by Jo Verity
The clock started to strike eleven. Tessa nudged her brother. ‘We’d better go.’
Mr Zeal eased himself out of the armchair and delved into the pocket of his cardigan. ‘Before you venture on your way, hold out your right hands.’
The children waited, savouring what they knew would come next.
The old man dropped a wrapped sweet onto each extended palm. ‘From Morocco,’ he said, as he always did.
They sauntered down the road, chewing the chocolate-covered toffees, which needed to be eaten before they reached home. Tessa, the faster eater, finished first. ‘It was barley sugar last time, wasn’t it?’
Lewis nodded.
‘Those were from Morocco, too. D’you think he gets all his sweets from there?’
Lewis shrugged and mumbled, ‘Dunno.’ Then, swallowing, asked, ‘Where is Morocco, anyway?’
‘A long way away,’ Tessa hedged. ‘He must get them sent.’
‘Probably in crates,’ Lewis added.
Once back home, it was clear that their mother hadn’t given them a second thought. The pram stood outside the back door, Gordon, barely visible beneath a mound of shawls and blankets, whimpering persistently.
‘What’s the matter with him, Mum?’ Lewis asked, following her as she pegged nappies on the clothes line. He was getting used to the paraphernalia that had arrived with Gordon. It covered every surface, like debris after a bomb had exploded – nappies, bibs, safety pins, Vaseline, fancy cardigans and smocked romper suits, talcum powder, cotton wool. But he didn’t think he would ever become accustomed to the grizzling that he knew would, without intervention, increase in intensity until the screaming baby was the only thing in the world.
His mother smiled. ‘There’s nothing wrong with him, Lewis. He’s just a baby. All he can do is cry.’
‘And wee and poo and puke,’ he added, wanting to set the record straight, ‘Like Tess said.’
His mother pushed his hair away from his forehead. ‘Tessa’s very stubborn. Once she says something she’ll stick to it, whether it’s right or wrong. And remember, she’s not always right. You must make up your own mind.’ Again and again her fingers ran through his hair, calming and attentive, and, looking up into her face, he willed her never to stop, but the baby’s wail grew louder and she hurried to the pram. He followed, watching as she pulled back the covers and lifted Gordon, laying him gently on her left shoulder and stroking his back. ‘There, there. Mummy’s here. What’s the matter? D’you want a cuddle? Do you?’
The baby soon stopped crying and Lewis noticed that his eyes were open and that he appeared to be peeping at him over his mother’s shoulder as if to say, She’s mine.
‘I’m bored.’ Tessa burst out of the house where she’d been looking for something to do. ‘When’s dinner ready, Mum? I’m starving.’
‘I’ll get something when I’ve fed Gordon and settled him for his nap.’
‘That’ll take ages. Me and Lewis need feeding, too. Why are we the ones who have to wait?’
Their mother swayed from side to side, the baby silent on her shoulder. ‘You know what Dad said, Tessa. You two are supposed to be helping, not making things more difficult.’
‘Just a jam sandwich to go on with?’ suggested Lewis, inclined, as ever, to look for the middle way.
Lewis and Tessa took their sandwiches to the far corner of the garden, their favourite place to escape the baby-ness that had, during the previous week, permeated the house and transformed it into a foreign land. As they ate, they returned to the topic which now dominated their lives.
‘See. I told you it would be like this, didn’t I?’ Tessa threw a clod of soil at a white butterfly that had settled on a ragged cabbage. ‘We’ve got to do something.’
‘Like what?’
Tessa sucked the end of her plait and then looped it under her nose. ‘D’you like him?’
‘How d’you mean?’
‘D’you like him? D’you like it how it is now? Or d’you think everything was nicer before he was born?’
‘Before.’ Lewis came straight back with his verdict.
‘Me, too. So we’ve got to do something.’
Lewis waited, confident that his sister had a plan.
‘I’ve been thinking about it. What if we put a spell on him? Something to make him … to make it like it was … before.’
‘We can’t kill him,’ Lewis said firmly.
‘Not kill him. Just … send him back.’
‘Back where?’ He tried not to picture where Gordon had come from.
Tessa shrugged. ‘Look. Why don’t we just do a spell and see what happens? It probably won’t work,’ she conceded. Then added, ‘Anyway, it’ll be something to do.’
Lewis, feeling out of his depth, scrambled up into the flowering cherry that grew on the edge of the lawn, the bark on its trunk and lower branches polished to a rich red in several places, indicating the best foot and hand holds. Safely in the crown of the tree, he crouched, knees doubled up to his chin. In winter this made an excellent vantage point from which to study the houses and back gardens of Medway Avenue but now, peering between the leaves, he only saw fragmented sections of the same scene, as if it were a half-finished jigsaw puzzle and, when he looked up, the leaves stirring in the light breeze revealed shifting patches of sky, giving him the not unpleasant sensation that he, too, was moving.
‘I’ve worked out what we’ve got to do.’ Tessa stood at the base of the tree. ‘We’ll get started after dinner.’
Chapter 3
‘I’ve made a list.’ Tessa pulled a scrap of paper from the pocket of her navy shorts. The children were sitting cross-legged on the floor in her bedroom and, beyond the closed door, Gordon was crying. ‘Plasticine. A dirty bib. Some of his hair – it doesn’t have to be much. And…’ she paused, ‘a blob of poo. Gordon’s poo, that is.’
Lewis closed his eyes and shook his head. ‘I’m not touching poo. Can’t we use something else?’
‘No, we can’t.’
What was the matter with Lewis? Wasn’t it obvious that if the magic were to be successful they needed to use the right things – things that belonged to Gordon? People seemed to think that Lewis was brainy, and maybe he was as long as he had all day to work things out, but at the moment he was being completely dim.
‘But you said the spell probably wouldn’t work so I don’t know why we’re—’
‘Because – we – haven’t – got – anything – else – to – doooo.’ She emphasised every word, effectively overruling his objection.
They sneaked around the house, locating a soiled bib and a ball of plasticine. The hair was trickier. Whilst Lewis asked his mother to write out a page of sums, Tessa sneaked the nail scissors from the manicure set that was kept in the middle drawer of her mother’s dressing table. She tiptoed towards the cot, whispering the nonsense that people used as soon as they were within sight of a baby. ‘There, there. Everything’s fine. Fine. There.’ It was a bit spooky when Gordon’s intermittent crying stopped as, open-eyed and calm, he appeared to be looking at her. She lifted a few silky strands of dark hair from the nape of his neck, where it grew thickest, and snipped it with the scissors. He turned purposefully towards her touch, his parted lips in search of something, but she pulled away and, dropping the tuft of hair into an envelope she’d salvaged from the waste-paper basket, slipped out of the room.
The final item proved more straightforward than they could have hoped. When Gordon soiled a nappy, their mother removed it, folding it over, and set it to one side whilst she cleaned him up and pinned on a fresh one. Tessa made sure that she was with her mother on several nappy changes and eventually, when she went to find something in the bathroom, Tessa had the chance, with the aid of a wad of cotton wool, to collect a smear of poo from the soiled nappy. This she wrapped in a sheet of Izal toilet paper before placing it in an empty Smiths crisp packet. ‘Like a pass-the-parcel,’ she explained to Lewis later, thrilled by her own daring.
Le
wis, relieved that his role in the plot had been so hygienic, smiled his admiration. ‘When are we going to do the actual spell? Won’t it look a bit funny if we start dancing around him, chanting or whatever we have to do?’
‘We can do it without going anywhere near him. That’s what all this is for.’ Tessa held up the brown paper bag that now contained everything they needed to proceed. Getting hold of the spell items had been great fun in itself, like fulfilling a secret mission, and they agreed to leave it until the following day before carrying out the next phase of the plan.
Lewis settled at the kitchen table to do the sums, double-checking his calculations, muttering, ‘Look at the sign,’ before starting each one. Tessa sat opposite, cutting pictures and words from an old magazine then pasting them into a scrapbook. There was no purpose in her effort, no holiday homework to complete or Brownie badge in the offing – she was doing it because she liked cutting things out, liked the almond scent of the stiff paste. They concentrated on their projects, sporadically breaking into song, one starting and the other joining in. ‘Maresy dotes… an dozy dotes… an liddle lambsy tivy’, occasionally exchanging glances or kicking each other under the table.
Their mother was ironing in the dining room when the phone rang. The children stopped what they were doing, listening as she crossed the hall to answer it.
‘Of course, Frank… Of course not… You’ll have to take pot luck… See you later then.’
Tessa returned to the table. ‘I think Uncle Frank’s coming to tea.’
Lewis smiled. ‘Good.’
They were playing hopscotch behind the garage when Frank Swinburne came whistling around the corner. ‘You kiddos up to no good, as usual,’ he grinned.
The children loved everything about Uncle Frank. He was one of the few people they knew – along with Mrs Channing and Mr Zeal – whose company lived up to expectations. He wasn’t like other adults who promised ‘I’ll be there in a minute’ but never came.
‘Will you play hopscotch, Uncle Frank?’ Lewis asked.
‘Why else would I come to this hell hole? Don’t you know I won medals for hopping when I was in the army?’ He dipped his knees, catching each of them around the waist, lifting and swinging them round. When they signalled enough, squealing and screaming that they were going to be sick, he took his turn in their game, skidding the flat stone across the chalked grid, hopping from square to square, ensuring he made a bad job of it then feigning outrage at their amusement.
Peggy Swinburne came out, the baby a swaddled bundle clasped against her chest. ‘What’s all the noise about?’ Her frown dissolved. ‘Oh, hello, Frank. Dick’s not home yet.’
‘Hi, Peg. These two horrors are giving me a hard time.’ He dropped to his knees, clutching his chest, then sprawled forward. ‘You win. I’m a gonner. Aaaggghh.’ He lay prone, eyes closed and legs twitching.
The children whooped with delight and their mother laughed. ‘You’re a daft beggar, Frank. You’ll ruin your clothes.’
He jumped up, brushing chalk-dust from the knees of his pale trousers and the front of his short-sleeved shirt, and held his arms out, ‘Let’s have a gander at this new nephew of mine, then.’ He took the baby in the crook of his left arm, loosening the sheet around the tiny head. ‘Ugly little blighter, aren’t you?’
Tessa couldn’t square his unkind words with their tender delivery, or the way he raised the baby to his face, brushing his lips against the pink forehead. She looked to her mother, expecting her to look hurt by the insult, but she was smiling.
‘We think he’s ugly too,’ Tessa crowed.
‘Almost as ugly as you two.’ He punched them both lightly on the shoulder.
‘I think it’s a joke,’ Lewis whispered to his sister.
‘I know. I’m not stupid.’ In an instant, her adoration for her uncle turned to loathing. Did he really intend to treat this upstart as their equal?
‘I’m a bit behind with the tea,’ their mother announced. ‘Could you hold Gordon while I get organised?’
‘Why don’t we have a picnic? Out here, in the garden.’ Frank suggested. ‘And we’ll sort it out, won’t we, kids? Give you time to settle this little fella down.’
This was more like it. ‘Can we, Mum? Pleeease.’ As their uncle passed the baby back to their mother, Tessa immediately forgave him for his disloyalty.
Picnic preparations were well under way when the garage doors slammed, heralding Dick Swinburne’s arrival. The children, who were tugging the plastic table-cloth, arguing over the best spot on the lawn to place it, abandoned their tussle and rushed to meet him.
‘Dad. Dad—’
‘We found a dead frog by the rhubarb—’
‘Uncle Frank’s hopeless at hopscotch—’
‘He says Gordon’s ugly.’ This, gleefully, from Tessa.
‘We’re having a picnic tea, Dad.’
‘Hang on, hang on.’ Their father put down his well-worn brief case, hugged his children and nodded to his older brother. ‘Hello, Frank.’
‘How’s tricks?’ Frank asked.
‘Fine, thanks. You?’
‘Tickety-boo. Just took over a mate’s book and doubled my commission. I’m thinking of changing my car. Peggy’s looking well. And the nipper.’
‘Yes. She’s tired, of course, but it’ll be easier when the kids are back at school.’
The two men sat on the steps leading up from the yard to the lawn talking about work and cars and cricket, while the children hovered hoping that each lull in the conversation signalled its conclusion. On and on they rumbled and Tessa closed her eyes, surprised how alike the men’s voices sounded. They looked similar, too – brown hair, grey eyes, big ears and straight noses – but Uncle Frank’s face seemed somehow gentler; more friendly. He always wore interesting clothes. Pale trousers and jazzy ties. Coloured socks. Not boring greys and browns like Dad. And, of course, he didn’t limp.
Eventually the children could put up with hunger and inactivity no longer and went to see why their mother was taking so long.
After the picnic, Frank showed the children how, by blowing across a blade of grass clamped between their thumbs, they could generate a delightfully ear-splitting noise. Tessa struggled for a few minutes, refusing to take advice from anyone, then gave up altogether and began juggling with two tennis balls – something her brother couldn’t do. Lewis persisted with the grass until he was able to produce the reedy sound at will.
Frank gave him the thumbs up. ‘The lad’s got talent.’
Delighted at gaining his uncle’s approval, he marched around the lawn, blowing into his fist, drowning out the gentle evening sounds that floated across the gardens. But, after a couple of circuits, his father snapped, ‘That’ll do, Lewis. We’ve had quite enough of that racket.’ He pointed to the open bedroom window. ‘You’ll wake Gordon.’
The grown-ups went on chatting and Lewis, near to tears at what he considered an unjust reprimand, retreated to the far corner of the garden. Here he pretended to be fascinated by a colony of ants as they went about their mysterious business, all the while wishing that his mother would come looking for him, to hug him and persuade him to rejoin the family group. But she didn’t, leaving him feeling doubly abandoned. After a while the ants gained his attention and he pushed a twig down into the mound of frothy soil which marked the nest. Instantly, shiny dark-brown ants spilled out, scattering in all directions, many carrying a single egg the size of a grain of pudding rice.
‘Ssshhh.’ Tessa crept up behind him. ‘Don’t talk too loud. I think they’ve forgotten us and it’s way past bedtime.’
‘I hate him,’ Lewis whispered.
‘Who? Dad or Gordon?’
He thought for a moment. ‘All of them.’
‘What about me?’
He stared at her. What a silly question. Her ‘What about me?’ was like asking what he felt about clouds or Saturdays or books. His sister was – and there was nothing more to be said.
A wail, quiet b
ut powerful, seeped out of the bedroom window, like a factory hooter announcing that it was time to go home. Dick Swinburne glanced around and, spotting the children, pointed at his wristwatch. ‘Come on, you two. Look at the time.’
‘Ooohhh. Can’t we have a bit longer, Dad? It’s the holidays,’ Tessa pleaded.
Frank jumped up, brushing grass off the seat of his trousers. ‘I’m off now anyway. Got to see a man about a dog.’ He grabbed the children gently by the earlobes and led them, giggling, towards the house where he said his goodbyes, shaking his brother’s hand and kissing Peggy and the children on the cheek.
‘See you soon, Frank,’ Peggy said.
‘Not if I see you first,’ he countered, winking at the children, and the family stood on the doorstep, waving as he drove away, the novelty of the evening dissolving as he disappeared from view.
Tessa and Lewis undressed then went in search of their mother. She was sitting in her bedroom, giving Gordon his bottle, singing tenderly ‘Lula-lula, lula-lula bye-bye…’ and smiling down into the baby’s face, so absorbed that she didn’t notice her other children, waiting in the doorway for her bedtime blessing.
‘Where’s the … stuff?’ Lewis whispered after breakfast.
‘Under the hedge, by the rhubarb.’ Tessa checked that her mother was out of earshot. ‘We’ll do the next bit when she gives him his feed.’
During the course of the morning, Peggy Swinburne paid more attention to her older children than she had for weeks, apologising for the dreariness of their school holiday. ‘Perhaps we can do something nice at the weekend, if the weather holds. Go to the beach, maybe. Dad’ll be here to help…’