“What’s the matter? Don’t the parents know what they’re up to, then?”
“Well, not exactly—I mean, it’s all right really, but— but—” Jane floundered miserably.
“But you don’t want them to know, is that it?” the man asked.
“Look,” Richard said. “We'd better explain.” And explain he did, about the way the two sets of parents had gone away, about the dull holiday, about Yossell, everything. But at the ends of his recital, the man merely shook his head, and stood with pencil poised over his notebook.
“Sorry about all that,” he said, “But I can’t help it. I’ve got to report this, and the parents’ll have to be told. Come on now.”
“Isn’t there anything we can do to make it all right?” Jane asked desperately, an all too vivid vision of her father’s wrath before her yes, should he find out what was happening. There must be something.”
“If you can find a responsible adult to stand guarantor for these youngsters, that'd be O.K. But it would have to be someone pretty responsible— a relative or someone. Now, come on. I haven’t time to waste. Names and addresses, please.”
While Richard unwillingly gave the plain-clothes man the information he wanted, the others stood about miserably. When the man had gone. Peter said, “I’m terribly sorry about this, really I am. I came as soon as I got the tip.”
“You did your best, Peter,” Richard said wearily. “Thanks, anyway. Now what do we do?”
“A responsible adult,” John said thoughtfully. “I wonder.” He stared at the others for a moment, lost in thought. “Look, Richard—can I slope off for a while? I’ve got an idea.”
“If you like,” Richard said absently, and John turned and slipped away though the crowds.
“How did you know that the policeman was coming, Peter?” Hilary asked.
“Oh, one of the people in the market knew about it—seems Barker tipped the police with wink, and this chap I know was too scared to be seen talking to you, in case Barker guessed he was tipping you off—so he came and told me, seeing he'd noticed me around you. Nice feller, he is.”
“Barker again,” Richard said bitterly. “Honestly, as if it was going him much harm, us being here. He’s got stalls already, greedy old whatsit. Why can’t he leave us alone?”
“He’s ambitious, I suppose,” Peter said with a shrug. “Anyway, what are you doing now?”
“What can we do? Wait for the balloon to go up, I suppose. I just hope it doesn’t go up too high. Look, Jane, you'd better take these blasted kids off somewhere. Go swimming or something, and keep them out of my way, or I’ll do 'em a mischief.” He glared at the silent Barbara and Jojo. “Any why you two hadn’t the sense to stay at Mrs Minsky’s, or at least keep your big mouths shut…”
“I’m awfully sorry,” Barbara said, tears in her eyes. “I didn’t realize what was going on.”
“Never mind, love,” Jane said soothingly. “It wasn’t really your fault. Come on— we’ll go for a swim.”
Jojo brightened at once, if there was one thing he enjoyed more than eating it was swimming, but Barbara was not appeased. “But what are we going to do?” she wailed. “We can’t go swimming every day. Have we got to be on our own all the time from now on, while you have all the fun of being here?”
Jane looked at her helplessly. “I’m sorry, Bar,” she said. “Really I am. But what can we do? You heard what the policeman said.”
“You can be here,” Hilary said, putting her arm round Barbara’s drooping shoulders. “You don’t have to stay at home by yourselves or anything like that.”
Barbara shrugged Hilary’s arm away pettishly. “What’s the good of that? Standing around like a— like a lamp-post? I want to do something. I wish Mummy were here—” And she burst into tears.
“I’ve got an idea!” Peter pushed through the little knot round the weeping Barbara, and squatted on his haunches in front of her. “Listen, Bar, do you like my grandmother?”
Barbara sniffed dolefully, and looked at him through brimming eyes. “Mmm. Why?” she gulped.
“Well, you know she sells things like cheesecake, and apple strudel—”
“Strudel?” said Jojo, his eyes brightening. “What’s that? Something nice?”
“It’s sort of pastry thing, with apples and nuts and raisins and cinnamon in it.—” Peter grinned at the look of sheer greed on Jojo’s face— “and she makes it herself. She works in a little kitchen behind the shop. Well, she’s always got an awful lot to do—and I think she'd be very grateful if you two helped her. And there’s other things to do there, too. Like putting pickles in the big dishes on the counter, and making potato salad, and weighing out biscuits ready to be sold, and all that. Suppose I asked her if you could come and help her. Would you like that?”
Barbara stopped sniffing and looked interested, while Jojo leaped in the air with joy. “Lovely! I’m a bit tired of fruit, anyway. Could we, Bar—please?”
“Yes…” she said slowly. “It'd be better than nothing— and I like cooking. Will your grandmother let us really learn how to make strudel, Peter?”
“I’m sure she will,” Peter said. “Look, we’ll go and see her now—and then go swimming with Jane for today, because it’ll take Grandma a bit of time to get everything organised for you to help her. O.K.?”
Barbara wiped her eyes with a grubby handkerchief, and went off with Peter, Jane and Jojo to see Mrs Minsky.
“I suppose it’s all right,” Hilary said dubiously, watching them go. “I mean—isn’t that still working? And they aren’t supposed to work.”
“I think it’ll do,” Richard said. “And they’ll be out of the sight of the police. If I know Mrs Minsky, they’ll do more eating and playing than anything else— and she certainly won’t let 'em serve her customers. Come on— we'd better get back to work.”
Stephen and Philip had already returned to the stall to serve the customers who still came thick and fast, and now the others, miserable and worried, returned to help them.
They worked in comparative silence all morning, none of them having the heart to put on their usual show to attract customers, and their takings at the end of the morning showed their state of mind—at least half as much as they usually took.
“What’s happened to John?” Stephen asked suddenly, as they ate their lunch of sausage rolls bought from Mrs Minsky. “Where is he?”
“I'd forgotten him for a minute,” Richard said. “Where did he go, Hilary?”
Hilary shook her head. “I’ve no idea. You know how it is with John. He gets ideas, and likes to sort them out for himself, before talking about them.”
Stephen looked as miserable as it was possible for him to look. “I don’t see what he can do. Old Barker’s really shopped us this time.” They sank into gloom.
It was nearly four o'clock when John returned, his usually expressionless face wreathed in smiles. He was carrying a huge bag full of assorted chocolate bars and sweets, which he solemnly distributed among them refusing to say why, except that it was to “celebrate.”
“Celebrate what?” Richard asked, his mouth full of fruit and nut chocolate. “Where’ve you been?”
John smiled mysteriously, and peered away down the market, seeking though the crowds with his eyes. Then, suddenly he waived furiously and shouted, “Over here! Over here!” and a tall man wearing a black jacket and pin striped trousers came picking his fastidious way though the messy road towards them.
As he came up, his smooth black head turning this way and that with lively curiosity, John said, “Mr Percival— may I introduce my sister, my cousins.” He named each of them, and in some surprise they all shook hands with the man, who smiled at them in a friendly way, and then said:
“Well, well! Very enterprising of you, John, m'boy. Very enterprising of all of you— though I see what you mean about your father, John. He wouldn’t be best pleased, would he?”
“He would not!” John said feelingly. Then added anxiously. “Is it a
ll right now?”
The man raised his eyebrows in some surprise. “All right? Of course it is! Be a pretty poor show if I couldn’t handle a local police force, now wouldn’t it?”
John grabbed Mr Percival’s hand and shook it violently.
“Thank you very much indeed, Mr Percival— very much. Most grateful. Will you let us have your bill for your services?”
Mr Percival laughed richly. “Bless my soul, boy— no need for that— no need at all. It was a pleasure.”
“Will someone please tell me what is going on around here?” Richard burst out, unable to contain himself any longer. “What in— what are you talking about, John?”
John grinned. “Sorry. it’s just that I thought the best way out of any trouble with police was to get a solicitor. So I did.”
“What do you mean?” Hilary was all puzzlement.
“I went to a solicitor,” John explained patiently. “Mr Percival here. He knows Daddy— so I thought he'd understand if I explained what had happened, and how awful it'd be if Dad found out. So he went to the police, and sorted it all out for us.”
“And a fairly difficult job it was.” Mr Percival smiled reminiscently. “But I gather they don’t think much of the man who laid the original complaint anyway, and once I'd given them my personal guarantee the two young ones wouldn’t work at all on the stall, they said they'd waive the whole affair. Mind you don’t let me down, now.”
“Oh we won’t,” Hilary said fervently. “They don’t like it, but neither of them will do another thing at this stall, we promise— don’t we?” She looked at the others.
They, too, gave their personal assurances that Barbara and Jojo wouldn’t be allowed to work at the stall again, and then Richard said, a little uncomfortably, “As John said, Mr Percival— we'd like to pay you fee, please. We wouldn’t want to feel we'd wasted your time.”
Mr Percival laughed, and shook his head. “No need, my boy. No need at all.” He looked at the stall considering for a moment, then he laughed again, and said, “Look, I’ll take some fruit, hmm? Then we can call it square.”
So Richard filled Mr Percival’s briefcase with the choicest apples and pears and bananas that were left, before the tall man turned and went away, waving aside their renewed thanks with an easy smile.
Hilary hugged John tightly. “Oh, John, you’re an angel!” she said, almost with tears in her eyes, she was so relieved. “You’ve got us out of trouble again—you are a marvel.”
John disentangled himself, and said modestly, “Nothing to it. Just a bit of an idea. Look, can we pack up soon? I’m aching for a swim. I couldn’t be hotter!”
“You go along, John,” Richard said handsomely. “You’ve earned the time off. We’ll see you later.”
They finished the day’s trading with high spirits, once again bawling their wares at the top of their voices. But at the end of the afternoon, Richard spotted Barker, leaning against his own messy stall next door, staring at them venomously as he chewed his ever-present matchstick.
“We’ll have to watch that bloke like a hawk,” Richard said in a low voice to Hilary. “He’s tried everything now—and he’s not the type to give up easily. I’ll warn the boys to keep an extra special look-out on the shed tonight, I think!”
But even the fear of Barker hanging over them, they finished the day in high good humour, putting away the takings— respectable, if not much as they had been on other, less worrying days— before spending a noisy evening playing pontoon, a card game to which they were all partial, using grapes for stakes.
Chapter Twelve
RICHARD had been quite right. Barker hadn’t been beaten yet. They arrived at the shed the next morning— early this time— to find the cobblestones covered in very squashed tomatoes, and a reek of strong pine disinfectant in the air. Gregory had been watching for them, and leaned precariously out of his bedroom window as they arrived, to call “Wotcha mates!” in a shrill treble before vanishing to reappear at the entry to the alley a few minutes later.
“They came,” he reported breathlessly. “Bunch of right ugly geezers they wos, too. But I got 'em.” He grinned in satisfaction. “There was one got a great rotten tomato right in his kisser, and I got him with a whole bucketful of disinfectant. He’ll stink from here to Christmas, he will. Got his hair, see, and he won’t get the stink out of that in a hurry!”
“Did they get into the shed?” Hilary asked anxiously.
“Wot do you take me for?” Gregory said scornfully. “I chucked everything I had, and they couldn’t see where it was coming from— so they sloped off. Reckon it was worth those boxes, now, do you mate?” He peered up at Richard wickedly.
“And how!” Richard, and fished in his trouser pocket. “And a few bob besides. Thanks a lot, Gregory.” He shoved a ten shilling note into Gregory’s willing fist.
They put the stall up in worried silence. When they were settled at the pitch, Richard said thoughtfully, “Well Baker’s been pipped at the post again. Wonder what he’ll try next? We'd better keep a close look out.”
“Shouldn’t we call the police?” Philip said anxiously. “Tell 'em we expect trouble.”
“I’ve had enough to do with the police to last me a lifetime,” Richard said firmly. “No, we’ll just keep our eyes peeled.”
It wasn’t until nearly lunch-time that anything much happened. They had taken it in turns to watch the market, while the others served at the stall, though they were a bit short handed. Jane had taken Barbara and Jojo off to Mrs Minsky’s to settle them with her, and had stayed with them to make sure they didn’t come back to the stall.
Hilary was serving a man with some apples, when she suddenly felt a cold sinking at the pit of her stomach. As the man turned to go, she raised her head, and sniffed carefully. At the evidence of her nose, her heart sank even further.
There was a distinct smell of pine disinfectant coming from behind her, a smell that had apparently been covered by a lavish application of something with lavender in it. The combination was rather unpleasant, though it wasn’t that that upset her. She turned slowly, to look behind her, and there, leaning against Barker’s stall, was the young man in the black leather jacket, the hooligan who had tried to get fresh with her the first time she had tried to put the stall up.
She stared at him, her throat dry with fear, as he looked insolently back at her, his smooth young face sneering under this slicked-back hair.
“'Allo, beautiful,” he said softly, looking her up and down in a way that made her want to run away. “What you been up to, then? You’ve made my dad right mad, you and your pals have. That was naughty, wasn’t it? Real naughty.” He grinned horribly. “You was a silly piece, wasn’t you? If you'd been nice to me, none of this would have happened, Would it?”.
“I— I don’t what you’re talking about,” Hilary managed to croak, trying to pull her eyes away from his, so that she could look round and call the others, but his light blue eyes were so fixed on her that she felt like a mesmerised rabbit. “G-go away!”
He smiled slowly. “Not on your life, sweet'eart,” he said still softly. Indeed, they were both speaking in such low tones that the boys on the other side of the stall, behind Hilary, hadn’t even noticed that she was talking to anyone.
“Not on your life,” he said again, wiping the smile off his face. “I got a few debts to collect off you lot, I 'ave. Mates of yours ruined a perfectly good suit of mine last night they did— and I don’t put up with that sort o' thing from no one, I don’t. And I tell you what else, I wants your pitch, see? My dad says I can have it, and my dad’s not a bloke what doesn’t get what he wants. So are you going to be good children and run off 'ome, or 'ave I got to make you?”
Hilary at last got her voice back, and with a tremendous effort of will, turned her head towards Richard and the others.
“Richard—” Her cracked voice brought the others rushing to her side, Richard dropped the bag of bananas he was about to hand to a customer.
As he got to her, he sniffed suddenly, just as Hilary herself had done, and looked up sharply at the boy in the black leather jacket.
“Aha!” he said with unconscious theatricality. “So we know who it was now, do we?”
“Barker’s son,” Hilary managed, her knees shaking with fright. “He—he—” She managed no more.
The boy straightened and took a menacing step forward.
“Listen, buster,” he said threateningly. “You take a tip from me, and slope off quietly. Or so help me, me and me mates’ll make mincemeat of you. And he slowly took his hand out of his trouser pocket, where it had been all the time. Wrapped around his knuckles was a length of bicycle chain, gleaming with ugly oiliness on the midday sun.
“Richie—let’s go!” Hilary grabbed Richard’s arms, terrified at the sight of the chain. “It’s not worth a fight— come on.” But Richard shook her off as though she had been an importunate puppy, and thrust his head forward, clenching his own empty fists as he did so.
For one interminable second they stood glaring at each other, like a couple of stags in the rutting season, then the boy in the black jacket whistled shrilly through his teeth.
Hilary and the other three boys were now clustered round Richard, Stephen nervously pushing his glasses on to his nose, Philip and John rigid with attention.
Almost as though they came from nowhere, a group of young men came lounging up through the market, their hands thrust into their pockets, until they stood in a tight circle round your Barker and the Cooper and Jackson stall.
Almost without looking, Hilary was aware of a sudden stillness of movement in the market. The few lunch-time shoppers stood silent, staring at the tableau round the stall, while other stallholders stared fearfully across the street at them all. Then there was a flurry of movement, as some of the shoppers, apparently realising that trouble was brewing, scuttled off away to the main road, and a couple of stallholders rapidly let down the tarpaulin roofs of their stalls to cover their merchandise.“Go into Sophie' shop, Hilary,” Richard said through his teeth. “There’s going to be trouble here.”
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