Nanny Piggins and the Daring Rescue 7 (23 page)

‘Nanny Piggins knows what she's doing,' said Boris.

And he was proved correct. His sister did plummet to the ground at a frightening speed but she did not hit the ground, she kept falling – precisely into the one-metre-wide well in the middle of the village.

WHOOMPH!

‘I don't believe it,' said Samantha. ‘How did she manage to hit the well?'

‘And why wasn't there a splash?' wondered Derrick.

They all rushed over to see if Nanny Piggins was alive.

‘Are you all right in there?' Michael called down.

‘Absolutely fine,' called Nanny Piggins. ‘I filled the well with marshmallows last night. They made for a lovely soft landing, mmm-mm – delicious too!'

Everyone cheered.

‘I told you Nanny Piggins knew what she was doing,' said Boris proudly.

‘But does it help the yams?' asked Derrick. ‘She did land on marshmallows.'

The Chief considered this. ‘Yes, but the marshmallows were on land, so I think it counts. Plus the well is 15 metres deep, so she fell 615 metres, which means we are going to have the biggest yam crop ever!'

The village threw quite the party that night. Admittedly the food consisted mainly of marshmallows, because it was still a few weeks until yam harvesting time, but there was lots of dancing and mango juice, and of course Nanny Piggins managed to find a few chocolate cakes in her luggage, so everyone had a marvellous time.

Nanny Piggins, Boris and the children were sad the next morning when they had to say goodbye.

‘Are you sure you won't stay?' asked the Chief.

‘I'm afraid Mr Green has to be rescued, and I really should get on with it,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘But if you ever have another yam shortage, just call me and I'll pop back for a visit. And I'll bring a cannon next time.'

All right, I suppose we have to do this,' said Nanny Piggins with a sigh.

Nanny Piggins, Boris and the children were standing outside an unimpressive concrete-clad building in downtown Port Vila. According to their directions, Mr Green's office was inside.

‘We could always leave him here and hire a Mr Green impersonator to come and live in the house with us,' suggested Boris.

‘Excellent idea!' exclaimed Nanny Piggins. ‘We wouldn't even need to hire anyone. You're a brilliant actor, you could impersonate Mr Green.'

‘But Boris is a ten-foot-tall bear,' Michael pointed out.

‘Pish!' said Nanny Piggins. ‘No-one who has ever met your father would be able to pick him out of a line-up. There's something about him that makes you want to avoid looking at him directly. It's as if his boringness could damage your retinas, unless you look at him through a tiny hole in a piece of paper.'

‘You have to rescue Father because you promised,' said Samantha sternly, ‘and you know you are a pig who prides herself on keeping her word.'

‘Darn my deep-seated sense of integrity,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘I blame my mother for bringing me up properly. If only she'd allowed me to be immoral, I would get so much more done in a day.'

‘You do have lapses of immorality when it comes to cake,' Derrick observed.

‘True,' agreed Nanny Piggins, ‘but that's got nothing to do with morality. That's just common sense. If someone is going to leave cake unattended in a locked factory behind nothing but a 12 foot high razor wire fence with movement-sensor technology and infra-red trip wires, then I think on an unconscious level they want me to steal it.'

‘So are we going to rescue Father?' asked Samantha.

‘I guess so,' said Nanny Piggins with a sigh.

When they entered Mr Green's office it was not what they were expecting. The concrete and breeze block exterior was vaguely prison-like. And from the tone of desperation in Mr Green's phone call, Nanny Piggins had assumed he would be chained to his desk inside, or there would be someone standing over him with a stick, hitting him periodically to force him to violate the tax code faster. But Mr Green's office was nothing like that. It was a beautiful big room with Melanesian decorations on the walls, reed floor mats and a huge picture window with a spectacular view of the tropical harbour. The only thing that Nanny Piggins had imagined accurately was the vision of Mr Green sitting at his desk weeping.

‘Thank goodness you're here,' sobbed Mr Green. ‘I couldn't bear the strain any longer.'

‘Have they been hitting you?' asked Derrick.

‘Have they been yelling at you?' asked Samantha.

‘Have they been forcing you to eat vegetables?' asked Nanny Piggins.

‘No, it's all far worse,' said Mr Green, waving his hand vaguely at the office. ‘Look at the conditions they expect me to work in.'

They all looked about at the beautiful, spacious, sun-drenched office.

‘It looks lovely,' said Nanny Piggins.

‘Exactly!' sobbed Mr Green. ‘How can I get anything done?!'

A woman poked her head round the door. ‘Iced tea, Mr Green?'

Mr Green wailed louder. ‘Did you hear that? Iced tea! I didn't even have to yell at someone to get it. They're offering to bring it to me! It's like a form of torture.'

‘What are you talking about?' asked Derrick.

‘I'm not allowed to eat my sandwich at my desk,' complained Mr Green. ‘They expect me to go out for lunch! At a restaurant! With French cuisine. And at the end of the day a security guard comes around and locks the door. And I have to go home, and stop working.'

‘Shocking,' said Nanny Piggins.

‘And you should see the house they've given me.' Mr Green completely broke down at this point. ‘It's a beach house. I can hear the lapping of the waves from every room.'

‘Now, Mr Green, just so we can understand fully,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘What exactly is wrong with all those things? They sound lovely to me.'

‘I don't want lovely,' said Mr Green. ‘I want to work hard – harder than everybody else, so that I win and know that I'm better than everyone. And the only way I can do that is in my nice quiet basement office, with no windows or sunshine or iced drinks with little umbrellas to distract me.'

‘Why?' asked Nanny Piggins. ‘Are you worried that if you let your guard down, you might accidentally wind up being happy.'

‘But my basement office, my paperwork and my stale sandwiches are what makes me happy,' said Mr Green. ‘I miss them.' He broke down again.

‘But Father,' said Derrick, ‘if you don't want to be here why don't you just come home. You're a grown man. They aren't holding you hostage. You could leave.'

‘But they
are
holding me hostage!' protested Mr Green. ‘They took my passport.'

‘They found out how morally bankrupt you are and they're keeping you under lock and key?' guessed Nanny Piggins.

‘No, I'm a hero,' said Mr Green, starting to cry again. ‘They are forcing me to stay because they love me.'

‘But that doesn't make any sense,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘Have you been hiring a Mr Green impersonator to pretend to be you?'

‘When I arrived and began going through the paperwork,' explained Mr Green, ‘I discovered a massive fraud. A foreign investor had embezzled millions from the government and hidden it in an offshore caviar trading scheme. I exposed it all and recouped millions for the country. The President says I'm a national treasure.'

‘Wow!' exclaimed Samantha, impressed by her father for the first time ever in her life.

‘It was money for schools, libraries and hospital renovations,' continued Mr Green. ‘Returning it affected the lives of everyone in the country, and they're all so grateful.'

He began sobbing again here.

‘But Father,' said Derrick, ‘that's wonderful. You should be so proud. We're proud.'

‘We didn't know you had it in you,' marvelled Michael.

‘You don't understand,' said Mr Green. ‘The only reason I found the fraud was because I was the one who had arranged it years ago on behalf of a previous client.'

‘So you were only returning money you had embezzled?' asked Derrick.

‘It's not called embezzlement when a lawyer does it,' snapped Mr Green. ‘It is called identifying areas for flexibility within the tax code.'

‘It's still stealing money that isn't yours,' said Nanny Piggins.

‘Yes, but when you're doing it for a client that's not a bad thing,' said Mr Green. ‘It just shows I believe in providing good customer service.'

‘It would be fitting punishment to leave you here,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘You have been very naughty.'

‘I know,' agreed Mr Green.

‘But it would not be fair on the people of Vanuatu,' continued Nanny Piggins. ‘They might love you now, but you would be sure to poison them with your spendthrift ways and misery-guttishness.'

‘But how are we going to get him home if the whole country wants him to stay here?' asked Samantha.

‘If they won't let your father leave, we'll just have to sneak him out,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘I'm good at being sneaky, having worked with the Ringmaster for all those years.'

They all stood back and looked at Mr Green, imagining ways they could get him past border security.

‘You could bake him into a cake!' suggested Michael.

‘Or strap him into some scuba gear and submerge him in a giant crème brûlée?' suggested Samantha.

‘Or roll him up in a giant sponge cake and tell people he's a Swiss roll?' added Derrick.

‘They're all good ideas,' said Nanny Piggins, ‘but this is your father we're talking about. It would be unfair to a dessert to taint its beautiful flavour with his body odour.'

‘Can you taste body odour?' asked Michael.

‘Do you honestly want to find out?' asked Nanny Piggins.

‘No,' shuddered all three children.

‘No, I had a simpler idea,' said Nanny Piggins. ‘Children, I need you to fetch me some sticky tape, string and brown paper. And Mr Green, I need you to go out and buy a brand new refrigerator, a large one.'