Edi found himself lying uncomfortably on a bag of potatoes with a piece of rhubarb stuck in his ear. There was no way he could make himself more comfortable, for being a toy bear he was subject to the universal law that no toy could move or talk whilst within the sight of a human. Up until just a few minutes earlier Edi had been sitting comfortably on a table in Jack’s dressing room. Jack was a young boy actor who was appearing in a play at Edinburgh’s Theatre Royal and Edi had been his mascot and companion for over five years.
A lady from Jack's agent's office had called in to have a chat with him about the role he would be playing in his next show. When she got up to leave she had accidentally knocked Edi off the table with the hem of her long red coat. He had fallen straight into her shopping bag and none of the humans had noticed, so nobody came to his rescue.
Suddenly the shopping bag was snatched from the floor as the lady shouted a quick goodbye and rushed out of the room. She ran down the corridor and within seconds had passed through the stage door and out into the darkness. Edi felt a rush of cold air flowing into the shopping bag as the lady ran along the pavement. The bag was swinging from side to side and Edi found himself being bounced about in all directions. One minute he was on his back, the next on his tummy, then standing on his head and finally he was once again on his back, this time with a large carrot lying on top of him.
He became more and more worried the farther the lady ran. How would he ever find his way back to Jack? What would Jack think when he discovered he wasn't in his usual place? Then he began to feel silly for he realised he had been worrying about nothing. The lady would eventually find him in her bag and when she did she would know where he had come from and return him to where he belonged. He probably wouldn't get back to Jack that night, but they were sure to be back together sometime the following day.
He wondered where the lady was going? Was she on her way home? Maybe she wouldn't find him until she went to put the vegetables into her kitchen cupboards. Perhaps she was going out for dinner and he and the bag would be left in a cloakroom while she ate her meal. She might even be going to do some more shopping, in which case he might get discovered sooner than he thought.
After a few more minutes the lady came to a stop. Edi could hear a crowd of people chatting about the cold night, how much rain there had been earlier that day and about their busy days at work. He could hear the sound of cars and trams passing by, so he knew they were still on the main road.
The lady started moving again and Edi lost hope of being found before she began her journey, for he assumed she was about to step onto a tram. It came as a surprise when he suddenly saw bright lights above him and felt warm air flowing into the bag. It seemed the lady had gone into some kind of building, a building still quite close to Jack! He began to believe that maybe there was still a chance of him being noticed and returned to Jack that evening.
"One please." Edi heard the lady say. A few seconds later she began running again and headed down a flight of stairs. Eventually they arrived in a darker part of the building, where Edi could hear the voices of a great many people chatting and laughing. The lady sat down on a seat and set her bag on the floor next to her feet. From inside the bag Edi was able to see the back of a chair, but no ordinary chair, it was a theatre seat! Maybe the lady had come to see Jack's show! Yes! Of course that was where they must be, they were back in Jack's own theatre!
Edi felt very relieved to be close to Jack once again. Although he was still trapped under a carrot, things did not seem quite so bad. As he lay looking at the ceiling, enjoying the magical sparkle coming from the lights above him, music began playing softly in the background. He was surprised to find that it was not the music he was familiar with from Jack's play, but nevertheless it sounded nice, so he listened to it with interest. A few minutes later the lights began to fade and the people became completely silent.
The music grew louder and more and more instruments joined in with the melody. Suddenly the shopping bag was knocked over by a man squeezing past the lady to get to his seat. It fell flat on the floor and the impact sent Edi and two tomatoes rolling out onto the carpet. Edi rolled along just a little bit, and ended up underneath the seat in front. The lady managed to catch one of the tomatoes, but as the floor was on a slope the other one kept rolling for quite a distance. While Edi lay motionless on the floor, he could see the runaway tomato rolling under the seats and between people's feet. It was brought to a sudden stop when someone stood on it and squashed it into the carpet.
Edi did not like lying on the dirty floor, but he had no option. He would have to remain there until all the humans had left and then he would make his way back to Jack's dressing room. As he listened to the music he began to pay more attention to his surroundings and what he saw shocked him. This could not be Jack's theatre! The carpet was not the same as the one at the Theatre Royal and the sounds he could now hear were definitely not from Jack's play. He couldn't imagine where he was and he began to feel worried again. What if the lady didn't see him lying on the floor? Even if she did, she wouldn't know that he had come from her shopping bag and she might not recognise him as Jack's bear! What if he was left here in this strange place, where nobody would know who he was or who he belonged to?
The music had now faded and the first actor began to speak. Edi tried to concentrate on what was being said, but he couldn't push the dreadful thought of losing Jack from his mind. Besides that, there was something strange about how the actors spoke, he couldn’t quite decide why, but it all sounded very unusual.
As he lay there trying to understand what was happening on the stage, his thoughts kept drifting back to Jack. What would he do when he discovered his little bear had gone? The two of them had been together ever since Jack had got his first acting job. Jack’s mother had spent many hours sewing together tiny pieces of material to make Edi's soft furry body and then many more hours making him a beautiful set of clothes. She dressed him in a kilt of green and blue tartan and added a tiny black sporran with little white tassels. Next she made him a white shirt with a bow tie and a long black frock coat. She finished off the outfit with an impressive top hat covered in black satin. Edi looked extremely smart and Jack was delighted when his mother presented the little bear to her son on the day he began rehearsals for his first show. Jack had called him Edi, because his first job had been in Edinburgh and so he took the first three letters of that city and gave them to his bear as a name.
From that day onwards Edi had gone all over the country with Jack to every theatre he ever worked in. At each theatre Jack would show him around the entire building on their first day and then position him in a place where he could watch the rehearsals. Once the play had opened Edi would live in the dressing room until the play ended and then he would go back home with Jack until the next time they had another theatre to go to.
Now here he was in a new theatre once again, but without Jack. Edi loved theatres, but it wasn't the same without Jack to share the experience. He was trying to enjoy listening to this strange show, but not only was he missing Jack, the show just didn't sound right. Perhaps it was because he could only listen to it and not watch it, but whatever the reason, it wasn't what he had expected.
Eventually the show came to an end and Edi was waiting to hear the audience applaud the actors as they took their bows, but there was no applause at all! The people simply started talking to each other, got up from their seats and began leaving the theatre. Edi was shocked, to not applaud the actors seemed extremely rude to him, but he didn't have time to think about it at that moment. He was watching the lady, she was standing up now and slowly putting on her coat. Edi was hoping she would see him when she stooped to pick up her bag, but she didn't. She just grabbed the bag, walked along the row of seats and made her way towards the door.
Edi had been left behind! Now he had no idea how he was going to find his way back to Jack. His only consolation was that he was not too far away from their theatre. The lady had only ran for a few minutes, she hadn't got into a car or a tram, so wherever he was he was still somewhere close to Jack.
There was nothing he could do yet, all the humans would have to leave the building before he'd be able to move and begin exploring this new theatre. Surely he would be able to find a way out and hopefully make his way back to the Theatre Royal in time for Jack coming to work tomorrow.
It took a very long time for all the humans to leave, but eventually Edi's little limbs came back to life and soon he was up on his feet and walking about. The lights had been switched off and the building was now in complete darkness, but as all toys can see in the dark this was not a problem for Edi.
He made his way along the row of seats and into the aisle of the stalls. It was then that he realised just how big this theatre was. In one direction he could see a door at the back which was an awfully long way away. In the other direction, almost as far away, he could see the orchestra pit and beyond that the beautiful golden curtain that hid the stage.
It all looked very pretty, but he had to find a way out, so he began his search by heading towards the doors at the back. When he got there, he found that they were either locked or too heavy for him to open. He continued around the entire stalls, trying every door he found. It took him over an hour to try them all and by the time he had finished he was exhausted and disappointed. Not one of them would open for him, so after all his efforts he was still trapped. He looked at the huge curtain and wished he could explore behind it, but there was no way he could get up there as there was a high barrier all the way around the orchestra pit.
He sat down in the middle of the aisle and wondered what he should do. If he were to stay in the open somebody would certainly find him in the morning, but he wasn’t sure yet if that was what he wanted to happen. If he was found, whoever found him would not know where he had come from. They would probably put him in a lost property box somewhere and that's where he would stay forever! Nobody would come looking for him because nobody would know where he was. His plan of getting out of the building and finding his way back to the Theatre Royal seemed to be faltering. It all sounded so easy, but now he was beginning to wonder if it was at all possible, when he couldn't even find a way out!
Edi looked around the auditorium one more time and thought again how huge the building was. Most of the theatres he had ever been to could fit into this one two or three times over! The thought made him think of Jack again and how he really wanted to get out of this strange theatre to find him. With new determination he continued searching the stalls, this time even more thoroughly.
After looking into every corner and under every seat, he eventually found a hole in the wall behind a radiator. It was a tight squeeze, but he managed to push himself through and discovered a tunnel leading off into the distance. He slowly began walking along the tunnel, following the pipe that led away from the radiator. At a few points there was not enough space for him to walk beside the pipe so he had to crawl along the top of it or squeeze himself through a tight hole when the pipe went through another wall. He was getting very dusty, but he tried not to worry too much about his clothes, finding a way out was more important.
While he was steadily following the radiator pipe, he noticed that there were other tunnels running off in various directions. He thought about exploring these too, but decided to follow just the one pipe at first to see where that would lead him.
After what seemed like hours he reached a tall void made from red bricks. There were lots of other pipes coming into this void from all directions and they disappeared through the brick wall. All the pipes, including his went through tiny holes, far too small for Edi to squeeze through. He began to look about for another way and eventually noticed a missing brick higher up on the wall. To reach it he had to climb on top of one of the pipes and make several attempts at jumping high enough to pull himself up to the hole. When he managed to pop his head through he felt warm air hit his face. With a bit more effort he pushed the rest of his body through and clambered down the other side into a cosy warm room.
In the corner stood two big red machines, each with piles of coal on the floor beside them. Edi recognised these as heating boilers for he had seen ones exactly the same in other theatres he had been to. The boilers were turned off, but there must still have been some hot coals inside them, as their metal frames were warm to touch.
Although sorry he had not yet found a way out, Edi was happy to have found such a lovely warm room. He was truly exhausted after his hours of exploring the auditorium and his long walk through the tunnels, so he decided that he would have a short rest before searching any farther.
He had a look around for a place to lie down and behind one of the boilers he found a large pile of rags. They were a bit dusty but seemed to be quite free of coal or oil, so he lay down in the middle of these and within seconds had fallen asleep. He only intended to rest for a short while, but the heat of the room made him feel so cosy and comfy that he couldn’t wake up. No matter how hard he tried, all he could do was sleep and sleep and sleep.