Kit's Wilderness (17 page)

W
e were in the papers. A reporter came to talk to me but Dad wouldn’t let him in. He sent a photographer packing too. Allie sent a photograph of herself in her costume anyway. She wrote that she was the rescuer, and there was a great story of danger, courage and magic to be told. When the paper came on the Monday, there were just a few lines about Askew and me, and nothing at all about Allie. “BOYS SAFE AFTER NIGHT IN ABANDONED DRIFT MINE.” Underneath it said “How Long Until These Death Traps Are Sealed Forever?” There was a photograph of the newly bricked-up entrance. There was a long article about the dangers of the old pits, and an announcement of a new campaign to make sure they would all be properly filled in and sealed.

“Typical,” said Allie. “They wouldn’t know a decent story if it slapped them in the face.”

They printed her photo on Christmas Eve on the Local Events page: “Miss Alison Keegan, aged thirteen. A Little Miss Who’s Been A Big Hit In St. Thomas’ Christmas Play.”

She came running to the door waving the paper in her fist.

“Have you seen it?” she said. She rushed in and spread it on the kitchen table. “They can’t even get my bloody name right! Makes you want to tear your bloody hair out! Nothing about the proper story or even about the bloody part I played! Little Miss! Who do they think I am? Shirley Bloody Temple? Jeez, Kit!”

“Alison!”

It was Mum, standing in the doorway. Allie gasped and bit her lip.

“Sorry, Mrs. Watson,” she said.

Mum nodded. “Glad to hear it.”

“Have you seen it, though?” said Allie. “Can’t even get my—“

“I know who that is!” shouted Grandpa from the living room.

Allie looked through, saw him sitting there with a blanket on his knee.

“Mr. Watson!” she said.

“Aye,” he said. “That’s the one. And you’re that little bad lass, aren’t you?”

“Yes! Yes, I am!”

“Well, get in here and have a cup of tea with me and stop driving that lad and his mother round the twist!”

G
randpa had come that morning, Christmas Eve. Dad brought him in the car. He tottered into the garden, in his old best suit with a blanket around his shoulders. He stood leaning on his walking stick. His body trembled gently. His eyes were watery. His breath rose in plumes around him. He turned to stare back through the gate.

I went to his side and took his elbow.

“Aye, Kit,” he said. “It’s good to be back home again.”

He leaned on me for a moment, and we gazed together across the wilderness toward the river, where the sun shimmered on ice and water and the air trembled and skinny children played.

I felt his sigh.

“It’s a magic place, this world,” Grandpa whispered. “Always remember that.”

I smiled and helped him in. He was frail and small. His jacket hung loosely from his shoulders. He sat in front of the Christmas programs on television and sipped tea and nibbled Christmas cake. A carol service came on and he sang along in his trembling voice.

“In the bleak midwinter

Frosty wind made moan,

Earth stood hard as iron,

Water like a stone;

Snow had fallen, snow on snow,

Snow on snow,

In the bleak midwinter,

long ago.”

Mum and I sat with him. Each time he looked at us it was as if he had to remember us again. Then his eyes would clear and he would smile with joy. He had a glass of sherry and he fell asleep, with his head resting on the wing of the chair and his eyes shifting beneath their lids.

Mum reached out and stroked his hair.

“Lovely man,” she whispered.

She stroked my hair, just the same.

“Stay with him, Kit.”

She turned the television down, and left the room, went on preparing for Christmas Day.

I sat with a notepad, scribbling down the final part of Lak’s story, the part I’d told to Askew in the drift mine. As I wrote the final sentences, Grandpa woke and watched me.

“Okay?” I whispered.

He narrowed his eyes, squinted, trying to see me clear, trying to remember me.

“It’s Kit,” I said.

“That’s right. Course it is.” We laughed gently together.

“Off with the fairies, eh?” I said.

He closed his eyes and smiled. “Head full of caves and tunnels, son. Keep getting lost in them.”

I scribbled on. He kept staring at me. He sang softly.
“When I was young and in me pri-ime . . .

“I know what it was,” he said.

“Eh?”

“Eh? Eh? It was you, wasn’t it? It was me and Silky and you. A few nights back. That’s right, isn’t it?”

“Yes, Grandpa, that’s right.”

He sang again.

“Strange what you remember,” he said. “Never know these days what’s dreams and what’s real.”

He nibbled at the Christmas cake, closed his eyes again, fell asleep again.

Then Allie came with the newspaper and he called through to us, “I know who that is!”

She had tea and Christmas cake with him. He grinned and told her, “You’re the one that drove me missus round the bend and up the pole!”

“That’s right!” She giggled. “That’s right, Mr. Watson.”

“Bad lass,” he said. “Good bad lovely lass. Give us a song, then, hinny.”

She stood in front of him. She danced as she sang and reached down and held his hands and swung them as if he was dancing too. They sang together:

“Wisht, lads, had yer gobs

An I’ll tell yez all an aaful story,

Wisht, lads, had yer gobs

An I’ll tell ye aboot the worm . . .”

Allie sang more softly as the song went on, knelt down and rested his hands in his lap, guiding him as he closed his smiling eyes and drifted back to sleep.

C
hristmas Day. I woke to his knocking at my door, his little voice. Very early, dawn just breaking. I called him in. He stood there smiling in his dressing gown.

“Happy Christmas, Kit,” he said.

“Happy Christmas, Grandpa.”

He pressed a finger to his lips.

“Come and see,” he whispered. “Eh?”

“Something for you. Come and see. Tiptoes, mind.”

We slipped into his room. He switched the light on. The tinsel and baubles glittered at the window. He gave me a sheet of white paper with silvery red writing:

To Kit

Happy Christmas

With Love

Grandpa

“This is for you,” he said.

I looked around for a present, saw his souvenirs on the shelves, fossils and little carvings, ancient photographs of his pit mates, the wardrobe with the cuff of a white shirt caught in the door, slippers on the floor, the wedding photograph, his bed with the impression of his frail body on it.

“What is?” I said.

He grinned. “Everything is. Everything is yours.”

I didn’t know what to say.

“Have to hang on to a few of the things a while longer,” he said. “But afterward they come to you, to keep or chuck as you wish. Everything.”

I gazed around the room again as the light grew and shone in upon these gifts. His eyes were shining.

“What I’d like to give you most of all is what’s inside. The tales and memories and dreams that keep the world alive.” He squeezed my arm.

I touched the photographs, the fossil tree, the shirt cuff, felt how they burned with Grandpa’s life, and with those tales and memories and dreams.

“Okay?” he whispered.

“Yes.” I put my arms around him, held him as we’d held each other in the darkest tunnels of our dreams. “Thank you, Grandpa.”

He sighed.

“One day,” he whispered, “I won’t be here anymore. You know that, Kit. But I’ll live on inside you and then inside your own children and grandchildren. We’ll go on forever, you and me and all the ones that’s gone and all the ones that’s still to come.”

And the light intensified around us, bringing Grandpa’s final Christmas Day.

The morning was presents from under the tree, mince pies, sausage rolls and sherry, Dad getting tipsy, parading in his new checked shirt and stinking of aftershave, Mum showing off dangly silver earrings, carols blasting from the CD, the house warm and filled with steam and the smells of turkey and sausage stuffing and spicy pudding. Allie came in red and green with snowflakes melting in her hair and with little gifts for all of us. She sang “Good King Wenceslas” with Grandpa and ate chocolate coins from the tree, and talked too fast and giggled and said she loved Christmas, just loved it. When she left, I stood with her beside the fence. We watched the kids with their new bikes and skates, with Walkmans plugged into their ears. We watched them slithering and sliding and giggling with the joy of it all.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” she said. “The place we live.”

“I thought you just wanted to get out of it.”

“I will. But wherever I go, I’ll take it with me.”

She kissed me on the cheek and blushed.

“I’m glad you came to Stoneygate, Mr. Watson,” she whispered, and she slipped way.

It was almost lunchtime when John Askew came.

I was setting the table—knives, forks, wineglasses, place mats—when he knocked at the door.

“I’ll get it,” called Mum.

There was silence when she opened it.

I looked through and saw him standing there, thickset, dark-haired, dark-eyed. I hurried to the door and slipped past Mum onto the step.

“John,” I said.

And I laughed, because he opened his coat and showed his baby sister in a sling at his chest. She wore a furry hood, and she grinned out at us.

I saw the suspicion in Mum’s eyes, the sudden anger, but saw how it softened as she saw the baby.

“I just brought this,” said Askew.

He held out an envelope. I took the card out. He’d drawn the wilderness with a huge Christmas tree at the center, with angels hovering around its tip and children playing at its foot. Inside, he’d written simply “Happy Christmas. John Askew.”

“Your sister’s lovely,” said Mum.

He grinned. There was new brightness in his eyes.

“Aye,” he said. “She’s grand.”

I looked at Mum.

“Come on in,” I said.

John shook his head. “Got to get back,” he said. “Just came with the card.”

“Yes, come on,” said Mum. “She’ll catch her death out here.”

He came in shyly, awkwardly. He stood in the living room, clumsily shifting his feet. Dad came in and watched him there.

“John brought this,” I said to Dad, and showed him the card.

Askew looked at the tree, at the television, at Grandpa sleeping.

Then he met Mum’s eye.

“Sorry about the bother, Mrs. Watson, Mr. Watson,” he said. “Won’t happen again.”

“Good,” said Mum.

“Kids’ games,” said Dad. “Kids’ games, eh? They’re over now.” He reached out and took Askew’s hand. “Happy Christmas, John,” he said. “And to your family.”

“Aye,” said Askew. “Thank you. Happy Christmas.” He drew his coat across the baby as if to leave.

“John Askew,” said Grandpa, opening his eyes.

“That’s right,” I said.

Grandpa stared at him.

“Aye,” he said. “That’s right. Knew your grandfather, son. A good brave man.”

The baby whimpered. Askew opened his coat again and she giggled out at us and Grandpa gasped with delight.

“Peepo,” said Grandpa. “Peepo, little hinny.”

He grinned. “Give us a hold, eh?”

“Yes,” said Mum. “Go on, John.”

Askew lifted the baby from her sling and put her down on Grandpa’s lap. Grandpa held her, made a face for her, giggled with her.

“What’s her name?” he said.

“Lucy.”

“Peepo, little Lucy. Peepo, bonny lass.”

Then he was silent, and we stood together and watched as the old man and the baby gazed with joy into each other’s eyes.

Mum touched John’s arm.

“How’s your mum?” she asked.

“Okay. She’s going to be okay.”

“Look after her now, son.”

He nodded. “Yes, I will.”

The baby giggled.

“Better take her home,” said Askew.

He leaned down to take her.

Grandpa kissed her cheek.

“Bye-bye, little Lucy,” he whispered.

Askew closed his coat and I took him out.

“See you, Kit,” he said.

“See you, John. Happy Christmas.”

Back inside the house, we went on preparing for the meal. I lit the candles on the table. Grandpa drifted in and out of sleep. Mum watched me.

“So,” she said. “What do we make of that, then?”

I shrugged.

“He’s all right, you know,” I said. “He really is all right.”

Then Dad brought the massive steaming turkey in.

“Come on!” he said. “Action stations! Happy Christmas, everyone!”

Grandpa woke with a start.

“Bye-bye,” he said. “Bye-bye, lovely Lucy.”