Four squeezes countered affectionately.I love you more.
A nudge from a tiny whiskered nose settled the dispute irrefutably.
After deeming Clara’s coif satisfactory, Mum fetched Clara’s newly polished boots and a buttonhook. She perched on the edge of the bed, and the fox kits leapt from the floor—one, two, three—to nestle alongside her. Mum gestured for Clara to produce her unshod foot. “While I’ll always admire Strasbourg for its hospitality to the noble stork, I must admit I’m quite ready to resume our travels.”
On that front, they were all in agreement. They would set out on the first available train. Clara placed a stockinged foot in Mum’s lap. Upon their return at the break of dawn, the thought of arranging the next leg of their journey had overwhelmed her already spent emotional and physical resources,but before she could confess as much, Mr. Kingsley had assured her he’d take care of everything. And true to character, he had. Right down to the smallest detail.
As soon as Mr. Kingsley had placed her sobbing form into Mum’s care, he’d set to work. While she’d bathed, he’d obtained a hearty breakfast and settled with the innkeeper. While she’d eaten, he’d procured collars and leashes for the fox cubs, who would travel as “puppies,” allowing the turtle Mum had adopted in her absence to travel in their old wicker basket. As she’d sat to have her hair brushed, Mr. Kingsley had dashed off to purchase their train tickets to...
Clara straightened. “Where? How?”
“Ooooh! What are questions asked by mourners at a funeral?” A smile brightened Mum’s countenance as her deft hands threaded the buttons of Clara’s boot. “Great idea, ducky. I do love a game of word association.”
“I’m not playing—”
“Of course you aren’t. It’s my turn now. Rutabaga. Parsnip.”
Apparently this game would be played with or without her participation. “What are root vegetables?”
“Pshaw! The answer is ‘vegetables only rabbits should eat.’ Honestly, dearest, I gave that one to you on a platter, what with you being abducted and all. Are you sure you feel all right?”
“I’m fine. Merely confused. Mr. Kingsley has gone to acquire train tickets, buthowdoes he knowwherewe are bound? He had the automaton, but I had Grand’s clue. What with being kidnapped, held captive, and rescued, I never had a chance to tell Mr. Kingsley our final destination. How did he figure it out?”
With a knowing smile, Mum finished buttoning Clara’s boot and set it on the floor. “There was a second clue.”
“A second clue?”
“Aye, ducky.” Mum set aside the buttonhook and reachedinto the nearby gadget bag, retrieving the automaton Grand had hidden at the cathedral with his last note. A bear cub with twinkling eyes of glass and scruffy bronze fur. The automatonwasa clue within itself, confirming beyond doubt the meaning of the final clue in Grand’s merry scavenger hunt. The combined clues of paper and metal directed them to Bern, Switzerland, where the memory of Granny and Grand’s young love lingered at the inn where they’d honeymooned and marveled at a fountain.
Clara gently took the automaton into her arms as tears sprung to her eyes. Stars ... this wasn’t justabear cub. This wasthebear cub.“Norma nearly jumpedout of her skin when one of the bear cubs came to life and began dancing around its bronze mother’s claws. My, how she laughed.”
Oh, Grand.How had she not seen it before? All this time, he’d been leading her to the place where the story had unfolded so that he might tell it once again ... so they might finally remove the black mourning bands from their hearts and tell Uncle and Granny good-bye.
A tear broke free as she looked up. “Will we arrive in time?”
Mum’s blue eyes glistened. “Our train will arrive in Bern on the very day.”
Hugging the cub to her chest, Clara grinned even as tears flowed. She was going to see Grand! Finally, they would reunite, on the very day he and Granny had said “I do.” She chuckled. Grand always did have perfect timing.
“I must show you Grand’s final clue. It was so terribly clever.”
Bear with me as we make one fiNal stop in a place where the memory of young lOve lingers andlaughteR bubbles forth like a Marvelous fountAin.
The capitalized letters spelled Granny’s name—Norma—the one whose contagious laughter bubbled forth nearly every day of her life.
Passing the bear cub to Mum, Clara removed the journal from her pocket and found the spot where she’d tucked all the scavenger hunt clues between the pages. Her brow furrowed. “It ... it’s not here.”
“Perhaps you tucked it in a different page?”
Clara thumbed through the journal backward and forward. The clue directing them to Bern was nowhere to be found. “It has to be here. I read it in the potting shed, and then I put it in my ... pocket.”Notin the journal. Her heart faltered.Oh, Lord, what have I done?
Reaching into the pocket where the journal had been stored, Clara turned it inside out. Empty. Like the hollow sensation carving out her stomach. For her other pocket—and Grand’s clue—were long gone.
Ripped away by the desperate man who’d warned her not to try his patience. Clutched tight by the furious man who’d screamed her name like a curse.
“Thisis far from over, Clara!”
Indeed it was not. Not even close.
