The Mystery of the Cupboard (11 page)

“Yeah. I dunno where that came from. Neither of them was.”

“Jessica Charlotte was! And Frederick wasn't so bad. I mean you could understand how he felt.”

“Frederick sounds like a total prat. And I don't see how you can say Jessica Charlotte was good. She was a thief.”

“She wasn't! Well, not—”

“Course she was,” said Patrick crisply. “She was just as bad as the skinheads who broke into your house.”

Omri sat silently. The comparison horrified him.

“You don't understand,” he said at last. “I haven't explained properly what made her do it.”

“If you steal, you're a thief,” said Patrick.

Omri felt strangely upset. “Let's go to bed if that's all you can say,” he mumbled, and stood up to undress.

The boys got into their pyjamas in silence. Patrick knew he'd upset Omri and was sorry, but he was too stubborn to take his judgement back.

When they were ready for bed, he suddenly said, “Let's see the cashbox.”

Omri, with obvious reluctance, as if he didn't think Patrick deserved to see it now, fished it out from under the bed and unwrapped it. Patrick did all the things Omri had done with it: tried to open it, felt the sealing wax, shook it gently. Then he examined the keyhole.

“You realize the magic key would almost certainly open this,” he said quietly.

Omri sat up straight with a jolt. “Of course! I never thought of that!”

“Pity it's in the bank,” said Patrick meaningfully.

Omri said nothing. He was thinking furiously.

“There's something I don't get,” said Patrick. “The key was round this Jessica Charlotte's neck when Frederick was writing. And soon after, she died. How did it get to your great-grandmother?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well,
she
had it, didn't she? The magic one, the copy. She gave it to your mum when
she
was dying - that's what you told me.”

Omri's mouth opened. Another angle he hadn't thought of. He just hadn't made the connection. Of course the key, and the cupboard too, must have found their way back to Maria after Jessica Charlotte's death, or his own mum couldn't have inherited them.

“Perhaps it was in the will,” said Omri. “If there hadn't been a will, everything in this house would have gone to Frederick, would have stayed here until
he
died, which was only last year.”

“And what about the earrings? What happened to them?”

“She'd never have sent the earrings back to Maria! That would have been like admitting she stol— took them, and in any case she half-thought Maria had died before her.”

“Then she'd have left everything to Lottie.”

“No, no, you're getting mixed up. Lottie was dead, she died in the London blitz.”

“Oh, yeah… How did she know that, though?”

“Who? Jessica Charlotte? How did she know what?”

“You said she wasn't in touch with Maria, right? And that Maria wasn't in touch with Frederick, never met him? So how could she have known even that Lottie was dead? The newspapers?”

Omri shrugged and shook his head. There was a thinking silence, and then Omri said slowly, “Or… her Gift.”

“Her what?”

“That's what she called her ability to - like, know things she couldn't normally know. Maybe she - poured the lead, and found out that way about Lottie, and my mum.”

“If she could know that, she could know Maria was still alive.”

“Maybe she hadn't done it when she wrote the Account,” said Omri slowly. “Maybe she only did it at the very end.”

“You said she was too weak even to write. How could she possibly do this lead-pouring bit? It's boiling metal we're talking about, she couldn't even boil water to give the thatchers their tea.”

Omri stood up slowly.

“The thatchers,” he said breathlessly. “The thatchers! That's it!” He opened the notebook to the last written-on page. “What do you make of this?”

Patrick read it. He looked up. “‘Confidence' and
‘followed' spelt wrong. Looks like a child's writing.”

“Or a person who wasn't very educated. Wait. Just wait till tomorrow when we meet Tom Towsler at the Red Lion. He'll have something interesting to tell us — I know he will! If only Tony's dad gives us a chance to talk to him alone.”

T
o Omri's secret annoyance, it was decided next morning that they would all go down to the Red Lion together, for Sunday lunch.

“They've got a good carvery, I've heard,” said Omri's father. “Cut-and-come-again, boys, you'll like that!”

“The bottomless plate,” put in Tony's father. “Sounds good to me, this country air gives me an appetite.” He'd been up early for a walk and to inspect the thatch more closely. “Wonderful craftsmen! The patterning on the peak of the roof, and over the eaves — all traditional, I guess — kind of woven into the straw. Love it!”

“Reeds,” said Omri, “not straw.”

“Oh, yeah, thanks, must get it right,” said Tony's dad seriously, making a note in his notebook.

They walked into town along the lanes between the tall Dorset hedges. The four boys dawdled, picking late blackberries. Omri was quiet while the others chatted. This wasn't what he'd planned. He would have to find a way to get this Tom to himself or Tony's dad would monopolize him. Journalists didn't chat to people. They interviewed them.

Omri had lain awake a long time the night before, trying to figure things out in the light of some of the ideas Patrick had come up with. If what he had said was right, and the key of the cupboard (which had also worked on his seaman's chest) would fit the cashbox, then he might have to break his promise to himself and get the key, at least, out of the bank. He couldn't just leave the cashbox locked for ever!

Because it had suddenly flashed upon him what was in there.

The earrings!

Where else would Jessica Charlotte have put them? It was obvious! And this certainty Omri felt about their whereabouts added a bit of ordinary treasure-hunting excitement to the whole business. They were not only valuable in themselves, they were invested with mystery. With history. A family heirloom! And they would belong to him, because he would have found them!

Of course he'd give them to his mother. She had only recently had her ears pierced and now loved dangly hook-on earrings. Omri could hardly wait to see her face when he handed her these beautiful precious jewels.

But it was Sunday. Even if he'd absolutely made up his mind to go against his strongest intention and get his secret package out, the banks weren't open. Good, really. It meant he couldn't do anything on impulse.

The Red Lion had a largish garden at the back, with wooden tables and benches under coloured umbrellas with the brand names of drinks emblazoned on them. Lots of families were there already, having lunch, with kids running around. There was quite a festive atmosphere, which normally would have been fun, but just now all Omri wanted was a word alone with this Tom Towsler. A long talk, in fact.

Omri's father went into the bar to order drinks and Omri went too. He looked all round for a man of the right age to be Tom. There wasn't one — they were all either too young or too old. Anyway, none of them looked right.

While his father was occupied, Omri slipped through into the public bar. Here there were several older men who looked like locals. He summoned up his courage and approached one of them.

“Excuse me,” he said. “I'm looking for Tom Towsler.”

“Don't know 'im,” said the man grumpily.

“He used to be a thatcher,” persisted Omri.

“You should be outdoors, not in 'ere. What's the world comin' to, kids in pubs, I dunno.”

Omri looked anxiously over his shoulder at the bartender. He was looking at him all right, but not crossly. He beckoned him over.

“Looking for Tom?” he said. “He ent been in today. Ent been too well these last months.”

Omri's heart gave a lurch.

“He's ill?”

“Yeah, sort of.”

“What's wrong?”

“Who knows? Tom's a funny bu— er, chap. He takes funny turns.”

“How do you mean?”

“Talks to hisself and like that, if you take my meanin'.”

Omri remembered one of their thatchers, tapping his head significantly about Tom.

“But he's not — dangerously ill or anything?”

“I shouldn't think so. If you wanted, you could call on him, p'raps.”

“Where does he live?” asked Omri dubiously.

“In the Fairacre Estate with his daughter. She works here part-time, name of Peggy.” He wrote down the address. “He'd be glad of a visitor, I expect. Likes young company, does Tom.”

“Is this far from here?”

“No! Just up the hill. Five minutes.”

Back in the garden, Omri sidled up to Patrick.

“Let's scarper,” he muttered. “He's not here, but I've found out where he is. Not a word to Tony's dad.”

The address was a council house with a neatly kept front garden. The door was ajar. They rang the bell and a not-young woman in an overall answered.

“We'd like to see Mr Towsler, please,” said Omri.

“You friends of his, are you?”

“Well, no, but we - we have some business with him,” said Omri.

She smiled. Clearly the idea of the two of them being businessmen amused her.

“My father's out the back, working,” she said. “You can go round the side.”

The small back garden was entirely devoted to vegetables, set out in neat rows, interrupted by tepees of runner beans. An old-looking man with a bald head was working away, pulling out spent pea plants and throwing them in a pile. He wore rubber boots and old clothes and had a cigarette end in his mouth.

Omri coughed. “Mr Towsler?”

The old man turned and stared at them. Omri thought he looked startled.

“Who are you?” he asked rather sharply.

Omri came to the edge of the vegetable bed and put out his hand. “I'm — my name's Omri. My family's moved in to Mistle Hay Farmhouse.”

The man looked quite blank for a moment, then a curious expression came over his face. The odd thought flashed through Omri's mind:
He's been expecting
me. The man made no move to take Omri's hand, so he let it fall.

“Mistle Hay?” the man said. “You'm at Mistle Hay?”

“Yeah. We've just had it re-thatched and we found the bottle. That's how we heard about you. You thatched it last time.”

“Arh,” he said. He kept staring at Omri. “You'm family, ent you,” he said suddenly. “You've got a look of she.”

Omri felt his neck prickle. He understood instantly.
This man was saying he looked like Jessica Charlotte.
He said quietly after a moment, “She was my great-great-aunt.”

The old man gazed at him. He took no notice of Patrick. After a few moments he stepped onto the path and took off his gardening gloves, banging them against his leg.

“What do ee want with me?” he asked.

“Could I ask you some questions?”

He led them to an aged garden table like the ones at the pub. They sat down. Omri pulled the notebook out of a plastic bag he was carrying, and opened it to the last page with writing, the two lines in blunt pencil. And the initials. TT. Tom Towsler.

“You wrote this, didn't you?” Omri asked.

The man looked at it briefly, then back again in to Omri's eyes.

“You found more'n th'ould bottle, seemingly,” he said. He took the book gently out of Omri's hand and turned it over. “Tarpaulin kept it pretty well dry then,” he said.

“Did
you
wrap it up and put it in the thatch?” Omri asked, trying to keep the excitement out of his voice.

“Oh, arh.”

“Do — do you know what's in the cashbox?”

“I might guess but I don't know. How would I?”

“I thought she might have told you.”

“She give it me. And the book. Told me what to write. Told me what to do - give me instructions.”

“To wrap the box and the notebook in thatchers' tarpaulin and hide it in the thatch.”

The old man nodded.

They sat in the sunlight in silence. Behind Tom Towsler's head, the fields, yellow after haymaking, spread upward to the edge of a blue early autumn sky.

Then Patrick said, “Anything else?”

The old man looked at him slowly. “Like what?”

“Did she ask you to do anything, or help her with anything else?”

“
You
ent family,” Tom said, almost accusingly.

“He's my friend,” said Omri quickly. “It's all right.”

“My instructions was to 'ide one package. And post another,” he said.

Omri sat up straight on the bench and glanced at Patrick.

“Post? You had to post a parcel?”