Paddington Marches On. Michael Bond

Curry took a deep breath. “Not dose,” he said, swallowing hard and making a great effort. “Dnose. And as if that isn’t enough, my system is frozen.”

      Paddington became more and more upset as he listened to Mr Curry and he nearly fell off his box with alarm at the last piece of information. “Your system’s frozen!” he exclaimed. “I’ll ask Mrs Bird to send for Doctor MacAndrew.”

      Mr Curry snorted. “I don’t want a doctor, bear,” he said crossly. “I want a plumber. It’s not my own pipes that are frozen. It’s the water pipes. There isn’t even enough left in the tank to fill my hot-water bottle.”

      Paddington looked slightly disappointed as a heavy object wrapped in a piece of paper landed at his feet.

      “That’s my front door key,” explained Mr Curry. “I want you to take it along to Mr James, the odd-jobman. Tell him he’s to come at once. I shall be in bed but he can let himself in. And tell him not to make too much noise – I may be asleep. And no hanging about the bun shop on the way otherwise you won’t get your ten pence.”

      With that Mr Curry blew his nose violently several times and slammed his window shut.

      Mr Curry was well known in the neighbourhood for his meanness. He had a habit of promising people a reward for running errands but somehow whenever the time for payment arrived he was never to be found. Paddington had a nasty feeling in the back of his mind that this was going to be one of those occasions and he stood staring up at the empty window for some moments before he turned and made his way slowly in the direction of Mr James’s house.

      “Curry!” exclaimed Mr James, as he stood in his doorway and stared down at Paddington. “Did you say Curry?”

      “That’s right, Mr James,” said Paddington, raising his duffle coat hood politely. “His system’s frozen and he can’t even fill his hot-water bottle.”

      “Hard luck,” said the odd-jobman unsympathetically. “I’m having enough trouble with me own pipes this morning let alone that there Mr Curry’s. Besides, I know him and his little jobs. He hasn’t paid me yet for the last one I did – and that was six months ago. Tell him from me, I want to see the colour of his money before I do anything else and even then I’ll have to think twice.”

      Paddington looked most disappointed as he listened to Mr James. From the little he could remember of Mr Curry’s money it was usually a very dirty colour as if it had been kept under lock and key for a long time, and he felt sure Mr James would be even less keen on doing any jobs if he saw it.

      “Tell you what,” said the odd-jobman, relenting slightly as he caught sight of the expression on Paddington’s face. “Hang on a tick. Seeing you’ve come a long way in the snow I’ll see what I can do to oblige.”

      Mr James disappeared from view only to return a moment later carrying a large brown paper parcel. “I’m lending Mr Curry a blowlamp,” he explained. “And I’ve slipped in a book on plumbing as well. He might find a few tips in it if he gets stuck.”

      “A blowlamp!” exclaimed Paddington, his eyes growing larger and larger. “I don’t think he’ll like that very much.”

      “You can take it or leave it,” said Mr James. “It’s all the same to me. But if you want my advice, bear, you’ll take it. This weather’s going to get a lot worse before it gets any better.”

      So saying, Mr James bade a final good morning and closed his door firmly, leaving Paddington standing on the step with a very worried expression on his face as he stared down at the parcel in his paws.

      Mr Curry didn’t have a very good temper at the best of times and the thought of waking him in order to hand over a blowlamp or even a book on plumbing, especially when he had a bad cold, filled him with alarm.

      Paddington’s face grew longer and longer the more he thought about it but by the time he turned to make his way back to Windsor Gardens his whiskers were so well covered by flakes that only the closest passer-by would have noticed anything amiss.

      Mrs Brown paused in her housework as a small figure hurried past the kitchen window. “I suppose,” she said with a sigh, “we can look forward to paw prints all over the house for the next few days.”

      “If this weather keeps on, that bear’ll have to watch more than his paws,” said Mrs Bird as she joined her. “He’ll have to mind his p’s and q’s as well.”

      The Browns’ housekeeper held very strict views on the subject of dirty floors, particularly when they were the result of bears’ ‘goings on’ in the snow, and she followed Paddington’s progress into Mr Brown’s garage with a disapproving look.

      “I think he must be helping out next door,” said Mrs Brown as Paddington came into view again clutching something beneath his duffle coat. “It sounds as if Mr Curry’s having trouble with his pipes.”

      “I hope that’s all he’s having trouble with,” said Mrs Bird. “There’s been far too much hurrying about this morning for my liking.”

      Mrs Bird was never very happy when Paddington helped out, and several times she’d caught sight of him going past the kitchen window with what looked suspiciously like pieces of old piping sticking out of his duffle coat.

      Even as she spoke a renewed burst of hammering came from the direction of Mr Curry’s bathroom and echoed round the space between the two houses. First there were one or two bangs, then a whole series which grew louder and louder, finally ending in a loud crash and a period of silence broken only by the steady hiss of a blowlamp.

      “If it sounds like that in here,” said Mrs Brown, “goodness only knows what it must be like next door.”

      “It isn’t what it sounds like,” replied Mrs Bird grimly, “it’s what it looks like that worries me.”

      The Browns’ housekeeper left the window and began busying herself at the stove. Mrs Bird was a great believer in letting people get on with their own work, and the activities of Mr Curry’s plumber were no concern of hers. All the same, had she waited a moment longer she might have changed her views on the matter, for at that moment the window of Mr Curry’s bathroom opened and a familiar-looking hat followed by some equally familiar whiskers came into view.

      From the expression on his face as he leant over the sill and peered at the ground far below it looked very much as if Paddington would have been the first to agree with Mrs Bird’s remarks on the subject.

      Paddington was an optimistic bear at heart but as he clambered back down from the window and viewed Mr Curry’s bathroom even he had to admit to himself that things were in a bit of a mess. In fact, taking things all round he was beginning to wish he’d never started on the job in the first place.

      Apart from Mr James’s blowlamp and a large number of tools from Mr Brown’s garage, the floor was strewn with odd lengths of pipe, pieces of solder and several saucepans, not to mention a length of hosepipe which he’d brought up from the garden in case of an emergency.

      But it wasn’t so much the general clutter that caused Paddington’s gloomy expression as the amount of water which lay everywhere. In fact, considering the pipes had been completely frozen when he’d started, he found it hard to understand where it had all come from. The only place in the whole of the bathroom where there wasn’t some kind of pool was in a corner by the washbasin where he’d placed one of his Wellington boots beneath a leaking pipe in the hope of getting enough water to fill Mr Curry’s hot-water bottle.

      Paddington was particularly anxious to fill the bottle before Mr Curry took it into his head to get up. Already there had been several signs of stirring from the direction of his bedroom and twice a loud voice had called out demanding to know what was going on. Both times Paddington had done his best to make a deep grunting noise like a plumber hard at work and each time Mr Curry’s