Paddington: The Junior Novel Read online

  Contents

  Marmalade Day

  Bear Aboard

  Introducing the Browns

  Trouble with the Facilities

  Paw and Order

  All Records Destroyed

  Paddington Comes Unstuck

  Wrong Number

  Get Stuffed

  Home

  Photo Section

  Back Ad

  About the Author

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  CHAPTER ONE

  Marmalade Day

  It was a warm summer’s day in Darkest Peru, and deep in the rain forest, a scruffy bear cub was sitting in the fork of an orange tree sniffing the fruit. He picked one, squeezed it, and his furry face split into a huge smile; the oranges were ripe! He’d been waiting for this moment for months. He hurried back to the tree house to tell his relatives the good news.

  When he arrived, Aunt Lucy and Uncle Pastuzo were listening to a crackly recording of A Friendly Guide to London Life on their old wind-up gramophone.

  It was one of many gifts given to them by a gentleman explorer many years ago; the first person to discover them (though, as Uncle Pastuzo had once pointed out, they had known they were there all along). Now, Aunt Lucy flicked a duster over his photograph.

  “You pass a stranger on the street,” said the gramophone. “What do you say?”

  “Good morning,” answered Aunt Lucy. “And then I comment on the weather.”

  She knew it off by heart and while most of the advice seemed somewhat strange, if they ever visited the explorer in London as he had asked them to, they would need to know how to behave. The record ended with its usual tip: “And don’t forget to raise your hat!”

  Uncle Pastuzo raised the explorer’s old tattered red bush hat that he now wore, picked a grub out of his fur, and ate it.

  “Very sophisticated,” said Aunt Lucy.

  “I try my best,” he said.

  Just then, their young nephew burst into the tree house waving an orange.

  “Good morning, my little hurricane,” said Aunt Lucy.

  “Guess what, Aunt Lucy?” he whooped, skidding across the floor and crashing into the gramophone. He landed on his bottom and as the needle bounced across the record, the gramophone trumpet fell over his head like a metal helmet.

  Uncle Pastuzo grabbed hold of it and pulled, but all this did was lift the cub off the floor with the trumpet still wedged over his ears. He hung in space for a few seconds, then, wriggling free, he thrust the orange under his uncle’s nose.

  “Uncle Pastuzo? They’re ripe!”

  The cub tore the orange open with his claws, and the scent of the juice filled the old bear’s nostrils.

  “Marmalade Day!” he beamed, tumbling over his nephew as they raced each other out of the tree house.

  “My favorite time of year,” smiled Aunt Lucy, watching Pastuzo swing the cub onto his broad shoulders and carry him off through the trees. The young bear took his uncle’s hat and waved it at her.

  “Meet you by the marmalade machine, Aunt Lucy!”

  “Wash your paws and no licking the ladle,” she called, lowering herself sedately into the bamboo stair lift that Pastuzo had rigged up to save her tired old legs.

  She watched fondly as they romped off to gather oranges. Ever since the explorer had introduced them to marmalade all those years ago, making it had become an annual ritual. In fact, marmalade had become their favorite food, and Pastuzo had even built an ingenious contraption which helped them produce enough of the sweet preserve to last throughout the year, plus a few extra jars for emergencies.

  After she’d adopted her nephew, Aunt Lucy felt it was her duty to pass the marmalade-making skills onto him. It was true that letting a young bear loose with a sticky spoon was asking for trouble, but he seemed to be getting the hang of it.

  By the time she reached the forest clearing where the magnificent machine stood, the oranges had been gathered and firewood was already piled up under the huge cooking pot waiting to be lit. Aunt Lucy struck a match.

  “It’s a bumper crop,” said Pastuzo, mounting the rickety wooden bicycle that operated the works.

  “This is going to be the best marmalade ever!” said the cub, lobbing the fruit into a funnel. “What did you eat before you discovered marmalade, Uncle Pastuzo?”

  “Before the explorer came?” he puffed. “Those were dark days. We lived like animals, but now we are civilized!” He raised his backside to give it a good scratch. “We have marmalade, the most nutritious food known to Bear!”

  Aunt Lucy took a wooden spoon from the explorer’s old leather boot, which she used as a utensil holder, and stirred the pot.

  “All the vitamins and minerals you need for a whole day are contained in just one sandwich,” announced Pastuzo as the cub climbed up the nearest tree to pick a fat juicy orange that he’d missed earlier—it was just out of reach.

  “One sandwich, Uncle?” he said, stretching as hard as he could to grab the fruit. “Then why do you eat so many?”

  Pastuzo patted his stomach apologetically.

  “Because they are, unfortunately, delicious!”

  The cub managed to catch hold of the orange he was reaching for, but as he did, he slipped off his branch and hung there, dangling on the stalk, clinging to the orange by both paws. Unaware that he was spinning slowly above her, Aunt Lucy tasted the mixture.

  “Mmm . . . not bad. But it needs something to give it a kick. . . .”

  The orange stalk snapped. With a startled cry, the cub plummeted. Catching his foot on a vine, he swooped across the clearing and, unable to stop himself, knocked the explorer’s boot into the bubbling mixture. It landed with a sticky plop.

  “Oh for goodness sake,” said Aunt Lucy as he whistled back past her ears.

  Trying to slow himself down, he made a grab at his uncle, who was peering into the marmalade, but only managed to snatch his hat. He swung back over the cooking pot and, flailing wildly, scooped it to the brim with boiling marmalade.

  “You can’t be trusted with anything!” said Uncle Pastuzo as the boot bobbed about in the marmalade. “We’re going to have to start all over again now.”

  Just then, the vine snapped, dumping the cub in the long grass. He hid the hat behind his back, hoping to empty it before anyone noticed.

  “Give that to me,” said his uncle.

  “But . . . but . . .” stammered the cub.

  “No buts!”

  Pastuzo grabbed the hat and put it on with a grand flourish, saying, “It’s about time I got a bit of respect around here.”

  Warm marmalade chunks slid down his cheeks. His expression changed.

  “Embarrassing . . . but better than ever!” grinned Uncle Pastuzo.

  Aunt Lucy dipped her spoon in the pot. The marmalade tasted even better than last year.

  “When I said it needed a kick, this wasn’t quite what I had in mind,” she said, pulling the boot out by its lace, “but it seems to have done the trick!”

  By evening, all the jars had been filled . . . and several of them emptied again. The floor was covered in crusts and crumbs, and just one marmalade sandwich remained. The cub lay on a tree branch and gazed at it longingly while his relatives dozed in their hammocks.

  “Delicious,” burped Uncle Pastuzo.

  “Next year we’ll try two boots,” yawned Aunt Lucy.

  The cub sat up.

  “Please can I have the last sandwich?”

  Uncle Pastuzo opened one eye.

  “No, no. A wise bear always keeps a marmalade sandwich under his hat for emergencies,” he said, feeling for the last one with his paw and tucking it under his brim. Th
e cub was about to ask what kind of emergency when a deep rumble rattled the marmalade jars.

  At first he thought it was Aunt Lucy snoring, but as the noise grew louder, the house began to shake. In the far distance, he could see the trees whipping backward and forward violently in the wind.

  “Aunt Lucy?” he panicked.

  She sat up with a start.

  “Earthquake!” she exclaimed, reaching for her glasses.

  “Get to the shelter!” cried Uncle Pastuzo.

  Branches hurtled through the air as Aunt Lucy made a beeline for the stair lift.

  “No, too dangerous,” said Pastuzo. “You’ll have to climb down, old girl.”

  She looked at him in dismay. It had been years since she’d last climbed down. She gripped the tree trunk and froze.

  “Come on, Auntie! I’ll catch you,” called the cub, scrambling to the bottom.

  “Keep going,” said Pastuzo, looking over his shoulder at the rapidly approaching quake as she inched her way down. Finally, she made it to the ground and, pelted with twigs and fruit, the three of them ran through the forest trying to dodge the obstacles thrown into their path.

  “Nearly there, Aunt Lucy!” yelled the cub over the screaming wind. She was lagging behind. Trying desperately to put a spurt on, she tripped and fell. There was an ear-splitting creak as a huge tree keeled over toward her.

  “Look out, Auntie!” shouted the cub.

  Pastuzo raced forward to catch it by the trunk, but nothing could have stopped it. It landed on top of Aunt Lucy, pinning her down by the leg. She let out a sharp cry. The cub knelt down beside her.

  “Don’t worry, Aunt Lucy. We’ll soon have you out.”

  “Keep going before we all get killed!” she said urgently. “Pastuzo, take him with you.”

  The old bear shook his head. “I’m going nowhere without you.”

  Using every ounce of his strength, he managed to lift the tree trunk just enough for her to pull her leg out.

  “Lean on me, Aunt Lucy,” said the cub. “I might not be very tall, but I am very strong. It must be all the vitamins and minerals in the marmalade.”

  Aunt Lucy smiled weakly and, allowing herself to be pulled up, she hobbled toward the shelter as fast as she could, using her nephew as a crutch.

  “Don’t look back, darling,” she said. “Whatever you do, don’t look back.”

  It was only once inside the shelter with Aunt Lucy that the little cub realized his uncle was no longer with them.

  “Uncle Pastuzo?” he wailed. “Uncle . . . where are you?”

  He pushed open the door to go and look for him, but Aunt Lucy hauled him back inside.

  “Get down!” she cried, as another tree splintered and fell toward the shelter. There was a thunderous crash, then everything went black.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Bear Aboard

  Dawn came. The earthquake had passed. The forest was eerily silent, as if the birds had lost the will to sing. A parrot sat mournfully in the uprooted tree which had landed against the bears’ shelter. Just then, the branch it was sitting on jerked. The parrot screeched and flew off as Aunt Lucy emerged slowly.

  The cub stepped out of the shelter and blinked in the sunlight. He gazed in disbelief at all the fallen trees. He hardly recognized the place.

  “Oh, Aunt Lucy,” he sighed. “I hope that earthquake hasn’t broken our marmalade jars. Uncle Pastuzo will be furious.”

  “Let’s go home and see if he’s there,” said Aunt Lucy quietly, limping off.

  “Of course he’s there,” said the cub. “He’ll be mending our tree house.”

  But when they arrived, there was no uncle and no tree house to mend. It had been ripped out by the earthquake and dashed to the floor in a thousand pieces. “Pastuzo?” called Aunt Lucy, fearfully. “Past . . . u . . . zo! Please be somewhere safe.”

  They picked their way through the pile of twisted timber that had once been their home, throwing aside the broken jars, crushed kettle, and smashed gramophone as they searched frantically under the fallen branches for him. The cub began to dig furiously with his paws.

  “Uncle Pastuzo? . . . Uncle Pastuz . . . oh!”

  Aunt Lucy looked up and stumbled over the rubble toward him.

  “What is it? Have you found him?”

  The cub gave a mournful sob and held up a hat with marmalade stains under the brim. It was all that remained of Uncle Pastuzo. Aunt Lucy’s face crumpled. She took the hat and clung to the cub in the middle of the flattened forest.

  “What are we going to do, Aunt Lucy?” he sobbed. “Where shall we go?”

  There was nothing left for them here. She bent down stiffly and picked up a snow globe that was lying in the dirt. It was a gift from the explorer, and a miracle that it had survived. She gave it a shake. As the snowflakes fell on the miniature model of Buckingham Palace, Aunt Lucy said slowly, “I think we should go to London.”

  If Aunt Lucy was honest, the Amazon River was a lot longer than she’d thought. After several days in a dug-out canoe crammed with marmalade jars and luggage filled with their few remaining possessions, tempers were getting a little frayed.

  “Are we nearly there yet?” asked her nephew for the umpteenth time as they shot over the rapids.

  “If I’d known Lima was this far away, I’d have caught the bus,” muttered Aunt Lucy, using the explorer’s old cricket bat as an oar.

  Sharks, shipwrecks, and seawater aside, they finally arrived in Lima under cover of darkness. There was a vast container ship being loaded at the docks, bound for Britain. Sneaking up the steps to the harbor, they hid behind a stack of crates and watched as a crane hoisted its cargo on board.

  “Let me get this right, Aunt Lucy,” said her nephew. “We sit on that crate, the crane picks it up, swings us high into the air, and drops us on that big boat?”

  Aunt Lucy was beginning to regret she’d suggested it. She’d never been higher than the top of a tree, and the thought of it gave her indigestion.

  “I’m afraid it’s the only way,” she said, rubbing her injured leg.

  If anyone had looked up at the sky that night, they’d have been amazed to see two bears swinging on a crate among the stars.

  “Look at the view, Aunt Lucy. Isn’t it wonderful?”

  “Splendid,” she muttered, her eyes squeezed tightly shut.

  She refused to open them again until they landed with a bump on the deck of the ship. Breathing a sigh of relief, she climbed off of the crate, staggering under the weight of the brown suitcase she’d packed with marmalade and mementos for her nephew. He took it and looked concerned.

  “Is your leg very bad, Aunt Lucy?”

  “I’ll be fine,” she said, ushering him toward a lifeboat. “In you get.”

  She lifted the tarpaulin and he threw in his suitcase and clambered inside. He held out his paw to help her on board, but for some reason she was reluctant to take it.

  “Don’t worry, Aunt Lucy. It’s roomier than it looks under here,” he said.

  She stood there awkwardly and when she finally spoke, her voice seemed far away.

  “Stay out of sight until you get to London, dear.”

  “But aren’t you coming?” laughed the cub.

  “It’s too far,” said Aunt Lucy. “My legs won’t make it. I’m too old.”

  His smile faded.

  “But where will you go?”

  “Don’t you worry about me. There is a lovely home for retired bears in Lima.”

  The cub swung one leg out of the lifeboat.

  “I’ll come with you.”

  Aunt Lucy patted his paw.

  “No, you’re too young to retire. You have your whole life ahead of you.”

  The cub stared sadly at his toes. Since his parents had died, Aunt Lucy had always been there for him. And Uncle Pastuzo. They were his family. His world.

  “I want to go home,” he said.

  Aunt Lucy whipped out her hanky and wiped a shred of marmalade off his whiske
rs.

  “Our home is gone. You must find a new one. In London.”

  He took the handkerchief and blew his nose loudly.

  “But I don’t know anyone there.”

  Aunt Lucy took out a luggage label, tied it carefully round his neck, and wrote on it in her best handwriting: “Please look after this bear. Thank you.”

  The cub held out his paws.

  “What if nobody does?”

  “They will,” said Aunt Lucy. “The explorer told us there was once a war in his country. Thousands of children were sent to safety, left at railway stations with labels round their necks. Unknown families took them in and loved them like their own.”

  “But I’m a bear,” said the cub.

  “No matter, they won’t have forgotten how to treat a stranger,” said Aunt Lucy, rummaging for something in her bag.

  “Remember the three rules the explorer gave us for living in London: always say hello, talk about the weather, and . . . ?”

  “Always wear a hat,” he said.

  She pulled out Uncle Pastuzo’s hat, placed it solemnly on his head, and kissed his nose.

  “Take care, my darling. Be safe.”

  Someone was coming. He ducked down, pulled the tarpaulin over his head, and watched through the holes in the eyelets until Aunt Lucy disappeared into the shadows. Using his suitcase as a pillow, he lay down in the bottom of the lifeboat and, all alone in the world, he wished himself good night.

  By the time the ship sounded its horn and set sail for England, the little bear was fast asleep.

  Several weeks later, the ship arrived at Bristol Docks—and just in time. The cub’s lifeboat was littered with empty marmalade jars, and he had almost run out of food. However, in the spirit of the brave explorer he’d heard so much about, he had decided to stop feeling sorry for himself. Although he missed his aunt and uncle dreadfully, he was determined to make the most of his adventure.

  The journey across the ocean had been a long one. Unable to wander on deck for fear of being seen, he had amused himself by peeking out of the lifeboat and noting his observations in the scrapbook Aunt Lucy had given him. This included weather conditions, the sighting of an albatross, and the time he’d almost been sick in his hat when the ship rounded the Cape of Good Hope. He’d promised to write to Aunt Lucy when he got to London and this way, he would remember the highlights.