Pudding Goes Up the Attic Stairs

Tom did bedtime properly. He had a list for it, written on a card, and he kept a pencil behind his ear so that he could tick off each step the moment it was done. He never ticked a step before it was done, because that was cheating, and Tom did not cheat at bedtime. The card lived in his dressing gown pocket until step two, and in his pajama pocket after that.

The list had nine steps. One, bath. Two, pajamas, with the buttons in the right holes. Three, teeth, including the back ones. Four, half a glass of water, because a whole glass spills. Five, goodnight to Biscuit. Six, a story, or two if they are short. Seven, slippers side by side. Eight, go to the toilet, even if you don’t need to. Nine, Pudding at feet.

Kisses were not on the list. Tom said kisses went without saying.

Pudding was the family’s hot-water bottle. It was round and red and warm all the way through, and it waddled about the house from side to side, sloshing as it went. When it was pleased, it gurgled. It wore a knitted jumper with only one sleeve, because Grandma had run out of wool, and Grandma said one sleeve was plenty for something with no arms. The sleeve hung off Pudding’s left side and swung when it walked.

In the daytime Pudding kept itself topped up in three warm places: the edge of the stove, the radiator in the hall, and Biscuit, who was the dog, and who did not mind. Every night, while Tom was busy with steps one to eight, Pudding went on ahead. It climbed into Tom’s bed and lay on the cold spot at the bottom, so that by the time Tom got to step nine, the cold spot was not cold anymore.

Now, you may think a hot-water bottle has no business walking about a house on its own. Tom’s family thought so too, the first week. After that they stepped over it like anybody else.

Tonight was different, because tonight Tom was sleeping in the attic for the first time.

The attic room was new. Dad had put a floor in, and Mom had painted the walls yellow, and there was a window in the slope of the roof so that Tom could see the moon without getting out of bed. The only trouble was the stairs. The attic stairs were so steep they were nearly a ladder, and you went up them with your hands as well as your feet. Biscuit had looked at them once and gone to lie down. Everybody agreed that Pudding, being round and having no legs to speak of, would never manage them either.

“Leave Pudding to me,” said Dad. “Step nine, I’ll carry it up.”

So Tom began. Bath, and the pencil came out from behind his ear, and tick. Pajamas, buttons right, tick. Halfway through his teeth, with his mouth full of toothpaste, he heard a slosh and a bump somewhere above the bathroom ceiling. Then another bump, a little higher. Then another.

“That’s the pipes,” said Dad, from the landing. Dad said that about every noise in the house.

Teeth, tick. Water, half a glass, tick. Biscuit was asleep by the back door with nothing on top for once, and Tom said goodnight, and tick. Mom read two stories because they were short. Slippers, side by side. The toilet, even though he didn’t need to. Tick, tick, tick, and the pencil went back behind his ear.

Then Tom went to fetch Pudding. He looked in his old bed first. The cold spot at the bottom was cold, and there was no Pudding in it.

On the stove there was only the kettle. On the radiator there were only Dad’s socks. And on Biscuit there was only Biscuit, snoring.

“Mom,” said Tom. “Dad. Pudding is lost.”

Mom looked in the laundry basket first, because that is where things usually are. She found a glove from last winter, the lid of the teapot, and one of Dad’s library books. She did not find Pudding.

“Well,” said Mom, “that’s three things found, anyway.”

They looked in the airing cupboard, where it was warm and smelled of towels. No Pudding. They looked in the toaster corner, where Pudding sometimes sat after breakfast because the counter stayed warm there. Crumbs, and no Pudding. Then Dad opened the fridge and looked in it, very carefully, behind the milk.

“In case Pudding fancied somewhere cool for a change,” said Dad.

Mom looked at him.

“Everybody fancies a change now and then,” said Dad, and he moved the butter, to be sure.

Tom took the card out of his pajama pocket and looked at it. Eight ticks, and one empty space. He did not want to go up to the new room with an empty space. A new bed in a new room has a cold spot at the bottom like any other bed, and Tom was fairly sure this one would be the coldest cold spot there had ever been.

He went and sat on the bottom step of the attic stairs, because he did his best thinking sitting down.

The step was warm.

Tom put his hand on the step above. That was warm too. So was the one above that.

“The stairs are warm,” said Tom.

“That’ll be the pipes,” said Dad.

“There aren’t any pipes in the stairs,” said Mom.

They all looked up.

* * *

Tom went first, with his hands and his feet, the way you have to on those stairs. Mom came behind him, and Dad came behind Mom, still holding the butter.

“Warm,” said Tom, on the fourth step. “Warm,” on the seventh. “Warm. Warm. Warm.” There were twelve steps, and every one of them had a round warm patch in the middle, about the size of a hot-water bottle. They went up the stairs in a row, like footprints, if a hot-water bottle had feet.

At the top, the yellow room was quiet, and the moon was in the roof window. There was a round lump at the bottom of the new bed, under the quilt. As Tom came up the last step, the lump gurgled.

Tom lifted the corner of the quilt. There was Pudding, round and red in its one-sleeved jumper, lying on the cold spot at the bottom of the bed, exactly where it always lay. Only the cold spot was not cold. Tom put his hand flat on the sheet. It was warm all the way down, and all the way across, and all the way up to the pillow.

Mom felt the sheet too. “It’s been up here an hour at least,” she said. “It wasn’t lost at all. It just got here first.”

The one sleeve of Pudding’s jumper was stretched out long, about twice as long as it ought to be. Dad looked at it for a while.

“It hooked that over each step,” said Dad, “and pulled itself up. One at a time. That was the bumping.”

“You said that was the pipes,” said Mom.

Nobody ever found out whether that was really how Pudding did it. But Dad was very pleased with the idea, because after the fridge and the butter, it was the first idea he had had all evening that turned out to be right. And when Grandma heard about it, she said she had always known one sleeve was plenty.

Tom took the pencil from behind his ear. He ticked step nine, very neatly, and put the pencil back. Then he climbed into the new bed and slid his feet all the way down to the bottom, where Pudding was. Pudding gurgled.

Kisses were not on the list, because kisses went without saying, but Mom and Dad did them anyway. Then Dad went back down the steep stairs, carefully, to put the butter back in the fridge.

Tom looked at the moon in the roof window for about as long as it takes to say so, and then he was asleep. He slept right through his first night at the top of the house, all the way to morning, with his feet warm the whole night long. And every so often, very softly, Pudding gurgled at the bottom of the bed, the way it did when everything was exactly where it ought to be.