Once Upon a Wardrobe(19)

“What do you mean?” he asks. “Not what I think?”

“They aren’t Narnia stories. No matter how many times I ask where Narnia came from, he and his brother tell me stories about their lives and childhood. Did you know his mother died when he was only nine years old? Isn’t that dreadful?”

“Maybe he’s answering your question and you just don’t realize it.”

“I’m sure that’s true. He’s not one to waste time—for goodness’ sake, he barely puts his slippers all the way on his feet.”

“Well, in Narnia, aren’t the children without parents?”

“Separated from them, yes.”

Padraig smiles. “Stories have their own truth.”

I nod, not fully understanding his point, but wanting him to keep his attention on me; it feels nice, even if he does have a girl with long blonde hair and a giggle that sends all the boys running to the bar to get her an extra cider.

“I need to be getting on,” I say. “It was jolly to see you. Thank you for keeping me company.”

Padraig nods and spins around, departing as quickly as he’d appeared. I watch him go. A few steps down the sidewalk, he turns around, catches me watching him. He waves and smiles. I’m blessedly glad he can’t see my blush as I hurry on.

Only half a mile remains, and I reach Kilns Lane just in time. I walk quickly, dodging the icy bits until I approach the green door of the Lewis house again.

I knock and Warnie opens it. A blast of warm air hits my cold cheeks, making them tingle.

“Come in. Come in!” His voice echoes in the house and I step inside, shed my coat and mittens, and place them on the settle bench at the side of the hallway where other coats and hats and mittens are jumbled together in a party.

“Hello, Miss Devonshire. My brother is running a bit late, but let’s sit in the common room and warm you right up.”

From where I stand, coats and hats seeming to be the ghosts of their inhabitants hanging straight on the hooks, I can smell the woodfire and tobacco, and I smile at its comforting aura. I follow Warnie into the common room. “Tea is waiting for us,” he says.

I sit in the shabby but comfortable armchair I occupied on the last visit and cross my legs at the ankles, trying to be a most proper girl in the home of scholarly men. A tray with all the fixings for tea, minus the rationed sugar, sits on a wooden table at the far end of the room. A stout woman stands there, and she turns to me and smiles, her wild white hair pointing in all directions and her left front tooth askew.

“Hello, Miss Devonshire. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I am Mrs. Rounder.”

I nearly burst into laughter at how her name matches her body, but I don’t. How very rude that would be.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” I say. “Thank you for making the tea, ma’am.”

She smiles and looks at Warnie. “A right proper one she is. Enjoy your afternoon.”

And with that, she disappears through the doorway. Pots and pans clang a room or two away and then suddenly, without the sound of a door opening and footsteps, Mr. Lewis appears.

He wears the same clothes I saw him in last time: a tweed jersey that has worn patches on the elbows and a thick sweater beneath. A pipe hangs from his mouth with a little plume of smoke rising in front of his warm brown eyes.

“I am so sorry for the delay,” he said. “I was visiting Minto at the nursing home.”

“Minto?” I ask, thinking I had forgotten a story I was supposed to know.

“Mrs. Moore. Oh, you shall learn about her soon enough,” he says and sits down. “But not today.”

I smile because this means there are more stories to come.

When we’re all settled with our tea, which I have to say is very strong, Mr. Lewis looks to me with a grin. “Now where were we?”

My words rush like a river. “You don’t have to tell me so many stories. I know this is Michaelmas term’s end and you must be quite buried in papers and maybe if you gave me just one clue, one factual thing I can take home to George. He was so enchanted with Boxen he asked me to bring him a notebook and a box of colored pencils.”

“Well, isn’t that marvelous!” Warnie says.

Mr. Lewis sets his pipe on a tray. “One clue? One fact that tells George where Narnia came from . . .” The tutor’s voice trails off. “What did you tell us you were studying?”

“Mathematics and physics, sir.”

Mr. Lewis and Warnie reply at the same time.

“Ah!”

“Ah!”

Mr. Lewis leans forward. “With stories, I can see with other eyes, imagine with other imaginations, feel with other hearts, as well as with my own. Stories aren’t equations.”

“I realize that. I just thought . . . Well, I don’t want my brother to escape into fantasy, that is to say, to believe something is true that isn’t.”

The brothers look at each other as if deciding who will tell me how very wrong I am. I can feel it. But the world, it is so hard—don’t they know that? There is false hope everywhere, and I want to give George the kind of hope that is good and true, not a disappointing sham.

But I sit still.

“Miss Devonshire,” Mr. Lewis says and looks out the window as if what he wants to say dances in that dormant winter garden. “The fantastic and the imaginative aren’t escapism.”