Meet the Austins (20 page)

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Authors: Madeleine L'engle

BOOK: Meet the Austins
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“A biscuit's so hard,” I said, “and I'm sure the roof of her mouth is sore.” What Colette loves more than anything in the world is buttered toast, so I told John and Suzy I was going to make her some, and they decided to have some, too. As a matter of fact, we were hungry again. Colette danced about, delighted at having got rid of the chop bone, and ate pieces of all our
buttered toast. Then we had some tea, and Colette had several saucersful, with lots of milk.
After a while John said, “I hope Rob and Maggy are okay.”
“Well, of course they are!” Suzy said impatiently. “Maggy's old enough to look after Rob for a few minutes.”
“I hope you told them not to go wading,” John said anxiously, like a mother hen.
“What do you think I am!” I said indignantly. “I've got
some
sense of responsibility.”
“Sure, Vic,” John said, “but I'll just feel better if you'll go down and check on them.”
I thought I'd feel better, too, so I slithered down the cliff path to Grandfather's cove. And they weren't there. There was the sand castle they had been building, and there were two more big piles of shells, but no sign of either of them. “I
told
them not to go out of Grandfather's cove!” I said aloud.
I wasn't very worried yet, though, and I clambered around the rocks to the bigger cove where we sometimes go but they weren't there, either. I went back to Grandfather's cove.
Make
them be there, I half thought, half prayed, and I really thought I'd see them squatting by the sand castle or playing with their shells. But they weren't there. The picnic basket was there, and the thermos jug of lemonade, and my book, but no Rob or Maggy. I called and called but nobody answered except a gull. The tide was well on its way in now, and a good half of the spit of land where they'd been trotting up and down getting shells was already underwater. I began to feel panicky. I put the book in the picnic basket, carried the basket in one hand and the
heavy thermos jug in the other, and clambered back up the cliff-side to the stable.
In the stable all was peace and quiet. Grandfather was writing at his desk with Colette sleeping peacefully at his feet, and he looked so happy and busy that I hated to disturb him, especially with something worrying, so I climbed the ladder to the loft, but nobody was there. Then I heard a noise in the kitchen, so I hurried down.
Please
make Rob and Maggy be there. Make them have come home without my knowing it.
But just John and Suzy were there, both of them eating more toast and marmalade.
“Where're Rob and Maggy?” John asked.
“They aren't there,” I said flatly. “They aren't in Grandfather's cove or anywhere around. I called and called and they didn't answer.”
“Where could they be?” Suzy asked blankly.
John looked at me and said, “Mother and Daddy said we were never to leave the little ones at the beach without one of us being there.”
“John,
don't
!” I cried. “Help me find them!”
“All right,” John said. “The first thing is not to get panicky. They're undoubtedly perfectly all right. We've just got to figure out where they're likely to be. Just where did you leave them, Vicky?”
“In Grandfather's cove,” I said again. “I told them to stay right there till I came back for them and they weren't to go near the water.”
“And she really wasn't gone very long,” Suzy said in my defense. “Just while she took the chop bone out of Colette's mouth and made the tea and toast. And if they didn't want to stay down at the beach I don't see why they didn't come back up to the stable.”
“I don't think Rob would go off and do anything cockeyed by himself,” John said. “I'm sure of Rob, and I thought I was sure of Maggy, but now that it comes to the point, I'm not quite so sure. I'm trying to think, well, what would Maggy, being Maggy, be most likely to do, and I don't know.”
“Could they have gone to the post office?” Suzy suggested.
“But you remember, we all walked to the post office this morning.”
“Oh. Well, they wouldn't have gone there.”
“I want to look for them,” I said nervously. “I don't want to sit here and talk about it.”
“The point is,” John said, “we have to figure out where to look. There's no point going off half cocked to the post office if they've gone in the other direction. You really looked thoroughly on the beach, Vic?”
“Of
course.
”
“Do you think we ought to tell Grandfather?” Suzy asked.
“Not yet.” John shook his head. “Okay, Vic, it's not that I don't trust you, but I'm going to look down on the beach again.”
“But I
did
—” I started to protest.
“I know, but they might have wandered off and come back,” John said. “You go look over by the lighthouse. Suzy, you stay here, and if they come back you tell us as fast as you can.
Vicky and I'll be as quick as possible and we'll meet right back here.”
 
I half ran, half walked, along the narrow cliff road. Above me the sea gulls had evidently sighted some fish or something that excited them, because they kept diving and swooping and crying, and I kept thinking it was Rob or Maggy, crying or frightened or hurt. When I got to the yellow frame building across the road from the lighthouse where Mr. Henreys, the lighthouse keeper, and his wife lived, I went in and asked if they had seen Rob or Maggy anywhere that afternoon, and they hadn't. So I turned around and hurried back to the stable again. The thing that kept bothering me, the thing that for some reason I kept seeing in my mind, was Rob and Maggy walking out on that spit of land hunting for shells, and knowing now that the spit of land was rapidly being covered with water from the incoming tide; and Rob is too young to swim much and I didn't even know whether Maggy could swim or not.
Suzy was waiting for me in the kitchen. She said she'd just gone up to the loft to look out; she'd seen me on my way back from the lighthouse, and John starting up the cliff path, and she could see all along the beach, but there was no sign of Rob or Maggy.
“But I couldn't have seen them, of course,” she said, “if they'd been around the corner of a cove or behind a rock.”
“It's my fault,” I said. “I told them I'd be right back.”
“There isn't any point in
blaming
anybody,” Suzy said. “If it comes to blame, we told them to stay right where they were, and they didn't.”
John came in then. “They aren't down at the beach and that's that.” He looked at me and I looked at him and neither of us said what we were thinking.
“The tide's coming in,” Suzy said. “If they went into some of the littler coves they couldn't get back to Grandfather's cove until the tide goes out again. Rob's too little to climb up the cliff except by the path.”
“Well, maybe we'd better not just go on looking by ourselves,” John said, sort of tentatively. “Maybe we'd better tell Grandfather.”
“Tell Grandfather what?” a voice asked, and Maggy came strolling into the kitchen.
“Maggy!”
We all pounced on her, the three of us shouting at once, where had she been, why hadn't they stayed in Grandfather's cove the way I told them to, why had they worried us that way, and then, all of a sudden, “Where's Rob?”
Maggy looked blank. “Rob? Isn't he with you?”
“He was with
you
!” I said fiercely. “I left you with him in Grandfather's cove and you
knew
you should have stayed there till I got back. You're six years older than Rob! You
knew
you were in charge of him!”
“You didn't tell me I was,” Maggy said.
At that point I would gladly have seen Maggy thrown to the lions.
“She didn't have to tell you,” John said coldly. “Where have you been and why did you leave Rob?”
Maggy looked around from one to the other of us, her vague look slowly being replaced by a wary one; if there was anything Maggy hated, it was acknowledging she'd done wrong
in any way—hated it even more than the rest of us. Finally she said, “Well, Rob told me to go away, so I went.”
“No, Maggy, that won't do,” John said.
“Well, what really happened,” Maggy started again, “was that we were playing hide-and-seek and it was my turn to hide and, well … and … and I waited and waited and when Rob didn't come look for me I … well … I thought he'd come back to the stable, so I came along to see if he was here. I was … I was looking for him.”
Suzy came up to Maggy and looked at her earnestly. Suzy is a full year younger than Maggy, but they're just exactly the same size, and Suzy looked her right in the eyes. “Maggy, do you remember Wilbur the pig?”
“Well, sure,” Maggy said. “Why?”
“And right after that I took the candy from the Jenkins' store and I didn't tell Mother or Daddy or anything and when Mother and Daddy asked if I knew anything about the candy I said no and I didn't tell the truth?”
Maggy got very pink, but all she said was, “Well, sure I remember.”
“And I remember
you
said you never lied.”
“Well, I never do.”
“Then please
don't,
” Suzy begged. “We know Rob loves to play tricks, and when he's mad at people he does say ‘Go away,' but he'd never have left you like that after Vicky told you to stay together in Grandfather's cove. Please, Maggy, all we want to know is where to look for Rob. You've
got
to help us. Why aren't you with Rob and why didn't you stay in Grandfather's cove?”
“Well, we
were
playing hide-and-seek,” Maggy said. “Honestly.”
“Okay,” John said. “We all believe you were playing hide-and-seek. Then what?”
“Then—well, then nothing.”
John suddenly looked terribly old and grownup. “We'll have to go to Grandfather,” he said.
Then I had an idea. “Maggy, did
you
play the trick on Rob? Did
you
go off and leave
him
for a joke?”
Maggy nodded.
“Then what happened?” John asked. “Maggy, please! You've got to tell us right away! Don't you realize, every minute you pussyfoot around something awful might happen to Rob? He can't swim very well, and the tide's coming in.”
All the pink went out of Maggy's cheeks and she went very white and the darks of her eyes seemed to get very big. When she spoke it was breathlessly, as though John had hit her in the stomach. “It was just for a joke. It was Rob's turn to hide, so I climbed up the cliff path and then I walked on down to Dick's Place and had an ice-cream cone. I had a dime in my pocket.”
“And you knew if Rob came along you'd have to share it with him!” Suzy said furiously.
But John shushed her warningly.
“And when I got back he was gone,” Maggy said. “That's the honest truth. I thought he'd just grown tired of waiting for me and come back to the stable. So I waded for a few minutes to cool my feet off, and then I went and picked some kind of pink flower for Grandfather—it was blooming all over the path—and then I just came along home.”
This time we knew she was telling us the truth. John said, “Okay, Maggy, thanks. But we've got to tell Grandfather that we don't know where Rob is. Vicky and I've both looked down at the beach and Vicky went to the lighthouse and now we don't know where he could be and he's too young to be wandering off somewhere by himself.”
“The tide's coming in,” Suzy said again.
John said, “Suzy, shut
up
!”
Then he led the way to Grandfather's desk.
 
Grandfather listened gravely, one hand slowly stroking Colette's ear. He looked down at Colette, then at us, and then he asked, “Where's Mr. Rochester?”
None of us knew where Mr. Rochester was. Maggy said he hadn't come down to the beach while she and Rob were still playing there. But Grandfather said in his quiet way, “Mr. Rochester must be with Rob now, and we all know that Mr. Rochester will take care of him.” He spoke with such assurance that we couldn't help feeling better, and yet John and I knew that he was worried, because somehow, without any line or expression in his face being altered, he suddenly looked older. “I'd better make some telephone calls,” he said.
We stood by while he phoned, first to the people round about that we knew, the Nortons who had the big house down the hill the stable had once belonged to, the Woods who took us out in their boat, everybody Rob might have gone to see; but nobody had seen him. Then Grandfather called in to the village, the post office, the grocer and the butcher and the drugstore, old Mrs. Adams who played the organ at the church, and
Reverend Mr. Hanchett, though Rob wasn't apt to be there, because although we all loved Mr. Hanchett, Mrs. Hanchett was, as Grandfather said, a very peculiar woman more like a hatchet than a Hanchett, and among other things she didn't like children or dogs, so neither Rob nor Mr. Rochester would have had too warm a welcome there.

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