William Read online

  ‘Soppy-looking kid,’ said Ginger, who had not noticed William’s facial challenge and its spirited acceptance.

  ‘No, she isn’t,’ said William; ‘she’s all right,’ and added hastily, ‘all right for a girl, of course, I mean.’

  The Outlaws met in the old barn to discuss the waxwork show in greater detail.

  ‘We’ve gotter think of famous history people,’ said William.

  ‘All right,’ said Ginger, ‘you start.’

  ‘Oh, there’s heaps of ’em,’ said William carelessly, ‘you jus’ say one or two.’

  ‘S’pose you jus’ say one or two first,’ said Ginger.

  ‘Anyone’d think,’ said William, ‘hearin’ you talk, that you thought I di’n’ know any history people.’

  ‘I don’ think you do,’ said Ginger simply.

  After an exhilarating but indeterminate scuffle the argument was resumed.

  ‘Well, I’ll say one if you’ll say one,’ said William.

  ‘Alfred and the cakes,’ said Ginger, whose brain had been stimulated by the contest.

  ‘That one sounds all right,’ said William carelessly, secretly rather impressed.

  ‘Well, now you say one,’ challenged Ginger.

  William’s brain still remained empty of historical characters.

  ‘Robinson Crusoe,’ he said at last uncertainly.

  Ginger had a vague impression that there was something wrong with this, but did not like to commit himself too definitely.

  ‘I think we’d better stick to English history people,’ he said; ‘he was a foreigner.’

  ‘All right,’ said William, and with a burst of inspiration, ‘what about Bruce?’

  ‘Who was Bruce?’ said Ginger suspiciously.

  ‘It tells about him in copy-books,’ said William vaguely. ‘He kept spiders.’

  ‘Well, I’ve kept spiders myself,’ said Ginger, ‘but they aren’t very interestin’. They don’t turn into anythin’. I don’t think much of an history person what only kept spiders.’

  ‘All right,’ said William, annoyed, ‘think of another yourself then.’

  He was rather relieved thus to be able to detach himself with dignity from further historical research.

  ‘Oh, well, there’s lots of ’em,’ said Ginger, ‘there’s all the kings such as Charles an’ George—’

  ‘What did they do?’ challenged William, stung by Ginger’s academic manner.

  ‘They fought in wars an’ went to the Crusades—’

  ‘What were they?’

  ‘Crusades?’ said Ginger vaguely. ‘Oh, they were jus’ things people went to, wearin’ armour an’ suchlike. There wasn’t much goin’ on at home those days, you see. It was before cinemas an’ things were invented. They’d gotter do somethin’.’

  ‘Well, we’re not much nearer a waxwork show,’ said William irritably (he objected to being taught history by Ginger), ‘’cept Alfred and the cakes . . . Oh, an’ I suppose we can have King George goin’ to the Crusades. Wasn’t there somethin’ about a dragon too? I seem to think that King George did somethin’ to a dragon.’

  ‘No,’ said Ginger, ‘we’d better leave that part out. We haven’t anyone to be a dragon, anyway. We’ll just have him goin’ to the Crusades in armour.’

  ‘That’ll be quite easy,’ said William thoughtfully, ‘trays an’ things tied round him an’ a saucepan on his head. I won’t be him,’ he added hastily, ‘I’m the showman. Besides, I never have any luck with saucepans. They always seem too big when they’re on my head an’ then when they’ve slipped down over my face they seem too small. They nearly tore off all the front of my face gettin’ the last one off. I went on feeling the feeling of it for ever so long afterwards. Well, then, we’ll have Alfred and the cakes an’ King George goin’ off to the Crusades. What did King Charles do? Somethin’ about oak trees, wasn’t it?’

  ‘He was killed,’ said Ginger.

  ‘I bet he wasn’t,’ challenged William, with spirit, ‘I bet it was somethin’ to do with oak trees.’

  ‘Oh, well, never mind,’ said Ginger wearily. Ginger was tired of historical discussions, and in any case felt rather unsure of his ground. ‘It doesn’t much matter what they did. We’ve only gotter dress up as them, anyway. It doesn’t matter what you say about ’em either. No one’ll know any different, whatever you say.’

  ‘How d’you know?’ said William. ‘Sometimes they do. Sometimes there’s someone there that knows things an’ keeps on contradictin’ you.’

  ‘Smack his head,’ said Ginger simply, ‘or else learn up the history first so’s no one can contradict you.’

  ‘There’s so many pages out of my history book,’ said William, ‘it makes it more muddlin’ readin’ it than not readin’ it. I’d better not start ’em all fightin’ either. There always seems to be trouble when everyone starts fightin’. You know, their mothers all comin’ round to tell your father afterwards. No, if anyone starts contradictin’ me I’ll jus’ reason with ’em. I’m good at reasonin’!’

  ‘Well, then, it’s nearly settled, isn’t it? You the showman an’ Douglas Alfred and the cakes. He can easy get some cakes an’ burn ’em. An’ me King George goin’ to the Crusades in tin trays and things. An’ Henry King Charles. It ought to be all right. An’ how much shall we charge?’

  ‘I wonder if they’d pay a penny?’ said William hopefully.

  ‘You bet they won’t,’ said Ginger bitterly. ‘I’ve never met such a mean lot of people as the lot of people that lives about here. I bet they’ll only pay a half-penny. Or a farthin’. I bet they try to get in for a farthin’, or a cigarette card. An’ bring ones you’ve got at that.’

  But subsequent enquiries among the Outlaws’ contemporaries elicited the fact that the potential patrons of the show had no intention of paying anything at all. They were willing to come if the show was free and they were equally willing to stay away if entrance fee was charged. William reasoned with them.

  ‘Kin’ly tell me,’ he said with dignity, ‘anyone else what gives shows free an’ without people havin’ to pay money to go in.’

  ‘Kin’ly tell us,’ retorted the potential patrons, ‘anyone else what gives such rotten shows as you do.’

  The argument then shifted from the plane of reason to the physical plane, and the main problem was forgotten in the exhilaration of the contest. It was, of course, William who had a brilliant idea next day.

  ‘Tell you what,’ he said to the Outlaws, ‘tell you what, let’s give it free the first day and charge the second day an’ be diff’rent history people the second day. See? They’ll have enjoyed it so much the first day that they’ll all want to come the second day an’ pay money.’

  The others were not quite so optimistic as William, but his plan was, as usual, adopted. As William said, ‘Anyway it’ll be fun doin’ it twice as diff’rent people.’

  William was a glorious sight as showman. He wore his red Indian costume and had corked a luxuriant moustache and an imperial upon his face. He wore also a pair of horn-rimmed spectacles that for no particular reason generally formed part of any character he impersonated.

  Douglas as Alfred was slightly unpopular. Ginger, by the exercise of much skill and ingenuity, had managed to abstract two slightly burnt cakes from the cook’s last batch. Douglas had turned up at the rehearsals with these and they had given an atmosphere of verisimilitude to the whole affair that had greatly impressed the others. It was annoying therefore to find on the day of the performance that Douglas had been overcome with hunger in the early morning and had eaten them. Ginger, after having tried without success to abstract two more, had brought two potatoes to take their place, but it was felt that the potatoes were less convincing, and Douglas, despite his gorgeous appearance, was under a cloud. He wore a long pair of white silk stockings (borrowed by him from his sister without her knowledge), and over these his trousers were rolled up as far as they would go. On the upper part of his person he wore a mauve jumper (also bo
rrowed from his sister). On his head he wore a waste-paper basket of rather a gaudy pattern and at his eye a monocle which belonged to his father. On his feet he wore brown brogues – the property of his brother – so large that his feet came out of them at every step. Despite all this, however, he was, as I have said, under a cloud for eating his cakes, and the potatoes, though submitted to an elaborate blackening process by Ginger who mixed together ink and black paint for the purpose, were felt to be wholly inadequate.

  Ginger as King George on his way to the Crusades was the pièce de résistance of the whole show. He wore six tin trays, two fire guards, seven saucepan lids and a saucepan. Although a whole ball of string had been used to secure his equipment, trays and saucepan lids were continually falling off him and when he stooped to recover them others followed. William, who had continually to return from the arrangement of the others every other minute to pick up pieces of Ginger’s panoply, grew irritable.

  ‘Can’t you stop dropping things all over the place?’ he said.

  ‘I can’t help it,’ returned Ginger, ‘they drop off when I breathe.’

  ‘Well, then, you needn’t breathe so hard,’ said William, ‘surely you needn’t breathe so hard that trays and things drop off you all the time. Other people don’t.’

  ‘You’d like me to die with not breathin’, I s’pose,’ said Ginger indignantly, ‘and then I’d like to know what you’d do for King George.’

  ‘Oh, shut up,’ said William who was wrestling with King Charles’s head-dress.

  Henry as King Charles was magnificent in a fringed tablecloth and a paper crown that was just a little too big for him, and moustaches that arose with a flourish from either lip to perform symmetrical revolutions just under his eyes.

  The audience was seated on turned-up boxes in various stages of insecurity on the floor of the old barn. Douglas, Ginger and Henry were posed in suitable attitudes behind a string that was tied from wall to wall to prevent a too near approach of the audience. William as showman made his speech,

  ‘Ladies an’ gentlemen,’ he began, ‘I’ve gotter message first of all for you from Ginger an’ Henry an’ Douglas. They’re very sorry not to be able to be here. They’d all hoped they’d be able to be here, but they all of them aren’t very well an’ have to stay in bed havin’ their temperature took an’ such-like. Well, I’ve got three very good waxworks for you here. Made by the best waxwork maker in the world an’ sent down from London jus’ for the performance.’

  The sheer impudence and ingenuity of this deprived the audience temporarily of breath and he continued unchallenged. ‘The first waxwork you see before you, ladies an’ gentlemen, is Doug – is King Alfred, I mean, what burnt the cakes. You see the waxworks of the cakes too.’

  ‘Looks like potatoes to me,’ said a member of the audience sceptically, ‘dirty potatoes with bits of their skin scraped off.’

  Ginger’s ink and black-paint treatment had certainly been less successful than he had imagined.

  ‘Those are the sorts of cakes people had in those days,’ said William coldly; ‘it was before the sort of cakes people have nowadays was invented. D’you think that people ate the sort of cake people have nowadays in anshunt times? How could they when the modern sort of cakes people have nowadays weren’t invented? It was very expensive gettin’ a waxworks of an anshunt sort of cake, but we wanted to have everythin’ jus’ like what it was in anshunt times.’

  The audience stared suspiciously at the potatoes, but were momentarily silenced by the severity of William’s voice and expression.

  ‘He burnt the cakes, you know,’ said William vaguely. William had meant to borrow a history book with its full complement of pages to read up the careers of the historical characters that figured in his show, but he’d been so busy preparing his waxworks that he hadn’t had time. ‘He burnt his cakes, you remember. Let ’em fall into the fire jus’ when he was eatin’ ’em. Got ’em burnt up, you know. Pulled ’em out, but they were too burnt to finish eatin’. Got insurance on ’em,’ he ended uncertainly with vague memories of a hearth rug onto which some coal had fallen out at home the week before, and added hastily, ‘Now let’s look at the next one. The next one’s made very speshul for this show. At very great expense. It was a jolly expensive one this one was. It’s King Charles.’

  ‘Which King Charles?’ said an earnest seeker after knowledge in the front row.

  ‘The one what had to do with an oak tree,’ said William coldly and hastened on. ‘His clothes is made exactly like the real one’s clothes were like. He’s a very expensive one indeed.’

  ‘Wasn’t he killed?’ went on the earnest student in the front row.

  ‘Yes,’ said William, assuming an air of omniscience, ‘killed failin’ out of the oak tree,’ and hastily proceeded, ‘his crown’s made of gold same as the real one’s was.’

  ‘I thought he was put to death with an axe by Parliament for doin’ something wrong,’ protested the student.

  ‘Yes, he was,’ agreed William, trying to accommodate his story to this fount of knowledge. ‘He was, but it was all to do with the oak tree. He was trespassin’ in the oak tree. The oak tree was in someone’s field an’ they had him up an’ put him to death for it, same as they did in those days. The lor was different in those days—’

  ‘But I thought—’ began the student.

  William ceased trying to accommodate his story to the facts of history as revealed by the student and turned to simpler methods.

  ‘You can jolly well shut up or get out,’ he said to the student.

  ‘All right,’ murmured the student pacifically. ‘All right. All I meant was that it says in my history book—’

  ‘Well, your history book’s wrong,’ said William. ‘Do you think I’d be havin’ a waxwork show of history people like this, if I didn’t know all about ’em? Your history book’s all wrong. It was written ever so many years ago an’ I’ve found out a lot of things about history what no one knew when your history book was written. So you’d better listen to me or get out.’

  So impressive was William’s tone and mien that that young student subsided and ever hereafter regarded his history book with deep distrust.

  ‘Looks to me,’ said another critic, ‘jus’ like Douglas dressed up.’

  ‘Yes,’ said William, unperturbed, ‘I had it made like Douglas. I thought it would be more int’restin’ to have it made like someone we all knew. It was more expensive, of course, but I thought it’d be more int’restin’ for you all.’

  ‘Made of wax, did you say?’ said a red-headed member of the audience, peering over the dividing string.

  ‘Yes,’ said William, ‘very good wax.’

  ‘He’s winkin’ his eyes.’

  ‘Yes. I had ’em made to wink their eyes,’ said William, ‘so as to look more nachural. It costs more to have ’em made that way, but it looks more nachural. More like what the real person must’ve looked like. Real people always wink their eyes, so that’s why I had my waxworks made to wink their eyes – so as to look more nachural – more like the real person must’ve looked like – winkin’ their eyes like what the real person did. Look at ’em. They all wink their eyes.’ Ginger, Henry and Douglas promptly began to blink with great violence. ‘There’s speshul machinery inside ’em makin’ ’em wink their eyes. Very expensive machinery.’

  ‘They’re breathin’,’ said the investigator, leaning yet further over the string. ‘I can see ’em – breathin’ – breathin’ an’ – movin’.’

  ‘Yes, I had ’em made to breathe an’ move,’ said William calmly. ‘There’s speshul machinery inside ’em makin’ ’em breathe – so as to make ’em look more nachural.’ Then he proceeded hastily with his lecture.

  ‘The nex’ one, ladies an’ gentlemen, is King George goin’ off to the Crusades.’

  ‘What are they?’ said the red-headed investigator.

  ‘Things people went to in armour.’

  ‘I bet you’re thinkin’ of Saint
George.’

  ‘Some call him one an’ some the other,’ said William with dignity. ‘I call him King George,’ and continued hastily: ‘He lived in anshunt times an’ he went out to the Crusades.’

  ‘What were the Crusades?’ demanded a member of the audience.

  ‘Islands,’ said William with a burst of inspiration, ‘like the Hebrides what we learnt in Geography las’ week. He went out to ’em wearin’ armour an’ such-like.’

  ‘What for?’ said the red-headed boy simply.

  ‘Oh, shut up,’ said William wearily.

  ‘I thought he had something to do with a dragon,’ said the student, recovering something of his poise. ‘I’ve seen a picture of him with a dragon.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said William carelessly, ‘he had a dragon all right. There were lots of dragons in the Crusades. He tamed this one and took it about with him – sort of makin’ a pet of it.’

  ‘But he was fightin’ it in the picture I saw,’ objected the student.

  ‘Yes, he did fight it,’ conceded William. ‘He fought it all right. It turned savage on him one day an’ bit him an’ he had to fight it’ – then, wishing to bring the story to a conclusion – ‘an’ it killed him. That’s how he died – fightin’ his dragon what’d turned savage on him out in the Crusades—’

  ‘What d’you say they’re made of?’ said the redheaded boy, leaning so far over the string that it broke. ‘Wax?’

  ‘Yes, wax,’ said William. ‘Very good wax. You really couldn’t tell the difference between that wax and a real person. It’s so nachural.’

  ‘It wouldn’t feel it if I pinched it, seein’ it’s wax?’ said the red-headed boy.

  ‘Course not,’ said William; ‘but you’d better not go spoilin’ my waxworks or—’

  His warning was too late. The red-headed boy had given Ginger a sharp, experimental nip. With a yell of fury and a clatter of tin trays and saucepans Ginger hurled himself upon him. Henry and Douglas joined the fray. The audience, too, joined the fray except for the student, who went home to consult his history book. William stood in the background and murmured pathetically, ‘I had ’em made to fight like that. There’s speshul machinery inside ’em makin’ ’em fight like that.’