Читать книгу Six Bad Boys - Enid blyton - Страница 4

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A very good-looking boy was walking up the front path. He was dressed in jersey and shorts, and his dark curly hair was thick and unruly. He had bright, cheeky eyes and a smile that won Pat’s heart at once.

“Good morning,” he said to Mrs. Mackenzie when she came to the door. “I expect you’ve seen us moving in next door—my Mum and I. Mum says she hates to bother you, but could you possibly lend us a kettle to make a pot of tea? Our kettle has completely disappeared.”

“Well, I was just going to send in to ask if you’d like a pot,” said Mrs. Mackenzie. “I’ll lend you a kettle too, with pleasure. Come in and wait a minute and I’ll make you some tea and you can take it back with you.”

The boy came in. He grinned at the twins and Pat. “Hallo! You’re neighbours, aren’t you? Does anything exciting go on in this town? I lived in Croydon before, and my word there was always something going on there. I belonged to a fine gang.”

“What’s a gang?” asked Pat.

“Oh—a whole lot of boys—and girls too sometimes,” said the boy. “What’s your name? Mine’s Bob Kent.”

“We’re twins, Jeanie and Donald, and this is Pat. She’s only a baby—she’s seven. We’re eleven,” said Jeanie.

“She’s no baby!” said Bob, grinning at Pat. “I once had a seven-year-old cousin to stay with me, and she was up to all sorts of tricks. I bet Pat is too.”

Pat was delighted at this. She never did get up to tricks, but she didn’t mind this boy thinking she did. She smiled broadly at him, hoping that he would be friends with her, and not with Jeanie and Donald. But he was so big for his age—he would never want a little girl like Pat!

Mrs. Mackenzie went into the scullery to boil a kettle. She liked Bob too—a merry boy with plenty of go in him, she thought. It would be fun for her family to have him to play with.

“Is your father coming soon?” asked Jeanie. “We only saw your mother.”

“My father’s dead,” said Bob. “He died last year. I miss him an awful lot. There’s only Mum and me, so I like to look after things—when she’ll let me!”

The twins felt sorry about Bob’s father. They loved their own father very much—he was cheerful and loving, and also strict, but they didn’t mind that so long as he loved them! They thought it must be dreadful not to have a father to say “Yes, you may” or “No, certainly not!” or to take them to the Zoo or on a picnic with Mother.

Mrs. Mackenzie appeared with the tea. She had put it on a tray with a jug of milk. She had put a glass of lemonade on the tray as well, and a plate of biscuits.

“Oh, thanks awfully,” said Bob. “I shall love a drink of lemonade. I’ll bring back the tray later. And thanks for the kettle too.”

He went off, carrying the tray carefully, giving Pat a broad wink as he went. She didn’t like to wink back. She stared after him, thinking that it really would be fun to have him next door. He didn’t think her a baby, so he might quite well play with her.

“Did you like Bob, Mother?” asked Donald. “I did. He’ll be fun—up to all kinds of things.”

“Yes, I liked him,” said Mrs. Mackenzie, secretly wondering what kind of things Bob would be “up to.” He had a bold look about him—she thought he would dare to do a good many things he ought not to do. And what a good-looking boy he was!

She looked at the twins—red-haired and freckled with greeny-brown eyes. Pat wasn’t red-haired, she was dark with brown eyes. Mrs. Mackenzie hoped that Bob would take a little notice of Pat. Pat was too shy, and too dreamy, and she suffered because the others were twins and didn’t need her. That made her a bit of a “mother’s girl,” but it couldn’t very well be helped.

Frisky the dog ran in, wagging his tail. He had taken the boy right to his front door. He liked him. He liked his loud, cheerful voice, and the way he stroked him and patted him—firmly and confidently. Frisky thought he was the right kind of boy for a dog!

“Well, anyway we’ve got one nice neighbour,” said Donald. “I expect he’ll go to school with us.”

It was Saturday, so there was no school that day. The twins went off for a walk with Frisky in the afternoon, and Pat went with her mother to see her aunt, though she wished and wished she could go with Jeanie and Donald.

The two new families settled in that day and the next. Curtains went up, and the houses began to look lived-in. When lights shone from the window at night the Mackenzies felt pleased.

“It’s nice to have people living each side of us again,” said Jeanie. “Mother, may we ask Bob to tea some time?”

“Ask him for Thursday,” said Mother. “Then he will have had time to settle in.”

Bob appeared at their school on the Tuesday. He was in a class below Jeanie and Donald, but higher than Pat’s, of course. The other three children from Summerhayes appeared also. They were well-dressed and neat.

They gave their names as Eleanor, Hilda, and Thomas Berkeley. Bob gave his as Robert Kent. He rushed up to Jeanie and Donald when the eleven o’clock break came.

“Hallo! I went to call for you this morning but you’d gone. Hallo, Pat! Have one of my biscuits?”

“Oh, thank you,” said Pat, proud that the big boy had singled her out for a biscuit.

“Are those the kids from the house on the other side of you?” asked Bob, nodding towards Eleanor, Hilda, and Thomas. “They look pretty stuck-up—and the boy looks bad-tempered, I think.”

“He’s not very nice to his sisters,” said Jeanie. “I saw him push one over just now.”

“Well, I might push a sister over if she was stuck-up,” said Bob. “Come on—let’s play burglars and policemen. I’ll be the burglar, you be the policemen. And Pat can be a detective and watch all I do.”

Bob made it a most exciting game, and they were all sorry when the bell went for lessons again. Bob shoved past Thomas as they went in. Thomas shoved back at once.

“Here! Who are you shoving?” he said.

“You,” said Bob, cheerfully. “What are you called—Thomas or Tom? I’m Bob. I live two doors away from you.”

“I’m Tom Berkeley,” said Tom, and looked closely at Bob. Bob grinned back, and Tom gave a sudden grin too, which made his sulky face look quite different.

The Mackenzies, Bob, and Tom all walked home together. Eleanor and Hilda walked some way behind, talking in low voices. They had been polite but not friendly.

“Haven’t made up their minds yet whether they want to know us or not!” Jeanie said to Donald.

Frisky came rushing to meet the children. Bob made a great fuss of him and so did Tom. “I wish I had a dog,” said Tom. “I’ve always wanted one, but my mother said it would have to belong to all of us if we had one, and I want a dog of my own.”

“But Frisky belongs to all of us!” said Donald. “We all share him—and he likes it.”

“You wouldn’t like sharing anything with my two sisters,” said Tom.

“I’d like a dog too,” said Bob. “But my mother says they’re a nuisance. They bring in mud and all that.”

“But you can always clear it up,” said Jeanie. “What’s it matter? Donald and I always clear up any mud Frisky brings in.”

“And I pick off the hairs he leaves on Mother’s sofa,” said Pat. “I’m glad our mother likes dogs.”

“Oh, my mother lets me have anything else I like,” said Bob, at once. “I go to the cinema, and I get plenty of sweets, and I’ve got a fine railway set. The rails take up the whole of the floor when they’re set out.”

“I had a set like that too,” said Tom. “But when we moved out of our big house to this small house, my mother sold my railway set. She said there wouldn’t be room to play with it here. My father was angry, because he’d said I could keep it. There was a fine old row.”

Jeanie and Donald remembered the loud, harsh voice scolding in the kitchen of the house next door, when the Berkeleys had moved in. They didn’t somehow think they would like Tom’s mother—especially if she had sold his lovely railway set!

“Will your father buy you another one?” asked Pat.

“No. Mother would only sell that too,” said Tom. “Do you know what he said? He said that he would sell one of my mother’s brooches because she’d sold my railway set! So she locks all her jewellery away. When she sold my railway set I’d a good mind to take one of her brooches myself and sell it!”

All the others looked at him, shocked and disbelieving. What a dreadful thing to say!

“Don’t you love your mother?” said Pat, in an amazed voice. “You couldn’t do a thing like that to her!”

Tom looked suddenly ashamed. He began to whistle loudly, then he stopped. “Look at old Frisky!” he said, changing the subject very abruptly indeed. “He’s found a bone or something!”

Frisky had indeed found a bone—but unfortunately it belonged to another dog! The dog leapt at him, growling, and Frisky dodged aside, still holding on to the bone. The other dog leapt again.

“Oh—Frisky will be bitten!” cried Pat. “He won’t let go the bone!”

Bob ran to the two growling dogs, and caught Frisky by the tail. Frisky barked crossly—and dropped the bone! The other dog snapped it up and was off at once.

“Good work!” said Tom admiringly to Bob. “I say—that was jolly plucky of you. You might have been badly bitten. I hate to interfere when two dogs begin a fight.”

“Thank you, Bob!” said Jeanie, and she thumped him on the back. “Frisky, you’re bad to steal another dog’s bone. Bad dog!”

Tom seemed to be very struck with Bob’s action. “I wouldn’t have done that for worlds,” he said. “I say, let me come and see your railway some time, will you?”

Bob was pleased. He liked being praised by a bigger boy. “I’ll ask my mother when you can come,” he said. “Well, here we all are—I’m off to my dinner. Good-bye!”