Richmal Crompton

“ Both made a grab at Twinkie-Luky, but Twinkie-Luky escaped both and flew like a dart down the road in the direction of Mr. Gorton’s. Like all real gentlemen, Twinkie-Luky preferred death to a scene. William was no coward, but even a braver man than William would have fled. William’s fleeing figure was already half-way down the road in which his home lay.
At the cross-roads Miss Amelia Blake and Miss Cliff clung to each other hysterically and sent forth shrill, discordant cries after the fleeing Twinkie-Luky. ”

“ William gazed in frozen horror.
“I hear that Omshafu has bitten most people this year,” said Miss Fairlow demurely.
Miss Euphemia pursued her lips disapprovingly. She was growing reckless with success. “I think there’s something dangerous in it,” she said.
“You mean its teeth?” said Miss Fairlow brightly.
There was a moment’s tense silence. A horrible suspicion occurred to Miss Euphemia that she was being trifled with. The Higher Thinkers looked helplessly first at her and then at Miss Fairlow. Then Miss Euphemia rose from the sofa with a piercing scream. ”

“ William’s mother and sister worked there all the morning. A tent had been erected, and inside the tent were a few select stalls of flowers and vegetables. Outside on the grass were the other stalls. The opening ceremony was to be performed by a real live duke.
William absented himself for the greater part of the morning, returning in time for lunch, and meekly offering himself to be cleaned and dressed afterwards like the proverbial lamb for the slaughter.
“William,” said Mrs. Brown to her husband, “is being almost too good to be true. It’s such a comfort.” ”

“ His sister, who was finding it difficult to whip up a loving sorrow for Bunker, while Bunker, mangy and alive, stared at her through the window, said nothing and William muttered: “All right—after tea—I’ll go after tea.”
He went after tea. He handed the basket to Mr. Gorton with an unblushing: “There was two really to be done—here’s the other.”
He stood oppressed by the thought of his crime, and waited the return of his basket. He had even lost interest in Mr. Gorton’s wonderland. When the parrot screamed, “Go away, you ass, go away,” he replied huffily, “Go away yourself.” ”

“ He also came to the conclusion that he was going to like her. William generally got on well with timid people. He was not timid himself. He was small and freckled and solemn and possessed of great tenacity of purpose for his eleven years.
Miss Tabitha, happening to look up from the débris of a small table which one of the removers had carelessly and gracefully crushed against the wall, saw a boy perched on her wall, scowling at her. She did not know that the scowl was William’s ordinary normal expression. She smiled apologetically. ”

“ Ancient Britons in various stages of skins and woad and grease paint stood about the room or leap-frogged over each other’s backs or wrestled with each other in corners. William espied a particular enemy at the other end of the room. He put his head through the window.
“Hello, Monkey Brand,” he called in his strident, devastating voice.
Miss Carter, mistress of the Second Form, raised herself wearily from arranging the skin of an infant Ancient Briton.
“I wish you wouldn’t,” she began testily, then, her voice sinking into hopelessness, “Oh, it’s William Brown.” ”

“ He believed that children should be led, not driven, that their little hearts should be won by kindness, that their innocent curiosity should always be promptly satisfied. He believed that children trailed clouds of glory. He knew very few. He certainly did not know William.
Mr. Bennison had met Ethel, William’s sister, while she was staying with an aunt. Ethel possessed blue eyes and a riot of auburn hair of which William was ashamed. He considered that red hair was quite inconsistent with beauty. He found that most young men who met Ethel did not share that opinion. ”

“ You ought to take something cooling, and then lie down for a few hours.”
“You don’t understand,” said Robert desperately. “It’s life or death to civilisation. You see, we’re all human beings, and all equal, and we’ve got equal rights, and yet some have all the things, and some have none. You see, we thought we’d all start at home and get things made more fair there, and our fathers to divide up the money more fairly and give us our real share, and then we could go round teaching other people to give things up to other people and share things out more fairly. ”

“ At the first throw she shook her hat crooked, at the second she shook a tail of hair down, at the third she shook off her spectacles. The third ball went wider of the mark than all the others, and hit a young man on the shoulder. Seeing Aunt Jane, however, he only smiled. She demanded another two-pennyworth. The bystanders cheered her loudly. The crowd round the cocoanut-shy stall grew. People from afar thought it was an accident, and crowded up to watch. Then they saw Aunt Jane and stayed.
At last, after her sixth shot, Aunt Jane, flushed and panting and dishevelled, turned to William. ”

“ She paid for William and Douglas, and Henry, and Ginger, and herself, and mounted a giant cock. It began. She clung on for dear life. It went faster and faster. There came a gleam into her eyes, a smile of rapture to her lips. Again the crowd gathered to watch her. She looked at the people as the roundabout slowed down.
“How happy they all look,” she said innocently. “It’s—it’s quite a pleasant motion, isn’t it? It seems a pity to get off.” ”

“ Later in the morning, William brought Omshafu over to visit Miss Fairlow. It escaped, and Miss Fairlow pursued it up her front stairs and down her back ones, and finally captured it. Omshafu rewarded her by biting her finger. William was apologetic.
“I daresay it just didn’t like the look of me,” said Miss Fairlow sadly.
“Oh, no,” William hastened to reassure her; “it’s bit heaps of people this year—it bites people it likes. I don’t see why it shun’t be an insect, anyway, do you?” ”

“ William adjusted his mask, which was not a very good fit, and performed the sinister smile.
“We gotter kidnap someone first,” he said.
“Well, who?” said Ginger.
“Someone who can pay us money for ’em.”
“Well, who?” said Ginger irritably.
William took a deep draught of liquorice water.
“Well, you can think of someone.”
“I like that,” said Ginger, in tones of deep dissatisfaction. “I like that. You set up to be captain and wear that thing, and drink up all the liquorice water——”
“Grog,” William corrected him, wearily.
“Well, grog, an’ then you don’t know who we’ve gotter kidnap. I like that. ”

“ They gazed at the stairs from the open doorway. “They’ll be upstairs,” said William in a hoarse whisper; “clothes are always upstairs. Now, come very quietly. Creep upstairs.”
Ginger followed him loyally, fearfully, reluctantly, and they went upstairs. Every time Ginger hit a stair rod, or made a stair creak, William turned round with a stern and resonant “Sh!” At last they reached the landing. William cautiously opened the door and peeped within. It was a bedroom, and it was empty.
“Come on,” whispered William, with the cheerfulness of the born optimist. “They’re sure to be here.” ”

“ William was watching them with a perfectly expressionless face.
“Never mind,” he said. “It doesn’t matter what happens to-day. It’s extra.”
“We must keep the boy,” said Augustus, “till we have made inquiries.”
“Then he must be washed,” said Sophia firmly, “and those dreadful clothes must be fumigated.”
William submitted to the humiliating process of being washed by a buxom servant. He noticed, with misgiving, that his birthmark disappeared in the process. He resisted all attempts on the part of the maid-servant at intimate conversation. ”

“ Brown persuasively.
“Huh!” ejaculated William.
The monosyllable looks weak and meaningless in print. As William pronounced it, it was pregnant with scorn and derision and sinister meaning. He curled imaginary moustachios as he uttered it. He looked round upon his assembled family. Then he uttered the monosyllable again with a yet more sinister smile and scowl. He wondered if Rudolph of the Red Hand had a mother who tried to make him go out to tea. He decided that he probably hadn’t. Life would be much simpler if you hadn’t. ”

“ William asked for a day in which to choose the treat. He discussed it with his friends.
“Well,” advised Ginger, “you jolly well oughter choose something she can’t muck up like when my aunt took me to a messy ole museum and showed me stones and things—no animals nor nuffin’.”
“What about the Zoo?” said Henry.
The Zoo was suggested to Great-Aunt Jane, but she shuddered slightly. “I don’t think I could,” she said. “It’s so dangerous, I always feel. Those bars look so fragile. I should never forgive myself if little William were mangled by wild beasts when in my care.” ”

“ Some had pipes, some had blue noses, some black eyes, some giant spectacles, some comic head-dresses. Some had received more attention than others. Aunt Julia, “a most saintly woman,” positively leered from her “cabinet,” with a huge nose, and a black eye, and a cigar in her mouth. The album was handed from one to another. An unwonted hilarity and vivacity reigned supreme—and always there were crowds round the album.
Mrs. Adolphus Crane was surprised, but vaguely flattered. Her party seemed more successful than usual. People seemed to be taking quite a lot of notice of William, too. ”

“ Helbert merely stared at him.
“Would they take me?” went on William, nodding his head in the direction of the caravans. “I’d soon learn to be a gipsy. I’d do all they told me. I’ve always wanted to be a gipsy—next to a Red Indian and a pirate, and there don’t seem to be any Red Indians or pirates in this country.”
Helbert once more merely stared at him. William’s hopes sank.
“I’ve not got any gipsy clothes,” he said, “but p’raps they’d give me some.”
Enviously William looked at Helbert’s ragged jersey and knickers and bare feet. Enviously Helbert looked at William’s suit. ”

“ THERE was quite a flutter in the village when the d’Arceys came to the Grange. A branch of the d’Arcey family, you know. Lord d’Arcey and Lady d’Arcey and Lady Barbara d’Arcey. Lady Barbara was seven years of age. She was fair, frilly, fascinating. Lady d’Arcey engaged a dancing-master to come down from London once a week to teach her dancing. They invited several of the children of the village to join. They invited William. His mother was delighted, but William—freckled, untidy, and seldom clean—was horrified to the depth of his soul. ”

“ Meanwhile William sat beneath a tree in the wood in an attitude of utter despondency, his head on his paws.
“Why didn’t you tell them,” said Goldilocks impatiently.
“I tell everyone,” said William. “Nobody’ll listen to me. They make a noise and throw things. ”

“ Adolphus Crane was rich and immensely respectable—the last person whom Fate should have selected as his godmother. Fortunately, she lived at a distance, and so was spared the horrible spectacle of William’s daily crimes. ”

“ William was very clever at not understanding [Pg 219] Compound Interest. He had an excellent repertoire of intelligent questions about Compound Interest. At school he could, for a consideration, “play” the Mathematics master on Compound Interest for an entire lesson while his friends amused themselves in their own way in the desks behind.
Mr. Bennison’s eloquence was somewhat lacking in lucidity and inspiration this time, but he struggled gallantly to clear the mists of William’s ignorance. At times the earnestness of William’s expression touched him. ”

“ BUNKER, the old black cat, had been an inhabitant of William’s home ever since he could remember. Bunker officially belonged to Ethel, William’s sister, but he bestowed his presence impartially on every family in the neighbourhood. He frequently haunted the next door garden, where lived another black cat, a petted darling named Luke, belonging to Miss Amelia Blake.
William treated all cats with supreme contempt. ”

“ William and Ginger had to climb down, pale and rather unsteady. Henry and Douglas followed their example the next time it stopped. But still Aunt Jane stayed on, smiling blissfully, her hat dangling over one ear. And still the crowd at the roundabout grew. The rest of the fair ground was comparatively empty. All the fun of the fair was centred on Aunt Jane.
At last she descended from her mount and joined the rather depressed-looking group of boys who were her escort.
[Pg 82]
“It’s curious,” she said, “how much pleasanter is a circular motion than a straight one. ”

“ He held meetings of his Branch under the laurel bushes in the garden, and made eloquent speeches to an audience consisting of a few depressed daffodil roots, and sometimes the cat from next door.
“All gotter be equal,” he pronounced fiercely, “all gotter have lots of money. All ’uman beings. That’s sense, isn’t it? Is it sense or isn’t it?”
The cat from next door scratched its ear and slowly winked.
“Well, then,” said William, “someone ought to do somethin’.”
The Society of Advanced Bolshevists met next month in Robert’s room. William had left nothing to chance. ”

“ It had been the sensation of the week to William and his friends. For it sold everything a halfpenny cheaper than Mr. Moss.
It revolutionised the finances of the Outlaws. The Outlaws was the secret society which comprised William and his friends Ginger, Henry, and Douglas. Jumble, William’s disreputable mongrel, was its mascot.
The Outlaws patronised Mallards’ generously on the first Saturday of its career. William spent his whole threepence there on separate halfpennyworths. He insisted on the halfpennyworths. He said firmly that Mr. Moss always let him have halfpennyworths. ”

“ Ginger, who had decidedly had the worst of the battle, was removing dust and twigs from his mouth. He gave a non-committal grunt.
“Well, you know the Sale of Work next week?” went on William. They groaned. It was a ceremony to which each of the company would be led, brushed and [Pg 133] combed and dressed in gala clothes, in a proud parent’s wake.
“Well,” went on William. “You jus’ listen carefully. I got an idea.”
They leant forward eagerly. They had a touching faith in William’s ideas that no amount of bitter experiences seemed able to destroy. ”