‘I don’t mind at all,’ said Mr Clive pleasantly, ‘not at all. Allow me to see you to the door. Good-night, William.’
He closed the door and went to the library window. There he watched the white-clad figure disappear down the drive. ‘That young man’s progress through the village,’ he said aloud, ‘ought to be worth watching.’
William set out once more on his adventurous journey At the thought of the village street his knees felt quite definitely unsteady. Never to William had his home seemed so near and yet so unattainable. Suddenly he thought of the path over the fields and through the churchyard. It would bring him out a good way beyond his home, but it would avoid that nightmare of the village street.
William climbed over the stile and set off over the fields. It was nearly dark anyway. He could see no one near . . . He climbed the second stile that led into the churchyard, and began to walk forward. Suddenly a woman who had been standing with her back to him, reading one of the gravestones, turned, stared at him with open mouth and eyes, gave a scream that made the hair on William’s head stand upright, and shot off like an arrow from a bow, falling head over heels over the opposite stile, picking herself up and running with deafening screams in the direction of the village. William, feeling slightly shaken, sat down behind a tombstone to recover.
Several people passed, but William’s nerve had gone. He dared not emerge from his damp and gloomy refuge. At last he heard the sound of many cheerful voices, as if seven or eight people were coming together through the churchyard. His spirits rose. He would tell them his plight. Seven or eight people all together would not be afraid of him . . . He rose from behind his tombstone and with eight wild yells eight young women made for the horizon. All but one. She tripped over a stone and crouched with her head on her hands where she fell. With a thrill of joy William recognised his mother’s housemaid. His troubles were at an end. She would fetch him his overcoat.
‘Ellen –’ he began.
‘OO-ow-ow-ow!’ yelled Ellen.
With a shriek more piercing than he had yet heard, Ellen fled from William’s sight.
‘I don’t know where William is,’ said Mrs Brown to her husband. ‘He wasn’t in to tea.’
‘Don’t worry yourself about him unduly,’ said her husband. ‘There was a rumour rife in the village as I came from the station to the effect that William had been seen walking in the direction of the village over an hour ago wearing a suit of clothes of abnormal size.’
Mrs Brown sat down suddenly.
‘Abnormal size? But he was wearing his ordinary suit at lunch.’
‘I can’t explain it,’ said her husband. ‘I merely repeat the rumour.’
‘An hour ago – then why isn’t he home?’
‘I can’t say,’ said her husband callously opening the evening paper.
At this point an unearthly yell broke the silence of the house, and Ellen rushed into the room, flinging herself beneath the table.
‘It’s come after me,’ she screamed. ‘It’s at the side-door – Oh lor! Oh lor! – It’s there, all white an’ all. Oh, don’t let it get me – I don’t want to die – I’ll repent – I’ll – Oh lor! Oh lor!’
Mr Brown laid down his paper with a sigh.
‘What is it?’ he said wearily.
‘Oh lor! Oh lor!’ sobbed Ellen, beneath the table.
A figure appeared in the doorway – a wild figure, with a fierce, indignant, aggrieved expression and hair that stood up round its face, a figure that clutched a ragged tablecloth round it with certain enraged dignity.
‘It – it – it’s William,’ said Mrs Brown.
‘But they was stole off me,’ said William wildly.
‘So I gathered from your account,’ said Mr Brown, politely.
‘Well, is it fair to ’speck me to pay for things wot was stole off me?’
‘I have already remarked that if I observed in you any sudden growth of such virtues as cleanliness, tidiness, obedience, silence, modesty – er – and the rest, I might myself contribute a little towards the waistcoat, say, or the collar and tie. We will now consider the discussion closed.’
‘It’s ever so long past your bedtime, William,’ said Mrs Brown. ‘Do go to bed. I simply can’t bear to see you wearing that dreadful thing any longer.’
With a glance of sorrowful anger at his parents William drew his tablecloth about him and prepared to depart. He felt injured, infuriated, ill-treated, and weary His self-esteem was cruelly hurt. Screams of laughter came from the next room where his grown-up brother and sister were relating his adventures to a friend.
The telephone rang.
‘William, someone wants to speak to you.’
He took the receiver unsmilingly.
‘William, Daddy said I could ring you up to say goodnight to you. I was so sorry I couldn’t go home with you. William, I don’t think you looked a bit funny in those things – I think you looked nice in the tablecloth and it wasn’t your fault – and you were awfully brave about it – and wasn’t it fun – the desert island part? – I did enjoy it – we’ll play a game like that again soon, won’t we? – Goodnight, William darling.’
‘Goodnight.’
William hung up the receiver and went upstairs to bed. He held his untidy carroty head erect. On his freckled face was a softened expression – nearly as good as a smile – he wore his tablecloth with an almost jaunty air.
He was himself again.
Richmal Crompton was born in Lancashire in 1890. The first story about William Brown appeared in Home magazine in 1919, and the first collection of William stories was published in book form three years later. In all, thirty-eight William books were published, the last one in 1970, after Richmal Crompton’s death.
‘Probably the funniest, toughest children’s books ever written’
Sunday Times on the Just William series
‘Richmal Crompton’s creation [has] been famed for his cavalier attitude to life and those who would seek to circumscribe his enjoyment of it ever since he first appeared’
Guardian
Books available in the Just William series
Just William
More William
William Again
William the Fourth
Still William
William the Conqueror
William the Outlaw
William in Trouble
William the Good
William at War
First published in 1923
This selection first published 1995 by Macmillan Children’s Books
This edition published 2011 by Macmillan Children’s Books
This electronic edition published 2011 by Macmillan Children’s Books
a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
Basingstoke and Oxford
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-0-330-54361-3 PDF
ISBN 978-0-330-54359-0 EPUB
All stories copyright © Richmal C. Ashbee
This selection copyright © 2005 Richmal C. Ashbee
Foreword copyright © Louise Rennison 2009
Illustrations copyright © Thomas Henry Fisher Estate
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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William Again Page 19
