Searching for Shona (9 page)

“You go ahead and wear your silk dress,” Miss Agnes said smoothly. “I’ll just wear this skirt and blouse today.”

Miss Morag looked doubtful but finally went upstairs to put on her Sunday dress.

“Morag and I were talking while she was ironing her dress this morning, Anna,” Miss Agnes said. “We’ve decided that with the war on it wouldn’t be right for us both to get new dresses, so my sister will go on wearing her silk, and I’ll pick out something suitable from the shop. I’m quite looking forward to choosing something of my own.”

She gave a pleased little smile and leaned over and patted Anna’s cheek. Anna grinned back at her. Miss Agnes didn’t feel bad about the dress at all. Both girls were suddenly sure of that.

Chapter 9

Escrigg Pond

A day or two later when Marjorie came home from school, Miss Campbell told her there was a letter for her on the hall stand. Thinking that it must be an answer to her letter to Shona, she snatched it up and ran to her room, only to find that it was the very same letter she had written. Across the envelope, stamped in great black letters was the word UNKNOWN, and in smaller letters, RETURN TO SENDER.

Looking at the envelope with the name Marjorie Malcolm-Scott partly obscured by the word UNKNOWN gave her an awful feeling. It was as if everything she had known and done before she became Shona had never happened. It was as if she had no past. But Mrs. Kilpatrick
had
to know where Marjorie was. Marjorie couldn’t just have disappeared. And then it occurred to her that Mrs. Kilpatrick might no longer live in the house on Willowbrae Road. Uncle Fergus would surely have some important job connected with the war in London or somewhere like that. With no Marjorie for Mrs. Kilpatrick to look after, there would be nothing for her to do.

Marjorie could think of no other way of reaching Shona now. And probably Shona had no way of finding her. She wondered once again how long the war would last. Maybe for years and years. But somehow that still didn’t seem likely. She heard people say that the British would beat the Germans before summer and then—somehow—she and Shona would find one another again. But the feeling that there was no Marjorie Malcolm-Scott stayed with her. She was UNKNOWN. There were now two Shonas.

Marjorie was very busy these days with school work. Miss Dunlop gave her extra lessons to help her when it came time to take the Qualifying Exam. One afternoon when she stayed late for help on fractions, Miss Dunlop said suddenly, “I wrote to Mrs. Holmsworth, your matron at St. Anne’s, to tell her how well you’re doing in school.”

Miss Dunlop was waving a letter in front of her, and Marjorie stiffened, sure she’d been caught at last. Miss Dunlop seemed to be waiting for her to say something, so she asked cautiously, “How could you write her? I thought she had been evacuated, too—with the little ones.”

“So she was, but I have her address and, of course, she has yours. We have to keep records, you know.” Then Miss Dunlop added lightly, “We wouldn’t want to misplace any of you! Mrs. Holmsworth says it’s a pity you’re billeted so far from Gatebridge, where she is, because she would like to see you and Tommy and Anna again.”

Marjorie’s face grew hot and her heart was beating uncomfortably fast. She was sure Miss Dunlop expected her to say something, but she didn’t trust her voice.

“She says she’s surprised you’re doing so well,” Miss Dunlop continued with a smile. “She claims you were good at drawing and had lots of imagination but never showed much interest in school work, especially arithmetic. Isn’t it funny how teachers can see children so differently!”

Marjorie sat very still, her hands clenched and her nails digging into her palms, waiting for the suspicious questions to begin, but Miss Dunlop tossed the letter aside and went back to correcting the pile of exercise books on her desk.

“Miss Dunlop,” Marjorie said at last, “Do you think she’ll ever come and see us?”

“I can’t really say,” Miss Dunlop answered. “You know how difficult traveling is in wartime, and you’ve seen these posters asking ‘Is your journey really necessary?’ Besides, she seems to have her hands full where she is.”

Matron turning up was a threat that hadn’t occurred to Marjorie. Miss Dunlop made it seem unlikely that Matron would come—but Marjorie was beginning to think it was the unlikely things you had to watch out for.

She was no longer in the mood for fractions. Closing her book, she said, “I think I’ll go home now.”

Miss Dunlop looked up. “You do look a little strained, Shona. No sense in overdoing it. You run along!”

Marjorie did run most of the way. It was very cold and not for the first time she wished Shona had owned a warmer coat. The only good thing about the cold weather was the news that Escrigg Pond was almost frozen over.

By Friday the ice was holding. When Anna and Marjorie arrived home from school Miss Agnes was waiting for them with extra thick socks and long woolen scarves.

“I hear they’re skating on the pond today,” she said, her eyes bright behind her round glasses. “How excited Morag and I used to be when we heard the ice was holding! We were always among the first down there. You’ll be wanting to get down there, too, to try out those skates.”

She wrapped the long scarf around Anna’s neck, crossed it over her chest, and pinned it behind her back.

“There, child, that should keep out the wind,” she said. “You’ll find your way all right, will you? You take the first road to the left after you pass Clairmont House. It goes to Escrigg Farm. There used to be a sign there, but I think they’ve taken it down—to confuse any Germans that land by parachute. A piece of nonsense, I say! What difference would it make to any spy to know that that road leads to Escrigg Farm?”

“It would if he wanted to go skating,” Anna said with a giggle.

“Anyway, take that lane and keep going right past the farm and you’ll come to the pond.”

Marjorie was so excited she scarcely listened to Miss Campbell’s directions. The girls set off, their skates tied together and slung over their shoulders. The air was crisp and clear, and their breath made little clouds of fog when they spoke to one another. They passed Clairmont House without giving it a glance and turned down the narrow lane to the farm. Anna jumped from one frozen puddle to the next, cracking the ice.

Long before they reached the pond, they could hear the voices of the skaters echoing in the clear air, and once they passed Escrigg Farm they could see small, dark figures weaving about on the ice. Both girls broke into a run, eager to join the lively crowd.

In the autumn the pond was used for duck hunting, and a small triangular blind had been built with a narrow wooden walkway leading out to it. Marjorie and Anna made their way carefully along the walkway past the rushes at the edge of the pond where the ice was brittle and then sat down on the walkway to take off their shoes and put on their skates.

It took them a long time to lace the high boots, and their fingers were soon stiff with cold. Anna’s lace got knotted, and Marjorie, very impatiently, helped her untangle it. At last they were ready and they stood up unsteadily. How could the other children move so effortlessly when they felt so clumsy and weighted down? Marjorie took a cautious step forward and felt the muscles in her calves and feet tighten.

“I wish there was something to hold onto,” Anna said.

“Don’t hold onto me,” Marjorie warned.

Just then, Isobel McKay, from Marjorie’s class at school, came gliding across the ice and curved to a stop beside them.

“Hello Shona,” she said. “Have you been skating before?”

If Marjorie’s cheeks had not already been red from the sharp cold, she would have glowed with pleasure at the idea of Isobel coming over to speak to her. She wished her feet didn’t feel so heavy. Pushing one foot forward, she immediately lost her balance and landed with a thud on the ice.

“Put your hands on my shoulders and try moving your feet like I do,” Isobel suggested, when Marjorie managed to struggle to her feet again.

Marjorie leaned on Isobel and gradually began to get the feel of it.

“I’m going to try by myself,” she said, letting go of Isobel’s shoulders. She was wobbly, but was surprised to find she was managing. She wouldn’t get points for style or speed, but she
was
staying upright. Then Billy Wallace, a boy from their class, skated past them shouting, “It’s Shona Lot, Mona Lot!”

Everybody listened to the Tommy Handley Hour on the wireless and knew the whining voice of Mona Lot, so all the children thought this was funny and took up the shout. “Shona Lot, Mona Lot!” echoed in the cold air. But this time the name-calling was good-natured and made Marjorie feel she was, at last, one of them. Two other girls offered to take her skating between them and she was halfway around the pond before she looked back at Anna, who was still sitting where Marjorie had left her. But Marjorie was having too much fun to worry.

After a while Marjorie did leave her friends and reluctantly headed back to Anna. She went around the edge of the pond because some of the bigger boys were playing hockey out in the middle, and she didn’t want to skate between them.

“I’m cold,” Anna, complained, when Marjorie was close enough to hear. “I want to go home.”

“It’s because you don’t keep moving. You’ve got to get out there and try, Anna! You won’t learn sitting down.”

“Every time I stand up, I
do
sit down,” Anna said tearfully. But she did try to stand up again. Her ankles were bent, so that she was almost standing on the side of her skates. She took two uncertain steps.

“That’s the way!” Marjorie said encouragingly.

Just then Isobel skated up to them saying, “Come on, Shona! Let’s go straight across.”

With an apologetic smile to Anna, Marjorie followed Isobel out onto the ice among the fast-moving hockey players. The sun had set and the moon was rising in the clear sky, giving the ice and frost-encrusted trees and grass a strange silver cast. The sounds of voices and the ring of skates on the ice seemed more melodious in the dark. Marjorie, surrounded by friends, felt as if she were in an enchanted dream. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been skating when she heard a shout from across the pond near the duck blind. She watched two of the bigger boys skate over to see what the trouble was. They came back quickly, dark shapes weaving across the ice, and they scraped to a halt beside her.

“It’s that little kid that stays with you,” one of them said. “She’s fallen down and hurt herself. They’re taking her to Escrigg Farm.”

Marjorie’s knees began to wobble. Her skates seemed heavy and useless, and she longed to kick them off so she could run across the ice and find out what had happened to Anna. Even with Isobel’s help, she found it a great effort to cross the space of ice that separated her from Anna.

By the time she got to the walkway, they had already carried Anna to the farm, and no one really knew how badly she had been hurt, though there were plenty of people who were willing to talk about it.

“Cut her head open on a skate,” somebody said. “You should have seen the blood.”

“It’s a broken leg,” someone else volunteered.

Marjorie was cold and tired, her feet were numb, and her legs ached. It took her forever to unlace her boots, and then she couldn’t find her shoes. At last she saw them, and Anna’s too. She thrust her feet into her shoes, and picking up Anna’s, went running toward the farm house, desperately afraid of what she was going to find.

When she pounded on the door, it was immediately opened by a plump, rosy-cheeked woman.

“You’ll be Shona,” she said. “I’m Mrs. Appleby. And I’m glad to see you’ve brought Anna’s shoes! Come on in! She’s waiting for you.”

“Is she all right?” Marjorie asked breathlessly.

“She’s got a bit of a bump on the head, that’s all. Coming up like an egg, it is, and they say it knocked her out for a spell. Dr. Knight is coming to take a look at her. I’m sure he’ll give you both a ride home. Come on in by the fire and see Anna for yourself.”

Anna was sitting in a big stuffed chair, a rug over her knees, drinking a cup of tea. She looked remarkably well, and Marjorie thought that the rumor-spreaders down by the pond would be disappointed to see her looking so hale and hearty.

“Let me give you a cup of tea, too,” Mrs. Appleby said, placing a platter of warm scones between the girls.

“It puts me in mind of the time Jane Carruthers fell through the ice,” Mrs. Appleby said, when she brought Marjorie her tea. “They brought her back here, dripping wet and scared half to death, poor wee thing.”

“Jane Carruthers?” whispered Marjorie.

“Aye! Maybe you’ve heard of her. She lived in Clairmont House—that big place you pass just before you turn down our road.”

“Was that long ago?” Marjorie asked.

“It must be twenty years ago. It was when my girl, Becky, was the parlor maid up there. Jane had got these new skates for her birthday and couldn’t wait to try them. The ice wasn’t very thick, and she went through it there by the rushes where the brook runs into the pond. You want to watch that place—it’s always the last to freeze over.”

“Did she nearly drown?” Anna asked anxiously.

“Dear me, no!” answered Mrs. Appleby. “It’s not deep, but she got an awful cold, as I remember, and Becky had to carry all her meals up to her in that little room in the tower, and the coal for the fire, as well. They overworked Becky there, and small thanks she ever got.”

“What was Jane like?” Marjorie asked.

“She was a bonny wee thing with golden ringlets—like a china doll. But headstrong! It was just like her to slip out and go skating when she’d been told that she couldn’t. Becky used to say she was spoiled, with all her find clothes and toys, but I fancy she was a lonely wee lass. Her mother died in the flu epidemic at the end of the last war, and her father never had much time for her.”

“Did she have brothers and sisters?” Marjorie asked, eager to find out all she could about the family in Clairmont House.