The Key to the Indian (5 page)

R
acing downstairs to fetch the key, Omri stopped dead.

His parents were out. That must mean, in the car – there was no other way to get anywhere, other than on foot. No doubt they’d gone shopping in the village.

His heart was beating at twice its normal speed. He decided he had to calm down. Think. There must be a spare key somewhere, but he had no idea where. No, he’d have to wait – preferably patiently – till his parents returned.

Meanwhile, he would get Jessica Charlotte a hot drink.

He went to the kitchen, built out at the back of the longhouse. It was quite a simple kitchen, with a big Aga
which was always warm, day and night. There was invariably a big heavy kettle simmering away at the back of it.

He rummaged in a drawer till he found what he was looking for – a tin of oil; his mum could not abide a squeaking hinge. It had a narrow spout with a little cap on top. He took this off, put it in a sieve and poured the very hot water over it to clean it. He sniffed it – okay, no oily smell. Then he made a mug of tea with a teabag, added milk and sugar, stirred vigorously and was just carrying it towards the stairs when Gillon came strolling through from the TV room.

“I see you got your cupboard out of the bank,” he remarked.

Omri spilt some tea. “When did you see it?”

“Yesterday.”

“Do you have to go snooping in my room?”

“You have to crash
right through
my room, about fifty times a day.
I
don’t get much privacy.”

“You wanted the outside room.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m beginning to think I messed up there. You’ve got the best room.”

“Yours is bigger.”

“This is a crazy old house, no corridors,” said Gillon. “You having hot chocolate? You might’ve made me some.”

“Tea,” said Omri reluctantly. Gillon knew he hated tea.

Gillon gave him a comic look of puzzlement. Omri turned, anxious to get away, and started up the stairs. Gillon followed.

“About the cupboard.”

“What about it?”

“Why’d you get it out of the bank?”

“You told me that it was silly to ask them to take care of it.”

“You didn’t get it out because of me,” said Gillon shrewdly.

“I wanted to have it back,” said Omri. They were in Gillon’s room by now. Omri walked straight across to his own door.

“Can I come and look at it?”

Omri turned sharply, nearly spilling the tea again. “Gilly, listen. I’m not just being – I mean, I’m busy with something. It’s something I’m – busy with. Of my own. You can see the cupboard later. D’you mind?”

Gillon looked at him for a moment, then turned away. “Why should I mind,” he said flatly. “I don’t care a toss about your old cupboard.”

It was obvious his feelings were hurt, even though Omri had tried to be as tactful as possible.

“Sorry, Gilly,” Omri mumbled, and went into his room. He didn’t want to bolt the door because Gillon would hear, and maybe be more hurt. But the need to be safe was paramount. He put the tea down on the desk, and moved the bolt with infinite slowness. Of course it had to squeak.

“Don’t worry!” Gillon called through the door. “You couldn’t pay me to come in now.”

“Sorry,” was all Omri could think of to reply.

He hurried to the bed. He was going to have to whisper
– no,
breathe
– everything he said to Jessica Charlotte. These walls were thin.

She was there, as he’d left her, in the blanket. She’d twisted up her hair somehow and was looking a little better. He poured a drop of the hot tea into the oil-tin cap (spilling more on the floor than went in) and handed it to her.

She took it in both shaking hands and drank and drank. Then she said, “Thank you. Are my clothes dry?”

Omri rubbed the tiny dress between finger and thumb. It
was
nearly dry. He smoothed its skirt with his fingers, held it by its top and flapped it a little in the warm air above the radiator. He had to stop at once because the flapping nearly blew her drawers away! He handed the dress to her.

“What do you think? Is it dry enough?” he whispered.

“It will do quite well. Please bring my – other garments.”

He lifted his comb, taking great care to keep it level, and carried it to her. She snatched the drawers and the corset-thing and hid them in the blanket.

“I’ll go away while you dress, if you like.”

“I would be obliged.”

He stood with his back to her at the window. For the first time, he stopped to think that his dad was going to be
well
disappointed about his bringing Jessica Charlotte without him.

After a few minutes, she said, “I am ready.”

He turned. She was standing on the bed fully dressed. Her little weight made a dimple in the quilt. “Now, where is this key you spoke of?”

“I can’t give it to you until my dad gets here.”

“Your father!”

“He knows about the magic. He’s—”

Suddenly Omri heard the sound he’d been listening for. The car! He heard it coming along the lane, and stop near their gate.

“Wait! I’ll get it for you!” Omri said, forgetting to whisper, and dashed to the door. He stopped. No, he must go out the other way, through his parents’ and Adiel’s rooms, and down the other stairs. He couldn’t risk leaving the door between his and Gillon’s rooms open, especially as Gillon might have heard him speak. He wouldn’t blame him if he had a peep now.

He dashed down the other way, out of the house, and met his parents at the gate. They were unloading shopping from the car boot.

“Hi, Om, you look as if you’ve been running!” said his father cheerfully.

“Dad – please – can you come?
Bring the key
.” The last three words were not spoken aloud. He just mouthed them behind his mother’s back, and gestured turning a key in case his dad hadn’t caught on.

Excitement and secrecy brightened his father’s face. He hefted a big box of shopping and almost ran after Omri up the path and into the kitchen from the back. “What’s up?” he asked eagerly.

“I brought her! Jessica Charlotte!”

His dad gasped.

“Dad, it just happened, and it’s good it did! She was in the river – she was drowning! The magic just got her out in time – I – I sort of saved her life!”

“
Is she here?
”

Omri nodded.

“She’s upstairs – Jessica Charlotte – she’s upstairs now?” his dad asked dazedly.

“
Yes
, Dad! And she’s agreed to do the key for us. Only I didn’t have it. Bring it up. You can meet her! Come on!”

His father dropped the box on the table with a thump and was halfway up the nearest stairs before Omri could stop him.

“The other stairs, Dad!” he whispered, and pointed upward to Gillon’s room.

Down, across through four rooms, and up the far staircase they ran, and in five seconds they were in Omri’s room. Omri pointed silently. His father followed his finger, and turned to face the bed. His face when he saw the tiny figure of Jessica Charlotte was a study in wonder. Omri thought that for him, it was like looking at a famous person, from history or fable, standing alive before him, staring back at him.

He moved towards her slowly. He crouched down beside the bed and smiled at her like someone dazed by a miracle. “I’m so pleased to meet you,” he breathed.

“Dad! Shhhh! Let’s go next door!” Omri mouthed.

He picked Jessica Charlotte up very carefully and they went into his parents’ bedroom. There, his father indicated his mother’s dressing-table. It was her favourite piece of
furniture. It had a glass top, under which she had arranged a number of family snapshots. Omri put Jessica Charlotte down on its top.

She, it seemed, could no more take her eyes off Omri’s dad than he could take his from her. Her tiny but compelling voice piped, “Are you my Lottie’s son?”

“No,” said Omri’s father. “My wife is Lottie’s daughter.”

“What is her name – her first name?”

“Jane.”

There was a silence. “Well,” she said at last. “At least the initial is the same. It is a sort of bond, even if… accidental.”

“But her second name is Charlotte.”

After a beat, Jessica Charlotte said hoarsely, “After her mother.”

“No. After you.”

Jessica Charlotte seemed to sway where she stood. “How – do – you – know – that?” she asked as if she could barely get the words out.

“Because her grandmother told me so.”

Omri hardly believed what he was hearing. Was his father making this up? But no. He wouldn’t do that. Why had Omri
never
thought to ask if his mother had a middle name? Why had it never occurred to him that his dad must have met Maria?

“Her grandmother!” Jessica Charlotte gasped. “She was my sister.”

“Yes. And I knew her. Of course I thought the same as you did – that Lottie had named my wife after herself. But
one day before we were married, when I was visiting Granny Marie—”

“Granny Marie!”

“Yes, that’s what my wife called her. She got annoyed with my wife over some little thing, and said, quite sharply, ‘That’s your namesake coming out in you!’ My wife said, ‘Do you mean, Mummy?’ meaning Lottie, and Maria said, quite tartly, ‘Don’t run away with the idea that your mother christened you after
herself
! She never thought of herself as a Charlotte, it was always Lottie. She named you after my wic—’” He caught himself, and stopped, and then went on, “‘—after my sister, Jessica Charlotte.’”

“Is this the truth?”

“Yes it is. I remembered it very clearly when I was reading—”

Omri trod heavily on his foot and he stopped.

“Tell me!” she cried, and Omri saw her clasp her hands at her breast. “Is my Lottie still alive?”

Omri’s mouth went abruptly dry. He almost pushed in front of his father. “Aunt Jessie, we can’t talk any more. It’s – it’s not allowed. If we give you the key, can you take it back with you and copy it?”

She switched her gaze on to him. He thought he saw a look of eagerness – a sort of blaze – in her eyes.

“I will.”

Omri put out his hand for the key, and when his father gave it to him, laid it on the glass at Jessica Charlotte’s feet. She bent down and looked at it.

“How can I manage to carry something so large and heavy? I have a long walk home from the Embankment.”

“When you get back, you’ll be full-size, and the key will be very small. Do you think you can do it?”

“I’ll try. How shall I – go back?”

“The same way you came – through Frederick’s cupboard.”

“Frederick’s cupboard? What do you mean?”

“Never mind. It’s all in your future. When do you think the key will be ready?”

“Tomorrow.”

“We’ll bring you back then.”

Jessica Charlotte bent down again and grasped the key, holding it just below the bulging plastic top part. Just as she was lifting it, with some difficulty, she stopped and pointed at the glass at her feet.

“These are photographs,” she said. “Who are they?”

“People in our family.”

“Who is that?”

She was pointing to a black and white picture of a young woman holding a baby in her arms. Beside her was a tall, good-looking man in naval uniform.

“That’s your Lottie,” said Omri’s father very quietly. “With her husband and Jane. My Jane, Omri’s mother. Jane Charlotte.”

Omri’s Aunt Jessie stood with the heavy key, its end still resting on the glass, in her hands, staring and staring down at the faded photo. When she had looked her fill, she turned,
lifted the key, which was nearly as big as herself, and turned her face to them. The tears in her eyes caught the light in starlike pinpoints.

“I will never despair again,” she said. “Now please. Send me about my business.”

N
either Omri nor his father slept much that night. In fact, in the middle of it, Omri heard his dad come creaking through the dividing door into his room in his pyjamas. He immediately shot up in bed.

“Oh – you’re awake, too!”

“Yes.”

His father sat down on the edge of Omri’s bed. “D’you think she’s doing it right this minute?” he whispered.

“Making the key? I expect she’s done it by now.”

His father shivered a little. “This is so exciting! Listen, I was thinking. If we’re really going back to Little Bull’s time, we’ll need something of his to take us.”

“Yeah… that’s right.”

“Have you anything?”

“No.”

“Then won’t we have to – to bring him back, just for a few minutes, to give us something of his?”

Omri was glad of the darkness. It hid the grin he couldn’t suppress at the boyish eagerness in his dad’s voice. It occurred to him that where this business was concerned,
he
was the grown-up, in a way, because he’d had more experience. His dad acted just the way he had, in the beginning. As if it were all a marvellous game. Omri knew better, but his dad would have to learn for himself.

“You’re right, Dad.”

“Could we – could we do it now?” He was obviously dying to work the magic again.

“Okay!”

There was no moon and they couldn’t see much by the starlight that come through the small window with its deep thatched eaves. They couldn’t turn a light on for fear Omri’s mum would see it reflected through her window. Omri got his pencil torch out from under his pillow and switched it on, got out of bed and went to the fireplace. He reached up into the sooty darkness and fished the plastic bag down.

“Great hiding place!” whispered his father.

Omri took Little Bull’s figure out by the light of the torch. He opened the cupboard. There on the shelf stood the plastic figure of ‘Aunt Jessie’. She was clutching the key.
Omri picked it up. He was amazed to see that the whole key, not just the bit at the top, was made of plastic now.

“Look, Dad! This means it’s definitely gone back. I wasn’t absolutely sure it would, being made of metal – the cupboard’s never worked except with plastic. P’raps the plastic part worked for the whole thing – it couldn’t just
half
go back.”

His father took the figure from him. “How strange! It’s joined to her. It’s part of Jessica Charlotte’s figure, you can’t separate them.”

“Come on – let’s bring Little Bull back!” Omri stood him carefully on the shelf and closed the door.

“Can – may I turn the key?” asked his dad eagerly.

“Sure, go ahead, Dad.”

He turned it. There was a brief, breath-held pause. Then he turned it back, opened the door cautiously, and Omri shone the finger of light directly on to Little Bull. He was standing, arms slightly away from his sides, legs bent, as if he’d just landed from a jump.

He straightened up, and shielded his eyes against the bright light. “Om-Ri?” came his gruff voice. He said Omri’s name as if it were two words.

“Yes. Are you okay, Little Bull?”

“I am O-Kay. You are O-Kay? Why is sun so strong my eyes see it only?”

“It’s night. We have this special kind of light.”

“Take from eyes. It makes me like night-mouse.”

Omri swiftly redirected the pencil downward.

“Better! You and father come now to my longhouse?”

“We can’t come yet, Little Bull. We have to make arrangements. We can’t leave just like that.”

Little Bull became thunderous. “You have small understanding! Trouble swallows the days. All press chiefs for wise words, to conquer fear. What can Little Bull tell them? Our land drinks our blood season by season in English wars, now King George says he has no more need of the Six Nations. English change their faces, break their word, let rebels take our land. Now we fight tribe against tribe instead of together as white enemies grow greater.”

“The French?”

“No! When Little Bull was young warrior, he fought the French. Now French lay down guns, go back to France. But now white enemy does not fight and then go back across the sea. Now they stay, move against Indians like wolf-packs, more and more. Much trouble. We must travel together. Now. We must sit in council.”

“Little Bull,” said Omri’s father, “how will it be, in your place? What will people think when they see us?”

“They will not see. Do your people here see me, see wife, see Boone? Not see because we are small here. Easy to hide. When you come to me, you small, too.” He looked up at them triumphantly. “O-Kay? Little Bull understands magic right?”

“Yes,” said Omri. “But Little Bull, listen. When you come here, you – you bring a sort of toy to life. Last time I went, I was part of a picture on a tepee. I couldn’t move or speak or
anything. You’ll have to have something ready for us to – to bring to life. We won’t be much use to you if we can’t talk or move.”

Little Bull looked thoughtful. “Toy,” he said slowly. “What is ‘toy’?”

“Something kids play with.”

“‘Kids’?”

“Children.”

“Ah! We have toys. Small Indians and animals made from corn, animal skins, parts of tree. Wife makes good, makes for son and others. I will ask her, make toy like you. You come, bring alive.”

“We need something of yours, to help us come to you,” Omri said. “Can you give us something? Anything.”

Little Bull, after a hesitation, slowly took off his belt. “Wampum,” he said. “Worth much. You take care, give back.” He laid it across Omri’s outstretched hand. Omri shone the pencil torch on it. It was white with tiny purple marks. Omri knew about wampum – what he was looking at was shells strung together. But wampum was more valuable to the Indians than mere money.

“I’ll take great care of it, Little Bull, don’t worry!”

“Now send me back. Twin Stars will make toys. You come soon. Little Bull will wait.
Wait hard
.” He put out his hand and Omri touched it with his finger. “Brother. My heart has trust, you will come to our help,” he said gruffly.

When he’d gone, Omri and his father examined the belt under a magnifying glass. Omri explained about wampum,
how it was the Indians’ money, and how the patterns also recorded their history and events like treaties, in a symbolic language. “And look! See those few purple shells among the white, made into a pattern? Those are the most valuable ones! I bet only Little Bull has a belt with those in, because he’s a chief.”

“I’ll take care of that,” said his father. He found a scrap of paper and wrapped the belt in it carefully, putting it away in his pyjama pocket. After a moment of stillness, he suddenly said in strange voice, “Omri.”

“What?”

“Did you – did you exactly realise we were going to be
small
when we got there?”

“Of course, Dad! Didn’t you?”

“No. And I didn’t realise I was going to inhabit a corn dolly, either.” Omri gave a snort of laughter, but his father wasn’t laughing. After a moment Omri felt his hand grasped in the darkness.

“You’re not scared, are you, Dad?”

“Bloody scared,” his father replied. “Suddenly.”

Things got tricky next day.

First of all, of course, there was school, and no getting out of it, and Omri’s dad had things to do.

A man arrived early to pump out their septic tank. They had one because the cottage wasn’t on mains drainage. It was a large tank buried in the garden, with a flowerbed on top of it, into which all the wastewater from the house flowed. His
dad had explained to them solemnly that there were little bugs – bacteria – living in there that devoured any ‘nasty solids’, reducing them to sludge, while liquids soaked away into the surrounding earth. The boys all thought this was hillarious, in a disgusting sort of way.

Anyway, the sludge had to be pumped out every so often, and today the man came to do it, with a vast tanker lorry that stood in the lane while something like a giant hosepipe was poked through the hedge, across the lawn and down into the tank through a manhole. The tanker was pumping away with a loud roaring noise while their father and mother stood watching, when Gillon and Omri set off for school on their bikes.

Omri felt a renewed sense of guilt for making Gillon feel left out the day before, so he decided to chat as they rode along. It took an effort, because he would rather have stayed silent, dreaming and planning and trying to imagine ahead.

“Did you do anything about the camping trip?” he asked.

“Sure,” shouted back Gillon, who was slightly ahead, flying along between the high Dorset hedges. “I got the mag after school yesterday and I’ve been making a list of…” His voice faded as he sailed round a corner, in the middle of the lane.

The next second there was the screech of brakes and that unmistakable metallic clashing sound of a bicycle coming to grief.

Omri automatically swerved in tighter to the edge of the narrow lane, partly lost control and bumped up on to the
grass verge just as a red Post Office van appeared, almost up on the opposite verge as if it had just narrowly missed someone coming to meet it. Which it had.

The van halted, nearly standing on its bonnet, and the postman jumped out and ran back round the bend. Omri meanwhile had fallen off his own bike straight into the ditch that ran alongside the hedge.

He lay stunned for a second, feeling ditchwater soaking his side. His leg had hit something sharp. Then he heaved himself out the only way he could, by clutching a handful of stinging nettles in preference to a handful of hawthorne. He was covered with mud and scratches but he didn’t notice. He stumbled along the rough verge round the bend, terrified of what he might see.

What he saw was the postman, hauling Gillon, likewise muddy and scratched, none too gently out of the same ditch ten metres further along. The bike was lying at a strange angle with its front wheel in the air.

Seeing he was all right, the postman began giving him what-for in his strong Dorset accent.

“Ye girt young fooil, what ye be thinkin’ yer doin’? Near made me ticker conk out, sno! Lucky me brakes be sharp, ye’d have bin a gonner! All right, are ye? Nothin’ broke?” He looked as if he might start feeling Gillon’s arms and legs. He was fairly dithering with shock.

Gillon looked shaken, too.

Omri struggled up to him on wobbly legs. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I think so. Sorry,” he said to the postman.

“Girt young fooil!” he said again, and took himself off, muttering.

Omri and Gillon looked at each other. Then they burst out laughing.

“You should see yourself!”

“What d’you think
you
look like?”

“Someone who just fell into a ditch?”

They collapsed on the grass, helpless.

After a while Gillon sat up. “You realise we’re late.”

“We can’t go to school like this anyway. We’d better go home and get cleaned up.”

“Mum’ll have kittens.”

They rose slowly and went to their bikes. When straightened out, these proved to be more resilient than their owners. They rode back to the cottage, unfortunately meeting the postal van coming back the other way. The postman scowled out of the window at them, put on speed and, accidentally or otherwise, sent a shower from a convenient puddle to add a little something to their appearance.

Their mother was waiting at the gate. The postman must have told her what had happened. She grabbed Gillon.

“Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“There are occasions,” she said between her teeth, “when I could wish the days of
serious
clips round the ear were not past. You have been told
ten thousand times
to keep in to the side. No, not a word. Get indoors and clean yourself up. Don’t imagine for one moment you’re getting off school.”

“Mum, if we go in now we’ll get detention!”

“Just see if I care.
And why aren’t you wearing your helmet?
”

Gillon fled.

She turned her attention on to Omri. “What happened to
you
? Did you jump into the ditch to show solidarity?”

Omri was beginning to feel the stings on his hand, and various other aches and pains apart from the scratches, rather painfully.

“I think I’ve hurt my leg, Mum,” he said pitifully.

She looked at it. Through the crust of mud it was bleeding in three places. “All right. Come on, I’ll look at it. Put your bike away.”

“Does that mean I don’t have to go to school?”

“Maybe after lunch.”

When Gillon found out that he had to go straight to school and Omri didn’t, he naturally set up a howl of protest. “At least I was knocked off my bike, practically! Omri just fell off! It’s not fair!”

But their mother was not to be moved. As soon as Gillon was ready, she clapped his helmet on his head and banished him. Meanwhile she had washed and bandaged Omri’s cuts and told him to go and rest in his room while she phoned the school.

Omri only noticed then that the tanker was gone. It hadn’t passed them so it must have gone farther up the lane to pump the neighbours’ sludge. Omri wondered where his dad had gone when it left. In the same moment that he wondered, the obvious answer came to him.