Eva Ibbotson Quotes

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It's true that adventures are good for people even when they are very young. Adventures can get in a person's blood even if he doesn't remember having them.
Eva Ibbotson (The Secret of Platform 13)
Slowly, Anna put up a hand to his muzzle and began to scratch that spot behind the ear where large dogs keep their souls.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
And so they played some of the world's loveliest piano music - the exiled homesick girl, the humiliated, tired old man. Not properly. Better than that.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Loneliness had taught Harriet that there was always someone who understood - it was just so often that they were dead, and in a book.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
When you're sad, my Little Star, go out of doors. It's always better underneath the open sky.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
She was so intelligent that she could think herself into beauty. Intelligence...they don't talk about it much, the poets, but when a woman is intelligent and passionate and good...
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
She's like snow in Russian," said Anna. "Snow in the evening when the sun sets and it looks like Alpengluhen, you know? And if snow had a scent it would smell like that [the rose]....
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Shadows are cool and peaceful places for those whose minds are overstocked with treasure.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
You cannot stop the birds of sorrow from flying over your head, but you can stop them nesting in your hair.
Eva Ibbotson (The Dragonfly Pool)
I want to live like music sounds."- Ruth
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
But she had to know words. She had to know everything.
Eva Ibbotson
They were steaming out of the station before Maia asked, 'Was it books in the trunk?' 'It was books, admitted Miss Minton. And Maia said, 'Good.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Not a frog, I hope?” he asked…She shook her head. “No. And if it was I wouldn’t kiss it, I promise you. I might kiss a prince if I could be sure he’d turn into a frog, but not the other way around.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
For an instant she felt his touch on her cheek then he stepped back. There that was my ration for all eternity. People have died for less I dare say.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
This is worse than Hollywood, he thought. A girl comes in with a pork chop and I write a song for her.
Eva Ibbotson
One must not judge other cultures by the standars of one's one,' said Aunt Hilda
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
How dare you suppose that I don't know who you are or what you are? That I don't understand what I see? Do you take me for some kind of besotted schoolboy? It is unspeakable! You could weigh as much as a hippopotamus and shave your head and wear a wig and it wouldn't make a difference to me. I never said you were beautiful. I never thought it. I said that you were you.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Well, dear, it's true that adventures are good for people even when they are very young. Adventures can get into a person's blood even if he doesn't remember having them.
Eva Ibbotson
one of the sisters started shaving her legs and marrying tax inspectors, so she was no good.
Eva Ibbotson (Island of the Aunts)
The news should have terrified her, but it was difficult to be frightened of anything when she was sitting so close to Rom. 'I thought we had convinced him that I was leading a blameless life?' 'We had, till you burst out of that damnable cake.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
Just because we've never done it doesn't mean we can't do it.
Eva Ibbotson (The Dragonfly Pool)
What are you afraid of then? Not Being able to see, I think not seeing because your obsessed by something that blots out the world.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
To show too much joy in a place such as this would be unseemly but, as he padded toward her, his tail was extended in a manner which would make wagging possible should all go as expected.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
He then kissed her. It was a very long time before he let her go. When he did, she looked up at him, hurt and bewilderment on her face. “Why did you stop?” asked Tessa. “I thought you might want to breathe,” said Guy carefully. “Breathe?” said Tessa, shocked. “I don’t need to breathe when I’m with you.
Eva Ibbotson
There are those who dance the notes, and those who dance the music.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
...Adventures, once they were over, were things that had to stay inside one--that no one else could quite understand.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
It was a lovely church - one of those places which look as though God might be about to give a marvellous party.
Eva Ibbotson (The Star of Kazan)
One can always bear what is right.
Eva Ibbotson (Island of the Aunts)
Pauline kept a scrapbook into which she pasted important articles that she had cut out of the newspapers. These were about the courageous deeds that had been done by people even if they only had one leg or couldn't see or had been dropped on their heads when they were babies. 'It's to make me brave,' she'd explained to Annika.
Eva Ibbotson (The Star of Kazan)
Herr Altenburg, I can't; I have vertigo.' And Marek looked at him: 'All right - I'll get the chemist to fix me something.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
She stood looking carefully at the labeled portraits Ursala had put up: Little Crow, Chief of the Santees, Geronimo, last of the Apaches, and Ursala's favorite, Big Foot, dying in the snow at Wounded Knee. "Isn't that where the massacre was?" asked Ellen. "Yes. I'm going to go there when I'm grown up. To Wounded Knee." "That seems sensible," said Ellen.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
The world was so beautiful in those days, Annika. The music, the flowers, the scent of pines..." "It still is," said Annika. "Honestly, it still is.
Eva Ibbotson (The Star of Kazan)
But of course he knew, all of them knew. There is only one kind of a person a wizard can marry, and that is a witch.
Eva Ibbotson (Which Witch?)
Please, God,' Ruth would pray, 'don't let me be competitive. Let me realize what a privilege it is to study. Let me remember that knowledge must be pursued for its own sake and please, please stop me wanting to beat Verena Plackett in the exams.' She prayed hard and she meant what she said. But God was busy that autumn as the International Brigade came back, defeated, from Spain, Hitler's bestialities increased, and sparrows everywhere continued to fall.
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
That's silly, Anna," said the Honorable Olive. "Being afraid is silly, you know it is.
Eva Ibbotson
It was a night to dream about: windless, warm and scented, with a streak of gold and amethyst still lingering in the sky.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Those who think of the Amazon as a Green Hell,” she read in an old book with a tattered spine, “bring only their own fears and prejudices to this amazing land. For whether a place is a hell or a heaven rests in yourself, and those who go with courage and an open mind may find themselves in Paradise.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Dostoyevsky was her brother, Victorian children's books her passion and though she lived, when in funds, mainly on avocado pears, she took her bath each night with a different cookery book.
Eva Ibbotson (A Glove Shop in Vienna and Other Stories)
It is a fearful thing to love what time can touch.
Eva Ibbotson (The Reluctant Heiress)
There are those who dance the notes and those who dance the music.
Eva Ibbotson
[Tessa] knew about phantom limbs [....] Her cheek, where the Englishman's fingers had been, did not exactly ache ... but very strangely, most curiously ... it felt.
Eva Ibbotson (The Reluctant Heiress)
The dowager rose and slipped from her pew. There was the sound of tearing silk as she threw up her arms to embrace her son. Then: "Oh, Rupert, darling," she exclaimed in tones of theatrical despair, "don't you see? The game's up!
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Happiness is almost as good as magic for altering a person's looks.
Eva Ibbotson (Which Witch?)
Anyone who has an egg to watch over has a stake in the future, and the future--they were sure of it--was going to be good.
Eva Ibbotson (The Ogre of Oglefort)
People make their own worlds.
Eva Ibbotson
I must go-- the aunts will be worried. Guy, I don't know if we will meet again, but--" Her voice broke and she tried again. "Sometimes, when you're alone and you look up at--" Once more, she had to stop. Then she managed, "If I cannot be anything else... could I be your Star Sister? Could I at least be that?" Guy dug his nails into his palms. Everything in him rose in protest at the fey, romantic conceit. He did not want her in the heavens, linked to him by some celestial whimsy, but here and now in the flesh and after the death of the flesh, her hand in his as they rose from graves like these when the last trump sounded. "Yes," he managed to say. "You can be my Star Sister. You can at least be that.
Eva Ibbotson (The Reluctant Heiress)
She took a deep breath, inhaling the night air scented with hay, honeysuckle and the rich waters of the lake, listened to the music and laughter coming from the theatre, tilted her head to the the stars. She had never seen them so brilliant and clear. Cassiopeia, Orion, the great girdle of the Milky Way-and her own birth sign, Gemini. With such staggering beauty in the world, how could anyone not rejoice? It seemed however, that 'anyone' could. For at once came the age-old cry of lovers since time began. 'What are the stars if i am not gazing at them with him? What is beauty except something we share?
Eva Ibbotson (The Reluctant Heiress)
Smells are odd things. They follow you about when you’re not thinking about them, but when you put your nose to where they ought to be, they aren’t there. The
Eva Ibbotson (The Secret of Platform 13)
Would you like me to stop talking? Because I can. I have to concentrate, but it's possible
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
Once the hag got upset she was apt to go downhill very fast and remember things like she was an orphan. People are often orphans when they are eighty-two, but it is true that when you have no mother or father you can feel very lonely at any age.
Eva Ibbotson
What about you, Ellen?' he asked. 'What does music mean to you?' It was a while before she answered. 'When I was at school... quite little still... there was a girl there who had perfect pitch and a lovely voice and she played the piano. I used to hear people talking about her.' She paused, lacing her fingers together. '"She's musical," they used to say, "Deirdre's musical," and it was as if they'd said: "She's angelic." That's how it seemed to me to be musical: to be angelic.' Isaac turned to her. 'My God, Ellen,' he said huskily, 'it is you who are angelic. If there's anyone in the world who is angelic it is you.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
When you know what you want you usually get it.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
We mustn't only remember the good bits," she said. "We must remember the bad bits, too, so that we know it was real.
Eva Ibbotson
Yet for a moment it seemed to him that the men who had dragged marble from Italy and porphyry from Portugal, who had ransacked the jungle for its rarest woods and paid their millions to build this opulent and fantastical theatre, had done so in order that a young girl with loose brown hair should move across its stage, drawing her future from its empty air.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
I would let her...have adventures. I would let her...choose her path. It would be hard...it was hard...but I would do it. Oh, not completely, of course. Some things have to go on. Cleaning one's teeth, arithmetic. But Maia fell in love with the Amazon. It happens. THe place was for her - and the people. Of course there was some danger, but there is danger everywhere. Two years ago, in this school, there was an outbreak of typhus, and three girls died. CHildren are knocked down and killed by horses every week, here in these streets--" She broke off, gathering her thoughts. "When she was traveling and exploring...and finding her songs, Maia wasn't just happy, she was...herself. I think something broke in Maia when her parents died, and out there it healed. Perhaps I'm mad--and the professor too-- but I think children must lead big lives...if it is in them to do so.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
What are you afraid of then?' She pondered. He had already noticed that it was her hands which indicated what she was thinking of quite as much as her face and now he watched as she cupped them, making them ready to receive her thoughts. 'Not being able to see, I think,' she said. 'Being blind, you mean?' 'No, not that. That would be terrible hard but Homer managed it and our blind piano tuner is one of the serenest people I know. I mean ... not seeing because you're obsessed by something that blots out the world. Some sort of mania of belief. Or passion. That awful kind of love that makes leaves and birds and cherry blossom invisible because it's not the face on some man.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
Stupid women were lured into it and assured they would become young and beautiful if they let themselves be pummeled and pounded and smeared with sticky creams, and have their faces lifted and their stomachs flattened. They paid a lot of money to Madame Olympia, who would put a little bit of magic into the creams and ointments that she used so that at first they did look marvelous. But it was the kind of magic that wore off very quickly, leaving the women even uglier than before so that they would rush back to her and pay her more money and the whole thing would start again.
Eva Ibbotson (Which Witch?)
You’ll never know what you’ve done for me,” he said as they reached the gates of the level crossing. “If there’s anything you want--” Clovis grinned. “Can I have Maia when she’s grown up?” Finn’s smile vanished in an instant. “No,” he said.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
One must not judge other cultures by the standards of one's own
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
She realized that adventures, once they were over, were things that had to stay inside one--that no one else could quite understand.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
The Unconscious, lately discovered by Professor Freud and used by others to store their joys, fears and frustrations, was for Nerine a gigantic subterranean wardrobe
Eva Ibbotson (The Reluctant Heiress)
Do I know everything about him already? she thought, bewildered. And back came the answer: Everything. You are branded with this knowledge, you will have it for the rest of time.
Eva Ibbotson (The Reluctant Heiress)
When you’re sad, Little Star, go out of doors. It’s always better underneath the open sky.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
A faint terror lest she begin to curtsy took hold of Rupert.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Ms. Wrack's mother, Mrs. Wrack, had been a mermaid: a proper one who lived on a rock and combed her hair and sang. But sailors had never been lured to their doom by her, partly because she looked like the back of a bus and partly because modern ships are so high out of the water that they never even saw her
Eva Ibbotson (Which Witch?)
As Maia turned to go, hardly believing that there could be such happiness, she heard a loud splash. Miss Minton was leaning over the side, watching the parcel she had held on her knees floating away downriver. “What was that?” asked Maia. Miss Minton straightened herself. If you must know,” she said, “it was my corset.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
It was his time with the Xanti which had changed him. They thought that everyone’s life was like a river; you had to flow with the current and not struggle, which wasted breath and made you more likely to drown.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Miss Minton knew she was going to be dismissed, and she thought this was perfectly fair. A governess who let her charge sail up the rivers of the Amazon and live with Indian tribes could hardly expect to keep her job.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
-they were still practicing the fiendishly difficult pattern at the end of the act where the diagonal lines of swans cross over and dissolve to form three groups: unequal groups, since the number seventeen is notoriously difficult to divide by three.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
Aware that she was on the edge of the abyss, that he must call her back very gently, he laid only the lightest of hands on her hair.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
...and after all, it wasn't her fault that she was an idiot and had two ridiculous children. Life isn't fair and never has been.
Eva Ibbotson (Island of the Aunts)
well wtith a statue hermann cannot possibly fight
Eva Ibbotson
Love begets love. As he grew, Petya followed his sister everywhere… “Wait for me, Annoushka!” … And Anna did wait for him. She was to do so always.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
Now, tell me everything, please. Of course if he has harmed you I shall kill him, whoever he is,” he added matter-of-factly. “But otherwise, perhaps something can be done.
Eva Ibbotson (A Countess Below Stairs)
What do you mean to do with Maia when you do find her?” the professor asked that night. “Take her back to the Keminskys and never let her out of my sight again,” said Miss Minton. “She may not find it easy.” “Why on earth not? The Keminskys are the kindest people in the world.” “Yes. But she has tasted freedom.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Then she washed and dressed very attentively, putting on high-heeled court shoes, silk stockings, a black skirt and crisply ironed white blouse, because she was Viennese and one dressed properly even when one's world had ended.
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
It was a heavenly summer, the summer in which France fell and the British Expeditionary Force was evacuated from Dunkirk. Leaves were never such an intense and iridescent green; sunlight glinted on flower-studded meadows as the Germans encircled the Maginot Line and overran not only France but Belgium and Holland. Birdsong filled the air in the lull between bursts of gunfire and accompanied the fleeing refugees who blocked the roads. It was as though the weather was preparing a glorious requiem for the death of Europe.
Eva Ibbotson (A Song for Summer)
Knowing it was her last night on the Arabella, Maia fought against sleep. She must remember it all--the lapping of the water against the side of the boat, the white moths, the fireflies… Finn, too, was awake. “When we’re grown up I’ll come back for you, I promise. No one can stop us then.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
And lying there, her hair in damp strands across her crumpled face, Harriet gave up the long, long struggle to love her father and her aunt. "It was for this loss above all that she wept. She had learned, during the long years of her childhood, to live without receiving love. To live without giving it seemed more than she could bear.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
To this largesse had been added waist-length golden, curling hair which, had she chosen to sit on a rock brushing it, must have sent every sailor within miles plunging to his doom.
Eva Ibbotson (A Company of Swans)
She made life… big for me
Eva Ibbotson (The Morning Gift)
Mr. Murray had no doubt about Miss Minton’s honesty. It was her sanity he was not sure about.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
People who’ve suffered don’t have time to grumble.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
They’re a jolly lot, the lepers,” said Father Liam. “People who’ve suffered don’t have time to grumble.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
When we’re grown up I’ll come back for you, I promise. No one can stop us then.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
If this is the ‘Green Hell’ of the Amazon, then hell is where I belong,” said Maia.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
And when Finn complained at the end of a day that they had not come very far, she said, “What does it matter? We’ve got all the time in the world.” Which is not always a clever thing to say.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
There had, of course, been no golden-haired boys; there hadn’t been any boys at all. What there had been was a leper colony, run by the Brothers of Saint Patrick, a group of Irish missionaries to whom the crows had been sent.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
He felt her hand creep from her muff into his pocket as they walked the snowy streets to buy their Christmas tree; dusted the pollen off her nose after he had brought her the first king-cups. By the gay and gilded fountains of Peterhof they bandied preposterous names for their unborn child. At night, in their big wooden bed, he watched her spoon cherry jam into her tea and told her that her habits were disgusting, that he loved her more than life itself.
Eva Ibbotson (A Glove Shop in Vienna and Other Stories)
I’m sorry you never got my note that night,” said Minty. “I was arranging for us to go and live with them. You’ll like that, won’t you?” she asked Maia. Maia was silent, looking down at her plate. “Of course she will,” jeered Finn. “Sergei will be able to kneel at her feet like a person in a book.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Clovis straightened himself. He squared his shoulders. He tossed back his curls. Then slowly, with immense dignity, he climbed the cellar steps. “Unhand my servant, please,” he ordered the crows. “As you see, I am Finn Taverner.” The crows let go of the Indian. They stared at the golden-haired youth who had appeared at the top of the cellar steps. The boy’s breeding showed in every movement; he was an undoubted and true aristocrat. Here before them was The Blood which Sir Aubrey longed for, and they were filled with joy. The boy now addressed his servant. “You have served me well, Kumari,” he said--and every word was crystal clear; the words of a perfect English gentleman, speaking slowly to a foreigner. “Now I give you your freedom. And with it, this token of my thanks.” And out of the pocket of his tunic he took a watch on a long chain which he handed to the Indian. “But, sir,” said Mr. Trapwood, who had seen the glint of silver. “Should you--” “I am a Taverner,” said Clovis. “And no one shall say that I am not grateful to those who have served me. And now, gentlemen, I am ready. I take it you have reserved a first-class cabin for me?” “Well,” began Mr. Low. Mr. Trapwood kicked his shin. “It shall be arranged, sir,” he said. “Everything will be taken care of.” “Good. I should like to go on board immediately.” “Yes, sir, of course. If you’ll just come with us.” Clovis bowed to Miss Minton, then to Maia. His eyes were dry and his dignity was matchless. Then he followed the crows out of the museum.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
In another couple of hours we can go on board.” He looked longingly at the lighted ship, ready for her start at dawn. She looked so clean, so nice, so British… Mr. Low came to stand beside him. “Decent bunks, decent food, people speaking English. You can’t believe it.” But in spite of the relief of being on the way home, the crows were broken men. Mr. Low was still feverish, Mr. Trapwood’s insect bites had spread in an infected mass over his face and neck, and neither of them could keep down their food.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Then Furo’s canoe came through the reeds and Maia hugged Clovis and said good-bye. If everything went according to plan, he would be on the boat the day after tomorrow, and it was hard leaving him. “But I expect you’ll come to England, won’t you?” Clovis said. He had given her the address of his foster mother. “I wish you were coming now,” he said, and his eyes filled with tears. As Finn helped Maia into the boat, he leaned forward and whispered in her ear. “Don’t worry about Clovis,” he said. “I’ll see he’s all right. I won’t let him get too scared, I promise.” And Maia nodded and got into the canoe and was paddled away.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Do you want to go back, Maia? Back to England?” “I did,” she said, thinking about it. “The twins are so awful and there seemed no point in being here, shut up in this house. But not now. I don’t want to go now because I’ve seen that it is there. What I thought was there.” Miss Minton waited. “I mean…the forest…the river…the Amazon…everything I thought of before I came. And the people who live in it and know about it.” Then she told Miss Minton about the boy who had taken her into Manaus. “He didn’t speak English, but he had such a listening face; I couldn’t believe he didn’t understand everything I said. Oh Minty, it was such a wonderful journey, like floating through a drowned forest. You can’t believe it’s the same world as the Carters live in.” “It isn’t,” said Miss Minton. “People make their own worlds.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
I would let her…have adventures. I would let her…choose her path. It would be hard…it was hard…but I would do it. Oh, not completely, of course. Some things have to go on. Cleaning one’s teeth, arithmetic. But Maia fell in love with the Amazon. It happens. The place was for her--and the people. Of course there was some danger, but there is danger everywhere. Two years ago, in this school, there was an outbreak of typhus, and three girls died. Children are knocked down and killed by horses every week, here in these streets--” She broke off, gathering her thoughts. “When she was traveling and exploring…and finding her songs, Maia wasn’t just happy, she was…herself. I think something broke in Maia when her parents died, and out there it was healed. Perhaps I’m mad--and the professor, too--but I think children must lead big lives…if it is in them to do so. And it is in Maia.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
Knowing it was her last night on the Arabella, Maia fought against sleep. She must remember it all--the lapping of the water against the side of the boat, the white moths, the fireflies… Finn, too, was awake. “When we’re grown up I’ll come back for you, I promise. No one can stop us then.” But she wasn’t grown up and nor was he, and Finn was going on alone. The professor had tried to persuade him to come back with them, but Finn only said, “I promised my father I’d go and find the Xanti. I promised.” Now, though, lying in the dark, he realized how much he hated the idea of going on by himself. He wasn’t afraid exactly; he knew he could do it--but it suddenly seemed utterly dismal to go on without his friend. “We could still run away into the forest,” said Maia. But Finn said no. “Minty really cares about you. The professor told me she nearly went mad when she thought you’d been killed in the fire. You can’t play tricks on her--or on him. They’re good people. It’s just…oh, why can’t grown-ups understand that we might know what is right for us just as well as they do?
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
They went on arguing, but Maia had forgotten them again, following Finn in her mind. Where was he? Did he have enough wood for the firebox? Were his maps accurate? Did he miss her at all? Finn did miss her--she would have been surprised to know how much. He had never sailed the Arabella alone for any distance and it wasn’t as easy as he’d hoped. While she was under way he managed well, but when it came to anchoring in the evening or setting off at dawn, he would have given anything for another pair of hands. Not any pair of hands--Maia’s. She had obeyed his orders quickly but not blindly; he had learned to trust her completely. And she was nice. Fun. Quick to catch a joke and so interested in everything--asking about the birds, the plants. This morning he had found himself starting to say, “Look, Maia!” when he saw an umbrella bird strutting along a branch, and when he realized that she wasn’t there, the exotic creature, with its sunshade of feathers, had seemed somehow less exciting. After all, sharing was something everyone wanted to do. He could hear his father’s voice calling, “Look, Finn, over there!” a dozen times a day.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
The children slept late, and washed and dressed almost in silence. Both of them were afraid to speak. Maia packed her belongings in an old canvas bag and stroked the dog. “I’ll come over in a minute to say good-bye,” said Finn. The Carters’ boat was ready to leave, breakfast tidied away, ropes coiled. The professor was sorting out the firebox and feeding in fresh logs. Miss Minton, sitting in the stern, had a parcel wrapped in burlap on her knees. “I’m ready,” said Maia, trying to keep her voice steady. She mustn’t cry. Above all, she mustn’t sulk. “Finn’s coming over to say good-bye.” “No need,” said Miss Minton. “He’d like to.” “All the same, there is no need.” Maia looked at her governess. Miss Minton seemed different…Softer? Rounder? More at peace? “Why?” she asked. “Why is there no need?” “Because we’re coming with you. We’re going on. Get back on the Arabella and tell Finn we’ll follow three lengths behind.” As Maia turned to go, hardly believing that there could be such happiness, she heard a loud splash. Miss Minton was leaning over the side, watching the parcel she had held on her knees floating away downriver. “What was that?” asked Maia. Miss Minton straightened herself. If you must know,” she said, “it was my corset.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
The howler monkeys had been right to laugh when he said he wasn’t going back. He had turned downriver again almost at once to fetch Maia, and he had made good time, traveling with the current--but he had come too late. Finn went outside again and stood on the square of raked gravel that had been the Carters’ garden. His mind seemed to have stopped working. He had no idea what to do. Should he go in to Manaus and see if he could find anything out--from the hospital perhaps? After a while he found himself walking back along the river path to where he had left the Arabella. As he came to the fork in the path which led back into the forest, the dog put his head down excitedly into a patch of leaf mold. Finn pushed him aside and saw a smear of blood…and then a little way off, another…and another. He almost fell over her, she lay so still, hidden in the leaves and creepers, almost as if she had burrowed into the forest to die. But she was not dead. She lay stunned, still in her nightdress, breathing lightly with closed eyes. The blood came from a gash in her leg. He could see no burns on her skin. She must have fainted from loss of blood. Then, when he said her name, she opened her eyes. One hand went out to his sleeve. “Can we go now?” she whispered. And he answered. “Yes.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)
That settles it,” said Mr. Trapwood. “We’re going back to the pension. We’re going to pack. We’re going to be on the Bishop first thing tomorrow. Sir Aubrey will have to send someone else out. Nothing is worth another day in this hellhole.” Mr. Low did not answer. He had caught a fever and was lying in the bottom of a large canoe owned by the Brothers of the São Gabriel Mission, who had arranged for the crows to be taken back to Manaus. His eyes were closed and he was wandering a little in his mind, mumbling about a boy with hair the color of the belly of the golden toad which squatted on the lily leaves of the Mamari River. There had, of course, been no golden-haired boys; there hadn’t been any boys at all. What there had been was a leper colony, run by the Brothers of Saint Patrick, a group of Irish missionaries to whom the crows had been sent. “They’re good men, the Brothers,” a man on the docks had told them as they set off on their last search for Taverner’s son. “They take in all sorts of strays--orphans, boys with no homes. If anyone knows where Taverner’s lad might be, it’ll be them.” Then he had spat cheerfully into the river because he was a crony of the chief of police and liked the idea of Mr. Low and Mr. Trapwood spending time with the Brothers, who were very holy men indeed and slept on the hard ground, and ate porridge made from manioc roots, and got up four times in the night to pray. The Brothers’ mission was on a swampy part of the river and very unhealthy, but the Brothers thought only about God and helping their fellowmen. They welcomed Mr. Trapwood and Mr. Low and said they could look over the leper colony to see if they could find anyone who might turn out to be the boy they were looking for. “They’re a jolly lot, the lepers,” said Father Liam. “People who’ve suffered don’t have time to grumble.” But the crows, turning green, thought there wouldn’t be much point. Even if there was a boy there the right age, Sir Aubrey probably wouldn’t think that a boy who was a leper could manage Westwood. Later a group of pilgrims arrived who had been walking on foot from the Andes and were on their way to a shrine on the Madeira River, and the Brothers knelt and washed their feet. “We know you’ll be proud to share the sleeping hut with our friends here,” they said to Mr. Low and Mr. Trapwood, and the crows spent the night on the floor with twelve snoring, grunting men--and woke to find two large and hungry-looking vultures squatting in the doorway. By the time they returned to Manaus the crows were beaten men. They didn’t care any longer about Taverner’s son or Sir Aubrey, or even the hundred-pound bonus they had lost. All they cared about was getting onto the Bishop and steaming away as fast as it could be done.
Eva Ibbotson (Journey to the River Sea)