The Christmas Mouse (13 page)

Yes, the yellow frock should have an airing, and her bronze evening shoes an extra shine. Ray Bullen should have no cause to regret his invitation.

She turned on the tap, as the children came rushing into the room.

‘Why, Mummy,’ exclaimed Frances, wide eyed with amazement, ‘
you’re singing!
’

Upstairs Mrs Berry put on her grey woollen jumper and straightened the Welsh tweed skirt. This was her working outfit. Later in the morning she would change into more elegant attire, suitable for church-going, but there was housework to be done in the next hour or two. Last of all, she tied a blue and white spotted apron round her waist, and was ready to face the day.

Once more, she opened the window. The small birds chirped and chatted below, awaiting their morning crumbs. A grey and white wagtail teetered back and forth across a puddle, looking for all the world like a miniature curate, with his white collar and dove-grey garments. The yellow winter jasmine starred the wall below, forerunner of the aconites and snowdrops soon to come. There was a hopeful feeling of spring in the air, decided Mrs Berry, gazing at the sky. How different from yesterday’s gloom!

The children’s happiness was infectious. Their delight in the simple presents warmed the old lady’s heart and set her thinking of that other child, less fortunate, who had no real family of his own and who had wept because of it.

How was he faring? Had he, after all, found a watch among his parcels? Mrs Berry doubted it. The Roses had spoken truly when they told the child that a watch was too much to expect at Christmas. No doubt, lesser presents would make him happy, assuaging to some extent that fierce longing to have a watch like Patsy’s and Jim’s. A passionate child, thought Mrs Berry, shaking her head sadly. Pepe all over again! It made life hard for the boy, and harder still for those who had to look after him. Would he ever remember any of the good advice she had tried to offer? Knowing the ways of children, she suspected that most of her admonitions had gone in one ear and out of the other.

Ah well! One could only hope, she thought, descending the staircase.

Mary had set a tray at the end of the table for her mother. Beyond it stood the pink cyclamen and a pile of parcels.
The two children, hopping from leg to leg with excitement, hovered on each side of the chair.

‘Come on, Gran! Come and see what you’ve got. Mum gave you the plant!’

‘Mary,’ exclaimed Mrs Berry, hands in the air with astonishment, ‘you shouldn’t have spent so much money on me! What a beauty! And so many buds to come out too. Well, I don’t know when I’ve seen a finer cyclamen, and that’s a fact.’

She kissed her daughter warmly. Why, the girl seemed aglow! Christmas was a comforting time, for old and young, thought Mrs Berry, reaching out for the parcels.

‘Open mine first,’ demanded Frances.

‘No, mine,’ said Jane. ‘I’m the oldest.’

‘I’ll open them together,’ said the old lady, taking one in each hand. ‘See, I’ll tear this bit off this one, then this bit off that one—’

She tugged at the wrappings gently.

‘No, no!’ cried Jane, unable to bear the delay. ‘Do one first – don’t matter which – then the other. But read the tags. We wrote ’em ourselves.’

Mrs Berry held the two tags at arm’s length. Her spectacles were mislaid amidst the Christmas debris.

‘“Darling Grandma, with love from Jane,”’ she read aloud. She shook the parcel, then smelled it, then held it to her ear. The children hugged each other in rapture.

‘Why do you listen to it?’ queried Frances. ‘Do you think there’s a bird in it?’

‘A watch perhaps,’ said Mrs Berry, surprised by her own words.

‘A
watch?
’ screamed the girls. ‘But you’ve got a watch!’

‘So I have,’ said Mrs Berry calmly. ‘Well, let’s see what’s in here.’

Wrapped in four thicknesses of tissue paper was a little egg-timer.

‘Now, that,’ cried the old lady, ‘is exactly what I wanted. Clever Jane!’

She kissed the child’s soft cheek.

‘Now mine!’ begged Frances. ‘Quick! Undo it quick, Gran.’

‘I must read the tag. “Dear Gran, Happy Christmas, Frances.” Very nice.’

‘
Undo it!
’ said the child.

Obediently, the old lady undid the paper. Inside was a box of peppermint creams.

‘My favourite sweets!’ said Mrs Berry. ‘What a kind child you are! Would you like one now?’

‘Yes please,’ both said in unison.

‘I hoped you’d give us one,’ said Frances, beaming. ‘Isn’t it lucky we like them too?’

‘Very lucky,’ agreed their grandmother, proffering the box.

‘Let Gran have her breakfast, do,’ Mary said, appearing from the kitchen.

‘But she’s got lots more parcels to open!’

‘I shall have a cup of tea first,’ said the old lady, ‘and then undo them.’

Sighing at such maddening adult behaviour, the two children retired to the other end of the table where they had set out a tiny metal tea set of willow pattern in blue and white.

‘This is my favourite present,’ announced Frances, ‘and the teapot pours. See?’

Mary and her mother exchanged amused glances. The set had been one of several small toys they had bought together in Caxley to fill up the stockings. The chief present for each girl had been a doll, beautifully dressed in handmade clothes worked on secretly when the girls were in bed. It was typical of children the world over that some trifle of no real value should give them more immediate pleasure than the larger gifts.

At last, all the presents were unwrapped. Bath cubes, stockings, handkerchiefs, sweets, a tin of biscuits, another of tea, and a tablecloth embroidered by Mary – all were displayed and admired. Mary’s presents had to be brought from the sideboard and shown to her mother, to please the two children, despite the fact that Mrs Berry had seen most of them before.

‘Now, what’s to do in the kitchen?’ asked Mrs Berry, rising from the table.

‘Nothing. The pudding’s in, and the bird is ready, and the vegetables.’

‘Then I’ll dust and tidy up,’ declared Mrs Berry. ‘Upstairs first. I can guess what the girls’ room looks like!’

‘At least there are no mice!’ laughed Mary.

The children looked up, alert.

‘No mice? Was there a mouse? Where is it now?’

Their grandmother told them about the intruder, and how she had settled by the fire, but at last gone up to bed and had let the mouse out of the window.

What would they have said, she wondered, as she told her tale, if she had told them the whole story? How their eyes would have widened at the thought of a boy – a big boy of nine – breaking into their home and trying to steal
their grandmother’s Madeira cake! As it was, the story of the real mouse stirred their imagination.

‘I expect it was hungry,’ said Jane with pity. ‘I expect it smelled all the nice Christmas food and came in to have a little bit.’

‘It had plenty of its own sort of food outdoors,’ Mrs Berry retorted tartly.

‘Perhaps it just wanted to see inside a house,’ suggested Frances reasonably. ‘You shouldn’t have frightened it away, Gran.’

‘It frightened
me
away,’ said the old lady.

‘Perhaps it will come back,’ said Jane hopefully.

‘That,’ said her grandmother forcefully, ‘I sincerely hope it will not do.’

And she went upstairs to her duties.

When the children and her mother had departed to church, the house was blessedly quiet. Mary, basting the turkey and turning potatoes in the baking dish, had time to ponder her invitation. As soon as the children were safely out of the way she would have a word with her mother, then reply.

But where should she send it? There had been no address on the note, and although she knew the part of Caxley in which Ray lived, she could not recall the name of the road, and certainly had no idea of the number. Perhaps the best thing would be to send it to the office of
The Caxley Chronicle
, where he worked. He would be going into work, no doubt, on the day after Boxing Day. Plenty of time to spare before New Year’s Eve.

Now that the first initial surprise of the invitation was over, Mary found herself growing more and more
delighted at the thought of the evening outing. Caxley had produced a New Year’s Eve concert as long as she could remember, and she and Bertie had attended several of them.

The Corn Exchange was always full. It was something of an occasion. The mayor came, all the local gentry sat in the front rows, and everyone knew that the music provided would be good rousing stuff by Handel and Bach and Mozart, with maybe a light sprinkling of Gilbert and Sullivan, or Edward German, or Lionel Monckton, as a garnish.

It was definitely a social affair, when one wore one’s best, and hoped to see one’s friends and be seen by them. It would be good, thought Mary, to have a personable man as an escort instead of attending a function on her own.

Kind Ray! Good Quaker Ray! How did that passage go in the library book – ‘Very thoughtful and wealthy and good’? She could vouch for two of those virtues anyway!

She slammed the oven door shut and laughed aloud.

At one o’clock the Christmas dinner – everything done to a turn – was set upon the table, and the two little girls attacked their plates with enviable appetite. Their elders ate more circumspectly.

Nevertheless, at two o’clock it was the children who played energetically on the floor with their new toys, whilst Mary and her mother lay back in their armchairs and succumbed to that torpor induced by unaccustomed rich food.

‘We must take a turn in the fresh air before it
gets dark.’ Mrs Berry yawned; Mary nodded agreement drowsily.

They woke at three, much refreshed, donned their coats and gloves, and set off. The bright clouds of morning had gone; a gentle grey light veiled the distant scene.

The four of them walked towards the slope where young Stephen had walked scarcely twelve hours earlier. Mrs Berry’s mind was full of memories of her Christmas visitor. She strode along, dwelling on the oddity of events that had brought one of the Amonetti family into her life once more.

Ahead of her, holding a child by each hand, Mary was running a few steps, then stopping suddenly to bring the two children face to face in an ecstatic embrace. It was a game they had loved as toddlers, but it was years, thought Mrs Berry, since Mary had played it with them.

Their delighted screams matched the calling of the flight of rooks above, slowly winging homewards against the evening sky.

Now they had reached the top of the slope, and Mary, breathless, stopped to wait for her mother.

They stood together looking across the shallow valley, already filling with the pale mist of winter.

‘That’s Tupps Hill over there, isn’t it?’ said Mary.

Her mother nodded. ‘D’you remember the Roses?’

‘Vaguely,’ said Mary. ‘Why?’

There was an intensity about her mother’s gaze that made Mary curious.

The old lady did not answer for a moment, her eyes remained fixed upon the shadowy hill beyond the rising mist.

‘I might call on them one day,’ she said, at last. ‘Not yet awhile. But some day – some day, perhaps.’ She turned suddenly. ‘Let’s get home, Mary dear. There’s no place like it – and it’s getting cold.’

I
t was hardly surprising at teatime, to find that the family’s appetite was small, despite the afternoon walk.

‘I’ll just bring in the Christmas cake,’ said Mary, ‘and the tea tray. Though I expect you’d like a slice of your Madeira, wouldn’t you?’

‘No, thank you,’ replied Mrs Berry hastily.

She pondered on the fate of the Madeira cake as Mary clattered china in the kitchen. It certainly seemed a terrible waste of sugar and butter and eggs, not to mention the beautiful curl of angelica that cost dear knows how much these days. But there it was. The thought of those pink paws touching it was enough to put anyone off the food.

Perhaps she could cut off the outside, and slice the rest for a trifle? Waste was something that Mrs Berry abhorred. But at once she dismissed the idea. It was no good. The cake must go. No doubt the birds would relish it, but she must find an opportunity for disposing of it when Mary was absent from the scene. Explanations would be difficult, under the circumstances.

Mary returned with the tray. To the accompaniment of cries of appreciation from the children the candles were lighted on the Christmas tree and at each end of the mantelpiece.

Outside, the early dusk had fallen, and the shadowy room, lit by a score of flickering candle flames and the
glow from the fire, had never looked so snug and magical, thought Mrs Berry. If only their menfolk could have been with them . . .

She shook away melancholy as she had done so often. The time for grieving was over. There was much to be thankful for. She looked at Mary, intent upon cutting the snowy cake, and the rosy children, their eyes reflecting the light from the candles, and she was content.

And that child at Tupps Hill? Was he as happy as her own? She had a feeling that he might be – that perhaps he had been able to let the Christmas spirit soothe his anxious heart.