Trick or Treat (12 page)

Rodney slurps. ‘He
can
stay then?'

‘Behaviour includes these things, Rodney: no foul language, no elbows on the table, no talking with your mouth full
or
eating with your mouth open. It means no sitting on the bedspread. It means leaving the lavatory
as you would wish to find it …
'

‘All right –'

‘And no interrupting.'

‘I'll fetch my things this morning.'

Nell hesitates. Perhaps it is as well to jump in at the deep end. She taps the top of her egg delicately with her teaspoon, as if politely requesting admittance. She thinks of Jim upstairs, big-hearted Jim, powerless in his frame. ‘Oh all right,' she says. ‘Why I'm so soft I don't know. You can scarcely claim to deserve it. But come back via the barber's, understand. Short back and sides before you re-enter this house.'

Rodney grins. Nell dips her teaspoon in the egg-yolk. It is a bright splashy yellow, and it is
not
just right, Jim's timer has failed her, there are clinging traces of clear gelatinous white. Eggs have been in the news lately, she remembers, featured as unclean. Nell, up to now, has taken no notice. An egg is an egg as far as she's concerned, perfectly sealed into its shell, untouched by human hand. If you can't trust an egg what can you trust? Propaganda, she took it for. Trying to blame the government for the centre of an egg! You might as well blame it for the stars. But all the same, she puts down her spoon. She'd have done better to stick with her All-Bran after all.

‘There,' breathes Arthur proudly. Arthur and Wolfe stand at the top of the allotments looking down towards the river and the park.

‘It's beautiful,' says Wolfe but that is not what he means, he means more than that but doesn't have the words. It is more than beautiful. The morning is mild and a pale sun shines across the plots of land, glinting on the bare twigs of the fruit bushes and the roofs of the little sheds. Everything is still. Leaves hang damply or flop crumpled on the ground, onion flowers glow like little planets. Nothing moves. Even the one figure on the allotment, an old man bent over his spade, is motionless, like a man in a painting. The smell is green and brown and cool and rich. In a rush of homesickness Wolfe thinks of the Longhouse garden.

‘Yes,' agrees Arthur. ‘It's grand. Can you guess which is mine?'

Wolfe stands on tiptoe to see better and looks critically at the plots. Arthur's will be the best, he knows that much. He screws his nose up in concentration and feels Arthur smile down at him.

‘I'll give you a clue, it's lower down,' he says.

‘That one,' decides Wolfe suddenly, pointing at a newly dug patch, neatly marked out with twigs.

‘I'll be blowed!' laughs Arthur. ‘Got it in one! How did you know?'

Wolfe is relieved. ‘Not sure, it just sort of … looks like you, I s'pose.'

Arthur's shoulders rise as he chuckles. He takes Wolfe's hand and squeezes it in his own, which feels as hard as leather. ‘Want to take a closer look?'

‘Course I do.'

‘Over here then,' Arthur points to a low stile. Wolfe scrambles over, and Arthur struggles with Potkins who tangles round his legs in his eagerness to follow. They walk down a steep narrow path, slippery with stones and damp grass. Birds rustle in the thorn hedges. Just for a moment Wolfe forgets the town, feels that he's back in the country again.

‘Here we are.' The path opens out onto the lower allotments where the sudden sound of the river tumbling over its stones is a surprise. ‘All right, Fred?' Arthur calls to the old man, who has come alive and is pulling things out of the ground.

‘Considering,' the man replies.

Arthur walks across one allotment that looks as if it's just been left to go wild, and across a grass boundary to his own. He shows Wolfe all his plants and his gooseberry bushes; he shows him his seedbed and his cold-frame and his water-butt. He unlocks his shed and Wolfe steps inside, breathing in the delicious smell of dry earth and string. He looks at Arthur's tools, spades and forks and rakes and hoes. They are so old that the wooden handles are pitted and worn like things in a museum. There is a very old lawn-mower and piles of flowerpots, and panes of glass leaning against the wall, there are old tins full of bits and bobs on the shelf, and bundles of green netting hanging from hooks. There is a rickety folding chair. It is clean and neat and orderly and Wolfe loves it.

‘When I'm grown-up I'm going to have an allotment,' he declares. ‘And I'm going to have a shed just like yours. 'Zactly the same.'

‘I don't doubt it, lad,' says Arthur.

‘And if we go back I'm going to help in the proper garden. They usually give kids little gardens of their own but they're too small to grow much in. There was only really room for radishes.'

‘Go back?'

‘I want to go back to our old house. Like I told you, the Longhouse it's called and it's a commune and it had a great garden.'

‘A commune eh?'

‘Yes, lots of people and all that.' Wolfe strokes the handle of Arthur's fork covetously.

‘And what made you move away?'

‘Love,' says Wolfe wearily. ‘Mum fell in love but I think it was a bit of a mistake really.' Arthur's lips twitch.

‘Oh?'

‘Well Tom's un … un something or other. He never does what he says.'

‘Unreliable?'

‘Yes. Like he said he'd take me out today and then he went away. That's another thing, he's always going away.'

‘Well,' says Arthur cautiously. ‘Sometimes folk can't help going away – but you're always welcome to come here with me. Potkins!' The dog makes a sudden lunge at a thrush, which is busy battering a snail upon a stone. Wolfe suddenly notices how small Arthur is for a grown-up man, how tiny he is inside his clothes. His legs inside his baggy brown trousers seem no thicker than the bean-sticks neatly bundled in the corner of the shed. He looks down at his own stout legs in their too-small jeans.

‘Thanks,' he says. ‘Do you want to come to our bonfire party?'

‘Oh I don't think …'

‘Mum said. She's going to ask. And I've got to ask you if you've got any wood for our fire.'

Arthur gathers together a pile of stuff to be burnt, including some good thick wood from an old window-frame. ‘That lot'll burn like the clappers,' he says. ‘But we'll never fetch it back.'

‘That's OK,' Wolfe says. ‘Tom can come and collect it in the car.'

‘That's all right then.'

‘And you will come to our party,' begs Wolfe. ‘Please. It won't be much of a party if no one comes.'

Arthur laughs. ‘I'll see what I can do,' he promises. ‘We'd better get off now.' Wolfe looks regretfully around. It is so lovely here, a bit like the Longhouse garden, but different because it's all broken up into separate bits. And Arthur is his first new friend, even if he is old.

‘Next time I'll help you dig shall I?' he says.

‘There's nowt like a bit of help,' Arthur says agreeably. Wolfe stands on the grass boundary waiting for Arthur to lock his shed.

‘Did you plant this grass?' he asks.

‘No,' Arthur replies. He puts his keys in his pocket. ‘Come on Potty.' He tugs Kropotkin to his feet. ‘No, my mate Jim turfed that over. There were a bomb in war. God only knows the point of bombing allotments! Anyhow, it landed just there, where you're stood now, and wrecked the lot. I was away at time and Jim sorted out mess. This here were his allotment. He's passed on now but he'd turn in his grave if he could see the state it's in now.'

Arthur turns round and smiles at Wolfe. ‘Now let's be off.'

Seven

Wolfe looks uneasily at the guy, who lolls in the corner of Bobby and Buffy's room. He is a clumsy guy, hasty, his face scrawled on a paper bag, his body lumpy. A pair of Petra's tights knobbly as Christmas stockings tail off into limply trailing feet. He is a guy with a funny lopsided face, an almost-smile. A nice guy. Wolfe feels sorry already that he has to burn.

‘It won't hurt,' he whispers. He reaches out his hand and dares to touch the guy lightly on the corner of his paper head. ‘You're not real, so it can't.' And then he flees downstairs as the screwed-up paper stuffing shifts and crackles.

‘Aren't you going to help me with this toffee?' asks Petra. She is searching in the kitchen cupboard. ‘I'm sure I've got some black treacle somewhere.'

‘Course,' says Wolfe. ‘What shall I do first?'

‘I'll call you when I'm ready.' Petra frowns at him. ‘Have you seen it? I know we've got a tin. Otherwise
someone
will have to run down to the shop.' She looks out of the window at Bobby and Buffy who are building the fire. ‘Why don't you help Bob and Buff for now. I'll call you when I'm ready.'

Bobby and Buffy are arranging the wood into a wigwam shape. ‘This is brilliant,' Buffy says, ‘this wood from next door.'

‘I got that,' Wolfe reminds them. They ignore him.

‘We need more though, little sticks and stuff, kindling,' Bobby says.

‘Where shall we get that from?'

‘The park?'

‘We haven't got time to go faffing about picking up twigs,' Bobby says. ‘We've got to get some more money. We might get more today since it's actually the day.'

‘We need to make the guy a bit better,' Buffy says. ‘I think that was the trouble before. It doesn't look as if we've taken much time over it.'

‘We could ask that side if she's got anything to burn.' Bobby nods at Nell's house. ‘Then we could do the guy up a bit and get going.'

‘You ask.'

‘Will you ask, Wolfe?' Buffy asks him, giving him her brilliant smile.

‘No, I'm helping Mum with the toffee,' Wolfe says. He goes back into the kitchen. Petra is kneeling on the floor with her head under the sink. She gives a little muffled cry. ‘Here it is! I knew I'd seen it somewhere odd.' She emerges with the sticky tin, her face red from the effort of searching.

‘Are you all right?' Wolfe asks. ‘Only you look a bit funny.'

‘I'm fine.' Petra struggles to her feet. ‘In fact I feel very well today. Let's get this toffee made, then I'm going to clean out that cupboard – it's revolting under there, all damp and full of God knows what.'

‘What shall I do then?' Wolfe loves cooking. He loves the pots and pans and wooden spoons and he loves the warm smell you get when the things melt together in the pan, especially sweet things.

‘Weigh some brown sugar,' Petra says. ‘A pound.'

‘We do kilograms at school.'

‘I don't. Nor do my scales. A pound.'

Wolfe spoons the sugar carefully into the shallow dish of the scales, watching the needle wobble and flicker towards the one-pound mark. It is like dark damp sand, stuck together in hard lumps at the bottom of the bag. He pops a lump in his mouth and it melts on his tongue in a sweet sandy pool.

‘Teeth,' warns Petra, and then she laughs and takes a lump herself.

‘A pound,' announces Wolfe when the needle on the scales has arrived at the mark. ‘Now what?'

‘Tip it in the pan. Then you want …' Petra squints at a soft old bit of paper, ‘two ounces of butter – it'll have to be marge – and four of water. And then two tablespoons of treacle. OK? Just bung it all in the pan. This is my mum's recipe you know.'

‘My granny?'

‘Would have been. We always had Bonfire toffee.'

‘Why did she die?' Wolfe prizes the lid off the treacle tin with a knife.

‘Careful. She had a bad heart, I told you before. Now try not to dribble it everywhere.'

‘I haven't got a granny or a grandad or a dad,' Wolfe grumbles, pushing the spoon into the stiff black treacle. It is like tar. It smells a bit like tar on the road on a hot day, and it trails from the spoon in sticky ropes as he tries to tip it into the pan.

‘No, but you've got me. And Bob and Buff and this …' She pats her tummy. ‘You're better off than lots of children. Watch what you're doing with that.' Wolfe licks his treacly fingers which taste dark and sweet, like sugary blood. The handle of the spoon is sticky and treacle crawls down the sides of the tin.

‘Mum …' he says, looking at her helplessly, and she sighs and whips the spoon away from him and twists it round and conjures the second spoonful into the pan.

‘Right. I'll put this chair in front of the cooker so that you can stir it yourself. And I'll grease the tin ready for you.' Wolfe climbs up and Petra lights the gas under the saucepan. ‘Now, keep stirring until the margarine melts and then the sugar dissolves. It takes ages, but you must keep stirring.'

‘Mum!' cries Buffy suddenly bursting in through the door. ‘That side hasn't got any wood but look! She's given us a hat for the guy. Isn't it great?'

‘Except it's a girl's hat,' complains Bobby.

‘So? Why can't it be a girl guy? Sexist,' retorts Buffy.

‘Because it was a man, dickhead.'

‘Bobby, please,' Petra says frowning at him. ‘Let's see.' She holds out her hand for the hat. She turns it round in her hands, a greedy expression on her face. It is an old black straw hat with cherries on the brim that look good enough to eat.

‘Do you know, I'm sure I've seen this before,' she says. ‘I wonder where. It's a good hat.' She puts it on her head, tilted to one side. ‘What do you think?' she asks Buffy. Buffy shrugs. ‘It seems a terrible shame to burn it.'

‘Well you're not having it,' says Buffy, snatching it from her head.

‘No, let's have another look,' Petra fingers the cherries almost as if she is hungry. ‘It's certainly too good to burn. Where's Nothing?'

‘Dunno. Asleep upstairs I think.'

‘I'll give you a fiver to buy the stuff you need for Nothing, if you give me the hat.'