The Various Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Dedication

  An Introduction

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  About the Author

  Copyright

  About the Book

  There have been stories of the ‘little people’ – piskies, fairies, call them what you will – ever since the world began. Whispered rumours are all they amount to, until a twelve-year-old child discovers the truth, hidden away among briars and brambles. The truth is strange and wild – and sometimes deadly.

  A compelling tale of the extraordinary tribes who struggle for survival in the land of human giants – you may even be tempted to seek them out for yourself . . .

  WINNER OF THE SMARTIES BRONZE AWARD

  Dedicated to all those who live precariously,

  yet remain hopeful.

  (And this includes my family, of course – Gina, Camille and Marcelle).

  You have been granted three wishes, And The Various is but the first. Coming soon, the second wish: Celandine.

  An Introduction

  The Various were not as Midge had imagined they would be. They were much taller for a start – well above knee-height – and rather grubby-looking. They gazed up at her in wary silence, their dark eyes full of suspicion, never blinking. Midge felt dizzy, overwhelmed by the sudden reality of it all. She stared back at them, a ragged little group, dressed in black and white for the most part, their weatherbeaten skin and broad features made yet more strange by the mottled sunlight at the edge of the clearing. Spears and arrows they had – not pointing at her directly, but obviously at the ready – and it occurred to her that she might actually be in some danger. She had forgotten what was expected of her. Shouldn’t she kneel, or curtsey or something?

  Their Queen, she couldn’t help thinking, wasn’t a bit beautiful. She was dumpy, and her eyebrows met in a deep scowl. Her grey hair was tied back in an untidy bun. She was obviously quite old – and this was more shocking than anything, somehow. Midge had never expected that the little people might grow old, as we do. The Queen sat, carefully posed, and looking ridiculously pompous, in a sort of wickerwork sedan chair – a rickety affair with carrying handles at either end. Her off-white dress had a purplish stain down the front of it (blackberry?) and she held a tatty black fan, half-raised and motionless, as though she were poised to issue a command. Her lips were painted, but badly smudged, and she wore long grey gloves, that looked as though they had been mended a few times. Midge pictured her trying to fly, this tubby little creature in her faded finery, and she began to bite the inside of her cheeks to stop herself from giggling. The silence had become a strain.

  Then a tiny spinning movement caught her attention, as a stray sycamore seed – a relic of the previous autumn – twirled gently down from the trees and landed abruptly on the Queen’s head, where it remained, a homely decoration, perched just so on her grey bun. And that did it. Midge started to laugh. Her snorts and splutters rang through the sunlit clearing, startling the pigeons in the trees, as the strange assembly stared up at her, outraged.

  Chapter One

  A WEEK AGO she had been bored, bored, bored. The prospect of spending most of the summer holiday in the West Country with her cousins wasn’t so bad – although she could barely remember them, not having seen them for years – but for the first fortnight they would still be away with their mother somewhere, and so that meant staying on her own with Uncle Brian until they arrived.

  Uncle Brian was her mother’s elder brother. He was OK, as far as she could recall, but he was unlikely to be much fun. And anyway, she felt weird about living in some big old half-derelict farmhouse with just Uncle Brian for company.

  ‘Do I have to go?’ she asked her mum. ‘Can’t I wait until Katie and George get back? Couldn’t I stay here till then?’

  ‘Darling, you know you can’t stay here all by yourself,’ her mum had said. ‘We’ve been through all this. Please don’t make me feel any worse than I do already. You’ll be fine, and anyway, Brian’s easy enough to get along with. You’ll remember him when you see him.’

  Well, it was easy for her to say, thought Midge. Swanning around with the Philharmonic and having all the fun (‘actually it’s not much fun, darling, it’s really quite hard work,’) while she, Midge, had to kick about a deserted old farm waiting for her cousins to arrive.

  ‘I still can’t see why you don’t take me with you,’ she grumbled – although this was an old tack, and she knew it would get her nowhere. Worth a last try, though.

  She remembered something else. ‘Mr Powers takes his children.’ Mr Powers was second oboe, and lived quite close by. They occasionally bumped into him in Safeway.

  ‘Mr Powers does not take his children, Margaret. Mr Powers sometimes takes his wife and his children. There’s a difference. And only then if it’s just a weekend concert and not too far away. This is a four week tour, darling. Four weeks! Living in hotels, up late every night, flying around here there and everywhere. It’s no life for a twelve-year-old.’

  ‘Yeah, it sounds like hell,’ said Midge, and knew even as she said it that she’d crossed one of those invisible lines that her mother drew around their conversations.

  ‘Listen, Margaret. This is my job. It’s what I do, and believe me it’s not easy. I’m a single parent and a professional musician. The two don’t always go together very well. Now Brian has very kindly said that he’ll look after you for a few weeks, and I think we should both be extremely grateful. I know I am.’

  Midge came within an inch of saying, ‘Yeah, I bet,’ but managed to bite back the words. She felt, as she had always felt, that the ‘job’ came first as far as her mother was concerned, and that her daughter was often an inconvenience, something to be organized, palmed off, dealt with. And lately things had become worse. Her mum seemed to be perpetually distracted and on edge – hardly there, somehow. The best times were when the orchestra was resting and there was time off from the otherwise constant round of rehearsal and performance. Then they got along pretty well. But as soon as a new tour was scheduled, Midge felt that she was just a nuisance, no longer deserving of much attention.

  ‘Left playing second fiddle,’ she often thought, wryly. Second fiddle was what her mother actually did play – although she didn’t call it a fiddle of course.

  And so she arrived at Taunton bus station after a two-and-a-half hour coach journey, collected her bags and magazines together, and tried to look through the dusty windows to see if her Uncle Brian had arrived to meet her. Midge recognized him almost straight away, although he looked a bit older now than when she had last seen him. He was peering up at the windows in the way that people do when they’re meeting someone from a coach or train – smiling already, even though they can’t yet see the person they’re smiling for. He wore a very red jumper and those awful ye
llow corduroy trousers you only ever seem to see on people who live in the country. (Midge thought of herself as a ‘townie’, and a rather sophisticated one at that.) His hair – which Midge had remembered as being black – had gone much greyer, and he had a very definite bald patch, which she could clearly see from her high position in the coach.

  ‘Hallo Midge! You look cheerful!’ Uncle Brian stretched his arms out towards her as she got off the coach, and Midge wondered for a moment if he was going to kiss her, or shake her hand, or something embarrassing like that. But he was only reaching for her hold-all and carrier bags. ‘Here, let me take those things. Had a good journey?’

  ‘Not bad, thanks. How are you, Uncle Brian?’

  ‘I’m extremely well, my dear. Can’t grumble at all. Now then, let’s see if we can’t get you back home before the soup’s ruined. Car’s parked just round the corner, right opposite the Winchester.’

  Midge remembered hearing about the way in which Uncle Brian’s sense of geography always seemed to involve the name of a pub, or hotel. Her mum sometimes said that Uncle Brian would probably describe the Pyramids of Egypt as being ‘just down the road from the Dog and Sphinx.’

  Mum didn’t seem to have much time for Uncle Brian – not that it stopped her from using him as a babysitter now that it suited her. ‘He’s a “nearly” man,’ she would say. ‘Good at everything – but not quite good enough at anything.’ She had never forgiven him for inheriting Mill Farm, that was the trouble. Mum and Brian had grown up there as children. Mum had left home, gone to university and music college, then had become a professional musician and something of a success. Her brother Brian had stayed at Mill Farm, got married, fathered two children, separated, looked after his mother, Midge’s granny, until she died, and then the farm had been left all to him.

  ‘I got nothing,’ Midge’s mum would say bitterly. ‘What a slap in the face that was. Nothing at all. It should have been shared between us. And what does Brian know about farming? Lived there all his life and still wouldn’t know one end of a hay-rake from the other! Or rather he’d know how to fix it, without knowing when to use it. Tried pig-farming. Didn’t work. Tried cider-making – planted acres of trees and used up God knows how much capital. Didn’t work. Agricultural machinery auctions, bed and breakfast, go-karts – you name it, he’s messed it up. He’s messed up his life, the farm and his marriage. Brian’s a fool. Or rather he’s not, and that’s the trouble. He’s a nearly-man. Nearly good enough. But not quite.’

  Yes, she could be pretty scathing, could Mum, when she got on to the subject of Brian. Until she wanted him to do something for her, of course.

  But he was being friendly enough now, and actually quite funny in a shy sort of way, as they threw the bags into the back of his battered old estate car and drove out of Taunton.

  ‘Poor old Midge, you must be wondering what you’ve ever done to deserve this. Stuck on a farm with Mad Brian,’ (he rolled his eyes and stuck out his tongue), ‘and nearly two weeks till the cavalry arrives. You must have been a terrible sinner in a previous life. Seriously though, when Christine phoned to ask if you could come and stay, I said delighted, of course, but what on earth will the poor girl do until Katie and George get down here?’ Uncle Brian glanced across at her. ‘I gather you’re a big reader,’ he said.

  Yes, thought Midge, that’s just the kind of thing her mother would have said. ‘Don’t worry about Margaret, Brian. Just give her a stack of books and you won’t see her for a fortnight.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I do like reading. Don’t worry, Uncle Brian, I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Well listen, I thought perhaps we could try and organize a couple of trips out at least. Perhaps go to the cinema, or maybe ten-pin bowling at that place in Taunton. What’s it called – the Hollywood Bowl?’

  Poor Uncle Brian, he was trying. Midge imagined him in his big old yellow cords, attempting to have a jolly time at the bowling alley. ‘It’s OK, Uncle Brian,’ she said kindly, but half mischievously, ‘I’m sure you like skittles better.’

  ‘Well, you know, I do like a game of skittles. I won a pig a few summers ago at the local fête. Mind you, I was up to my ears in pigs at the time, so I gave it back. But Midge, if there’s anything you want to do, or anywhere you want to go to pass the time a bit, then you will speak up, I hope.’

  The inside of the car was scruffy, and smelt of dogs and hay. The back seats were folded down and the vehicle was obviously a maid-of-all-work, used for everything and anything. One of the foot control pedals kept making a funny noise – a long protesting squeak – every time Uncle Brian pressed his foot down on it. Midge glanced down into the driver’s footwell, and noticed that her uncle was wearing quite a smart pair of polished brown brogues – but no socks. His ankles showed up pale and strange in the shadow of the footwell.

  Midge was so surprised that she spoke without thinking; ‘Uncle Brian, you’ve got no socks on!’ and immediately felt embarrassed.

  Uncle Brian laughed, though, and said, ‘Less a case of not wearing socks, and more a case of am wearing shoes!’ This made Midge feel even more confused. Did her uncle usually go barefoot then? But Uncle Brian went on, ‘I was padding around the house in bare feet looking for my sandals – it suddenly felt like that kind of weather – then realized that the time was getting on and I needed to be heading for Taunton to pick you up. So I bunged on the first pair of shoes I came across. Happened to be my Sunday best. Don’t worry,’ he added, ‘I may be crazy, but I can dress myself.’ He saw that the remark had hit home and that Midge may well have had her doubts about him, and he laughed again. ‘What have they been saying about me?’ He was obviously amused and not at all offended.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Midge. But it was true that her mum’s remarks had led her to expect that her uncle might be a bit weird. Harmless probably, but definitely a weirdo. And yet he wasn’t really that odd, as far as she could tell. He just wasn’t much like her mum, that was all.

  ‘Do you mind if I phone Mum?’ she said. ‘I just remembered I promised.’

  ‘Yes, do,’ said Uncle Brian. ‘You’ve got a mobile then?’

  ‘For my birthday,’ said Midge. She pulled out her new phone, and took it out of its soft case.

  ‘Coo!’ said Uncle Brian, sounding like a schoolboy and obviously impressed, ‘it’s tiny!’

  Midge’s mother answered the phone in the slightly breathless manner she always affected – as though she were either just rushing out or just rushing in. Which very often was the case, of course. ‘Christine Waaalters!’

  ‘Hi Mum, it’s Midge.’

  ‘Margaret! Everything all right, darling? Have you arrived?’

  ‘We’re in the car. I’m fine.’

  ‘Uncle Brian found you then?’ She sounded as though there may always have been the possibility that he wouldn’t.

  ‘Yes, he was there waiting.’

  ‘Now have you got everything?’ Midge looked out of the window, bored now, and answered her mother’s questions automatically. No thought was required. It was a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ conversation. Finally, her mum got to the end of the list and said, ‘Well have a lovely time, darling. Be good and look after yourself.’

  ‘You too, Mum. Bye.’

  ‘Say hello to Brian for me.’

  ‘OK. Bye.’ Midge snapped the little popper shut and squeezed the phone back into her pocket. ‘Mum says “hi”,’ she said.

  ‘Good old Chris!’ said Uncle Brian, with an enthusiasm that took Midge rather by surprise. ‘What a gal! Very clever woman, your mum,’ he added. ‘Always knew she’d go far. Always had that drive – you know? That drive!’

  ‘Yes,’ said Midge. She did know.

  And so the journey passed comfortably enough. They crossed Sedge Moor, the Somerset Levels, flat and still partially flooded from the recent summer storms, then rose up higher through narrow leafy lanes, past some dense and ancient-looking acres of woodland – thickly overgrown and untended – and finally wound in throug
h a rickety wooden gateway, once painted white but now peeling and green with tree-sap. The sign on the gate said ‘Mill Farm’ in whitish letters on a faded blue background. The car swung into a weed-strewn cobbled yard, past a couple of tumbledown farm buildings and came to a halt in front of the main house.

  Midge’s passenger door window was open, the weather being warm and dry for a change, and she was instantly struck by the peaceful silence as the car engine died. There was no noise other than the sound of the birds, the warm rustle of the leaves in the trees, and the buzz of a passing insect. No traffic, no roaring jets, no people, no city. Just peace. She looked up at the house. Remote, overgrown and neglected, the old Somerset longhouse nevertheless seemed friendly and unthreatening in the bright sunshine. The honey-coloured stone from which the house was built, although weathered and stained, could never look sinister or forbidding.

  Midge got out of the car and looked about her. Rust-red barn doors hung uncertainly on their hinges, bits of disused machinery lay everywhere, overgrown with nettles. An ancient milk churn, once used as a plant-holder but now perforated to the point of disintegration, stood by the open farmhouse door. (Uncle Brian had obviously not worried about locking the place up before he left.) A couple of tatty hens scratched around on the doormat, just inside the threshold, and she caught a glimpse of a tiny kitten – far too young to be out by itself – playing in a tipped-up Wellington boot that lay on the front path (where it may well have been lying for weeks, judging by the state of it). The whole place looked derelict, disused – and entirely delightful. Midge just loved it instantly. She had never been here in her life before, to her knowledge, and yet she felt somehow as if she had come home. Home to Mill Farm.

  ‘And of course, my time’s pretty well my own,’ said Uncle Brian. He had not spoken for half an hour, but was obviously still continuing their earlier conversation. ‘So if you should want to pop over to Taunton, to the library or whatever, then you just say so. Always best to go in the morning though. Don’t do much in the afternoons usually.’