Читать книгу The 1,000-year-old Boy - Ross Welford, Ross Welford - Страница 10

All of that happened ages ago.

I have tried telling my story before, but I soon learnt that people do not want to know. I have to leave out crucial details like the life-pearls, and so people think I am teasing them (at best) or that I am dangerously mad (at worst).

So I stay schtum, as you say.

I sometimes wonder if people’s reactions would be different if I looked old? That is, if I were wrinkled and stooped and bald, with a quavery voice, and huge, veiny ears and badly fitting clothes. Then again, people would not bother with the ‘teasing’ bit, would they? They would immediately assume that age had sent me mad.

‘Bless ’im, old Alf,’ they would say. ‘He was on about the Vikings again today.’

‘Was ’e? Aww. It was Charles Dickens yesterday. Reckoned he’d met him!’

‘Really? Poor old soul. Mind, he’s harmless, in’t he? Away with the mixer, like, but harmless.’

As it is, I do not look old at all: I look about eleven.

At the point I stopped ageing, the Vikings had more or less completed their occupation of north-eastern England. It was the Scots that Mam and I were fleeing. It was to be another fifty or more years before the south of the country was invaded: 1066, by the Normans (who were basically Vikings who had learnt French, if you ask me, but nobody does. Nor-man, north-man – you can see the link).

And, in case you are interested, I did meet Charles Dickens, but not until many, many years later.

See? You do not believe me, do you? I cannot really blame you, seeing as I am the last remaining Neverdead on earth. And, now that Mam has gone, living forever is no life at all.

The trouble is, if you do not believe me, what chance do I have of convincing Aidan Linklater and Roxy Minto? I will need their help if I am to lift the curse of my endless life.

And if they do not believe me then I am, as you say these days, stuffed.