The Snowstorm

By Richard Markin

Charlie Palmer’s preoccupation with collecting Objets D’art for her bedroom, leads to a chance encounter with a ghostly old woman at Bundles Charity Emporium, where her mother is hoping to find something decent to wear, money having been short since her father left home. This unexpected meeting turns out to be the luckiest day of Charlie’s life, providing her with an opportunity which other girls could only dream about!

Follow Charlie as she embarks on a magical adventure, which quickly transforms into the journey of a lifetime during this coming of age tale about one girl’s voyage of discovery, as she negotiates her way through the trials and tribulations of love, loss and betrayal.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu Publishing Services
• Release date: May 23, 2014
• ISBN: 9781483405681

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MARKIN

Copyright © 2014 Richard Markin.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted by any means—whether auditory, graphic, mechanical, or electronic—without written permission of both publisher and author, except in the case of brief excerpts used in critical articles and reviews. Unauthorized reproduction of any part of this work is illegal and is punishable by law.

Interior Graphics/Art Credit: Paul Tucker

ISBN: 978-1-4834-0569-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4834-0568-1 (e)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Lulu Publishing Services rev. date: 5/19/2014

CONTENTS

Introduction

Bundles Charity Emporium

The Water Mill

Spontaneous Combustion

Up All Night

Trespassing

Finders Keepers

Other Activities

A Simple Transfusion

Choc Ices

Walking On Air

An Unexpected Item

About The Author

For Valerie.

INTRODUCTION

O n the 22 of March 1960, Mr Foden Petulengro, a well-known and highly-respected rag and bone man, took delivery of a number of items that had been left to him by Madame Christina Bonaventure, a famous gypsy clairvoyant. She had long held Mr Petulengro in very high esteem, not only for his generosity in allowing the travelling community (of which she was a lifelong member) free and unrestricted access to the large field he owned in East Anglia where he grazed his horses, but also for the care and understanding he expressed for the Romany p eople.

Madame Christina Bonaventure had often elaborated about certain treasures in her possession and always promised to repay this kindness by pledging the accoutrements of her profession to East Anglia’s pre-eminent rag and bone man as a lasting legacy. Foden Petulengro was a very basic man with few airs and graces, and brushed aside the tales of magic and intrigue he’d heard concerning one of the items in her collection as nothing more than pie-in-the-sky, pure bunkum, and had set about trading most of the items on for profit, including a magnificent Madagascan smoky quartz crystal ball and various talismans. There was, however, one exception - an innocent-looking piece that he’d reserved as a birthday gift for the little girl who adored and tended to his horses, often feeding them scraps along with the occasional sugar cube she would pocket from her parents’ larder.

Children would run and hide when Foden Petulengro came collecting old rags, dishing out pieces of inferior china to customers in return, but not this little girl. Dotty, as Foden christened her, was the opposite of all the other children and would always run to greet him on his rounds. Foden adored her and would have adopted Dotty on the spot. However, as this was not possible, he contented himself with the joy and friendship she expressed for both him and the two magnificent dray horses that hauled his brightly-painted trailer.

It was shortly before her thirteenth birthday that Dotty announced to a very sad Foden that her parents were moving away from the area to another county. She continued to visit the field where the horses would run free and graze when not harnessed to the trailer, and maintained her close friendship with Foden right up to the day of her parents’ moving. It was on this particular day that she received the innocent-looking curio that Foden had inherited from the marvellous Madame Christina Bonaventure . . .

Dorothy Topping treasured the little gift, keeping it in her secret hiding place, away from inquisitive eyes, particularly those of her parents, as they had never approved of the likes of Foden Petulengro. During her life-long tenure of the item in question, Dorothy never once told anyone anything about the magical masterpiece. To what extent she was able to benefit from this unusual legacy no one could say, only one other person knew of its existence and that person was an old school friend, Dorothy’s lifelong companion whom she confided in behind closed doors. All she knew was that her friend kept the piece under the tea cosy for safe-keeping. She attributed this bizarre behaviour to Dorothy’s eccentricity. The enormous sums Dorothy donated to charitable organisations, particularly those connected with cancer research and young people, two subjects very close to Dorothy’s heart, were an absolute mystery, as it was never quite clear where the money came from or what she did for a living, besides occasionally helping out at any charity shop that needed someone who cared and could give their time freely.

Following the passing of Commander Robert Topping and his wife Prudence, Dorothy Topping, their only child, had held forth at East Wynick’s magnificent old water mill. She referred to this place as her parochial moorings but it was, in fact, a listed building, much admired by the locals and all who saw the great wheel turning in the often rapidly-flowing waters of the busy river Ivan. The mill even featured in books and on the occasional postcard, that is until that fateful day when Dorothy Topping spontaneously combusted, reducing the once-magnificent old water mill to nothing more than a cinder! Everything went up in flames; all they found was a shoe! Fortuitously, one rather precious item managed to miraculously survive the raging inferno, finding its way into the back of a dusty old display cabinet in a nearby charity shop, changing the path of one girl’s destiny forever.

And so, it was beneath the canopy of Bundles Charity Emporium, that the tale of this lucky girl commences …

BUNDLES CHARITY EMPORIUM

C harlie Palmer waited patiently as her mother rummaged through the vile garments that festooned Bundles Charity Empo rium.

Do you like this, pet? It’ll go with the shoes I picked up last week.

Charlie pretended not to hear her mother and moved to the back of the charity shop to inspect some of the other more interesting items for sale. She had become increasingly frustrated with her mother’s appetite for charity shops and jumble sales as a trendy alternative to the stores on the High Street where, in Charlie’s opinion, her mother was guaranteed to find something far more appropriate to wear and smelling a lot sweeter than the pot-pourri of garments that had been conscientiously dumped in the doorway of Bundles Charity Emporium under cover of dark by the relatives of the recently-deceased, anxious to do their bit for charity, whilst retaining anything of real value for themselves.

Places like Bundles Charity Emporium were Charlie’s domain and she liked to be on her own when ferreting out interesting new items for her flourishing collection of objets d’art. Items that ranged from bottles, tins, shells from the beach and books she would never find time to read, to the macabre skull of a cat found in a pet cemetery. Each of these items was highly-prized and central to her collection, but of absolutely no consequence to anyone else, as her best friend Sam liked to point out!

Leroy Baker, a young male volunteer fresh out of school, observed Charlie closely from the sanctuary of a small room to the side of the premises. He seemed enormously pleased with his observations. Leroy was a member of the same swimming club as Charlie but he had never been able to pluck up the courage to say hello to her, let alone ask her out on a date. Leroy’s only liaison with female company was with Charlie’s best friend Sam, but that had been short-lived. There was something altogether different about Charlie, and his fascination with her reflected the opinion of most of his team mates and almost every other boy when confronted with her physical charms.

Charlie’s neatly-cropped natural blond hair complemented the silky-soft light tan of her delicate skin, accentuating her bright-blue ever-so-slightly cross-eyed look, and a tiny heart-shaped birthmark on the left of her slender neck captivated those close enough to observe. Sixteen-year-old Charlie had clearly inherited her mother’s beauty and much of her absent father’s impressive athletic build. However, so preoccupied was she with adding to the burgeoning collection of paraphernalia that was taking over her room, that she seemed not to be aware of her allure, nor the effect she had on people around her, particularly Leroy Baker, the young male volunteer, who now manoeuvered into the deepest recesses of his hideout in order to conceal his excitement.

Charlie paused immediately adjacent to an enormous, clumsy-looking, 1930s display cabinet. Inside, an assortment of tacky ornaments, mostly of fairground quality, gathered dust. This ugly duckling of the cabinet maker’s repertoire had clearly adorned someone’s living room prior to arrival at Bundles Charity Emporium, presumably having been sacrificed by its owner in favour of something less conspicuous. But it was not the cabinet maker’s lack of discretion that attracted Charlie’s attention, reviving her flagging interest in a flash, but rather a seemingly impossible occurrence, the likes of which she had never experienced . . .

On the top shelf of the cabinet was a pair of chipped vases, on the bottom shelf an assortment of unloved stuffed toys. However, it was the peculiar looking snowstorm wedged in between a volume of dusty old books on the middle shelf that caused her eyes to pop out of their sockets. It was not so much the snowstorm, but the curious building inside it, that caught Charlie off guard. Now, Charlie was not easily fooled. However, on this occasion, she was convinced that she had caught a glimpse of light twinkling from within the curious building.

Sadly, with no money in her pocket and only a limited amount coming in each week, thanks to the child-minding activities her mother had secured for her, Charlie Palmer was in no position to barter for anything new, least of all an object so valuable that it was under lock and key in the display cabinet of a charity shop. And yet there was no way Charlie was going to allow this curious piece to escape her clutches, it was as if her initials were engraved on it.

How much is that, please? she enquired, pointing to the little snowstorm in the display cabinet.

Mesmerizing, isn’t it? croaked the anaemic old lady behind the counter. It’s not the kind of item you’d expect to find in a place like this. As a matter of fact, it’s really rather special, a genuine bargain too - it’s all yours for one pound! Would you like me to wrap it up for you, dear? I’m sure it’ll fit in nicely with the other knick knacks you’ve got at home.

That would be fantastic, said Charlie, unable to take her eyes off the old woman or the item. But, unfortunately, I have no cash on me at the moment.

In that case, I’ll keep it under the counter for you, dear. You’ll soon find the money. The old woman removed