The Secret

by Ruth Thomas

  ‘While I was on my bed of sickness,’ said Mr Hunt in the staff room, ‘something has happened to Nicky Mitchell.’

  ‘She’s seen the light, I think,’ said Miss Powell.

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Meaning that Nellie threatened to have her mother up to school.’ (Nellie was the teachers’ nickname for Mr Nelson.)

  ‘Nicky’s mother’s been called up at least five hundred times,’ said Mr Hunt. ‘That never bothered Nicky before!’

  ‘Nellie probably threatened her she’d get left out of Easthaven as well, if she didn’t mend her evil ways.’

  ‘That’s more like it,’ said Mrs Blake.

  ‘Don’t remind me!’ groaned someone else. ‘All our horrible lot at the seaside, imagine!’

  ‘Getting lost!’

  ‘Being sick!’

  ‘Drowning themselves!’

  ‘Oh, a few lost, a few drowned, what’s the difference?’ said Miss Powell.

  ‘Well I’m looking forward to it,’ said Miss Greenwood, who was new and innocent. She fluttered her eyelashes at Mr Hunt, hoping he would notice how fresh and sweet she was. She thought Mr Hunt had the most fascinating moustache she had ever seen, but so far he hadn’t shown any interest in her.

  ‘We’re all looking forward to it, really,’ said Mr Hunt, still not showing any particular interest in Miss Greenwood. ‘Don’t take any notice of what we say. It’s better than the classroom any day. And some of those kids never see the sea.’

  ‘Roy and Nicky Mitchell, for instance,’ said Mrs Blake.

  ‘Poor little devils, they don’t have much of a life, do they?’

  ‘Can’t have, can they, with that scatty mother!’

  ‘You can say that again! Defends ’em like a she-cat when there’s trouble, and then neglects them half the time. The last eighteen months or so, anyway.’

  ‘Spends enough money on her own back, from what I can see, and Nicky’s still in last year’s summer dresses!’

  ‘Have you heard she goes out late at night? Well that’s what I’ve been told. Leaves the kids on their own till goodness knows what time!’

  ‘Where did that piece of information come from?’

  ‘One of Eric Morris’s little titbits,’ said Mr Hunt. ‘And you know what a tattle-tale that boy is! Still – he does live next door.’

  ‘I must say they seem very fond of her,’ said Mrs Blake. ‘Roy and Nicky, I mean. Fond of their mother.’

  ‘Well of course,’ said Mr Hunt. ‘She’s all they’ve got!’

  At home time, Nicky deliberately gave Roy the slip; she had some important shopping to do that she didn’t want him to see. After she had done the shopping there was only six pence left out of the five pounds she had put in her dress pocket. She was a bit frightened to have spent so much, but she stamped on the fear hard. Today she had to think about making a good birthday for Roy. She would think about money tomorrow. Or the next day.

  ‘We’ll have the spaghetti for tea tonight,’ said Nicky. That would save spending.

  ‘You don’t like spaghetti,’ said Roy.

  ‘I changed my mind,’ said Nicky.

  ‘The telly’s gone wrong,’ said Roy, peevishly. He was still sulking because she had been so long coming home and he couldn’t get in.

  Nicky fiddled with the knobs, but the picture refused to come back. ‘Well all right, the telly’s gone wrong! So what? Haven’t you got anything else to do except watch telly?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Homework?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How about your toys?’

  ‘They’re all broke.’

  ‘Mend them then.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘I wouldn’t like to be you,’ said Nicky, exasperated.

  ‘I don’t like being me.’

  ‘All right, wait till tomorrow! You’ll like being you then!’

  ‘Because Mum’s coming home.’

  ‘Perhaps. But other things, other things, Roy. You just wait!’

  After the spaghetti, the children ate the rice pudding. Roy would have preferred biscuits, but Nicky said it was still her turn to choose. And after tea there was that nuisance Aunty Four-Eyes at the door again.

  ‘Told you!’ said Roy.

  ‘I – er – I was wondering about your mum,’ said Mrs Morris. It cost her quite a bit to come and say that. They had quarrelled, she and Mrs Mitchell, and there had been harsh words, and unpleasant language. But Mrs Morris had been counting her blessings, and noticing how many more blessings she had than Mrs Mitchell, and thinking that as a Christian she really ought to try to make it up. Even though it wasn’t her fault in the first place, it was Mrs Mitchell’s.

  ‘What about my mum?’ said Nicky. ‘Aunty Four-Eyes!’ She’d been so good all day, she really couldn’t resist that one.

  Mrs Morris swallowed. It was hard to be a Christian in the face of deliberate rudeness. ‘You know. What you said yesterday. The pain.’

  ‘Oh that – it’s better.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Of course I’m sure. I said so, didn’t I? Goodbye.’

  Mrs Morris swallowed again, and made one more effort. ‘You don’t have to talk to me like that. Actually, I brought something for your mother if you’ll give me a chance to say it.’ She was carrying a dish-sized object wrapped in a plastic bag. ‘Something I made to help out, in case she wasn’t up to cooking.’

  ‘I’ll take it,’ said Nicky, stretching out her hand.

  ‘Give it to your mother, and say I’d like to speak to her,’ said Mrs Morris, determined to see it through now she had got this far. ‘Say I know we had words that time, but I was thinking we are neighbours and we didn’t ought to be bad friends.’

  ‘Oh . . . you want to make up,’ said Nicky.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ll see what she says,’ said Nicky. She disappeared into the Back Room and counted to ten, slowly. She knew what she had to do, but it was very, very hard. She went back to the front door, still carrying the dish-sized object, wrapped in the plastic bag.

  ‘She doesn’t want to see you,’ said Nicky to Mrs Morris. ‘She doesn’t want to make up and she doesn’t want this.’ Regretfully, she handed back the casserole, which would have made a good meal for her and Roy. ‘She said some rude things about you which I rather not repeat,’ she added, to make sure that Mrs Morris would go away.

  Mrs Morris’s pudgy cheeks went very pale. ‘Well!’

  ‘It’s not my fault,’ said Nicky. ‘I can’t help what she said.’

  Mrs Morris’s cheeks turned to fiery red, and she stumped down the short front path without another word. Her indignation burst at the Mitchells’ gate, all over Mrs Williams who had been listening at her front gate while pretending to be very much interested in something down the road. The two women spent the next ten minutes, quite enjoyably, exchanging complaints about that unspeakably dreadful Mrs Mitchell.

  Nicky gave Roy the goldfish and the card, and he was thrilled as she knew he would be. He put the goldfish in his room, and watched them swimming round and round; and they were beautiful, and they were his. He said nothing about Mum, but his eyes were shining still, and avoiding hers, so Nicky knew he hadn’t changed his mind about his hope. And then the thought struck her that if Mum didn’t actually come, she might at least have remembered Roy’s birthday. Suppose she sent him a card – now that would be exciting!

  The post came when they were getting ready for school, and Nicky ran to get it; the postman didn’t often call at their house so it might be, it might be! It wasn’t a card from mum though, it was only the electricity bill, she put it behind the clock with the other odds and ends, just in front of the rent book. The rent book! What about not paying the rent? But Mum was often behind with the rent; no one would start fussing about that for a while. Much more interesting than the rent book was the paper Mum had left with her seaside address on it. ‘For emergencies,’ Mum said. What were emergencies exactly? It was hard t
o know, Mum didn’t explain it properly, she was in too much hurry. The only thing she explained was, she was going to get in trouble if anybody found out she left them on their own all night.

  Roy knew why Nicky ran to get the post, and he was disappointed for a moment that there wasn’t a card from Mum. But it didn’t matter, did it? It didn’t matter because Mum was going to be back tonight, she was going to be back tonight, she was going to be back tonight, she was! And meanwhile he had his goldfish.

  Roy thought about his goldfish all morning. His goldfish make him feel safe; they came between him and all the horrible things in the world. ‘It’s my birthday today,’ he told Claudette, when it was nearly dinner time. ‘And my sister gave me two goldfish.’

  ‘What did your mum give you?’ said Claudette.

  Roy hesitated; he was not good at making up lies, his thoughts moved too slowly. ‘A bicycle,’ he said at last. Before he had the goldfish, he used to think a bicycle would be the most wonderful thing in the world to have.

  ‘A bicycle?’ said Gary, impressed. ‘Why didn’t you say that first?’

  ‘I like the goldfish best,’ said Roy.

  ‘I bet you can’t ride the bike,’ said Sanjay.

  ‘I bet I can,’ said Roy.

  ‘Prove it. Ride to school tomorrow.’

  ‘My mum might not let me.’

  ‘Can I come round and see your bike then?’ said Gary. ‘Can I have a go?’

  ‘Can I?’ said Sanjay.

  ‘Can we come too?’ said Claudette. ‘Me and Sharon and Jennifer?’

  All of a sudden Roy found he was embarrassingly popular because he had a new bicycle. ‘My mum said I mustn’t let anybody ride it, only me.’

  ‘Are you having a party?’ said Sharon. ‘For your birthday?’

  ‘Nah!’ said Roy. ‘Don’t like parties.’

  Gary whispered something to Sanjay, and Sanjay sniggered. Roy blushed. ‘Shut up, Gary,’ said Claudette. ‘Don’t be horrible.’

  ‘He don’t like people coming to his house in case they see—’ Gary whispered again.

  ‘We’ll come this afternoon then, all right?’ said Sanjay, taunting him. ‘All right, Roy? Me and Sanjay’s coming round your house to see your bike. And see you ride it. After school, all right?’

  ‘And see—’ Sanjay whispered to Gary, and the boys exploded with not-very-nice laughter.

  ‘Don’t take no notice of them, Roy,’ said Jennifer. ‘They don’t mean it.’

  But Roy was very much afraid they did, and he tried to forget about Gary and Sanjay, and think about his goldfish again instead. In the afternoon his class were writing stories, and often Roy had no ideas for stories at all, but today he wrote happily, ‘There was wuns a boy called Roy who had to goldfish for his berthday he dident no if they were boy goldfish or girl goldfish so he called them fishy and goldy.’ After that he sucked his pencil and thought about what he would do at home time, because Gary and Sanjay were clearly plotting something, and he would have to be a bit cunning to give them the slip.

  He was pretty sure they didn’t know where he lived. Well – they might know it was Gilbert Road, but they wouldn’t know which house it was unless they followed him. Roy decided to hide in the toilets until they had gone. Slowly, carefully, he began to plan how he would do it.

  Coming into school the classes were nearly always escorted by their teachers, and sometimes going out as well. But at home time things were more haphazard, with some people going to the cloakroom, and some having nothing to go there for, and some staying behind to chat to Mrs Blake, or help tidy the classroom. Roy dawdled down the stairs, aware that Gary and Sanjay were keeping close behind him. He bent to tie the laces of his plimsolls and they passed him, giggling and nudging one another. Roy could hear the muffled sniggers coming from where they lingered round the corner on the next landing of the winding stone staircase. Swiftly, Roy ran back up the stairs and along the corridor to the boys’ toilets. He passed his own classroom as he went, and heard Mrs Blake’s mournful voice exhorting her helpers to hurry up and finish clearing, because there was a staff meeting and she was supposed to be there.

  Roy was tempted to lock himself in one of the cubicles; but he didn’t, because he had already thought out that would be wrong. That way he could get trapped. If Gary and Sanjay came back to look for him, they would be sure to notice that one of the cubicles was locked, and they wouldn’t rest until they found out who was inside. A better idea was to squeeze behind the main door into the toilets, which stood open. They might not think to look there.

  As a matter of fact, one of the cubicles was locked, because someone from the other third year class had a tummy-ache. Roy heard the pounding footsteps of his enemies, and Mrs Blake shouting, ‘Stop running,’ and Sanjay’s voice calling, ‘Here he is! Locked in, so he thinks we won’t find him!’

  ‘Come on out!’ said Gary. ‘We know you’re in there!’

  ‘Leave me!’ said the muffled voice of the person with the tummy-ache. Sanjay was in the next cubicle, climbing to look over the partition. Roy could hear his grunts, and the hollow-sounding thump of his knees. Then there was a shriek of outrage from the person with the tummy-ache, and Mrs Blake coming to see what all the noise was about, and one of the teachers from the staff meeting as well, despatched by Mr Nelson to sort out the trouble. Gary and Sanjay were sent packing, the person with the tummy-ache was comforted, and after everything had died down, Roy crept out of his hiding place. No one noticed him slinking down the stairs by himself; for once, just for once, things had gone right for him!

  They were waiting for him round the corner; he might have known they would be! He ran, of course, but it was hopeless. They caught up with him, and pinned his arms on either side. ‘Come on then, take us to your house!’

  Roy began to cry.

  ‘Cry-baby!’

  ‘Cry-baby wet the bed!’

  ‘Cry-baby can’t ride a bike!’

  ‘Leave me!’ In desperation, Roy began to struggle, but they only held him tighter.

  ‘Temper, temper, naughty, naughty!’

  Roy gave in, and went limp. This wasn’t happening to him, it was happening to someone else. And he wasn’t here, being frogmarched down the road by two nasty bullies; he was somewhere else altogether, in a dark secret world inside himself, where they couldn’t get at him.

  ‘Come on, then, which way?’

  ‘I’m not telling you,’ said Roy’s voice, from somewhere in that outside world where the bullies were.

  ‘It’s Gilbert Road, isn’t it?’

  ‘What do you ask for, if you know?’

  ‘Is it this house?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘This one?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I can see where it is,’ said Gary. ‘It’s the one with Nicky Mitchell standing by the gate!’

  She was waiting for Roy, impatient for him to come home. ‘Let go my brother! Creeps!’

  ‘We come to see Roy’s bike,’ said Gary, dropping Roy’s arm. There was no point holding him now, anyway.

  ‘What bike?’

  ‘Didn’t he get a bike? Did he make it up?’ Gary doubled up with mirth.

  ‘Push off!’ said Nicky, furiously.

  ‘Didn’t he get a bike for his birthday, then?’ said Sanjay, the small eyes mocking.

  ‘None of your business,’ said Nicky. ‘I told you to push off.’

  ‘It’s a free country.’

  ‘No it’s not, not this bit of it. This bit is ours. Get lost!’

  They lingered, nudging one another and grinning.

  ‘Go on then, what you waiting for?’

  ‘Can’t Roy have some mates in on his birthday?’ said Gary.

  ‘Roy got plenty of mates coming,’ said Nicky. ‘Roy got mates you don’t know nothing about. A lot better’n you!’

  ‘You’re a liar,’ said Sanjay.

  ‘Shut your mouth,’ said Nicky.

  ‘Liar, liar, liar!’ said Sanjay.

&n
bsp; Nicky punched him. ‘That’s for opening your mouth when I told you to shut it.’

  Sanjay made a feeble attempt at punching back, but he wasn’t much of a fighter, and he was quite a bit afraid of Nicky really. Nicky pummelled him, contemptuously, and he turned to run. Nicky aimed a kick at his backside, to help him on his way.

  ‘I saw that!’ said Polly Pry, calling out of her window. ‘Poor little boy!’

  ‘Mind your own business!’ said Nicky.

  ‘Wait till I see your mum!’

  ‘My mum says you’re a nosy old bag,’ said Nicky. ‘She won’t listen to you whatever you say. She only makes fun of you behind your back.’

  Mrs Williams’s mouth opened and shut a few times, but only strangled sounds came out because she was actually too angry to speak. The red colour was all over her face and her neck and her scalp. Nicky thought, with mild interest, that if she got any redder she might burst into flames. ‘All the time!’ she added. ‘She makes fun of you all the time!’ The window banged shut. ‘Yes?’ Nicky said to Gary, who still hovered. ‘Looking at something?’

  She pushed Roy into the house. ‘Where’s Mum?’ he said.

  ‘I’ve got a surprise,’ said Nicky. ‘For your birthday.’

  ‘Where’s Mum though?’

  ‘Come and see the surprise.’

  ‘I don’t want the surprise,’ said Roy. ‘I want Mum.’ The china-blue eyes filled with tears and then, as reality dawned, the hysterical crying began.

  ‘I want Mum! I want Mum!’ He rampaged through the house, kicking doors, thumping walls, and finally banging his head against the sofa with the broken springs again, and again, and again.

  ‘Finished?’ said Nicky.

  ‘I want Mum,’ said Roy.

  ‘I want, I want, I want!’ said Nicky, disgustedly. ‘That’s all you can say, isn’t it! Only what you want. You don’t think about me, do you? You don’t think about what I want, do you? And I got a surprise for you for your birthday, and I wanted you to be pleased, and all you can do is go on about I want Mum.’

  Roy buried his face in his arms and said nothing. His shoulders still quivered but he was calm now, the anguish spent.

  ‘Well?’ said Nicky. ‘Are you going to say something or what?’