The Outside Child by Nina Bawden

Author:Nina Bawden [Nina Bawden]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780571309313
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Published: 2013-03-24T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

She looked quite comfortable, her head resting on the back of the bench, her legs stretched out in front of her, and her hands folded across her handbag on her lap. Her mouth had fallen open and she was snoring gently. A little bit of cottony stuff, some sort of seed blown on the wind, had settled on her upper lip, and it fluttered with each breath.

I looked at this sleeping person who was my grandmother, and thought how odd it was that she was a stranger to me.

She stirred and muttered something. “Come away,” Plato said. “They’ll see you. They’ll think we’re thieves. Stealing her handbag or something.”

The children had come out of the bushes on the other side of the clearing. They were running towards us, a little, matted dog chasing them, leaping up, yapping. We walked slowly towards them and they glanced at us briefly as they ran past us. George said, “Gran?” and Annabel hushed him. “Don’t wake her.”

At the edge of the clearing we stopped and looked back. Annabel was fastening the dog’s leash to its collar and slipping the loop over an iron strut on the bench. “Stay,” she said. “Good dog.” And the little dog sat like a statue, ears up, head cocked to one side.

The children backed away from the bench, giggling. George whispered something to Annabel and she looked in our direction.

“Pretend to be busy,” Plato said. “Let’s pick blackberries.”

High up where they caught the sun, a few berries were ripening, but on the lower branches they were still shrunken and green.

“Rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb,” Plato said. “That’s what actors say when they’re part of the crowd on the stage and pretending not to notice what’s going on. If you get a stick, you might be able to reach some of the top bits. I’ll keep an eye on your brother and sister.”

The bushes were covered with dust and smelled fusty. The few berries I managed to reach were sour and pursed my mouth up. “Yuck,” I said, spitting. “What are they doing, Plato?”

I was too nervous, or shy, to look round myself.

“Nothing special,” he said. “It’s all right, they’re not watching us.” Then, concerned suddenly, “Oh, no …”

I looked then. They were standing at the wire fence between the clearing and the railway line.

I said, “They’re just watching for trains. All kids do that.”

George had sat down. Annabel was stooping over him, pulling at something. George was on his back, wriggling. He disappeared. Annabel looked over her shoulder at her sleeping grandmother. George’s head popped up on the other side of the fence. Annabel sat down.

“They’re sliding under the wire,” Plato said. “That’s dangerous …”

Annabel was wearing a skirt. A bit of it must have snagged on the fence. She said, “Oh …” and then a rude word I would not have expected. George was out of sight but I heard him laugh. Annabel tugged her skirt free. Then she vanished too.

Plato set off at a run. I followed him, my heart jumping.

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