Lightning Strikes (Hudson 2)

I helped Mary Margaret finish clearing the table. Then we had our breakfast and I went back to my hole in the wall to fix my hair and put on a little lipstick. Before I left I gave G

reat-aunt Leonora the check Grandmother Hudson had given me. She gazed at it, her eyes widening and her eyebrows lifting.

"This is a lot of spending money to give someone," she commented. "I never knew my sister to be so generous. I'm sure Victoria knows nothing about it," she added thoughtfully. Then she shook her head as if she was shaking off a bad thought and smiled. "Not to say you won't be needing it. London is an expensive place. I'll see to it that you start with a few hundred pounds. Have a good day, dear," she added.

With my heart bonging like that grandfather's clock in the drawing room, I left the house and began my journey to my new school.

My first mistake happened only a block from Endfield House. I was concentrating on all the things Great-uncle Richard had told me and I stepped off the curb, forgetting that the English drive their cars on the opposite side. When I looked to my left, I thought I was safe. Next thing I heard was a squeal of brakes and the sight of an enraged driver. I jumped back to the sidewalk, my heart pounding.

"Mind the traffic light," the driver screamed with wild eyes stretched into his temples as he drove past.

I closed my eyes, sucked in my breath and started across the street when it was sate. The sky was still quite gray and I noticed that just about every pedestrian was carrying an umbrella. I didn't have one and no one at the house had offered one to me before I left. The first drops began just before I reached the station. I couldn't run across the street because of the traffic, so I had to wait even though I was getting drenched. Finally, I charged into the station and shook myself. My blouse was soaked. What a horrible beginning.

People pushed by me, rushing to and fro. I didn't think it looked all that much different from the subway stations in the States. There was even someone playing a saxophone in front of a can set out for coins. The station clerk was helpful, however, and moments later, I was waiting alongside everyone else for my train. I heard an announcement every minute or so telling everyone to "Mind the gap." I couldn't imagine what that meant until the train pulled up and I saw there was a gap between it and the platform.

"Mind the gap," I muttered to myself with a laugh and got aboard my first subway train in London. I studied the map and watched for the stations Greatuncle Richard had written out for me. Not long after, I emerged and found myself searching for the school in a slow, steady drizzle. I panicked, thinking I had gone the wrong way, and stopped to catch my breath in a storefront. My damp clothes were sticking to my body. What an embarrassing way to present myself the first day, I thought, and wondered if I shouldn't just turn around and go back to Endfield Place.

"You all right, sweetie?" a small, elderly lady asked as she stepped out of the shop.

I guess embracing myself and squeezing myself against the wall made me look peculiar.

"No. I can't find where I have to go," I said.

"And where would that be, sweetie?"

She looked up at me and blinked her eyes. Her face was almost painted, she had so much makeup on.

"Here," I said thrusting the address in front of her. She glanced at it and looked up.

"Oh, you're not far, sweetie. Just go left here until you come to the Plowman's Pub and it's right around the corner. Matter of fact," she said opening her umbrella, "I'm headin' to visit a friend who lives nearby. Always have my cup of tea with her about now," she said. "Later, when the pub opens, we go down and have a shandy. Come on, now," she beckoned and I knelt to step under her umbrella. We had to make some funny sight walking down that sidewalk, I thought.

"What's a shandy?" I asked her.

"A shandy? Oh, just half beer and half lemonade. Ain't you never had a shandy?"

"No," I said laughing.

"My first husband and me, we would spend every afternoon together at the Plowman for the last five years. He passed on six months ago."

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Yeah, it don't pay to get old, sweetie. You stay young and keep dry now," she called as she turned into the doorway of a building next to the pub.

I hurried around the corner until I found the address. It looked more like a small office building than a school, but the name was written on the double glass doors. I entered just as two girls in black tights came bouncing down the stairs on my right, giggling loudly. They looked like sisters. They both had very dark brown hair but one girl's was cut short at the nape of her neck and the other's was longer and seemed unbrushed, but in a way very attractive. Both had pretty faces. Their complexions were almost as dark as mine.

"Bonjour" the short-haired one said. "Can we help you?" she asked.

"I'm looking for Mr. MacWaine." I wiped my hair with the palms of my hands.

"Ali, yes, Monsieur MacWaine is in his office, no, Leslie?" she asked the other girl.

"Mais oui. You come to be a student?" she asked me.

"Yes."

"You are the girl from America?"

"Yes," I said laughing to myself. The girl from America, I thought.