Paddington Novels 1-3

his glasses and stared. “You know,” he said, “I do believe it was!”
    “I bet all the cards are the same,” whispered Mr Brown to his wife.
    “Ssh!” said Mrs Brown. “I thought he did it very well.”
    “This is the difficult bit,” said Paddington, tearing it up. “I’m not very sure about this part.” He put the pieces under his handkerchief and tapped them several times with the wand.
    “Oh!” said Mr Gruber, rubbing the side of his head. “I felt something go pop in my ear just then. Something cold and hard.” He felt in his ear. “Why I do believe…” He held up a shining round object to the audience. “It’s a sovereign! My birthday present for Paddington! Now I wonder how it got in there?”

    “Oooh!” said Paddington, as he proudly examined it. “I didn’t expect that. Thank you very much, Mr Gruber.”
    “Well,” said Mr Gruber. “It’s only a small present I’m afraid, Mr Brown. But I’ve enjoyed the little chats we’ve had in the mornings. I look forward to them very much and, er,” he cleared his throat and looked around, “I’m sure we all hope you have many more birthdays!”
    When the chorus of agreement had died down, Mr Brown rose and looked at the clock. “And now,” he said, “it’s long past all our bedtimes, most of all yours, Paddington, so I suggest we all do a disappearing trick now.”
    “I wish,” said Paddington, as he stood at the door waving everyone goodbye, “I wish my Aunt Lucy could see me now. She’d feel very pleased.”
    “You’ll have to write and tell her all about it, Paddington,” said Mrs Brown, as she took his paw. “But in the morning,” she added hastily. “You’ve got clean sheets, remember.”
    “Yes,” said Paddington. “In the morning. I expect if I did it now I’d get ink over the sheets or something. Things are always happening to me.”
    “You know, Henry,” said Mrs Brown, as they watched Paddington go up the stairs to bed, looking rather sticky and more than a little sleepy, “it’s nice having a bear about the house.”

Postscript
    A Bear Called Paddington didn’t begin life as a book. The opening paragraph was simply an early-morning doodle brought on by the certain knowledge that if I didn’t put something down on the blank sheet of paper in my typewriter nobody else would.
    However, it caught my fancy, so I wrote a second paragraph, then a third, until by the end of the day I had completed a whole story.
    The source of my inspiration was a toy bear sitting on the mantelpiece of our one-room flat near London’s Portobello market. I had bought it in desperation the previous Christmas Eve as a stocking-filler for my wife, and we called him Paddington because I had always liked the sound of it and names are important, particularly if you are a bear and don’t have very much else in the world.
    In no time at all he became part of the family. In fact, for a long time he was the family and was treated as such; joining us at meal times, sharing our holidays, occasionally interrupting our conversations.
    Ten working days later, having completed seven more stories, I realised I had a book on my hands. It hadn’t been written with any particular age group in mind, which was fortunate, because until then I had always written for adults and if I had consciously aimed at a young audience I might have ‘written down’, which is always a bad idea. Anyway, I agree with Gertrude Stein: a book is a book is a book, and it should be enjoyable on all levels.
    It was lucky, too, that I picked on a bear for my doodling. The late Peter Bull, actor and arctophile, once said that whereas dolls are always wondering what they are going to wear next, you never know quite what bears are thinking, and he was right. You feel you can trust them with your secrets and they won’t pass them on. Another thing about bears is that one perceives them in the wild lumbering around on two legs, so they are already halfway to being human.
    The first book in a series is always the most fun to write. The world is your oyster and you can go wherever your fancy takes you. However, at the same time you build in certain parameters which are therefor all time. Although Paddington’s adventures take place in the present, I always picture him going home at the end of the day to the rather safer pre-war world which I remember from my childhood.
    I don’t think they ever realised it, but my parents served as role models for Mr and Mrs Brown.