Eating Things on Sticks

by Anne Fine

  Who else but Morning Glory’s mother?

  ‘Good luck!’ she was shouting cheerily. ‘Oh, best of luck! I really hope you win! You certainly deserve the prize!’

  And then there was the strangest miracle.

  Morning Glory’s father smiled.

  Yes, Mr McFee smiled! I’m not sure how we knew. Perhaps some of the wispy bits of his mad beard were lifted somehow in the breeze. But there was no disputing it. He gave a radiant smile.

  That was the moment when the judges shuffled out of the tent. We stood in a breathless hush as they walked up and down in front of the finalists, studying in turn each goatee, silken avalanche and bushy beard. We waited with our hearts a-thump as they made notes on their clipboards. We sighed with anticipation as they retired behind the flaps of the tent to start their deliberations.

  I could see Uncle Tristram glancing at his watch. Anxiety was plain on his face. Only a couple of hours now until the ferry left! But none of us could tear ourselves away. We had become a part of the crowd, desperate to hear the result. And by the time the judges finally came out again, we were all standing at the front, around Morning Glory.

  ‘And the winner of the Best Beard Competition is . . .’

  I honestly think that I came close to a heart attack.

  ‘Mr McFee!’

  Oh, the punches of triumph and cries of delight! The stamps and cheers of the crowd. The hoots of relief. The hugs of joy between Mr McFee and his wife.

  ‘Oh, Albert!’

  ‘Oh, Angeline!’

  ‘Oh, Alby!’

  ‘Oh, Angie!’

  ‘Lambkin!’

  ‘Sweetpea!’

  They only tore themselves apart, with Mr McFee still beaming, for the Grand Prizegiving. The mayor of the island gave a short speech. It all got muffled somewhere in his beard, but no one minded. Most of them just wandered off, chattering excitedly among themselves about the honour and unrivalled glory, and the rather nice mock-tortoiseshell nit comb. In the end, we were the only people left, and Uncle Tristram was getting more and more anxious. ‘Really, we must press on. We have a door to barricade and a ferry to catch.’

  ‘A ferry to catch?’

  On Mr McFee, these words worked just like magic. Utterly galvanized, he pushed his daughter and Officer Watkins towards the car park. ‘Quick, Morning Glory. Hurry along. Your friends mustn’t miss the ferry! No one must ever miss a ferry again. So hurry along! Whatever it is you’re barricading, go and do it now. Quick! Hurry! Hurry!’

  AND THERE IT WASN’T

  We took the last tight corner before you reach Aunty Audrey’s house, and there it wasn’t.

  Yes, that’s right. Wasn’t.

  There was the new stream, a whole lot wider than when we’d left that morning. Along its edges lay a sort of tidemark of old bricks, strands of coloured wool and little heaps of rubble. Quite a few heavy bits of furniture were still exactly where they’d been. But there was no house around them. Nothing stood higher than Aunt Audrey’s wardrobe, which had clearly dropped as if from heaven and landed upright in the mud that Officer Watkins had been complaining about so bitterly earlier.

  Morning Glory was devastated. ‘What on earth’s happened? Where on earth has it gone?’

  ‘I think it’s been swept away,’ said Uncle Tristram.

  ‘But it’s a house.’

  ‘Not any more, it isn’t,’ said Officer Watkins. He started prowling up and down the banks of the stream, looking for clues. The pangs of guilt that I’d been feeling on and off all day suddenly crystallized into decision.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said. ‘I will be back in a minute.’

  I think they all suspected that, with the lavatory swept off downstream, I’d rushed to the undergrowth around the hill for quite a different purpose. I wasn’t stopping to explain. I simply vanished between the bushes and hoped that, in the shock of things, they would forget me. Certainly, each time I looked down from wherever I’d reached on the climb up, they seemed still to be wandering about like shell-shocked soldiers.

  On and on I climbed, higher and higher. At times the brand-new stream had taken over the old path so, slapped at by wet leaves and splattered by raindrops, I ploughed through the sodden wet undergrowth.

  In the end, panting quite desperately, I reached the top.

  The job did not take long. All I had to do was kick a few stones around. As if with relief – ah! that’s a whole lot better! – the first few tricklings of the stream washed away all the mud I’d packed around the stones, and fell straight back into its old route down the other side. It was so quick and easy I felt even more guilty. Why hadn’t I sneaked up and done it way back on Thursday, when I first realized? I could have saved the house!

  I took a little more time coming down again. For one thing I used the old path, and since the last of the stream I had diverted that way by accident was only just dribbling away, it was quite slimy underfoot. And for another, I was in no hurry to get to the bottom and have to explain how this extraordinarily forceful stream had vanished.

  They were all standing with their backs to me, staring at the tail end of the stream as it disappeared round the corner.

  I shuffled up beside Uncle Tristram. He glared at me suspiciously, then took my arm and led me out of earshot. ‘It’s just this minute stopped,’ he hissed at me. ‘We’ve just been watching the last of it run past.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Destroying houses is your speciality, isn’t it? So what did you do up there to cause that stream in the first place?’

  ‘Just kicked a few stones about,’ I said vaguely.

  ‘Just kicked a few stones about?’ His eyes went wide. ‘Just kicked a few stones about? You mean you made a dam? I don’t believe it! While we were up there that day, you actually were daft enough to build a dam?’

  ‘It wasn’t a real dam. It was only tiny.’

  ‘It didn’t need to be anything other than tiny, right up there at the top!’

  Hastily he stopped haranguing me as Morning Glory came rushing over towards us.

  ‘You just missed something amazing,’ she informed me. ‘While you were up the hill, the stream just stopped. It just came to an end. It was a real, live miracle!’

  I don’t know what came over me, I really don’t. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I went up the hill and called the angels for help. I asked for Dido in particular. And Dido stopped it.’

  Morning Glory clasped her hands together. ‘Really?’

  ‘Really,’ I said.

  ‘She came at once? And miracled away the stream?’

  ‘I told Dido what had happened. And she just fixed it.’

  Now Morning Glory was agog. ‘How did she fix it?’

  ‘Probably just kicked a few stones about,’ Uncle Tristram muttered.

  I gave him one of those Watch-your-step-Buster looks that Mum gives me, and turned back to Morning Glory. ‘She just did,’ I said firmly. ‘Using her special and angelic magic powers.’

  Morning Glory looked quite ecstatic. Her eyes shone.

  ‘Well that is wonderful! Perfectly wonderful! And now that the stream has been stopped, we will be able to . . .’

  She faltered. Swinging around, she took in the bleak sight of a few damp lumps of giant furniture stuck in the mud with no walls at all around them.

  ‘We will be able to . . .’

  Her voice trailed to a halt.

  ‘You can’t rebuild,’ said Uncle Tristram, valiantly trying to suppress his shudder of horror at the mere idea. He waved a hand at the few pitiful strands of coloured wool and bits of shattered debris lying around us. ‘No, you must see it as a beautiful and vanished dream. A glorious old house, filled with old-fashioned charm and pretty little knick-knacks, and with the loveliest apple tree on the island.’

  ‘It was the only—’

  I jumped to avoid the hand that had shot out to swipe me.

  ‘No!’ Uncle Tristram persisted. ‘You must do the sensible thing. Never look back! Set your face forward! Imagine your c
osy future with Officer Watkins here in that divine little cottage beside the fairground. Think of the roses you will grow around your door. Think of the babies the two of you will soon be dandling on your knees. Take the insurance money.’

  Morning Glory looked a bit startled. ‘Will they pay out?’

  ‘Of course they’ll pay out,’ said Uncle Tristram. ‘Their only problem is going to be deciding under which of the many headings in the insurance policy you ought to claim.’

  ‘I should think subsidence,’ Officer Watkins said firmly. ‘I think they’re definitely going to decide to go for serious subsidence.’

  ‘Flood, I’d say,’ Uncle Tristram argued.

  I thought I might as well put in my pennyworth. ‘But by the time anyone comes in on next week’s ferry to inspect the place, the ground around here will have dried out a bit, and they might decide that it looks more like a gas explosion. Or a terrorist outrage.’

  ‘But there’s no sign of blast or fire,’ said Uncle Tristram. From his wide range of threatening looks, he shot me one of the darkest. ‘Though I think we could safely say there have been signs of vandalism.’

  I blushed, and shut up after that.

  Morning Glory brushed all of their opinions aside. ‘But I’ll explain. I’ll tell them exactly what happened. I’ll tell them that all of a sudden, as if by magic, there was a stream that appeared completely out of nowhere, rushed down the mountainside and washed my house away.’

  ‘I think they might find that a little hard to believe,’ warned Uncle Tristram.

  ‘No,’ Morning Glory said. ‘Because I’ll go on to explain how the stream vanished. How this young boy–’ She slid an affectionate arm around my shoulder. ‘No, this young hero who was staying here all week climbed up the hill and asked my favourite angel to magic the stream away.’

  She beamed around at all of us.

  ‘And the angel did!’

  There was a tiny little silence. Then Uncle Tristram rallied. ‘Don’t be astonished,’ he said as gently as he could, ‘if anyone who hears that thinks that you are just in shock because you no longer have a home.’

  We heard a booming voice behind. ‘Of course my precious daughter has a home!’

  We all spun round. There, standing hand in hand, were Morning Glory’s mother and father. He still appeared to be beaming. ‘If Morning Glory needs a roof over her head until she’s bought her new cottage, she can live with us.’

  We watched him squeeze his wife’s hand as he so happily said the word ‘us’, and Morning Glory’s mother raised herself on tiptoe to kiss him through his storm of a beard.

  After a moment he broke away as if an awful thought had suddenly occurred to him. Hastily glancing at his watch, he said to Uncle Tristram anxiously, ‘Hadn’t the two of you better get your skates on? If you’re not careful you will miss that ferry!’

  Home Again

  PLERP LARP TENELLIN

  I think I must be a martyr to seasickness.

  ‘That,’ Uncle Tristram said virtuously as he watched me heave quite a few things off sticks over the rails into the churning water, ‘is probably because you didn’t take Morning Glory’s very good advice and make the effort to thank your stomach for doing all that extra work for you.’

  A sudden swell beneath the ferry caused it to pitch and roll. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Uncle Tristram clutch his own stomach and turn the same green as the tea towel I’d set on fire on the grill.

  ‘You don’t look all that much in harmony with the universe yourself,’ I snapped.

  When we had both completely finished throwing up, we leaned together side by side at the bow.

  ‘All in all,’ Uncle Tristram said, his spirits visibly rising, ‘that was a really good week. Lots of fresh air, and mucking about with mud, and dressing up and stuff.’ He looked at me sternly. ‘I certainly hope you enjoyed yourself even if you didn’t manage to fit in your favourite pastime.’

  ‘My favourite pastime?’

  ‘Burning down kitchens. But you did at least get to totally destroy one house.’

  I gave him a sour look. ‘A pity Morning Glory didn’t have a cat,’ I said. ‘You could have had a go at your own little speciality, and flattened it in some flower bed.’

  He grinned, and we went back to keeping our eyes peeled for the mainland. At last the grey mist of horizon gathered itself into a darker line.

  ‘There! See! Over there!’

  ‘Thank heavens for that!’

  We stood in silence, gazing at the approaching land. I know I was relieved to be on the way home. Still, I was anxious about the way they’d greet me. (Probably not with open arms and cries of ‘Lambkin! You’re back!’) After all, Mum and Dad had just spent nearly a whole week of ghastly days and sleepless nights worrying themselves silly about me, and making tea for police negotiators waiting for my calls and technicians hoping to trace them. Five days in which a host of helicopter pilots had been scrambled to scour the island for any sign of Uncle Tristram’s car. A week, frankly, after which, rather than stepping into the usual blizzard of welcoming hugs and kisses, you would expect me to walk through the door and get a rocket and my ears torn off.

  Gradually the fuzzy grey line of coast began to look darker and sharper.

  ‘Look!’ Uncle Tristram dug his elbow in my ribs excitedly. ‘I think I see a tree!’

  The ferry forged in closer through the waves with Uncle Tristram leaning so keenly over the rails I had to keep hold of his jacket. After a while, he turned and said, ‘Now, Harry, you’ll admit that Morning Glory was a lovely-looking girl. And as for that Delia, she was an absolute marvel.’ He pointed as the dock hove into view. ‘But that – that is without a shadow of a doubt the most attractive sight that I have seen all week.’

  Over the tannoy came a muffled announcement. ‘Plerp larp tenellin!’

  ‘Excellent!’ said Uncle Tristram. And just as if he’d understood whatever it was the woman was saying though her beard, he led the way back down the steps so that, when the boat docked, we would be the very first ones off.

  A WEIGHTED CANDLESTICK? BARE HANDS? A KITCHEN KNIFE?

  Uncle Tristram switched off the engine before we even reached the gate and rolled the Maverati to a silent halt on top of the petunias.

  ‘Let’s hope they didn’t get another cat while we were gone,’ I said sarcastically.

  He turned to give me a high-five. ‘Well, there you go,’ he said. ‘Hop out.’

  I stared in panic. ‘Aren’t you coming in?’

  ‘Don’t tell me you’re too chicken to face the music by yourself.’

  ‘Yes,’ I admitted.

  He sighed. ‘Oh, all right. I do understand your terror. My sister is a fearsome creature when she’s riled.’ He winced at what I took to be one or two rather nasty childhood memories he didn’t choose to share. ‘I shall be brave and join you.’

  He did unfasten his seat belt, but made no move to leave the safety of the car.

  Neither did I.

  After a few more silent and unmoving moments, he said to me, ‘Perhaps what we need here is another game plan.’

  ‘What’s worrying me,’ I said, ‘is what I’m going to say when they start in with all their questions.’

  ‘Just clutch your hand to your head,’ he advised. ‘Tell them you simply can’t bear to talk about it. Say it just brings back nightmares.’

  ‘And what about when the police show up to hand in their bill for a week’s worth of telephone tapping?’

  ‘You made those calls in all good faith,’ he said.

  ‘And when the Combined Air Services demand compensation for all those extra and unnecessary helicopters?’

  ‘Excellent practice for our armed forces. They should be grateful.’ He spread his hands like someone pleading innocence in the dock. ‘After all, Harry, it isn’t as if we have told any lies. I think that we can safely claim that we are still in harmony with the universe.’

  ‘I think we’ll be even more in
harmony with the universe in a minute,’ I told him glumly. ‘In fact, I rather suspect that, in a few minutes, you and I will very probably both be dead.’

  We sat in silence for a little while till Uncle Tristram got bored enough to say, ‘Oh, well then. No real point in putting it off.’

  ‘No,’ I said dubiously.

  ‘So shall we go and see which murder weapon your mother has decided to use? A weighted candlestick? Bare hands? A kitchen knife?’

  ‘Yes, let’s.’

  We both got out of the car. I noticed that neither of us spoke, or slammed our door, and both of us picked our way as softly as we could over the few unsquashed petunias between the front wheels of the car and the front porch.

  I slid my key in the door and turned it quietly. We crept into the hall. I could hear voices coming from the television in the living room so, looking for any old excuse to put off the dreadful moment, I pushed at the kitchen door.

  Ta-ra! It opened on a gorgeous room with gleaming cabinets and shiny tops and magic pools of light pouring from nowhere. Honestly, it looked fantastic. The walls were pristine and the cupboard doors the richest, deepest scarlet. The bright new cover on the brand-new ironing board bore not a single scorch mark.

  ‘Hey!’ Uncle Tristram whispered. ‘New freezer! Handsome!’

  ‘Look at that oven hob! Ace-matic!’

  ‘I like the new blinds.’

  I stepped back. ‘Seen the floor tiles?’

  ‘Groovy! I reckon you’ve done your family a giant favour, Harry. This is a huge improvement on before. Look at that space-age microwave.’

  I spun round. ‘Where?’

  ‘Built in. There. See?’

  He pointed. That was his mistake. I merely followed the direction of his finger and there it was. The brand-new microwave. And when, by sheer force of habit, I found myself reaching out to press Defrost – One Minute, not expecting anything at all to happen, this supersonic clean machine with snow-white buttons actually obeyed at once.