There were sandwiches, and cakes and meat-pies and cold cooked fish, and eggs, and goodness knows what-all.
Weren’t those bad children surprised? They couldn’t think how all those sandwiches and things could have got into the old mackintosh.
Then Bad Harry said, ‘Shall we eat some?’ You remember he was a greedy lad. But my little sister said, ‘No, it’s picked-up-food.’ My little sister knew that my mother had told her never, never to eat picked-up-food. You see she was good about that.
Only she was very bad after that, because she said, ‘I know, let’s play with it.’
So they took out all those sandwiches and cakes and meat-pies and cold cooked fish and eggs, and they laid them out across the path and made them into pretty patterns on the ground. Then Bad Harry threw a sandwich at my little sister and she threw a meat-pie at him, and they began to have a lovely game.
And then, do you know what happened? A big roary voice called out, ‘WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH OUR DINNERS, YOU MONKEYS – YOU?’ And there was a big workman coming towards them, looking so cross and angry that those two bad children screamed and screamed, and because the workman was so roary, they turned and ran and ran back down the road, and the big workman ran after them as cross as cross.
Weren’t they frightened?
When they got back to where the other roadmen were digging, those children were more frightened than ever, because the big workman shouted to all the workmen all about what those naughty children had done with their dinners.
Yes, those poor workmen had put all their dinners under the hedge in the old mackintosh to keep them dry and safe until dinner-time. As well as being frightened, Bad Harry and my naughty little sister were very ashamed.
They were so ashamed that they did a most silly thing. When they heard the big workman telling the others about their dinners, those silly children ran and hid themselves in one of the pipes that the workmen were putting in the road.
My naughty little sister went first, and old Bad Harry after her. Because my naughty little sister was so frightened she wriggled in and in the pipe, and Bad Harry came wriggling after her, because he was frightened too.
And then a dreadful thing happened to my naughty little sister. That Bad Harry stuck in the pipe – and he couldn’t get any farther. He was quite a round fat boy, you see, and he stuck fast as fast in the pipe.
Then didn’t those sillies howl and howl.
My little sister howled because she didn’t want to go on and on down the roadmen’s pipes on her own, and Bad Harry howled because he couldn’t move at all.
It was all terrible of course, but the roary workman rescued them very quickly. He couldn’t reach Bad Harry with his arm, but he got a long hooky iron thing, and he hooked it in Bad Harry’s belt, and he pulled and pulled, and presently he pulled Bad Harry out of the pipe. Wasn’t it a good thing they had the hooky iron? And wasn’t it a very good thing that Bad Harry had a strong belt on his coat?
When Bad Harry was out, my little sister wriggled back and back, and came out too, and when she saw all the poor workmen who wouldn’t have any dinner, she cried and cried, and she told them what a sorry girl she was. She told the workmen that she and Bad Harry hadn’t known the mackintoshy bundle was their dinners, and Bad Harry said he was sorry too, and they were so really truly ashamed that the big workman said, ‘Well, never mind this time. It’s pay-day today, so we can all send the boy for fish and chips instead.’ And he told my little sister not to cry any more.
So my little sister stopped crying, and she and Bad Harry both said they would never, never meddle and be inquisitive again.
My Naughty Little Sister series
My Naughty Little Sister
More Naughty Little Sister Stories
My Naughty Little Sister and Bad Harry
When My Naughty Little Sister Was Good
My Naughty Little Sister’s Friends
My Naughty Little Sister Page 6