William The Outlaw

by Richmal Crompton

  ‘Frank Simpkins . . . does that suggest anything to you?’

  ‘No,’ said William with perfect truth.

  ‘Doesn’t know his own name,’ whispered the doctor, then again sharply:

  ‘Acacia Cottage . . . does that convey anything to you?’

  ‘No,’ said William again with perfect truth.

  The doctor turned to his wife.

  ‘No memory of his name or home,’ he commented. ‘I’ve always wanted to study a case of this sort at close quarters. Now, my good boy, come back home with me.’

  But William didn’t want to go back home with him. He didn’t want to return to the house which still bore traces of his recent habitation and where his ‘flood’ presumably still raged. He was just contemplating precipitate flight when a woman came hurrying along the road. The doctor’s wife seemed to recognise her. She whispered to the doctor. The doctor turned to William.

  ‘You know this woman, my boy, don’t you?’

  ‘No,’ said William, ‘I’ve never seen her before.’

  The doctor looked pleased. ‘Doesn’t remember his own mother,’ he said to his wife: ‘quite an interesting case.’

  The woman approached them aggressively. The doctor stepped in front of William.

  ‘Come after my boy,’ she said. ‘Sayin’ ’is hours ended at five an’ then keepin’ ’im till now! I’ll ’ave the lor on you, I will. Where is ’e?’

  ‘Prepare yourself, my good woman,’ said the doctor, ‘for a slight shock. Your son has temporarily – only temporarily, we trust – lost his memory.’

  She screamed.

  ‘What’ve you bin doin’ of to ’im?’ she said indignantly, ‘’e ’adn’t lorst it when ’e left ’ome this mornin’. Where is ’e, anyway?’

  Silently the doctor stepped on to one side, revealing William.

  ‘Here he is,’ he said pompously.

  ‘’Im?’ she shrilled. ‘Never seed ’im before.’

  They stared at each other for some seconds in silence. Then William saw the real house-boy coming along the road and spoke with the hopelessness of one who surrenders himself to Fate to do its worst with.

  ‘Here he is.’

  The real original house-boy was stepping blithely down the road, an extemporised rod over his shoulder, swinging precariously a jar full of minnows. He was evidently ignorant of the flight of time. He saw William first and called out cheerfully:

  ‘I say, I’ve not been long, have I? Is it all right?’

  Then he saw the others and the smile dropped from his face. His mother darted to him protectively.

  ‘Oh, my pore, blessed child,’ she said, ‘what have they bin a-doin’ to you – keepin’ you hours an’ hours after your time an’ losin’ your pore memory an’ you your pore widowed mother’s only child. . . . Come home with your mother, then, an’ she’ll take care of you and we’ll have the lor on them, we will.’

  The boy looked from one to another bewildered, then realising from his mother’s tones that he had been badly treated he burst into tears and was led away by his consoling parent.

  The doctor and his wife turned to William for an explanation. Their expressions showed considerably less friendliness than they had shown before. William looked about him desperately. Even escape seemed impossible. He felt that he would have welcomed any interruption. When, however, he saw Miss Polliter running towards them down the field he felt that he would have chosen some other interruption than that.

  ‘Oh, there you are!’ panted Miss Polliter. ‘Such dreadful things have happened. Oh, there’s the dear boy. I don’t know what we should have done without him . . . rescuing children and animals at the risk, I’m sure, of his own dear life. I must give you just a little present.’ She handed him a half-crown which William pocketed gratefully.

  ‘But, my dear Miss Polliter,’ said the doctor, deeply concerned, ‘you should be resting in your room. You should never run like that in your state of nervous exhaustion . . . never.’

  ‘Oh, I’m quite well now,’ said Miss Polliter.

  ‘Well?’ said the doctor amazed and horrified at the idea.

  ‘HERE IS YOUR SON,’ SAID THE DOCTOR POMPOUSLY.

  ‘’IM?’ SHRIEKED THE WOMAN, ‘NEVER SEED ’IM BEFORE.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Miss Polliter, ‘I feel ever so well. The flood’s cured me.’

  ‘The flood?’ said the doctor still more amazed and still more horrified.

  ‘Oh yes. The river’s risen and the whole place is flooded out,’ said Miss Polliter excitedly. ‘It’s a most stimulating experience altogether. We’ve saved a lot of animals and two children.’

  The doctor was holding his head.

  ‘Good heavens!’ he said. ‘Good heavens! Good heavens!’

  At that moment two more women descended upon the group. They were the mothers of the infants. They had searched through the village for their missing offspring and at last an eye-witness had described their deliberate kidnapping and imprisonment in the doctor’s house. They were demanding the return of their children. They were threatening legal proceedings. They were calling the doctor a murderer and a kidnapper, a vivisectioner, a Hun and a Bolshevist.

  The doctor and the doctor’s wife and Miss Polliter and the two mothers all began to talk at once. William, seizing his opportunity, crept away. He crept down the road towards the cave.

  At the bend in the road he turned. The doctor and the doctor’s wife and the two mothers and Miss Polliter, still all talking excitedly at the same time, began to make their way slowly up the hill to the doctor’s house.

  He looked in the other direction. There was a large crowd surrounding the cave; men were just coming along the road from the other direction with pickaxes to dig his dead body from the rock.

  He went forward very reluctantly and slowly.

  He went forward because he had a horrible suspicion that the doctor would soon have discovered the extent and the cause of the ‘flood’ and would soon be pursuing him lusting for vengeance.

  He went forward reluctantly and slowly because he did not foresee an enthusiastic welcome from his bereaved parents.

  Ginger saw him first. Ginger gave a piercing yell and pointed down the road towards William’s reluctant form.

  ‘There – he is!’ he shouted. ‘He’s not dead.’

  They all turned and gaped at him open-mouthed.

  William presented a strange figure. He seemed at first sight chiefly compounded of the two elements, earth and water.

  He turned as if to flee but the figure of the doctor could be seen running down the road from his house after him; following the doctor were the doctor’s wife, the infants’ mothers with the infants and Miss Polliter. Even at that distance he could see that the doctor’s face was purple with fury. Miss Polliter still looked bright and stimulated.

  So William advanced slowly towards his gaping rescuers. ‘Here I am,’ he said. ‘I – I’ve got out all right.’

  He fingered the half-crown in his pocket as if it were an amulet against disaster.

  He felt that he would soon need an amulet against disaster.

  ‘Oh, where have you been?’ sobbed his mother, ‘where have you been?’

  ‘I got in a flood,’ said William, ‘an’ then I lost my memory.’ He looked round at the doctor who was running towards them and added with a mixture of fatalistic resignation and bitterness, ‘Oh, well, he’ll tell you about it. I bet you’ll b’lieve him sooner than me an’ I bet he’ll make a different tale of it to what I would.’

  And he did.

  But Miss Polliter (who left the doctor’s charge, cured, to his great disgust, the next day) persisted to her dying day that the river had flooded and that the hose pipe had nothing to do with it.

  And she sent William a pound note the next week in an envelope marked ‘For a brave boy’.

  And, as William remarked bitterly, he jolly well deserved it. . . .

  CHAPTER 10

  WILLIAM IS HYPNOTISED

/>   IT seemed to William and his friends the Outlaws as if school had been comparatively peaceful till Bertie appeared upon the scene. Bertie was the headmaster’s nephew who had come to the school for a term only (which to some of his associates seemed long enough – if not too long) and stayed with his uncle. Unfortunately he was in William’s form.

  Everybody except William and his form agreed that Bertie was charming. He had a beautiful smile and beautiful manners. Old ladies were often heard to declare that he must have a beautiful soul. He would recite beautiful poetry for hours on end without stopping. He had a beautiful conscience. It was his beautiful conscience that annoyed the Outlaws most. His beautiful conscience was always making him tell his uncle anything that he thought his uncle ought to know. And the things which he thought his uncle ought to know were just the things which the Outlaws thought his uncle ought not to know. For instance, Bertie thought that his uncle ought to know that the Outlaws were keeping white mice in their desks, while the Outlaws on the other hand did not consider it at all necessary for his uncle to know this. Again, Bertie’s beautiful conscience forced him to tell his uncle that it was the Outlaws who had stitched up the sleeves of his gown so securely that he had to go about for a whole morning without it, and this again the Outlaws did not consider it necessary for his uncle to know. Bertie thought that his uncle ought to know that it was the Outlaws who, when a committee meeting was being held at the school, had changed the position of all the neatly printed little notices, ‘To the Committee room’, so that the committee, after wandering desolately round and round the corridor, found themselves ultimately in the bootroom in the basement. All these things Bertie conscientiously reported to his uncle, and his uncle visited the full force of his wrath upon the Outlaws.

  The uncle, as a matter of fact, did not quite approve of Bertie’s beautiful conscience, but he could not resist the temptation to get a bit of his own back on the Outlaws. He’d suffered in (comparative) silence from the Outlaws for so long. He’d always found it so difficult ever to lay the crimes for which he was certain that the Outlaws were responsible at the Outlaws’ door, that it was impossible to resist the circumstantial evidence laid ready to his hand day by day by the conscientious Bertie. The result of all this was that the advent of Bertie coincided with a period of what the Outlaws regarded as unmerited persecution for the Outlaws themselves. Sometimes idly on the way home from school the Outlaws laid tentative plans of vengeance upon Bertie, but they never came to anything because the Outlaws tempered boldness with discretion. A mass attack upon the unctuous Bertie would be highly enjoyable, but the resultant interview with Bertie’s uncle would be less so. The Outlaws cherished a deep respect for Bertie’s uncle’s right arm. They had come into pretty frequent contact with it, they were good judges of its strength and they knew that it was not to be unduly provoked.

  ‘What it comes to,’ said William indignantly as they walked home discussing the situation, ‘what it comes to is that we simply can’t do anythin’ excitin’, not while he’s about, simply can’t do anythin’ . . . .’

  ‘There was yesterday,’ agreed Ginger disconsolately, ‘when he went an’ told old Markie that it was me what had put the hedgehog into Mr Hopkins’ desk.’

  A blissful smile dawned upon William’s freckled countenance. ‘It was funny, wasn’t it?’ he said simply, ‘watchin’ him put his hand into the desk without lookin’ to get his ruler out an’ then seein’ his face. . . .’

  Ginger gave a constrained smile. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I daresay it seems funny to you. It seemed funny to me yesterday but you din’t have to go up to him about it this mornin’. An’ that old Bertie grinnin’ at me all over the place afterwards. . . .’

  ‘Never mind,’ said Henry consolingly, ‘it’s only for a few weeks now. He’s goin’ at the end of the term.’

  ‘What worries me,’ said William slowly, ‘what worries me is lettin’ him go at the end an’ nothin’ happenin’ to him. I mean him goin’ round makin’ trouble all over the place like this an’ then jus’ goin’ off at the end of the term an’ nothin’ happenin’ to him.’

  ‘Let’s jus’ be glad he’s going off at all,’ said Douglas philosophically, ‘an’ never mind nothin’ happenin’ to him. Let’s jus’ be glad that things’ll stop happenin’ to us.’

  ‘’Sides,’ said Henry, ‘if we did do anythin’ to him . . . you know what he is . . . he’d tell him an’ then jus’ go about grinnin’ at us. You know what he is.’

  ‘Yes,’ said William sadly and thoughtfully, ‘we know what he is, but – but it jus’ seems a pity, that’s all.’

  It was the Vicar’s wife who first suggested the pageant, but once suggested the idea took root firmly in the village. Mrs Bott of the Hall took it up and so did Mrs Lane and Mrs Franks and Mrs Robinson and all the rest of them.

  Arrangements went on apace. The junior inhabitants of the village looked on with apathy. ‘No children to be in it’ had been pronounced very early on in the proceedings. The activities of the Outlaws may have had something to do with the distrust with which the senior element of the village regarded the junior.

  William and the Outlaws treated the whole affair with superior contempt.

  ‘A pageant!’ said William scornfully. ‘Huh! An ole pageant. Jus’ dressin’ up in silly clothes an’ having a procession. Jus’ a lot of silly ole grown-ups. Huh! Well, I bet I could make a better pageant than that ole thing, if I tried. I bet I could. Well, I wun’t be in it not if they asked me. I’m glad they’ve not asked me ’cause I wun’t be in it not if they did.’

  He was none the less disconcerted and secretly much annoyed to hear that despite the ban on children Bertie was to be in it. Bertie was to be Queen Elizabeth’s page.

  Queen Elizabeth was Mrs Bertram of The Limes. She was a newcomer to the village and her most striking characteristic was a likeness to the Virgin Queen as represented in her more famous portraits. She considered it a great social asset and was never tired of drawing attention to it. It was, as a matter of fact, Mrs Bertram who had first suggested the pageant to the Vicar’s wife. And despite the reluctance of the committee and the ban they had placed on the younger generation, Mrs Bertram had insisted on having a boy page.

  ‘We’ve – er – never found it wise,’ objected the Vicar’s wife mysteriously.

  ‘But where I used to live,’ said Mrs Bertram indignantly, ‘we always had children in the pageants. Without exception. There’s something so romantic and beautiful about children.’ Mrs Bertram, it is perhaps unnecessary to add, had no children of her own.

  The Vicar’s wife cleared her throat and spoke again still mysteriously.

  ‘Perhaps,’ she said. ‘Quite. But one or two occasions in this village have been spoilt – wrecked by the presence of certain children.’

  ‘The children of this village,’ said Mrs Franks still with something of the Vicar’s wife’s mysteriousness in her tone, ‘seem, I don’t know why, to bring bad luck to anything they take part in—’

  Someone seemed to murmur the two words ‘William Brown’ in the background and then they all changed the subject.

  But the next day Mrs Bertram met Bertie and fell in love with him at once. She found him ‘adorable’ and at the next pageant committee meeting she announced her firm intention of having him for her page.

  ‘I must,’ she said, ‘I must have a page and he’s a perfectly adorable boy. He’ll look sweet in white satin.’

  ‘Oh, he’s all right,’ said the Vicar’s wife with relief, ‘there couldn’t be any harm in having him. It’s—’ again she dropped her voice and spoke darkly, mysteriously, ‘it’s some of the others.’

  So it was decided that Bertie was to be Queen Elizabeth’s page.

  Bertie received the honour complacently. He, like Mrs Bertram, thought that he was eminently suitable for a page. Moreover, his position as the only boy in the village admitted to the pageant delighted him. While still retaining his charming manners towards the grown-ups h
e began to put on more and more side when with his contemporaries. He was enjoying his position of supremacy over the Outlaws. He had a pretty well-founded idea that William, despite his professed scorn, would have loved to be in the pageant. He smiled sweetly and meaningly at William in public and in private informed his uncle that it was William who had introduced the mouse into the drawing class and the handful of squibs into the anthracite stove. . . .

  Bertie joined William in the playground where William and the Outlaws were playing leap-frog during ‘break’.

  ‘Hello, William,’ he said pleasantly.

  He always affected great friendliness of manner towards William and the Outlaws.

  William, gathering together all his forces, took a mighty leap over both Ginger’s and Douglas’s back, landed on his nose, picked himself up, said ‘Crumbs!’ in a tone that expressed mingled pride in his exploit and concern for his nose and ignored equally Bertie’s presence and greeting.

  ‘You’ve heard about the pageant they’re going to have in the village, haven’t you?’ went on Bertie, still with his most engaging smile.

  William addressed his Outlaws still as though not seeing Bertie. ‘Bet I can do three of you,’ he said vaingloriously. ‘Come on, Henry . . . you stand with Ginger and Douglas and I bet I’ll do all three of you.’

  ‘They decided not to have any children in at first,’ went on Bertie suavely, ‘but in the end they’re to have just one for Queen’s Elizabeth’s page. Me.’

  Ginger, Douglas and Henry crouched down. William went back, took a mighty run, a mighty leap and – landed on the top of Douglas and Henry. The wriggling mass of Outlaws disentangled themselves. William’s nose, brought a second time in violent contact with the asphalt playground, began to bleed copiously. William held to it a grimy handkerchief already saturated in ink and mud and watched with interest the effect of the introduction of the fresh colour.