2. What Perry Angel Did Next

After Perry Angel made his small but important decision, he went to talk to Saffron, the youngest of his Rainbow sisters. Saffron was excellent at keeping secrets and very keen on any activities that involved dressing up. She might not know exactly how to plan a proper dance for Nell and Jenkins, but she would help him find out.

Saffron listened patiently and carefully, but as soon as Perry got to the part about petticoats and posies and the beautiful Tennessee Waltz she became very excited.

‘That’s such a great idea, Perry!’ she said. ‘Scarlet’s really good at making things happen; why don’t we ask her what to do?’

Perry was pleased Saffron liked his idea even though he hadn’t explained about the peaches’ and Jenkins’ cheeks and the look of wishfulness in Nell’s eyes. He nodded his head, certain Scarlet would have noticed them too. Since she had turned sixteen, she seemed to know a lot about love and other important things. Being sixteen seemed very complicated to Perry. Scarlet didn’t like cardboard pegged to her bicycle spokes any more, but she still liked fake tattoos. She bought bubble-gum from the Colour Patch Café because there were tattoos inside the wrappers. Her favourites were love-hearts and bluebirds.

Perry used to be scared of Scarlet because she was a teenager: the loud, clever and complicated kind. But he wasn’t scared any more, because he knew Scarlet liked him. She proved it by putting a fake tattoo of Superman on her arm, even though Superman was not her favourite superhero. She did it because Superman was Perry Angel’s favourite.

Because it was Saturday, Scarlet was at work at the Colour Patch Café. So Saffron and Perry went into Nell’s bedroom and tipped all the dress-ups out of the tin trunk onto the floor. For the rest of the afternoon, Saffron tried on gloves and gowns, bracelets and beads, shawls and shoes and dangly earrings, and Perry put on a big white shirt.

When Saffron was satisfied with her outfit, she showed Perry how to make a perfect bowtie. Then he combed baby oil into his hair and practised parting it straight down the middle, the way Jenkins did.

Afterwards, they picked sourgrass flowers and took them into the kitchen, where Nell was making coconut macaroons. She stopped beating egg whites, admired the children’s costumes, said how nice Perry’s hair looked and helped to arrange the flowers into posies. Saffron pinned one to Perry’s striped braces and the other to her fake fox-fur stole. Nell was all out of April Violets, but instead she put a dab of vanilla essence in the crooks of Saffron’s elbows.

‘We’re going dancing now,’ said Saffron, taking Perry by the hand.

Nell went back to her baking without asking why, because at the Kingdom of Silk it is not unusual for people to dress up or to dance on the rosy carpet square in the front room on a Saturday afternoon, or any time at all.

When it was almost time for Scarlet to finish work, Saffron offered Perry a dink on the back of her bicycle. Perry’s heart bounced. Simply looking at Saffron’s bicycle made him feel happy. It wasn’t a Malvern Star like the one Jenkins rode. It didn’t have rear-view mirrors or genuine leather saddlebags. Ben had found it at the rubbish tip. He’d brought it home all scratched and rusty, put new tyres on it and polished the wheels with a pad of steel wool. Then he’d painted the frame Sunflower Yellow with the leftover paint from the kitchen cupboards, and Annie wrote Saffron’s name in curly writing on the crossbar.

Anik’s grandma Mosas wove the small willow basket that was tied to the handlebars with blue ribbons, and Nell knitted handle grips to match and a padded cushion for the parcel rack, in case Saffron had a passenger.

Saffron could make her bike go very fast or very slow and she never fell off, even when she rode it without holding the handlebars. She made it go very fast as they rode to the Colour Patch Café to meet Scarlet.

The tar strip on the Silk Road was as skinny as a liquorice strap and the sky that day was as grey as a pigeon’s chest. But the yellow bike was a flash of sunlight and Perry was brave and free. He held tight to Saffron’s fake-fur stole as she dodged potholes as big as bird-baths, and together they sang the beautiful Tennessee Waltz all the way to Mr Kadri’s shop.

Mr Kadri had expanded his business. He had two new tables with matching chairs under the striped awning outside the café. He was pouring mint tea from a silver teapot into tiny green and gold cups. Steam from the hot tea curled like drakes’ tails in the cold air.

‘Table for two, Madam, Sir?’ said Mr Kadri, when he saw Saffron leaning her bike against a veranda post.

‘We haven’t got any money today, Mr Kadri,’ said Saffron, taking off her helmet and shaking loose her corkscrew curls. ‘We’ve just come to meet Scarlet.’

She rearranged her stole and untangled the dangly earrings from her marigold hair. Perry took off his helmet and felt his hair, but it seemed to have stayed in place despite the helmet and the very fast ride.

‘My goodness!’ said Mr Kadri. ‘Am I mistaken or is that you, Little Petal? And surely the fine gentleman beside you cannot be Superiorman?’

Saffron smiled.

‘Of course it’s us, Mr Kadri!’ she said.

‘Yes, now I see your pretty bicycle, but your costumes confused me! Have you come in all your finery to take Miss Crimson home or is there some celebration I have forgotten?’

Perry could now read the golden writing on every one of his seventy-two coloured pencils and he had discovered that scarlet and crimson are two shades of red. Getting the names of your reds mixed up would be an easy mistake to make if you came from a country where English is not spoken, especially if you don’t have a tin of pencils to check. So Perry didn’t mention it to Mr Kadri.

‘No, you haven’t forgotten anything, Mr Kadri,’ said Saffron. ‘Perry’s got a great idea and we want Scarlet to help us. But we want it to be a surprise for Nell.’

‘Ah, a surprise for Grandmother Silk!’ said Mr Kadri. ‘Then we must have a meeting here before you go home. Come inside and sit down while I tell Miss Crimson you are here.’

Saffron winked at Perry. A wink is like a smile: a song with no sound, a dance with no steps, happiness without words. Stars wink because they are too far away for us to hear the sound of their happiness. They are happy simply because they are stars. Saffron winked because Mr Kadri wanted to help without even being asked.

Mr Kadri ushered them to a table near the window. It was Perry’s favourite: the one where he had sat with the Silks on the day he first met them all. While he and Saffron waited for Mr Kadri to fetch Scarlet, Perry thought about that day, when he had stepped off the train clinging to Melody, the social worker, and gripping the handle of his suitcase.

He remembered being afraid to meet the eyes of all the people who’d come to meet him. Instead he concentrated on their feet and amongst them saw a small brown pair with glittering toenails. The person they belonged to walked over to him and tied a red balloon to the handle of his suitcase. He remembered looking up at a girl with eyes bluer than starlings’ eggs. It was Layla Elliott. And she’d winked at him. Smiles and winks were so plentiful at the Kingdom of Silk that no-one thought to explain them to Perry.

Layla had come with the Silks to the Colour Patch Café on that special day. Ben hung her angel wings on the parcel rack and Melody bought raspberry spiders for them to drink. They were the most beautiful drinks Perry had ever seen, pink and bubbly with a dollop of ice-cream floating on top, but Perry was far too anxious to drink his. He was worried about the meaning of winks and wings and other things.

But that was long ago. On this Saturday afternoon, when Perry saw Mr Kadri coming back to the table with Scarlet, he wasn’t worried about anything. Layla was his friend now and the Silks were his family. He had a great idea and everyone wanted to help him make it come true. He turned to Saffron and carefully winked at her.