Free Escape from Shangri-La by Michael Morpurgo Page B

shed. ‘Any boatbuilder worth his salt can’t be satisfied with getting it almost right,’ he told me one day, as I watched him at work. ‘He has to get it perfect. And I’m going to get this boat perfect for you, Cessie, perfect.’
    It looked quite perfect enough for me already, but Iwasn’t going to argue. I was more than happy to sit and watch him at work, and happier still not to have to venture out into the park. But I knew the day must come when he would want to test the
Lucie Alice
out on the water again, and that unless I had a ready excuse, I’d have to go with him, my heart in my mouth all the time.
    One Sunday afternoon I was reading on my bed when he came into my room with his coat on, the
Lucie Alice
in the shoe box under his arm. ‘She’s ready,’ he said.
    â€˜It’s raining,’ I told him.
    â€˜Only drizzling, Cessie girl,’ he said. ‘Come on.’ I had no choice.
    I knew that Sunday afternoon was always the most likely time to meet some of Shirley Watson’s crowd in the park. They could be on their way down to the bus shelter, a favourite hang-out at weekends, particularly when it was raining. I was thinking about that as I followed him down the stairs. ‘But I haven’t done my violin practice,’ I said, stopping where I was.
    â€˜It won’t take us long,’ said Popsicle, and I could see how disappointed he was at my reluctance.
    My father had heard us from the sitting-room. ‘She needs to practise,’ he said. ‘She won’t get her Grade Six by playing with boats, will she?’ There was no need to say it like that. I very nearly changed my mind, just toshow solidarity with Popsicle. But I didn’t. Instead, to my everlasting shame, I gave Popsicle my scarf and sent him off to the park on his own in the rain.
    I went up to my room and pretended to practise, but of course my heart wasn’t in it. I spent all the time excusing my excuse, rationalising my chickening out. I just couldn’t concentrate. I kept thinking of Popsicle out there in the park, of what Shirley’s cronies might say to him if they caught up with him, how bewildered he’d be, how hurt. Then, quite suddenly, I could picture him in my mind. I knew they were there, all around him, laughing at him, jeering.
    I was down the stairs and out of the house before anyone could stop me. I could hear my father calling after me as I slammed the door.
    The traffic lights turned red at the right moment. I dashed across the main road, past the library and the bus shelter, and into the park. I hurdled the children’s play-ground fence and got a shrill rebuke from an angry mother seesawing her little girl, before I hurdled out again. I was almost there.
    To my intense relief there was no chanting, no jeering, just a commotion of quacking. There was no one about, only the ducks – that was how it seemed at first. But then I saw that the ducks were not alone intheir pond. Popsicle was standing waist-high in the water, with his back to me. I called to him and ran down to the water’s edge. He didn’t turn; I ran round so that he’d have to hear me, have to see me. He had something in his hand. There was debris floating in the water all around him. I knew in an instant what had happened. I ran into the water and waded out towards him. He was holding the bow of the lifeboat in one hand, the stern in the other. The yellow funnel was floating towards me. I picked it up. I saw the wheel just under the surface and retrieved it. I looked for the lifeboatman in the sou’wester, but he was gone.
    â€˜They just came,’ he said. ‘They were shouting things, horrible things. Then they threw stones, hundreds of them. They went on and on. I don’t know why. I don’t know why.’
    Nothing I said would persuade him to come out of the pond. He had to stay, he said, until he’d picked up every last bit of her.