Y. S. EMERY

1 Trobate

 

 

Abigail and her friend Ethan walked into her grandfather's junk shop after breaking up early from school for the half-term holidays. They were thirteen-years old and had been friends most of their young lives. Ethan just happened to live next door to Abigail. His family moved there when he was a year old and he and Abigail became playmates, later to become best friends. On entering, they were amazed to find her grandfather, Mr. Adams, walking around and around a table, stroking his hand across the surface of the wood.

"Come on, please give me another clue, what am I to use?" he murmured to himself.

They looked at him in some bewilderment, and asked what he was doing. Before he had a chance to answer, they heard voices coming from around the corner, outside the shop. Mr. Adams put up a hand to quiet them and turned his head towards the voices. Into view came a family of four—the parents, a girl of about five and a boy of about eleven. Mr. Adams found himself strangely drawn to this family, though he didn’t know why. He stepped outside the shop, closely followed by Abigail and Ethan. There, they heard the mother saying, “Why on earth did you have to bring him? You should have left him at home.”

"But Mum, he would have been all alone at home," replied her son.

"Yes, but now we can't get in anywhere, we keep being told that we can't go in with a bird," reasoned his father.

"We will have to take him back to the car and leave him there for the rest of the day," sighed his mother.

Mr. Adams craned his neck to get a better view of the bird they were speaking of, and to his amazement saw the boy had a woodpecker perched on his arm. He lost no time in shuffling over to ask if he could be of any assistance.

"I could look after your bird," he offered. "I have a fine perch in my shop, which I am sure would suit him very nicely."

The mother looked to the father with a questioning glance; he shrugged and smiled non-committedly. They both looked to the boy, who said that it would be better than leaving him in a stuffy old car all day. So it was agreed that Mr. Adams would look after the woodpecker until the family were ready to go home. After they had gone, Mr. Adams took the bird over to the perch and rubbed his hands together in glee.

“This is it, I’m sure that this is it, I’ve a peck in mind,” he said to himself and then began to chuckle.

Abigail looked at Ethan, and then over to her grandfather.

"Gramps, what exactly are you doing? And why did you offer to look after that bird?" she asked.

Mr. Adams looked from Abigail to Ethan, then sighed, "Can you keep a secret?"

Abigail and Ethan exchanged puzzled expressions, before turning their gaze to Mr. Adams, and hesitantly nodded.

"Well, it all started," began Mr. Adams, "when this old oak table was delivered . . .”

 

“That’s it lads, put it over here," Mr. Adams said to the men who were delivering some pieces of furniture.

They proceeded to put an old oak kitchen table where Mr. Adams had just made space for it. His shop was full of old pieces of furniture that people didn’t want anymore. At one time he did a roaring trade, when people couldn’t afford to buy new and were happy to purchase old furniture in good condition. Although Mr. Adams’ shop was known as a junk shop, he only ever took pieces that were in good condition; he would turn away anything tatty or battered. The same went for bric-a-brac, nice-looking ornaments, and dinner sets with no cracks—no, he never took rubbish. Unfortunately, in this day and age people could now buy cheap flat-packed furniture to assemble themselves when they got home. This had had a crippling effect on his shop, although there were still a few people who bought from him as the old furniture was made to last, unlike the new, and had better character too.

"Want a cup of tea before you go?" he asked.

"Wouldn’t say no to that," said one of the men with a laugh.

"Too right," said the other.

After their tea, Mr. Adams waved them off. “See you next week then?" he called to them.

One of the men put his thumb up in reply as they climbed into their van.

Back in the shop, Mr. Adams picked up a duster and haphazardly dusted the furniture which had just been delivered. When he came to the table, he was amazed to see that there was writing carved into the wood.

He scratched his head in bewilderment, then to himself, as there was no one else in the shop said, “That’s strange, that wasn’t there before."

He leaned over the carving and began to read it.

“There’s a quest to be done,

You’ve been chosen, you’re the one.

First, find the key if you want to partake.

With the aid of this key a new room you'll create.”

Mr. Adams stared in disbelief at the carved message.

“Is this some kind of joke? Why yes! I bet those lads kept this covered up so that I wouldn't see it until they'd gone,” he said.

But deep down inside he knew that this wasn’t the case; the writing hadn’t been there before, this he knew for certain as he had inspected each piece carefully before accepting it. He looked again at the carving on the table, and for some strange reason knew he had to get this message written down on paper. But why? It certainly wasn’t going anywhere, not carved in that deeply. He took a note pad from the shelf and a pen from his pocket, and proceeded to write down the message. No sooner had he written the last letter than the words began to disappear one by one in front of his eyes.

"Whoa!" he said in alarm, stepping back. He looked about him, as though he would see the culprit responsible for this . . . this prank?

“Oh this is crazy!” he said.

Pulling his fingers through his hair he paced up and down the room, then rubbed his chin with his hand. He suddenly put down the notebook and pen, rushed out the back into the kitchen, turned on the cold water tap, collected two handfuls of water, splashed his face liberally, and then stood back with water dripping down the front of his shirt.

He ran back into the shop and stopped dead at the table. He felt the colour drain from his face, he felt cold, thought that at any moment he would faint. It couldn’t be true, no . . . no it couldn’t be.

For carved into the surface of the table, exactly where the last message had been, was a new message.

He touched the words with his fingertips—it really was carved deep into the wood, but how? He pulled up a chair and sat down heavily; he took a hanky from his pocket and wiped the excess water from his face, and noticed how his hands trembled.

He read the new message aloud in a quivering voice.

“I'm sleek, and I'm black.

And I rhyme with that.”

Once Mr. Adams had composed himself, he stood up. He copied out the second clue just in case this one should also disappear, and of course once he had written down the last letter this was exactly what happened. He looked again at the first clue.

“First find the key! What key?” he questioned, looking around him. “Hang on . . . it doesn’t have to be an instrument for operating a lock!  Of course, it could be anything, something which controls or explains.”

He proceeded to read the second clue. “I’m sleek and I’m black, um . . . and I rhyme with that.”

Once again he looked around the shop, and suddenly his eyes fell upon a small ornamental black Egyptian cat with a gold collar.

“I wonder . . .” he said.

He got up and walked over to pick it up. As soon as he touched it, it began to emanate a golden glow.

“Well I’ll be,” he whispered, “it’s never done that before.”

He went back over to the table and put the cat down, just as a third clue appeared.

“Go outside, then through another door,

And there you’ll find your passage.

Once inside, you’ll make a voyage.

You’ll not be in this world no more,” he read.

As before he quickly copied out this new clue before it too disappeared, which of course it did.

Mr. Adams had now begun to relax, and was even beginning to enjoy this mysterious adventure.

“Now if this is a quest, like the first clue told,” he queried in quite a loud voice, as though he was asking someone in the room, “then shouldn’t there be a reward or something at the end of it, like a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow?”

He stood there perfectly still, holding his breath as he waited for the answer. Again, just like before, there in front of his eyes the words began to form one by one, carved deep into the wooden surface.

“Treasures untold

Will before you unfold”

He gave a soft low whistle, sat down again and started to laugh. He laughed until he was tired of laughing.

Shaking his head at last, he said, “I don’t know if I’m dreaming—if I am, then this is a mighty fine dream. If I’m not, wow! What a morning, what a day.”

He went over to the shop door, locked it and put up the ‘closed for lunch’ sign, then went into the kitchen to make himself another cup of tea and a sandwich. He sat down at the kitchen table and began to ponder the clues he had written down that morning.

After he finished his lunch, he cleared up and then went out of the back door into the garden.

“I really must get out here at some time and clear this lot up,” he said as he walked up the garden path, looking at the weeds in the borders and the leaves all over the lawn.  He realised as he looked up at the clear blue sky that it was a lovely day, a bright autumn day, a bit chilly but a nice bit of sunshine. As he started back to the house his eyes fell on the door to the outhouse. It didn’t really get used much these days, probably had a few bits of unwanted items stored in there. If he was honest, he hadn’t been in there for quite some time. He opened the door, which groaned a bit with age and lack of use.

Once inside, he looked about and saw he was right; there were odd bits and pieces stacked on top of each other, things he had been unable to sell in his shop, and a few old tools and plant pots.

He turned and walked back out into the garden. As he returned to the kitchen, the penny dropped. He stopped dead on the spot, put his hands to his mouth, and stood there for a few moments, hardly daring to think that what he was thinking could be right. Was that the place the clue was referring to, the other door? To be honest there was no other door out there, apart from the garden shed door.

What would happen if he was right? Curiosity soon got the better of him—he ran into the shop and over to the table. There were no new messages; he picked up the ornamental cat that was once again giving off a golden glow and went back outside. He stood for a moment at the door of the outhouse, hardly daring to breathe. Should he go in or not? What would happen if he did?  He looked about him, at the glowing cat in his hand, and then back to the door.

“If I go in, will I be whisked away into another world like it said in the clue, unable ever to return? I might never see my family again. But if I don’t go in, I’ll never know what could have happened.”

It was an agonizing few minutes, standing there, not knowing what to do.

He took a deep breath, and before he could change his mind he stepped through the door and closed it.

Nothing happened.

He was still standing in the small dark room.  He sighed disappointedly and then began laughing to himself. What on earth had he expected to happen? Accept it, he thought; although he couldn’t think how it had been done, this was obviously all an elaborate joke.

He began to open the door but realised that this time things were not the same—the light coming through the opening was different. He squinted as he opened the door wider, then slowly stepped into a strange room.