Mennyms Under Siege Page 4

  “What about the Post Office?” said Appleby as her mind leapt from Granny’s wool to Granpa’s manuscripts. “I always take your mail to the Post Office. That’s a necessity.”

  “And what about the Market?” said Vinetta. “There are always things we need at the Market – light bulbs, thread, all manner of things. It would be impossible for me to stay at home for weeks at a time.”

  “And I,” said Miss Quigley, “have to take Googles to the park.”

  Magnus let them talk. He looked expectantly at his son, who caught the glance and gave a dour reply.

  “I go to work,” he said, “and that is that. I go in the evening. I return early in the morning. No one ever so much as crosses my path.”

  “A fair point,” conceded his father.

  “I jog,” said Soobie, “but only after dark.”

  It was a new pleasure for the blue Mennym and not one he would willingly give up.

  With memories of his days in the Royal Navy, wartime days when battle strategy was so vital, Magnus considered the situation. Brocklehurst Grove occupied three sides of a square round a green in the centre of which stood the statue of Matthew James Brocklehurst. Looking across to the right from a first floor window, the Mennyms could see Number 1 at the end of the street, where lived Bobby Barras, fire chief, and friend of Anthea Fryer. Looking across to the left, at the other end of the street, was Number 9, home of the dreaded Anthea. There was no back entrance to Number 5. Where their garden ended, over a high, woody hedge and a stout fence, another long garden began, a neglected tract of land belonging to a house in the old Georgian terrace that was waiting forlornly to be demolished.

  “This is a tight situation,” said Magnus whose serious concern could not prevent him from enjoying the challenge. Here at last was the opportunity to protect his family from the outside world by taking positive steps, instead of just lying awake at night fearing the worst. Now they would have to listen to him.

  “We could regard ourselves as being potentially under siege,” he said. “There is no crisis yet, but we must be ready for anything.”

  The others said nothing and waited. Magnus sat back and clasped his hands across his chest, pressing his thumbs together in a manner that looked decisive. Then he spoke again in slow Churchillian tones.

  “Joshua will – for the present – go to his place of employment as usual. His hours are his best protection, especially at this time of year.”

  Joshua looked relieved and lost all interest in anything else that might be said. He had the sort of mind that took short cuts to reality. He was in total agreement with his father over the need for the other Mennyms to stay at home. And he was absolutely confident that no outsider would ever find him out.

  “Same applies to my jogging,” said Soobie.

  “A non-essential activity,” said his grandfather, “but I suppose you’re right.”

  “What about the shopping?” asked Vinetta.

  “That,” said her father-in-law, “is where we come to our secret weapon. All of the shopping, all of the visits to the Post Office or the cash machine, must be done by Miss Quigley. She will also go to the wool shop for Tulip. She is right. Her ability to go unnoticed is unsurpassed.”

  Miss Quigley was flattered to be so publicly recognised as the one who was unnoticeable, but she was astute enough to know that there had to be a catch somewhere.

  “The old green perambulator,” said Sir Magnus, “is quite another matter. It is conspicuous. Babies are conspicuous. They are an excuse for people to speak, to look and to admire. In normal circumstances, Miss Quigley’s own appearance would be enough to deflect attention. But these are not normal circumstances. A woman over there” (he flung his arm out in the general direction of Number 9) “is watching us. She may be waiting her chance to pounce. Googles and the perambulator must not leave this house again until we are sure that all is safe.”

  “No park?” said Miss Quigley. “Googles loves the park, even in winter. She likes to watch me feed the ducks.”

  Sir Magnus gave her a look of disdain.

  “Wimpey tells me we have robins in the back garden,” he said. “Feed them, if that is what takes your fancy.”

  Miss Quigley was uneasy, but she accepted her new role as forager in enemy territory. She visualised it as being a small addition to her duties as nanny, and not one that would encroach too much upon her time for painting. Appleby still looked disgruntled. Pilbeam, thinking over all that had been said, was suddenly ashamed of herself.

  “This is all my fault,” she said. “We would have been much safer if I hadn’t gone to the theatre. Wearing a red coat too, and trying to look so smart. So much for being grown up and seeking new experiences!”

  “Don’t blame yourself,” said Vinetta. “Any one of us could have been observed at any time. And,” she lowered her voice and looked cautiously towards the old man, “I do think your grandfather might be over-reacting.”

  6

  Miss Quigley On Call

  TWO OR THREE times a year a delivery van brought a parcel of flat-packs to 5 Brocklehurst Grove. Poopie and Wimpey were always delighted when this happened. The parcel was for their grandmother and consisted of a pile of shaped and printed cardboard sheets that needed to be folded correctly to turn them into boxes. The outside of each box was deep green with the name tulipmennym scrawled all over at different angles most artistically. In these boxes, Tulip used to pack the sweaters and cardigans she made for Harrods to sell. This had been her business for many years. She had designed the boxes before ever approaching the London store, knowing instinctively that packaging was important.

  Poopie and Wimpey, over the years, had become expert at assembling the flat-packs. They knew exactly how the folds went and where the tabs fitted. And they loved doing it!

  “You two are really very good at that,” Granny Tulip would say. “I’d get into a right tangle if I had to do it myself.”

  The problem came when half a dozen boxes were ready packed, with tissue paper covering the soft newness of the wool. Who was to take them to the Post Office?

  It had always been Appleby’s job, but under the new regime there was only one errand-girl. And she was well over fifty and considerably over-worked.

  “Hortensia,” said Tulip in her pleasantest voice, “I know it’s an imposition, but would you be so kind as to take some packages to the Post Office for me? They need to go Guaranteed Delivery, or whatever it is they call it now.”

  Miss Quigley gave Tulip an icy look. Diffident people and super-confident people are always poles apart, no matter what the situation. This particular situation was not of the best to start with. For the past three weeks, Hortensia had shopped for Vinetta, posted things for Sir Magnus, bought newspapers and magazines and generally fetched and carried for every member of the family till she felt like the most menial of servants. They had even begun to ask her to take things up and downstairs for them. Her role as nanny was neglected. Poor little Googles lay in the nursery unfed, unchanged and unburped, like a doll some child no longer wants. She slept most of the time. Awake, her flecked hazel eyes looked listlessly at the ceiling. She did not even bother to rattle her favourite pink plastic bear. It was worse than the years before she had a nanny. Vinetta, always in demand with the rest of the family, always able to find something useful to do, would forget all about Googles till bedtime, then pop in to carry her baby to the night nursery. A brief hug. A guilty sigh. And that was that.

  “How many of these do you expect me to take at a time?” asked Miss Quigley, looking doubtfully at the boxes. Had Tulip been at all sensitive she might have detected the hostility in Miss Quigley’s voice.

  “Four will do,” she answered calmly, with no regard at all for the bulkiness of the packages. “They are not really heavy.”

  “They are bulky,” said Miss Quigley through lips that hardly opened.

  Appleby had usually taken six at a time, packing them into a very large sports bag. It was electric blue
, imitation leather, with Adidas written in huge white letters on the sides. When this was shown to Miss Quigley, she gave it a look of contempt.

  “That,” she said, “is too conspicuous for me to use. If you think a green pram would attract unwelcome attention, you have to realise how much attention that object would merit, especially carried by a woman of my age and dignity.”

  The last word was said with a mocking half-smile. Hortensia Quigley’s muted sarcasm was individual to her. The Mennyms, for all their varied talents, never quite understood it.

  Without answering, Tulip went to the cupboard in the corner of the breakfast room and dragged out an old tartan shopping trolley hooked onto a rather lopsided frame.

  “That should do,” she said. “No one will ever notice that.”

  “It’s very, very shabby,” Hortensia said, feeling embarrassed but goaded into a protest. She had no personal vanity and no pretensions, but she loathed shabbiness. Her self-respect was being eroded. The dirty old trolley was just another straw on a camel’s back about ready to break.

  Tulip was a good bit shorter than Miss Quigley, but she had a way of drawing herself up to her full height that would have made her seem the tallest person in any room. In a quiet but imperious voice she said, “It’s the best I can do. I hope you won’t have to be troubled much longer. We are just waiting for Sir Magnus to give the all-clear. When he feels it is safe again, we’ll all be able to go back to normal. This will probably be the only delivery I shall have to ask you to make.”

  So, reluctantly, Hortensia took the trolley full of boxes to the Post Office. Her shoes were polished, her coat well-brushed, and all her clothing was fresh and clean. It did not make her conspicuous, but it dissociated her from the despicable trolley with its torn flap fitting badly over the four boxes. People are what people wear!

  The man behind the Post Office counter, middle-aged, grey-haired and preoccupied, accepted the parcels, filled out the receipts and handed them over without a word or a look. Miss Quigley bought two books of postage stamps for Sir Magnus. If there was to be a siege, he had argued, it was wise to lay in supplies. A few at a time. A squirrel’s hoard of stamps and stationery.

  7

  Sounds Easy

  TONY BARRAS AT sixteen was taller and slimmer than his father, but he had the same black hair and deep blue eyes. Father and son had lived at Number 1 Brocklehurst Grove with Great Aunts Jane and Eliza for the past three years. In term time, Tony was away at school in Harrogate. So he never really got to know the neighbours, even by sight. Maybe it was because the girls at Number 5 had always been young ladies and he had only just become a young man, but this year was the first time he had ever noticed them. It was the last week in March and he was home for Easter.

  He was just closing the front gate, off for a morning in town, when he caught sight of two girls about his own age emerging from Number 5 and striding along the street in his direction. They looked bright and confident, not at all like the ‘weirdos’ Anthea and Dad talked about. Instead of going straight out onto the High Street, Tony decided to take the long way round so he could pass the girls. He had quite made up his mind to say hello to them. Well, why not?

  Then they saw him. As if they had suddenly collided with a force-field, they stopped abruptly, wheeled round and sped off in the opposite direction.

  The whole of the Mennym household had by now continued in a state of self-imposed siege for nearly two months. At first it had not seemed too bad. The February weather had not been inviting, so no one envied Miss Quigley when she wrapped up warm to face the elements. She, poor lady, had been numbed as much by the tasks loaded upon her as by the chilling weather.

  “Don’t forget to take your umbrella,” Tulip said each time she saw her to the door. But it was Vinetta who greeted her when she returned, and helped her with her packages, and made her sit by the fire in the lounge.

  “Do have a biscuit,” Vinetta would say warmly, after she had poured a pretend cup of tea for her friend and ally. Hortensia always managed to smile bravely, but there was really no going back to praising the little pink-iced biscuits and brushing imaginary crumbs from her lip. All that belonged to another era.

  “I don’t know how much more I can take,” she said to Vinetta one day. “My job is looking after Googles. I hardly ever get to see her these days, and when I do she looks so limp and listless it breaks my heart. You must spend more time with her, Vinetta. Don’t let the others monopolise you. And as for my painting, I haven’t touched a brush since this all began.”

  She felt as if she had maybe said too much. She took a conciliatory sip from the china cup and nervously nibbled an ancient biscuit.

  Vinetta looked concerned.

  “It shouldn’t last much longer,” she said. “Nothing else has happened. No one has come near us. I’ll have another word with Magnus. He must be made to see that he is being over-cautious.”

  Appleby was of the same opinion, though she expressed it somewhat differently as she fumed at Pilbeam in language that sounded more like Poopie in mid-tantrum. The sisters had been listening to records. Outside, the sun had put in one of his rare appearances.

  “I want to go out,” said Appleby. “This is just not good enough. Do you know what I think?”

  Pilbeam was sitting on the floor, sorting through a pile of old records. She looked up at Appleby who was lying sprawled across the bed.

  “Come on then,” she said. “What great thought have you had this time?”

  “I’m serious,” said Appleby. “I think Granpa’s flipped his lid. He’s gone totally potty and we are all just letting him get away with it. Staying indoors, week after week, as if we were manning the barricades. He’s stark raving bonkers, and they’re all too scared of him to do anything about it.”

  Pilbeam looked doubtful. Privately, without going to such linguistic extremes, she almost shared Appleby’s opinion. One visit to the theatre . . . one word from a stranger . . . one tap on the shoulder . . . And suddenly all the world was their enemy.

  “I wish now I hadn’t told him about Anthea Fryer. After all, she only wanted to give me a lift. I wish now I’d had the presence of mind to say no thank you. One panic leads to another. I suppose we have to remember that being recognised is the biggest risk we can take. Granpa is only thinking of our good, our future.”

  Appleby looked unconvinced. Rebellion welled up inside her.

  “I don’t know why I am lying here grumbling,” she said. “There is a solution. I’m getting ready and I’m going out!”

  “They won’t let you,” said Pilbeam.

  “They can’t stop me,” said Appleby, eyes flashing emerald green. “And I certainly won’t be asking their permission.”

  Pilbeam faltered. She too was frustrated at being kept in, day after day. She too thought that Granpa was carrying caution to excess.

  “I’ll go with you,” she said at last. “We’ll be very careful and we won’t stay out long. At least not the first time. It might even prove something. I know Mother would be pleased if we could go back to normal. And so would poor Miss Quigley.”

  Appleby looked enthusiastic. This was more like the old Pilbeam, in the days before she had become so tiresomely grown-up.

  “Jeans and anoraks,” said Appleby. “Not that red coat.”

  They left the house very quietly, unobserved by anyone. Miss Quigley was already out, away to the Market with a shopping list. Everyone else was busy. Soobie, seated in his chair by the window, might have seen them but he was absorbed in reading Lord of the Rings yet again.

  They closed the gate behind them and set out towards the town end of the street, past Number 4, then Number 3. It was as they were passing the gate of Number 2 that they saw Tony Barras walking purposefully towards them. Pilbeam saw him first and immediately knew that he meant to speak to them. She grabbed Appleby’s arm and wheeled her round to go the other way.

  “That boy is going to speak to us,” Pilbeam said. “Don’t run, but h
urry.”

  They soon put a few yards between themselves and danger.

  “Is he following us?” asked Pilbeam, afraid to look round, but knowing that Appleby would be doing just that.

  “No,” said Appleby. “He’s changed his mind. He’s gone back, past Number 1.”

  With a wary look at Number 9, they left the Grove at the other end.

  “We’ll cross the main road straightaway, just in case. We can cross back later,” said Pilbeam.

  But the boy was out of sight and by now was on his way to town, well ahead of Appleby and Pilbeam.

  “Let’s go to Sounds Easy,” said Appleby. “It’s ages since I bought a record.”

  Sounds Easy was one of Appleby’s favourite shops. It sold new and second-hand records, everything from 78s to CDs. Appleby’s taste did not include ‘the classics’, but her knowledge of good popular music extended over the past forty years and even longer. She had an enviable collection of Country and Western records.

  From every point of view, Sounds Easy was a perfect shop for the Mennyms to use. It was not so very far from home – a goodish walk along main streets where it was easy for young people to be anonymous. To reach it, the girls had to go up the High Street past the Theatre Royal to the junction with Albion Street, then along Albion Street as far as the Cathedral, behind which there was a mews enclosed by towering eighteenth century buildings, now used as offices with some of the ground floors converted into dark little shops. Sounds Easy was one of these shops, tucked away in a corner, a little below street level and approached down three well-worn steps. Inside, it extended far back as into a cave. The lighting was dim and barely adequate. Customers tended to bring their discs to the front windows, the better to read the labels. The proprietor had a counter placed strategically near the door. He was a man of indeterminate age with thinning sandy hair and an unkempt appearance, intensely interested in his stock, almost reluctant to sell it, and taciturn with his customers.