by R. A. Spratt
Finally, after two long days and seven matches, Boris made it through to the grand final. All the other tables had been cleared away and raised seating had been arranged around the one remaining table.
‘So where is Olga?’ asked Nanny Piggins. ‘I haven’t seen this nemesis of yours.’
‘I wouldn’t call her a nemesis,’ said Boris. ‘She is far too mediocre for that. But because she has inexplicably been given the rank of grandmaster, she didn’t have to compete. She automatically went straight into the final.’
‘Here she comes now!’ said Michael.
There was commotion at the doorway as the anorak-wearing men rushed forward to get a glimpse of the great chess celebrity. They all gasped, one or two even swooned, and murmurs of ‘she’s brilliant and beautiful!’ could be heard about the room.
Nanny Piggins rolled her eyes. ‘Haven’t these men ever seen a woman before?’
‘Well, they spend their spare time at chess tournaments, so probably not,’ said Boris.
The crowd parted and Nanny Piggins and the children got their first glimpse of her.
‘Oh,’ said Nanny Piggins. She had to reluctantly concede that this Olga Svinya was indeed stunningly beautiful.
True, she was very short, and her face was half-obscured by an enormous pair of sunglasses and a long black fringe. And on anyone else, the grey trench coach and a huge faux fur hat might look silly, as if her head had been encased in a furry UFO. But somehow Olga carried it off. There was something alluring, almost familiar, about her strikingly beautiful face.
‘Aaah, Boris,’ said Olga in a thick Russian accent. ‘We meet again.’
‘Olga, either you’ve been given a brain transplant or you have somehow fooled the chess establishment into making you a grandmaster,’ said Boris.
‘Boris,’ scolded Samantha. ‘It’s not like you to be so rude.’
‘I’m not being rude,’ said Boris. ‘Only truthful.’
‘Hah,’ shrugged Olga dismissively. (Russians like this type of guttural gesture.) ‘Perhaps I have done both. Shall we play chess?’ asked Olga, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
‘Of course,’ said Boris, ‘unless you’d rather play Twister. I like that too.’
They sat down at the chess table and the whole room, including Nanny Piggins, the children and 254 anorak-wearing men, fell silent. It was an engrossing battle. Even Nanny Piggins paid attention, aided by Michael handing her a constant stream of lollies so she could stay awake.
It turned out that Boris and Olga were very evenly matched. Boris would try a bold Sicilian defence, and she would respond with a brilliant Siberian Trap. She would try to trick him with a Budapest gambit and he would respond with an Adler variation. The match wore on until they each only had four pieces left and there were only twenty minutes left on the clock – four for Olga and sixteen for Boris.
‘Do you think Boris will be able to win in time?’ whispered Derrick.
‘He would if he was allowed to put her in a headlock,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Really, it is ridiculous forcing a ten-foot-tall bear to play a war game with a four-foot-tall woman. Obviously he’d win in real life.’
‘I don’t know,’ said Samantha. ‘He is prone to crying.’
Olga looked up from the board. She was clearly frustrated. She angrily rubbed her ear. ‘Umpire,’ she called to the clipboard-carrying man. ‘I want to make an official complaint about audience members whispering. I want that pig thrown out.’ She glared at Nanny Piggins.
Everyone gasped.
‘What did you say?’ asked Nanny Piggins, glaring at Olga as if seeing her for the first time.
‘Here we go,’ said Michael, bracing himself for Nanny Piggins’ response.
‘Um . . . er . . . Miss,’ said the clipboard-carrying man. He was terrified of Nanny Piggins and he did not even realise she was an eighth dan blackbelt in taekwondo. He was just terrified of women generally. Even if they were pigs. ‘Um, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.’
‘Ask me to leave?’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Hah!’ (She enjoyed being dramatic too.) ‘I’m not the one you should be asking to leave. You should be throwing her out!’ Nanny Piggins pointed dramatically at Olga Svinya.
‘Grandmaster Svinya?’ asked the clipboard man.
‘No, because Olga Svinya is not her real name,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘She is an imposter!’
Everyone gasped again. This was quickly becoming the world’s second most exciting chess tournament (nothing would ever equal the St Petersburg Chess Final of 1913 where the Bolsheviks tried to overthrow the chess elite by using poisoned chess pieces).
‘Her real name is Sue Piggins and she is my identical twin sister,’ declared Nanny Piggins, ‘and I can prove it!’ Nanny Piggins leapt forward and grabbed Olga’s hair, yanking it hard. It didn’t move.
‘Ow!’ screamed Olga.
‘Why isn’t your wig coming off?’ asked Nanny Piggins. ‘Have you superglued it on there?’
‘It’s not a wig, you twit,’ said Olga.
‘Nanny Piggins!’ cried the children as they rushed forward to try to prevent her from escalating common assault to grievous bodily harm.
‘Well, I bet you haven’t had these stapled to your face,’ said Nanny Piggins as she instead whipped off Olga’s sunglasses.
Again everyone gasped, but this time from shock to find themselves staring at an exact clone of Nanny Piggins.
‘It is one of your identical twin sisters!’ exclaimed Samantha.
‘I think I recognise my genetic replica when I see her,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘It did take you three hours and you’ve been staring right at her,’ said Derrick.
‘I was distracted by that ridiculous hat,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘So what?’ demanded Olga (Sue). ‘There’s no crime against changing my name and speaking in a fake Russian accent.’
‘Oh there’s no crime in that,’ agreed Nanny Piggins, ‘no matter how peculiar it may be. But I suspect there is a crime here. For my sister Sue is not a chess genius.’
‘She’s not?’ asked Michael. ‘But your sisters are always brilliant at something.’
‘And she is,’ agreed Nanny Piggins, ‘but it is not chess. She has a genius for grifting.’
‘What’s grifting?’ asked Michael.
‘She’s a con-pig!’ said Boris.
‘Exactly,’ pronounced Nanny Piggins. ‘She has a genius for fooling others and taking advantage of the weak-minded.’
‘Then why would she target chess players?’ asked the organiser. ‘We’re all very clever.’
‘You may be clever,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘but your minds are as weak as a weak blancmange. Put your hand up if you’ve ever heard of deodorant!’
Not one man put his hand up.
‘You see,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘Then how did she get to be a grandmaster?’ asked Derrick. ‘You have to play a lot of tournaments to qualify.’
‘That’s what I’d like to know,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘and I think I have the answer.’ Nanny Piggins peered closely at her sister.
‘You’re bluffing,’ said Sue as she backed away.
‘I think the answer lies in that hat,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘No Piggins would wear a winter hat today, three days into spring, not unless they had something to conceal in among all that faux fur.’
Nanny and Sue Piggins stared each other down. Sue Piggins weighed up her options. Not being as brainy as a chess genius, this took her a few moments. Then suddenly Sue Piggins (apparently deciding to abandon her claim to the year’s supply of cheesecake) made a dash for the door.
Unfortunately the years of sitting at a chess table pretending to know how to play had taken their toll. She was no match for the superior athleticism of Nanny Piggins, who soon tackled her to the ground where a wrestling match ensued. The sisters were evenly matched, being equally talented at hair pulling and biting. But the large faux fur hat was not up to it. It tu
mbled off Sue’s head revealing a tangle of multicoloured wires, a transistor receiver and a tiny pink electronic device.
‘Look!’ cried Derrick. ‘An earpiece.’
‘That’s how you did it,’ accused Nanny Piggins. ‘Someone has been telling you what moves to make. But who?’
She looked around the crowd of anoraked men. ‘Clearly not one of them,’ decided Nanny Piggins. ‘But who else could see what was going on?’
Nanny Piggins walked over to the window, whipped a collapsible telescope out of her handbag (she carried one in case she should find herself on the high seas being attacked by pirates) and peered out into the distance.
‘There!’ exclaimed Nanny Piggins. ‘On the tenth floor. Someone is watching us. Quick, we have to get over there before they make their escape!’
Nanny Piggins threw open the window, leapt out, did a commando roll through the rhododendron bushes and took off at a sprint for the neighbouring building (making no concession for the honks and screeching tyres of the traffic on the busy road).
Boris, the children, Sue Piggins (she came against her will because Boris carried her) and the more athletic of the chess players (about six of them) chased after her. But because they used the door and waited for the traffic to clear, by the time they got to the lobby of the other building Nanny Piggins already had her victim trapped in a painful leg lock, as she sat on top of her on the floor. Computers, communications equipment and a large powerful telescope lay strewn around them (there had evidently been a wrestling match).
‘I’ve caught the real evil villain behind this wicked scheme to defraud the chess community,’ said Nanny Piggins proudly.
‘Who is it?’ asked Derrick.
‘A Russian spy?’ guessed Boris.
‘A disgruntled chess genius?’ guessed Samantha.
‘A lover of cheesecake?’ guessed Michael.
‘Yes!’ exclaimed Nanny Piggins, ‘and who loves cheesecake more than a normal person.’
‘Um . . .’ said everyone. This pop quiz was getting hard.
‘My identical twin sister, Deidre Piggins!’ declared Nanny Piggins as she got up to reveal the crushed person she had been sitting on. Deidre stood up and brushed herself off. She looked exactly the same as Nanny Piggins and Sue Piggins (indeed, all of the Piggins fourteenuplets) except that she had mousey brown hair and thick-lensed glasses.
‘Aaa-hhhaaa,’ said the children.
‘So the mousey hair and thick-framed glasses are a disguise?’ guessed Samantha.
‘No,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘You see, Deidre is a computer genius so she is the only Piggins who actually needs to wear glasses, having wrecked her eyesight from years of staring at a screen. And the hair, that is just a sad fashion choice. Not all Pigginses have been blessed with my sense of style.’
‘She’s right,’ declared Deidre.
‘That your hair is an unfortunate colour?’ asked Boris.
‘No, that I am a genius,’ said Deidre. ‘I knew I could program a computer brilliant enough to beat the greatest chess players. But no-one would let me enter a machine in a tournament, so I enlisted the help of my morally bankrupt sister, Sue.’
‘So you did all this to prove you are a master computer programmer?’ said the clipboard man.
‘Yes, but also for the cheesecake,’ said Deidre.
‘Obviously,’ agreed Nanny and Sue Piggins.
And so Olga Svinya was disqualified from the chess competition, partly because she was not Olga Svinya but mainly because she was a huge cheat. She and Deidre were banned from ever entering a chess tournament again (which all three sisters agreed would be no hardship), and Boris won by default. He gave Deidre the money to help repair the equipment that got damaged when Nanny Piggins sat on her. Then they all went to the cheesecake factory to claim the other (better) part of his prize. And finally, they had a lovely party back at the Green house, eating an entire year’s supply of cheesecake in one night.
‘Well, the chess tournament ended up being more exciting than we were expecting,’ said Michael.
‘Yes,’ agreed Nanny Piggins, ‘but don’t give chess the credit. Chess itself is definitely boring. But my sisters do have a knack for turning even the most tedious situation into a shocking international debacle.’
Hurry!’ cried Nanny Piggins as she and the Green children sprinted down the street towards their home. Unfortunately it is not easy to hurry when your arms are full of chocolate, cake and a ten-litre tub of ice-cream.
Their morning had been running meticulously to schedule, but just as they were leaving the sweetshop, Nanny Piggins had spotted a new jar of sherbet-filled flying saucers (a delicious culinary delight that has to be tasted to be believed), and since Nanny Piggins had not had a sherbet flying saucer for a whole six days, she naturally had to go back to the register and buy the entire shop’s supply.
This took longer than they expected because a small child in the shop was also trying to buy the flying saucers, so Nanny Piggins had to play a prolonged game of paper, rock, scissors with him to win the rights to the lollies. Eventually they left, the small child having been compensated with a horde of chocolate-covered caramels that Nanny Piggins just happened to have in her handbag. By which time they were running very late. They had just three minutes to get back to the house in time for the most important thing on their daily schedule (even more important than brushing their teeth or going to school as far as Nanny Piggins was concerned) – sitting down in front of the television to watch The Young and the Irritable.
Derrick was the first back to the house. He was generally not as quick as Nanny Piggins, but she was carrying a handbag containing 20 kilograms of chocolate buttons, which slowed her down. Derrick jabbed his key in the front door and struggled with the lock. When Nanny Piggins caught up with him she could not bear to wait a moment longer.
‘No time for keys!’ she yelled. ‘It’s starting in six seconds.’ So she slammed her trotter into the door and kicked it open.
They raced into the living room and flung themselves on the couch, switching the television on just as the opening credits began. They all breathed a sigh of relief.
‘Oh I do hope they let Bethany out of the mental hospital in time for her to ruin Crevasse’s wedding,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘And that wicked Vincent is finally punished for ruining Ariella’s nail-polishing business and trying to sell her daughter to a band of travelling flamenco dancers,’ agreed Michael.
‘Those flamenco dancers, they can’t be trusted,’ sobbed Boris. (He always cried the whole way through The Young and the Irritable because he was Russian and there were so many tremendously happy and terribly sad things in every episode; just hearing the theme music made him burst into tears.)
But then, just as the credits ended, the most dreadful thing happened – the show did not begin. A title card appeared on the screen and a voice-over announced that ‘Today’s episode of The Young and the Irritable will not be shown due to a writers’ strike’.
‘Nooooooooo!’ screamed Nanny Piggins.
They watched in horror as a six-year-old re-run appeared on the screen. (You could tell it was six years old because Brianna was trying to win Buff Jnr’s love by dressing as a man, and getting a job as his chauffeur. Whereas in the current day Brianna was divorced from Buff Jnr and was trying to win Buff Snr’s love by dressing as a man and taking a job as his gardener.)
‘This is awful, this is dreadful – it can’t be allowed! We have to do something!’ cried Nanny Piggins.
‘Like what?’ asked Derrick.
The children were used to thinking of the television as an all powerful box that sat in the middle of the living room and, when switched on, brought happiness to whoever gazed upon it (provided they were not watching the news, or a documentary, or a movie in a foreign language that required a lot of reading subtitles). It had never occurred to them that they could in any way influence what was on the television.
‘Should we write an angr
y letter?’ suggested Samantha.
‘No, that would take too long,’ said Nanny Piggins, shaking her head. ‘It would take at least fifteen minutes to write the letter, then two or three hours to go through the thesaurus finding extra words to let them know how really cross we were. Then two days for the letter to get to them in the mail. So it would be almost three days before we got to see a new episode.’
‘We could ring them,’ suggested Michael.
‘No,’ said Nanny Piggins sadly. ‘They’ve got caller ID down at the television station. They won’t take my calls, ever since that time I rang up and screamed at them because they interrupted the cartoons to give a cyclone warning.’
‘Then what are we going to do?’ asked Michael.
‘I don’t want to watch a re-run. I can’t bear to watch Ariella falling in love with Buff Jnr again. It was bad enough the first time,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘It’s the saddest love story ever told,’ agreed Boris. ‘I kept wanting to scream at the screen – “Just pull off her moustache and kiss her!”’
‘There’s only one thing for it,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘Read a book?’ suggested Samantha.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘We shall have to go down to the television station and protest in person. Wait here while I go and put my hot-pink wrestling leotard on.’
Eventually the children were able to persuade Nanny Piggins that while going to the television station to complain was fine, going down dressed in a wrestling leotard could be construed by some people of a less passionate disposition (ie a jury) as premeditated assault. And for some strange reason, the legal system frowns on people who think about crime much more than those people who just do it on the spur of the moment (which seems dreadfully unfair to conscientious criminals).