Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang (21 page)

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‘I will, sir,’ he said proudly. ‘I mean, I will, Father. Righto.’

‘Righto,’ said Lord Gray, the right side of his top lip twisting slightly, which might have been the beginnings of a smile but might just as easily have been indigestion.

Cyril decided that the conversation was probably over and joined Norman at the door. Taking a last look at his father, standing looking rather alone in the huge chamber, Cyril gave a small salute and the boys left.

The Diary 24

We’re back at Wormsley and the barley has been harvested! Oh, joy! Lots of wonderful little stacks and a couple of giant ricks that you can climb up on. It looks very beautiful. Monet would have wanted to paint it, I reckon. Lindsay is in the hotel with flu and isn’t allowed back to the set until they have decided it isn’t swine flu. Oo-er. She’s going mad, of course, with frustration, but we will all be OK and just get on with it.

Spent two hours in the make-up caravan having hair prettified for nicer-looking Nanny, only to get out of the car into so much wind and rain that the entire hairdo was destroyed in seconds. Much wailing and gnashing of teeth from Paula.

It is raining heavily. We are up the creek. Everyone deeply depressed. Little tents everywhere, with crew and cast sheltering in the vain hope that the skies may clear and we can shoot something. Each other, possibly.

I have had a day off and it seems to have made matters worse. I am like a dysfunctional clockwork mouse. I keep winding myself up and going off at a fair lick, but then my workings run down so quickly that there must be something wrong somewhere. A spring missing or some such. I no longer have the oomph to write in between takes. I just stare into space or lie down if I can find something to lie on. We’ve just a month to go and have done about two and a half months so far. Quite a long time to keep all this up, I s’pose. Groan.

The Story 24

Celia was still screeching as Mrs Green gave up trying to flush out the offending mouse. She shouted, ‘Celia! Stop screaming! There is NO MOUSE!’

Celia stopped. ‘I saw it,’ she said meekly.

‘It must have escaped.’

‘Come along, Isabel, come along!’ said Phil, getting down off the settle rather sheepishly. ‘Let’s get this thing signed off!’

Sighing, Mrs Green went back to the table and looked at the dotted line Phil was pointing at.

‘Give me the pen then,’ she said.

Phil looked and looked again.

‘What . . . Where the . . . Where’s it gone?’ he said, patting his pockets anxiously. ‘It was just here a second ago –’

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Phil!’ said Mrs Green, thoroughly irritated. ‘I thought you wanted me to sign the thing!’

‘I do! I do! But it’s just gone –’

‘There’re pens on the dresser,’ said Mrs Green, and Celia looked with alarm at Megsie. Phil found three pens and put them on the table next to the contract.

Megsie was distraught. She couldn’t think of any way of preventing her mother from signing. Then she had a thought. She didn’t know quite where it had come from, but it definitely sprang into her head like a cuckoo coming out of its clock. She ran to a quiet corner and stared fiercely up at the ceiling. Then, feeling slightly bonkers, she hissed, ‘Nanny McPhee, we need you!’

Nothing happened. Once more, she hissed, ‘Nanny McPhee, help! Help! We need you!’

Turning round, she half expected to find Phil had disappeared in a puff of smoke with contract, pens and all, but no, he was still there, leaning over her mother with three perfectly good pens lying there ready to be used.

The kitchen door opened quietly. No one noticed something coming in and getting under the kitchen table.

Norman and Cyril, in the meantime, were rushing down the steps of the War Office at top speed.

Suddenly, Norman stopped and turned to Cyril with a shocked expression. ‘Hang on!’ he said. ‘If the War Office
didn’t
send a telegram, then the one we got must have been forged!’

Cyril stared at him. ‘But – that’s awful,’ he said. ‘Who would forge a telegram that said someone was dead? Who would do such a terrible thing?’

‘I think I know,’ said Norman grimly. ‘Come on! We’ve got to hurry!’

Outside, Mr Edelweiss was in the grip of terrible collywobbles and having a strip torn off him by Nanny McPhee.

‘Where did you find it this time?’ she said, frowning at him.

Mr Edelweiss squawked and burped at length until Nanny McPhee shushed him.

‘Now you just listen to me for once,’ she said, very sternly. ‘You
must
understand that all that comes of eating it is the destruction of other people’s property and recurring collywobbles.’

Mr Edelweiss burped sadly.

‘I don’t care how much you love it,’ said Nanny McPhee. ‘It is a very nasty habit and we’d all be far better off if you never did it again. Do you hear?’

Mr Edelweiss nodded and let out a final rolling and tremendously resonant burp.

‘Oh, don’t be so
disgusting
,’ said Nanny McPhee, turning away from him crossly. At that very moment both the boys shot out of the great door and came running over, shouting, ‘Quickly! Quickly, we’ve got to get back!’

As they put on their goggles and breathlessly told Nanny McPhee the good news about Mr Green, she started up the engine and, no sooner had their bottoms touched the seat, sped off with a very ill Mr Edelweiss in hot pursuit.

Sergeant Jefferies watched them go.

‘Goodbye, Nanny McPhee,’ he said to himself rather sadly, as, just along the way, several panes of putty-less glass dropped out of their windows and on to the sandbags below.

In the kitchen, Megsie and Celia were in agonies. Mrs Green was on the last page of the contract and Phil was speeding her through the difficult bits. Megsie clutched Celia’s hand, but Celia could only shake her head despairingly. But suddenly, something very odd indeed appeared just at the edge of the table where the pens were lying. One of the pens shot off the table and disappeared. Megsie and Celia looked at each other in absolute astonishment. What on earth was that? They looked – and there it was again! A little grey tube thing with red hairs on it – and SUCK!! Another of the pens disappeared.

It was the baby elephant’s trunk!

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Megsie had to stuff her hand into her mouth to keep from exploding with hysterical laughter. Celia actually let out a small squeak of excited shock, but luckily Mrs Green and Phil were both ensconced in the contract and didn’t see or hear any of it. There was one last pen left. The little trunk came up again, this time further down the table. It sucked and the last pen shot across the table and into the trunk. There was a whiffle of what could have been elephant mirth as the little creature wobbled out of the kitchen door, helped by Vincent, who had seen it all and was doubled up with silent giggles.

Very suddenly, Phil stood up. The girls whirled back to watch as he laid the contract down in front of Mrs Green and pointed at the dotted line.

‘Righto. There it is, simple, really – here we are, and here’s a –’

Phil shrieked. There were no pens at all where once there had been three.

‘What . . . Where
are
they? They were here!!’ he shouted, looking accusingly at Megsie and Celia.

‘We didn’t touch them!’ said Megsie. ‘How could we? We were standing here.’

The girls both assumed innocent expressions and stood away from the table, holding up their empty hands for the grown-ups to see. Mrs Green also suspected the girls, but couldn’t really see how they had got around to pick up the pens without either Phil or her noticing them moving. She frowned at them warningly and then spoke with unaccustomed harshness to Phil.

‘Come along, Phil,’ said Mrs Green. ‘Get a grip. If you want the thing signed, then find a pen.’

Phil rolled up a sleeve and started to pat the inside of his elbow. ‘Not to worry – we’ll sign it in my blood.’

Everyone stared at him as he came round to Megsie.

‘I’ll just open a vein and then all we need is a quill from one of the chickens and it’s done – lend me your penknife there, Megs—’

He put his hand into Megsie’s tool apron for the knife, and it came out holding his original fountain pen.

‘Oh!’ said Phil, giving Megsie a truly evil look. ‘Look what I’ve found!’

Keeping his eye very firmly on the girls, he took Mrs Green’s hand and put the pen into it. Then he guided her hand to the line on the paper. Mrs Green sighed heavily and started to write. Megsie let out a sob.

‘That’s it, Isabel,’ said Phil, his voice heavy with relief. ‘Isabel Gree—’

THUD!!!

The kitchen shook, and Mrs Green stabbed the pen into the contract, releasing a cloud of ink over the dotted line. Everyone was completely silent for a moment and then started to shout all at once as they ran to the kitchen window to see what on earth the noise had been.

Out of the window, beyond the hedge and in the middle of the barley field stuck a massive green metal tail fin stuck up, like the end of half a rocket.

‘What in heaven’s name is that?’ said Mrs Green, still shaking from the shock.

‘It’s a UXB!’ said Celia.

‘What’s that?’ said Megsie.

‘An unexploded bomb. We have them in London quite a lot. It could go off at any second.’

‘WHAT?’ screeched Vincent, who had rushed back into the kitchen and was standing behind them. Everyone jumped with fright.

‘But then again, it might not. Depends,’ said Celia, sounding impressively unruffled.

‘But they don’t drop bombs in the country!’ said Megsie. ‘It must be a mistake!’

From behind them came a voice barely recognisable as Phil’s, it was so hoarse and broken.

‘It’s not a mistake,’ he said. ‘It’s the sign!’

They all turned to look at him. He was standing with his back against the wall, staring out of a face like a grey mask.

‘What are you talking about, Phil?’ said Mrs Green, completely mystified.

‘They’re coming for me!’ said Phil, covering his face with his hands.

Mrs Green was just about to enquire further when another voice was heard outside, sounding somewhat amplified as it shouted, ‘Stop panicking!! Unexploded bomb is at hand!! Help has landed!!! Stop it!!!!’

In burst Mr Spolding, very pink in the cheeks and yelling through a loudhailer.

Phil rushed to him. ‘They’re going to kill me!!!’ he said.

‘Who’s going to kill you, Phil?’ said Mrs Green.

‘Stop all that panicking, I said!!!’ shouted Mr Spolding through the loudhailer.

‘I can’t stop it!’ said Phil. ‘I’m going to die!’

‘I’m going to get under the table,’ said Vincent.

‘I’m going to put the kettle on,’ said Mrs Green, deciding that the only thing for it was for everyone to have a cup of tea and calm down a bit.

‘Mine’s a milk and two sugars,’ yelled Mr Spolding through the loudhailer.

Phil got as close as he could to Mr Spolding. ‘Mr Spolding, you have to arrest me! You have to arrest me before they get here because it’s the only way I’ll be safe! You have to put me in official custody!’

‘In what?’ said Mr Spolding, looking confused and still speaking through the loudhailer.

Phil grabbed the hailer from him and shouted back at Mr Spolding, ‘Arrest me!’ Put me in a – what you called it – a fishy custard!’

Mr Spolding now grabbed the hailer and shouted back at Phil, ‘Arrest you for what? What for? What’ve you done? There’s got to be a crime!’

From the kitchen door came a voice everyone knew very well. It was Norman’s.

‘Try forgery!’ he said.

The Diary 25

You can very easily freeze that moment in your heads, can’t you? Norman standing there looking very heroic, everyone staring up at him or down at him depending on who they are, and Mrs Green about to pour the tea. There.

Nice day! Nice weather! We are at Tilsey Farm at what we call the carousel field because it was where we shot the piglets flying around the tree (they weren’t really flying, of course, it was me and all the children’s mums and dads running around holding foam piglets and singing silly songs). There’s no loo paper in my trailer, so halfway through this morning I had a rather nasty moment in my corset and curls. That’s filming for you. Very little in the way of personal dignity is left by the end of a long shoot. Most people have seen you either cry, lose your temper, vomit, hit things for no reason, whinge – or in this case, seen your bottom, which is really the lowest point in my view. Rather unpleasant altogether, but there it is.