Flour Babies Read online

  ‘You should never have let Hooper and Phillips use her as a goal marker,’ Wayne was telling him.

  Simon defended himself as best he could.

  ‘That didn’t make much difference. What got her so torn was using her to tease Hyacinth Spicer’s cat.’

  ‘I don’t think that the rips look nearly as bad as the chewed bits,’ Wayne observed dispassionately.

  ‘I blame Macpherson,’ Simon said gloomily. ‘He’s had it in for my flour baby since the very first day.’

  ‘What about those black smudges?’

  ‘Fell in the grate, didn’t she?’

  ‘And the nasty charred bits?’

  ‘Oh, those are my fault,’ Simon admitted. ‘I left her on the grill while I made toast.’

  ‘What about all this stuff stuck to her bum?’

  Simon upturned her, and inspected her.

  ‘Glue,’ he said. ‘Lump of toffee. Mud. Macpherson’s dried dribble. Chicken korma soup –’

  There was enough to keep the litany up for quite a while. But, hastily, Wayne interrupted him.

  ‘Come on, Sime. Time to go.’

  And confident that, at the very least, he wouldn’t come off worst at the morning inspection, Wayne pulled Simon with him along the road. As they reached the roundabout, Simon took to explaining the problem he had with the flour baby.

  ‘I’m not the type, you see. I thought I was, at first. But it turned out that I was wrong. Some people are good at looking after things. Some people aren’t. I reckon I’m out of the second box. More like my dad.’

  Wayne shot him a curious look, making Simon realize it must be the very first time his friend had ever heard him bring up the subject of his father. But he pressed on anyway.

  ‘He couldn’t handle it either, that’s obvious. Maybe some people can’t. Maybe they’re just like that, and you can’t blame them.’

  As usual, he stepped out fearlessly into the stream of cars slowing unwillingly for the roundabout.

  ‘He just wasn’t the sort to settle and dandle his babies,’ he yelled, over the roar of the traffic.

  As usual, Wayne scurried in his wake, nodding apologetically to all the drivers Simon had just brought screeching to a halt.

  ‘Wasn’t the sort to what?’

  But Simon was over the road now, and striding purposefully across the grass towards the school buildings. There was one last thing he wanted to find out, one last clue to the mystery of his father’s disappearance. One thing he still needed to know.

  ‘Miss Arnott! Miss Arnott!’

  She turned as soon as she heard him.

  ‘What is it, Simon?’

  To her astonishment, he started to sing at her in the rich, robust, unembarrassed tenor voice she’d heard often enough in Assembly, and never realized belonged to him.

  ‘Unfurl the sail, lads, and let the winds find me –’

  ‘Simon?’

  ‘Breasting the soft, sunny, blue rising main –’

  Was he giving her a bit of cheek?

  ‘I’m in a hurry, Simon,’ she told him, as a warning. But he kept pace with her along the path, still singing heartily.

  Toss all my burdens and woes clear behind me –’

  ‘Is this a joke, Simon? A bet? A sponsored sing?’

  ‘Vow I’ll not carry those cargoes again.’

  Impatient, she turned away, along the narrower path that led to the staff door. Totally ignoring the strict school rule, and the sign on the little wooden post: Staff only beyond this point, Simon charged along beside her, still singing his powerful heart out.

  ‘Sail for a sunrise that burns with new maybes,

  Farewell, my loved ones –’

  Miss Arnott stopped in her tracks. She’d never faced this problem with Simon before. Moody and awkward he could be. And downright troublesome on some occasions. But she had to admit that, in all her experience of the boy, she’d never known him truly disobedient. What should she do? Tackle him? Or ignore it? First things first, thought Miss Arnott. Who was watching?

  She glanced up to where, framed in the staffroom window, Mr Cartright was blowing the smoke of his last surreptitious cigarette before class out between the folds of the curtain.

  He gave a little wave, then, taking her look of temporary indecision for one of pitiful entreaty, he threw up the sash window, all set to bellow at Simon for daring to set foot on hallowed turf.

  ‘– and be of good cheer,’ he heard Simon singing at the top of his voice.

  Be of good cheer? The snatch of song rang a bell instantly in Mr Cartright’s brain. He couldn’t help staring down at Simon with a teacherly blend of pleasure and pride. What price psychology now? Why, the lad was a walking tribute to good old-fashioned horse sense. Look at the change in him, for heaven’s sake. One morning he was moping around like a fool, in love with his revolting little sack of flour. A word in his ear from his wise old class teacher, and look at him. Right back to normal (well, normal for him, of course), and courting the only real love of his life, the heavenly Miss Arnott, in fine voice, and full throttle.

  ‘Others may settle to dandle their babies –’ Simon’s glorious warm tenor rang out, over the grounds.

  The pause that followed lasted a beat too long. It was, Mr Cartright thought, a bit like that old oriental torture of waiting for the water drip.

  When he could stand it no longer, he threw the window up higher, leaned out and roared in the great,tuneful baritone he used to haul them back to time in hymns:

  ‘My heart’s a tall ship, and high winds are near.’

  Simon dropped to his knees, exhausted. Miss Arnott fled. And Wayne came thumping up behind.

  ‘What was Old Carthorse bellowing about?’

  ‘My heart’s a tall ship,’ panted Simon. ‘And high winds are near.’

  Wayne made a face.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  Simon looked up to ask Mr Cartright. But it was too late. Perfectly content with the satisfactory rounding off of a lovely old sea song, Mr Cartright had stubbed out his cigarette, pulled down the window, and vanished.

  As had been proved more than once on the football field, dogged determination was one of Wayne’s most salient characteristics.

  ‘How can a heart be a tall ship?’ he persisted.

  ‘I don’t know, do I?’ snapped Simon. ‘We’ll have to ask someone.’

  ‘Who?’

  Wayne looked round. The only person in sight was Martin Simon, who was strolling along the path reading The Quest for The Holy Grail.

  ‘Ask him. He’s an ear’ole. He might know.’

  Simon’s face brightened. Yes, Martin Simon might know. Anyone who puffed round all day reading poetry – often in French – was bound to have no trouble putting a fancy line of a song into plain English. No trouble at all.

  Simon picked himself off his knees, and walked over the grass, till he was almost directly in front of Martin.Sticking out his foot, he waited calmly and deliberately until Martin tripped over it, and The Quest for The Holy Grail fell out of his hand on to the grass.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Simon, stooping to pick it up and hand it back.

  ‘Thanks,’ Martin said, somewhat warily.

  But Simon felt that, by reaching down to pick up the book, he had already established his good faith. There was no need for any further tact.

  ‘Look,’ he said. ‘You’re an ear’ole. You read poetry. What does it mean if someone says they’re a tall ship?’

  Martin hesitated. It could be the start of a tease. But, on the other hand, there was a serious and determined look about Simon, as if, like Sir Galahad in the book that he’d just handed back, he was on some sort of quest.

  ‘A tall ship?’

  ‘Yes, a tall ship.’

  You had to hand it to these clever dicks, Simon reflected as he stood waiting for the answer. If anyone strolled up to him and asked him a question like that, he’d push them in the face and stride off. But Martin didn’t see
m to find it either odd or insulting to be asked a question about what might even be a poem. He simply took off his glasses and wiped them while he had a little think, then asked:

  ‘What did this person say exactly?’

  No point in beating round the bush, thought Simon. So, throwing back his head, he sang out full-throatedly:

  ‘Others may settle to dandle their babies,

  My heart’s a tall ship, and high winds are near.’

  Martin’s look of confusion cleared instantly.

  ‘Well, obviously it’s a metaphor,’ he began. ‘The protagonist has chosen to use the analogy of –’

  He stopped, partly from terror, and partly because Simon’s sudden grip on his throat had cut off the air in his windpipe.

  ‘I wasn’t asking for a lecture,’ Simon informed him sternly. ‘I just want to know what it means.’

  He took his hand away, and stood waiting.

  Martin Simon tried again.

  ‘What it means,’ he said, ‘is that the fellow has to go. Just as a ship with its sails spread has to move with the winds, so this chap knows the moment is coming when, however much he may want to stay, the sort of person he is – the sort of character and temperament he has – is going to force him to leave. He has no choice.’

  Simon stared up at the sky. His eyes were prickling, and he swallowed hard.

  ‘No choice?’

  Martin said firmly:

  ‘None at all. That’s just the way it is with someone like him.’

  At this point, Wayne broke in, asking Martin suspiciously:

  ‘How can you be so sure?’

  ‘It’s in the words,’ Martin explained patiently. ‘That’s what they mean.’

  ‘But how do you know?’

  It was Simon who came to Martin’s rescue, putting Wayne firmly in his place.

  ‘Listen,’ he said. ‘You and me, we know how to play football and have a good laugh, right? Now Martin here, he’s an ear’ole. He’s useless at football. He couldn’t kick a jelly in a drain. But he knows about things like songs and poetry.’

  He turned to Martin.

  ‘Isn’t that right?’

  Martin nodded.

  ‘Right,’ Simon said. And then, since the discussion of cultural strengths and weaknesses seemed to have petered to a halt:

  ‘Well, thanks very much.’

  On an impulse, he stuck out his right arm. For just a moment Martin couldn’t fathom why, and then he realized Simon wanted to shake hands with him.

  ‘That’s all right,’ he said, responding as promptly as he could. ‘Any time.’

  ‘No,’ Simon assured him. “That’s it, I expect. I’m pretty sure I’ll be all right now.’

  And indeed, Martin couldn’t help thinking, there was a strange, unearthly look about him once again, almost an aura, as if, like Sir Galahad, he’d seen his vision of the Holy Grail, and knew he’d come across his heart’s desire.

  9

  Miss Arnott rooted in her bag for aspirins. ‘That’s the third time he’s tramped past this door, singing at the top of his voice.’ She turned to Mr Spencer, who was hunched over the staffroom table, rubbing the pencilled black centres out of most of the crotchets in the song books to try and turn them back into minims. ‘Why can’t you teach them quieter songs?’

  Without raising his eyes from his salvage work, Mr Spencer defended himself calmly.

  ‘I never taught him that one. And what you teach them makes no difference. Those lads in 4C would belt out a cradle song as if it were a battle hymn. There’s nothing I can do about it. Just thank your lucky stars the boy has a fine voice.’

  Miss Arnott dropped a second aspirin in her water glass.

  ‘Call it a staff rest period,’ she muttered bitterly. ‘It’s just a different way of suffering.’

  She lifted her head.

  ‘Is that him coming back again? I can’t bear it. What is the boy doing, traipsing up and down this corridor, time and again?’

  Mr Henderson broke off sipping coffee to tell her.

  ‘If it’s Simon Martin you’re complaining about,’ he said, ‘Dr Feltham roped him in to carry Nimmo-Smith’s Microprocessor Controlled Pedestrian Crossing along to its stand for the Science Fair. For once, the boy’s only doing what he’s told.’

  ‘Was he told to sing sea shanties at full tilt while he did it?’

  ‘Shall I tell him to turn down the volume?’ Mr Henderson stuck his head round the staffroom door, but he was a moment too late. Mr Cartright had already appeared at the other end of the corridor.

  ‘Simon Martin!’ he bellowed, cutting the enthusiastic tenor off at source. ‘Why aren’t you down here at our weigh-in?’

  Simon stopped short with his arms full of oscilloscope.

  ‘I’m carrying stuff for Dr Feltham, sir,’ he answered in the virtuous tones of one who knows himself to be girded with the strength of a more powerful teacher. ‘It’s for the Science Fair.’

  Mr Cartright’s face darkened. Science Fair! Science Fair! There was still half a week before it even started, and already he was heartily sick of it. Why, the business disrupted the whole term. If every other school in creation could tack this sort of licensed chaos on to the very last week, why on earth couldn’t Dr Feltham? Really, the man was getting too big for his boots.

  Mutiny rose in Mr Cartright. Before he could stop himself, a string of unteacherly words sprang from his lips and rang down the corridor with such force that Simon was shocked. Not that he hadn’t used language as bad as that himself. Worse, in fact. And quite often. But for Old Carthorse to start frothing at the mouth, and let fly with such a blue flood – well!

  Simon gazed at his teacher with a new respect.

  ‘And as for you!’ Mr Cartright finished up, glowering horribly at Simon. ‘You can just put down that pile of junk, and come back to the classroom for the weigh-in.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Simon laid the oscilloscopes and Wishart’s Digital Sine-Wave Generator down on the floor, and submissively fell in behind as his teacher strode off down the corridor.

  ‘That’s better,’ muttered Mr Cartright. All very well, he was thinking, this business of Simon being of good cheer. But unfortunately, just like anything else in a school, it could be taken just that bit too far.

  His bad mood lasted as far as the classroom.

  ‘Right!’ he bellowed, as he came through the door in time to catch Philip Brewster practising scissor jumps over Sajid’s prams. ‘That’s it! I’ve had enough! You can just push that tin juggernaut in the corner, and line up with your little sacks of flour. I’m taking them in, and giving them back to Dr Feltham.’

  ‘Giving them back?’

  Mr Cartright totally misunderstood the nature of their astonishment and concern.

  ‘Yes. Giving them back. I know it’s four days too early, but you can just spend the time getting your diaries up to date.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘No buts!’ roared Mr Cartright. ‘Just get your flour babies, please, everyone.’

  He stood beside the scales.

  ‘Who wants to be first?’

  From the thunderstruck silence that followed, he took it that no one wanted to be first.

  ‘How about you, George?’

  George was too baffled even to shake his head.

  ‘Henry?’

  Henry looked to the others to sort out this obvious oversight. But, seeing him turn away, Mr Cartright moved on impatiently.

  ‘What about Rick? Not here? No, of course not. What about you, then, Russ? Are you ready to hand over your flour sack? One last weighing, and the thing will be off your hands for ever. How does that sound?’

  Russ glanced up from picking cat hairs off his flour baby. He didn’t realize that, by now, everyone else in the class was staring at Simon Martin expectantly, waiting for the one amongst them who had first burst in extolling the virtues of this particular experiment to break out of his ashen-faced paralysis and clear up this o
bvious confusion about the way it should end. Returning his attention to picking off the cat hairs, Russ simply asked:

  ‘But what about the Glorious Explosion?’

  Mr Cartright stared.

  ‘The Glorious What?’

  ‘The Glorious Explosion.’ Russ looked up again. ‘Simon told us that, on the last day, there’d be a Glorious Explosion. We’d all get to kick our flour babies to bits.’

  ‘Kick them to bits?’

  Mr Cartright could scarcely hide his amusement. ‘Kick the flour babies to bits? And you believed him?’

  He looked round and saw all their crestfallen expressions.

  ‘You did!’ he declared. ‘You all believed him!’

  He turned to Simon, whose stupefaction was giving way to deep embarrassment.

  ‘You managed to convince them that, on the last day, they’d get to kick over a hundred pounds of sifted white flour around?’

  Simon nodded.

  Mr Cartright spread his arms wide.

  ‘Here? In my classroom?’

  Simon nodded again.

  And then, slowly, seismically, Mr Cartright began chuckling. As he gripped the sides of his desk to steady himself, the chuckling grew. It grew from chuckles into loud guffaws, and from guffaws into huge rocking laughter. From huge rocking laughter it became an earthquake of merriment. Tears of amusement flooded from his eyes. The desk beneath him pitched and rolled. The windows rattled in their frames, and, next door, Miss Arnott feared for her wall display.

  Mr Cartright pointed at Simon.

  ‘You – You –’

  For quite a while, he couldn’t get it out.

  ‘You told them they would be allowed to kick one hundred pounds of sifted white flour around in my classroom!’

  He fished in his jacket pocket and drew out his huge spotted handkerchief. He wiped his streaming eyes.

  ‘And they believed you!’

  Still laughing fit to burst, he fell off his desk and landed on the floor. The boards shook. The desk careered over backwards, snapping the steel-tipped wooden blackboard rule in two, trapping one half beneath, and sending the other flying up at the ceiling where it hit the central light fitting.