Three's a Crowd: and other family stories by Kate Blackadder

Author:Kate Blackadder [Blackadder, Kate]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Kate Blackadder
Published: 2016-02-27T05:00:00+00:00

Published in The People’s Friend under the title Bright Spark

The Night the Band Played

I’m remembering the night The Ceilidh Band came to our village hall.

They were to play at the first event to be held in the hall since the war ended. For six years the hall had been used for all sorts of other purposes: first aid classes, soup kitchen, store room for the Home Guard. So this was a big occasion. I was ten and could barely remember a time when there wasn’t a war, couldn’t remember the amateur dramatics, the concerts and harvest suppers my mother told me about. The Ceilidh Band – that was their name – coming to play for us, followed by tea and cakes, was the most exciting thing that had ever happened as far as I was concerned.

I stood gazing at the announcement in the post office window for the umpteenth time. Dad had taught me to play the fiddle but I looked at that poster and longed for a piano accordion.

‘I bet I could play one of them,’ I said to Will, pointing to the picture of the burly musician, his fingers stretched over the keys and buttons. ‘Do you think he’d let me have a go?’

‘You, Alex? You couldn’t even lift it.’ He felt my upper arm. ‘Not with your puny little muscles.’

I forgot about the accordion for the moment as I fell on Will. My muscles might have been puny but they were strong enough to wrestle him to the ground.

Mr MacRae tapped on the post office window.

‘Alexandra Fraser. What would your mother say if she saw you scrapping in the street?’

Alexandra! I hated my full name. Will and I picked ourselves up and I said, “Sorry, Mr MacRae’ and we went off to our den at the bottom of Will’s garden.

‘Now, Will,’ I said, ‘I really want to play that piano accordion and you’ve got to help me.’

As I spoke, I could picture myself up on stage wearing the Fraser tartan kilt that had been my big brother’s, picking up the piano accordion, instantly learning how to play all my favourite tunes, and then listening to the thunderous applause.

‘Me? How?’ Will burrowed in the earth and picked up a worm. ‘I’m sure this is the worm I saw yesterday. He’s a beauty.’ He stroked his finger along the worm’s length.

‘They all look the same,’ I said. I thought of pointing out to Will that a worm is a she as well as a he, but I had more important things to talk about. ‘William!’ Will hated his full name too. ‘What we could do is this. When the band stops playing to have their tea you distract the accordion player somehow and then I’ll have a go of it.’

Will put the worm on the ground and watched it slither away. He wouldn’t look me in the eye and said something I couldn’t quite hear.

‘Don’t mumble, boy, can’t abide a boy who mumbles’, I said, imitating a Sunday School

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