By the end of tea, Sid had not come back.
‘Bill, aren’t you going after him?’
‘No, because he’ll come back on his own.’
But he didn’t.
Dusk had fallen. Mrs Sparrow went out into the hall and brought her coat into the living room and began putting it on.
‘All right,’ said Bill Sparrow, ‘I’ll go.’
He put on his raincoat – it was a damp night – and got on his bicycle. He cycled slowly from the estate into the centre of the village. That was the obvious way for Sid to have gone. If the two boys were unknown on the estate, then it was likely that they lived in the village. But there was no sign of Sid. In the centre of the village, everything was shut up. Nobody in the streets.
Bill Sparrow turned and went home.
‘Hasn’t he turned up yet?’ he asked his wife.
‘No.’
He went round to the Deans’, but Sid was not there. Nor had Jimmy Dean’s father seen him on the estate. (Mr Dean always exercised their dog at that time of evening.) He asked old Mrs Pring if she had seen Sid. She and her cats kept a pretty close watch, through net curtains, on who came and who went. But she had not seen Sid. He even called at the Mudds’, to see if by any chance Sid were there. He was not, but Dawn Mudd put on her coat and came back with him. She seemed positively to have sharpened her nose for this mystery, Bill Sparrow thought.
‘I shall go to the police,’ said Mrs Sparrow flatly.
‘But he hasn’t run away,’ said Bill Sparrow. ‘He just hasn’t come home yet.’
‘That’s why I shall go to the police.’
‘Don’t, Alice! Let me have another try.’
Dawn Mudd was listening intently.
‘And where are you going to have another try?’ Mrs Sparrow asked.
‘I’ll go somewhere I haven’t been before.’
He did not know where. But Dawn Mudd followed him to the front door: ‘There’s a place he might be …’
‘Where?’
‘It’s confidential. Sid knows he can’t find Bubble and Squeak. He’s given that up. So he’s not coming home because he feels awful. He’s just gone somewhere to feel awful in.’
‘Well?’
‘An awful place. There’s one we found last summer. We tried to have a picnic there – Peggy and me and Amy and Sid and Jimmy Dean. It’s a straggly little wood, away from people and houses altogether. In the opposite direction from the village. You go up a little hill and down a little hill, and then –’
‘I know,’ said Bill Sparrow. ‘Then it’s on the left.’
‘It’s boggy where you go in. Somebody’s driven an old car round the boggy bit and into the wood and dumped it. It’s not nice there.’
‘I’ll go,’ said Bill.
On his bike again, he took the road that led away from the village and the estate. He came to an end of the street lighting. To the end of speed restrictions on traffic. Up a dark hill; down a dark hill; and there, to one side of the road, on the left, was a deeper black than the darkness round it: the wood.
He got off his bicycle and leant it against a gate that seemed to mark an entrance into the wood. He climbed the gate slowly, walked away from it into the wood, skirted the boggy patch, and stopped.
As Dawn Mudd had said, in no way was this a nice wood.
The outer parts of the wood seemed haunted by the sharp-edged, painful ghosts of people’s worn-out metalware. When he moved again, he trod on something that thereupon rose up out of the wintry undergrowth like a snake rearing to strike: an old bicycle mudguard. Soon he saw ahead of him, like some sunken hovel, the dumped car that Dawn Mudd had mentioned. All the doors were off. The sickening smell of rot and rust from inside made him certain that Sid was not sheltering there.
He penetrated farther into the wood – farther, probably, than most people bothered to go who were dumping rubbish. He could feel round him that the trees were growing closer together. The brambles seemed to spring at least waist high. They seemed deliberately to tear at him. He tripped on a low one, and put his hand out to steady himself on an upright darkness that must be a tree. He felt the tree trunk quite solid under his hand, but then it seemed to move away from him. In terror he stumbled forward. He recovered himself, and realized that this really was only a tree: it had died, or been felled by the wind, but could not fall because of closely surrounding trees. It was supported by its companions, dead on its feet, the corpse of a tree.
He wished that he had brought his torch with him into this wood. Really, he could see nothing; and he could hear nothing except his own crashing about and his own uneven breathing. When he stood still and listened to his breathing, it struck him as sounding like the breathing of a frightened man.
He tried to quiet himself, so that he could listen for noises outside himself, beyond himself. He strained his ears to hear the faintest, most distant sound in the wood, that might be Sid.
But Sid might not be here after all. It was ridiculous of him to have paid any attention to Dawn Mudd. What could she know?
Or, if Sid had come here, he might have gone by now. He might have left the wood as Bill himself had entered it, under cover of all the noise that Bill had been making.
There might be no Sid. He might be quite alone in the wood.
Then, much, much closer than he could ever have expected it, came Sid’s voice. It sounded thin and hard. Very unpleasant.
‘I’ve got a knife,’ said Sid.
‘A knife?’ His voice was dying in his throat.
‘Who is it, then?’
‘Me. Bill.’
Suddenly Sid was at his elbow, ordinary again, but cross. ‘I thought it was someone else.’
‘Who?’
‘I don’t know. Oh –’ he sounded too careless – ‘the kind of man who’d choose to go into the middle of a wood like this, all alone, after dark. Or someone who’d watched me go in. Waited. Followed me …’
‘Well,’ said Bill. ‘I hadn’t much choice in coming. Your mum sent me out.’
Sid was furious. ‘Can’t you do anything on your own? Do you always have to do what she says?’
‘No,’ said Bill, ‘but mostly.’
‘It’s not your fault my gerbils didn’t go long ago. You took them to be sold. Offered to take them.’
‘And I brought them back.’
‘You had to.’
‘No.’
There was a pause. Sid said resentfully: ‘What do you mean, “No”?’
‘The Garden Centre would have taken them back all right. But, in the end, I didn’t ask them to.’
A much longer pause. Sid had to make sure: ‘Didn’t ask them to?’
‘No. I just brought the cage back, without going into the Pet Department at all.’ He couldn’t help adding: ‘Don’t tell your mum.’
A long, long pause. Then Sid laughed. Then said: ‘Well, they’re gone now.’
‘Yes, but I suppose …’
‘What?’
‘You might get two more.’
‘You mean, in spite of Mum? Against Mum?’
‘She’d have to be talked round.’
‘And who’d do that?’
‘Well, I’d try.’
‘Why?’
‘I’m –’ Bill Sparrow hesitated. ‘I’m your stepfather. And, when I was your age, I had white mice.’
Sid moved away, but not deeper into the wood. He was making for the road. Bill Sparrow followed him closely.
As they came out from the gloom of the trees, Bill saw that Sid really did have a knife – a big thing, with a wicked big blade, open. He had been hacking at brambles and branches with it, as he went. Now he was snapping it shut.
‘Where did you get that knife?’ Bill said.
‘I stole it.’
‘Stole it?’
‘Out of Mum’s chest of drawers. Top left-hand drawer. It was my dad’s pruning knife.’
‘If you like, I’ll put it back for you.’ Sid gave it to him. ‘And
you know, your mum’s worrying about you. Take my bike, and get home quickly.’
Sid said, ‘I trod in something – ugh! – as I was going into the wood.’
‘You stink,’ Bill agreed. ‘Get it off now. I’ll go on.’
Bill Sparrow left Sid working away at the side of his shoe in the grass. He set off walking. Halfway down the hill, Sid passed him on the bike. ‘Hi!’ he called, as he flew on.
By the time Bill Sparrow got home, Sid was eating his tea. Dawn Mudd, having seen him arrive, had gone.
Mrs Sparrow was happy. She brewed a fresh pot of tea for her husband, and fussed over him, as she had already fussed over Sid. No mention was made of gerbils until after the children had gone to bed. Then, ‘It turns out there’s quite a demand for gerbils, after all,’ said Mrs Sparrow. ‘While you were out, someone else came asking about the advert.’
‘I’ve been thinking about gerbils and white mice,’ said Bill Sparrow. He cleared his throat.
‘Not tonight,’ said his wife. ‘We’ve had enough tonight. Tomorrow, if you like.’
But on the next night there was no need for discussion. Three more sets of people called on Mrs Sparrow because of her gerbil advertisement. Mrs Sparrow told the first two, blithely, that they were much too late.
The third set of people were the two little boys who had taken the gerbils in the first place, and their mother. Their mother carried the cage with Bubble and Squeak in it. She was unpleasantly polite. ‘We have come to return your kind gift,’ she said. ‘In my opinion, parents should always be consulted before children are given presents which parents may not want. We have had animals similar to these in the past. They bred. We don’t want them again. Any more than you seem to want them.’
The gerbils in their cage, the bedding, what remained of the food – all were dumped on the doorstep. Peggy, who had come behind her mother, stooped, reached past her, and brought everything indoors again.
The mother was marching her two little boys back through the front gate and away. ‘Here!’ called Mrs Sparrow. But the other woman paid no attention.
Behind her, indoors, Mrs Sparrow could hear the rest of her family welcoming home dear Bubble and Squeak. She could not bear it. She ran frantically down to the front gate. ‘HERE!’ she shouted.
But, of course, everything was useless.
She went slowly back up the path, in through the front door, shut it behind her. The living-room door was shut, but she could hear the sounds of delight behind it. She opened that door, stood in the doorway, looked.
A gerbil festival was going on.
Sid lay on the floor, and Peggy and Amy were each in charge of a gerbil. They were feeding Bubble and Squeak into the sleeves of Sid’s jacket and into his trouser-legs. Tails disappeared; there were scurryings; uncontrollable gigglings were tickled out of Sid; pop-eyed gerbil faces popped out of trouser-ends, sleeve-ends; there were two gerbils – there were twenty gerbils; Sid was gerbil-infested.
Everyone was laughing, not loudly, but softly, affectionately.
And Bill stood over them, laughing too.
Mrs Sparrow stood in the doorway, and looked. They never noticed her. She backed out and slammed the door – but perhaps they never noticed that either?
She went into the kitchen and sat down. She felt like screaming and screaming; but she knew that she never screamed.
CHAPTER FIVE
That evening Alice Sparrow hardly spoke to her family.
That night she hardly slept.
The next morning she was up very early, before anyone else. For one thing, it was the day for the dustbins. She busied herself indoors and out.
At one point, ‘That’s that,’ she said, brushing her hands together smartly.
Later, nearly at breakfast-time, there was a ring at the doorbell. She answered it. One of the dustmen stood there. He held the gerbil cage in front of him. ‘Missus,’ he said, ‘you can’t do this. There’s something alive in here.’
Mrs Sparrow had thought she was still the only one downstairs, but Amy had come behind her. Amy looked past her. She saw the dustman and the cage he held. She looked past him. She saw the huge van that had drawn up just past the front gate. She saw the open back of the van and the great fangs that closed slowly and opened … and closed … and opened …
She began to scream.
Mrs Sparrow took the cage from the man. She shut the front door on him and on the sight of the fangs.
Amy’s screaming turned to crying. She cried as if her heart would break.
Mrs Sparrow took the cage into the kitchen and put it safely on the table there. Bubble and Squeak came out and pottered about, unaware of drama. Mrs Sparrow sat down and took Amy on to her knee. Amy, still crying, fought her.
‘Amy,’ her mother said. ‘Listen. Listen, Amy. I didn’t mean them to go into the van. Truly. I put them on top of the dustbin, not inside. Truly. I thought one of the dustbin-men might have a little girl that liked gerbils.’
Amy wailed: ‘I’m a little girl that likes gerbils! I love Bubble and Squeak!’
She still cried, but she was beginning to allow her mother to cuddle her. This was as her mother talked to her, coaxed her, promised her. Mrs Sparrow found herself promising that – No, she wouldn’t send Bubble and Squeak away. She would never send them away.
As she was promising, Sid and Peggy walked into the kitchen; and Bill Sparrow was just behind them.
They all heard her promising.
CHAPTER SIX
The night after the dustbin morning was a bad one. Everyone was asleep when the screaming began. At first it was difficult to know who was screaming.
Amy, still deeply asleep, screamed and screamed.
She was having a nightmare: tiny trickles of blood were oozing from between the black bars of a cage. The trickles widened and deepened into streams, into rivers, into torrents and seas. At last Amy was sinking and drowning in the rushing and roaring tides of hateful oceans.
She woke everyone with her screaming; lastly, herself. Her mother had to spend a long time with her, cuddling and coaxing her all over again, calming her, reassuring her with yet more promises. Bill Sparrow carried her downstairs to look at the gerbil cage, quiet and safe, and then carried her back to bed. At last everyone was in bed again, free to sleep again.
But Peggy could not sleep.
Bill had shown Amy the gerbil cage, but the gerbils themselves had not been out. Peggy knew she was being overanxious, but she wondered about them, worried about them. At last she crept out of bed and downstairs. There was still no sign of Bubble and Squeak. Not surprising, she knew. They must be deep in the hay nest in their bedroom. Ordinarily she would have left them undisturbed. But tonight – after the dustbin morning – she wanted to be sure. She opened the door of the cage, and put her hand in. Cautiously she moved aside the top hay in the bedroom. There was the brindle of gerbil fur, and it was warm to the touch. When she touched them, the gerbils fidgeted uneasily. She covered them up again quickly, shut the cage door and secured it, and went back upstairs.
At her own bedroom door, Peggy hesitated. She turned aside into Sid’s room. She felt lonely, troubled.
She had not expected Sid to be still awake, and would not have woken him. But the slight noise she made in entering caused him to roll over creakily in bed. He whispered: ‘Well, were they all right?’
‘Bubble and Squeak? Yes. But I can’t sleep.’
‘Nor me.’
She sat down on the end of the bed and drew Sid’s eiderdown round her. ‘But I’m not a bit worried about Bubble and Squeak,’ she said.
‘No?’
‘Not now Mum’s promised not to get rid of them.’
‘Oh.’
‘What do you mean – saying “Oh” like that, Sid?’
‘I just said “Oh”.’
‘You didn’t. You said it in a funny way.’
‘Look, Peggy, I didn’t ask you to come into my room in the middle of the night and keep me awake with silly
talk. You go back to bed.’
She did not move. She repeated: ‘Mum’s promised not to get rid of Bubble and Squeak. A promise is a promise. She can’t get out of that.’
Sid said: ‘You’d be surprised …’
‘Now what do you mean, Sid Parker?’
Sid said: ‘Mum doesn’t love my gerbils now any more than she did before. This morning she just about got them murdered –’
‘No! She didn’t – she didn’t mean to! You heard what she said: she put them on the dustbin, not inside it.’
Sid said carefully: ‘I don’t think she really knew herself what she meant to happen. She was a bit off her head. She still is, a bit. All right: she promised. But she only needs some cast-iron excuse …’
‘A promise is a promise,’ Peggy repeated.
‘Look,’ said Sid once more. ‘I heard her this morning, talking to Bill. She said she was worrying about rabies. Whether you could catch rabies from a gerbil bite, because if so, really how wrong to keep gerbils at all. And when Bill said, No, he was sure you couldn’t catch rabies from gerbils, she looked terribly – well, disappointed.’
He had convinced her of his point. She whispered: ‘Then they really are still in danger. All the time here, they’re in danger. Sid, this house isn’t a safe place for them.’
Hard-voiced, Sid replied: ‘They’re my gerbils. Where I live, they live. I’m not going to let them go.’
‘But, Sid, if you didn’t give them away – if you just let them be out of this house for a bit – just for a bit, Sid – till Mum really gets used to the idea of having them – please, Sid – not far away, and not for long –’
‘What are you driving at?’
‘The Mudds would take them for a bit. I asked Dawn at school today. She’s sure they would. They’ve only got Mrs Mudd’s budgie and Mr Mudd’s racing pigeons.’
‘You really expect me to let my gerbils go to the Mudds?’
‘Only for a little while – say, a week or two. Until we see that Mum feels better about them. Calmer.’
‘No!’