Free Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones

maintained a restless silence. She was mentally fending off all that bad news to make space for God. On that subject, she asked if us kids ever heard the word of the Good Lord from Pop Eye.
    â€œMr. Watts does not use the Bible,” I said.
    She let that sit in the air, as if it were a betrayal of our very safety. Then she returned to her other preoccupation, testing me with the names of relatives and fish and birds from our family tree.
    I failed miserably. I could think of no reason to remember them, whereas I knew the name of every character I had met in
Great Expectations
because I had heard them speak. They had shared their thoughts with me, and sometimes as Mr. Watts read aloud I could even see their faces. Pip, Miss Havisham, and Joe Gargery were more part of my life than my dead relatives, even the people around me.
    But Mum was not put off by my repeated failures. She said I should unblock my ears. She said she felt sorry for my heart. My heart, she said, didn’t have much of a choice for company. She wouldn’t let go of this task she set me. She was insistent. The tests continued, without success. Then she changed strategy. I have an idea she had seen the name PIP on the beach, because one night after I had failed her again she told me to write the names of the family tree in the sand.
    The next day I did as she asked—and she came to check on my progress. She became very angry when she saw Pip’s name next to the relatives’. She cuffed my hair.
    What did I think I was up to? Why did I have to act dumber than I looked? What was the point of sticking the name of a make-believe person next to her kin?
    I knew why. I knew exactly why I had done this. But did I have the courage to stand up for what I believed? I knew from experience you could get four-fifths of your answer right and my mum would pounce on that leftover bit that was wrong. In the end my mouth decided for me. Away it went—leaving me astonished at the way I threw the question back at her.
    Now, I asked, where’s the value in knowing a few scattered and unreliable facts about dead relatives when you could know all there was to know about a made-up person such as Pip?
    She gave me a look of pure hate. She didn’t say anything at first. Maybe she was afraid if she opened her mouth too quickly all that would come out would be anger. I waited for the slap. Instead she kicked out at the sand around PIP, then kicked out at the air over his name.
    â€œHe isn’t a blood relative!” she yelled.
    Well, no, Pip wasn’t a relative, I explained, but I felt closer to him than the names of those strangers she made me write in the sand. This was not what she wanted to hear. She knew where to place the blame. She looked up the beach in the direction of the old mission house.
    The next day Mabel stuck up her hand to ask Mr. Watts if he believed in God.
    He looked up at the ceiling; his eyes went searching.
    â€œThat is one of those difficult questions I warned the class about,” he said. He fiddled with the book in his hands. He was trying to find our place in
Great Expectations,
but his mind was elsewhere.
    Then it was Gilbert’s turn to ask. “What about the devil?”
    We saw a slow smile creep out onto Mr. Watts’ face, and I felt embarrassed for us kids and Mr. Watts because I knew he had just guessed the source of these questions.
    â€œNo,” he said. “I do not believe in the devil.”
    This is not something I would have mentioned to my mum. I was not that dumb. One of the other kids must have blabbed, which led to Mr. Watts’ heathen beliefs circulating at that evening’s prayer meeting.
    The following day Mr. Watts was just about to read from
Great Expectations,
when my mum strode into the classroom. She wore the same head wrap she had worn the other time. Now I understood why. It gave her a frightening authority.
    Her heavy eyelids drew back and she gave Mr. Watts a hostile