Читать книгу Those Dreadful Children - Enid blyton - Страница 6

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Margery, John and Annette did keep away from the garden wall for the next two days. They heard the shouts of the Taggerty children, and they heard the deep woofs of Dopey. Once they heard the baby crying.

“I saw Pat looking over our wall this morning,” said John to Margery. “I don’t think we’d better let him see us, because he doesn’t know that we live here. He might go and tell Annette he saw us in his garden last week, if he sees us—and then she’d tell Mother.”

“I suppose Annette really is a tell-tale, just as Pat said,” said Margery. “Fancy his telling her that! If we did she’d complain to Mother and we’d get a scolding. Mother always treats Annette as if she was still a darling baby, but she isn’t. John, I wish I could see that baby next door. I do like babies. They’re better than dolls because they can really move and make noises.”

“I don’t want to see the baby!” said John, scornfully. “It will be like the rest of them—dirty and rude—and smelly too, I expect.”

“Oh, I shouldn’t like it very much if it was smelly,” said Margery. “I hope it isn’t. I like the smell of babies usually—such a nice fresh baby-smell—of baby-powder and soap. I wonder if it’s a boy or a girl.”

Mother went to see her friend, Mrs. Wilson, to ask her about the Taggertys. “Are they nice?” she asked. “What about the children? One of them wasn’t very polite to little Annette the other day.”

“My dear, they’re awful!” said Mrs. Wilson, wrinkling up her nose. “Not at all the sort of people for our road. A great pity they came, I think.”

“Oh, dear,” said Mother. “What a shame! As they live at the bottom of our garden I rather hoped they would be nice. The children would like to play with others living so near.”

“They’ve no manners at all,” said Mrs. Wilson. “Not one between them. And Mrs. Taggerty came borrowing something the very day after she moved in. And hasn’t returned it yet. Such an untidy woman, too. Pleasant though. She had a dreadful dog with her that simply romped all over my geraniums. And Mrs. Taggerty never said a word to stop him.”

“Oh, dear!” said Mother again. “I’m afraid they will be impossible as friends. I must warn the children to have nothing to do with them.”

“My dear, your three are so well brought up that I am sure they wouldn’t have anything to do with the Taggertys anyhow,” said Mrs. Wilson. “That little Annette of yours now—a sweet child, with such lovely manners. What a pretty little thing she is—and you always dress her so beautifully, too.”

Mother was pleased. “Yes, Annette is a dear pet. Well, all of them are, really, though my husband does complain sometimes that John isn’t a real boy! He’d like him to swarm up trees and tear his clothes, and crawl through bushes and splash through puddles and goodness knows what. Well, there’s no need for children to do things like that, and I don’t like it. I like well-brought-up, well-behaved children, who like to be clean and tidy, and helpful to others.”

“Well, yours certainly are all that,” said Mrs. Wilson. “A pleasure to be with. Do let them come to tea with me one day next week. As for those Taggertys, don’t you let your children mix with them. Yours might be good for the Taggertys, but the Taggertys wouldn’t be good for yours.”

When Mother got home she called the children to her. “I’m sorry to say that I haven’t had a very good report about the Taggertys,” she told them. “There’s no need to repeat to you what I’ve heard, but all I want to say is this—the Taggerty children are not our sort, and I don’t want you to play with them. You can be polite, and say ‘hallo,’ but no more than that.”

The children were glad. They didn’t want to know those rough children and their dog.

“I don’t expect they go to church or to Sunday School, and I don’t expect they even say their prayers,” said Margery. “Do you think they clean their teeth, Mother?”

“Oh, I expect so,” said Mother. “That’s their business, not ours. Now, I’m going to go and see Granny. Who wants to go with me?”

Nothing more was said about the Taggertys that day. The three children spent the rest of the day with their granny, and she praised their behaviour to their mother.

“Really, they are a credit to you,” she said. “You are lucky to have such good children. I don’t believe they are ever naughty.”

“No, they’re not really naughty,” said Mother. “Their father says sometimes he wishes they were. He thinks they’re too good, you know. But that’s only because he was a very naughty little boy when he was small, and he can’t understand John’s not wanting to be naughty and mischievous, too.”

The children didn’t go down to the bottom of the garden at all for some days. Annette wouldn’t even go half-way down, she was so afraid of seeing Pat and having something rude called out to her. They couldn’t help hearing the Taggerty children though, for they always seemed to be playing some exciting game.

“Red Indians, or robbers and policemen, I should think,” said John. “I wish they were nice. I’d love to play those games with them. It’s no fun playing them with Annette, because she screams at the least thing.”

Then on Saturday something surprising happened. It was when the children were having their midday dinner. Daddy always came home for dinner on Saturdays, and the children liked that. He served out the stew, and then began to talk.

“Mother,” he said, “I met a very famous writer yesterday. I meant to have told you. He was at school with me as a boy, and when he grew up he became famous as a writer of books. Very fine books they are, too.”

“Really?” said Mother, busy taking the meat off the bones for Annette. “Where did you meet him?”

“Well, I went to a tea-shop I sometimes go to, to buy chocolates for you and the children,” said Daddy, “and there, having tea, was old Dickie—and his family with him! My word, you’d have liked his children, Mother.”

“What were they like?” asked Margery.

“Well, there was a boy, about John’s age, I suppose,” said Daddy. “A fine boy, merry and with plenty to say. A proper boy, too—won all the races at his last sports, can climb any tree, according to his father, and is as plucky as a boy can be. He broke his ankle last year, doing something mad, and never made a murmur about it.”

“What were the others like?” asked Annette.

“There was a girl like you, Annette, an amusing little thing. She was quite squashed by the others, but she didn’t seem to mind a bit. A little monkey, I should think. And there was another girl, too. I like her very much. So natural and friendly.”

“They sound nice,” said Margery.

“They were rather noisy and excited,” said Daddy. “Their mother was there too—such a nice, friendly woman, enjoying the treat as much as the children were. Well, well, it was a surprise to meet old Dickie, I must say—and to find him with a family too. Of course, I told him all about you—and I do want you all to be friends.”

“Oh yes!” said Annette. “I want a friend. I’d like that little girl to play with. But where do they live, Daddy?”

“Well, now I’ve got a surprise for you,” said Daddy, beaming all round the table. “A real surprise. They’ve come to live here, in our village! They live next door but two to Mrs. Wilson, Mummy’s friend. Isn’t that strange? It will be nice to have old Dickie round in the evenings.”

There was a silence. Everyone looked at Daddy. Mother asked the question they were all thinking. “Daddy—what is their name?”

“Taggerty,” said Daddy. “Dickie Taggerty sat by me at school, and he was always first in composition, and vowed he’d be a writer one day. And so he is—at the top of the tree, too. I am proud to know him. Well, you’ll call on Mrs. Taggerty, won’t you, Mother, and ask the children round to tea?”

There was another silence. The children’s hearts sank. Goodness! To think it was the Taggertys that Daddy had been talking about. That dreadful family.

“Oh dear,” said Mother, at last. “Daddy, the Taggertys live in the house whose garden joins ours at the bottom. And, dear, they are not really very nice children. So rough and dirty and rude.”

“Well—they seemed a little untidy, and they certainly had plenty to say, and could have done with a little better manners,” said Daddy, “but they were thoroughly nice children, natural, jolly and friendly. I liked them. It would do ours good to know them. And it might do them good to know ours too. You’d like Mrs. Taggerty, I’m sure, dear. Most amusing, and so jolly.”

Mother didn’t look as if she would like Mrs. Taggerty at all. Whatever was she to do? She didn’t want to make friends with the Taggertys at all—and now Mr. Taggerty had turned out to be Daddy’s old friend at school! It really was too bad.

“Well, will you call on the Taggertys?” asked Daddy, sounding a little impatient. “I want to ask old Dickie round here, and we must ask his wife too. And the children would mix quite well together—exactly the right ages. There’s a baby too, Mrs. Taggerty said.”

“I don’t think they would mix, Peter,” said Mother. “Really, the Taggerty children are very rough and not well brought up at all. I don’t want John and Margery to make friends with children like that.”

“John’s too girlish,” said Daddy. “I want him to be more of a boy. That elder Taggerty boy will shake him up a bit. And the little girl will soon stand up to Annette and teach her not to cry so much.”

John looked alarmed, and Annette looked ready to cry. Daddy looked at Margery.

“And I’ve no doubt Margery will get over her fear of this, that and the other,” he said. “The Taggerty children have all kinds of pets—a dog, a cat, pet mice——”

Margery gave a scream. “Mice! I’ll never never go near the Taggertys if they keep mice.”

“I had twenty pet mice once,” said Daddy, “and two of them lived in my trousers pocket for a week. It’s a pity you children have no pets. You none of you seem to have my love for animals. I’d like a dog myself, but I suppose Margery and Annette would have a fit if it jumped up at them. Mother, it’s time we did something about these children of ours. They’re good and well-behaved, and truthful, and nice-mannered—but are they proper children? No, they’re not! I tell you, they want a bit of shaking up.”

“I don’t agree with you, Peter,” said Mother, in a smooth sort of voice. “But don’t let’s discuss it now, dear. I will call on Mrs. Taggerty, if you want me to, but please don’t make us enter into any close friendship with them, if we do find they are not the kind of people we like.”

“Well, we’ll see,” said Daddy, looking rather annoyed. “What’s the pudding? Oh, cherry pie, good! I’ll have a nice big helping, please, because I’m going for a long walk this afternoon. Anyone want to come with me?”

Nobody did. John knew he ought to say he would come, because Daddy liked boys who wanted to go for long walks and tramp through the woods and over the hills. But John didn’t like walks. He wanted to stay at home and read.

“Well, I’m off,” said Daddy, in a disappointed voice, when he had finished his pie. “Now, if only we had a dog I could take him for company. But we haven’t. Good-bye.”