The Children's Book

Where could she go, and how?

Tom had run away. Running away was what children in stories did. There was no point in hurrying off to be a wild woman in the woods. She wanted to be a doctor. She tried to think of someone she could plausibly visit for a time.

She was getting tired. She allowed her mind to touch, tentatively, at the image of Anselm Stern, her blood father.

Incurably truthful, she remembered she had not much liked him, had been even a little afraid of him. Griselda had liked him, had talked German to him.

She remembered a slim, black, bearded figure, a bit like a demon. Putting Death into Death’s own box.

His English was no better than her own clumsy German. His puppets had made her uneasy.

He was a kind of showman. Was he a serious person?

She thought a bit harder. Did he know she was his daughter? Did he know he had a daughter?

She felt, in a hot and angry way, that he should be made to know.

She felt, in an exhausted, tearful way, that she needed to know who he was.

Could she bring herself to tell Griselda?

In the morning, she did not go down to breakfast. She huddled under her eiderdown, and said to the maid who brought her ewer of hot water that she felt ill, really ill, and would be glad if Griselda could be fetched. The maid said she would speak to Mrs. Wellwood— either Mrs. Wellwood—and Dorothy said, no, she would be grateful if Griselda could come. Quickly. There was no need to bother anyone else.

Griselda came in, in a white shirt and green skirt, her hair knotted loosely on her neck.

“What is it? Aren’t you well? What’s wrong? Do you need a doctor, or anything?”

“No. I had a nosebleed. I’m sorry about the bedclothes. Something has happened, Grisel, something that changes all my life.”

Griselda moved the midnight dress, and the petticoat, folding them neatly, and sat down on the stubby chair.

“Tell.”

“I almost can’t.”

“We don’t have secrets from each other. Only from the world.”

“This is a secret that a lot of people know, which is a secret about me, and was kept from me.”

“Tell me.”

“My father—that is—well—he told me, I am not his real daughter. He had drunk a bit too much, and it sort of slipped out. He hadn’t been planning to tell me.”

Griselda’s pale face went white.

“Did you believe him?”

“Yes.”

“Did he say who your father was—is?”

“Yes. He’s that German man with the puppet-show who came to the Midsummer party, when we were younger.” She thought. “I don’t know if he knows he’s my father. I can’t face asking my mother—anything—I just can’t. I can’t go home. I’ve got to think of a way to get away. You must help.”

One tear rolled out of Griselda’s blue eye.

“Grisel, you don’t have to cry.”

“We aren’t cousins,” said Griselda. “If it’s true, we aren’t cousins.” Dorothy had not thought of that. They looked at each other.

“We’re even more best friends,” said Dorothy. “Help me. Where can I go?”

Griselda was thinking furiously. “Would you consider telling Charles?”

“He isn’t my cousin either,” said Dorothy, with a brittle cackle of laughter.

“No—but—he keeps going on these cultural trips to Germany with Joachim Susskind. He goes to Munich, where he—Herr Stern—is. Do you think—just possibly—we could go, too? With Charles, and Herr Susskind, and maybe even with—with—Toby—do you think a grown-up brother and two tutors would be chaperone enough? Charles is good at secrets. He has lots. He does all sorts of secret things with Joachim Susskind who looks so respectable and gentle. He gets up to all sorts of things—revolutionary things, avant-garde art things—the parents would die if they knew. We could both go. I could speak German and study there. And if the tutors went, you could go on working for your exams. I’m sure they have classes in Munich we could go to. And you could think about seeing him—Herr Stern—your father. I liked him. I liked him very much. He’s gentle.”

Dorothy sprang out of the bed and flung her arms round Griselda. They hugged each other. Griselda considered the bloodstains on the nightdress.

“That was a voluminous nosebleed. Buckets of blood. You must have had a frightful shock.”

“I did.”

“Are you all right now?”

“I’m all right as long as I keep doing something. I shall have to lurk here, for a bit.