William the Bad Read online

  ‘Oh, William,’ sighed the little girl, ‘I think you’re wonderful!’

  ‘I remember when we were staying in Nice,’ began Claude in his languorous high-pitched drawl, but the little girl said impatiently, without even looking at him:

  ‘Oh, Claude, do be quiet,’—then sinking her voice to tenderness again—‘do tell us all about it again, William.’

  And William, nothing loth, stretched out his hand for a jam tart and told them all about it again.

  When William set off at the appointed hour to go home it appeared that the little girl had decided to accompany him. She wanted a last glimpse of William’s home and family and person, all of which were now invested with a dazzling glamour in her eyes. Claude, who had not been allowed to finish a sentence since William had returned from his heroic exploit, did not even offer to accompany them, but retired sulkily to listen to the wireless.

  William and the little girl set off together down the road.

  ‘I’m so sorry I’m going home to-morrow, William,’ said the little girl regretfully.

  ‘Uh-huh,’ said William distantly as from immeasurable heights of heroism.

  ‘I shall miss you awfully.’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ said William again.

  He was alone with the little girl. There was a whole mile of country road before them. He could talk to his heart’s content about civilisation, pianos, ostriches, sacks—anything. She’d listen with awe and reverence. She wouldn’t interrupt. And quite suddenly all his desire to talk to her had faded. He realised that without interruption it wouldn’t be any fun at all. He looked down at the little girl’s face. It was raised to his, alight with adoration. And quite suddenly he discovered that her charm for him had completely vanished. It was her disdain of him that had made her so desirable in his eyes.

  ‘OH, WILLIAM,’ SIGHED THE LITTLE GIRL, ‘I THINK YOU’RE WONDERFUL!’

  His hand closed over the two half-crowns in his pocket. They at any rate were real and desirable enough. They were just passing Mr. Moss’s sweet shop. With a murmured excuse he disappeared inside to reappear a few minutes later with a paper bag.

  ‘Bulls eyes,’ he explained tersely. ‘Big ’uns. They last for miles.’ He handed her one. It was gigantic. He took one himself. Their lips could not quite close over them. Conversation for some minutes at any rate was quite impossible. William walked on in enforced, but quite enjoyable silence. A rosy haze of content was upon his spirit. He’d soon be at home. Ginger would be waiting for him. They’d have time for a game before bed-time. He was already forgetting the past except as food for the future. Lunatics and keepers . . . it would make a jolly fine game. It held endless possibilities. A change from Red Indians and smugglers and the other games.

  The little girl spoke with an effort through her bulls eye.

  ‘What are you going to be when you grow up, William?’

  William considered the question in silence for a minute. He didn’t want to be a lecturer after all. He was tired of it already. He wasn’t really sure that he wanted to be a robber or a chimney sweep either. It was a jolly good bulls eye, the best he’d ever tasted. Bottles and bottles of bulls eyes all your own. He made up his mind suddenly.

  ‘Keep a sweet shop,’ he said indistinctly.

  CHAPTER 3

  WILLIAM, PRIME MINISTER

  ‘What’s this gen’ral election they keep talkin’ about?’ said Ginger. He directed the question at Henry because Henry had a reputation for universal knowledge, but he wasn’t really interested. The general election was just a grown-up topic of conversation like the weather and the price of petrol, and so he took for granted that it must be as dull as any other grown-up topic of conversation. Still, it had been mentioned so often lately that he felt an idle curiosity as to its meaning.

  ‘It’s somethin’ to do with makin’ a tunnel under the sea,’ answered William who never liked to own himself at a loss.

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ said Henry earnestly, ‘it isn’t anythin’ to do with that. That’s somethin’ quite diff’rent. The general election means choosin’ people to rule the country.’

  ‘I thought the King ruled the country,’ said William.

  ‘Well, he sort of does and he sort of doesn’t,’ said Henry, still with his air of deep wisdom.

  ‘Oh, shut up,’ said William impatiently, ‘if he does, he can’t doesn’t as well, can he? Stands to reason.’

  ‘No, but what I mean is,’ said Henry still more earnestly, ‘that there’s a sort of man under him called the Prime Min’ster that sorts of help him govern an’ he’s chosen out of a general election.’

  ‘Like the man they have in It’ly called the duck?’ said Douglas anxious to air his knowledge.

  ‘You’re thinking of the dog,’ said Ginger scornfully, ‘the man we had in history what ruled a place called Venice an’ was called a dog.’

  ‘I’d have called myself somethin’ better than a dog or a duck if I was goin’ to be a ruler,’ said William. ‘I’d be called a lion or an eagle or somethin’ like that.’

  ‘Do shut up int’ruptin’,’ said Henry, ‘I’m tryin’ to tell you ’bout this gen’ral election. There’s four sorts of people tryin’ to get to be rulers. They all want to make things better, but they want to make ’em better in different ways. There’s Conservatives an’ they want to make things better by keepin’ ’em jus’ like what they are now. An’ there’s Lib’rals an’ they want to make things better by alterin’ them jus’ a bit, but not so’s anyone’d notice, an’ there’s Socialists, an’ they want to make things better by taking everyone’s money off ’em an’ there’s Communists an’ they want to make things better by killin’ everyone but themselves.’

  ‘I’m goin’ to be one of them,’ said Ginger promptly, ‘they sound more excitin’ than the others.’

  ‘Well, they get everyone they can to vote for them,’ went on Henry patiently, ‘and the ones that gets the most votes win and their head man’s called Prime Min’ster an’ tells the King what to do.’

  ‘I’d smack his head if I was the King an’ he started tellin’ me what to do,’ said William with spirit.

  ‘I say,’ said Ginger excitedly, ‘there’s just four of us. Let’s be them an’ have one. How do they make people vote for them?’

  ‘They get ’em together an’ make speeches to ’em,’ said Henry, ‘an’ then they give ’em little pieces of paper to vote on an’ they count ’em up an’ the one that gets the most’s won.’

  ‘I’m jolly good at making speeches,’ said William complacently, ‘there’s not many things I can’t make speeches about. I once thought of bein’ a leckcherer but it’d be a bit dull when you got used to it.’

  ‘Well, who’ll be which?’ said Ginger. ‘I’ve bagged bein’ the one that wants to kill everyone.’

  At this moment the church clock struck five and expressions of the four Outlaws changed.

  ‘Tea-time,’ said William eagerly. ‘Let’s come back after tea an’ fix up what we’ll be. There’s goin’ to be doughnuts for tea an’ I don’t want to be late. Robert’s going to be in for tea an’ he likes them too.’

  Despite his haste, William was late for tea and found that Robert had eaten all the doughnuts but two. He decided that in view of Robert’s eight years’ seniority it would be waste of time to enter upon hostilities on these grounds so he merely fixed Robert with a cold stare and said:

  ‘Which are you votin’ for, Robert?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Robert, stretching out his hand for the last doughnut, but being artfully foiled by William who neatly abstracted it from the plate when it seemed that Robert’s hand was actually closing over it.

  ‘I mean are you Conservative or what?’ said William, keeping one hand closed over his rescued doughnut till he should have finished the one he was eating.

  ‘You ought to be in the Zoo,’ said Robert dispassionately. ‘Anyone’d think you were starving.’

  ‘I wish I was in the Zoo,’ said
William, ‘they have a jolly sight better time than I have. An’ I jolly well am starving. I’ve had nothin’ to eat since lunch. Are you a Conservative?’

  ‘No,’ said Robert shortly, ‘I’m a Liberal.’

  ‘Well then I’m jolly well goin’ to be one of the others,’ said William crushingly.

  ‘I don’t care what you are,’ said Robert, rising from his seat and brushing a few doughnut crumbs from his trousers to the carpet with an air of great fastidiousness.

  ‘I bet you do,’ said William darkly.

  Robert went out, leaving William alone at the table eating the last of the doughnuts. William’s mind went over the political careers still open to him. He couldn’t be a Communist because Ginger had bagged it and he couldn’t be a Liberal because Robert was a Liberal, and Robert had eaten nearly all the doughnuts. Socialism and Conservative were still open to him. Socialism sounded rather fun. Then suddenly he remembered a friend of his father’s who’d stayed a week-end with them last month—a tall bronzed spare man who’d just returned from a shooting trip in the African Veldt where he’d shot elephants, buffaloes and numerous other animals, and had once met a lion face to face on a jungle path when he was totally unarmed and had walked past it showing no more concern than if it had been a hen. This man had, of course, become William’s hero, replacing Robin Hood, Hereward the Wake, Buffalo Bill and Sexton Blake, who had successively held that position. William had decided to go out big game shooting as soon as he’d left school, to meet a lion unarmed and to stroll past it with no more concern than if it had been a hen. He felt that life could have no real savour for him till he’d done that.

  His mother came in and sat down by the fire knitting socks. Mrs. Brown had a husband and two sons, and so she was always knitting socks.

  ‘Enjoying the doughnuts, dear?’ she said to William.

  ‘I only had two,’ said William.

  ‘I think two’s quite enough,’ said his mother.

  William uttered a sound expressive of mingled amusement, incredulity, sarcasm, bitterness, cynicism and resignation, and after a short silence said:

  ‘Mother, you remember that Mr. Martin what stayed here last month?’

  ‘Yes, dear.’

  ‘Well, what was he?’

  ‘He was a friend of your father’s, dear.’

  ‘I mean, was he a Communist?’

  If Mr. Martin were a Communist, William had decided to fight Ginger for the post of head of the Communist party.

  ‘Of course not, dear,’ said Mrs. Brown, deeply shocked, ‘he was a Conservative.’

  ‘Then I’m one too,’ said William importantly.

  ‘Are you, dear?’ said his mother vaguely, and added, glancing with a worried frown at his legs, ‘Haven’t you any garters, William?’

  ‘No, I lost ’em,’ said William shamelessly.

  Every day his mother made him a new pair of garters to keep his stockings up, and every day he took them off and used them as catapults.

  ‘Well, you mustn’t go out like that,’ said his mother, ‘it looks so untidy. Wait a minute and I’ll make you another pair. I can’t think what happens to all the garters I make you.’

  ‘Make ’em of good strong stuff, won’t you?’ said William.

  ‘Yes, I will, dear,’ said Mrs. Brown, pleased that William should be beginning at last to take an interest in his appearance and should want his stockings to look neat.

  When he returned to the old barn the other three were waiting for him.

  ‘Let’s get it settled,’ he said importantly. ‘I’m bein’ the Conservative, an’ Ginger the Communist. Then there’s the Socialist that wants to take other people’s money off them—’

  ‘I’ll be that,’ put in Henry hastily.

  ‘You’ll have to be the Lib’ral, then,’ said William to Douglas.

  ‘I don’t care,’ said Douglas gloomily. ‘I don’t care what I am. I don’t think it’s goin’ to be half such fun as Red Indians.’

  ‘Well, what do we do now?’ demanded Ginger; ‘how do we start?’

  They looked at William. William turned to the encyclopædical Henry.

  ‘What do they do now?’ he said, with the air of a potentate asking advice of his head tribesman.

  ‘They get meetin’s together,’ said Henry, ‘an’ they make speeches, an’ then they give ’em papers an’ pencils to vote, an’ the one that gets the most votes wins.’

  ‘Well, let’s do that, then,’ said William cheerfully. ‘We’ll tell ’em about it at school to-morrow an’ have the meetin’ here after school. We can think out what we’ll say in our speech in school to-morrow morning.’

  They followed him out of the old barn into the sunshine.

  He picked up a small stone from the ground and pointed.

  ‘See that tree over there? I bet I can hit it.’

  He slipped off one of his new garters and took careful aim.

  The gathering in the old barn the next evening was larger than even the Outlaws had expected. It was not that the juvenile population of the village was interested in politics. It was merely that any function of any sort got up by William and his Outlaws was apt to be exciting and no one wanted to be out of it.

  The audience sat on the floor facing the Outlaws who sat on upturned packing-cases at one end.

  William—garterless once more—stepped forward to explain the situation.

  ‘Ladies an’ Gent’men,’ he began in his best platform manner, ‘we’re goin’ to have a gen’ral election jus’ the same as what grown-ups have. We’re goin’ to make speeches an’ when we’ve finished you’ve all got to vote for us an’ I hope you’ve all brought pencils and pieces of paper same as what we told you to. We’re all goin’ to make speeches tellin’ you about what we are an’ askin’ you to be the same, so you’ve got to choose between us after hearin’ us make speeches, same as what grown-ups do. Douglas is a Lib’ral an’ Henry’s a Socialist an’ Ginger’s a Communist an’ I’m a Conservative. Now we’re all goin’ to make speeches, startin’ with Douglas.’

  William, who possessed a pretty sound knowledge of psychology, had decided to be the last speaker. He pulled Douglas up by his collar and said: ‘Ladies an’ Gent’men, this is Douglas what’s goin’ to speak to you about bein’ Lib’rals.’

  Douglas stepped forward amid faint applause.

  ‘Ladies an’ Gentlemen,’ said Douglas, ‘I’m makin’ this speech to ask you all to be Lib’rals same as what I am. Nearly all of you came to my birthday-party las’ month an’ if you don’t vote Lib’rals I won’t ask you again next year. My aunt’s gotter parrot that talks, an’ I’ll let you come an’ listen to it through the window when she’s not there if you’ll vote Lib’rals. I can’t let you listen when she’s there ’cause she doesn’t like boys. I’ll let you look at my rabbits too, an’ I’ll give you all a suck of rock if my aunt sends me a stick when she goes to Brighton same as she did last year.’

  He sat down breathless.

  There were certainly the makings of a politician in Douglas. He didn’t care what he promised. William stood up.

  ‘Now you ask him questions,’ he said. ‘Go on! Ask him questions! Tell him anythin’ you didn’t like in his speech. That what’s they do when they’ve finished speakin’. It’s called hecklin’.’

  ‘It was a rotten party,’ said a small boy in the front row bitterly, ‘I gotter whistle out of a cracker an’ it wouldn’t whistle.’

  ‘Well, that wasn’t my fault,’ said Douglas indignantly. ‘I didn’t make the crackers.’

  ‘They must’ve been rotten crackers,’ said the small boy.

  ‘All right, you jolly well needn’t come next year,’ said Douglas heatedly, forgetting the spirit of propitiation that the occasion demanded. ‘It was a jolly sight better than your party, anyway. Did you have a conjurer?’

  ‘No, but we had a Punch and Judy.’

  ‘Yes, an’ a jolly mess-up it was too. Your aunt’s baby started crying an’ we couldn’t
hear a word they said.’

  ‘All right, you jolly well needn’t come next year.’

  ‘No, I won’t, an’ you needn’t come to mine.’

  ‘No, I’m not goin’ to. An’ I’m not goin’ to vote for you, either.’

  ‘I don’t want you to. I’d soon not win than have people like you votin’ for me.’

  William had listened to this spirited interchange with pride and interest. He now rose to his feet and said:

  ‘That’s jolly good hecklin’. Anyone got anythin’ else to say?’

  Someone had. A boy with red hair in the back row said:

  ‘What does your aunt’s parrot say?’

  ‘It says, “God Save the King” and “Polly put the kettle on.” ’

  ‘That’s nothing. I know someone that’s got a parrot that says “Go to hell.” ’

  ‘And your rabbits aren’t any different from other people’s rabbits,’ said a little girl with freckles and a snub nose. ‘I don’t want to see ’em.’

  ‘Well, I never asked you to,’ said Douglas.

  ‘Oo, you story-teller,’ said the little girl. ‘Oo, you did.’ She appealed to the room. ‘Didn’t he?’

  ‘I didn’t,’ said Douglas.

  ‘You did.’

  ‘I didn’t.’

  ‘You did.’

  ‘I shun’t want my rabbits to see you. I don’t want ’em killed, do I?’

  ‘It would take a lot to kill ’em if they’ve lived seein’ you every day,’ returned the spirited damsel.

  ‘Who cried when she fell in at the deep end?’ said Douglas, turning to more direct personalities.

  ‘And who stayed up in a tree all day because he couldn’t get down?’ retorted the damsel.

  ‘That’s enough hecklin’ about Liberalism,’ said William in his character of master of the ceremonies. ‘If you go on hecklin’ all day about that we won’t have any time to listen to the others. Now it’s Henry’s turn to talk about Socialism. Socialism means takin’ other people’s money off ’em. Henry’s goin’ to talk about it.’ He turned to introduce the speaker. ‘This is Henry, goin’ to make a speech to you about Socialism.’