"Baldwin, Barry - Party Time" - читать интересную книгу автора (Baldwin Barry)

= Party Time
by Barry Baldwin


Charlie was all togged up in clothes he'd only worn once before, as page boy at somebody's wedding: a white shirt-cum-blouse, brown velveteen shorts, ankle socks, and blue Junior Start-Rite shoes that he'd been forced to shine up with Cherry Blossom polish till his arm hurt: "If you're going, you may as well look the part," his father had said, "but don't run away with the idea that this is going to be a regular thing."

He'd been scrubbed as clean as a whistle. His eyes were still smarting from the carbolic in them, his fault (he was loudly told) for not standing still at the kitchen sink while he was being made presentable, and his hands and knees were tingling from the pumice-stoning they'd been given. Such hair as he had was plastered down with soap and water, with a dab of his father's Brilliantine to be on the safe side.

It was Charlie's first birthday party. According to his father they were a waste of time and money, so he didn't have any of his own, which meant he wasn't often asked to anybody else's, and when he was that was a waste of time and money as well. He had strict instructions backed up by a light but intentionally painful tweak of the ear to hand over the present he was clutching the minute he got there and to be sure to ask for the lavatory before he had any accidents or there'd be big trouble when he got back. Charlie thought, but didn't say, that he'd only ever once filled his pants as far as he could remember and that was his father's fault for not listening when he'd told him he had to go. His mother knew this just as well as Charlie did, but even if she'd been there she wouldn't have backed him up. These days, she didn't come in on either side of anything.

The party was only down the yard at one of the end houses, so no one had to take him there or fetch him back. Charlie supposed that was a reason he was being allowed to go, since it wouldn't interfere with his father's precious Saturday afternoon. But he knew the main thing was that he would be leaving the coast clear for a few hours, especially as his mother had gone into the city to do her shopping and was stopping on to have tea with somebody she'd known at school. Or so he'd said she'd said.

Charlie got down to the party all right, kicking the door of the woodshed for luck as he passed it. He hoped Tony would turn up; nobody else counted. The birthday boy was in fact the birthday girl. Ann, a soppy-cake, in white taffeta most of the time with coloured slides and Small Girl kirby grips all over her curly hair despite the shortages of such things, one of those Pears Soap Preparing-To-Be-A-Beautiful-Lady advertisement kinds of girl; Charlie was washing-soap, Cuticura at best.

She hadn't been in the yard all that long. Her father was away in the forces --Charlie's had been kept out by varicose veins, so was on Home Guard duties --and her mother had suddenly decided to go off and be a Land Girl, so her granny had taken her in. Charlie was her friend, but she wasn't his. He didn't mind playing with her when there were no boys available, since she had a swing set and he hadn't. He usually pushed the swing in such a way that she either fell out and got hurt or became sick and giddy and had to be taken indoors, leaving him with it all to himself.

The door was open, so Charlie just went in. Party or not, that's what they always did in the yard. The place was full of girls making a lot of typical noise even though they weren't running around playing proper games but just standing about or squatting in little groups, the way they did. There were a few other boys, all watching Tony who was happily sitting on the face of Billy Watson. Nobody minded this, since Billy Watson was delicate, which meant he was allowed to be mardy whether anyone was sitting on his face or not, so it was a blessing not to have to listen to his grizzling.

Charlie was relieved to see Tony there. Although he was bound to have been asked, he was very good at persuading or terrorising his parents into letting him not go to things he didn't want to. He was a bit older and a lot bigger than the rest, and he could stop grown-ups in their tracks by shouting out words that Charlie and the others didn't dare use even among themselves. He was their hero. The girls were all going to marry him when they grew up. Tony himself didn't have birthday parties, not in the same way that Charlie didn't have them, but because he was taken out by himself on special treats. The reason he got invited everywhere was that his parents ran the village pub, so the others wanted to be well in with them. So did Charlie and company, since whenever they managed to play there they were guaranteed plenty of fizzy pop and crisps. Their parents had to put up with stomach ache and sick on the floor when they came home from an afternoon at Tony's, but there was the compensation of saving some food since they never wanted any tea.

Charlie remembered to find Ann's granny first, which wasn't hard since their house like his only had the kitchen and the one living room downstairs, and hand over the present as per instructions. He imagined it was some kind of stupid doll; nobody had told him. Ann herself wasn't there just then to say Thank You, and Charlie thought he might be able to miss speaking to her at all, which would be a good trick to pull off at her own party.

Stopping only to make Doreen Cartwright cry by telling her that her pink dimpled face looked like a Spangle, Charlie pushed through the others to help Tony by sitting on Billy Watson's tummy. That was all right for a bit, but then Tony told him to get up and pull Billy Watson's sailor suit trousers down and cut off his willy with the big penknife complete with the special gadget for removing stones from horses' hooves which he took from his own pocket. On hearing this, Billy Watson began to squirm furiously, so much so that he managed to throw Tony off his face and howl for help. Charlie was sure they were going to get into trouble with Billy Watson's mother who hadn't left after bringing him, but all she did was look across at Tony with a funny smile from under her Victory Roll sausage hair, so it was Ann's granny who came over and sharply told them to leave Billy Watson alone, using her most dreaded threat, "Do you want smacked legs?"

She then announced that it was time for tea. Tony looked rebellious, so Charlie did as well, wondering if Tony was going to come out with one of his words, but inside his stomach was crying out for food. Taking the chance to economise, his father had said, "I'm not having you spoil your appetite," and left Charlie out of the Saturday lunch that was normally one of the best meals at their house. Charlie'd thought it would have been fairer if his mother had been left out as well, since she was also going somewhere for tea.

The food was all right, though Charlie had been hoping to see some Spam. There were pilchard sandwiches, banana spread, jam tarts, Siege Cake, chocolate cream buns, blancmange, and two flavours of jelly. Doreen Cartwright's mother, who was helping, was very impressed: "My goodness, you've laid on a grand feast for them. However did you come up with chocolate cream buns?"

"A recipe I copied down from the wireless. One of Mabel Constanduros' on the Kitchen Front programme. It's all artificial. Still, they've never had anything else, have they?"

"They aren't half wolfing it down. I hope they leave a bit for us. And two jellies as well. Who do you know at the Ministry of Food?"

"Oh, her at the shop's very good about saving things for kiddies' birthdays if you tell her soon enough in advance. She kept the pilchards and one of the jellies under the counter for me, and I swapped her for the other one with some knitting wool she wanted."

The jellies were the kind made by pouring hot water on to the rubbery lumps that came in square packages as opposed to the crystals which only appeared at Christmas. They were just right for flicking across the table at one another. Charlie got Tony in the eye with a spoonful of orange, and Tony splattered Charlie with a load of lemon. Then, as usual, Tony was the first to get bored, so he threw an entire cup of Vimto at Billy Watson but to Charlie's suprise he missed and it went all over Ann, which got him sent away to a tune of "Look what you've done, you little devil, that's her best frock ruined," from her granny and "You wicked boy, what a waste, don't you know there's a war on?" from Doreen Cartwright's mother.

Tony clomped out, showing that he knew full well he'd gone up even more in the others' estimations, even Ann's despite her bursting into tears. But then Billy Watson's mother, who seemed more concerned about Tony than anything else, went over and practically pulled Billy Watson out of his chair and frog-marched him out of the room. Doreen Cartwright's mother asked if they ought to be fetched back, but Ann's granny said No, they were all as much trouble as each other in their own different ways, so good riddance to the lot of them.

"That Mrs Watson's a funny one," Doreen Cartwright's mother said, "hanging around here and the only time she lifted a finger to help was to keep piling extra food on to that Tony's plate."

"She's funny in a lot of ways, her. Gadding around like one of those Oomph Girls with her tight jumper and that sickly cheap scent. This isn't the only house she's been hanging around, if you take my meaning."

"You wonder what happened to Mr Watson, don't you? She doesn't seem very bothered about poor little Billy. They say it wouldn't take much to do him in for good."

"Oh, she's bothered, all right. By him, not about him."

Normally at parties, the drill was that, after they were let down from the table, the ruins of the tea would be left there while the grown-ups organised games, the official opening of the presents, and then more games until it was time to go. But on this occasion, since Tony's Vimto blitz and Billy Watson's mother's queer behaviour had left Ann screaming and the rest frantic with excitement, her granny wheeled in a couple of mothers who had been lined up with Doreen Cartwright's to help and set them about clearing the tea things away for washing-up.

Charlie thought that some of them, especially the girls, needed to be given a Bob Martin's animal Fit and Hysteria tablet, something his father would occasionally threaten him with. But he wasn't sure what was what at parties and anyway, with Tony and Billy Watson gone, he'd lost interest, so he sneaked out.