Becca Fair and Foul Read online

  “Leave Merlin be,” said Gran. “He’s —”

  “Let’s go to the fish-and-chips place at Diver Cove,” Becca said. “Then we won’t have to cook. Or shop.”

  “Yes,” said Aunt Fifi. “And Merlin can join us. Should he wish to. And you, too, Jane. You do enough chores around here to deserve a dinner or two.”

  “We won’t have to wash the dishes,” said Becca.

  “Or try to get Alicia to wash the dishes,” said Jane.

  “I don’t know,” said Gran. “Fish and chips aren’t healthy. We could have sea-asparagus stir-fry. It’s better for growing girls and there’s plenty of it out there.”

  Becca looked out at the sea asparagus that grew on the beach in front of Gran’s. Even as she watched, a border terrier trotted along and lifted its leg there.

  “I won’t eat it,” said Aunt Fifi. “I don’t care how many times you or the sea wash it.”

  “It’s just well fertilized,” said Gran. “Or we could have lamb’s-quarters instead. There’s lots of that on the beach. And I spotted some young stinging nettles up by the well. They’d make a good stir-fry, or maybe soup.”

  “Those nettles were covered with bugs!” said Auntie Meg.

  “And we’d have to clean up,” said Becca.

  “We’ve done enough chores for the day,” Aunt Fifi said.

  “For the week!” said Jane.

  “For the summer!” Becca said.

  “For ever!” Alicia grumped from behind her book.

  * * *

  “I’m glad you thought of fish and chips,” Aunt Fifi said, as Becca and Jane piled out of her sporty car.

  “Part man, part fish, gave her the idea,” said Jane. “Caliban!”

  “I’m surprised Gran agreed,” said Aunt Fifi. “She hates fried food.”

  Fried food sounded good to Becca. She was starving. Already the taste of chips, vinegar and salt filled her head. And cod, hot oil and crusty batter.

  Or maybe halibut, if Gran didn’t mind paying the extra.

  “They do have other things,” said Jane as they joined the line at the fish-and-chips stand.

  It stretched for miles. It was going to be ages before they ate.

  “What was I thinking?” said Gran. “Maybe I’ll go home and have an oatcake.”

  “An oatcake isn’t dinner,” Auntie Meg told her.

  “What about the chicken place?” Lucy asked. “You know — in the van by the store?”

  “But we’re already lined up for fish and chips!” Becca said. Oh, how fussy they all were!

  “Is chicken healthier, though?” asked Auntie Meg.

  “Not better than oatcakes,” said Gran. “Oats have healing properties. They help rebuild tissues.”

  “But fish is good for the brain, right?” Becca said.

  “And what about Merlin?” asked Aunt Fifi. “We invited him to meet us here, and we wouldn’t want to stand him up, would we, Mum? After all, he is the only plumber on the island.”

  * * *

  In Diver Cove there was a bustle of cars, trucks, scooters, boat trailers, bikes, dogs, strollers, gulls and people.

  Down in the harbor, there was a bustle of yachts and dinghies, kayaks, paddleboards and fishboats.

  It seemed that everyone on and around the island had decided it was a good night to eat out.

  “I’m not surprised to see you here, Jane,” Merlin said, sneaking in at last to join them. “Given the atmosphere at your house.”

  “It’s a bit stinky,” said Jane. “When are you going to fix it?”

  “You still haven’t solved the mystery in Jane’s plumbing?” asked Aunt Fifi.

  “Not yet,” Merlin confessed.

  “Why are you talking so quietly?” Jane asked.

  “Why are you all hunched up?” said Becca.

  “Never mind,” said Merlin, almost whispering. “How’s the play going? Have you settled on a date? I thought I’d invite the volunteer firefighters and their families.”

  “Merlin!” Becca heard then, and suddenly there was Mrs. Barker talking rapidly about replacement filters for her water system.

  “I’ll look in my workshop,” Merlin said. “I should be able to round something up tomorrow.”

  He turned back to Becca and Jane. “Now, tell me about that eaglet up by Jane’s. What happened?”

  “It sat there stuck to the tree for the longest time. It wouldn’t move!”

  “And then stuff dripped on us,” Jane said. “Pink and juicy!”

  “Pink juice?” Merlin asked, deeply interested, but before Becca or Jane could say more, someone interrupted.

  “Oh, here you are!” It was someone Becca didn’t know. He stepped close to Merlin. “I heard you were here.”

  “I’m not sure …” Merlin said.

  “Aren’t you Gandalf?” the man asked. “Dumbledore?”

  “Merlin.”

  “Yeah. Hey, I need advice about hooking up cisterns. You can come by tomorrow and take a look. I’m building a place just past the Big Tree.”

  “Oh, the Big Tree. Well. Best thing is to leave a message on my phone and I’ll let you know when I can make it,” Merlin said.

  “Who is that guy?” he muttered, staring after him. “I’ve never seen him before in my life.”

  “You’re famous,” Becca said.

  “I’m just trying to have dinner!” he said.

  Lucy had struck up a conversation with the person in front of them.

  “Market days it’s nuts,” the lady said. “I do tons of harvesting the night before, but I have to get up really early to pick lettuce and herbs, and then there’s cutting flowers and making bouquets, all in time to start setting up my stall.”

  “I could pick lettuce,” Lucy offered. “And flowers! It would be fun.”

  “Really? Well, look. My name’s Annie. Just ask Merlin. He knows my number,” the lady said. “Give me a call if you want to help. We could trade veg and flowers for labor.”

  The smell of fried fish mingled with the smell of dust and seaweed and creosote from the wharf, and with the sounds of gulls keening, ravens croaking and even the nutcracker chatter of a kingfisher looking for its dinner.

  “I’m so hungry,” Becca said. “I feel like making eaglet noises.”

  The line shuffled forward.

  Now they were close enough to see the boy who worked at the counter. He was taking orders and delivering fish in a frenzy, making change and even running out to clear tables now and then. He looked like he could use about eight arms, like an octopus.

  At last they were only a little way from the head of the line, which was a good thing because now Jane was moaning softly and Becca felt like her whole self was a giant, empty pit burning with hunger.

  She felt so hungry she was actually hot inside.

  She could barely see the chef working in the back of the cook shack. He was lost in clouds of steam and smoke billowing from the cooker.

  And now here came Angharad who worked on the ferry, tapping Merlin on the shoulder.

  “Merlin!” she said. “So glad to see you! You know that pump you installed? Something’s gumming it up.”

  Merlin groaned.

  “The thing is, could you come by and look at it?” Angharad asked. “The situation’s dire.”

  “All plumbing situations are dire,” Merlin said. “Sure. I’ll come tomorrow.”

  “You’re a hero,” said Angharad. She gave Merlin a kiss on the cheek and was swept away down to the wharf by a crowd of friends.

  Merlin was popular, Becca thought, but before she could finish her thought, a great storm burst forth from the side of the cooking shack and there was a terrific shout.

  The counter boy disappeared completely, as if he’d been felled at his station.

  “N
o!” Merlin clutched his head.

  “It can’t possibly be plumbing,” Aunt Fifi said.

  “Anything can be plumbing,” said Merlin.

  “We should have had nettles and lamb’s-quarters,” said Gran.

  People at the head of the line were mumbling. The counter boy reappeared as suddenly as he’d disappeared and said something to them.

  “The deep fryer’s bust!” someone cried out. “But I’ve been waiting for hours!”

  Becca’s stomach gave a sad fall.

  “I’m sorry to say that the deep fryer is no longer functioning,” the counter boy announced. “There will be no more fish or chips for the duration. However, we do serve hamburgers.”

  “Hamburgers!” Auntie Meg said. “Do we want hamburgers?”

  Becca couldn’t believe how much discussion could go into such a decision. It was easy. Food or no food? What would the mother eagle say?

  It was a no-brainer.

  But not for Gran. “Maybe we should go to the chicken place after all,” she said.

  “What’s wrong with hamburgers?” Becca asked.

  “What do you think, Meg?” Gran asked. “Hamburgers, or try the chicken van?”

  “I’ve heard the chicken’s really good,” said Jane.

  “Do you want to wait even longer?” muttered Becca.

  “But hamburgers sound great,” Jane added quickly.

  “Well, I don’t know,” Gran said. “Nettles …”

  “The beef’s organic,” said Merlin.

  “And grown on the island,” said Aunt Fifi.

  “Why can’t they just grill the fish like they do hamburgers?” asked Becca.

  “I guess hamburgers are okay,” Auntie Meg finally agreed.

  “And — oh, no!” said Merlin. “Here comes the marriage commissioner, and I just know she’s going to ask me about composting toilets. About which I know nothing!” He bent down and fiddled with his shoe. “Tell me when she’s gone, Becca,” he begged. “Don’t let her see me. Go on, crowd around. You, too, Jane.”

  In the end, the marriage commissioner wandered down the wharf, and everyone agreed on hamburgers. Or grilled fish, if the chef agreed.

  “We shouldn’t have stepped out of the line,” Becca lamented.

  “We’ll have to join at the back again,” said Jane sadly.

  “Look,” said Merlin. “Please, just get me some food. I don’t care what. I’m going to sit on the beach under a tree with long concealing branches, where no one will find me.”

  “No,” said Gran, glaring at Aunt Fifi.

  “I was just going to keep him company,” she said.

  “We need you to carry hamburgers,” said Gran, but Becca couldn’t see why. Between herself and Jane, Auntie Meg, Gran, Lucy and Alicia, they had enough hands to carry food for everyone.

  She thought Gran’s efforts to keep Fifi and Merlin apart were bound to fail.

  The sun dropped to the tops of the mountains. Soon they’d be standing in shadow and it wouldn’t be so roasting hot. The evening would be almost over and still no dinner.

  Auntie Meg and Aunt Fifi had a long talk about cooking. All they seemed to want to think about was food.

  Now the chef looked like he was having a temper tantrum. He jumped around by the grill at the side of the cookhouse. He banged on it with his spatula, and the counter boy went over to talk to him.

  Lucy came back from exploring the wharf.

  “There are boats for sale,” she announced. “Sailing dinghies. Don’t we have any food yet?”

  “No,” Becca said. “And we’re going to have hamburgers.”

  “Hamburgers!” Lucy said. “But I’ve given up red meat!”

  At that moment the counter boy made his second announcement.

  “I’m awfully sorry,” he called out. “Our grill’s having trouble keeping up with the customers tonight. It’s given up the ghost. All we can serve now is pop and bits of lettuce and tomato. And mustard and vinegar and ketchup in individual packets,” he added. “In case that appeals.”

  “At least it wasn’t the plumbing that gave up the ghost,” Merlin said when they told him.

  * * *

  “Is there any point in even trying to turn in here?” Aunt Fifi wondered when they got to the parking lot for the chicken van. A steady stream of cars and bicycles was pouring out into the road, turning and disappearing down the now-twilit lane into the cool of the night.

  “There’s a reason they’re all leaving,” Jane said. “I just know it.”

  But it was as if none of them could quite believe it, Becca thought, because every one of them — Auntie Meg and Gran, Lucy and Alicia, Aunt Fifi and Merlin, Jane and even Becca herself — had to be told personally by the chicken man that he was now entirely out of chicken.

  He had to tell Jane twice. She thought he might have changed his mind the second time, but he hadn’t.

  “Oh, Merlin!” the chicken man called after them. “I need to talk to you!”

  “I didn’t hear that,” Merlin said, tossing his van keys to Auntie Meg and jumping into Aunt Fifi’s little car with her. “Floor it, Fifi!”

  And they zoomed off in a direction entirely wrong for going home to Gran’s.

  * * *

  “There’s something wholesome about oatcakes,” Gran said, as they sat on their own dark beach eating crackers. “And the lamb’s-quarters are tasty. I’ve never made a salad with them before.”

  “I feel faint,” Jane said. “I think I’ll go home. It smells bad there, but as far as I know Mum and Dad have food.”

  It was like the magical feast that appeared in The Tempest, Becca thought. It vanished when the characters tried to eat it. The fish and chips had all been in their heads. They got to think about them and look at them and even smell them.

  Then suddenly, they weren’t there.

  She felt a pang of envy for the eaglet with its raw fish.

  9. The Wood Pile

  Jane had an eagle-headache.

  “They just go on and on,” she said. “We need somewhere better than the treehouse to rehearse. And it’s not just the eagles. Now we’ve got the mystery in the plumbing and Merlin’s always around and Mum and Dad are always having fits. And I don’t mean in a good way.”

  She thought for a moment.

  “Maybe we could practice in the clearing by the beach. Nobody would even see us. And no eagles live there.”

  “Merlin’s brother-in-law dumped Gran’s load of wood there,” said Becca.

  “All the better,” said Jane, finishing her toast and marmalade. “Prospero makes Ferdinand carry wood — remember? It can be a prop.”

  She brushed her crumbs into the salal.

  Becca looked at her.

  “For the towhee,” Jane said. “It’s hungry, too.”

  * * *

  The heap of wood and the swooping cedar branches above it hid the actors from the beach. It was perfect — not far from the house and not too near. Peaceful. And nobody ever went there except people delivering wood for Gran.

  “Let’s start with Act Three, Scene One,” said Becca. “Enter Ferdinand, bearing a log. That’s what it says.”

  “Okay!” Jane hefted up a piece of pine.

  “‘I must remove some thousands of these logs, and pile them up,’” she said, and carried it across the clearing.

  “Just drop it there,” Becca said. “We can move it back later.”

  A shower of cones descended from the trees and pattered down on them.

  “What was that?” Lucy asked.

  “Wind,” said Becca. “Dugald says it’s going to get blowy.”

  “That log gave me slivers,” Jane said.

  “We’ll get you work gloves,” said Becca.

  “Why are you taking your clothes off?” Lucy asked.r />
  “A pine cone fell into my underpants,” said Jane, pulling her shorts back up.

  “Come on. Get another log,” Becca said. “Lucy, look at Ferdinand in a moony way. You’re supposed to be crazy about him.”

  “‘If you sit down, I’ll bear your logs the while,’” Lucy told Jane, her Ferdinand. She staggered off with her arms full of alder.

  “Maybe try to sound more swoony,” Becca said.

  “I’m not swoony,” said Lucy. “Mum says I’m practical-minded.”

  Another shower of cones fell, and Lucy shook the itchy bits of tree out of her hair.

  “Maybe it’s a jay,” said Jane. “They like picking at cones.”

  “But there aren’t any jays here,” said Lucy.

  “You don’t have to be swoony,” Becca told Lucy, ignoring the falling cones. “You just have to sound swoony. It’s acting! Come on — let’s start again and go through without interruptions.”

  “‘I must remove some thousands of these logs, and pile them up,’” Jane began again, carting wood.

  “Becca!”

  And now here was Auntie Meg, tramping through the salal.

  “Fifi and I are heading to the farmers’ market. Want to come?”

  “We’re rehearsing,” Becca told her.

  “Okay!” said Auntie Meg. “Gran’s helping Mac and no one knows where Alicia is, so the place is yours.”

  Lucy wiped sweat off her forehead with the bottom of her T-shirt.

  Then Auntie Meg just stood there. For a person going to the farmers’ market, she was remarkably stationary.

  “‘I must remove some thousands of these logs, and pile them up,’” Jane said, yet again.

  “‘If you sit down, I’ll bear your logs,’” Lucy replied, lifting chunks of pine. “Really, we should just use the wheelbarrow,” she muttered, stopping to stack the wood they’d moved so it wouldn’t fall over. “I’ve got sap all over my arms now.”

  “I’m trying to get them to sound like they’re in love, and it isn’t working,” Becca whispered to Auntie Meg.