Free A Kestrel for a Knave by Barry Hines Page A

class quietened, still grinning. Anderson stared at his desk, blushing.
    ‘I don’t know owt, Sir.’
    ‘Anything at all Anderson, anything that’s happened to you, or that you’ve seen which sticks in your mind.’
    ‘I can’t think of owt, Sir.’
    ‘What about when you were little? Everybody remembers something about when they were little. It doesn’t have to be fantastic, just something that you’ve remembered.’
    Anderson began to smile and looked up.
    ‘There’s summat. It’s nowt though.’
    ‘It must be if you remember it.’
    ‘It’s daft really.’
    ‘Well tell us then, and let’s all have a laugh.’
    ‘Well it was once when I was a kid. I was at Junior school, I think, or somewhere like that, and went down to Fowlers Pond, me and this other kid. Reggie Clay they called him, he didn’t come to this school; he flitted and went away somewhere. Anyway it was Spring, tadpole time, and it’s swarming with tadpoles down there in Spring. Edges of t’pond are all black with ’em, and me and thisother kid started to catch ’em. It was easy, all you did, you just put your hands together and scooped a handful of water up and you’d got a handful of tadpoles. Anyway we were mucking about with ’em, picking ’em up and chucking ’em back and things, and we were on about taking some home, but we’d no jam jars. So this kid, Reggie, says, “Take thi Wellingtons off and put some in there, they’ll be all right ’til tha gets home.” So I took ’em off and we put some water in ’em and then we started to put taddies in ’em. We kept ladling ’em in and I says to this kid, “Let’s have a competition, thee have one welli’ and I’ll have t’other, and we’ll see who can get most in!” So he started to fill one welli’ and I started to fill t’other. We must have been at it hours, and they got thicker and thicker, until at t’end there was no water left in ’em, they were just jam packed wi’ taddies.
    ‘You ought to have seen ’em, all black and shiny, right up to t’top. When we’d finished we kept dipping us fingers into ’em and whipping ’em up at each other, all shouting and excited like. Then this kid says to me, “I bet tha daren’t put one on.” And K says, “I bet tha daren’t.” So we said that we’d put one on each. We wouldn’t though, we kept reckoning to, then running away, so we tossed up and him who lost had to do it first. And I lost, oh, and you’d to take your socks off an’ all. So I took my socks off, and I kept looking at this welli’ full of taddies, and this kid kept saying, “Go on then, tha frightened, tha frightened.” I was an’ all. Anyway I shut my eyes and started to put my foot in. Oooo. It was just like putting your feet into live jelly. They were frozen. And when my foot went down, they all came over t’top of my Wellington, and when I got my foot to t’bottom, I could feel ’em all squashing about between my toes.
    ‘Anyway I’d done it, and I says to this kid, “Thee put thine on now.” But he wouldn’t, he was dead scared, so I put it on instead. I’d got used to it then, it was all right after a bit; it sent your legs all excited and tingling like. When I’d got ’em both on I started to walk up to this kid, waving my arms and making spook noises; and as I walked they all came squelching over t’tops again and ran down t’sides. This kid looked frightened to death, he kept looking down at my wellies so I tried to run at him and they all spurted up my legs. You ought to have seen him. He just screamed out and ran home roaring.
    ‘It was a funny feeling though when he’d gone; all quiet, with nobody there, and up to t’knees in tadpoles.’
    Silence. The class up to their knees in tadpoles. Mr Farthing allowed them a pause for assimilation. Then, before their involvement could disintegrate into local gossip, he used it to try to inspire an emulator.
    ‘Very good, Anderson. Thank you. Now has anyone else anything