by R. A. Spratt
‘Well, apparently, if you take a whole law firm full of lawyers, it is very hard to find three of them who are good fathers,’ said Mr Green. ‘Smythe from Accounting actually knew all his children’s birthdays and most of their names, so obviously he went straight through. And Harris from Maritime Law was seen taking his four-year-old to the park on his own without a woman there to help him, so he automatically got picked as well. Luckily Peterson still hasn’t been released by the tribe in Papua New Guinea. Apparently they think he is a god just because he’s been giving them good stock-market tips.’
‘But why on earth did they choose you?’ asked Nanny Piggins.
Mr Green looked shifty and did not answer.
‘You’d better tell her, Father,’ encouraged Derrick. ‘You know she’ll find out anyway, and you won’t like the way she does it.’
‘All right,’ snapped Mr Green grumpily. ‘The Senior Partner said that while I was terrible in all other respects, I had made one stroke of genius.’
‘Which was?’ asked Samantha.
‘Hrrring nnn pggg,’ mumbled Mr Green, trying not to make eye contact.
‘I’m sorry, we didn’t quite catch that?’ said Michael.
‘The Senior Partner said I made a stroke of genius when I hired Nanny Piggins,’ confessed Mr Green.
Nanny Piggins smiled. ‘I always thought your new Senior Partner was a lovely, insightful man.’
‘So why are you giving Nanny Piggins a cake?’ asked Samantha. ‘To thank her?’
‘Of course not,’ said Mr Green as though this was the most ridiculous suggestion in the world. ‘No, you see, there is a final stage in the competition to find out who the ultimate winner is.’
‘You mean who the best father is,’ said Derrick.
‘Yes, yes, same difference,’ said Mr Green. ‘Anyway, the Senior Partner has set us a task. We have to team up with our children and raise money for charity. Whoever raises the most money wins.’
‘Right,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘So could you do all that for me?’ said Mr Green, picking up his briefcase and straightening his tie. ‘I want to get back to the office.’
‘Wait just a minute!’ said Nanny Piggins, blocking his path. ‘It is called the “Father of the Year Competition”, not the “Nanny of the Year Competition”.’
‘They’d never have a competition like that,’ said Michael. ‘You’d win hands down every year.’
‘True,’ agreed Nanny Piggins. ‘But my point is, if you want to win, then you should jolly well do some fathering yourself.’
‘But, but, but …’ whined Mr Green, ‘I don’t want to.’
‘Tough,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I do everything else for you. I can’t be you for you as well.’
‘But I don’t know how to arrange a charity event,’ complained Mr Green.
‘Then you’d better learn,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Here, take back your cake. I refuse to accept your bribe.’ (The strength of this gesture was somewhat diminished by the fact that it was already three-quarters eaten.)
‘Fine,’ snapped Mr Green. ‘I order you three children to meet me at 7 am tomorrow morning for a breakfast meeting to discuss what we are going to do.’ With that, Mr Green got in his Rolls Royce and returned to his office.
‘Nanny Piggins, what have you done?’ asked Michael. ‘We have to go to a meeting!’
‘And at 7 am on a Saturday!’ exclaimed Derrick.
‘And with Father!’ exclaimed Samantha (which was the most horrific kind of 7 am Saturday breakfast meeting she could imagine).
‘You are going to get us out of it, aren’t you?’ asked Michael.
Nanny Piggins looked at the three children. It broke her heart to see their crestfallen little faces. But she had principles.
‘I’m not,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I am sorry that you are going to have to suffer this, when you have suffered so much already: the loss of your mother, the cruelties of compulsory education and, on occasion, having to eat vegetables. But there are some points on which a pig should stand firm. Your father should spend some time with you. And while that may be deeply unpleasant for you, sometimes you have to suffer unpleasantness to do what is right.’
‘We do?’ asked Michael.
‘Oh yes,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Look at Superman. He is the strongest, most powerful man in the universe. And yet he still has to wear his underpants on the outside of his leotard. We all have our crosses to bear. You will just have to be strong and see it through. And if your father is too unbearable, let me know and I will come and bite his leg for you.’
The following two weeks were not pleasant for the Green children. Admittedly, they did not have to spend too much time with their father. He soon discovered he could organise the event simply by ringing up and barking orders at them on the phone. But the children were surprised when Nanny Piggins actually stayed true to her word and left them to it. They thought she would not be able to resist sweeping in and transforming the drab event Mr Green was organising into something fabulous.
When the big night arrived the children trooped into the living room to say goodbye to her. Nanny Piggins was curled up in an armchair, eating a box of chocolates and reading a very silly novel (about how the truth about the Loch Ness monster was hidden in coded messages painted into Salvador Dali paintings).
‘So you’re really not coming with us?’ asked Derrick.
‘I’m afraid not,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I do hope it is not too awful for you. But if it is, always remember – what’s my first rule about awkward social situations?’
‘Trip the fire alarm,’ chorused the children.
‘And what’s the best way to trip the fire alarm?’ coached Nanny Piggins.
‘By setting a fire,’ chanted the children.
‘That’s right,’ said Nanny Piggins approvingly. ‘I can’t tell you how many tedious tupperware parties that has got me out of.’
‘It wouldn’t be so awful if you came with us,’ pleaded Michael.
‘Even if you just sat in the corner and said mean things about people’s haircuts, it would really cheer us up,’ added Derrick
‘I know,’ said Nanny Piggins, giving them each a hug. ‘But you really do need to interact with your father. Once a year or so, and obviously not for very long. Just remember, while it may not feel that way at the time, very few people actually die of boredom.’
And so, after Nanny Piggins had pressed half-a-dozen chocolate bars into each of their pockets and kissed them goodbye, the children left to go to their father’s horrible function.
Nanny Piggins was surprised when, just forty-five minutes, two engrossing chapters and twelve chocolate bars later, the children returned.
‘What are you doing back already?’ asked Nanny Piggins. ‘And you’re not even wet from the sprinkler system. Let me guess – your father held his function at a venue with inadequate fire protection?’
‘No, better than that!’ said Samantha.
‘Nobody turned up,’ explained Derrick.
‘Nobody?’ asked Nanny Piggins.
‘Nobody at all,’ said Michael with a grin.
‘What sort of social function did your father organise?’ asked Nanny Piggins. ‘Even street performers who can barely hack their way through a three-chord song can get people to give them the loose change from their pockets.’
‘Father decided he didn’t want to do a sit-down dinner because the food costs were too expensive,’ explained Samantha.
‘So it was just out-of-date crackers with the cheapest lump of cheddar he could find,’ continued Derrick.
‘And he didn’t want to pay a professional performer to entertain the audience,’ added Michael, ‘so he was going to give a speech himself.’
‘No!’ gasped Nanny Piggins. ‘What about? Was he going to give a lecture on how to be boring?’
‘Close,’ conceded Samantha. ‘He was going to give a talk explaining lesser known details of the law as it applies to offshore tr
ust funds.’
‘I’m surprised there weren’t insomniacs beating down the door, begging to attend,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘That would be guaranteed to put anyone to sleep.’
‘Well, there might have been,’ admitted Derrick, ‘but you know how father feels about advertising.’
‘Let me guess,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘All he did was paint a sign himself and stab it in the ground outside the hall?’
‘Exactly,’ said Samantha.
‘Oh well, at least that ordeal was nowhere as bad as we all thought it would be,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘And the Father of the Year Competition will be all over in a couple of days, so you won’t have to spend time with your father again for months, if not years, provided you are very careful and don’t get caught in an elevator with him.’ Nanny Piggins shuddered. ‘What a horrific thought! I highly recommend you never ever get in an elevator with your father, just to be on the safe side.’
The children also shuddered at the nightmare-like idea.
‘Come on, let’s do something fun,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘The retired army colonel who lives round the corner has just bought himself a ferret. Let’s go round and play with it.’
‘But it’s 9 pm,’ protested Derrick.
‘He won’t mind being suddenly woken up,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘It’ll remind him of the war.’
But just then their pleasant plans were ruined when they heard Mr Green coming in through the front door.
‘Darn,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I suppose bopping him on the head and going out anyway would be rude.’
‘I don’t know much about etiquette,’ said Samantha, ‘but it certainly sounds like that would be a rude thing to do.’
Nanny Piggins and the children went out into the hallway to greet Mr Green (and then try to escape around him at the first opportunity).
‘Sorry to hear that your evening went so poorly,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Still, at least you won’t have to buy any cheese and crackers for a while, hey?’
But Mr Green was not very good at looking on the bright side of anything. He was, by nature, a ‘glass half-empty’ man. So he responded to Nanny Piggins’ attempt at joviality by bursting into tears.
Nanny Piggins and the children were horrified as Mr Green covered his eyes, sobbed loudly and lurched towards them, as if wanting a hug. They instinctively backed away.
‘What should we do?’ asked Derrick.
‘Is this part of our compulsory father interaction?’ asked Samantha.
‘No, it has gone beyond that, the situation is officially out of control,’ declared Nanny Piggins. ‘This is more responsibility than any child should have to bear. Don’t worry, I will take care of it.’
‘You’re not going to hug him, are you?’ asked Michael, clutching Nanny Piggins’ hand and not wanting to let her go.
‘I can handle it,’ Nanny Piggins assured him.
She carefully edged towards Mr Green, reached out an arm and patted him on the back.
‘There, there, Mr Green, it will be all right,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘If you haven’t taken the cheese out of its packet, perhaps you’ll be able to return it.’
‘That’s not it,’ wailed Mr Green. ‘I’m upset because I just found out the prize for the Father of the Year Competition was an all-expenses-paid, two-week family trip to Hawaii. And if I’d cashed in the children’s tickets and gone on my own, I would have been able to have such a lovely time.’
The children gasped. Now they were devastated too. They were imagining what a wonderful time they would have had with their father gone for two weeks.
‘Then you’re just going to have to win that prize!’ announced Nanny Piggins.
‘But it’s too late,’ blubbered Mr Green. ‘The competition ends on Monday. And I’m twenty dollars in deficit.’
‘Leave it to me,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘But I thought you said that the purpose of the Father of the Year Competition was for us to spend time with Father,’ said Michael.
‘It’s all very well to have principles. But sometimes there are more important things at stake. Like a two-week holiday from having your father about the house,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘You go back to the office, Mr Green. I will take care of it all.’
‘Oh thank you, thank you so much,’ gushed Mr Green. For a moment it looked like he was going to hug Nanny Piggins from sheer gratitude, but he immediately thought better of it and fled the house.
‘What are you going to do, Nanny Piggins?’ asked Derrick.
‘Smythe has raised $8000 by doing a sponsored walk around the block one thousand times,’ said Samantha.
‘And Harris has raised $11,000 by auctioning off paintings done by badgers,’ said Michael.
‘Piffle!’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I’m sure I can do better than that.’
The next morning when the children came down to breakfast they were surprised to discover their nanny hard at work in the kitchen.
‘What are you doing, Nanny Piggins?’ asked Samantha.
‘There is an old saying,’ explained Nanny Piggins. ‘When life gives you a lemon, make lemonade.’
‘When did life give you a lemon?’ asked Michael, looking at the hundreds of squeezed lemons lying on the kitchen counter.
‘It didn’t,’ admitted Nanny Piggins. ‘I borrowed these from Mrs McGill’s lemon tree. But the principle is still the same. Making lemonade is an excellent way to solve all your problems.’
‘It is?’ asked Derrick sceptically.
‘Oh yes,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘How?’ asked Samantha.
‘We are going to set up a lemonade stand,’ explained Nanny Piggins.
‘But it’s not even a hot day outside,’ said Michael, looking out the window at the overcast sky.
‘Pish!’ said Nanny Piggins.
As if a little thing like that would stop her.
Half an hour later they were all sitting behind a makeshift table, with a jug of lemonade and a few plastic cups. Nanny Piggins was humming happily to herself. But the children were not so confident that this was a high stakes money-making scheme.
‘Do you think you are going to get many customers?’ asked Samantha. ‘There aren’t many people about this morning.’
‘I’m confident I’ll get at least one,’ said Nanny Piggins smugly.
‘Why? What have you done?’ asked Derrick, beginning to feel suspicious.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Nanny Piggins, unable to keep the smirk off her face. ‘Ah, here comes Boris now. And look at that. He seems to have brought a friend.’
The children turned to see Boris walking towards them and he appeared to be carrying a struggling man. They could not hear exactly what the man was yelling because his face was pressed into Boris’ back, but they could tell from his tone that he was not happy.
‘Ppp-mm-dwn,’ yelled the man.
‘In a second,’ said Boris kindly. ‘I know being kidnapped is not a lot of fun. It has happened to me several times. But I promise you, you’ll think it is entirely worthwhile in this instance.’
‘Hello, Boris,’ called Nanny Piggins. ‘Bring him over here.’
‘Hello, Sarah,’ replied Boris. ‘I’m glad to see you. He’s quite a wiggler, even after I explained it would be easier for me to carry him if he just lay still.’
Boris set the man down on his feet.
‘This is an outrage!’ spluttered the angry man. ‘I’m calling the police.’
‘Good idea,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I’m sure the Police Sergeant would like a glass of lemonade.’
‘I’m a busy man, I don’t have time to be kidnapped,’ shouted the angry man.
‘Of course you don’t,’ said Nanny Piggins kindly. ‘You must be very hot and bothered after your ordeal. Here, have a free glass of lemonade.’
‘But, Nanny Piggins,’ whispered Michael. ‘How are we going to make money if you give the lemonade away?’
‘And how are we going to make money if
we are all arrested for kidnapping?’ added Derrick.
‘Trust me,’ whispered Nanny Piggins, holding out the cup to the angry man.
‘All right, I will have some,’ said the angry man. (A face full of bear fur does tend to make you thirsty.) So he took the cup and gulped it down.
But when he lowered the cup, the angry man did not continue yelling as the children had expected. He had a very different look on his face – it combined excitement, concentration and business acumen.
‘What is in that lemonade?’ the man asked shrewdly.
‘I won’t tell you,’ said Nanny Piggins.
‘It is the most delicious lemonade I have ever tasted,’ said the man.
‘I know,’ agreed Nanny Piggins.
‘How much do you want for the recipe?’ asked the man.
‘It’s not for sale,’ declared Nanny Piggins. ‘It’s a family recipe that has been passed down from generation to generation.’
‘I am the chairman of the world’s largest soft-drink company,’ said the angry man.
‘Really?’ said Nanny Piggins, a little too innocently. ‘What a surprise.’
The children looked at their nanny. They were beginning to suspect that she had put more thought into her kidnapping plot than they had realised.
‘You have to sell me the recipe,’ pleaded the angry man. ‘This lemonade is going to be a huge hit. I’ll give you whatever you want.’
‘I don’t know,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Great-Great-Aunt Hilda would turn over in her grave if she knew I’d sold it.’
The man was now starting to get desperate, ‘One million dollars? Two million dollars?! I have to have that recipe.’
Nanny Piggins turned to the children. ‘How much did Harris from Maritime Law make?’
‘Eleven thousand dollars,’ said Michael.
Nanny Piggins turned back to the soft drink chairman. ‘We want $11,000 and fifty cents,’ declared Nanny Piggins.
‘But Nanny Piggins,’ said Derrick, ‘he just offered you two million dollars. Why don’t you take that?’
‘Oh no, I’m not a greedy pig,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘We want your father to look good, but not that good.’
