The map was quite clear; what is more it even gave bus routes. Nesta found the right bus stop and watched out of the window for Portland Drive, the stop nearest Hedley Crescent. It was only when she got off the bus that she realized that finding James Martin was not going to be absolutely simple. She did not know the house number.
Hedley Crescent was a curved street of terrace houses, each with its own long front garden. Nesta walked the length of it, wondering which one was the Martin house. It was not snowing in Casselton but it was a very cold afternoon and so cloudy that it would soon be dusk.
A boy of about seven or eight passed her on a scooter. She thought about stopping him but he just whizzed past, almost sending her off-balance. A man was unloading shopping from his car outside Number 12. Nesta wanted to ask him if he knew the Martins, but she didn’t know what to say. As she passed the gate of Number 22, she noticed that the front door was open. She heard a woman calling out, ‘Jamie, can you not take this dog for a walk? She’s standing here with her legs crossed.’
The dog was in fact standing on the doorstep straining at the lead the woman was holding on to.
A boy of ten or eleven came stomping down the stairs inside the house shouting irritably, ‘Dad should take her. She’s Dad’s dog.’
Woman, boy and dog were all on the threshold now.
‘Your dad won’t be in for another hour. And Calypso is supposed to be your dog anyway.’
Jamie took the dog’s lead with a ‘humph’ and started out down the path.
‘C’mon, Calypso, we know whose dog you are. But there’s no use arguing.’
Nesta waited till the boy had gone a few yards down the street before she caught up with him.
‘Do you know James Martin?’ she said as she drew alongside.
‘Who wants to know?’ said Jamie, eyeing her suspiciously.
‘I do,’ said Nesta in the same challenging voice.
Jamie looked up at her, a slim stranger in a red hooded coat, taller and older than himself.
‘I don’t know you,’ he said doggedly.
‘I never said you did,’ said Nesta. ‘But do you know James Martin? He’ll be about your age and he lives in this street.’
‘That all you know about him?’ said Jamie. The dog began to sniff at Nesta’s coat.
‘Jamie is short for James, isn’t it?’ said Nesta, suddenly guessing that the boy was in fact James Martin his very self.
Jamie pulled on Calypso’s lead so that she came closer to him.
‘Mind the dog,’ said Jamie. ‘She’s trained to look after me. She doesn’t bark much, but she has a strong pair of jaws when it comes to biting.’
‘I’m not going to beat you up and take all you money,’ said Nesta with a grin. ‘I just want to ask you about your letter in the Courier.’
Jamie relaxed. After all, he might have to get used to being famous.
‘If you want my autograph, I hope you’ve brought your own pen. I haven’t got one with me.’
‘No, silly,’ said Nesta. ‘I am not an autograph hunter. I am a distant relative of your friend, Thomas Derwent. I know you only knew him for a short time, but you were quite friendly, weren’t you?’
‘Kindred spirits,’ said Jamie, proudly showing off a phrase he’d just learnt. ‘But you can’t be any sort of relative of his. He is special. I know he is. He comes from Outer Space. You must have heard the stories about him. You don’t come from Outer Space. I know you’re not from around here, but you are definitely not an alien.’
They had come to the end of the Crescent. Calypso did her business on the grass verge and James got out a little old seaside spade and scooped the dirt up into the plastic carrier bag he carried for the purpose. Nesta did not answer him till that performance was over.
‘I like dogs,’ she said. ‘We only have a cat. Her name is Charlie – short for Charlotte. My dad thinks dogs are too much bother.’
‘They are,’ said Jamie ruefully. ‘You’re always having to take them for walks and scoop up after them. But Calypso’s not bad really. She sometimes helps me with my homework.’
Nesta looked surprised and Jamie laughed.
‘It’s like this, you see. If I don’t get me homework done before Dad comes home I say I couldn’t do it because I had to take Calypso for a walk. Then Dad says, “Let’s have a look at it.” And if it’s sums, and it usually is, he can’t help doing them, just to show how clever he is.’
Nesta laughed and said, ‘My dad’s the same – except I don’t even need an excuse. He likes the English questions – that’s because he works in a bank and spends all his day working with numbers. English makes a change for him, he says.’
Now that they were more friendly, Jamie said, ‘Well how come you think you might be related to Thomas Derwent?’
‘Distantly related,’ said Nesta, wondering how much to tell the boy. ‘He and I might be from the same place originally. What did he tell you?’
‘No more than I said in the letter to the paper,’ said Jamie. ‘He was fun and we had a laugh, but he didn’t talk English. He talked sort of special, in a way of his own. But if you’re related to him, you should be able to do it too. Tell me your name.’
Nesta realized at once that she could not tell this boy her real name. It might have been on the news even this far north.
‘I’m called Amy,’ she said.
‘But what is your proper name?’ said Jamie. ‘Your Ormingat name?’
This time he used the newspaper version of Ormingat but without any attempt to reproduce the voice that Thomas had used.
‘Neshayla,’ said Nesta in her normal voice, for she had no other! To tell the secret name that her mother had given her seemed harmless here.
‘Yah!’ said Jamie in disgust. ‘And my name’s Collywolly.’
Nesta did not know what to think.
‘But my name really is Neshayla. I have been told that. It was entwined with me. Entwined – that’s what they called it.’
Calypso was sitting on the pavement by Jamie’s right foot. She stood up and gave herself a brief shake, then pulled at the lead.
‘You’re right, Calypso,’ said Jamie. ‘Better company at home.’
‘I really, really am Neshayla,’ said Nesta.
‘You haven’t a clue, have you?’ said Jamie over his shoulder as he walked away. ‘If you were Thomas Derwent’s cousin or whatever, you’d know how to speak in the voice. You’ve read the papers and you’re just plain nosy.’
Nesta then remembered the voice her mother had used, a voice she could not hope to imitate. So it was true: Thomas Derwent really did come from Ormingat. And the voice her mother had used was the voice of that distant world. There was no more to be found out here. That was obvious. The boy was heading towards his own house.
‘See you sometime,’ called Nesta as she walked off in the opposite direction.
‘Not if I see you first,’ said Jamie, kicking a stray chipping into the roadway as he walked away. The dog said nothing, but tugged harder on the lead and began to sniff at the ground.
Nesta was alarmed to notice that, although it was still not three o’clock, it was already getting darker. She hurried back to the bus stop and had ten minutes to wait for the bus to Casselton Central Station. It was shivery cold.
In the station she was dismayed to find that the next train was not until half past four. That would mean arriving in Belthorp well after dark.
At four o’clock, as she went to the platform for the Belthorp train, she bucked herself up with the thought that in ten hours’ time she would be able to phone home and give herself up. Because Mom and Dad would be there, of course. There was no way they would leave without her. That was a belief she must cling to. If she could persevere that little bit longer, a few more hours, they could all live happily ever after.
I am doing what is best for them. I am doing what is best for all of us.
In the meantime, she was determined to see Belthorp and somehow to meet Mrs Dalrymple who had known Thomas for five years. What was this ‘starlight’ she had spoken about? Did it come from Ormingat? Was it something Thomas had left behind?