“‘Stick it up your bum!’ So naughty! Though I might have said something far ruder! Ha ha!”
They laughed together. Mr. Stink reached into his trouser pocket to pull out a dirty old handkerchief to dry his tears of joy. As he raised the handkerchief to his face, Chloe spotted that a label had been sewn on to it. Peering closer, she saw that the label was made of silk, and a name was embroidered delicately on it. . . .
“Lord . . . Darlington?” she read.
There was silence for a moment.
“Is that you?” said Chloe. “Are you a lord?”
“No . . . no . . . ” said Mr. Stink. “I’m just a humble vagabond. I got this handkerchief . . . from a garage sale.”
“May I see your silver spoon then?” said Chloe, gently.
Mr. Stink gave a resigned smile. He reached into his jacket pocket and slowly withdrew the spoon, then handed it to her. Chloe turned it over in her hands. Looking at it close up, she realized she’d been wrong. It wasn’t three letters engraved on it. It was a single letter on a crest, held on each side by a lion.
A single, capital letter D.
“You are Lord Darlington,” said Chloe. “Let me see that old photograph again.”
Mr. Stink carefully pulled out his old black-and-white photograph.
Chloe studied it for a few seconds. It was just as she’d remembered. The beautiful young couple, the Rolls-Royce, the stately home. Only now, when she looked at it, she could see the resemblance between the young man in the photo and the old tramp beside her. “And that’s you in the picture.”
Chloe held the photograph delicately, knowing she was handling something very precious. Mr. Stink looked much younger, especially without his beard and dirt. But the eyes were sparkling. It was unmistakably him.
“The game’s up,” said Mr. Stink. “That is me, Chloe. A lifetime ago.”
“And who’s this lady with you?”
“My wife.”
“Your wife? I didn’t know you were married.”
“You didn’t know I was a lord, either,” said Mr. Stink.
“And that must be your house then, Lord Darlington,” said Chloe, indicating the stately home standing behind the couple in the photograph. Mr. Stink nodded. “Well, then, how come you’re homeless now?”
“It’s a long story, my dear,” said Mr. Stink, evasively.
“But I want to hear it,” said Chloe. “Please? I’ve told you so much about my life. And I’ve always wanted to know your story, Mr. Stink, ever since I first saw you. I always knew you must have a fascinating tale to tell.”
Mr. Stink took a breath. “Well, I had it all, child. More money than I could ever spend, a beautiful house with its own lake. My life was like an endless summer. Croquet, tea on the lawn, long lion days spent playing cricket. And to make things even more perfect, I married this beautiful, clever, funny, adorable woman, my childhood sweetheart. Violet.”
“She is beautiful.”
“Yes, yes, she is. She was. Unutterably so. We were deliriously happy, you know.”
It was all so obvious now to Chloe. The way Mr. Stink had expertly tossed the screwed-up piece of paper into the bin, his silver monogrammed cutlery and his impeccable table manners, his insistence on walking on the outside of the pavement, the way he had decorated the shed. It was all true. He was super-posh.
“Soon after that photograph was taken, Violet became pregnant,” continued Mr. Stink. “I couldn’t have been more thrilled. But one night, when my wife was eight months pregnant, my chauffeur drove me to London to have dinner with a group of my old school friends at a gentlemen’s club. It was just before Christmas, actually. I stayed late into the night, selfishly drinking and talking and smoking cigars. . . .”
“What do you mean, selfishly?” said Chloe.
“Because I should never have gone. We were caught in a blizzard on the way home. I didn’t get back until just before dawn, and found that the house was ablaze. . . .”
“Oh no!” cried Chloe, not sure if she could bear to hear the rest of the story.
“A piece of coal must have fallen out of the fireplace in our bedroom, and set the carpet on fire as she slept. I ran out of the Rolls and waded through the deep snow. Desperately I tried to fight my way into the house, but the fire brigade wouldn’t let me in. It took five of them to hold me back. They tried their best to save her, but it was too late. The roof fell in. Violet didn’t stand a chance.”
“Oh my God!” Chloe gasped.
Tears filled the old tramp’s eyes. Chloe didn’t know what to do. Dealing with emotions was a new thing to her, but tentatively she reached out her hand to comfort him. Time seemed to slow down as her hand reached his. This made the tears really flow, and he shook with half a century of pain.
“If only I hadn’t been at the club that night, I could have saved her. I could have held her all night, made her feel safe and warm. She wouldn’t have needed the fire. My darling, darling Violet.” Chloe squeezed his dirty hand tight.
“You can’t blame yourself for the fire.”
“I should have been there for her. I should have been there. . . .”
“It was an accident,” said Chloe. “You have to forgive yourself.”
“I can’t. I never can.”
“You are a good man, Mr. Stink. What happened was a terrible accident. You must believe that.”
“Thank you, child. I shouldn’t really cry. Not on public transport.” He sniffed, and gathered himself together a little.
“So,” said Chloe, “how you did you end up living on the streets?”
“Well, I was heartbroken. Utterly inconsolable. I had lost my unborn child and the woman I loved. After the funeral I tried to return to the house. Lived alone in a wing that hadn’t been so badly damaged by the blaze. But the house carried so many painful memories, I couldn’t sleep. Being there gave me terrible nightmares. I kept seeing her face in the flames. I had to get away. So one day I started walking and I never came back.”
“I am so sorry,” said Chloe. “If people only knew that . . .”
“Like I said on the televisual apparatus, every homeless person has a story to tell,” said Mr. Stink. “That’s mine. I am sorry it didn’t involve spies or pirates or what have you. Real life isn’t like that, I’m afraid. And I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“Christmas must be the hardest time for you,” said Chloe.
“Yes, yes, of course. Christmas is an emblem of perfect happiness I find very hard to bear. It’s a time when families come together. For me it’s a reminder of who’s not there.”
The bus reached their stop, and Chloe’s arm found a home in Mr. Stink’s as they walked toward the family house. She was relieved to see that all the reporters and camera crews had moved on. The funny old tramp must be old news by now.
“I just wish I could make everything right,” said Chloe.
“But you are making everything right, Miss Chloe. Ever since you came and talked to me. You’ve made me smile again. You’ve been so kind to me. You know, if my child had ended up like you, I would have been very proud.”
Chloe was so touched she could hardly think what to say. “Well,” she said, “I know you would have made a great dad.”
“Thank you, child. Unimaginable kindness.”
Nearing the house, Chloe looked at it and realized something. She didn’t want to go home. She didn’t want to live with her awful mother and have to go to that horrible posh school anymore. They walked in silence for a moment, then Chloe took a deep breath and turned to Mr. Stink.
“I don’t want to go back there,” she said. “I want to go wandering with you.”
23
Plastic Snowman
“I’m sorry, Miss Chloe, but you can’t possibly come with me,” said Mr. Stink as they stood in the driveway.
“Why not?” protested Chloe.
“For a million different reasons!”
“Name one!”
“It’s too cold.”
“Well,” said Mr. Stink, “living on the streets is far too dangerous for a young girl like you.”
“I’m nearly thirteen!”
“It’s very important you don’t miss school.”
“I hate school,” said Chloe. “Please please please, Mr. Stink. Let me come with you and the Duchess. I want to be a wanderer like you.”
“You must think about this properly for a moment, child,” said Mr. Stink. “What on earth is your mother going to say?”
“I don’t care,” snapped Chloe. “I hate her anyway.”
“I’ve told you before, you mustn’t say that.”
“But it’s true.”
Mr. Stink sighed. “Your mind is made up, is it?”
“One hundred percent!”
“Well, in that case, I’d better go and talk to your mother for you.”
Chloe grinned. This was superbrilliantamazing! It was really going to happen. She was going to be free at last! No more being sent to bed early. No more math homework. No more wearing yellow frilly dresses that made her look like candy come to life. Chloe was a hundred times more excited than she had ever been in her life. She and Mr. Stink were going to wander the world together, eating sausages for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, having baths in ponds, and emptying Starbucks wherever they went. . . .
“Thanks so much, Mr. Stink,” she said, as she put her key in the lock for the last time.
As Chloe raced excitedly around her room throwing clothes and the chocolate bars she had hidden under her bed into her bag, she could hear faint voices in the kitchen downstairs. Mother won’t care, thought Chloe. She’ll hardly miss me anyway! The only person she cares about is Annabelle.
Chloe looked around her little pink room. Strangely, she felt a tingle of fondness for it now that she was leaving. And she was going to miss Dad, and of course Annabelle, and even Elizabeth the cat, but a new life was calling her. A life of mystery and adventure. A life of making up bedtime stories about vampires and zombies. A life of burping in the faces of bullies!
Just then, there was a gentle knock on the door. “I’m coming, Mr. Stink!” Chloe called out, as she threw the last ornamental owl into her bag.
The door opened slowly. Chloe turned around and gasped.
It wasn’t Mr. Stink.
It was Mother. She stood in the corridor, her eyes red from crying. A tear was running down her cheek and a little plastic snowman dangled incongruously above her head.
“My darling Chloe,” she spluttered. “Mr. Stink just told me you wanted to leave home. Please. I beg you, don’t go.”
Chloe had never seen Mother looking so sad.
Suddenly, she felt a little guilty. “I, er, just thought you wouldn’t mind,” she said.
“Mind? I couldn’t bear it if you left.” Mother started sobbing now. This was so unlike her. It was as if Chloe was looking at another person entirely.
“What did Mr. Stink say to you?” she asked.
“The old man gave me a good talking-to,” said Mother. “Said how unhappy you’ve been at home. How I had to work at being a better mother. He told me how he’d lost his own family, and if I wasn’t careful, I was going to lose you. I felt so ashamed. I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye on things, Chloe, but I do love you. I really do.”
Chloe was horrified. She’d thought Mr. Stink was just going to ask if she could go with him, but instead he’d made Mother cry. She was furious with him. This wasn’t the plan at all!
And just then, Mr. Stink appeared solemnly in the doorway. He stood a foot behind Mother.
“I’m sorry, Chloe,” he ventured. “I hope you can forgive me.”
“Why did you say what you did?” she asked angrily. “I thought we were going to wander the world together.”
Mr. Stink smiled kindly. “Maybe one day you’ll wander the world on your own,” he said. “But for now, trust me, you need your family. I would give anything to have mine back. Anything.”
Mother’s legs looked like they were going to give way, and she stumbled toward Chloe’s bed. She sat there and wept, hiding her face in shame at her tears. Chloe looked at Mr. Stink silently for a long time. Deep down, she knew he was right.
“Of course I forgive you,” she said to him finally, and he smiled that eye-twinkling smile of his.
Then she softly sat down next to her mother and put an arm around her.
“And I love you too, Mother. Very much.”
24
Yuckety Yuck Yuck
It was well into the night on Christmas Eve now, and down in the living room, Dad waved a large festive assortment tin under Mr. Stink’s nose. “Would you like a biscuit?” he asked.
Dad had already scoffed quite a few, having been hiding in the room under the stairs again all day with only a couple of slices of dry bread to keep him going. Mr. Stink eyed the contents of the tin with disgust.
“Have you any stale ones?” he asked. “Maybe with just a hint of mold?”
“I don’t think so, sorry,” replied Dad.
“No, thank you, then,” said Mr. Stink. He patted the Duchess, who was sitting on his lap, trading evil looks across the coffee table with Elizabeth. The family cat was bundled up in a towel on Annabelle’s lap, still recovering from her “swim.”
“Never mind about the biscuits,” said Annabelle. “I want to know what you said to the Prime Minister’s offer?”
“Chloe told him to stick it up his—”
“We told him he wasn’t interested,” interjected Chloe hastily. “So maybe you can still run for Parliament, Mother.”
“Oh no, I don’t want to,” said Mother. “Not after I humiliated myself on television.”
“But now you’ve met Mr. Stink and seen how other people live their lives, you could try to make things better for people,” suggested Chloe.
“Well, perhaps I could try and run again during the next election,”said Mother. “Though I will have to change my policies. Especially the one about the homeless. I am sorry I got it so wrong.”
“And the one about the unemployed, eh, Dad?” said Chloe.
“What’s this?” said Mother.
“Thank you, Chloe,” said Dad sarcastically. “Well, I didn’t want to tell you, but the car factory looks like it’s going to close soon and it had to let most of us go.”
“So you are . . . ?” asked Mother, incredulous.
“Unemployed, yes. Or ‘welfare scum’ as you might say. I was too scared to tell you, so I’ve been hiding in the room under the stairs for the last month.”
“What do you mean, you were too scared to tell me? I love you, and I always will, whether you’ve got a job at the stupid car factory or not.”
Dad put his arm around her and she nuzzled up her head to meet his lips with hers. Their kiss lingered for a few moments, as Chloe and Annabelle looked on with a mixture of pride and embarrassment. Your parents kissing. Nice but somehow yuck. Them cuddling is even worse. Yuckety yuck yuck.
“I would go back to being in a rock band, but you put my guitar on the bonfire!” said Dad with a chuckle.
“Don’t!” said Mother. “I still feel so bad about that. I fell for you like a ton of bricks when I first saw you onstage with the band. That’s why I married you. But when the album didn’t sell, I could see how upset you were, and I couldn’t bear it. I thought I was trying to help you move on with your life, but now I realize all I did was crush your dreams. And that’s why I don’t want to make the same mistake twice.”
She got up and started searching in the bottom drawer of the sideboard where she kept her secret stash of Bendicks chocolate mints. “I am so sorry I tore up your story, Chloe.” Mother pulled out Chloe’s math exercise book that she had ripped to pieces. She had painstakingly Scotch-taped the whole thing back together, and with her eyes still shining with tears, she handed it back to Chloe. “After Question Time, I had a lot of time to think,” she said. “I fished this out of the garbage b
in and I read it to the end, Chloe. It’s brilliant.”
Chloe took back the book with a smile. “I promise to try harder on my math lessons from now on, Mother.”
“Thank you, Chloe. And I have something for you too, my darling,” said Mother to Dad. From under the tree she pulled out a beautifully wrapped present that was exactly the shape of an electric guitar.
25
Black Leather Mistletoe
“I’ve got some black leather mistletoe this Christmas,
I’m gonna kiss you and give you a bad shaving rash. . . .”
Dad had plugged his shiny new electric guitar into its amp and was strutting up and down the living room exuberantly singing one of his old band’s songs. He was clearly having the time of his life. It was almost as if his perm had grown back too. Mother, Chloe, Annabelle, and Mr. Stink sat on the sofa and clapped along. Even Elizabeth and the Duchess were curled up together nodding their heads in time with the music. The heavy rock wasn’t quite to Mr. Stink’s taste, and to combat the noise he had discreetly re-inserted his rabbit-dropping earplugs.
“Yeah baby, I’m gonna feast on your mince pies,
And give you a real good yuletide surprise . . . !”
The song ended with a huge flourish on Dad’s guitar, and his tiny stadium of fans cheered and clapped for him excitedly.
“Thank you, Wembley. Thank you so much. That was, of course, The Serpents of Doom’s Christmas single, ‘Black Leather Mistletoe,’ which rocketed to number ninety-eight in the charts. Now for my next song . . .”
“I think that’s enough heavy rock music just for now, dear,” said Mother, as if she might already be regretting giving him that present. She turned to Chloe and said, “You don’t want to leave anymore, do you?”
“No, Mother, not in a million years. This is the best Christmas ever.”
“Oh, wonderful!” said Mother. “It’s super that we are all together having fun like this.”
“But . . .” said Chloe. “There is one thing I would like.”
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