Lucy Montgomery - Emily Climbs

"Oh, drat your Jimmy-book!" said Ilse. "Let's get down... and eat breakfast if we have to... and get away."

But Emily, revelling again in her story-teller's paradise, had temporarily forgotten everything else.

"Where IS my Jimmy-book?" she said impatiently. "It isn't in my bag... I know it was here last night. Surely I didn't leave it on that gate-post!"

"Isn't that it over on the table?" asked Ilse.

Emily gazed blankly at it.

"It can't be... it IS... how did it get there? I KNOW I didn't take it out of the bag last night."

"You must have," said Ilse indifferently.

Emily walked over to the table with a puzzled expression. The Jimmy-book was lying open on it, with her pencil beside it. Something on the page caught her eye suddenly. She bent over it.

"Why don't you hurry and finish your hair?" demanded Ilse a few minutes later. "I'm ready now... for pity's sake, tear yourself from that blessed Jimmy-book for long enough to get dressed!"

Emily turned around, holding the Jimmy-book in her hands. She was very pale and her eyes were dark with fear and mystery.

"Ilse, look at this," she said in a trembling voice.

Ilse went over and looked at the page of the Jimmy-book which Emily held out to her. On it was a pencil sketch, exceedingly well done, of the little house on the river shore to which Emily had been so attracted on the preceding day. A black cross was marked on a small window over the front door and opposite it, on the margin of the Jimmy-book, beside another cross, was written:

"Allan Bradshaw is here."

"'What does it mean?" gasped Ilse. "Who did it?"

"I... don't know," stammered Emily. "The writing... is MINE."

Ilse looked at Emily and drew back a little.

"You must have drawn it in your sleep," she said dazedly.

"I can't draw," said Emily.

"Who else could have done it? Mistress McIntyre couldn't... you know she couldn't. Emily, I never heard of such a strange thing. Do you think... do you think... he can be there?"

"How could he? The house must be locked up... there's no one working at it now. Besides, they must have searched all around there... he would be looking out of the window... it wasn't shuttered, you remember... calling... they would have seen... heard... him. I suppose I must have drawn that picture in my sleep... though I can't understand how I did it... because my mind was so filled with the thought of little Allan. It's so strange... it frightens me."

"You'll have to show it to the Bradshaws," said Ilse.

"I suppose so... and yet I hate to. It may fill them with a cruel false hope again... and there CAN'T be anything in it. But I daren't risk NOT showing it. YOU show it... I can't, somehow. The thing has upset me... I feel frightened... childish... I could sit down and cry. If he SHOULD have been there... since Tuesday... he would be dead of starvation."

"Well, they'd KNOW... I'll show it, of course. If it should turn out... Emily, you're an uncanny creature."

"Don't talk of it... I can't bear it," said Emily, shuddering.

There was no one in the kitchen when then entered it, but presently a young man came in... evidently the Dr. McIntyre of whom Mrs. Hollinger had spoken. He had a pleasant, clever face, with keen eyes behind his glasses, but he looked tired and sad.

"Good-morning," he said. "I hope you had a good rest and were not disturbed in any way. We are all sadly upset here, of course."

"They haven't found the little boy?" asked Ilse.

Dr. McIntyre shook his head.

"No. They have given up the search. He cannot be living yet... after Tuesday night and last night. The swamp will not give up its dead... I feel sure that is where he is. My poor sister is broken- hearted. I am sorry your visit should have happened at such a sorrowful time, but I hope Mrs. Hollinger has made you comfortable. Grandmother McIntyre would be quite offended if you lacked for anything. She was very famous for her hospitality in her day. I suppose you haven't seen her. She does not often show herself to strangers."

"Oh, we have seen her," said Emily absently. "She came into our room this morning and told us how she spanked the King."

Dr. McIntyre laughed a little.

"Then you have been honoured. It is not to every one Grandmother tells that tale. She's something of an Ancient Mariner and knows her predestined listeners. She is a little bit strange. A few years ago her favourite son, my Uncle Neil, met his death in the Klondyke under sad circumstances. He was one of the Lost Patrol. Grandmother never recovered from the shock. She has never FELT anything since... feeling seems to have been killed in her. She neither loves nor hates nor fears nor hopes... she lives entirely in the past and experiences only one emotion... a great pride in the fact that she once spanked the King. But I am keeping you from your breakfast... here comes Mrs. Hollinger to scold me."

"Wait a moment please, Dr. McIntyre," said Ilse hurriedly. "I... you... we... there is something I want to show you."

Dr. McIntyre bent a puzzled face over the Jimmy-book.

"What is this? I don't understand... "

"We don't understand it, either... Emily drew it in her sleep."

"In her sleep?" Dr. McIntyre was too bewildered to be anything but an echo.

"She MUST have. There was nobody else... unless your Grandmother can draw."

"Not she. And she never saw this house... it's the Scobie cottage below Malvern Bridge, isn't it?"

"Yes. We saw it yesterday."

"But Allan can't be THERE... it's been locked for a month... the carpenters went away in August."

"Oh... I know," stammered Emily. "I was thinking so much of Allan before I went to sleep... I suppose it's only a dream... I don't understand it at all... but we HAD to show it to you."

"Of course. Well, I won't say anything to Will or Clara about it. I'll get Rob Mason from over the hill and we'll run down and have a look around the cottage. It would be odd if... but it couldn't possibly be. I don't see how we can get into the cottage. It's locked and the windows are shuttered."

"This one... over the front door... isn't."

"No... but that's a closet window at the end of the upstairs hall. I was over the house one day in August when the painters were at work in it. The closet shuts with a spring lock, so I suppose that is why they didn't put a shutter on that window. It's high up, close to the ceiling, I remember. Well, I'll slip over to Rob's and see about this. It won't do to leave any stone unturned."

Emily and Ilse ate what breakfast they could, thankful that Mrs. Hollinger let them alone, save for a few passing remarks as she came and went at work.

"Turrible night last night... but the rain is over. I never closed an eye. Pore Clara didn't either, but she's quieter now... sorter despairing. I'm skeered for her mind... her Grandmother never was right after she heard of HER son's death. When Clara heard they weren't going to search no more she screamed once and laid down on the bed with her face to the wall... hain't stirred since. Well, the world has to go on for other folks. Help yourselves to the toast. I'd advise ye not to be in too much of a hurry starting out till the wind dries the mud a bit."

"I'm not going to go until we find out if... " whispered Ilse inconclusively.

Emily nodded. She could not eat, and if Aunt Elizabeth or Aunt Ruth had seen her they would have sent her to bed at once with orders to stay there... and they would have been quite right. She had almost reached her breaking-point. The hour that passed after Dr. McIntyre's departure seemed interminable. Suddenly they heard Mrs. Hollinger, who was washing milk-pails at the bench outside the kitchen door, give a sharp exclamation. A minute later she rushed into the kitchen, followed by Dr. McIntyre, breathless from his mad run from Malvern Bridge.