Just William - Richmal Crompton (have you read this book .TXT) 📗

all. If you don’t want William to take him out, will you take him out yourself?”

Robert retreated hastily to the dining-room and continued the conversation from a distance.

“I don’t want to take him out myself⁠—thanks very much, all the same! All I say is⁠—you know William as well as I do. I’m not finding fault with anything. I simply am stating a fact.”

Then William came downstairs.

“Here he is, dear, all ready for you, and you needn’t go far away⁠—just up and down the road, if you like, but stay out till teatime. He’s a dear little baby, isn’t he? And isn’t it a nice Willy-Billy den, to take it out a nice ta-ta, while it’s mummy goes bye-byes, den?”

William blushed for pure shame.

He pushed the pram down to the end of the road and round the corner. In comparison with William’s feelings, the feelings of some of the early martyrs must have been pure bliss. A nice way for an Outlaw to spend the afternoon! He dreaded to meet any of his brother-outlaws, yet, irresistibly and as a magnet, their meeting-place attracted him. He wheeled the pram off the road and down the country lane towards the field which held their sacred barn. He stopped at the stile that led into the field and gazed wistfully across to the barn in the distance. The infant sat and sucked its thumb and stared at him. Finally it began to converse.

“Blab⁠—blab⁠—blab⁠—blab⁠—blub⁠—blub⁠—blub!”

“Oh, you shut up!” said William crushingly.

Annoyed at the prolonged halt, it seized its pram cover, pulled it off its hooks, and threw it into the road. While William was picking it up, it threw the pillow on to his head. Then it chuckled. William began to conceive an active dislike of it. Suddenly the Great Idea came to him. His face cleared. He took a piece of string from his pocket and tied the pram carefully to the railings. Then, lifting the baby cautiously and gingerly out, he climbed the stile with it and set off across the fields towards the barn. He held the baby to his chest with both arms clasped tightly round its waist. Its feet dangled in the air. It occupied the time by kicking William in the stomach, pulling his hair, and putting its fingers in his eyes.

“It beats me,” panted William to himself, “what people see in babies! Scratchin’ an’ kickin’ and blindin’ folks and pullin’ their hair all out!”

When he entered the barn he was greeted by a sudden silence.

“Look here!” began one outlaw in righteous indignation.

“It’s a kidnap,” said William, triumphantly. “We’ll get a ransom on it.”

They gazed at him in awed admiration. This was surely the cream of outlawry. He set the infant on the ground, where it toddled for a few steps and sat down suddenly and violently. It then stared fixedly at the tallest boy present and smiled seraphically.

“Dad⁠—dad⁠—dad⁠—dad⁠—dad!”

Douglas, the tallest boy, grinned sheepishly. “It thinks I’m its father,” he explained complacently to the company.

“Well,” said Henry, who was William’s rival for the leadership of the Outlaws, “What do we do first? That’s the question.”

“In books,” said the outlaw called Ginger, “they write a note to its people and say they want a ransom.”

“We won’t do that⁠—not just yet,” said William hastily.

“Well, it’s not much sense holdin’ somethin’ up to ransom and not tellin’ the folks that they’ve got to pay nor nothin’, is it?” said Ginger with the final air of a man whose logic is unassailable.

“N⁠—oo,” said William. “But⁠—” with a gleam of hope⁠—“who’s got a paper and pencil? I’m simply statin’ a fact. Who’s got a paper and pencil?”

No one spoke.

“Oh, yes!” went on William in triumph. “Go on! Write a note. Write a note without paper and pencil, and we’ll all watch. Huh!”

“Well,” said Ginger sulkily, “I don’t s’pose they had paper and pencils in outlaw days. They weren’t invented. They wrote on⁠—on⁠—on leaves or something,” he ended vaguely.

“Well, go on. Write on leaves,” said William still more triumphant. “We’re not stoppin’ you are we? I’m simply statin’ a fact. Write on leaves.”

They were interrupted by a yell of pain from Douglas. Flattered by the parental relations so promptly established by the baby, he had ventured to make its further acquaintance. With vague memories of his mother’s treatment of infants, he had inserted a finger in its mouth. The infant happened to possess four front teeth, two upper and two lower, and they closed like a vice upon Douglas’ finger. He was now examining the marks.

“Look! Right deep down! See it? Wotcher think of that! Nearly to the bone! Pretty savage baby you’ve brought along,” he said to William.

“I jolly well know that,” said William feelingly. “It’s your own fault for touching it. It’s all right if you leave it alone. Just don’t touch it, that’s all. Anyway, it’s mine, and I never said you could go fooling about with it, did I? It wouldn’t bite me, I bet!”

“Well, what about the ransom?” persisted Henry.

“Someone can go and tell its people and bring back the ransom,” suggested Ginger.

There was a short silence. Then Douglas took his injured finger from his mouth and asked pertinently:

“Who?”

“William brought it,” suggested Henry.

“Yes, so I bet I’ve done my share.”

“Well, what’s anyone else goin’ to do, I’d like to know? Go round to every house in this old place and ask if they’ve had a baby taken off them and if they’d pay a ransom for it back? That’s sense, isn’t it? You know where you got it from, don’t you, and you can go and get its ransom.”

“I can, but I’m not goin’ to,” said William finally. “I’m simply statin’ a fact. I’m not goin’ to. And if anyone says I daren’t,” (glancing round pugnaciously) “I’ll fight ’em for it.”

No one said he daren’t. The fact was too patent to need stating. Henry hastily changed the subject.

“Anyway, what have we brought for the feast?”

William produced his licorice water and half cake, Douglas two slices of raw ham and a dog