The Secret Five and the Stunt Nun Legacy (36 page)

In which Old Hag has a surprise; we learn a thing or two about line dancing and the Birmingham area; more truths are revealed although who knows if they are the truth or not; indeed, who cares; reinforcements arrive; stick with it, we’re near the end now.

Unfortunately, some churlish souls might say, there was someone to save these brave children from a gruesome death. Ricky’s eyes were squeezed tightly shut as he heard a whine, a huge thud and a loud old haggish scream. It was as if she had been flattened by some rather large and rather heavy something or other falling from the top of the bookshelves.

‘Get me out of here!’ Old Hag said in a squashed old haggish voice. ‘I’m old and vulnerable! Where’s care in the community when you need it?’

Ricky dared to open his eyes and saw that the truly faithful but truly hungover dog Whatshisname had fallen off the top of the bookshelf on top of Old Hag! The cake slice had flipped out of her hand as she had been flattened, and it now lay at Daniel’s feet.

Daniel paused in his humming as the deadly weapon missed his toes by millimetres.

Betty leapt to her feet. ‘Daniel! Pick it up!’

But Daniel just stared at the cake slice in a pathetic way.

‘Get this smelly animal off me!’ moaned Old Hag, who was showing an unseemly amount of various veins and big flannel knickers as her skinny arms and legs flailed from beneath the considerable weight of Whatshisname.

‘Yo! Issa a cool blade!’ said Daniel, leaning forwards and
inspecting the cake slice. ‘Hevvvveeee, Dude! Da blade iss lush, innit!’

Betty gasped a medium-sized gasp as Sampson went to grab the weapon! Without any thought for the safety of her own knee, she raised that very same knee into his groin, which we shall call, for decency’s sake and in the true innocent spirit of The Secret Five, his Birmingham area. (She had learned the technique accidentally during a Secret Five special training session on defensive line dancing, and had been fascinated by the result, although it had taken Ricky a very long time to be able to speak and even longer to sit cross-legged.)

‘Aaaaaah!’ Sampson groaned loudly as he crumpled to the floor, clutching his Birmingham area, where his bollocks (oops!) now felt as though they had been seared with a blowtorch. ‘Aaaaah! Oooooh!’ he moaned again for effect.

‘Shhhhh!’ Daniel shushed. Carefully, he reached out and picked up the cake slice. ‘Nang nang! Cool!’ he said, examining it closely.

‘Daniel!’ said Betty. ‘Now give it to me. But first, it is my sisterly duty to slap you extremely hard.’

Dutifully, she slapped him extremely hard, as she didn’t like to let him down, and wrenched the cake slice off him. Daniel looked stunned. ‘What’s happening?’ he said, staring wide-eyed at the chaos around him. ‘And why is Whatshisname on top of Old Hag?’

‘Daniel!’ said Betty. ‘Get up and help me untie Ricky and Amy. And we need to stop Sampson’s evilness while Old Hag is disabled.’

‘Hmmm, complicated, isn’t it?’ noted Daniel. ‘I can’t recall such a knotty adventure before, can you? Oh, can I clean my spectacles before I untie you two? They’re filthy, what with all the time travelling.’

‘Oh for goodness’ sake, untie us!’ yelled Ricky.

On top of Old Hag, Whatshisname managed to open an eye. He still felt extremely poorly but was keen to know what all the
noise was. It wasn’t helping his banging head. What was happening? Oh, yes, of course, he’d fallen off the top of the bookshelf after he’d crept to the edge and looked down. It had made him feel quite giddy! It had been a good job Old Hag was there to cushion his fall. As he’d toppled over the edge, he had seen his canine life flash before his canine eyes – all those lost opportunities, those bones that he’d buried in forgotten places, all those puppies he’d never had the chance to father, those surprise visits to the vet’s, the fluffy pink collar – hmmm, maybe there were some distinct advantages to dying after all.

For now, he just couldn’t be bothered to move off Old Hag. He’d put his head down for a few sticks and have a snooze. No more slurping unidentified red liquids . . . no more . . . zzzzzz.

‘Get this dozy mutt off me!’ screamed Old Hag. ‘And can someone stop her dribbling?’

‘Ur,’ groaned Sampson, still clutching his Birmingham area.

‘Do you think Sampson will be all right?’ Amy asked. ‘And why is he holding his . . . his . . .’

‘We’re calling it his Birmingham area,’ Betty whispered to her. ‘And it was me that hurt him.’

‘Oh, gosh!’ said Amy, unable to grasp the concept of hurting someone.

Betty and Daniel untied the ropes – the rather flimsy pathetic ropes that a child of three could probably have snapped with one finger – that had bound Ricky and Amy. ‘I wasn’t actually afraid,’ Ricky said bravely as he stood up. ‘It was all under my control.’

‘Yes, right,’ said Betty, with unprecedented but totally wasted irony.

‘I’m glad you agree. At least I didn’t wave my arms about shouting
enough enough
!’ said Ricky.

‘Well,’ chipped in Amy, ‘
I
would have saved the day if you could all have waited a minute!’

‘Huh!’ said Daniel. ‘
I
was biding my time to strike. Another minute and you’d have all been free!’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Ricky. ‘You were in a street-talk coma.’

‘To be honest,’ Betty said, rather sensibly, ‘Whatshisname rescued us all, and he’s my dog and I trained him in the art of self defiance, so there!’

Just then, unexpectedly, Sampson spoke up. ‘Er, I say, Mummy,’ he said to Old Hag. ‘I
am
in considerable pain . . . oooh . . . from that girl’s knee thrust into my testicles.’

‘Isn’t that our secret password?’ Amy whispered to Betty. ‘How does he know it?’

‘But, oooh,’ Sampson continued, ‘I’d really like you to tell me the truth before I decide whether to be evil or not. It’s a difficult choice and an uninformed decision . . . oooh . . . aaah . . . wouldn’t be right. I don’t want to dominate the world under false pretences.’

‘Will you get this mutt off me if I tell?’ said Old Hag, her face pressed to the floor and her various veins bulging to bursting point.

The children gathered around and agreed that they would rescue her, although they had not really thought it through, in particular how they might move Whatshisname.

‘Ha!’ squeaked Old Hag. ‘You want the truth? The truth is that I’m really your mummy!’

‘No you’re not!’ said the children, not quite together, so it sounded more like ‘No you’re no not you’re no not you’re you’re not not.’

‘Ha!’ cackled Old Hag. ‘You’re all too clever for your own good! All right, I’ll make this easy for you. Sampson. I’m not your mummy!’

‘Oh! What?’ groaned Sampson.

‘But I loved you as your real mummy would, after I snatched you from the cradle at Clarissa’s posh house for my own evil ends,’ continued Old Hag. ‘I had a compulsive disorder, a compulsion to change nappies, you see. It was the smell of ammonia. Lovely. It was out of my control.’

‘Told you!’ smirked Ricky.

Amy looked quite confused. ‘I am very confused,’ she said, going one qualifier further, which was not good for her literary future. ‘You said that our very own Uncle Quagmire is Sampson’s father. How . . . what . . . where . . . why . . .’

‘Ha! She’s off again with her adverbs!’ muttered Old Hag from her privileged position under a big fat snoring dribbling dog. ‘And, despite her youthful exuberance, she’s not going to understand all this, is she? What a waste of a character . . . will
someone
stop this dog dribbling on me!’

‘But we’re The Secret Five!’ Amy whined. ‘How can such things happen? Our mother Aunt Trinny is our father Uncle Quagmire’s wife and surely it’s just not physically possible!’

‘Excuse me, Thick Annie,’ interrupted Old Hag. ‘I’m really getting tired of being under this fat dribbly dog. And the collar! Yeuk! It’s blinding me. But now can I finish my evil speech?’

‘Shall we let her?’ Betty asked the others.

‘Ooooh,’ moaned Sampson.

‘Let’s hear what she has to say,’ said Daniel.

‘Thank you. Ahem. I did nothing wrong,’ Old Hag said in a little voice that she’d recently stolen from a little person. ‘I was young, misguided . . .’

‘Enough!’ said Ricky in rather a manful way for a boy with his taste in socks. ‘I think we all know that you stole Sampson for your own highly evil ends, and that goes against all the teachings and beliefs of The Secret Five, at least those I can remember from the meetings I managed to attend.’ He pointed a manly finger at Old Hag. ‘We, The Secret Five, declare you as officially evil, Old Hag!’

‘Well said,’ whispered Betty, somewhat afraid that her senior position was being undermined. ‘But isn’t that my role, to declare people evil?’

Ricky looked mildly embarrassed but was very keen to continue his maiden speech. ‘And you, haggish Old Hag, tried all ways to turn Sampson into an equally evil monster and it hasn’t worked!
Because of our intervention, our careful strategic planning, our relentless time travel, Uncle Quagmire’s libido and, of course, our daring individual bravery, especially me, Sampson is now the offspring not of Bartle but of the kindly, if a trifle unfaithful, Uncle Quagmire, and is therefore basically
good!
’

‘Ha!’ Old Hag cackled. ‘I was doing all right until you interfering kids came along. With the right training and an effective appraisal system, Sampson here could have been the most reviled person in modern times, after certain British prime ministers, all members of parliament, and disgraced TV game show hosts, and he’d have made me the most famous old hag in history!’ She looked up at Sampson. ‘You were doing rubbish at it, though. The castanet solo was my last chance to turn you!’

Carefully, Sampson stood up, grimacing from the effects of the raging furnace in the central Birmingham area, now spreading to the suburbs as far as Erdington and Edgbaston. ‘You . . . you evil, nasty, unmotherly person!’ he cried. ‘You lied to me! I
never
suckled at your breast . . .’

‘Oh, please!’ moaned Amy.

‘. . . but,’ continued Sampson, still grimacing but now frowning as well, ‘I don’t understand how I was Clarissa and Bartle’s child until The Secret Five came along and now I’m Clarissa and Uncle Quagmire’s child. How could that be?’

Betty glanced at Daniel, Ricky glanced at Amy, Whatshisname opened one eye, couldn’t see anyone to glance at, so fell asleep again, back into the dream about the fit black poodle and the bondage game with the leash.

‘It’s best not to ask,’ Betty said to Sampson. ‘It’s the rather complex nature of the narrative, you see.’

‘And the inbuilt plot holes,’ added Ricky brightly. ‘It’s part of our unfailing charm. Apparently.’

‘And all this time travel can make it all so very complicated,’ said Daniel.

‘Why?’ asked Amy.

Just then, to everyone’s surprise, they heard the library door being opened rather suddenly! They all turned and looked at the door, fully expecting to be astonished to see George swarm in with a policeman who looked very much like Constable Landscape but in a modern day policeman’s uniform.

They weren’t disappointed.

‘Thank God!
¹
You’re both safe!’ sighed George after he had finished swarming in with the policeman. George stood with his feet apart, wiggled his hips and ran his very own fingers through his very own hair, yet again. ‘We heard all the contemporary commotion and the story climax dialogue so I called the police, after we had polished off the splendid buffet of course. Yeah!’ He pointed a finger dramatically at the policeman. ‘I have the utmost respect for the police, and always will have, yeah. Constable Simon Country here rushed over in his 1980 Series 3 Austin Allegro panda car to arrest and detain the evil ones, and the flying squad back-up are on their way in their Ford Granada GT . . .’ He stopped with a start. ‘Blimey! Jesus to a child
²
! Who
is
the girl with the big knockers? And who on earth is McFly?’

‘Erm, thank you, George,’ said Ricky. He pointed at Old Hag. ‘Constable Country, if you please, the evil moaning woman under the fat ugly dog with the pink fluffy collar is the one you want to arrest. She is the evil rogue behind the plot to nurture Sampson to dominate the world.’

Betty nudged Daniel. ‘Is that who I think it is?’ she whispered, nodding in George’s direction.

Daniel shrugged. ‘He could be,’ he whispered back. ‘Why, do you fancy him?’

‘Best not to,’ Betty replied.

Just then (which, for clarity’s sake, was a different just then from the previous one) a scruffy plain-clothes man in flared trousers swooped into the library, his tie undone and a cigarette hanging rather dangerously from his lips.

‘Ah,’ said the constable in a timely effort to explain the sudden appearance of yet another peripheral character. ‘The Flying Squad. Reinforcements at last.’ He raised his constable’s arm. ‘Over here, sir.’

The scruffy reinforcement approached and glared at them all. ‘You can all call me The Guvnor,’ he growled. ‘Capital T, capital G, capital N, if you please.’ He glared again, causing Amy to hide behind George.

The GuvNor pointed at Daniel. ‘You!’ he said. ‘Despite the pathetic attempt to disguise yourself with those naff spectacles, I sense that I must have seen your ugly mug before. You look well bad, you do, so I must have done.’ He walked up to Daniel, removed the cigarette from his very own lips, and pressed his face close to Daniel’s. ‘I’m The GuvNor, and I haven’t had my dinner yet, so unless you want a good kicking, you’d better come quietly, son.’

Daniel opened his mouth to protest, but only a feeble mewing came out. Betty tutted at Daniel.

The constable pointed at Old Hag. ‘But Guvnor . . . sorry, I mean GuvNor . . .’

‘Shut it, Constable!’ said The GuvNor. ‘I can always tell the criminal element, soon as I walk into a room. And this blagger is it.’ He breathed on Daniel’s spectacle lenses. ‘What’s your name, son?’

‘Dur . . . dur . . .’ stammered Daniel.

‘Well, Durdur,’ said The GuvNor, backing away from Daniel. ‘Get your trousers on, son. You’re well and truly nicked!’