The Clockwork Teddy (32 page)

Limping over to the chair beside the bed, I sat down and gently took Ash’s hand. After a few seconds her fingers tightened slightly around mine. I looked up and saw that her blue eyes were open and she was looking at me blearily.

“Honey, what happened? Where am I?” Ash whispered in a groggy and raspy voice.

“You’re in a hospital in Sacramento, my love,” I said as my eyes began to fill with tears. “It’s a long story, but Lauren Vandenbosch drugged and kidnapped you.”

“Why?”

“Because she was the person in the ski mask at the Paladin. She killed that man and she was going to kill you. We almost figured it out too late . . .” I looked down for a second, ashamed that my failure to solve the puzzle had nearly cost Ash her life.

“I’ll bet you saved me.”

“I had a lot of help. Heather and Colin and Gregg.”

“Why are your eyes so red?”

“I got pepper-sprayed,” I said, which was partly true. “Again, it’s a long story and there’ll be plenty of time to tell it later.”

“Uh-huh . . . Where’s Heather?”

“Calling Chris to tell him that you’re okay. He’ll be here in a couple of hours.”

“Chris . . . is in Missouri.” I looked up and saw that her eyes seemed slightly unfocused. Ash was beginning to drift.

“I know, honey, but he caught a flight out. He’ll be here soon.”

“That’s nice. I’m very tired.”

“Go back to sleep, honey.”

“I want to go home, Brad. Back to the Valley.”

“I know. So do I. Rest, my love, and we’ll go home soon.”

“I will, but . . . Brad?”

“Yes?”

“If I’m . . . asleep when . . . Heather . . . comes back, will you please . . . tell . . . her something?” Ash was on the verge of going to sleep again.

“Anything. What?” I kissed her hand.

Ash yawned and closed her eyes. “Please tell her . . . that she and Colin . . . have to . . . come to Remmelkemp Mill . . . to get . . . married, because . . . I don’t ever want to . . . come back here again.”

“Neither do I, love. I may have been born and raised here, but my home is in the Shenandoah Valley and my life is making teddy bears with you.”

There was a hint of a smile on Ash’s face as she drifted into slumber. I held her hand for a while and once I was certain that she was fast asleep, I released it so that I could look in the nightstand drawer. I found what I was looking for: a notepad and pencil. Sitting back down, I began to make some rough sketches of a teddy bear with a Karl Marx beard and wearing a groom’s tuxedo. Later, when Ash felt better, I’d share my idea for a wedding gift and I knew she’d want to begin work immediately on her half of the ensemble. It would be a teddy bear dressed in a bridal gown and it would look like our daughter . . . sans the blue hair.

A TEDDY BEAR ARTISAN PROFILE

Penny French

 
 
One of the things I really enjoy about writing these books is inserting some of the actual teddy bears that my wife Joyce and I own into the tale. For instance, in Chapter Two, Brad buys a bee-costumed bear from artist Penny French as a birthday gift for Ashleigh. Been there, done that. The bumble-bear and the artificial tree he’s climbing are on display in our home, as are nine more of Penny’s sweet creations. Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn’t just arrange for a monthly allotment from our bank account to Penny’s, because we can’t seem to get enough of her wonderful Back Mountain bears. We’re also honored to count her as one of our friends, and she is one of the funniest people I’ve ever met.

Penny lives with David, her husband of forty-seven years, in Trout Run, Pennsylvania. She made her first teddy bear back in 1970, when her two-year-old son wanted a Winnie-the-Pooh bear for Christmas. Money was tight and Penny couldn’t afford to buy a bear, so she decided to make one.

“I spent seventeen cents to get a copy of
Woman’s Day
that had a teddy bear pattern in it, and used an old coat lining for my material. Then I used a small piece of red knit fabric to make a little shirt.” Penny recalled. “My son loved the bear! After that, I began to make more bears for my nieces and nephews and other family members.”

For the next sixteen years, Penny made the bears exclusively for family and friends. Then in 1986, she took the plunge and became a full-time teddy bear artist. Up until that time, she’d been modifying commercial and other people’s patterns to create her bears, but now she began developing her own designs and was surprised by her own creativity.

“It was like opening Pandora’s box,” Penny said with a chuckle. “Except the box was full of warm and sweet and fuzzy things, instead of creepy stuff.”

Warm and sweet and fuzzy things, indeed. Penny’s bears radiate a tangible aura of kindness and joy. Joyce and I aren’t the only ones who hold that opinion. In the winter of 2006, one of Penny’s bears won the People’s Choice Award at the prestigious Teddy Bear Artist Invitational show in Binghamton, New York.

When asked about the creative process that goes into making a bear, Penny told me that she views fabric the same way a sculptor envisions a figure within a block of stone. She can somehow “see” a bear’s face in the mohair or plush fur, and it’s her goal to bring that vision into existence. And like so many other bear artists I’ve spoken to, Penny doesn’t consider a teddy bear finished until you can look into its eyes and see life. However, she is also quick to clarify that she doesn’t give the bear its “soul,” she merely helps make it manifest.

Metaphysics aside, Penny is a bear-making machine. It takes her six to eight hours to make a bear and she creates on average one a day—a fact I find mind-boggling. It also provides some insight into just how popular her stuffed animals are among collectors and fur fanatics. Another amazing thing is the constantly changing variety of bears you’ll find at her booth. The reason for this is that Penny tends to produce small limited editions of her bears, which allows her the freedom to experiment as fresh designs occur to her.

“I get bored and I want to explore new ideas,” said Penny. “Yet there’s a fine line. I’m always looking to redefine my work, but I also want people to be able to recognize my bears.”

Penny needn’t worry about that. Whether it’s one of her spectacular angel bears, a magical Celtic Santa bear, or one of her cute little girl bears in a party frock, Penny’s creations are immediately identifiable. They mirror her infectious humor, warmth, and sincerity.

Penny attends teddy bear and craft shows throughout the northeastern and mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. If you’d like to learn more about her event schedule and her bears, she can be contacted via email at
[email protected]
.

Afterword

I’m sad to report that there is no annual teddy bear show in Sonoma’s lovely and historic Plaza. If there was, my wife and I might be induced to return to California to attend it. But like Brad and Ashleigh, we’d only go back to the Golden State for a brief visit. We have a blissful life here in the Shenandoah Valley.

As in the past, I’ve mixed some genuine folks up with my fictional characters. Donna Griffin, Mac Pohlen, Karen DiNicola, and Rosalie Frischmann are all real teddy bear artists and Joyce and I are honored to have their creations on display in our home. Susan and Terry Quinlan are also real, as is their incredible teddy bear museum in Santa Barbara, California. If you want to find out more about the museum, please visit
www.quinlanmuseum.com
. On a technological note, both the Japanese scientist and his remarkable humanlike androids that I obliquely referred to in Chapter 13 are authentic, too. Dr. Hiroshi Ishiguro is the director of Osaka University’s Intelligent Robotics Laboratory and one of the world’s foremost pioneers in this field.

Finally, I want to thank all my readers who’ve either sent me photos of their teddy bears or brought their furry treasures to my book signings. I’m humbled that you’d share such a joyful part of your life with me.