Ornate eagle head design in coloured pen

The eagle came back from the framers in Whitby on Tuesday, and I have hung it in the hall where the coats go, because Mum says it frightens the vicar. You will remember it: Grandad's bird, the one he spent a whole winter on with those little black pens he bought off a man who sold sextants. Every feather is dotted. Not drawn, dotted, one speck at a time, so that from the door it seems to shimmer when the kettle steams up the glass.

I counted the feathers last night when I couldn't sleep. Four hundred and twelve before I gave up at the crest, though I think I missed some, because he was always adding little scallops in the margins where he'd changed his mind. The pinks went on first, then the gold, then the grey-teal he mixed from two pencils and a bit of spit. He said the eye was the hardest part. You have to leave a white spark in it or the bird looks dead, and a dead-looking eagle is worse than no eagle at all.

Here is the bit I wanted to tell you. Tucked in the back of the sketchbook I found a page torn from the Marigold's galley log, the one you wrote about, with the cook's stores list pinned beneath it. Cocoa, tins of peaches, a sack of onions gone soft. Under the list, in his square hand: Tell Tom the beak is the honest part. Everything else is just decoration. I don't know what he meant, and I suspect he didn't either, but I've decided you should find out.

Your loving sister, Nell