The Exiles at Home by Hilary McKay

Author:Hilary McKay
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan

CHAPTER EIGHT

‘Saturday at last!’ said Naomi, reaching over to shake Ruth awake. ‘Let’s go straight to Toby and Emma’s.’

‘What about Peter?’

‘What about him?’

‘I said we’d stop with him for an hour this morning, while Mrs Collingwood takes Martin to football.’

‘We’d stop with him!’ exclaimed Naomi. ‘What a cheek!’

‘I help you at Toby and Emma’s.’

‘Toby and Emma are different,’ said Naomi. ‘They don’t scream. They’re house-trained. They don’t bite, they don’t spit, they don’t . . .’

‘He’ll be in the garden,’ said Ruth. ‘Perhaps he’ll be better outside. Mr Collingwood’s built him a playpen, huge, with high sides and a door that locks.’

‘Sounds more like a cage,’ remarked Naomi.

‘It looks like a cage,’ admitted Ruth frankly, ‘a very posh one; they designed it specially to fit Peter. They measured his head and how far he could reach, so they knew how wide apart to put the bars and how high they had to make it.’

‘They should have dug a moat round it,’ said Naomi. ‘All right, we’ll do Toby and Emma this afternoon. What time are they caging up Peter?’

‘Ten.’

At ten o’clock Peter was lifted into his play-pen. It stood in a sunny corner of the immaculate Collingwood lawn, filled with rugs, bouncy cushions, a rainbow collection of beautiful toys and several teddy bears. At two minutes past ten, Peter was hurling himself at the bars and roaring.

‘How strong are they?’ Naomi asked Mrs Collingwood apprehensively.

‘Very,’ replied Mrs Collingwood, leaning over the side to hug Peter. ‘Very, very strong, my poor baby!’ and she yelped as her poor baby sank his teeth into her shoulder.

‘I’ll be straight back,’ she promised. ‘I’m glad there’s two of you!’

It took two of them to retrieve the missiles Peter hurled over the side at his departing mother’s back. Josh came bouncing up to help too, but departed under a hail of wooden bricks.

‘I’m not putting anything hard back in,’ Naomi told Peter sternly, ‘you’re dangerous! Even Phoebe was never as bad as you!’

‘He’s not usually this awful,’ Ruth said. ‘I think we ought to just leave everything where he throws it and see what he does.’

They sat out of range while Peter emptied his playpen and then proceeded to tear up the lawn with his fists and teeth.

‘He’s getting awfully dirty,’ remarked Naomi.

‘I know, but he’s stopped screaming and they’re used to him getting dirty.’

‘Ruining the grass as well.’

‘Yes, Mr Collingwood said he would ruin the grass. It’s only that one corner.’

‘He’s really strong,’ commented Naomi, looking at the size of the clods Peter was excavating. ‘What do they feed him on? Dynamite?’

‘Martin said he was like that even when he only drank milk. Martin says he’s quietened down a lot. He used to scream so loud he could hear him as far as the bus stop. And ringing in his ears all day at school afterwards!’

At that moment a fat hand shot out from underneath the play-pen.

‘He’s tunnelling out!’ said Naomi in horror.

Ruth jumped to her feet and began picking up toys and putting them back into the play-pen to distract the captive.

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