Aunt Effie and Mrs Grizzle

by Jack Lasenby

  “The quick-witted Bonny lowered them into the water. Swearing, the monster pukeko lit another flaming arrow to fire at the barrels of gunpowder on the scow’s deck, but I leapt ashore with my father’s sword and slashed the elastic. It snapped back, knocked out the vile beast, and the flaming arrow sizzled into the water.

  Mrs Grizzle bent its head under one wing, clipped the other, and chained it between two ringbolts on deck with the rest of the monster pukekos, who began pecking it because it had no tail.

  “I picked up my little mother and hugged her. ‘Are you all right, Euphemia?’

  “‘Naughty Brunnhilde! You ruined my elastic,’ she whined. ‘And you’ve made my nice new school uniform all dirty!’

  “‘I’ll sew on a new piece of elastic. I’ll sponge and press your gym,’ I promised. ‘As good as new!’ But my mother stamped her button shoes, tossed her golden ringlets, and pinched me cruelly.

  “Back home, Mrs Grizzle drove the monster pukekos into one of the deer paddocks. They couldn’t fly over the high fence with their clipped wings.

  “I had to piggyback my little mother up to the house. She grizzled for something to eat, so I made her a honey sandwich. ‘I wanted peanut butter,’ she whined. I made her a peanut butter sandwich. ‘I wanted Vegemite,’ she pouted.

  “‘Make up your mind,’ I told her, ‘or you won’t have any sandwich at all.’

  “‘You wait till your father comes home,’ she said in her spoiled little voice. ‘We’ll see what he has to say when I tell him you’ve been playing with his medals and his sword.’

  “‘It was lucky for you that I had his sword!’

  “My mother screwed up her little face and poked out her pink tongue. ‘Your father will be very annoyed with you!’

  “‘You’ll have to be his little girl now,’ I told her. ‘You’re much smaller than me.’

  “My mother smiled at that. ‘I’m going back to school tomorrow,’ she said. ‘I want to see the nice School Inspector again.’

  Jessie sat up on the foot of Aunt Effie’s enormous bed and pulled her thumb out of her mouth. “Euphemia sounds just like Daisy!” she said.

  Daisy went, “Huff!”

  “Now, listen!” Aunt Effie said.

  “‘IT’S ALL RIGHT,’ Mrs Grizzle whispered to me. ‘Euphemia’s just tired. She’s had a big day and doesn’t know what she’s saying.’

  “While my mother had a nice little lie-down, Bonny came to the back door. ‘I’ve done the milking,’ she told Mrs Grizzle. ‘It’s so much easier with the pigs doing the separating, and the cows sweeping and hosing down the yard themselves.’

  “‘Come in!’ said Mrs Grizzle, ‘and sit down. We were just about to have a cup of tea.’

  “Bonny wiped her feet, came into the kitchen, and sat on the edge of a chair. She managed the cup and saucer quite well, considering.

  “Afterwards, while Mrs Grizzle and Bonny dried and patched the sails, I sewed a new piece of elastic on my mother’s Panama, and sponged and pressed her gym. I scraped off the mud, dried her shoes on the rack above the stove, and polished them shiny black. Her starched white blouse was filthy where the monster pukeko had wiped its beak. I put it to soak, and sprinkled and pressed and aired a fresh one for tomorrow.

  “After tea I tucked my mother into bed and read her a story. She said all the other girls at school had a skipping rope and sobbed piteously till I promised to make one for her, too. Once she was asleep, I cut a skipping rope off a length of plough-line, and Mrs Grizzle showed me how to make a crown knot and tuck the ends to stop them coming undone.

  “Just after dark, Bonny came in. ‘The monster pooks pecked the tailless one to death,’ she said.

  “‘The deer don’t like having to share the same paddock. They say the monster pooks do stinky poos all over the grass.’

  “‘We’ll see about that tomorrow,’ said Mrs Grizzle. ‘Let’s get to bed. We’ve got a big day ahead of us.’

  “In the morning, I had to plait my mother’s hair. All the other girls had plaits. The knot on her sash had to go on the right. All the other girls wore theirs on the right. I had to take the laces out of her shoes and put them back criss-crossed. All the other girls wore theirs criss-crossed.

  “We sailed her across the Great Waharoa Swamp to where the Turangaomoana Road came out of the water. Bonny took the neck of her blouse between her teeth and carried her ashore.

  “‘Take the cream to the factory first, Bonny,’ Mrs Grizzle called. ‘Sit under Euphemia’s desk and see that School Inspector doesn’t give her the strap. We’ll meet you here after school. If there’s no trouble, you can have new shoes!’

  “Bonny clapped her hands. Dear vain creature, she loved having nice things! I lifted my mother on to her saddle. Bonny balanced the can of cream on her head, and they trotted down the Turangaomoana Road and joined the Ryan and Troughton kids riding to school. I felt a lump in my throat.

  “‘You’ve got to get used to the fact that your mother’s a growing girl,’ Mrs Grizzle told me. ‘You can’t keep her a baby for ever, you know.’”

  Daisy burst into tears. “Why can’t dear little Euphemia stay a baby for ever?” she cried. In fact, we knew Daisy has no time for real babies – because they’re so messy – but she loves wishy-washy stories about them. Still, the rest of us pulled our thumbs out of our mouths and said, “Yes! Why can’t Brunnhilde’s little mother, Euphemia, stay a baby for ever?”

  “With long yellow ringlets!” said Colleen.

  “And button shoes!” said Jane.

  “And elastic in the legs of her bloomers!” said Ann.

  But the little ones turned on us. “It’s all right for you!” they shouted together. “Just because you’re bigger. Who wants to be a baby for ever? We want to grow up and be real people!”

  Aunt Effie stared at each of us in turn till we stuck our thumbs back in our mouths and shut up, then she went on with her story.

  “MRS GRIZZLE AND I sailed home, and ran an electric fence around them to keep the monster pukekos away from the deer. That meant we had to build another trough because the deer complained that somebody had done number twos in theirs.

  “‘Those monster pooks need something to keep them occupied, Brunnhilde,’ said Mrs Grizzle. ‘Think of something that’ll keep them busy, or they’ll just start annoying the deer again.’

  “Pouring concrete, laying pipes to the new trough, there was so much to do, we forgot about lunch and, suddenly, it was late afternoon. Mrs Grizzle threw down her shovel and said, ‘Come on, we’ve got to pick up your mother from the other side of the swamp.’

  “That night, I bathed Euphemia, piggybacked her up to bed, read her a story about a dear little girl with long golden ringlets who was scalped by Redskins, tucked her in, kissed her goodnight, and took the candle downstairs. ‘It’s hard work, bringing up your mother as well as running a farm,’ I said to Mrs Grizzle.

  “She smiled. ‘It’s no trouble to witches because we’re used to multi-tasking, as I’ve told you before, Brunnhilde. We’ll get those cows milking themselves again. We’ll teach the sheep to shear their own wool. And to skirt, and class, and bale it. And Euphemia will have to learn how to sail herself to school.’

  “‘But she’s such a little thing – not much more than a toddler!’

  “‘Don’t be mawkish! She is your mother after all. Besides, she’s got Bonny to see she comes to no harm.’

  “I knew witches were good at multi-tasking and could do anything – because Mrs Grizzle could, but I wasn’t sure about a little girl like my mother.

  “‘And then we really must do something about your education, Brunnhilde,’ Mrs Grizzle said.

  “‘But my mother’s going to school for me!’

  “‘I didn’t say school,’ said Mrs Grizzle, ‘I said education!’ She stirred another handful of gunpowder into her tea. ‘You want to be a witch, don’t you?’”

  Chapter Twenty

  The Advantage of Having So Many Neph
ews and Nieces, Putting Paper on the Dunny Seat, What the Monster Pukekos Called Mrs Grizzle, and the Sort of Language That Brutes Understand.

  “‘You want to be a witch, don’t you?’ Mrs Grizzle repeated.

  “‘Oh, yes!’ I cried.

  “‘Then you must have a good education!’ Mrs Grizzle blinked and turned her head right around like a morepork.

  “‘Who’s going to teach me?’

  “‘I am!’ Mrs Grizzle sat by the fire and brushed her red hair with the hearth broom till sparks flew, while I put the lid on the gunpowder barrel and went to bed.”

  “I think it’s time we went to bed ourselves,” said Aunt Effie. “Tomorrow we’ll look out your school uniforms.”

  “We’ve all grown out of our uniforms,” we moaned. “Do we have to go to school?” we groaned. “Can’t we have some more of Mrs Grizzle’s story, dear Aunt Effie?” we asked brightly.

  “I can’t wait for school to start again,” said Daisy.

  “If you’ve grown out of your uniform,” said Aunt Effie, “just pass it down to the next one. That’s the advantage of having so many nephews and nieces. Each uniform gets worn umpteen times.”

  The little ones looked at each other and muttered.

  “Another thing, you’ll all be needing new exercise books and rulers. I don’t know what you do with your old rulers.”

  We looked sideways and said nothing. Rulers weren’t much good for ruling straight lines after sword fighting and rubbing grooves in our desks to make smoke.

  “I don’t know where the money’s coming from,” said Aunt Effie. “I thought education’s supposed to be free, compulsory, and secular.”

  “What’s secular?” Lizzie asked.

  “It means,” said Daisy, “sex education is not allowed in schools.”

  “What say we pay for our own rulers?” asked Jessie.

  “What with?”

  “With the treasure.”

  “What treasure?” Aunt Effie said very sharply.

  “Our treasure. Under your …” Jessie’s voice dwindled away as she saw Aunt Effie’s face. We scrambled off her enormous bed, and a big, gruff voice shouted, “Watch out for the Bugaboo!” as we hit the floor running.

  Before Aunt Effie woke in the morning, we finished cleaning the drain at the bottom end of the bull paddock; we topped the pine trees around the tennis court; we creosoted the sheds; and we clipped about three miles of the macrocarpa hedge on the northern boundary.

  “If we do enough,” said Peter, “she’ll forget she said we have to go to school. Next time she calls us, ask about her education.”

  “Mind you say education,” said Marie. “Don’t say anything about school.”

  We’d just finished chipping the ragwort in the horse paddock, and putting sodium on the roots, when we heard: “Daisy-Mabel-Johnny-Flossie-Lynda-Stan-Howard-Marge-Stuart! Peter-Marie-Colleen-Alwyn-Bryce-Jack! Ann-Jazz-Beck-Jane-Isaac-David-Victor! Casey-Lizzie-Jared-Jess!”

  We swished our feet in the trough to get off the cow muck, and scrubbed our hands to get rid of any sodium. We tore upstairs, jumped on the foot of Aunt Effie’s enormous bed, stuck our wet feet under the eiderdown, and leaned against the dogs.

  “Are you going to tell us some more about when you were a little girl?” asked Lizzie.

  Aunt Effie put a couple of empty Old Puckeroo bottles to her eyes like binoculars and looked at Lizzie through them. “Where was I up to?”

  “You were growing up, and your mummy was growing down, then Mrs Grizzle said you needed an education if you were going to be a witch.” Lizzie looked at Marie who nodded.

  “I remember!” Aunt Effie flung the empty bottles under her bed where they ding-donged against something that said, “Gruff!”

  “THE FOLLOWING DAY,” Aunt Effie began, “Mrs Grizzle and I stood on the jetty and watched them leave for school. Bonny hoisted the sails of our scow and cast off. I tried not to cry. My little mother, Euphemia, looked so adorable, standing on the deck of the Betty Boop in her school uniform, shouting orders at Bonny.

  “I’d starched the collar of her white blouse so stiff she could only look straight ahead. The box pleats of her gym frock were ironed so sharp, I’d cut my finger on them. I’d used all the elastic for the chinstrap of her Panama, and there was none left for garters, so her long black stockings were held up by red Agee jar rings.

  “‘Be a good girl and do what Bonny tells you.’ Euphemia was so busy looking at her reflection in the polished brass binnacle she didn’t hear me.

  “‘Have you got a clean hanky?’

  “Impatiently, my dear little mother huffed, and she tapped the leg of her bloomers where she kept her hanky, her comb, a couple of hair clips, and threepence to spend on lollies at Mrs Doleman’s after school.

  “‘There’s another in your schoolbag,’ I called. ‘Just in case.

  “‘The piece of cake in your lunch is for playtime. There’s some salt wrapped in paper to have with your hard-boiled egg.

  “‘Put the elastic under your chin; the crocodiles will eat your Panama if it blows over the side. And remember to put up your hand and ask the teacher if you want to go to the lavvy!’

  “‘She can’t hear you now,’ Mrs Grizzle told me. ‘Bonny will sit under her desk and won’t let the School Inspector strap her.’

  “I burst into tears. ‘I forgot to tell her to put some paper on the dunny seat before she sits on it,’ I sobbed. ‘And to wash the tap before she drinks out of it. She’s so little to be going to school by herself!’

  “‘For goodness’ sake, Brunnhilde, she’s all of thirty if she’s a day!’

  “‘What if the School Inspector gives her the strap?’

  “‘Pull yourself together! Witches don’t cry just because their mothers are going to school.’

  “‘You said witches can do anything.’

  “‘I didn’t mean they can go round bursting into tears. Real witches don’t have lachrymal glands, so they can’t cry real tears.’

  “That made me cry all the more. Even worse, the scow was out of sight, and Euphemia hadn’t looked back once.

  “‘Come on! We’ve got to shift those brutes before the deer complain again.’

  “The monster pukekos hopped ahead of our stock whips into the hay paddock. The sun glared off their steel feathers. Their eyes rolled till the whites showed.

  “‘There’s something lizardy-looking about their legs and tails this morning,’ Mrs Grizzle said. ‘We’ll need to keep a keep a close eye on them.’

  “The monster pukekos’ necks were corrugated like vacuum cleaner hoses. They stood on one naked, scaly leg and scratched behind their ears with the other foot. Their beaks yawned open – I saw their red teeth – and snapped shut like cutlasses clashing.

  “Mrs Grizzle opened her arms, floated up, and landed on top of a gatepost. ‘Monster pooks!’ she cried in a bold voice. ‘You are our slaves!’

  “‘Silly old fart!’ one of the monster pukekos said. ‘Who does she think she is?’”

  “Silly old fart!” the four little ones said together, and sniggered and giggled. “Silly old fart!”

  “Tsk! Tsk! Tsk!” said Daisy. “It’s those wicked monster pukekos who said it, not dear little Euphemia.”

  “‘SAY THAT AGAIN,’MrsGrizzletoldthemonsterpukekos, ‘and Brunnhilde will tie a knot in your scrawny neck, so tight your eyes will pop out!

  “‘Open your arms,’ she whispered. I held out my arms as she had done, floated up and landed on top of the other gatepost. The monster pukekos snapped their teeth, and I almost lost my balance.

  “‘Snap back!’ said Mrs Grizzle. I did: sparks showered off my teeth; the air stunk of burnt feathers; and the monster pooks squawked.

  “‘Give them something to keep them busy.’

  “‘Cut all the hay in this paddock,’ I told the lizardy-looking monster pukekos. ‘If you haven’t finished by dark, I’ll fire you out of a cannon!’

  “‘That’s the sort of langu
age the brutes understand,’ Mrs Grizzle nodded.

  “Snick-snack went their iron beaks. At the top of the paddock, they turned and cut another swathe back.

  “‘They appear to be working diligently,’ I said.

  “Mrs Grizzle snorted, ‘Monster pooks are most dangerous when they appear diligent.

  “‘Even though I’m not here, my eye will be watching you!’ she shouted. She plucked out her right eye and set it on top of the post. I felt sick, and the monster pukekos moaned and cut the hay twice as fast.

  “‘Come along,’ Mrs Grizzle said. ‘We’ll have a nice cup of tea – with some of your mother’s delicious gunpowder.’

  “I glanced back. Something on top of the gatepost shone green.

  “‘It’s only a glass one,’ Mrs Grizzle told me. ‘I always keep a few spares in my pocket. You never know when they’ll come in handy. You flew well, Brunnhilde.’

  “‘Flew?’

  “‘On to the gatepost.’

  “‘I don’t remember learning how to …’

  “‘Do you remember learning how to breathe? Or how to swallow? Of course not! I said I’d be your teacher. I learned you how to fly this morning, and I learned you how to speak to monster pukekos, too. You’re what we call a fast learner, Brunnhilde.’”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Why Australians Look Funny, Why Learning To Read is Like Seeing an Elephant Riding a Bicycle, and What Happened to the Naughty Primer Kids at Matamata Primary School.

  “As I made a cup of tea, Mrs Grizzle said, ‘By lunchtime, I’ll learn you how to read. And I’ll hear your times tables, till you know them off by heart.’

  “‘Do I have to?’

  “‘Once upon a time, there was a young witch who couldn’t be bothered learning her times tables by heart,’ said Mrs Grizzle. ‘She was supposed to maintain the spell that keeps the world spinning.’