Gift of the Gab

by Morris Gleitzman

  I tried to stay on my feet but the metal thing kept coming and wet dirt was showering into my face and my feet slipped on stones and I fell onto my back and the thing came sliding down onto my chest.

  I waited to be crushed.

  I wasn’t.

  I’m trapped under it, but.

  In the moonlight I can see if s a metal cylinder about the size of the water heater we used to have over the bath. Before Claire and Erin came along and we got one outside.

  It’s so rusty I can’t tell what it is.

  It could even be a water heater.

  Or one of those big gas cylinders people use if they’ve got a lot of welding or barbecueing to do.

  It could be a million things. Give people a hole and they’ll dump anything.

  Anyway, I’m lying here, half covered in dirt, trapped under it.

  Luckily it’s still half in the trench wall, sort of balanced, so it’s not actually crushing my chest, just pinning me down. Trouble is, both my arms are buried so I can’t even try and shift it. And when I try and wriggle, the thing starts to slip and more bits of trench wall collapse.

  I’ve been here for about half an hour already.

  I could be here for days.

  I don’t care, but.

  When your mum’s dead and your dad’s ruined your life, where else is there to go?

  What’s that noise?

  It sounds like a vehicle bouncing across the paddock. Now it’s stuck in the mud. I can hear wheels spinning.

  The ambulance?

  The police?

  I don’t know if I want them to find me or not.

  Is juvenile remand centre worse than being trapped in a trench under a lump of rusty metal?

  Wait on, that voice, calling my name.

  It’s Mrs Bernard.

  Why does her voice do this to me? Make my guts tingle. Make my heart skip. Make me not want to be buried alive.

  I’ll whistle to attract her attention.

  My mouth’s too dry. Too much dirt in it.

  With my arms buried I can’t even clap.

  It’s not fair.

  Normally I can cope with not having a voice, even though it means I can’t yell and scream and roar at dopey policemen and rude TV cameramen and grouchy grandparents and suspected killers.

  But now I need one.

  I’m not asking for much. I don’t want to tell long complicated jokes. I don’t want to quote Shakespeare. I’m not asking for Mum’s gift of the gab. I just want to yell a couple of words.

  ‘I’m here.’

  Is that too much to ask, Dad?

  Now I’m crying again. Oh well, perhaps if I let the tears run into my mouth I’ll be able to whistle.

  Hang on.

  The mouth-organ.

  It’s in my coat pocket.

  If I can just get one hand free.

  The left one’s no good, it feels like it’s trapped under my bum. The right one’s better. I can move it under the dirt. Wriggle it into the pocket.

  Got it.

  Now, get the mouth-organ up to my mouth without causing another avalanche.

  Slowly.

  Hope this mouth-organ was specially made for war in the trenches. Hope it’s a special model with holes that don’t dog up with dirt.

  I’ll give them a suck just in case.

  I don’t feel up to the first half of ‘Waltzing Matilda’. I’ll just blow a note. And again. And again.

  I think Mrs Bernard’s heard it.

  Her voice is getting closer. I can see a torch beam flashing.

  There she is, peering over the edge of the trench. She’s calling down to me. She’s forgotten I don’t speak French.

  Even when I don’t understand a word, her voice makes the hairs on my neck stand up. Or it would do if they weren’t caked with mud.

  Wait on, she’s got people with her.

  A row of faces, concerned and anxious, staring down at me.

  Mr Didot.

  Mr and Mrs Rocher from the sausage shop.

  The woman in pink jeans.

  Jeez, I’ve never seen a group of nice people so desperate to help people with bits missing. Even if they’re detectives, they’re incredibly dedicated. It’s 3 a.m. It’s starting to rain. And now they’re climbing down into the trench.

  Please, go easy. If you start a mud slide, we’re all history.

  They’ve made it.

  Mrs Bernard didn’t stop talking all the way down, but at least she switched to English.

  ‘I blame myself, Rowena,’ she said. ‘I should have guessed you’d find out who the driver was.’

  I wish I could tell her not to be so hard on herself. But I’m still groping in my pocket with my free hand for my notebook.

  Mrs Rocher is unwrapping something and holding it out to me.

  It’s a slice of something with bits in it.

  Mr Rocher is reading from an English phrase book.

  ‘Boiled ship’s had yelly.’

  I think he means boiled sheep’s head jelly.

  I wish I hadn’t worked that out.

  Mr Rocher has just dropped the phrase book. He’s staring at the metal thing I’m lying under. He’s looking horrified. He’s yelling at Mrs Bernard. Perhaps it’s a bit of his old fridge and he’s just remembered he left some duck nostrils in it.

  They’re all staring at it.

  They all look horrifed.

  They’re all talking to me in French.

  I can tell from their hand-movements they don’t want me to move. Not even a tiny bit. I think Mr Rocher would prefer it if I didn’t even breathe.

  The woman in pink jeans is making a frantic call on her mobile phone.

  ‘Be brave, little Ro,’ Mrs Bernard is saying. ‘Help will be here soon.’

  The danger of a mud slide must be even worse than I can see from here.

  Mr Didot has got his notebook computer with him. He’s switching it on. He’s crouching down next to me. He wants me to read the screen.

  ‘Your dad’s going to be OK,’ it says. ‘I’ve had a reply from the top agricultural chemical lab in Sweden. They checked the amounts of spray your dad was told to use. The amounts were too high. He was told to use too much. It wasn’t his fault.’

  I’m struggling to digest this.

  I think it means that the salesman who sold Dad the spray lied to him about how much he should use.

  I think it means that.

  I’m finding it a bit hard to concentrate because I’m also watching Mrs Bernard and Mr Rocher’s hand-movements and I’ve just realised why they’re whispering so frantically to each other.

  The big rusty metal thing I’m lying under.

  It’s a bomb.

  Isn’t it amazing how a few seconds can change your life totally and completely for ever?

  A bomb can explode.

  A car can hit you.

  Somebody can tell you something.

  And from then on you’re never the same.

  I’ll never be the same, not after what Mrs Bernard has just told me.

  I thought what she told me about the bomb was mind-boggling enough.

  ‘It’s not a bomb,’ she said, stroking my cheek. ‘It’s a shell.’

  ‘What’s the difference?’ I typed one-handed on Mr Didot’s computer that he was kindly holding for me.

  ‘A bomb comes from a plane,’ she said. ‘A shell comes from a cannon.’

  I could tell there was more.

  Mrs Bernard took a deep breath.

  ‘This shell is from World War One,’ she continued. ‘It is more than eighty years old. It is very fragile. One tiny movement and boom. You must be very still.’

  I wished desperately she hadn’t used the word boom.

  It’s really hard to be very still when your whole body’s shaking.

  I typed on the computer with the tiniest finger movements I could.

  ‘Get out. Get to safety.’

  Then, because if they did get out this would be my last c
hance to write anything, I also typed, ‘If I die please bury me with my mum.’

  I needn’t have bothered.

  They didn’t get out to safety.

  They stayed where they were, looking at me with such care and concern.

  I didn’t understand.

  ‘Rowena,’ said Mrs Bernard softly, ‘you are with your mother here.’

  I understood that even less.

  ‘She is in all of us,’ Mrs Bernard went on.

  I thought I understood that. I thought she meant they remembered Mum fondly. I thought they were being sweet and kind and religious.

  Boy, was I wrong.

  I saw Mrs Bernard exchange glances with the others. Mr Rocher gave a small nod.

  Mrs Bernard turned back to me.

  ‘Your mother did a wonderful, generous thing,’ said Mrs Bernard. ‘Years before she was killed, she instructed that when she died, parts of her body could be given to people who needed them.’

  Mrs Bernard pointed to the small group standing around her.

  ‘We are the people who needed them,’ she said.

  I looked at her, trying to understand.

  ‘Twelve years ago Mr Rocher was almost dead from a heart disease,’ said Mrs Bernard gently. ‘His heart was finished. Then he was given your mother’s heart.’

  Mr Rocher gave me a small nod. I’d never seen so much love in the eyes of a bloke I wasn’t related to.

  Although, my spinning brain tried to tell me, in a way I was.

  I wasn’t listening to it.

  Mrs Bernard was speaking again.

  ‘Edith was blind,’ she said, pointing to the woman in pink jeans. ‘Then she was given your mother’s eyes.’

  I stared at Edith.

  She stared back at me, her eyes shining in the moonlight.

  Except they weren’t her eyes.

  ‘Mr Didot,’ continued Mrs Bernard, ‘was on a kidney machine. Then he was given your mother’s kidneys.’

  Mr Didot held up his computer.

  ‘Thank you,’ said the screen.

  I didn’t type ‘you’re welcome’. I was thinking of the party hats in the hospital.

  I felt a stab of pain in my chest and it wasn’t just the big lump of high explosive pressing on it.

  ‘And I . . .’ said Mrs Bernard. She stopped. Her eyes were full of tears. For a second she couldn’t speak. Then she did.

  ‘I had an accident,’ she said. ‘A child was drowning. I dived into the river. There was wire. My throat was damaged. Then I was given your mother’s voice.’

  For the first time I noticed the small scar on her neck.

  I stared at her, numb, for what could have been hours.

  At some point she reached out and stroked my face. ‘I was lucky,’ she said sadly. ‘My condition wasn’t as serious as yours. The operation was a big risk. Most fail. Mine was a success.’

  Suddenly feelings started swirling through my whole body.

  I wanted to kill them all.

  If you’d told me this morning that I’d want to kill people with bits of my mother in them, I wouldn’t have believed you.

  But I did.

  All I had to do was give the shell a thump.

  I probably didn’t even have to do that.

  My heart was probably thumping enough as it was.

  Then there was a yell from above us.

  ‘Hang on, Tonto.’

  A figure was tumbling down into the trench in a spray of dirt.

  Dad.

  ‘Don’t panic,’ he yelled. ‘I’ve got it.’

  Before anyone could move, he grabbed the shell and tried to wrestle it off me.

  Everyone panicked.

  Mrs Bernard yelled in French.

  I yelled in one-handed English.

  Dad wasn’t listening. He flung himself down next to me and wriggled into the dirt and tried to push the shell off me. He wasn’t very successful. The shell slipped further out of the trench wall, onto us both.

  Mrs Bernard and the others put their arms over their faces.

  The shell didn’t explode.

  I saw the veins next to Dad’s ears bulging. He was supporting the weight of the shell, stopping it from crushing us.

  It wasn’t a good time to say what I said next, but I couldn’t stop myself.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ I yelled at him tearfully with my free hand. It was flying about so furiously it almost bashed the shell. ‘Why didn’t you tell me about Mum’s bits?’

  Dad took a deep breath.

  He was silent for a while. I started to think he couldn’t speak because of the weight of the shell.

  He looked sadly at Mrs Bernard and the others. Then he looked back at me and sighed.

  ‘I was ashamed,’ he said quietly. ‘Ashamed I hadn’t saved all of her for you.’

  My heart stopped.

  Did he mean . . .?

  He couldn’t. When Mum died I was a small baby. Her throat bits would have been about eight sizes too big for me.

  ‘Mum wanted to give her body to help others,’ Dad was saying. ‘It was her wish. My wish was you’d think Mum was buried in Australia where you could feel close to her. All of her. For ever.’

  I understood.

  I shut my eyes.

  I remembered how close to her I’d always felt, sitting by her grave in Australia.

  My insides went warm, just thinking about it.

  Then I realised Dad was still speaking.

  ‘There’s another reason I didn’t tell you the truth about Mum,’ he was saying. ‘I . . . I didn’t want you to know it was my fault she was killed.’

  I turned my head towards Dad in the dirt.

  His face was very close to mine.

  I stared at him.

  He took another deep painful breath. Even though Mrs Bernard’s torch was getting a bit dim, I could see the tears in Dad’s eyes.

  ‘Mum brought me here to see my grandfather’s grave,’ he went on, ‘so I could understand why my dad’s such a ratbag. Him growing up without a dad and all. If Mum hadn’t been trying to help my dud family, she wouldn’t have been in France and she wouldn’t have been killed.’

  Over the years I’ve seen a lot of pain on Dad’s face, specially when I catch him watching me when he thinks I’m not looking, but I’ve never seen as much pain as I saw at that moment.

  I felt a stab in my chest. For a sec I thought the shell was slipping more. Then I realised it was a sob.

  I knew how he felt.

  All those years I’d thought Mum’s death had something to do with me being born.

  All those years me and Dad had been feeling the same thing and we hadn’t known it because we hadn’t told each other our side of the story.

  ‘Such a waste,’ Dad was saying. ‘Her lovely, lovely life wasted and it was my fault.’

  I reached out my free hand and put it on his cheek.

  Then I took it off so I could tell him.

  ‘Mum’s death wasn’t your fault,’ I said, moving my hand gently in front of his straining, tear-streaked face. ‘And it wasn’t a waste.’

  I looked up at Mrs Bernard, Mr and Mrs Rocher, Mr Didot and Edith, who were peering down at me, faces soft with care and concern.

  ‘That’s not a waste,’ I said, pointing to them.

  I was shocked I’d said it.

  But I meant it.

  Before I could get my breathing under control, I had another thought.

  What Mum wanted could still happen.

  Dad could still visit his grandfather’s grave. He could still have a chance to understand his dad’s side of the story.

  If we could get out from under this shell, Mum’s mission could still be successful. It wouldn’t have ended in vain.

  As I turned to Dad to tell him this, I had an incredible feeling.

  I was carrying on Mum’s mission.

  Which means I’ve got a part of Mum in me too.

  Dad was struggling again with the shell.

  ‘
Get off her, you mongrel,’ he grunted, veins bulging.

  I felt the weight lift from my chest and suddenly I was being dragged out from under the rough metal.

  Mrs Bernard pulled me to my feet and wrapped her arms round me and shielded me with her body.

  Well, the bits of it that are hers.

  Dad groaned and the shell dropped back onto his chest.

  The others put their arms over their faces again.

  The shell didn’t explode.

  ‘Get her somewhere safe,’ said Dad. ‘Now.’

  Before I could get my arms free to talk to him, Mrs Bernard started moving me away down the trench.

  Dad looked at me as I went. ‘I was wrong,’ he said. ‘I should have told you the truth about Mum. I stuffed it up.’

  I wriggled round in Mrs Bernard’s arms to face Dad. I still couldn’t get my hands free to reply. In the torchlight I noticed something gleaming in the dirt near his head.

  My guts gave a lurch.

  It was a skull.

  The skull of an old soldier.

  It could even be the skull of Dad’s grandfather.

  Dad saw it. He stared at it sadly.

  Then the shell started slipping further out of the trench wall. I wanted to throw myself back under it and stop him being crushed, but Mrs Bernard held me tight.

  Dad shifted his body and managed to stop it.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ he said through clenched teeth. ‘I’ve stuffed everything else up, I’m probably gunna stuff this up as well.’

  As Mrs Bernard pulled me away along the trench, my eyes were so full of tears I couldn’t see if Dad was speaking to me or the skull.

  Why’s it taking them so long?

  With the amount of gear they’ve got here, you’d think they’d have him out by now.

  If I was the French version of the State Emergency Service and I had cranes and scaffolding and generators and lights and an army of bomb-disposal experts in padded suits, I’d have had Dad out of there hours ago.

  OK, I know the shell’s so fragile that the slightest bump could blow him and them into the next country.

  And I know the edge of the trench is so crumbly that they have to reinforce it before they can get the crane close enough.

  And I know the shell’s slipped so far out that they daren’t try and get scaffolding in next to Dad in case the whole thing comes down on them.

  But I still reckon I’d have him out by now.