Paddington Novels 1-3. Michael Bond
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Gruber’s offer of a second cup of cocoa, he slipped down off the chair and began making his way home. He raised his hat automatically whenever anyone said good-day to him, but there was a far-away expression in his eyes. Even the smell of buns from the bakery passed unheeded. Paddington had an idea.
When he got home he went upstairs to his room and lay on the bed for a long while staring up at the ceiling. He was up there so long that Mrs Bird became quite worried and poked her head round the door to know if he was all right.
“Quite all right, thank you,” said Paddington, distantly. “I’m just thinking.”
Mrs Bird closed the door and hurried downstairs to tell the others. Her news had a mixed reception. “I don’t mind him just thinking,” said Mrs Brown, with a worried expression on her face. “It’s when he actually thinks of something that the trouble starts.”
But she was in the middle of her housework and soon forgot the matter. Certainly both she and Mrs Bird were much too busy to notice the small figure of a bear creeping cautiously in the direction of Mr Brown’s shed a few minutes later. Nor did they see him return armed with a bottle of Mr Brown’s paint remover and a large pile of rags. Had they done so they might have had good cause to worry. And if Mrs Brown had seen him creeping on tiptoe into the drawing-room, closing the door carefully behind him, she wouldn’t have had a minute’s peace.
Fortunately everyone was much too busy to notice any of these things. Even more fortunately, no one came into the drawing-room for quite a long while. Because Paddington was in a mess. Things hadn’t gone at all according to plan. He was beginning to wish he had listened more carefully to the things Mr Gruber had said on the subject of cleaning paintings.
To start with, even though he’d used almost half a bottle of Mr Brown’s paint remover, the picture had only come off in patches. Secondly, and what was even worse, where it had come off there was nothing underneath. Only the white canvas. Paddington stood back and surveyed his handiwork. Originally it had been a painting of a lake, with a blue sky and several sailing boats dotted around. Now it looked like a storm at sea. All the boats had gone, the sky was a funny shade of grey, and half the lake had disappeared.
“What a good thing I found this old box of paints,” he thought, as he stood back holding the end of the brush at paw’s length and squinting at it as he’d once seen a real artist do. Holding a palette in his left paw, he squeezed some red paint on to it and then splodged it about with the brush. He looked nervously over his shoulder and then dabbed some of it on to the canvas.
Paddington had found the paints in a cupboard under the stairs. A whole box of them. There were reds and greens and yellows and blues. In fact, there were so many different colours it was difficult to know which to choose first.
He wiped the brush carefully on his hat and tried another colour and then another. It was all so interesting that he thought he would try a bit of each, and he very soon forgot the fact that he was supposed to be painting a picture.
In fact, it was more of a design than a picture, with lines and circles and crosses in all different colours. Even Paddington was startled when he finally stepped back to examine it. Of the original picture there was no trace at all. Rather sadly he put the tubes of paint back into the box and wrapped the picture in a canvas bag, leaning it against the wall, exactly as he’d found it. He decided reluctantly to have another try later on. Painting was fun while it lasted but it was much more difficult than it looked.
He was very silent all through dinner that evening. He was so silent that several times Mrs Brown asked him how he was, until eventually Paddington asked to be excused and went upstairs.
“I do hope he’s all right, Henry,” she said, after he’d gone. “He hardly touched his dinner and that’s so unlike him. And he seemed to have some funny red spots all over his face.”
“Crikey,” said Jonathan. “Red spots! I hope he’s given it to me, whatever it is, then I shan’t have to go back to school!”
“Well, he’s got green ones as well,” said Judy. “I saw some green ones!”
“Green ones!” Even Mr Brown looked worried. “I wonder if he’s sickening for anything? If they’re not gone in the morning I’ll send for the doctor.”
“He was so looking forward to going to the handicrafts exhibition, too,” said Mrs Brown. “It’ll be a shame if he has to stay in bed.”
“Do you think you’ll win a prize with your painting, Dad?” asked Jonathan.
“No one will be more surprised than your father if he does,” replied Mrs Brown. “He’s never won a prize yet!”
“What is it, Daddy?” asked Judy. “Aren’t you going to tell us?”
“It’s meant to be a surprise,” said Mr Brown modestly. “It took me a long time to do. It’s painted from memory.”
Painting was one of Mr Brown’s hobbies, and once a year he entered a picture for a handicrafts exhibition which was held in Kensington, near where they lived. Several famous people came to judge the pictures and there were a number of prizes. There were also lots of other competitions, and it was a sore point with Mr Brown that he had never won anything, whereas twice Mrs Brown had won a prize in the rug-making competition.
“Anyway,” he said, declaring the subject closed, “it’s too late now. The man collected it this afternoon, so we shall see what we shall see.”
The sun was shining the next day and the exhibition was crowded. Everyone was pleased that Paddington looked so much better. His spots had completely disappeared and he ate a large breakfast to make up for missing so much dinner the night before. Only Mrs Bird had her suspicions when she found Paddington’s ‘spots’ on his towel in the bathroom, but she kept her thoughts to herself.
The Browns occupied the middle five seats of the front row where the judging was to take place. There was an air of great excitement. It was news to Paddington that Mr Brown actually painted and he was looking forward to seeing a picture by someone he knew.
On the platform several important-looking men with beards were bustling about talking to each other and waving their arms in the air. They appeared to be having a great deal of argument about one painting in particular.
“Henry,” whispered Mrs Brown, excitedly. “I do believe they’re talking about yours. I recognise the canvas bag.”
Mr Brown looked puzzled. “It certainly looks like my bag,” he said. “But I don’t think it can be. All the canvas was stuck to the painting. Didn’t you see? Just as if someone had put it inside while it was still wet. I painted mine ages ago.”
Paddington sat very still and stared straight ahead, hardly daring to move. He had a strange sinking feeling in the bottom of his stomach, as if something awful was about to happen. He began to wish he hadn’t washed his spots off that morning; then at least he could have stayed in bed.
Judy poked him with her elbow. “What’s the matter, Paddington?” she asked. “You look most peculiar. Are you all right?”
“I don’t feel ill,” said Paddington in a small voice. “But I think I’m in trouble again.”
“Oh dear,” said Judy. “Well, keep your paws crossed. This is it!”
Paddington sat up. One of the men on the platform, the most important-looking one with the biggest beard, was speaking. And there… Paddington’s knees began to tremble, there on the platform, on an easel in full view of everyone, was ‘his’ picture!
He was so dazed he only caught scraps of what the man was saying.
“…