broken and the skin bloodied. Maybe he's not a parrot, but an owl returned from a night swooping and scratching through the hedgerows. Wise and sleepy in the library by day; alert and predatory in the woodlands by night.

I stride confidently up to the reference counter.

The same lady as before looks me up and down. She is sharp and bright-eyed, more like a heron than an owl. Again, I hold up my scrapbook. The
Cutty Sark
heads for her: a pirate ship in pursuit of bounty.

‘I'm trying to understand more about people and animals,' I tell her from behind the scrapbook. Her eyelids open wide to show big bits of eyes. This, I know, means an adult is surprised by a child. So I say something else to help her.

‘I like legends about people and animals and I want to find a tiger name for my dog.'

I sense her weighing me up. After a few moments she tells me, in an authoritative but kindly voice, to follow her, to be quiet, not to look at any books save those she gives me, to sit still and return the books to the desk when finished.

‘All hands to the deck,' I think, my own hands firmly clasping the rudder, ploughing through the cavernous waves of the China Sea, following in the wake of the Head Librarian, Adult Section.

‘Remember, you are a member of the children's library and are here for educational purposes,' she says, walking between the rows, not turning her head. ‘You are not allowed to take any books away with you. Am I understood?'

The quiver of my head seems to satisfy her.

I sit where I am told, relishing my borrowed grown-up status. She busies herself picking books from shelves, closely examining each one before placing it on the table beside me. One she looks at for a few seconds, flips its pages, then returns it. I focus on its slate-grey spine, memorising its position next to a tall olive green book on the second shelf up.

The books have few pictures, but the words are mesmerising. I sharpen my pencil and open up a fresh page of my scrapbook.

The legends in the books talk about how animals and people worked together and looked after each other. One story is about how animals brought fire to man. Native Americans tell that in days long ago the only fire in the world was on a mountaintop, guarded by three Skookums. Skookums are very strong and scary. They are large animals that live in lakes, with orange bodies and two long, thin, black tentacles. The Skookums guarded the fire carefully so that man could not steal it.

In those days Coyote was a friend of man and wanted man to be warm and happy. He made up a plan to steal the fire from the Skookums. He crept up the mountaintop, just before dawn, and grabbed the fire while the Skookums were dozing. One of the Skookums saw him and followed him down the mountain, but before she could catch him Coyote gave the fire to Wolf. Wolf ran away into the forest and just before Skookum grabbed Wolf he handed the fire to Squirrel. Squirrel scurried away to Frog who hopped off with the coals of fire in his mouth. Skookum chased Frog, but Frog managed to spit the fire on to Wood who lived in a huge tree. Wood swallowed it and Skookum did not know how to get the fire out of Wood. Skookum went away without the fire.

Later on, when all was quiet and Skookum was far away, Coyote called Man to a meeting and showed him how to get the fire out of Wood by rubbing two dry sticks together.

And that's how the animals helped Man to get fire.

Now Man can cook all the animals he wants and eat them up.

I am licking my orange crayon, colouring in the body of a Skookum that I've drawn in my scrapbook, when I sense someone behind me. Looking around I see the librarian, peering over my shoulder. She has a pile of books in her arms, but she smiles at me and nods her head. Her approval gives me a warm feeling. Like the hot chocolate Great Aunt Margaret gives me sometimes when she likes me. Adults are so strange: one thing one minute; another the next.

‘A family is a little world within doors; the miniature resemblance of the great world without.' James

Strong winds from the faraway tropics gather and fold into each other, pushing a heavy blanket of cloud across the curve of the sky. On a distant shore, the lighthouse at Tidetown winks in collusion with the rumbling storm. Down at the quayside the fishermen look up from mending their nets and smell the turbulence in the air. Seagulls and guillemots ruffle their feathers and cling closer to the cliffs.

The house awaits the onslaught. The bricks pull tight together, bracing themselves against what rumbles on the wind. Windowpanes shudder in their frames, shrinking from the icy blasts long cast, gathering momentum, far out to sea. Bolts clatter into latches, age-old steel holding fast. Doors turn hard in their locks, squeezing out any space between wood and wall. Chimneystacks crouch down and hug the roofs tight, ducking twigs and debris whipped up by the tongue of the storm. Under cover of dark, the tempest creeps along the coastline, towards the avenue of Dutch elm trees snoozing in the breeze. The town sleeps, unaware, defenses down. But in the House of the Doomed and Damned a lamp is lit: one eye opens to check what threatens in the night.

I show my scrapbook to Mother. She says it should win a prize. We are in the kitchen, but there is no food on offer. She is drinking whiskey; the Great Aunt is clicking her rosary beads and chewing a toffee; the dog is stretched out in front of the fire. The Father must be back at sea.

‘Read us something, little Oscar,' says Mother, the light from the open fire lightening her complexion, catching a gleam in her eye. ‘Tell us some fascinating tale to amuse us,' she slurs.

She is a bit drunk, but not sad or nasty.

I open up my book. Carefully turn the pages. The dog pricks up his ears.

I take a deep breath and announce: ‘How the tiger got its stripes. According to a Vietnamese legend.'

‘Pagan nonsense,' murmurs Great Aunt, not moving, sucking deeply on her toffee, hurrying through the rosary beads to ward off any evil.

‘How the tiger got its stripes, as retold by Oscar Flowers the first.' I look at Mother. She has a glass to her mouth and either hasn't heard or doesn't care about the small embellishment. It is something I fancy to be, rather grand and regal. I clear my throat and read on.

‘This story comes from ancient times when animals spoke and people listened.'

I look to see if Mother and Great Aunt realise I am on to them and their animal ways. But one sips whiskey and the other sucks her sweet, and there is no change in the air. So I read on.

‘A farmer was eating lunch in a rice field in the shade of a banana tree. He was probably eating banana sandwiches, but we can't be sure. He noticed his water buffalo was getting worried, which was no surprise because it could smell a tiger getting closer.

‘The fearsome tiger sprang towards the buffalo, shouting: “Don't be afraid, I won't do you any harm. I just want to talk to you.”

‘The buffalo felt reassured and listened to the tiger. They sat together by the pond.

‘“Why do you let that weak man make you work for him? You are ten times stronger than him, you have better vision and a better sense of smell, but you do all his work. What is the magic power he has over you?” said the tiger to the buffalo.

‘“Well,' said the buffalo,” rubbing his tired and weary back, “I know I shall never be free from the power of the farmer, because he has a talisman he calls wisdom.”

‘“Hmm. I must ask the man about that,” replied the tiger. “If I could get this thing called wisdom then I could be equal to man and no longer fear his intentions.”

‘So the tiger asked the farmer if he could have some wisdom. The farmer was most courteous and apologised for having left the wisdom at home, but promised he would go back to his village and get it for the tiger.

‘“Wait here,” he advised the tiger. “If you come with me the villagers are sure to stone you. But I am worried that you might eat my buffalo while I am gone. Please put my mind at rest by allowing me to tie you with ropes.”

‘The tiger was suspicious, but he wanted the wisdom so much that he let the man tie heavy ropes around his body and then shackle him to a tree. The farmer rushed off and returned with armfuls of straw that he placed around the helpless tiger.

‘“Behold my wisdom,” shouted the man as he set fire to the straw.

‘The tiger was badly burnt and roared so loudly all the trees around him trembled. He raged and pleaded with the farmer. Even the buffalo, who had good reason to fear the tiger, asked that the tiger should be freed. But the man refused. Finally, the flames burnt through the ropes and the tiger fled to the forest. After a long while his wounds healed. But forever more tigers have the black stripes of the ropes that the flames seared into the flesh of their ancestor. And from that day onwards tiger would never trust man.

‘That's how the tiger got its stripes. The End.'

Mother is asleep, the empty glass on the table beside her. The dog is on the floor chewing a piece of wood from the coal-scuttle. Then I notice Great Aunt has a tear in her eye.

‘My baby,' she wails, ‘my darling, darling baby. All in cinders, all in cinders.'

She sucks on her rosary beads, tears coursing down the dry and wrinkled skin of her face like a summer storm on parched earth. The embers of the fire glow in the hearth. The room is darkening. I watch Great Aunt as she shudders and mumbles. She waves a hand at me, so I close my book.

Then I whistle to my dog and we wander into the garden to see what the moon is up to.

Munching on a cheese and pickle sandwich, I sense footsteps overhead in the kitchen. Sometimes a shaft of light between the floorboards is blocked out by the sole of a shoe. I lick my lips and lose myself in my book. It is a tale of the hurricane that washed away a town in America. The photos show bodies in the ruins and rescuers staring out at the camera like they've been caught in a dream. Survivors tell of roofs cutting peoples' heads off and being bitten by deadly snakes in the branches of treetops. How terrifying it must have been, how exciting, the huge wall of water, the roar of the wind. The chaos. On another page is a picture of the sea the day after. It is calm and the sky is orangey with a few clouds streaking across the sun. There's a bird flying by and I can almost hear the whistling of the wind. I smell the pages of the book: the salty ocean, the seaweedy air.