Evangeline Wish Keeper's Helper Read online

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE WE MEET EVANGELINE

  CHAPTER TWO SOME THINGS ARE EXPLAINED

  CHAPTER THREE NANCY AND THE NEW RECRUITS

  CHAPTER FOUR A VERY UNUSUAL RABBIT

  CHAPTER FIVE TRYING SOMETHING NEW

  CHAPTER SIX A NEW KIND OF TOY

  CHAPTER SEVEN A SPECIAL TREAT

  CHAPTER EIGHT NANCY DOES SOME EXPLAINING

  CHAPTER NINE A VERY BUSY DAY

  CHAPTER TEN SOMEONE SPECIAL

  CHAPTER ELEVEN A NEW BEGINNING

  For Lily de Kergeriest, who made the Wish Tree for Peggy’s sixth birthday party and gave me the idea for this book.

  And for Peggy Popovic, who is all my wishes come true.

  ONE morning, when Evangeline was lying under the bed, as usual, wondering what to think about next, a broom suddenly appeared and swept her out onto the bedroom floor.

  The next thing she knew she was thrown into a big black plastic bag with a jumble of other toys, books and old clothes. She lay there for a while, quite comfortable on what felt like a fluffy jumper, with her eyes open and her big elephant ears pricked to listen in case something else happened, but nothing did, so after a while Evangeline closed her eyes and zoned out.

  It wasn’t hard for her to do that, because nothing happening was what she was used to. It had been different once, but for what seemed a very long time, Evangeline had been lying around on her own with no one to talk to and nothing to do.

  So to pass the time in the plastic bag, which was getting rather hot and stuffy and had a funny smell, she did what she used to do on the long lonely afternoons she spent lying under the bed. She blocked out where she really was and imagined she was back at her first day, when she’d been taken from under the Christmas tree and unwrapped by a little girl with a happy smile and big brown eyes.

  Evangeline could remember it all so clearly. The girl had hugged the toy elephant to her chest and then named her after her father’s favourite song, which happened to be playing at the time.

  ‘Evangeline, Evangeline,’ went the song, and the father had swept the little girl and the toy elephant up into his arms and waltzed them both round, singing along with the music. All the other people in the room had laughed and clapped.

  After that exciting start, Evangeline had spent the afternoon sitting on a big armchair, with people stopping to admire her and pat her trunk and exclaim over her splendid ears. Every so often the little girl ran over to give her a cuddle and to pretend to feed her a chocolate. Later on, the Evangeline song had come on again and she’d been lifted up for another dance.

  Then the little girl’s father had said it was time for bed and Evangeline had been taken upstairs to a cosy room, with pink walls and curtains with pictures of cats on them.

  The little girl had sat up in bed with Evangeline in her lap while the father read them a story about another elephant.

  ‘Look, Evangeline,’ the girl had said, pointing at the pictures. ‘His ears aren’t nearly as lovely as yours, and he’s the King.’

  Then she’d hugged Evangeline tightly to her as she snuggled down to sleep.

  Evangeline was very happy waking up with the little girl every morning and helping her get to sleep every night, but then, one day, a fluffy white toy duck with big yellow velvet feet arrived with the little girl at bedtime, and Evangeline suddenly found herself at the foot of the bed, lying next to a rabbit.

  He was smaller than Evangeline and was wearing voluminous blue trousers held up by braces. The fur on his paws was rather worn.

  ‘Hello,’ he said in a friendly, high-pitched voice. ‘I’m Robert. What’s your name?’

  ‘Evangeline,’ she replied, shyly.

  ‘Sorry to see you got shunted out for the new Easter toy,’ he said. ‘He’ll be joining us down here at Christmas when someone else turns up. That’s what happened to me when you arrived.’

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ said Evangeline, feeling awful. ‘I had no idea. I was just brought up here on my first day and …’

  ‘That’s all right,’ said Robert, smiling. ‘That’s the way it works for us toys. When you’re new, you get special treatment, bedtime cuddles, stories, chats … Then it’s someone else’s turn. It’s quite fair, really, and this is my second time round, so I really can’t complain. I’ve already been Upstairs once, then someone found me in an attic and gave me to this little girl last Easter, so now I’m Downstairs again. I’m vintage now,’ he added proudly.

  Evangeline was confused.

  ‘But aren’t we upstairs now?’ she asked. ‘I’m sure I can remember coming up some stairs on my first day…’

  Robert chuckled and patted her gently on the shoulder with his paw.

  ‘Yes, we’re upstairs in this house with our little girl, you’re right about that, but there is somewhere else called Upstairs, with a capital U. Somewhere very special. You’ll go there one day, all toys do – and don’t worry, it’s lovely up there.’

  ‘Where were you before you went Upstairs with a capital U?’ asked Evangeline, trying to understand what it all meant.

  ‘Oh, I had a little boy when I was Downstairs before,’ he said, wistfully. ‘He’s grown up now, in fact he’s the uncle of our little girl, but when he was a boy, he had me. His wife found me in their attic and they gave me to our little girl last Easter, so I got to come Downstairs again. You can only be Downstairs when you’re attached to a particular child – or rather, when they’re attached to you. So I was lucky to have a second go down here.’

  Evangeline still didn’t really understand, but she didn’t have time to dwell on it because Robert had so many other things to talk about. There were other toys in the room, but they were too far away to chat to from the bed and he’d been lonely on his own until Evangeline had come along.

  For what seemed like a lovely long time, Evangeline was very happy lying at the foot of the bed chatting to Robert, until one day a lot of noisy children came into the room at once and they were both grabbed by a little boy Evangeline had never seen before.

  ‘Look!’ he was shouting. ‘It’s a toy volcano!’

  The room spun round and round as Evangeline was flung through the air, and when she landed on the floor by the window she wasn’t next to Robert any more and couldn’t even see where he was she was so dizzy. She could just make out some of the other toys sitting together on a big chair in the corner, but they still weren’t close enough to talk to. After that, Evangeline spent most of her time on her own.

  Sometimes the little girl gathered all the toys together for tea parties, which was fun – especially when Evangeline got to see Robert – but after a while he no longer appeared at them. It was as though he’d disappeared, and Evangeline wondered whether he’d gone back to that mysterious place called Upstairs with a capital U. And if he had, how had he got there?

  She rather wished she could go, too, because she really missed having him to talk to. Sometimes other toys were taken out to play in the garden, or put in suitcases to go on holiday, but Evangeline was never included in those jaunts and she was longing for some company.

  She did get to move around the room a bit, but it was mainly by the lady who came once a week to change the bed and vacuum the floor. Quite often she didn’t even pick Evangeline up, just pushed her out of the way with the noisy nozzle of the cleaner.

  Depending where she ended up, Evangeline spent a lot of her time lying under the bed, with only dust balls for company. While other toys might have been cross and unhappy about it, Evangeline forced herself to make the best of things and she soon found there was always a way not to be bored, if you just made the effort.

  She could always find something to th
ink about, even if it was just counting the slats in the bed above her head, or imagining flowers growing between them. And if you took the trouble to listen, she found the most unlikely things had interesting tales to tell, like the dust ball containing tiny filaments of cashmere wool which had come all the way from a Rajah’s palace in India, in an old paisley shawl. It told her about the palace gardens, where peacocks strutted between brightly coloured flowers and fountains sparkled in the sunshine.

  In the spring, when she was lying on the floor near the open window, a sunbeam told her about the meadows outside the house, where the hedgerows were in blossom and baby rabbits were coming out of their warrens for the first time.

  The gardens and meadows sounded wonderful to Evangeline. She’d never been anywhere apart from the small workshop where she was made, the toy shop where she had been bought, then lying wrapped up under the Christmas tree and, finally, the bedroom.

  To pass the time, she imagined all the places she could go to, the people she might meet and the things she would do, if only she had the chance.

  And now, she realised, coming to with a sudden thrill of excitement – and a little bit of apprehension – as the top of the black plastic bag was tied firmly shut and the whole thing was lifted up into the air, it was finally about to happen.

  EVANGELINE didn’t remember anything about a journey while she was in the black plastic bag, but she must have gone on one because the next thing she knew she was standing in the biggest room she’d ever seen, with bright sunshine flooding in through very tall windows. The room was absolutely full of toys.

  After looking round to get her bearings, she realised she was in a long queue and turned to ask the rag doll behind her if she knew where they were and what was happening. But the poor doll looked even more shocked and nervous than Evangeline felt, so she just smiled at her in an encouraging way, and turned back to the front.

  Toys were coming and going all around her, with no sign of any children or grown-ups.

  Could this be the Upstairs that Robert had mentioned? she wondered. The place all toys go to one day?

  Although it was a bit scary and strange, Evangeline couldn’t help feeling excited. It was already much more interesting than being under the bed. She peeped around the edge of the knitted kangaroo in front of her to see what everyone was waiting for and saw a large panda holding a clipboard and a pen at the head of the queue.

  He looked very stern and important, and although she was thrilled to be having an adventure, Evangeline felt her legs start to tremble. What if she didn’t know the right answers to his questions? All too soon it was her turn to talk to him.

  ‘Name?’ he said curtly, not bothering to look at her.

  Evangeline was so nervous her mouth went dry and she couldn’t answer immediately.

  ‘Name?’ said the panda, louder than the first time.

  ‘Evangeline,’ she said, very quietly.

  ‘Doll or animal?’ said the panda, scribbling her name onto the paper on his clipboard.

  ‘Animal,’ said Evangeline, even more quietly.

  ‘Type?’

  ‘Elephant,’ she whispered.

  ‘Oh, do speak up,’ said the panda, finally looking at her, although it wasn’t with a very friendly expression. ‘Can’t you see how much I have to do today? It’s spring. Always our busiest time. All the parents are having big clear outs and you lot all turn up here at once. It’s most inconvenient.’

  ‘I’m an African elephant,’ said Evangeline, more boldly, summoning all her courage.

  ‘Hmmm,’ said the panda, looking her up and down with a deep frown. ‘Size – medium. Demeanour – timid. Distinguishing feature – large ears.’

  He signed the piece of paper with what looked like a scribble, tore it off his clipboard and passed it to Evangeline.

  ‘Take this docket and give it to that anteater over there. The one wearing the green hat.

  Tell him Peter sent you.’

  Evangeline glanced over to where Peter the Panda was pointing and saw a small, shaggy toy, with a very long nose. The rest of his face was hidden under the brim of a large hat.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said brightly to Peter, thinking she would remember her manners, even if he didn’t.

  She started walking over to the table where the anteater was sitting, when suddenly she spotted a pair of distinctive blue trousers at the far end of the room. Voluminous trousers with braces. Robert!

  She wanted to rush over to him, but didn’t dare. The grumpy panda had told her to go straight to the anteater, so she thought she’d better do that first and go over to Robert afterwards. But just as she made that decision, she saw Robert disappear through a large wooden door. Evangeline’s heart dropped with disappointment and she began to feel very nervous again.

  The anteater looked up at her the moment she arrived at the table.

  ‘Hello,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Got your docket?’

  Evangeline put it down in front of him.

  ‘Ah,’ he said, running his paw down the page as he read it. ‘New intake. First time. Sit down and make yourself comfortable so we can have a nice chat.’

  Evangeline sat on the low stool across from him. From that angle she could see the whole of the anteater’s face beneath his hat and saw he was smiling broadly at her. He had slightly crossed eyes, which made him seem particularly friendly and approachable. Much nicer than Peter the Panda.

  ‘It’s all a bit strange and new for you, I would imagine,’ the anteater said, holding out a paw. ‘I’m Andrew the Anteater. AA. I’m alliterated like most of us up here – and I see you are too. Evangeline the Elephant – EE.’

  Evangeline smiled back. The ‘EE’ of her name was one of the things she used to think about when she was lying under the bed in the pink bedroom. It was nice to talk to someone else who had noticed it too. She hadn’t known there was a special name for it. She rolled the word around in her mind, ‘alliterated’. She liked it.

  ‘Let’s see who I’ve had today,’ Andrew continued. ‘Wally the Whale, Geraldine the Giraffe, Dabble Duck, Bunzie Bear, Boily Bear, Tiny Ted, Mickey Mouse – get a lot of those – Derek Doggie, even Colin the Carrot. He’s an unusual one, not a doll or an animal, but still alliterated. Just something cosy about an alliterated name, isn’t there?’

  Evangeline nodded enthusiastically. She liked Andrew the alliterated Anteater a lot.

  ‘Right,’ he said, picking up a pencil. He licked the end of it and looked at her encouragingly. ‘Tell me a bit about yourself, Evangeline. You’re a medium African elephant – you do have splendid ears, I must say – and Peter the Panda reckons you have a timid demeanour. Hmmm, I think I’ll change that to “dainty”, if that’s all right with you?’

  Evangeline smiled and nodded. She hadn’t liked being called timid. She knew she was quite shy, and didn’t have a very loud voice, but she was sure she could be brave if she needed to be.

  ‘So tell me,’ said Andrew. ‘What kind of a toy role did you have Downstairs?’

  Evangeline hesitated, wondering which kind of downstairs he meant. The downstairs in the house, or the Downstairs with a capital D that Robert had told her about, which was the opposite of Upstairs with a capital U? And was that where she was now? No one had told her and the Anteater was right, it was all very confusing.

  ‘Well,’ she said, tentatively. ‘On my first day I started off downstairs sitting on a chair, but then I lived upstairs, in the pink bedroom, and I didn’t go downstairs again.’

  Andrew had his head tilted to one side and was looking at her kindly.

  ‘Did Peter not explain where you are, Evangeline?’ he asked, gently.

  Evangeline shook her head. She felt tears prickling in her eyes and she hoped Andrew couldn’t see them.

  ‘You’re Upstairs now, Evangeline,’ said Andrew.

  ‘I thought I might be,’ she said, taking a big gulp of air. ‘Somebody did once mention the capital U and the capital D and children being attached, or
not, but I still don’t really understand quite what it means. Or how I got here.’

  It was all too much. The exciting adventure had become very confusing and before she could stop it, a tear slipped out of Evangeline’s left eye, rolled down her trunk and plopped onto the table in front of her.

  ‘There, there,’ said Andrew. ‘I know it’s a lot to take in, but really, Upstairs is wonderful. You’re going to love it here.’

  He put his hand in the pocket of his smart yellow-and-red checked jacket hanging over the back of his chair and took out a hanky, which he passed to her.

  ‘Dry your eyes and let me explain,’ he said. ‘Upstairs is a very special place, which humans can’t see – and don’t even know about – where we cuddly toys and well-loved dolls come to live when our owners don’t need us anymore. We have to go somewhere, don’t we? When you think about how many children there are Downstairs and how many toys each of them has – if there wasn’t Upstairs, what would happen to us all?’

  Evangeline managed a weak smile. It was beginning to make some sense.

  ‘Don’t worry, you’ll soon get the hang of it,’ continued Andrew, smiling back at her. ‘You’re going to have a marvellous time Upstairs. We do wonderful things for children here.’

  He clapped his hands and rubbed them together enthusiastically.

  ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Now you understand all about Upstairs, we can get back to our chat. Where were we …? Oh yes, what was your role Downstairs?’

  Evangeline’s spirits sank again, as she wondered how to answer. What did he mean by a ‘role’ exactly? And would lying around in different places count?

  ‘Were you a bedtime toy, or a day toy?’ said Andrew, encouragingly.

  ‘I lived in the bedroom,’ said Evangeline, glad of the help.

  ‘Right,’ said Andrew, making notes with his pencil on the piece of paper. ‘Bedroom, good. Were you bed, chair, or toy box?’

  ‘I started on the bed,’ said Evangeline. ‘Later I was more underneath it.’