A Girl Called Blue by Marita Conlon-Mckenna Page B

so.’
    ‘Well, everybody’s different, Bernadette. When you get older you’ll realise that.’
    ‘Sister Regina said I was a savage.’
    Sister Monica laughed. ‘Well, she would think that. Sister Regina has never had the good fortune to leave our native shores or see much beyond the walls of this convent. She has never felt the hot sun on her skin or heard the pounding of jungle drums or an elephant stampede. So it is hard for her to understand these things.’
    Blue could have hugged the old nun, her wizened monkey-face wise and full of love for mankind.
    ‘Be a good girl, now,’ said Sister Monica, ‘and reach up and pass me the cocoa tin from the top shelf there.’
    Blue stood up and passed down the yellow and red tin.
    ‘Perhaps I’ll have one myself,’ pondered the nun as she prised open the lid with a spoon. ‘Would you like one too?’
    Blue hesitated. She had never tasted hot cocoa before.
    ‘Yes, please, Sister.’
    She watched as the nun added more milk to the pan and then stirred in three large spoons of the chocolate-coloured powder.‘The trick is not to let it boil over.’
    A few minutes later Blue was holding a large mug of the sweet, warm, chocolate drink, savouring each mouthful slowly, with Sister Monica sitting opposite her.
    ‘Did you see the ladies’ expressions when you gave them your best African whoop?’ the nun laughed. ‘It did my heart good to see those ladies and the rest of the sisters here jump. They didn’t know what to make of you. Little Bo Peep and a bunny rabbit are much safer options for those judges.’
    Somehow, sitting there, talking and laughing about it, the day didn’t seem so bad after all, and Blue went to bed feeling less downhearted. Molly waited up to show her the skipping rope she had won as a prize.

CHAPTER 13
Pictures
    But the next night the yellow magazine was gone. Blue searched high and low for it, even taking her mattress off the bed just in case it had slipped under it or into the bed springs. But there was no sign of it. It was gone!
    ‘Molly, did you see my book?’ she asked anxiously.
    ‘Book?’
    ‘My book with the yellow cover, the one I always read.’
    Molly shook her head.
    ‘Molly, I won’t be cross if you borrowed it or pretended it was yours for a while once you give it back to me.’ She tried to keep the panic from her voice, not wanting to make the little girl even more nervous.
    ‘I don’t have it, Blue. Honest I don’t.’
    ‘Did you see it?’
    ‘No.’
    Molly was telling the truth.
    She went around the room from bed to bed asking everyone about her National Geographic , desperate to ascertain which of the girls had stolen it.
    ‘Are you sure you didn’t see it?’ she asked over and over again.
    Even Joan and her friends seemed to have no knowledge of what had happened to her most prized possession.
    ‘I have to find it!’ she screamed at the rest of the girls. ‘I need it. It’s mine!’
    Lil and Mary and Jess reassured her that it would definitely turn up.
    Molly sat on Blue’s bed, watching her get undressed. Over and over again, Blue was replaying in her mind what could have happened. Mary and Jess had asked in all the other dormitories if anyone had seen it and so far nobody admitted knowing anything about it. It was a mystery and Blue intended to solve it. She hoped that Sister Regina hadn’t somehow discovered it.
    ‘Molly, will you go and get into bed. I’m too tired to tell you a story tonight.’
    ‘Why are you so sad?’ Molly asked.
    Blue pulled on her nightdress. ‘That book is very special to me,’ she explained.
    ‘Why?’ asked the little girl.
    ‘Because,’ Blue was getting tearful, ‘because when I read my book it makes me think of different things, things you wouldn’t understand yet because you’re too young. I’m afraid that without the pictures, without my book, I’ll forget them’
    ‘You won’t forget, silly,’ teased Molly, curling up in bed. ‘I never forget my mammy. I