The Secret Five and the Stunt Nun Legacy

by John Lawrence

  Ricky wondered how he could have made such a silly mistake. Then he had a thought. He shot to his feet and looked up into thin air. He looked quite stern! Oh oh.

  ‘What’s up there?’ enquired Amy, looking up at exactly the same bit of thin air. ‘Daniel’s always looking up there. I don’t understand.’

  ‘It’s him, you know,’ he murmured. ‘I’d have been all right without him. He never lets me eat when I feel hungry, and he always makes me look so pathetic and mediocre and spineless.’

  ‘Who?’ said Amy, who was a zealous defender of mediocrity. ‘Ricky, you really do behave strangely sometimes. I’m wondering if I’m safe being left here with you. Let’s go and find Uncle Quagmire before I become too worried to continue the adventure.’

  Ricky gritted his teeth in the direction of the thin air, not a very effective gesture, but it made him happy, so we’ll let it go for now.

  And off they went in search of Uncle Quagmire. He would know exactly what to do, and they both had the luxury of several chapters to think how they could save the world and rescue their pals!

  PART THREE

  Chapter Twenty Two

  In which we meet a strange man; there’s a pathetic bit of a brooklet of consciousness which is quite confusing goodness knows why it’s there I do need a haircut oh yes I do; they discover that they are not where they are supposed to be; the kangaroo, typically, stays very quiet indeed.

  ‘Gosh!’ exclaimed Daniel as he landed with a big thump in the middle of a strange churchyard. ‘Is it 1980? This is exciting, isn’t it, Betty?’

  But there was no reply! Daniel looked around him. No Betty, no Whatshisname! He removed his spectacles and tried looking around him again. Still no Betty! Still no Whatshisname!

  ‘Gosh!’ he exclaimed again, but louder. ‘This is exciting, ISN’T IT BETTY?’

  No reply again! What a waste of capitals. He slipped his spectacles on. They felt good, reassuring. But he was alone and that wasn’t good. To add to his aloneness, it started to rain as he hunched up against a cold grey gravestone. A crow began to caw at him from the top of the yew trees that surrounded the churchyard. ‘Caw, caw,’ it cawed, as if it were laughing at him, which it was, as crows have an excellent sense of humour due to their tendency to bump into each other at night.

  Quietly, very quietly, he wondered if Betty was somewhere else. Maybe she had landed in another chapter! This was awful, awful, awful. She might be lost forever! What a terrible thought! And Ricky and Amy, where were they? They would also be somewhere else, and probably incapable of saving the world! Worryingly, he was now The Palpable One and would have to save the world on his own. He did not fancy the idea of that. He just didn’t feel up to it, no, no, not up to it at all. He sat for quite a while, sitting, wondering, sitting, wondering, feeling in his pockets for anything that might help, anything. Yes, some sprouts he had so must chew sprouts would that help help it might help funny old life I certainly need to trim my toenails that’s what I need to do yes that’s what I will do as soon as I can maybe I’ll just trim every other toenail for a change I hate the smell of rain I wonder if I can ever be a gentleman farmer when I’m grown up maybe I might look into it when I feel up to it but not now I don’t like being alone like this still all this being alone at least gives me the chance to indulge in a bit of stream of consciousness just like Ricky does only a bit better then again it’s hardly a stream I suppose maybe more like a streamlet of consciousness or no perhaps a creek of consciousness or no not a creek how about a rill or beck or gill or yes more like a brook or even a brooklet yes that was it a brooklet of consciousness.

  But, glory be, the sudden onset of a brooklet of consciousness faded away as quickly as it had begun, and he was back to being treated as a third-person with punctuation and without any insight into his pathetic fragmentary thoughts whatsoever.

  Just then, Daniel the Third Person suddenly heard a scampering noise and saw a flash of pink collar!

  ‘Whatshisname!’ Daniel exclaimed in a rather girly voice. His favourite dog had appeared at his side! Daniel got to his feet and patted Whatshisname’s head. Daniel was, for the first time in his life, really glad to see him. They were now The Palpable Two – himself and this fat ugly dog with a fluffy pink collar. Together, with their combined resources, they could save the world! How, he hadn’t a clue.

  ‘Where’s Betty?’ Daniel asked, not really expecting an answer that didn’t include the word woof.

  ‘Woof woof woof!’ said Whatshisname.

  ‘I’m over here!’ called Betty from over here.

  He looked up and saw Betty as she came scurrying down the path between the gravestones. He was really pleased to see her, and told her so. ‘I’m really pleased to see you,’ he said. ‘And I love the scurry!’

  ‘We landed over there and . . .’ Betty stopped, then looked hard at Daniel. She frowned. ‘Daniel, can I ask something? While you’ve been here on your own, all alone, have you been indulging in some interior monologue? Bordering on a stream of consciousness maybe? Please tell me you haven’t.’

  Daniel blushed and looked down at his feet. ‘I might have. If Ricky can do it then so can I! Anyway, I couldn’t help it, it just came over me. I’m rarely left alone and I felt the need, that’s all. And I enjoyed it, so there. Nothing wrong with enjoying something, is there? Hmmm?’

  ‘I suppose not,’ she sighed. ‘It’s very un-Secret Five, and against our written constitution. Boys! Huh! To be honest, I prefer your silly street-talk. Now, listen, I need to tell you at this stage that I landed over there, by that funny looking man.’ She pointed over there at a funny looking man who was standing sheltering in the entrance to the church. He was certainly dressed rather peculiarly, in a long black coat and black top hat and black gloves. Black was obviously the new black. And so was grey, because he had a big grey beard on his chin, with big bushy whiskers to match. He was leaning on a walking cane and looking up at the sky.

  ‘He’s dressed really strangely,’ said Betty. ‘Is that what they wore in 1980, do you think? He asked me if we’d fallen from a balloon. Let’s go and talk to him. He might know where Sampson’s school is. Come on, hurry!’

  ‘But shouldn’t we wait around here for the others?’ asked Daniel.

  ‘There’s no time,’ said Betty. ‘It’s up to you and me to save the world! We need to find Sampson’s school!’

  ‘Woof woof woof?’ said Whatshisname. Bravely, and eager to help, he trotted after them as they went up to the strange man. Maybe saving the world wasn’t a bad idea after all. He, Whatshisname, could be a hero. His name could resound in mythology as the Great Dog Benefactor of Mankind! He could be the Re-creator of the World! And yet his name might be an issue. Whatshisname doesn’t sound mythical or romantic in the slightest. Not like Prometheus, or Zeus, or Persephone. The Great Dog Benefactor Whatshisname? Hmmm. Now he’d completely lost interest in saving the world. He paused on the path. What to do? Hold on, in the grass down there, is that a maturing doggy poo? He trotted over and lowered his head and, by necessity, his nose. He sniffed. It was! This was more like it. He sniffed again, inhaling deeply, taking in the essence of . . . Labrador maybe? At the moment, there were more important things than saving the world and becoming The Great Dog Benefactor. That could wait. Yes, definitely Labrador. Sniff. Their silly adventure and the strange man could also wait. This – sniiiiiiff – was much more important.

  ‘Well, I’m blessed, there are now two Urchins!’ said the strange man as Betty and Daniel approached him. ‘Twas a great surprise to see the girl appear so. You are obviously not fowls of the air, especially that sniffing dog over there – nice collar, by the way – but I could not for the life of me see one of those confounded dirigibles that you must have fallen from. Are you hurt?’

  ‘We’re okay,’ said Daniel.

  ‘Oh-kay?’ said the man, frowning deeply. ‘What in heaven’s name does oh-kay mean?’

  ‘It means we’re . . . okay,’ said Betty, ‘but witho
ut an aitch. And we didn’t fall from a balloon. We travelled in a time machine. It’s a very reliable form of transport, we find, unaffected by leaves on the line and congestion charges.’

  ‘Well, I never,’ said the man, who had obviously forgotten that he had. ‘I’ve travelled on those highly life-threatening Iron Horse railways, but never in a time machine. What is the world coming to, yea verily. Before we know it there will be hybrid horseless carriages with catalytic converters. Anyway, young lady Urchin, can I just say that, with infant mortality the way it is, and the inclemency of the weather, you coming out without your woollen vest and your elbow-length gloves is asking for a dose of scarlet fever or even the pox. Would I not wish upon you such a tragedy. That curious dog, yes, but not you. And what or whom is this McFly on your strange blouse? A Scottish poet, by any chance?’

  Daniel and Betty glanced a short economical glance at each other and frowned.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Betty asked the man.

  ‘I am,’ said the alright man. ‘And I am also concerned for your health, young lady, as I would for any daughter of mine. If I had one, that is. Impotency is a terrible curse, believe me. But your clothing doth seem uncommonly unseemly, that is all.’

  Daniel nodded. ‘Do you know,’ he said, ‘as a caring brother, I’ve been worrying a lot about her unseemliness as well.’

  Betty clasped her arms to her chest. ‘Just leave them out of it,’ she said, quite moodily. ‘Look, I’m of voting age plus some, and well old enough for a McFly T-shirt, and we’re on an important mission to save the world, and all you can think of is my . . . my . . .’

  ‘Bosom?’ said Daniel, helpfully.

  The man staggered backwards, almost losing his top hat in the process of the stagger. He managed to stop himself mid-stagger, and staggered forwards again.

  ‘Children!’ he said. ‘Is it the righteous thing where you come from, for a child to address someone so forthrightly? This is the talk of raggedy children and ruffians! I beseech you, as the Moral Shepherd of this parish’s flock, I will not tolerate such behaviour! And you should only spoke when you’re speaken to! Where are your parents or guardians? I must have words with them about you. All this vulgar workhouse talk is most unbecoming. Of course, I blame our monarch, that Queen Victoria, for this degradation of morals.’

  ‘Quee . . . ?’ said Daniel.

  ‘Vict . . . ?’ said Betty.

  ‘Woof woof wo . . . ?’ said Whatshisname, who had rejoined them after his short but joyful sensory encounter with the Labrador poo.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Betty. ‘But don’t you mean Queen Elizabeth?’

  The man looked quite aghast. ‘Do you learn nothing at week-school?’ he asked. ‘Queen Elizabeth was our monarch some, er, three hundred years ago, give or take! Nice ankles, by all accounts. No, our queen is Victoria. The hussy!’

  Betty frowned and looked around her. The houses around the churchyard, with their mullioned windows and decorative bargeboards, all looked really old but really new at the same time, and she was slightly bewildered when a horse and trap came clip-clopping and trap-trapping along the lane the other side of the churchyard wall.

  ‘Erm . . .’ ermed Betty. ‘If I may speak, sir? The Revivalist Architectural features on those houses and the clip-clopping and trap-trapping do worry me just a little. Tell me, is this really nineteen-eighty?’

  The strange man looked aghast yet again, but then his aghastness cleverly turned into a rather quizzical expression. ‘Nineteen-eighty? This is Eighteen-eighty, my girl. I must speak to your parents about your schooling, and the need for extra Arithmetic lessons, yea verily.’

  ‘Eighteen-eighty!’ Betty stammered and spluttered, so it sounded more like ‘ay-ay-huh-tin-tin-ay-ay-huh-splut-tee-tee-huh?’ She was utterly shocked! They had been time-machined to the wrong year!

  But we knew that didn’t we? So, as a mini-cliffhanger, it’s somewhat lacking, if not total rubbish, and one wonders if her utter shock might have been avoided if she had been paying more attention, for goodness’ sake.

  Chapter Twenty Three

  In which sulforaphanes, dithiolthiones and glucosinolates are again mentioned, of course; there is some impromptu smiling; an apple makes a guest appearance; the sighting of a familiar house is interrupted by an unexpected chapter break.

  The strange man frowned silently at Betty’s outburst, the authorial whining, and the unnerving experience of being flung headlong into a new chapter without warning. He pointed his silent frown at Daniel so that he wouldn’t feel left out.

  Betty leaned towards Daniel. ‘Erm, Daniel,’ she whispered, ‘I think we need an urgent meeting.’

  ‘A meeting?’ Daniel whispered back. ‘With just the two of us?’

  ‘Woof woof woof?’ whispered Whatshisname.

  ‘He said it’s eighteen- eighty,’ Betty said in a whispery voice. ‘Apparently, we’re in the nineteenth century, and we’ve lost Ricky and Amy who might be stranded forever in Salzburg, near Austria, in another time. I think that’s enough reason for an extraordinarily-convened meeting, don’t you?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Daniel in a mournful yet pathetic whisper. ‘But I am a bit hungry now. I think I’ve caught something from Ricky. Some wasting disease. Can you ask him if there’s anything to nibble around here?’

  Betty spoke to the man. ‘Excuse me, kindly sir, but we think that we are quite seriously lost, and we need to have a private meeting of our secret club, and we have to find a nineteenth century teashop quite urgently. My brother here has developed a condition that appears to run in the family, you see.’

  The man seemed quite taken aback. ‘My word!’ he said. He leant forward towards them, so it was difficult to continue being taken aback. ‘This secret club, is it open to new members? And what do you call it, dear strange children?’

  ‘It’s The Secret Five,’ said Daniel. ‘Highly exclusive, very secret. Although to be honest, at the last count we are probably up to The Secret Five Hundred by now.’

  ‘Aaaah,’ aaaahed the man knowingly. ‘Highly exclusive, very secret? Rather like my very own secret club, The Fraternal Order of Puritan Sadists. Do you want to know our secret FOPS password? And I can demonstrate our secret FOPS handshake if you so desire. It doesn’t hurt. Much.’

  Eagerly, he began to remove a glove.

  Betty and Daniel said they’d rather not, under the circumstances, and carefully tried to explain that they’d arrived in the wrong year and had he a portal and a digital alarm clock that he might lend to them.

  ‘Stop all this nonsensical talk!’ boomed the man. ‘I cannot tolerate you two lost Urchins running loose and roaming the lanes of my parish frightening my pathetic flock with all this tittle-tattle about porters! Come! You need shelter and warmth and lots of porridge, if I am not mistaken. The vicarage these days is out of Victorian bounds for Mere Urchins unless accompanied by an adult of sane mind, so I will take you along to The Big House. Perhaps Mrs Wells the Housekeeper can do something with you until you are both well enough to walk.’

  ‘‘But we can walk, look!’ said Daniel, demonstrating how he could walk on the spot. The strange man frowned at Daniel’s even stranger behaviour and shook his head firmly from side to side.

  ‘You are obviously delirious,’ the man said. ‘And quite ugly, too. Come. Follow me. This can be my Good Turn, then I am done for this week, apart from a bit of symbolic pastoral care.’ And with that, he strode off down the path and towards the lane.

  Betty and Daniel looked at each other, then at Whatshisname, who shrugged an attempted shrug that seemed to say, ‘I don’t know what to do either so stop looking at me and while you’re at it get this stupid pink fluffy collar from around my neck’.

  As their options were quite limited, Betty suggested to Daniel that they had a mobile meeting while they followed the strange man in the top hat, who was now waving his walking cane in the air in an effort to encourage them onwards.

  ‘Hurry, Urchins,’ he called.
‘And the curious deformed animal. This way.’

  ‘Right,’ said Betty to Daniel as they followed the man, ‘let’s go along with it. They might have a handy portal up at this Big House. We’ve got the Brussels sprouts, so all we’d need then is a digital alarm clock and we’re done.’

  ‘Woof woof woof?’ said Whatshisname.

  Suddenly, Daniel stopped walking and started to rummage deep in his pockets.

  ‘What’s the matter now?’ asked Betty. ‘What are you doing, Daniel? Boys, honestly! There’s no time for that now!’

  ‘I’m only rummaging deep in my pockets. I don’t think I’ve got any sprouts left,’ he moaned. ‘I must have eaten them all while I sat on that gravestone. Waiting for you!’

  ‘You ate all the sprouts?’ exclaimed Betty. ‘I don’t believe you, Daniel! It’s bad enough Ricky eating everything in sight without you getting in on the act! Are you sure that you’re not just intensely jealous of his character’s traits? Isn’t it enough to have been given spectacles? Hmmm?’

  Daniel looked embarrassed. ‘Don’t blame me!’ he whispered. ‘It’s out of my control!’

  Betty shook her head in disbelief. ‘You’re always blaming You-Know-Who. Despite that, you’re so tiresome! Without those sprouts, where are we going to get the sulforaphanes, dithiolthiones and glucosinolates which, apparently, overcome the quantum object’s timeline resistance and help us get back home?’

  Daniel still looked embarrassed, and Betty was lost for words.

  ‘Really, Daniel!’ she scolded.

  Again she was lost for words.

  ‘Can’t you be trusted with anything?’