This carer, Mr. Peawee, was a most hearty gentleman who always dressed like a hiker. He wore a thick tweed jacket and a strange hat, and a long, thick walking stick accompanied him on every trip. He wore huge leather boots, and on his back he carried a knapsack, necessary for carrying essential items such as food, drinking water, a little stove, and a frying pan. With all these items securely in his bag, Mr. Peawee would then frogmarch the reluctant little troopers out of the front door to go on the next wild expedition. Any that dared to straggle in the forlorn hope of getting left behind felt the sharp boot of Aunt Mildred as she accompanied them to the front door and out into the fresh air. Rain or shine, every holiday was the same.
Polly remembered many times when her younger brother James got lost in the fields, for he was so small for his age, and the corn and wheat towered high above him. James getting lost became such a concern that an answer to the problem needed to be found. Luckily the solution was not too long in coming. Mr. Peawee got the inspired idea of tying a strong rope around James’s tiny waist, and an older child was given the other end of the rope. He was then ordered to hold on tightly and under no circumstances let go of the rope as they walked through fields with long grass. If James went missing, then everybody grouped together and lent a hand in tugging hard on the rope. They would carry on pulling as hard as they could until he emerged safely out of the field usually plastered from head to toe in fresh mud and still lying on his belly. He would then jump up, attempt to brush off the dirt, and continue walking on with the rope still tied around him just in case they ventured into any other fields with tall grass.
Thomas had often commented to Polly that he found it strange that James didn’t seem to mind any of this treatment; at least that’s how it appeared to be. It would be a long time before Polly realized that James never complained or seemed to cry even when he was really hurt. He preferred to visit his imaginary planets that were filled with rockets and spacecrafts and anything that had nothing to do with living in this world with all its heartache and pain.
On these long treks Polly was often ordered to carry Mr. Peawee’s knapsack for him, and the weight of his bag at times put quite a strain on her back and legs. At night the pain in her legs felt unbearable, and as a result sleep refused to come. If she was not crying for Thomas or for some awful event that had taken place, she would be crying due to the pain in her joints. She was often harshly rebuked by Aunt Mildred if she made any complaint about pain anywhere in her body. So she had little choice but to suffer in silence.
On hearing her anguished cries, Mr. Peawee started caring for Polly in a way that caused Polly to feel even more distressed, and it was not too long before she lost all trust in mankind. After many years, there came a day when this terrible truth came to light. Polly was punished for her participation in this most unmentionable saga. For despite only being five years old when the offenses concerned first began, she was deemed to be the irresponsible party because of her “wayward manner.” Therefore they determined that she was without question the thoroughly guilty one in this whole sad affair, and Uncle Boritz was left to see to it that she was suitably punished for her unmentionable and most disgraceful misconduct that had been going on for many years right under their very noses.
As for Mr. Peawee, Uncle Boritz had, at the time of the deeply disturbing revelation, determined that the best thing was for Mr. Peawee to disappear immediately without trace and thus prevent any scandal that might well involve his home coming under the scrutinous eye of the social services. Also, as any inquiry of a serious nature might involve the police, he became very anxious to bring the whole unpleasant saga to an end with the least amount of fuss and attention.
Happily and very luckily for him, the police also loved visiting and came regularly to the castle. They enjoyed the entertainment Uncle Boritz provided along with a nice hot cup of steaming tea, which was always served up with a nice slice of cake. However, he could not entirely rely on his friendship with them if the seriousness of this terrible problem were discovered. His influence might take him a long way, but the risk involved was much too great.
And so this most loving and hardworking carer had his services dispensed with overnight. That same evening, Mr. Peawee’s very smelly room was hastily emptied of all his belongings. Once darkness fell, Uncle Boritz led him most quietly to a small side entrance and bade him farewell, at the same time ordering him to never speak a word about any of it no matter what the circumstances. In fact, it would be best to deny ever working at the castle. Mr. Peawee readily agreed, for he was not an entirely stupid man. He knew full well that when Uncle Boritz wielded all his power and influence, it would, without a shadow of doubt, ruin the rest of his life. In his many years of service, he had witnessed others who, having intentionally or unintentionally crossed Uncle Boritz, rarely lived on to tell the tale. If by some miracle they did, their lives and reputations were normally left in tatters.
As Uncle Boritz closed the door behind him, he prayed most fervently that this would be swept under the carpet and become the end of this very trying little matter. All the same, he decided to fully cover his tracks just in case this was not to be the end. He was not a man readily given to trusting others, because he had been betrayed by business acquaintances many times in the past. He headed hastily towards his study and put a large sheet of paper into the ancient typewriter. He feverishly began composing a letter to Miss Dogsbody, Polly’s elusive social worker. He began by complaining that Polly’s imagination was now well-and-truly out of control, so further visits to expert doctors would indeed be required.
He hoped and believed this letter would do the trick and that Miss Dogsbody would, upon receipt of the letter, be fully persuaded that all appropriate action was being put into place by her extremely concerned guardians. His very thoughtful letter did much to suggest that not only would a visit by her be very time consuming, but also he feared that it would be fairly unproductive. Polly really needed further examination by specialists who deal with problems in the head as opposed to the heart.
He rightly reminded her that this was an area in which she had no experience, so she should not even begin to meddle. Although he was much too polite and gracious to express it in such undermining terms, Uncle Boritz rightly concluded that if things went to plan, she would stamp the letter and then store it with all other correspondence concerning Polly and her brothers. Eventually the letter, along with all other correspondence, would be boxed up ready for shipment to a vast warehouse. Once there, it would be placed with millions of other officially stamped documents, never to see the light of day again. They would be lost forever like some archeological document. He felt more than hopeful that the elusive Miss Dogsbody would stay true to form and busy herself with more important tasks that were closer to home and required her urgent attention.
Nobody ever came along to replace this committed carer except for a number of most peculiar and inexperienced people that were willing to work for a pittance. Most of these new arrivals had such deep-rooted problems that their stay in the castle was always short and filled with trouble. Polly observed that they always looked so sad when the inevitable happened and they were finally instructed to leave the castle. For the castle had not only provided them with a roof over their heads, but it had also been a welcome sanctuary in protecting them from the cruel world, which just like the children, they too found very hard to cope with.
As a direct result of Mr. Peawee’s dismissal, all other holidays found the children left to their own devices. It was therefore not too long before some of the children, so bored with no money in their pockets and no one available to pay them any attention, turned to other more questionable ways to spend their days during the weekends and holidays.
Although this made Uncle Boritz and Aunt Mildred very upset, the positive side of the children’s exploits meant that the terribly friendly police officers were at the castle far more regularly than they otherwise might have been, and it served to help prove wh
at wonderful people her guardians were. Who else would be crazy enough to take on the burden of such troublesome children and cope with all their very trying misdemeanors? Therefore, local policemen could often be found tucking into large slices of Queen Victoria’s cake and drinking endless cups of tea as Uncle Boritz filled their ears with the latest mischievous and often overdramatized antics of the foster children. As Uncle Boritz so loved their company, it went a long way to make him feel most happy and content.
As well as her legs, Polly’s teeth really hurt as well, for her mouth was overcrowded and her teeth were crumbling. Why this was she had no idea. It certainly had nothing to do with eating too many sweets. She therefore concluded that the root of the problem lay with her rarely getting enough fruit to eat. Many times she heard others say, “An apple a day keeps the dentist away.”
Polly had often thought to herself that there was less than a fine chance of getting an apple a month, let alone a day, so she apportioned all blame for this pain on apples. She had to admit that if she were given an apple each day, she would not eat it but keep it safe to give to her wonderful teacher, Mrs. Bailey, who had disappeared from her life so suddenly.
The other alternative to her condition was that the toothpaste they used to clean their teeth was not only cheap, but was solid as a rock. The bright pink paste came packaged in red cellophane in a small, circular tin. One child after another would open the tin, and if there was no sink at their disposal, they would happily spit on the hard, round lump of toothpaste before applying the bristles of their brush to grind the paste until frothy bubbles were produced. As child after child resorted to this unhygienic and rather gross method, Polly would find that she preferred not to clean her teeth at all. Besides, by the time it came to her turn, there was rarely anything left in the tin except pink frothy spittle with which to brush her teeth.
Whenever Polly went with Thomas and James and a small party of the other children on a visit to the local dentist, she was always terrified. Like most children she was frightened of going to the dentist, but as far as Polly was concerned, she had more reason than most to be afraid. Egor Treblinka was their dentist. He was a thin, wiry man with equally thin, wiry grey hair and matching thin, wiry, circular glasses that were permanently perched on the end of his nose.
Polly also had reason to believe that Egor was as blind as a bat. His drill never stayed on the tooth in question but would slip and slide from tooth to tooth, making huge holes in them all. He simply had the greatest of difficulty keeping to the designated area requiring immediate treatment. Since Polly hated the drill, he would give her numerous injections to numb the specific area he intended to work on. The needle looked like an instrument of torture to Polly, and she wasn’t that wrong! For he was forced to make several attempts at hitting the correct section of gum, and he never seemed satisfied until Polly’s whole face was thoroughly numb!
As he then bent over her to inspect her teeth more thoroughly, Polly often felt more than overwhelmed by his terribly stale breath and was therefore very anxious for him to get the task over with as quickly as possible. But sadly, every session went on for what seemed an eternity, for Egor loved drilling and filling cavities more than anything else in the world. With Polly’s whole face now thoroughly paralyzed and at least five holes ready and waiting to be filled, he would patiently wait for his dental nurse to hand him a bowl of thick gunk that she had made up with the help of a small pestle and mortar. As with everything else he did, the thick, off-white paste seemed to go everywhere once it was applied.
Polly would go home with the now-hardened filling paste stuck in her hair, caked on her face, and as far up into her nose as anything could possibly venture, momentarily making simple breathing a very arduous task. When the last in the little group finally left the dentist chair, they would all head for the door to walk back to the castle together. Most of the time they would find themselves spitting out the fresh fillings on the way home, and another appointment would then have to be made for an emergency visit. None of the children deliberately did this as some form of rebellious defiance, for it wasn’t as though any of them wished for regular visits to Mr. Treblinka’s dingy dental practice. It was just that their fresh fillings never seemed to stay in place long enough for them to make it up the hill and back home to the castle.
So Polly had little faith in either doctor or dentist, or in any adult for that matter. For she felt very betrayed and let down by every authorative figure who came into her sad little life. When she thought of dear Thomas, she felt really upset and angry, for she was convinced that Thomas would still be alive and well if Dr. Chipatti, instead of Dr. Glumchops, had been the one making weekly visits to the castle for tea!
Chapter 14
THE FUNERAL
POLLY AWOKE FROM her daydreaming and rubbed her sleepy eyes as she gave a big yawn. She noticed that the sun had gone down at least two feet since she last looked up. She knew she would miss the funeral if she stayed daydreaming any longer, so after hurriedly jumping up and brushing herself down, she decided to hurry up and pick some of the beautiful, rich red, velvety poppies that she knew Thomas so loved. Clutching a large bunch in her hand, she then went to the church graveyard as quickly as her little legs would allow.
She had not been walking long when she came across a wooded grove, and as she ventured on she stumbled into an area bursting with millions of bluebells. With great delight she picked as many as she had time for, adding these to her bunch of flowers and moving on. It was not too long before she saw an open field filled with stationary caravans and camper vans.
On seeing the vehicles in the field, memories instantly flooded back into Polly’s mind of one very fateful day. She remembered that some delightful nuns had offered to take them on a short holiday to this campsite. Polly had never been to a campsite before, and as a group of them set off, she had no idea that this time would also be their last.
She remembered that the nuns were very kind to them and loved telling stories, especially one particular nun who happily informed them all that before becoming a nun, she had once been a royal taster. This delightful lady, dressed from head to toe in her penguin outfit, had many more eventful stories to tell than the rest of the nuns put together. Polly decided they were all really lovely, for they made nice cups of tea and seemed to want to spend time with them, something she was not used to. And so it came as no great personal revelation when she decided to add becoming a nun to her constantly growing list of potential careers.
They had been at the site for only a few days when the incident happened. It all took place so quickly. One minute Polly was with the other children having a story read to them before tea, and the next minute panic and mayhem broke out. The nuns rushed all the children from inside the caravan into the field as they tried to make sense of what was happening. Polly looked up and could clearly see that fire was raining down from heaven, or so she thought. She wondered if she or the nuns had done something to upset God, as great lumps of burning wood were falling from the air directly onto the roof of their stationary caravan. But then she realized that all the other caravaners were experiencing the same terrifying plight, and they hadn’t, after all, been personally singled out.
While Polly and the other children continued to enjoy this unplanned fireworks display, the nuns had lost their inner joy and appeared to be more in a state of shock. In a matter of seconds other frightened vacationers ran up to the nuns shouting that help was urgently needed if the whole field of caravans was not to go up in smoke, but nobody seemed to know quite what to do. It wasn’t long before two large, bright red fire engines pulled up to the gate entrance of the field and firefighters began to pull out their long hoses. There was a problem; their hoses were not long enough to reach up into the trees of the thickly dense wood, which by now was well-and-truly ablaze and lighting up the sky.
With nightfall having arrived, it was like the biggest bonfire and fireworks party Polly had ever seen. The furnace crackled and con
tinued to spit its most fearsome load of fireballs down on all the caravans and tents in the field below. The fire crew became as desperate as the campers and knew that something had to be done quickly. Everyone present was asked to form a human chain, and then buckets of water were handed from person to person until it reached the firefighters standing at the end of the long line. Polly felt a truly tangible sense of excitement as she stood in the line taking and then passing bucket after bucket of sloshing water, which soaked her clothes and feet. As her heartbeat quickened within her breast, she felt gloriously exhilarated by the whole experience, for it left her wondering if there was any possibility of her becoming a part-time firefighter as well as a nun when she grew up! She was, after all, having so much fun, and for once in her life she was finally feeling a real sense of achievement and purpose.
Despite everyone working hard to pass the buckets down the line, the fire appeared to be gaining momentum and was spreading further out of their control. The nuns huddled together and agreed amongst themselves that the children should be removed for their own safety and returned to the castle.
The chief nun ordered the children to gather around for a head count. A younger nun then started the counting, touching the top of each head as she did so.
“One…two…three…Cecil Bogswater, go and stand over by Bertha so I get my figures right. There’s a dear,” she ordered in a most stern fashion. “Now, where was I? Ah, yes…four…five…six…seven. Yes, I do believe that everyone is all present and correct, Sister,” she delightedly announced.
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