The Cast-Off Kids (8 page)

‘I’ll come up and help you carry some of them down, just to make sure they don’t touch any of the walls.’ He looked worried now. ‘The bricks get burning hot and
they could start an internal fire.’

Now he tells me
!

Once the children were all safely round next door, with two of the firemen and Mrs Clark minding them, I phoned Mike and he came back from work. He went straight round and rescued the children,
by now all desperately hungry and climbing the walls . . . along with Mrs Clark herself, I should think.

So back they all came, with great curiosity.

‘Will the house burn down?’ asked Gilroy. ‘I hope so.’ He sniggered. ‘Our bedrooms will be burnt to ashes.’

‘Don’t be silly,’ admonished Chrissy. ‘You always exaggerate!’

‘Ooh,’ said Daisy when they went through the hall to the playroom. She held her nose. ‘I don’t like the smell.’

‘No, sweetheart,’ I reassured her. ‘It will go soon.’

‘What’s that you’ve got in your hand?’ asked Mike, prising the sparkly object from AJ’s fist.

‘I found it on the floor,’ said AJ. Mike and I exchanged glances, knowing that was unlikely.

‘It’s a ring,’ I exclaimed. ‘You do not take things from other people’s houses. I’ll have to take you round later to give it back to Mrs Clark and say
you’re sorry.’

Mike fed, dressed and entertained them all for the rest of the morning, with a bit of help from me, in between making our visitors mugs of tea and coffee, and getting them to help me pull all
the upstairs furniture away from the walls.

The firemen were still there at lunchtime, so I rustled up some plates of sandwiches, which they wolfed down like gannets. Paul and Ronnie came into the kitchen while they were sat there,
eating.

‘Can I try your helmet on?’ Ronnie asked one of them.

‘Me too!’ clamoured Paul. ‘I want to be a fireman.’

One of the men put his helmet on Paul’s head and it fell right down over his eyes. He walked round bumping into things, which made everyone laugh, including him.

The firemen finally left at about two, when they were sure the fire was out and it was safe for us all to get back to normal.

‘It was so funny,’ I told Mike that evening. ‘You should have seen that fireman’s face when I kept on bringing babies and children down.’

‘Did you tell them why we have so many children?’

‘Oh no. I forgot to mention it.’

A few weeks after the chimney fire, Mrs Clark moved out of her house.

‘Did you know she was going?’ Mike asked me.

‘No, she never said a thing.’

‘Do you think it was something to do with us?’ he grinned.

I laughed.

‘I wonder who we’ll have as neighbours next,’ he said.

‘Well,’ I sighed. ‘Whoever it is, I hope they like children!’

The following morning, a shiny black Rover car pulled into the drive next door. I held my breath and craned my neck as I stood with a baby in each arm, looking out of an
upstairs window to try and catch sight of the new people, but I couldn’t see much. A middle-aged couple, the man with grey hair and the woman wearing a head-scarf, walked swiftly to the front
door and closed it behind them. There was nobody else with them.

About ten minutes later, while I sat on the window-seat, feeding Mergey, a huge lorry arrived with a classy name written on the side and three men in green overalls climbed out. Whoever these
new people are, I thought, they certainly aren’t doing this move on a shoestring.

Throughout the day there were comings and goings next door, but I was too busy with the kids’ food, laundry and playtimes to look.

Lizzie had finished her studies now and was applying for full-time jobs, so she was able to come and help out with the children for more hours during the week, which was a brilliant support. She
made such a difference and I hated to think of how I would manage when she had to leave, which probably wouldn’t be long.

Early that evening, while Lizzie was supervising the children’s teatime, I nipped next door with a casserole I’d cooked up for the new people.

The door opened and a rather serious-looking woman gave me a curious look.

‘Hello?’ she said in her cut-glass accent. ‘Can I help you?’

‘I’m Trisha and I live next door.’ I smiled. ‘Welcome to Sonnington.’ I held out the dish. ‘I thought you might like a chicken casserole, to save you cooking
on your first night. You must be exhausted.’

‘Quite tired, yes.’ She nodded, with only a hint of a smile. ‘Very thoughtful of you, my dear.’ She took the casserole from me and put it down on the tiled floor of her
porch. ‘Which side are you from?’ she asked, looking at the houses on either side of hers.

‘That one,’ I said, pointing.

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘The one with the untidy orchard?’ It wasn’t the best start to a neighbourly relationship.

‘Yes, that’s right.’ I nodded. ‘We have a lot of children, and they love playing in the orchard.’

‘Oh, I hope they won’t be too noisy.’

‘I don’t expect so. They’re just normal children, and the orchard is a long way back from the houses.’

‘Well, thank you, Mrs . . .’

‘Merry, Trisha Merry, and my husband is called Mike.’

‘I hope you’ll excuse me if I get back to unpacking boxes, Mrs Merry?’

‘Yes, of course. Do you want any help?’

‘No, thank you,’ she replied, a little too abruptly, then picked up the casserole dish and held it out a little way in front of her, as if it were infectious. ‘Most kind of
you. Goodbye.’

‘I hope you’ll like living here,’ I said as I turned to go.

‘Well, that depends,’ was her parting shot.

P
aul was the stoic of the family, even at a very young age. Quite the little toughie. If he cut himself or grazed his knee, he never made a sound,
no matter how much it hurt. He would sit with his lips wavering but clamped together, without complaint.

One morning, when all the children were playing outside, I called them into the kitchen for a drink and a piece of fruit. They came running in as usual, all except for Paul. Oh well, I thought,
perhaps he doesn’t want to stop what he’s doing; though I couldn’t remember him turning down a drink or a snack before.

I looked out of the window, down the garden and I couldn’t see him, but I saw one of the giant tractor tyres swinging, so I assumed he’d just finished playing with that and had gone
off to one of the camps, beyond the large shed.

The children ran off out again, and I thought no more about it. But when I called them in for lunch a couple of hours later, and Paul still didn’t appear, I started to get worried. Really
worried. He was only three and a half. The garden was surrounded and the gate at the side was bolted, so he couldn’t have escaped. What on earth had happened to him?

‘Has anyone seen Paul?’ I asked all the other kids.

There were blank faces and shaking heads all around the table, so I walked over to the window again. It was an eerie sight to see that same tractor tyre swinging, turning and twisting all on its
own. None of the other tyres were moving. It wasn’t even windy. What could be causing it? And where was Paul?

‘I’m just popping down the garden to see if I can find him,’ I said to the children.

‘Can we come with you?’ asked Ronnie.

‘Yes, if you want to.’

So all the boots went on again and off we all trooped, with me in the lead, hurrying towards the swinging tractor tyre.

‘Paul,’ I called as I approached it. ‘Where are you?’

I heard a muffled sound, but couldn’t make out what it was.

‘Paul?’ I called again, just as I reached the tyre and tried to stop it moving. I held on to it and, as it slowed down, I was able to see something move inside.

‘I can’t get out,’ the muffled voice wailed. ‘Help! I stuck.’

I reached in and tried to get my hands round him. He felt all hot and sticky, but he was stuck so deep under the heavy rubber lips of the tyre, which had closed in over him, that it was very
difficult to lift him; and the tyre kept moving away from me.

‘Ronnie, Chrissy, AJ – the tyre keeps slipping away from me. Can you all go round to the other side and push it towards me to stop it?’ They were the only three tall enough to
do this, so I hoped it would help.

Thank goodness it did. They held the tyre steady, and I was finally able, with all my strength, to lever poor Paul out of the bottom of his dark rubber prison. As I pulled him free, all the
children shouted and cheered, then somebody clapped and the others all joined in.

‘I couldn’t get out,’ said Paul. ‘I stuck,’ he announced to the other children, as if it was a badge of courage. He was so hot and sweaty that his ginger hair was
plastered to his head and his face was bright red.

‘Poor Pauly,’ I said, lifting the wet wisps of his hair to get some air to his skin, then I pulled off his stripey jumper and put him down on the ground to walk around in his vest
and shorts. ‘That will cool you down.’

‘I shouted,’ he said, biting his lips to make sure he didn’t cry. ‘I shouted and shouted.’

‘I’m sorry, sweetheart. I never heard you. But we got you out in the end.’

He just gave a solemn nod then ran indoors with the others, as if nothing had happened.

I never noticed any noise from the garden. I suppose there was so much space outside that the sound didn’t reach the house. Or maybe I was just used to it. And the
kids’ behaviour (apart from Gilroy’s) was never bad at home, because they were all outside running off their energy, so they only came in for food or sleep through the warmer months.
And in the winter we had our big playroom, with masses to do. As far as I was concerned, the kids were a joy.

I used to think up new playthings we could make. One day I bought lots of saucepans and lids in a jumble sale for them to clatter and bang. Then the children helped me put rice or dried peas or
even nuts and bolts inside empty plastic containers, stuck together for them to shake.

I joined in with them one afternoon, to make an impromptu orchestra. There we all were, banging and shaking things, playing in this band and making ‘music’ when Mike came home.

‘Bloody hell, Trish!’ he shouted as he came round the corner of the house. ‘Can’t you hear the noise?’

I stopped and listened to the others . . . and he was right. I had to admit, it was an awful racket. So perhaps we were a bit noisy sometimes.

Not long after our new neighbours moved in, the husband threw back a ball over the fence, and then another. And half an hour later, the wife came round to our front door with a
third.

‘I’m sorry, Mrs Merry,’ she began. ‘But would you mind please making sure your children stop throwing balls into our garden. They break off the delicate petals and new
buds of our roses.’

‘Well, I’ll have a word with them,’ I agreed. ‘I’ll tell the kids to throw them the other way.’

She looked quite shocked.

‘I mean towards the end of the garden,’ I explained.

‘Oh.’ She gave a little nod, and off she went.

Two or three days later, she came round and knocked on the door again.

‘Mrs Merry. Some of your children are looking through our fence.’

‘Yes . . . ?’

‘Erm, we like it private. That’s why the fence is there.’

‘Right.’ I was trying not to laugh. ‘But it’s a woven fence, so even the littlest ones can see through it.’

‘Well, they should know not to look.’

‘I’ll have a word with the children about it,’

‘Thank you.’ She turned and strode away. What a moaner! It was true that I had seen them all lined up along the fence one day, peeking through, with little Laurel’s bottom
sticking out. In fact, she looked so funny that I went in for the camera and took a photo of her, and another one of all of them. I think I’ve still got those photos somewhere.

A few days later, a couple of men came into next door’s garden and replaced the fence with a higher one that had stronger overlapping wooden slats.

‘They won’t be able to see through that,’ she told me when she saw me.

Well, that was what she thought. In fact, the kids soon discovered the knots in the wood and started poking them out to look through. So it was all a lot of fuss and expense for nothing.

One morning, we decided to tidy up the orchard and have a bonfire but next door had their washing on the line, so I went round to see her.

‘I’ve just come to let you know that we’re going to light a bonfire shortly, so you might want to take your washing in.’

‘It’s immaterial to us,’ she said in her snootiest voice, ‘
what
you do in your garden.’

‘Well, we could have lit it, but I thought it was only fair to come and let you know, so that your nice clean washing doesn’t get covered in sooty smuts.’

She gave me a look. Then, without saying another word, she shut the door in my face. I couldn’t believe it. As I walked back . . . I knew it was petty, but I thought
sod you
, and I
blew a raspberry in the direction of her house. That made me feel better!

I went back to our garden and, as I struck the match, I caught sight of her closing an upstairs window and staring daggers at me. I lit the kindling and watched it go, sending black smoke up
from a couple of tattered tyres in the middle. I was glad that she rushed out and took her washing in, before the smuts blew over that way.

But what I didn’t realise was that, while I’d popped next door, Paul had picked up a plastic ride-on tractor and somehow thrown it up onto the top of the bonfire heap. I didn’t
notice it until he shouted, pointing at it, with the flames curling up between its wheels.

‘Tractor’s gone! My tractor’s gone!’

‘Too late to rescue it now,’ I told him. ‘Why did you throw it up there?’

‘King of the Castle!’ he shouted out.

Isn’t it funny how children’s minds work – doing things on impulse with a real purpose in their minds, but without any idea that there might be consequences.

It wasn’t so funny how Gilroy’s mind worked, except on this one occasion. I just caught sight of him doing a moony to the lady next door as she stared out of her window at us. She
raised her hands in horror, then immediately drew the curtains across from both sides. Gilroy grinned from ear to ear . . . and, turning away from him to hide it, so did I.