Amber’s Secret. Ann Pilling

what your friend told you, please? I’m a little hard of hearing.’

      ‘She said that if you rang Appleford 616 you could speak to God.’

      ‘I see.’ There was another long pause, and more wheezings.

      ‘So is God there?’ Sally said. ‘I really would like to speak to him.’ Then she added, ‘Please.’

      ‘The person you refer to,’ said the voice, ‘does indeed live here. But he is in hospital, I’m afraid, like your mother.’

      Now it was Sally’s turn to pause. How could someone like God be in hospital, or even have illnesses? There must be some mistake. ‘So I can’t speak to him?’ she said.

      ‘I’m afraid not.’

      Sally took the telephone away from her mouth and sat holding it, on the kitchen top. She didn’t know what to do. All she could think of were the tiny little pieces of wood and glass that had been Grandfather, and of her mother opening the front door, and seeing them. The person who was called God was not available to help her. Sally began to cry.

      She cried for a quite a long time. This crying kept on happening and she knew that it was because she was worrying more and more about Mum. Sally wasn’t a cryer, not like some people. She was certain the lady would have replaced her telephone by now, which would be just as well, because she could be no help. But when she reached up to put the phone back, too, she could just hear the creaky voice saying anxiously, ‘Little girl, little girl, please don’t cry.’

      ‘I’m not crying,’ Sally said, then she added, ‘now,’ for she was always truthful (the bit about the mouse droppings was true, though it had happened a long time ago, and only once or twice).

      ‘Would you be able to come to see me?’ the lady continued. ‘The person you wanted is too ill to be contacted at present but I just might be able to help.’

      ‘Is it near?’ Sally said. She had promised Mum she would stay with Mrs Spinks and not go anywhere big without her permission.

      ‘From the end of Villa Road you could get the number Nineteen bus. Stay on for three stops and when you see the Appleford sign get off. My house is by the bus stop. It has a blue door.’

      Sally looked at the kitchen clock. Mrs Spinks served dinner at one o’clock on the dot. But if the bus came quickly she might get there and back and not be late.

      But ought she to go at all? She had been told never ever to talk to strange people and this was worse than talking to them. This was going to their house, on a bus.

      She had decided she must say no when the creaky voice said, ‘Is your father an archaeologist, Sally? Does he dig up strange and wonderful things?’

      ‘Yes,’ Sally said. He was quite famous but to Sally and Alan he was just Dad.

      ‘He was once a little boy at my school. He was very good at sums and very bad at singing.’

      ‘He can’t sing in tune,’ Sally said. Then she added loyally, ‘But you can’t be good at everything.’

      ‘It would be best if you came now, Sally,’ said the lady. ‘I like to have my lunch on time, at one. Then I like to have a little rest.’

      ‘I’ll come at once,’ Sally said. What the voice had said about lunch on time was the only bit which reminded her at all of Mrs Spinks.

6

      The bus came almost at once and going three stops didn’t take long. Very soon Sally was standing outside the blue door. Walking from the front gate to the house was like pushing your way through a jungle. Big trees hung over the pebbled path, and bushes and shrubs and creeping green things were growing all over the place. It looked as if nobody had done any gardening for years and years. The front door itself had ivy trying to grow up the corners but the creaky voice had definitely said ‘blue door’ and ‘the house by the bus stop’. So Sally looked for a bell.

      She found a big brass handle, a bit like the wooden one that worked Mrs Spinks’s downstairs lavatory. Under the handle was a card with curvy writing. It said Mr G. Button and Miss A. Button. Sally pulled it and from somewhere inside she heard a far-away tinkling noise, then the slow shuffling of feet.

      The door opened and the voice she had heard on the telephone said, ‘Sally Bell?’ and she was looking down into the face of the smallest lady she had ever seen. ‘Are you Sally Bell?’ she repeated.

      But Sally forgot to reply. She was too busy thinking, Well, she’s not all that small. Amber’s granny’s very little and Mrs Spinks is quite little, too.

      Then the little lady said again, ‘Well, are you Sally Bell?’

      ‘Oh yes, yes, that’s me,’ she spluttered, all in a rush. ‘I mean, yes, that’s who I am.’ ‘That’s me’ didn’t feel quite correct, and the very little old lady sounded just a bit school teachery.

      ‘Come in, then,’ said Miss A. Button. She led Sally down a long cold passageway into a kind of greenhouse in which the walls and roof were covered with trailing plants whose leaves and stems had got all tangled together making a lovely greeny light. They sat down, in two creaking chairs made out of stuff that looked like raffia matting.

      It suddenly went very quiet. The raffia chairs creaked and Miss Button made little wheezing noises in her chest, and some goldfish in an old sink kept plopping up to the surface with open mouths. ‘They want me to feed them,’ said Miss Button and she sprinkled some fish food into the water.

      ‘Mrs Spinks says goldfish are a good idea,’ said Sally. ‘She says they’re much better than mice.’

      ‘Who is Mrs Spinks?’

      ‘She lives next door. I’m staying with her while Mum’s in the hospital. Alan’s in the army now and Dad’s Abroad. He’s doing a very important Dig. I think it’s in the desert. Mum says he mustn’t be worried because she’s going to get better very soon. But I don’t think so. She’s in a special room, in case she gets germs.’

      ‘Which hospital, Sally?’ Miss Button had leaned forwards in her creaky chair.

      ‘The big white one, the one on the hill.’

      ‘Oaklands Hospital?’

      ‘I think that’s it. But I can’t go and see her at the moment, because of the germs.’

      ‘I am very sorry, Sally,’ said Miss Button. ‘You do seem to have a lot of troubles.’

      Sally didn’t answer at first. Then, because Miss Button had a kind voice, and had been Dad’s teacher when he was a little boy, she said, ‘I’ve not told you my biggest trouble. It’s why I phoned up,’ and she explained all about the clock.

      The little old lady listened very carefully. Then she gave the greedy goldfish a bit more food. Then she took off her spectacles, rubbed at them and put them on again. Then she looked at Sally. ‘And that’s why you wanted to talk to God?’ she said.

      ‘Yes,’ said Sally, ‘but you said he’d gone to hospital. I didn’t understand that.’

      ‘No,’ Miss Button answered. Then she said, ‘Sally, you seem like an intelligent girl. Did you really believe that, by ringing a telephone number, you could talk to God?’

      ‘Well, Amber said you could,’ Sally told her, ‘and Amber’s right about lots of things. She’s not much good at lessons but she knows about all sorts of, you know, special things. I just thought this God person would be the one to talk to. I get these hunches.’

      Miss