by R. A. Spratt
‘Dear child,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Things are bad, but they’re not that bad.’
‘We could sell something,’ suggested Derrick.
‘Probably not wise,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I think your father is beginning to be suspicious. I sold his antique four-poster bed last week. And he has been muttering about his room not looking quite the way it did. No, what we need is a money-making scheme.’
The children scratched their heads and thought hard, but they did not know much about money-making schemes. Derrick had a vague idea that they had something to do with asking people to lend you money, then taking all that money and running away on holiday. (Which just goes to show Derrick actually knew everything you need to know about running a hedge fund.)
‘Aha! I’ve got it!’ declared Nanny Piggins, leaping up from the sofa. ‘I am going to become a fortune teller.’
The children were not entirely convinced that becoming a fortune teller was an easy way to make twenty-thousand dollars. But Nanny Piggins seemed even more chipper than usual as she set up a miniature circus tent on the footpath outside the front of the house.
‘Michael, run and fetch the “Nanny Wanted” sign from the garage,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘You’re not going to hire a new nanny, are you?’ asked a horrified Michael.
‘Of course not. I want to make my own sign,’ explained Nanny Piggins.
As soon as Michael returned with the old weather-beaten placard, Nanny Piggins repainted it in exotic lettering:
Madame Piggins Fortune Teller
$5
Enter if you dare
She then put on her best silk dressing-gown, wrapped a purple scarf around her head, took the statuette of Santa out of a snow globe so it looked like a crystal ball, and then disappeared into the tent. The children stood outside, wondering what would happen next.
‘Well, come on,’ called Nanny Piggins. ‘You’ve got to come in here too. You’re my assistants.’
The children breathed a sigh of relief. They might not think fortune telling was a brilliant money-making scheme but they were pretty sure watching Nanny Piggins telling fortunes would be brilliantly entertaining. So they sat inside the tent, playing cards with Nanny Piggins and waiting for their first customer.
Seven hours later, Nanny Piggins did not seem at all perturbed that there had not been a single person enter the tent. ‘It always takes a while to establish a small business,’ she said wisely, as she won her one hundred and thirty-seventh game of snap in a row. They had almost forgotten why they were crouching on the floor of a miniature circus tent when a young woman entered.
‘I was just on my way home when I saw your sign,’ said the woman. ‘You’ve got a front charging people five dollars to tell them a load of malarky.’
Nanny Piggins looked the woman up and down, sizing her up. ‘As you are my first customer I am prepared to offer you a discount. I shall tell you three things from your future for the bargain price of $4.99.’
‘All right,’ said the woman, ‘I could do with a laugh, and my mum is not expecting me home for another half hour so I might as well.’
The young woman sat down and held out her palm for Nanny Piggins to read.
‘Oh I don’t read those,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I rub heads.’
‘What?’ exclaimed Derrick. He had not seen that one coming.
‘If you want to know what is going on in someone’s brain you can’t tell by looking at their hand,’ said Nanny Piggins, as though this was perfectly obvious. ‘You’ve got to go right to the source and rub their head.’ So Nanny Piggins leaned across the table, grabbing the woman’s head between her trotters, and rubbed it. ‘Hmmm, interesting,’ muttered Nanny Piggins.
‘What is it?’ asked the woman scornfully. ‘Does my dead granny want to tell me to wrap up warm this winter?’
‘I’m a fortune teller, not a psychic. Do pay attention,’ scolded Nanny Piggins as she continued to rub the woman’s head. ‘Okay, I can see it clearly. You are going to . . .’ Nanny Piggins paused here for dramatic effect.
‘Yes?’ said the young woman, who could not help but be curious.
‘Lose a button from your cardigan,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘and . . . bang your head on a frozen fish. And . . . meet a man who is always wet.’
Nanny Piggins then let go of the woman’s head and sat back with an air of triumph about her.
‘What?’ said the young woman.
‘I have made my predictions for your future,’ said Nanny Piggins with finality.
‘You’ve talked a load of old hogwash,’ said the woman.
‘That will be $4.99 please,’ said Nanny Piggins, holding out her trotter.
‘If you think I’m going to pay for that utter –’ began the young woman.
‘Oh dear,’ said Nanny Piggins, suddenly with an edge of menace in her voice. ‘Michael, I think you had better fetch Boris.’
‘Who’s Boris?’ asked the young woman.
‘The giant bear who lives in our garden,’ said Samantha truthfully.
‘I predict he is about to get very angry,’ said Nanny Piggins.
The young woman decided to cut her losses. She handed over the money and left in a sulk, muttering about con artists and how she had a good mind to call the police.
‘That didn’t go well,’ said Derrick.
‘We’ll see,’ said Nanny Piggins smugly, whistling to herself as she packed up her fortune-telling paraphernalia. ‘I think that will do for today.’
‘But you’ve only told one fortune,’ protested Michael.
‘And you only charged $4.99,’ said Samantha, ‘so you’ve got another $19,995.01 to earn.’
‘All in good time,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Come along. Since you have been such good children I’ll make chocolate fondue for dinner.’
‘It’s Tuesday, you always make chocolate fondue on Tuesdays,’ said Michael.
‘Yes, I’m lucky that you always behave so well on Tuesdays,’ said Nanny Piggins.
The next day Nanny Piggins kept the children home from school. She rang Headmaster Pimplestock and told him they had all simultaneously contracted lead poisoning from too much sucking on pencils. Then she hung up and took the phone off the hook before he had a chance to consult a medical dictionary. Next they went outside and began re-erecting the tent. They had only just got the tent pegs banged into the root stocks of Mr Green’s pedigree rose plants when the young woman from the previous day burst back into the tent.
‘Good morning,’ said Nanny Piggins brightly, as though this sudden arrival was entirely to be expected.
‘You’re a genius!’ gushed the young woman.
‘Yes,’ agreed Nanny Piggins.
‘A savant . . . a wonder . . . an inexplicable force of nature,’ gabbled the woman.
‘All true,’ concurred Nanny Piggins.
‘You mean to say that Nanny Piggins’ predictions actually happened?’ asked Michael, being the first of the children to grasp the woman’s strange ramblings.
‘See for yourself,’ said the woman, holding up her cardigan.
‘See what?’ asked Derrick.
‘Exactly,’ said the young woman. ‘There’s nothing there. The button is missing!’
All three children gasped in amazement.
‘But what about being hit in the head with a frozen fish?’ asked Samantha.
‘Well, I went to a sushi restaurant last night, and as the chef was walking through the restaurant with a great big frozen tuna on his shoulder, someone called out to him, and when he turned around to say hello, the tuna’s tail whacked me in the head. Look!’ said the young woman, holding up her fringe and showing them a big black bruise right in the middle of her forehead.
‘Amazing!’ said Samantha. ‘B
ut surely you didn’t meet a man who is always wet?’
‘I went to the sushi restaurant on a blind date with a man who is a marine biologist. He goes scuba diving every day,’ said the young woman.
‘So he’s always wet!’ gasped Samantha.
‘Exactly,’ said the young woman. ‘Every word you said came true.’
‘I know,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I don’t do things I’m bad at.’
‘Can you do it again? Because I’ve brought along some friends who want to have their fortunes read too,’ said the young woman.
‘Of course,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Send the first one in.’
And so Nanny Piggins’ fortune-telling business took off. Word spread quickly. By the end of the week there were queues wrapped around the block from five o’clock in the morning onwards. And, amazingly, every single prediction Nanny Piggins made came true.
She told the butcher he would accidentally cut off a pinkie finger. And the next day he did. Luckily for him it was not his own – it was the work experience boy’s, and he was not disappointed. The doctors sewed it back on and he had quite the story to boast about when he went back to school on Monday.
She told a young lonely man with a secret passion for flamenco dancing that he would meet the woman of his dreams if he went outside the tent and found the seventeenth person in the queue. And indeed there was a lonely young woman with a secret desire to wear a frilly gypsy dress and rhythmically stamp her feet, standing right there.
She told Hans the Baker that he would find his television remote control if he looked in his freezer. And it was true. (His wife, Princess Annabelle, had put it there to punish him for leaving a very dirty ring around the bathtub. Now you have to understand, Hans and Annabelle had a very loving, happy marriage. And she was a broad-minded princess who did not mind a bit of dirt. But in this instance the dirt was in fact a caramel stain, where Hans had secretly been eating the leftover caramel éclairs from the shop without her. This was a sin that could not go unpunished.)
And she told Headmaster Pimplestock he would have a very boring life punctuated only by encounters with a glamorous and beautiful pig (which, admittedly, any one of the children could have predicted).
In just five days she had raked in $20,001.09.
‘Look at all this lovely money,’ said Nanny Piggins, heroically resisting the urge to roll in it.
‘Now you can repay the museum,’ said Samantha happily. She hated trouble in all its forms. It weighed heavily on her that Nanny Piggins was banned for life from the Transport Museum, even though Nanny Piggins was not bothered at all. (She actually cheered and threw her hat in the air when she found out.)
‘Yes, I suppose I have to,’ conceded Nanny Piggins reluctantly. The curator at the Transport Museum seemed particularly unworthy of large amounts of cash money. But when she thought of the poor broken cake stand, Nanny Piggins got a lump in her throat. ‘We’ll take it straight there this afternoon. But the fortune-telling business is going so well. There’s nothing to stop us making our own $20,000 next week.’
‘I suppose not,’ admitted Samantha. ‘It would be nice to have such a large amount of pocket money.
‘You could even tell fortunes for two weeks and make $40,000,’ said Derrick.
‘Or three weeks and earn $60,000,’ said Michael.
‘What a good idea,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘We could have a lot of fun with $60,000. We could travel the world trying exotic foreign cakes and learning new and exciting ice-cream recipes.’
‘And build a monster robot that crushes cars,’ said Michael.
‘Oh yes, obviously that too,’ agreed Nanny Piggins.
But their planning session was, at that very moment, interrupted when the lights in the tent flickered on and off, smoke billowed in under the entry flap, strange eastern music filled the air and a doorbell rang.
‘What’s going on?’ asked Derrick.
‘And why is there smoke in here?’ asked Samantha.
‘And who installed a doorbell in the tent?’ asked Michael.
‘Oh dear,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I know of only one woman who uses such elaborate special effects before making her entrance. I think I am in trouble.’
‘Not again,’ sighed Samantha.
‘Derrick, you had better open the front flap of the tent, and if you find a beautiful and exotic African sorceress there, do let her in,’ said Nanny Piggins as she picked up a plate of chocolate, ready to welcome her guest. ‘Children, prepare yourselves. You are about to meet a real fortune teller, the one from the circus.’
A moment later a beautiful and exotic sorceress glided into the tent. (Nanny Piggins’ predicting ability extended to knowing who was at the door.)
‘Hello Madame Zandra, so good to see you,’ said Nanny Piggins politely.
‘Sarah Piggins,’ boomed Madame Zandra in her beautiful resonant voice. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself.’
‘Oh, I am,’ Nanny Piggins assured her.
‘Those with the gift of fortune telling have a responsibility to uphold the rules of mystical power,’ said Madame Zandra sternly. ‘When I taught you my secrets you promised to abide by these rules.’
‘Sorry, I forgot. I must have had too little chocolate that day. The rules slipped my mind,’ confessed Nanny Piggins.
‘Then I shall remind you of them. Rule One: a fortune teller must always muddle her predictions up with gobbledegook and bunkum,’ intoned Madame Zandra.
‘Of course,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘If you tell fortunes accurately you’re going to put the rest of us out of business,’ said Madame Zandra. ‘Do you really want a whole crowd of angry unemployed fortune tellers on your doorstep?’
‘No, Madame Zandra,’ said Nanny Piggins humbly.
‘And Rule Two: always keep your tent properly ventilated,’ coughed Madame Zandra as she flapped her hand in front of her face, ‘so you can use lots of smoke in your special effects.’
‘You’re so right, Madame Zandra, I don’t know what I was thinking,’ agreed Nanny Piggins. ‘However, I predict that you won’t punish me too severely, because you’re so lovely and you would quite fancy some of the treacle tart I have hidden in my turban.’
And so Nanny Piggins closed her fortunetelling business. On the whole she was glad to do it. While having $60,000 would be nice, having jobs was not. So it was much better to have just one instead of two. Madame Zandra left after making Nanny Piggins swear never to tell an accurate fortune again. Then Nanny Piggins and the children went down to the Transport Museum to pay for their damages.
When they got to the museum, however, the most remarkable thing happened. For a start they could not get into the building, and not just because Nanny Piggins was banned but because there was police tape across the front entrance. Naturally, Nanny Piggins just ducked under the tape and went inside. Then, after several police constables tried (and failed) to crash-tackle her in the lobby, the Police Sergeant intervened and told her that she did not need to repay the museum.
It turns out Nanny Piggins had been entirely right. The World War I fighter planes were fakes. The curator had sold the real planes over the internet and substituted them with forgeries he had made in his own garage. (Which is why they had petrol in their engines, because he had flown them in to work early one morning before anybody else got in.) So the curator was being forced to pay for all the damages himself.
This meant Nanny Piggins, Boris and the children returned home with the $20,000 still in their possession. The cash sat on the coffee table while they stared at it.
‘It’s such a lot of money,’ said Samantha reverentially. ‘What are we going to spend it on?’ asked Derrick.
‘A honey farm?’ suggested Boris.
‘A medium-sized monster robot?’ suggested Michael.
‘No,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘While they are excellent suggestions, I have an even better idea.’
Later that day Nanny Piggins, Boris and the children went out and bought their very own refrigerated cake stand. They put it right in the middle of the kitchen. Nanny Piggins was so proud of their purchase she actually polished it (and as you know she did not normally believe in housework). Of course, the cake stand remained empty at all times. You see, it did its job too well. Whenever Nanny Piggins put a cake in there it looked so good, how could she resist eating it? But she enjoyed knowing she could store a cake if she chose to.
‘Nanny Piggins! Where are you?’ shouted Derrick, as he, Samantha and Michael rushed upstairs to their nanny’s room. Boris followed close behind.
Normally when they woke up in the morning, they went downstairs and found their nanny in the kitchen, making some wonderful sugar-filled delight. But occasionally, when Nanny Piggins was feeling lazy, she would get up an hour earlier, whip up a spectacular seven-course breakfast, then take it all back upstairs to her bedroom so they could enjoy breakfast in bed. Her room was all set up for it. Nanny Piggins had a camping stove in her dressing table for the omelette bar and a warming plate on her night stand to keep the pancakes at the perfect temperature. If anything else needed warming up she would just give it a good squeeze with her curling tongs. (She had an extra pair of curling tongs specifically for heating food.)
But on this morning, when the children burst into her room, they did not find Nanny Piggins surrounded by food, just putting the finishing touches on a profiterole tower. Instead she was lying in the middle of her bed, staring at the ceiling.
‘What’s wrong, Nanny Piggins?’ asked Derrick.
‘Are you sick?’ worried Samantha.
‘Has someone broken into your bedroom and superglued you to your bed?’ asked Michael.
‘No, I can move and I’m not sick,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘But something is wrong.’
‘You can’t decide what to wear?’ guessed Boris.
‘Worse than that,’ said Nanny Piggins.
Boris gasped. ‘What could possibly be worse than not knowing what to wear?’ (This just goes to show what an empathetic bear Boris was, because he did not even wear clothes himself.)