Cuckoo Song

Chapter 26. A SURPLUS GIRL

‘What does he mean?’ Pen glared at Not-Triss.

‘I’m afraid she’s not designed to endure,’ the Shrike explained, with a tiny shadow of regret in his voice.

‘I’m falling apart, Pen,’ Not-Triss said quietly. ‘I’m made of pieces, and I’m losing them, little by little. That’s why I’m hungry all the time, and keep losing weight.’

‘What?’ For a moment Pen looked totally lost, then she turned on the Shrike. ‘Then… put more stuffing in her! Take bits from them!’ She pointed around at the other dolls.

‘It wouldn’t work,’ the Shrike responded promptly. ‘Sticks and stones may strengthen her bones, but all that is keeping her on her feet is objects closely tied to your real sister. And even that will not help her in two days’ time when the enchantments all run out.’

The rooster squirmed in Not-Triss’s grip and gave a muffled abortive squawk. The Shrike visibly flinched, and cast a glance towards one of the narrow windows.

‘Dawn is coming,’ he muttered urgently. ‘The two of you must go – quickly! If you are here when the sun rises, that bird will give a full-hearted crow and… well… that will be the worst for all of us.’

Remembering the way gravity had started to reassert itself during the cockerel’s crowing spree, Not-Triss had some idea what he meant.

‘Come on, Pen!’ She managed to take the younger girl’s hand again. ‘We’ve got to go.’

‘But… you don’t mean you’ll die in two days, do you?’

‘Pen, please! If we don’t go, we’ll die now !’

As Not-Triss left by the door, Pen in tow, she saw the Shrike lift one hand to his brow. Perhaps it was a lazy sort of salute. Or perhaps he was adjusting his hat.

Outside in the street, some of the restlessness had returned. There was a nervous crackle and rustle, as if everything were made of brown paper and had sensed the fizzle of sparks.

The rooster made another attempt at crowing, and in a reflex of panic Not-Triss squeezed the bundle under her arm like an accordion, cutting the call short and occasioning some very annoyed clucking. Faint rays of light could be seen creeping out of the folds of the cloth, as if Not-Triss was grappling a little swaddled sun.

There was a voiceless whisper from every corner, every cobble. It rose in pitch, in volume, in ferocity and urgency.

Get out! Get out! Get out! GET OUT!

‘Run!’ shouted Not-Triss. She set off at a sprint with Pen beside her. The buildings parted before them, unseen hands pushed at their backs and then snatched them up and bore them on, so that their feet hardly touched the cobbles. The streets were a blur, a distorted mosaic of fleeting faces and clutching fingers… and then the world fell backwards off its chair, there was a sickening second of weightlessness, and they were crashing into a heap on to cold paving stones in a darkened alley.

The voices were gone. The clutching hands had gone. Not-Triss was lying in Meddlar’s Lane, and beside her lay Pen, who was struggling to sit up. The cockerel had taken advantage of Not-Triss’s flailing fall to recover his liberty and was strutting in ruffled confusion a few yards away, head twitching. Its flopping comb and tiny perplexed eye made her want to laugh and laugh when she remembered how it had terrified everybody in the Underbelly. Looking up, she could see only the dark, graceful arc of the bridge’s underside. When she tried to move her eye along its length towards the secret upside-down village, however, something in the lines of the architecture twisted, straining and tiring her eyes so that she could not help closing them. She had heard of tricks of the light. Here the light seemed to have been thoroughly hoodwinked.

The girls tried to capture the cockerel again, but it slipped between a pair of iron railings into a trim garden a little further down the road. Not-Triss was wary of following it, now that the sun was easing into the sky.

It did not seem wise to dally where people might see them. Looking at Pen, Not-Triss could see that the younger girl’s collar was torn, and her clothing covered in dusty handprints. Her dark hair was a mass of tangles, and there were a few new scratches and pinch-marks on her neck and cheeks. Not-Triss’s clothing had been mended with the Shrike’s neat, tiny stitches, but she could feel grit in her hair and was all too aware of her bare, grimy toes.

Unfortunately there were now more people out and about, many heading to work. The two girls won a glance of curiosity from a couple of factory hands and a milkman steering his three-wheeled handcart through the streets.

Not-Triss drew Pen into a park where she knew there was a fountain, to repair the worst of the damage. She expected resistance, but to her surprise Pen submitted, closing her eyes tight and turning her face upward so that Not-Triss could wipe at it with a drenched handkerchief. She ran her fingers through Pen’s hair, to loosen the worst of the tangles, and the smaller girl winced but did not complain. It occurred to Not-Triss that they were playing the parts of little and big sister, and she felt a crushing sense of loss, as if somebody had shown her something immensely precious then taken it away forever.

She’s nine years old. And what happened to Triss wasn’t because of her. She was just a pawn. It was all about Sebastian.

Sebastian, trapped in an eternal winter. ‘Stopped’ between life and death. As Not-Triss thought of this, she again remembered the single snowflake floating down to land between Violet’s feet, and the ice on the inside of the windows. Snow and ice. Did Violet fit into this strange picture somehow, and if so, where?

‘That’s good enough.’ Not-Triss finished wiping Pen’s face. ‘We should go back and talk to Violet.’

As they were leaving the park, Not-Triss looked back to find that Pen was stooped, scrabbling at the grass.

‘Pen, what is it? What have you got there?’

Pen ran to catch up, face set with concentration. She held up her hands towards Not-Triss and opened them. They were full of dead leaves, twigs, bits of string, a damp and trodden cigarette card and a ragged piece of a paper bag.

‘They were on the ground,’ declared Pen earnestly. ‘On the road behind you, when we were walking – and on the grass in the park. I think… I think they’re probably bits of you, so I picked them up. So that we can put them back.’

Not-Triss looked at the litter in Pen’s small, grubby hands, and felt cobweb sting at her eyes.

‘Yes,’ she said gently. ‘I think you’re right. I’ll… I’ll take them, and put them back in later. Thank you, Pen.’

Just as the two girls reached Violet’s street, Not-Triss found that Pen had fallen back once more. When the younger girl caught up again, she was carrying two pairs of shoes, one in each hand.

‘Pen! Where did you get those?’

‘It’s just borrowing!’ protested Pen. ‘Like the cockerel!’

Not-Triss sighed, feeling that she was perhaps not setting the best example as fake big sister.

‘Besides,’ Pen went on, ‘you need shoes. And I brought an extra pair so that you can eat them if you’re hungry.’

Nothing would persuade Pen to return them. As Not-Triss put on a pair of the stolen shoes, she tried to console herself with the thought that Pen was probably right. In order to avoid looking like a half-wild thing, she did need shoes.

They approached the door of Violet’s boarding house, and as they did so Not-Triss became aware that they had left it too late to sneak back in. The brass knobs of the door were being polished by a middle-aged woman in a floral-print dress and long strings of beads. Her body was pear-shaped, as if she was made of wax and had melted a little in the sun. There was nothing soft or warm about her expression of concentration or brisk gestures though.

Not-Triss and Pen came to a halt on the street and stared, uncertain what to do next.

The woman gave them a brief, hard glance.

‘We don’t have trouble with flies, thank you,’ she declared curtly.

When the girls showed no sign of leaving and every sign of confusion, she gave them another pointed look. ‘Well, I assume you’re here to catch flies, standing there with your mouths open. Now close them up and take yourselves off. I don’t run a peepshow.’

‘We’re here to see Violet Parish,’ said Not-Triss, hoping that the name might gain them entrance. Presumably this was Violet’s landlady, the one that she had described as ‘an old crab’.

‘We’re her cousins,’ Pen added promptly.

The landlady narrowed her eyes and looked down her slab-like cheeks at Pen.

‘I thought her family…’

‘Yes, they threw her out!’ Pen resumed enthusiastically. ‘But… our father sent us because he wants to bury the hatchet. Which comes from Indians, you know.’

The landlady examined them both, and Not-Triss saw suspicion replaced by a beaky look of curiosity.

‘Well, if I know Miss Parish, she won’t be out of bed yet… but why don’t you come in and wait for her? My ladies are just having their breakfast at the moment. How about a little bread and butter?’

What can we do? We can’t stay out in the streets.

‘That would be very kind,’ Not-Triss answered meekly, and they were shown into the boarding house again, but this time not as intruders.

Walking into the parlour was a bit like entering a large plum-coloured, cloth-lined trifle. There was an elderly upright piano, perfectly polished but with no stool. Along the top of it clustered photographs of royalty in tortoiseshell frames.

The ‘ladies’ turned out to be Mrs Waites, who had lost her husband in the War, and Mrs Perth, who had lost her husband ‘in Africa’. Mrs Waites’s forward-sticking teeth made her tea slurp and her smile look hungry. Mrs Perth was a watery-eyed old woman who sat up perfectly straight, ate her breakfast with care and dignity and said almost nothing.

The two girls were given stools, so low that the table edge came almost up to their shoulders.

As the landlady placed a plate of bread and butter in front of her, Not-Triss felt an all-too-familiar surge of ravenousness. Her right hand started to lunge for the bread of its own free will, but Pen pounced, seizing her wrist with both hands and holding it fast.

‘Triss!’ Pen hissed urgently. ‘Don’t!’

‘Are you called Triss, dear?’ asked Mrs Waites. ‘What a curious name!’

These words shocked Not-Triss out of her haze of hunger with a snap. They had only been in the house a minute and already they had dropped one of their real names.

‘I didn’t say “Triss”.’ Once again Pen was riding to the rescue, like a mounted knight through a minefield. ‘I… said… Tris… ter. She’s called Trista.’

‘How beautiful!’ Mrs Waites beamed toothily. ‘Is that from the French?’

‘Yes!’ Pen declared impulsively, then paused, eyes burning with curiosity. ‘What does it mean in French?’

Not-Triss winced slightly, but Mrs Waites was eager to show off her knowledge and did not seem to notice the oddness of Pen’s question.

‘“Triste” is French for “sad”. Sorrowful.’

‘My name is Ruby,’ Pen announced, through a mouthful of bread. ‘Ruby Victoria – like the old queen.’

‘They’re cousins of Miss Parish,’ the landlady explained, tenderly but with emphasis, ‘come to try and smooth over family differences.’

‘You dear lambs!’ Mrs Waites responded promptly, and proceeded to pour tea for both ‘Trista’ and ‘Ruby’.

‘Well, I do feel sorry for poor Miss Parish. Her fiancé was lost in the War, is that right?’ There was a gleam of sympathy tinged with satisfaction as the girls nodded. ‘One of our Surplus Girls.’

‘What’s surplus?’ asked Pen.

‘It means “left over”, dear. On the shelf.’ The landlady spoke confidingly, as if discussing a medical complaint. ‘So many young men died during the War, you see, that now there are a million young women who cannot find a husband.’

‘They should all go to the colonies,’ declared Mrs Perth in a high, husky, genteel voice. ‘There are plenty of eligible young men out there in need of healthy wives.’

‘I do not think Miss Parish has quite the standing or means,’ demurred Mrs Waites. ‘No, she should eat humble pie and go back to her family. It hardly seems right for a girl from a respectable home to be working the way she does –’

‘– so many men out of work right now –’ contributed the landlady.

‘– breadwinners and heads of families, some of them ex-soldiers,’ continued Mrs Waites smoothly. ‘It was all very well women pitching in during the War, keeping the country running… but sad to say, some of them got a taste for it.’

‘A taste for the money is more like it!’ exclaimed the landlady. ‘Vaunting around in their sealskin coats!’

‘Where does Violet work?’ Not-Triss cut in.

‘Where has she not worked!’ The landlady raised her hands and gave heaven a quick and knowing glance. ‘She has been a waitress at Lyons cafe, a shop girl at half a dozen places, a personal assistant… but it is always the same. She turns up late, leaves early and is never there when they need her. She cannot keep a place for more than a month.’

‘And now –’ Mrs Waites looked the two girls over, apparently judging whether they were equal to her next revelation – ‘now… she calls herself a courier. Skimming around on that motorcycle of hers, working for any Tom, Dick or Harry who offers her a job. And she is extremely mysterious about her deliveries.’

‘Rude, in fact,’ sniffed the landlady.

‘Tell me, in past years, did Miss Parish ever show any signs that she might turn out a bit… wild?’

Before the girls could answer, however, a sleep-fuddled figure appeared at the parlour door. Violet’s hair was tousled, her makeup hastily applied and her frown deep enough to suggest that she had overheard the last few words.

‘Yes,’ she declared, in answer to the hanging question. ‘I spent my entire childhood completely naked.’ As she glanced around the room, the sight of the two girls seated at the table seemed to jar her into alertness. She gave them an interrogative glare.

‘Cousin Violet!’ called out Pen with slightly manic enthusiasm. ‘Father sent us to talk to you, so you can eat humble pie and come back to the family!’

Violet gave a faint groan and pinched the bridge of her nose.

‘Oh, he did, did he?’ she muttered. ‘How tip-top of him. Why don’t I take the pair of you out to buy an ice cream so that we can talk about it?’

The three women at the breakfast table looked disappointed as their morning’s entertainment disappeared stage left to play the next act in the wings.

Violet said nothing to the two girls as they left the boarding house but looked tight-jawed and angry. She led them across the road into a dull, dust-windowed tea shop. It was almost empty, so it was easy to find a solitary table. When the elderly proprietor had brought them some weak tea and sad-looking biscuits, then shuffled back into the kitchen, Violet finally let out a long breath of exasperation.

‘Of all the silly pranks!’ She pushed back her hair in frustration. ‘Pen, I told you that I was taking a risk letting you stay with me without telling your parents. I could get into a lot of trouble. A lot of trouble, do you understand? And I told you that I expected to hear an explanation of all of this –’ her eye fled to Not-Triss – ‘when I woke up. Instead, both of you disappear from my room. And then I come down and find you eating breakfast with my landlady!’

‘But we didn’t tell her that we were in your room last night!’ protested Pen.

‘We were already outside when she saw us,’ added Not-Triss. ‘She invited us in.’

‘So you told her that you were my cousins?’ demanded Violet.

‘But it doesn’t matter!’ Pen protested. ‘They believed us!’

‘Of course it matters!’ Violet shook her head. The bell of the tea-shop door jingled and she flinched, glanced towards it, then continued in a lower tone. ‘If those nosy old crows ask questions, they’ll find out I only have male cousins. And now you’ve been seen here, visiting me. Do you understand? If your parents think to come to my lodgings asking questions, somebody will tell them that you were here. I could get into trouble with the police, Pen. Now, tell me what the… the deuce is going on, and give me one good reason why I should not take you back to your parents right now.’

‘Actually,’ said a soft and earnest voice behind the two girls, ‘that would be the best thing you could possibly do.’

Not-Triss spun around in her seat, but already know what she would see. There, not two paces away, was Mr Grace the tailor.