Jacky Daydream Read online

  ‘Hello, little girl. What’s your name?’ he said, starting to haul something heavy from the box.

  ‘Jacqueline, sir,’ I said.

  Oh, we were so polite in the fifties. I practically bobbed a curtsey.

  ‘You seem a very sensible little girl, Jacqueline,’ said George Cansdale. ‘Shall we show the other children just how sensible you are?’

  He was still hauling what looked like enormous skeins of khaki wool from the box. Loop after loop. Coil after coil. A snake! An enormous brown snake, with a mean head and a forked tongue flicking in and out.

  There was a great gasp, a collective series of Beano-comic exclamations: ‘Aah!’ ‘Ugh!’ ‘Eek!’

  I was so shocked I couldn’t even scream. I couldn’t back away because I had Biddy and hundreds of children pressing hard against me.

  ‘You’re not scared of snakes, are you, Jacqueline?’ said George Cansdale.

  I bared my teeth in a sickly grin.

  ‘Shall we show the other children how sensible you are?’ he said, reaching towards me, his arms full of writhing snake.

  He wound it round and round and round my neck like a loathsome live scarf.

  ‘There! Look how brave Jacqueline is,’ said George Cansdale.

  The children oohed and aahed at me. I stood still, the head of the snake an inch away, its tongue going flicker flicker flicker in my face.

  ‘There! Nothing to be frightened of, is there, Jacqueline?’ said George Cansdale.

  I was way past fright. Any second now I was going to wet myself. Mercifully, George Cansdale unwound the snake coil by coil until I was free at last. Biddy gave me a tug and tunnelled us through the crowd to the ladies’ toilets.

  ‘Why did you let him put that horrible slimy snake round you?’ Biddy said, dabbing anxiously at the velvet collar on my coat.

  ‘It wasn’t slimy, it was warm,’ I said, shuddering. ‘Oh, Mum, it felt awful.’

  ‘Well, you should have said something, not stood there looking gormless,’ said Biddy, but she gave me a quick hug nevertheless.

  That should have been enough excitement for one day, but Biddy was determined to get her money’s worth. We went to a kind of Mind Body Spirit section and had our bumps read by a shy man in spectacles still wearing a shabby brown demob suit. I’m surprised Biddy went for this, because his nervous fingers probed deep into our perms as he felt for significant bumps on our heads, wrecking our hairdos. Perhaps she was at a crisis point with Uncle Ron and wanted to see what fate had in store for her.

  The Bump Man seemed disconcerted by Biddy’s head.

  ‘You’re a real Peter Pan,’ he said.

  This pleased her no end, because she thought this meant she looked young for her age – which she did. He fumbled about in her curls, pressing and prodding, as if her head was a musical instrument and might start playing a tune. He said she was very bright and very determined. Then he ran out of steam and decided to do a bit of handwriting interpretation instead, maybe to reassure her she was getting her money’s worth.

  Biddy smiled happily. She always took great pride in her beautiful handwriting. The rare times she wrote a letter she always drafted it first and then copied it all out exquisitely in pen. The Bump Man admired her handwriting and said she was exceptionally neat and meticulous, which wasn’t really straining his psychic powers.

  Then it was my turn. I wrote my own much shakier signature. We were being mucked about at school. Every year the new teacher had different ideas about handwriting. I was currently in a class where we were all forced to write in very sloping copperplate with blotchy dipping pens and brown school ink. My natural handwriting was little and stood upright, so I was struggling. The Bump Man said my personality was still forming. He felt my head too, not so nervous of me, kneading it as if it was an awkward lump of dough. He asked me various silly questions and I muttered answers in monosyllables.

  ‘She’s very shy,’ said the Bump Man. ‘What do you like doing best, dear?’

  ‘Reading,’ I whispered.

  ‘Mm. Yes. You’re very dreamy.’

  ‘You’re telling me!’ said Biddy. ‘I sometimes think she’s not all there. What do you think she’ll be when she grows up?’

  ‘Oh, a teacher, definitely,’ he said.

  I was bitterly disappointed. I so so so wanted to be a writer. If I couldn’t ever get anything published, I wanted to be a hairdresser and create beautiful long hairstyles all day. I didn’t want to be a teacher. In the 1950s most teachers in primary school were in their forties and fifties, even sixties. Many of the women had their grey hair scraped back in buns. They all wore sensible flat laced shoes. When they sat down, their long-legged pink directoire knickers showed unless they kept their knees clamped together. I didn’t want to look like a teacher.

  I was glad to see the back of the Bump Man. To cheer me up Biddy took me to the Book Corner. There, sitting on a chair, was the famous children’s writer Pamela Brown. We knew it was her because she had a placard saying so right above her head. She looked incredibly smart and glamorous, the exact opposite of a frumpy teacher. She was dressed all in black, wearing a beautifully cut black tailored suit, a tiny black feathery hat on her soft curls, and high-heeled black suede shoes. She wore a string of pearls round her neck, one last elegant touch.

  She was sitting bolt upright on her chair, staring straight ahead. I know now the poor woman must have been dying of embarrassment, stuck there all alone, waiting for someone, anyone, to approach her, but to me then she seemed like a queen on her throne. I just wanted to gaze at her reverently.

  Biddy had other ideas. She prodded me in the back.

  ‘Go and say hello to her then!’ she said.

  ‘I can’t!’ I mouthed.

  ‘Yes you can! It’s Pamela Brown. You know, you like her books.’

  Of course I knew.

  ‘So tell her you like them,’ said Biddy.

  I was almost as frightened of Pamela Brown as I was of George Cansdale, but at least she was unlikely to produce a snake from her handbag and wrap it round my neck.

  ‘Hello,’ I whispered, approaching her.

  ‘Hello,’ said Pamela Brown.

  She seemed a little at a loss for words too but she smiled at me very sweetly.

  ‘I like your books,’ I confided.

  ‘I’m so pleased,’ she said.

  We smiled some more and then I backed away, both of us sighing with relief.

  * * *

  Who’s got a worst enemy called Moyra who had a gigantic snake called Crusher for a pet?

  * * *

  It’s Verity in The Cat Mummy.

  Do you have any pets? My best friend Sophie has got four kittens called Sporty, Scary, Baby and Posh. My second-best friend Laura has a golden Labrador dog called Dustbin. My sort-of-boyfriend Aaron has got a dog too, a black mongrel called Liquorice Allsorts, though he gets called Licky for short. My worst enemy Moyra has got a boa constrictor snake called Crusher. Well, she says she has. I’ve never been to her house so I don’t know if she’s telling fibs.

  I’ve got a very sweet-natured elderly ginger and white cat called Whisky. I wouldn’t mind a kitten and I’d love a dog – but I would hate to have any kind of snake as a pet!

  23

  More Books!

  I DON’T APOLOGIZE for another chapter about books (and it’s a long one too). This is a book about books. I wouldn’t be a writer now if I hadn’t been a reader.

  I’ve told you about my two favourite books, Nancy and Plum and Adventures with Rosalind, but I’m afraid you can’t read them for yourself because they’re long out of print. I’ve mentioned Enid Blyton and Eve Garnett and Pamela Brown, but I think my favourite popular contemporary author was Noel Streatfeild.

  Her most famous book is Ballet Shoes, a lovely story about three adopted sisters, Pauline, Petrova and Posy Fossil, who attend a stage school. Pauline wants to be an actress, Petrova aches to be an airline pilot and Posy is already a brilliant ballet