Michael Bond - Paddington Complete Novels

It was while she was helping Mrs Bird with the washing-up that Mrs Brown first noticed something odd going on in the garden.

“Look!” she said, nearly dropping one of the breakfast plates in her astonishment. “Behind the cabbage patch. Whatever is it?”

Mrs Bird followed her gaze out of the window to where something brown and shapeless kept bobbing up and down. Her face cleared. “It’s Paddington,” she said. “I’d recognise his hat anywhere.”

“Paddington?” echoed Mrs Brown. “But what on earth is he doing crawling about in the cabbage patch on his paws and knees?”

“He looks as if he’s lost something,” said Mrs Bird. “That’s Mr Brown’s magnifying glass he’s got.”

Mrs Brown sighed. “Oh well, we shall know what it is soon enough, I expect.”

Unaware of the interest he was causing, Paddington sat down behind a raspberry cane and undid a small notebook which he opened at a page marked LIST OF CLEWS.

Recently Paddingon had been reading a mystery story which Mr Gruber had lent him and he had begun to fancy himself as a detective. The mysterious flashes of the night before and the loss of Mr Brown’s marrow convinced him his opportunity had come at last.

So far it had all been rather disappointing. He had found several footprints, but he’d traced them all back to the house. In the big gap left by Mr Brown’s prize marrow there were two dead beetles and an empty seed packet, but that was all.

All the same, Paddington wrote the details carefully in his notebook and drew a map of the garden – putting a large X to mark the spot where the marrow had once been. Then he went back upstairs to his room in order to think things out. When he got there he made another addition to his map – a drawing of the new house which was being built beyond the edge of the garden. Paddington decided that was where the mysterious flashes must have come from the night before. He stared at it through his opera glasses for some time but the only people he could see were the builders.

Shortly afterwards, anyone watching the Browns’ house would have seen the small figure of a bear emerge from the front door and make its way towards the market. Fortunately for Paddington’s plans no one saw him leave, nor did anyone see him when he returned some while later carrying a large parcel in his arms. There was an excited gleam in his eyes as he crept back up the stairs and entered his bedroom, carefully locking the door behind him. Paddington liked parcels and this one was particularly interesting.

It took him a long time to undo the knots on the string, because his paws were trembling with excitement, but when he did pull the paper apart it revealed a long cardboard box, very brightly coloured, with the words MASTER DETECTIVE’S DISGUISE OUTFIT on the front.

Paddington had been having a battle with himself ever since he’d first seen it several days before in a shop window. Although seven pounds seemed an awful lot of money to pay for anything – especially when you only get one pound a week pocket money – Paddington felt very pleased with himself as he emptied the contents on to the floor. There was a long black beard, some dark glasses, a police whistle, several bottles of chemicals marked ‘Handle with Care’ – which Paddington hurriedly put back in the box – a finger-print pad, a small bottle of invisible ink, and a book of instructions.

It seemed a very good disguise outfit. Paddington tried writing his name on the lid of the box with the invisible ink and he couldn’t see it at all. Then he tested the finger-print pad with his paw and blew several blasts on the police whistle under the bedclothes. He rather wished he’d thought of doing it the other way round as a lot of the ink came off on the sheets, which was going to be difficult to explain.

But he liked the beard best of all. It had two pieces of wire for fitting over the ears, and when he turned and suddenly caught sight of himself in the mirror it quite made him jump. With his hat on, and an old raincoat of Jonathan’s which Mrs Brown had put out for the jumble sale, he could hardly recognise himself. After studying the effect in the mirror from all possible angles, Paddington decided to try it out downstairs. It was difficult to walk properly; Jonathan’s old coat was too long for him and he kept treading on it. Apart from that, his ears didn’t seem to fit the beard as well as he would have liked, so that he had to hang on to it with one paw while he went backwards down the stairs, holding on to the banisters with the other paw. He was so intent on what he was doing that he didn’t hear Mrs Bird coming up until she was right on top of him.

Mrs Bird looked most startled when she bumped into him. “Oh, Paddington,” she began, “I was just coming to see you. I wonder if you would mind going down to the market for me and fetching half a pound of butter?”

“I’m not Paddington,” said a gruff voice from behind the beard. “I’m Sherlock Holmes – the famous detective!”

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs Bird. “But don’t forget the butter. We need it for lunch.” With that she turned and went back down the stairs towards the kitchen. The door shut behind her and Paddington heard the murmur of voices.

He pulled off the beard disappointedly. “Thirty-five buns’ worth!” he said bitterly, to no one in particular. He almost felt like going back to the shop and asking for his money back. Thirty-five buns were thirty-five buns and it had taken him a long time to save that much money.

But when he got outside the front door Paddington hesitated. It seemed such a pity to waste his disguise, and even if Mrs Bird had seen through it, Mr Briggs, the foreman at the building site, might not. Paddington decided to have one more try. He might even pick up some more clues.

By the time he arrived at the new house he was feeling much more pleased with himself. Out of the corner of his eye he had noticed quite a number of people staring at him as he passed. And when he’d looked at them over the top of his glasses several of them had hurriedly crossed to the other side of the road.

He crept along outside the house until he heard voices. They seemed to be coming from an open window on the first floor and he distinctly recognised Mr Briggs’s voice among them. There was a ladder propped against the wall and Paddington clambered up the rungs until his head was level with the window-sill. Then he carefully peered over the edge.

Mr Briggs and his men were busy round a small stove making themselves a cup of tea. Paddington stared hard at Mr Briggs, who was in the act of pouring some water into the teapot, and then, after adjusting his beard, he blew a long blast on his police whistle.

There was a crash of breaking china as Mr Briggs jumped up. He pointed a trembling hand in the direction of the window.

“Cor!” he shouted. “Look! H’an apparition!” The others followed his gaze with open mouths. Paddington stayed just long enough to see four white faces staring at him and then he slid down the ladder on all four paws and hid behind a pile of bricks. Almost immediately there was the sound of excited voices at the window.

“Can’t see it now,” said a voice. “Must ’ave vanished.”

“Cor!” repeated Mr Briggs, mopping his brow with a spotted handkerchief. “Whatever it was, I don’t never want to see nothing like it again. Fair chilled me to the marrow it did!” With that he slammed the window shut and the voices died away.