William

by Richmal Crompton

  ‘Father,’ he said brightly, ‘I expect you used to have a jolly good time when you was a boy, didn’t you?’

  ‘Uh?’ said his father without looking up from the paper.

  ‘I say, I expect you used to have a jolly good time when you was a boy, di’n’ you?’

  ‘Were a boy,’ said Mr Brown absently. ‘You were a boy. I was a boy.’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ said William patiently, ‘that’s jus’ what I’m tryin’ to talk about. About when you was a boy.’

  Mr Brown groaned but said nothing.

  William tried again.

  ‘I expect you used to have a jolly good time,’ he said.

  ‘Uh?’ said his father again, absently turning over a page of his paper.

  ‘I say I expect you used to have a jolly good time when you was a boy.’

  Mr Brown, who was once more lost in the financial news, emerged from it again, vaguely aware that someone was addressing him.

  ‘What did you say?’ he said irritably.

  ‘I say I expect you used to have a jolly good time when you were – was a boy.’

  ‘I thought you’d said that once,’ said Mr Brown.

  ‘Yes,’ said William, ‘I did. I was – I was jus’ sayin’ it again.’

  ‘What do you want?’ said Mr Brown shortly.

  ‘Fireworks,’ said William, abandoning finesse.

  ‘Well,’ said Mr Brown with a simplicity as beautiful as his son’s, ‘you won’t get any out of me. Or out of anyone else if I can help it. When I remember—’

  At this point William, rightly suspecting that a highly coloured description of his abortive career as a firework manufacturer was about to follow, crept from the room.

  He met the other Outlaws in the old barn.

  ‘Wasn’t any good with mine,’ he said morosely. ‘Simply no good at all. He jus’ started rememberin’ that time when they gave us the wrong sort of gunpowder. Jus’ as if it’d been our faults.’

  ‘So did mine,’ said Henry.

  ‘So did mine,’ said Douglas.

  ‘So did mine,’ said Ginger.

  ‘I hope,’ said Ginger sadly, ‘that it won’t come to jus’ tryin’ to watch ole Colonel Masters, same as it has done some years.’

  Colonel Masters was a choleric old gentleman who lived with his sister at the other end of the village. Every November he had an elaborate firework display to which he invited a small band of his intimate friends, among whom he did not include the Outlaws. Moreover, he disliked the Outlaws and strongly objected to them as uninvited spectators. The back garden where his firework display was always held was surrounded by a high wall, and during his firework display he always kept a hose in readiness for any small boys’ heads that might appear above it. The Outlaws had been dislodged from posts of vantage by this means on several occasions.

  ‘Yes,’ said William gloomily, ‘an’ get nee’ly drowned an’ then have our mothers goin’ on as if it was our fault. An’ not see anythin’ at that. No, this year we’re jolly well goin’ to have a firework show of our own. At least we are if I know anything about it.’

  So very impressive did William sound that for a moment the Outlaws felt as if the whole thing were settled, down to the smallest detail. Then Ginger said:

  ‘How’re we goin’ to get ’em?’

  ‘That’s what we’ve gotter decide now,’ said William.

  ‘I know,’ said Ginger suddenly. ‘My aunt. She’s coming to stay with us. She’s goin’ home the day before firework day. She always gives me five shillin’s.’

  The Outlaws turned cartwheels exultantly in the middle of the road.

  ‘There,’ said William, sitting up panting and covered with dust on the spot where he had overbalanced, ‘I knew we’d hit on somethin’.’

  ‘It’s my aunt,’ said Ginger, thinking that due importance was not being given to him as originator of the suggestion.

  ‘Yes, an’ if it’s the one what wears the feather thing round her neck you can keep her,’ said William.

  Ginger assumed a truculent attitude and expression, then, as if thinking that his aunt was not really worth fighting for, pretended that he had not heard.

  ‘Well, that’s all right then,’ said William, disappointed of a scrap with Ginger, but cheered at the thought of the fireworks that were to be bought with Ginger’s aunt’s five shillings. ‘We’ll wait till the day before when Ginger’s aunt gives him his five shillin’s an’ then we’ll buy ’em. We can get a jolly good lot for five shillin’s. I bet we can get some of all the sorts in the world for five shillin’s. An’ we’ll wait till nearer the time to see who’s been worst to us before we fix on who we’ll have for a guy.’

  They watched Colonel Masters with interest during the days that followed. The thought of his firework display fascinated them. They were convinced that their own display would be superior to it in every way and yet they were consumed with curiosity to see what his was to be like. They dogged his footsteps as he went to and fro in the village – a conspicuous figure in his grey bowler hat and brown overcoat. They followed him whenever he set forth from his gate, hoping that he was going to the village shop to buy his fireworks. They began to feel that it was absolutely imperative that they should know what fireworks Colonel Masters was having, in order to surpass them. There was, they felt, nothing in the world in the way of fireworks that couldn’t be bought for five shillings. They even had glorious visions of Colonel Masters creeping near to watch their display and their turning the hosepipe on to him. It was, of course, useless to approach him directly and ask him what fireworks he was going to have. He possessed an excessively military temper and went purple at the mere sight of the Outlaws. He had first made their acquaintance in his orchard, and had met them subsequently on several occasions in his strawberry beds. So terrible had he been on those occasions that they fled him now on sight, following him very discreetly on his expeditions to the village and scattering whenever he turned round. His sister – a little old lady as mild as he was choleric – lived with him and kept house for him. She was of a nervous temperament and spent her life cherishing him. She was easier to approach, of course, than her brother, but she was uncommunicative. She refused to enter into conversation with the Outlaws. All she would say to them was, ‘Go away, you naughty little boys. I know all about you. Go away.’

  The Outlaws’ spirits rose, however, when they heard that she was going to tea with William’s mother. William promised to put in an appearance at tea-time and bring back full particulars of the Colonel’s fireworks.

  William did not usually take tea with his mother when she was entertaining visitors and she was as surprised as her visitor when William – a radiant vision of cleanliness and neatness (it had taken him nearly an hour to effect the miracle) and wearing his smuggest expression – entered the drawing-room at tea-time and began to hand round the cakes. So amazed were they that a dead silence fell upon them and they gazed at him helplessly. William took this as a silence of admiration, and the smugness of his expression deepened. He handed the cake-stand to the visitor with a courtly bow, fell over the hearthrug, upset the sugar, and then, choosing the largest bun within his range of vision, returned with it to the corner of the room to listen to the conversation. His mother and his mother’s visitor gradually recovered from their paralysis and continued the conversation where it had been ruthlessly cut off by William’s spectacular appearance. The conversation lacked its pristine verve and ever and anon they threw helpless glances at William, who sat smug and clean and shining in his corner munching his bun. His mother was hoping that the visitor would think that William always looked like this, and the visitor was wondering whether this was some member of the family that she’d never seen before. She was rather short-sighted, but she thought that he bore a strong family resemblance to the dirty little boy who’d annoyed her brother so much by trespassing in his garden. That reminded her of her brother and she began to talk about him again. She seldom talked about anything
else for long.

  ‘I’m so nervous about it all,’ she said plaintively. ‘I think that these firework displays are so dangerous. One reads of such terrible things in the newspapers. But he will have them – every year – though I beg him not to. You’ve no idea what I go through beforehand. After all, the things are made of gunpowder, and it’s a notorious fact that gunpowder is highly explosive. One of those Catherine wheels and things can do untold damage. Just a slight flaw in the manufacture and hundreds of people may be killed. Gunpowder, you know. I tell them so. I beg him every year not to have them, but he takes no notice of me.’

  The highly-polished figure of William spoke ingratiatingly and in its best company voice from its corner.

  ‘Has he got his fireworks yet?’ it said.

  Miss Masters turned her short-sighted eyes vaguely in his direction.

  ‘Yes,’ she said despondently, ‘I’m afraid he has. In spite of all I’ve said to him I’m afraid he has. He’s got them from Tanks’ in London. I’ve refused to have them in the house, though. He’s keeping them in the shed at the bottom of the garden.’

  Then the conversation tailed off to the rummage sale that Mrs Brown was getting up and to which Miss Masters had promised to send an old hat and coat of her brother’s, and while that was going on the sleek and radiant figure of William was seen to creep quietly from the room. A close observer might have noticed that its pockets now bulged considerably where it had, with a deftness acquired by long practice, unobtrusively secreted cakes for the other Outlaws.

  ‘What a nice little boy,’ said Miss Masters when the door had closed on him.

  ‘Y-yes,’ said William’s mother uncertainly. She was wondering helplessly why William had come and where he had gone.

  Outside in the road William distributed his largesse, then turned head over heels in the dust several times in order to rid himself of the revolting and unfamiliar feeling of spruceness.

  ‘Well,’ said the Outlaws indistinctly from behind half-masticated buns, ‘did you find anything out?’

  ‘Yes,’ said William triumphantly as, still sitting in the dust, he carefully stroked his hair up the wrong way. ‘Yes, I did too. I found out that he’s gottem from London an’ that they’re in the shed at the bottom of the garden.’

  The Outlaws hastily swallowed what remained of their buns and stood up. ‘Come on,’ said Ginger succinctly, ‘let’s go ’n’ have a look at them.’

  The inside of the shed was plainly visible from the top of the garden wall. Balanced precariously upon the top of the wall the Outlaws craned their necks to see through the little window.

  ‘I can see a box of catherine wheels,’ chanted William.

  ‘I can see a box of rockets,’ said Ginger.

  ‘I can see some Roman candles,’ said Douglas.

  But what they didn’t see was the figure of Colonel Masters, who had espied and recognised them from afar, creeping up behind the shed with his garden hose. They didn’t see it, in fact, till the stream of water hit them full and square on the face and dislodged them precipitately into the road below. For some time they sat there, gasping and spluttering, bereft of the power of speech. Then William, damp but impressive, said slowly, ‘Well, that settles it. There isn’t any doubt about it at all now. We’re goin’ to have him for our guy.’

  They separated their several ways homewards, each intent upon the problem of how to enter his home unseen.

  William thought that he had succeeded. He reached his bedroom door without meeting anyone, but with the usual perversity of fate met his mother there just as he was thinking himself safe. She was carrying a brown overcoat and a grey bowler hat.

  ‘William!’ she gasped.

  But William’s eyes were fixed upon the hat and coat.

  ‘Whose are those?’ he said.

  ‘Colonel Masters’,’ she said absently, ‘at least they’re for the rummage stall. But what have you been doing?’

  ‘A crule man turned the hosepipe on us,’ said William pathetically.

  ‘What were you doing?’

  ‘Jus’ sitting on a wall.’

  ‘What wall?’

  ‘Jus’ a wall,’ said William, ‘jus’ sittin’ on a wall for a rest, same as anyone might. Well, no one can go on walking for ever an’ ever without a rest. You’ve gotter sit down an’ have a rest sometimes. An’ we sat down to rest on this wall ’cause,’ with a sudden burst of inspiration, ‘’cause we didn’t want to spoil our clothes sittin’ on the ground. It was our clothes we was thinkin’ about. You’re always tellin’ us to take more care of our clothes. So that’s what we was tryin’ to do. Well, as soon as we’d sat down on the wall jus’ for a rest so as not to get our clothes dirty with sittin’ on the ground along comes the crule man with a hosepipe and turned it on to us all. You ask Ginger if it wasn’t like that, if you don’t believe me. He’ll tell you it was. Jus’ sitting on a wall to rest so’s not to get our clothes dirty sittin’ on the ground, when along comes this—’

  ‘William, will you stop talking and go in and change. You’re soaking.’

  William went into his bedroom and closed the door. A small pebble hit the window. He went to it and opened it. Ginger, a disconsolate and still dripping figure, was below.

  ‘I say,’ whispered Ginger, ‘can you throw me down somethin’ to dry with? I can’t get in my house ’cause my mother’s sittin’ jus’ at the drawin’-room window an’ she’d see me comin’ in at the gate.’

  William carelessly threw down his bath towel and proceeded to dry his own person on his counterpane, standing at the window. Thus engaged, they conversed.

  ‘I say,’ said William exultantly, ‘it’ll be all right about makin’ him the guy. I’ve found out where I can borrow some of his clothes.’

  The first setback the Outlaws received was a sudden and unexpected parental ban on any firework display at all. It happened that William’s father and Ginger’s father and Douglas’s father and Henry’s father travelled to town in the same carriage one morning, and it happened that they mentioned and discussed last year’s firework fiasco and finally agreed that the safest plan would be to forbid fireworks at all this year. As William’s father put it, ‘The young scoundrels are sure to blow the place up if we don’t,’ and as Ginger’s father still more succinctly put it, ‘After all, we know them and it’s foolish to take risks.’

  This parental ban did not very seriously disquiet the Outlaws. ‘What I’m goin’ to take it to mean,’ said William, ‘is that we’ve not gotter let off any fireworks where they can see or hear ’em. Well, that’s nacherally what they mean, isn’t it? I mean, you don’t mind anythin’ you can’t see, do you? You nacherally don’t. So it’s jus’ that that they mean. They don’t like lookin’ at fireworks an’ they don’t like the sound of ’em and so that’s why they’ve told us not to have ’em. But it’ll be all right nacherally if we have ’em where they can’t see ’em or hear ’em. That’s what they mean. Well, anyway,’ he ended shortly, ‘that what’s I’m goin’ to think they mean.’

  The other Outlaws agreed that that was what they were going to think they meant too.

  The days before November the Fifth were spent in preparation. The Outlaws had decided to hold their show in the field behind the old barn and preparations were made in the old barn. The chief preparation consisted in the making of the guy. William had successfully ‘borrowed’ from the box-room, where the rummage goods were being stored, the brown overcoat and grey hat that had been the property of Colonel Masters. Moreover, they had secured a mask with very red cheeks and an upturned moustache that bore a strong resemblance to the military gentleman himself, and from these materials they had manufactured a guy truly worthy of the magnificence of the occasion.

  ‘I CANT GET IN MY HOUSE,’ GINGER EXPLAINED, ‘’CAUSE MY MOTHER’D SEE ME COMIN’ IN AT THE GATE.’

  ‘BAD LUCK,’ SAID WILLIAM. ‘I SAY,’ HE ADDED EXULTANTLY, ‘IT’S ALL RIGHT ABOUT THE GUY!’

  ‘No one can se
e it an’ not know who it’s meant to be,’ said William, gazing at it with deep satisfaction, ‘and it’s all right about the clothes ’cause the sale isn’t till a week after Fireworks Day an’ we’re only borrowin’ them. We needn’t reelly burn them. At least,’ he said slowly, ‘if they sort of catch fire we won’t be able to help it. They’ll be mad, of course, but,’ he ended simply, ‘after a firework show like what ours is goin’ to be, it won’t matter much what happens to us afterwards. It’ll be worth it.’

  Although the five shillings that Ginger’s aunt was to give them was not yet in their possession, they had allotted every penny of it in imagination. They had discussed its expenditure for literally days together. They had spent whole mornings and afternoons with their noses glued to the window of the village shop. They had decided on their purchases down to the smallest squibs.

  They could hardly believe that they weren’t actually in possession of them. As William said:

  ‘It’ll only jus’ be a case of goin’ out to fetch ’em. We’ve got ’em settled on all right. It won’t take a minute once Ginger’s aunt’s given us the money. We’ve as good as got ’em now.’

  Meantime they prepared the old barn and sat round their guy, gazing at it proudly.

  ‘Of course, if it catches alight,’ said William again dreamily, ‘I don’t see how we can help it. It’s only ole clothes for a rubbish sale. Well, it’ll be savin’ my mother the trouble of sellin’ ’em if they do happen to catch fire. It’ll look jolly fine all burnin’ up.’

  On the morning of November the fifth they were in a state of barely concealed exuberance.

  William’s father looked at him suspiciously during breakfast.

  ‘You haven’t forgotten what I said about those fireworks, have you?’ he said.

  William hastily assumed his smug expression and said with perfect truth, ‘No, father.’

  ‘A silly, childish habit,’ said Mr Brown. ‘I’d grown out of it long before I’d reached your age. Noisy and dangerous and extravagant and of no earthly use to anyone.’