Nanny Piggins and the Accidental Blast-off (9 page)

‘Yes,’ said Samson. ‘I’ve got one of her accepting a certificate from the Guinness Book of Records for getting the most starch into one pair of underpants.’

‘Perfect,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Now, children, watch closely as I use some sticky tape to attach this picture to a soccer ball.’

The children watched Nanny Piggins. They had not been expecting to get an impromptu craft lesson.

‘I will place the ball on the ground so that Nanny Anne is looking at me, then take a few steps
back. Now, this is the important bit – I shall stare hard at Nanny Anne’s face …’ Nanny Piggins glared at the photograph so fiercely that the few children who had been foolish enough to turn and look at her instead of at the ball had to flinch away in fear, ‘… concentrating all my feelings of anger and resentment, pushing them down, deep down into my foot …’ Nanny Piggins was silent for a moment while she pushed her feelings. ‘And now I shall give Nanny Anne the good kick she deserves!’

Nanny Piggins ran forward and kicked the ball. Or rather she launched the ball. And because she kicked it so hard, it looked and sounded like it had been blasted out of a cannon. The black and white ball flew the entire length of the soccer field and disappeared into the darkness of the night.

‘Wow!’ said Derrick.

‘How do you do that?’ asked Michael.

‘She really is a very annoying woman,’ explained Nanny Piggins.

‘But we’ll never be able to kick like that,’ said Samantha.

‘Of course you will. Nanny Anne is annoying but she has never tried to teach me integers. I should imagine your feelings for your maths teacher are even stronger,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Come along,
everyone take out your photographs and use the sticky tape to attach them to a ball.’

The rest of the practice session went brilliantly. Young children are such easy targets for bullies, that every member of the team had lots of pent-up emotion towards some spiteful adult or cruel child. Balls were soon flying the length and breadth of the field. When Samantha remembered the time they had studied quadratic equations, she kicked the ball so hard she actually cracked one of the goal posts.

And so the day of the big match arrived. The Green children’s confidence began to waver when they saw the size and athleticism of their opponents.

‘What are we going to do?’ asked Samantha. ‘We can’t dribble or weave, we don’t know any set plays and the referee will never let us stick eleven different photographs to the soccer ball before we start play.’

‘Nine different photos,’ Derrick reminded her. ‘Three of us had photographs of Barry Nichols.’

‘You’ll be fine,’ said Nanny Piggins with complete confidence. ‘Tactics are just for people who haven’t got the skill to really kick the ball properly.’

‘Here he comes, here he comes!’ squealed Mr Green excitedly, as he saw the Senior Partner’s car pull up.

‘What did I tell you about not speaking until you are spoken to?’ asked Nanny Piggins sternly.

‘Sorry,’ mouthed Mr Green silently.

‘Ah, Green,’ said the Senior Partner. ‘Is this your team?’

Mr Green looked at Nanny Piggins to see if he had permission to speak. She nodded. ‘Yes,’ said Mr Green proudly. (He was not a great conversationalist.)

‘I look forward to seeing you all play,’ said the Senior Partner, smiling broadly at the children, ‘but remember the most important thing is that you have fun playing with your friends.’

‘No,’ said Margaret Wallace, ‘Nanny Piggins says the most important thing is that we have fun kicking our enemies.’

The Senior Partner’s brow creased as he puzzled over this statement. But he did not get an opportunity to ask any questions because at that moment the referee blew his whistle to start the game and the children jogged onto the field.

At first Mr Green’s team were indeed out-played. Their opponents wove around them and
effortlessly passed back and forth to score a classic goal. But that is where they made their big mistake. You see after you score a goal, the other team gets to take the ball back to the middle and kick off again.

This was Samantha’s job, so she was standing at the halfway line thinking dark thoughts about her maths teacher, waiting for the referee to get in position. She did not hear the taunts from the other team of ‘It’s just a girl’ and ‘Let’s get her’. She was too busy taking all her repressed rage and pushing it down into her foot. As soon as she registered the sound of the whistle she leapt forward and slammed her boot into the ball using every ounce of strength in her body.

The ball flew the length of the field, slamming into the opposition goalkeeper. It hit him so hard in the stomach he doubled over and stumbled backwards, collapsing on the ground so the ball rolled off his stomach into the net. And that is how Mr Green’s team scored their first goal.

From that point on it was a bloodbath. Mr Green’s team were blasting the soccer ball at the goal as if they had bazookas for legs. In the end, the opposition team forfeited the game at halftime because two of their players had broken kneecaps
(their fault for standing in front of Margaret Wallace when she was shooting for goal) and the rest of them were too afraid to go back on the field again.

‘Well, Green,’ said the Senior Partner, ‘you’ve done some extraordinary work with these children. They’re a pretty weedy bunch to look at, but you’ve certainly taught them how to kick.’

‘Thank you, thank you so much, sir,’ grovelled Mr Green. ‘Please allow me to run and fetch you an ice-cream from the kiosk.’

‘Okay, but shouldn’t you be getting ice-cream for all your team for winning their game?’ asked the Senior Partner.

Mr Green gulped. He instinctively disliked doing nice things for children. ‘Oh no, I think they’re all lactose intolerant,’ he lied.

‘They are not,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘They’ll all have three-scoop cones with a scoop of chocolate, a scoop of chocolate-chip and a scoop of chocolate with choc-chips.’

‘You heard the lady,’ laughed the Senior Partner.

Mr Green ran off to do as he was told.

‘But I suspect I should really be congratulating Green on his ability to delegate to a certain
glamorous assistant coach,’ said the Senior Partner, winking at Nanny Piggins.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said Nanny Piggins, although her blush gave her away.

It was April Fools’ Day, so Nanny Piggins and the children were baking biscuits in the shape of letters from the alphabet. This may seem like an unexpectedly educational thing to do, but the only reason they were making the letters was so Nanny Piggins could send Headmaster Pimplestock a rude message. She thought this was a tremendously funny idea. And how could the headmaster
complain when he received an insult in the form of 812 delicious sugar-coated shortbread cookies. (Nanny Piggins had thought up quite a long rude message.)

Unfortunately, just as they were sprinkling icing sugar over the warm biscuits, their festive activity was interrupted by the sound of a helicopter overhead. Now you are probably thinking – why would the sound of a helicopter interrupt a baking session? That is because you are thinking of the noise a helicopter makes when it is a long way overhead. But trust me, when a helicopter is hovering just thirty metres directly above your house it makes a noise so loud that all the furniture shakes, the crockery rattles and conversation becomes impossible.

‘What’s going on?!’ yelled Nanny Piggins as she bent over the cookies. Just in case the house did collapse, she wanted to shield the biscuits with her body. (Spending two days trapped in the rubble of a building would not be so bad if you had 812 biscuits to keep you company.)

Just then, the helicopter pulled away and there was an even louder sound, a voice bellowing from outside, ‘Nanny Piggins, we have the house surrounded. Come out with your hands up!’

‘I don’t know what to do, children,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Normally I never like to obey anyone who does not say “please”. But I am ever so curious to know why they have surrounded the house.’

‘Would you like us to hide you in the cellar until they go away?’ asked Michael. ‘We could build a secret wall and you could live as a recluse.’

‘Hmm, tempting as that does sound because the heroine in the Regency Romance novel I’ve just been reading did a very similar thing,’ mused Nanny Piggins, ‘I think I’d prefer to answer the door. I bet it is just someone we know playing a lovely practical joke. And the sooner we answer the door, the sooner I can play my own practical joke back, by biting them on the leg.’

And so Nanny Piggins and the children went to the front door fully expecting lots of laughing and joking and perhaps a pie fight to follow. They were soon to be bitterly disappointed, because when they threw open the door there was no smiling face. Just the grim expression of the Police Sergeant standing on the doorstep. And looking past him, they could see a dozen police patrol cars blocking the street with police officers cowering behind them.

‘Hello, Nanny Piggins,’ said the Police Sergeant.
He was not looking his normal happy self this morning.

‘Hello, Police Sergeant,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Have you naughty boys from the police station decided to play an April Fools’ trick on me? Well, it is a lovely thought. And I am flattered. But shouldn’t you have left some of your officers at the station in case a real crime happens.’

‘A real crime has happened,’ said the Police Sergeant.

‘Oh dear, and so early in the day. Poor you, Sergeant. I know you are not a morning person. Would you like a biscuit?’ asked Nanny Piggins. ‘I am prepared to edit the rude message I am writing to Headmaster Pimplestock because your need does seem greater.’

‘I’m afraid I can’t,’ said the Police Sergeant.

‘Really?’ said Nanny Piggins, very surprised. ‘But you love my butter shortbread biscuits.’

The Police Sergeant sniffed the air. The biscuits did smell good. But then he remembered why he had come and girded himself. ‘I can’t eat your biscuits because I have come here to arrest you,’ he said. ‘Sorry,’ he added as an afterthought, because he really was a very polite policeman.

The children were horrified.

‘But you can’t arrest Nanny Piggins,’ protested Derrick, ‘because, because …’ (He struggled here because he knew his nanny well, so he knew that there were actually several dozen reasons why the Police Sergeant probably
should
arrest her.)

‘You can’t arrest her because we won’t let you!’ declared Samantha boldly, standing in front of her nanny with her arms outstretched.

‘It’s all right, Samantha,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘The Police Sergeant is only joking. Men in uniform are always such tremendous pranksters. The helicopter overhead, the twelve police cars and the snipers I can see on Mrs Lau’s roof are all just part of a very elaborate practical joke. We should play along with it, it will be fun.’

‘I don’t think so, Nanny Piggins,’ worried Michael (and he was not a child normally given to worrying). ‘Snipers aren’t known for their sense of humour.’

‘Pish!’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘It would be rude not to play along when they have gone to so much trouble. All right, Police Sergeant,’ she said, winking at him as she offered up her wrists to be handcuffed, ‘why don’t you take me downtown and throw the book at me.’

And so the Police Sergeant was able to take
Nanny Piggins down to the station without her escaping in a cannon blast, swinging from building to building using her trapeze skills, disguising herself as a sanitation worker and disappearing into the sewers, or any of the other brilliant things he had imagined she might do.

It was only when she was down at the station and the Police Sergeant had the audacity to fingerprint her trotters, using ink that did not easily wash off with soap, that Nanny Piggins first began to suspect this was either a very poorly thought through practical joke, or she had really just been arrested. At this point she got very cross, and chased all the police officers around and around the station, giving them each several nasty bites on the leg and stamping on their feet. Eventually they were able to trap her in a cell (by throwing in a packet of chocolate biscuits, then slamming the door closed behind her when she instinctively lunged after them).

By the time the children had fetched Boris and caught the bus down to the police station, Nanny Piggins was a very sad pig indeed. Fortunately she was able to buck herself up by eating three or four hundred of the biscuits that the children had brought in for her. (The rude message to Headmaster Pimplestock would have to wait for another day.)

‘So why have they arrested you? What did you do?’ asked Samantha.

‘I didn’t do anything!’ protested Nanny Piggins, stuffing another two dozen biscuits in her mouth in an effort to control her rage.

‘No, of course not,’ comforted Derrick, ‘but what do they think you did?’

‘They are saying I broke into the Natural History Museum and stole the Giant Mumbai Diamond – which I certainly did not!’ said Nanny Piggins angrily, rattling the bars of her cell.

‘Oh, I read about that in the paper,’ said Samantha, ‘but it happened on Monday night, so it can’t have been you. That was the night you spent in Mrs Simpson’s attic trying to catch her possum.’

‘I know! That’s what I told the police,’ exclaimed Nanny Piggins, ‘but they say they are unable to verify my alibi.’

‘What does that mean?’ asked Michael.

‘Mrs Simpson won’t back her up,’ explained Derrick.

‘I probably should have told her that’s what I was doing,’ said Nanny Piggins regretfully. ‘She says she heard a lot of banging and crashing, and saw a foot stamp through the ceiling. But she thought it
was just her dead husband’s ghost, haunting her for forgetting to water his geraniums.’

‘But why did they arrest
you
?’ asked Michael. ‘If a giant chocolate cake had gone missing, I could see why you might be a suspect. But it’s not like you have a criminal record for stealing the world’s most valuable diamonds. You don’t, do you?’

‘Of course not!’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘No, they have arrested me because they have a witness who says he saw me.’

‘A witness!’ exclaimed the children.

‘But what sort of mean sneaking low-life would dob someone in for a crime she did not commit?’ asked Boris.

‘I don’t know,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘but there is going to be a line-up this afternoon where the witness has to pick me out. Which, under normal circumstances, would be thrilling because whenever I’ve seen line-ups in police programs I’ve always wanted to be in one so I could bite the real criminal. But it’s not so thrilling now there is a prospect of me being identified as the real criminal.’

‘Never mind,’ said Boris reassuringly. ‘I’m sure it’s all just a horrible mistake and the witness won’t be able to pick you out. It was probably one of those incredibly glamorous supermodels who did it. You
look so much like them, it would be an easy mistake to make.’

A short time later, Nanny Piggins was led into a room and asked to line up against the wall between four bedraggled-looking women.

Meanwhile in the next room, behind a two-way mirror, the witness was lead in to view the line-up.

‘All right sir, rest assured they can’t see you, so take your time,’ began the Police Sergeant.

‘It’s her, it’s her, it’s the pig in the middle!’ cried the witness before he’d barely even entered the room.

On the other side of the glass it was completely silent, but Nanny Piggins sniffed the air. She did not have to see or hear the witness to know who was dobbing her in.

‘I’d know that slightly mouldy smell anywhere,’ she declared. ‘That’s Mr Green! You dibber-dobber!! How dare you wrongly accuse me!!!’

She launched herself at the two-way mirror and put a large crack in it, even though it was bulletproof glass.

‘You said she couldn’t see me!’ squealed Mr Green.

‘Yes, but we didn’t realise she’d be able to smell you,’ protested the Police Sergeant.

The Police Sergeant tried to bustle Mr Green out of the police station before there could be an ugly confrontation, but he was too late. They met six burly police constables trying to restrain Nanny Piggins in the corridor.

‘Right, I demand you take these cuffs off immediately,’ declared Nanny Piggins. ‘I shall need to get a good grip of his leg before I bite him.’

‘It was her! I knew it, I knew she was trouble!’ yelled Mr Green triumphantly.

‘Oh, Father, how could you?’ asked Samantha. ‘You know you will only have to look after us yourself if you have Nanny Piggins arrested.’

That wiped the smile off his face.

‘I’m only dobbing her in because it is the truth,’ Mr Green complained petulantly.

‘Sir,’ chided the Police Sergeant.

‘And because of the $20,000 reward,’ added Mr Green, ‘but it was her I saw running out of the museum at two o’clock in the morning.’

‘But what were
you
doing outside the museum at 2 am?’ Derrick asked.

‘That’s none of your business,’ said Mr Green.

‘You were trying to avoid going home, weren’t
you?’ accused Nanny Piggins. ‘Monday night is the night they wax the floors in your office and you were just walking the streets until you’d be allowed back in.’

‘It’s not a crime that I love my job,’ sniped Mr Green.

‘You don’t love your job,’ accused Nanny Piggins. ‘You just love sitting in a room where someone else pays the electricity bills!’

Mr Green was eventually escorted from the building and taken home, with only a few small bite marks on his leg. Not that Nanny Piggins had a chance to bite him. It was Michael who’d had a go, when he saw his nanny was not able to reach.

‘What are we going to do?’ said Samantha as they all sat in Nanny Piggins’ cell, keeping her company. (The Police Sergeant was very good about letting Nanny Piggins bend the police station rules. He quite enjoyed it on the many occasions when she had been under arrest. Nanny Piggins was a lot more fun than the drunks, petty thieves and junior police officers he usually had to spend time with.)

‘Everything will be all right,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘If your father’s evidence is all they’ve got against me, I’m in the clear.’

‘But he’s prepared to testify in court,’ said Derrick.

‘Yes, but the jury will soon see he’s a sneaking weasel,’ explained Nanny Piggins. ‘Even if they believe him they’ll let me off just to spite him. It’s human nature.’

‘Are you sure?’ asked Michael.

‘Absolutely,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘as long as the police don’t find any more evidence, I’ll be fine.’