Nanny McPhee Returns (15 page)

‘Sergeant Jefferies,’ said Nanny McPhee, looking at the enormous soldier sternly, ‘you’ve grown.’

At the sound of her voice, an extraordinary change came over the guardsman. He gasped, stared at her, tried to bow, which caused his busby to wobble, and so instead executed a complicated series of manoeuvres with his rifle before saluting ever so smartly and saying, ‘Nanny McPhee, ma’am!’

‘At ease, Ralph,’ said Nanny McPhee, walking up past the gaping boys and examining the sergeant more closely.

‘Lesson Three paid off, I see,’ she said.

‘It certainly did, Nanny McPhee,’ said the sergeant, looking pleased.

‘How’s the army treating you?’

‘Proudly, ma’am, proudly!’

‘I’m glad to hear it. Have you learnt to eat your greens?’

The soldier stopped looking pleased and blushed. He started to stammer and then fiddled at length with something on his rifle.

‘Well?’ said Nanny McPhee, mildly.

‘I can’t lie to you, Nanny McPhee,’ he said. ‘Broccoli still presents a challenge.’

The boys couldn’t believe their ears.

‘Try it with cheese,’ said Nanny McPhee. ‘And don’t forget that in May and June, asparagus provides a pleasant alternative. Now. To business. I shall answer for these two boys. Please let them in at once.’

‘On the double, Nanny McPhee, ma’am!’ said the sergeant, coming to attention and beckoning to the boys, who sprinted up, grinning at Nanny McPhee and mouthing their thank-yous as they were marched briskly into the great building.

Meanwhile, sniffing back tears, Megsie was about to feed the chickens when she found a note in the egg basket with her name on it. She opened it, read it and gave a little shriek, which Celia, who had just walked in, heard.

‘What is it?’ said Celia.

‘It’s the boys! They’ve gone to London!’ said Megsie.

‘No! I thought they were still in bed!’ said Celia, who had also been completely taken in by the pillows under the bedclothes trick.

‘Look!’ said Megsie, showing Celia the note.

Celia thought she was going to faint. ‘He’s not dead?’ she said.

‘No! If Norman can feel it in his bones, then it must be true!!’ said Megsie. ‘He’s never wrong!’

‘But your mum’s just said she’s going to sell the farm!’ said Celia, clapping her hands to her mouth.

‘We can’t let her do that,’ said Megsie.

‘But how on earth are we going to stop her?’ said Celia.

‘I don’t know,’ said Megsie. ‘But we might not have to. Norman says he’ll be back soon – we’ll just have to hope he gets back before she does anything! Quick! Let’s get back to the house!’

Sergeant Jefferies had walked the boys through an enormous room full of maps and strange tall chairs and phones and people pushing things around on a gigantic table with wooden paddles. Everyone was concentrating terribly hard and there were a lot of quiet but urgent calls on telephones, which made Cyril feel that he really was in the centre of things and Norman feel vaguely sick because somewhere his poor father was caught up in all of it. Then they’d gone up some marble stairs and along a carpeted corridor, where all the people they passed seemed to have more stripes on their uniforms than the people they’d seen in the big map room. Then they’d turned a corner and found themselves in front of a huge door. Sergeant Jefferies had stopped, saluted the boys in formal fashion and marched away, leaving them alone.

‘This must be it,’ whispered Cyril.

He was terrified.

Norman said, ‘Hadn’t we better kno—’ and at that moment, a dapper little man with a moustache opened the door and came upon them. He gave a little shriek of dismay and shock before staring at them as if they had three heads each and boils. Norman decided to get things moving.

‘We’re here to see Lord Gray,’ he said, trying to make his voice sound important. ‘Lord Gray is this person’s father. It’s a matter of life and death,’ he added, feeling pleased that he’d sounded calm and strong. Cyril looked at him admiringly.

‘Father?’ said the dapper little man, looking as if he’d never heard the word before. A woman with a very large hairdo came up behind him now, saying, ‘What is going on, Lieutenant Addis?’

The little man turned and waved his hands about in agitation.

‘These . . . urchins say they have an appointment, Miss Spratling . . . with Lord Gray. Apparently, that boy’ – the lieutenant jabbed a finger at Cyril – ‘is his son. Does Lord Gray
have
children? I had no idea.’

Both Miss Spratling and Lieutenant Addis now stared at the pair as if they were museum exhibits.

‘There is some resemblance in the nose area,’ said Miss Spratling, examining Cyril minutely. Norman felt embarrassed and uncomfortable for Cyril. It was humiliating that these people didn’t even know that he existed. Very crossly, Miss Spratling snapped at them, ‘Wait here one moment, please. And don’t touch anything.’

Both Miss Spratling and the lieutenant disappeared for a moment. Norman looked at Cyril, wanting to give him an encouraging smile, but Cyril seemed very far away and looked pale. There wasn’t time to talk, because almost immediately Miss Spratling came back, looking harassed.

‘You’re to come this way,’ she said, looking at the boys as if they were responsible for something rather awful and she didn’t like them very much.

She led them through another office, this one a bit more normal, up to a pair of gigantic mahogany doors. She knocked gently, opened one door and pushed the boys inside, closing it quickly as though whatever was inside might grab her and bite her.

Back at the farm, Mrs Green was at the sink washing up the breakfast things and trying to swallow the rest of her tea. Suddenly, there was a sharp knock at the door and Uncle Phil walked in with the contract under his arm. Mrs Green tried to be polite.

‘It’s very early, Phil,’ she said.

‘Sorry!’ said Phil, casting a terrified glance behind him, which made Mrs Green wonder what he was afraid of. (You know, of course.)

‘Sorry – I know it’s early. It’s just that the sooner we get this done, the better!’

‘Phil, just put it down and have a cup of tea, for heaven’s sake,’ said Mrs Green irritably. ‘We’ll deal with all that later.’

‘No, no! It has to be now! You don’t understand!’ said Phil.

‘No, Phil, I don’t. I don’t understand at all.’

‘It has to be now. Else we’ll lose the sale, that’s all,’ said Phil, trying to sound calm. ‘That’s all it is! We’ll lose the sale if we don’t sign off NOW.’

Mrs Green stared at him. He was all white and sweaty-looking as though he weren’t very well. Then she reflected upon the fact that he’d just lost his brother and was entitled to be feeling all sorts of things she couldn’t guess at, so she put down the tea towel and with a resigned shrug, said, ‘Oh, you’d better get a pen then.’

Flooded with relief, Phil put the contract out on the table and got out his fountain pen and unscrewed the top. Mrs Green dried her hands and came to sit down. As she started to look through the document, Megsie and Celia came hurtling indoors, stopping suddenly as they saw what was going on.

‘Mum! What are you doing?!’ said Megsie, utterly aghast.

‘You know what I’m doing, darling,’ said Mrs Green. ‘It’s what we talked about this morning.’

‘But, Mum! You can’t sign anything without waiting for Norman!’

‘Where
is
Norman, actually?’ said Mrs Green. ‘And Cyril – they can’t still be in bed?’

Megsie had to think quickly. ‘They’ve gone out – to – to the field,’ she said, and then turned away to blush because she wasn’t used to telling fibs.

‘Yes,’ said Celia, who was, ‘they’ve gone to check the barley.’

‘Oh,’ said Mrs Green. ‘Well, they’ll be back soon, won’t they?’

‘Isabel . . .’ said Phil, waggling the fountain pen at her, ‘we’ve got to get on with this!’

‘I’ve got to read it first, haven’t I?’ said Mrs Green, picking up the contract and studying it closely.

Megsie closed her eyes. What could she do?

The Diary 23

I’m sorry to interrupt the story as it’s getting rather tense but just freeze-frame everyone in your head and then when you get back to it, it’ll be even more exciting, I hope.

We’re getting ready in a car park near Euston Station. Oh, the glamour. Today is a very exciting day because we are filming with the Horse Guards! It’s a bit of the story that isn’t in the book, where Nanny McPhee and the boys get held up by a lot of horses’ bottoms. The horses – and their bottoms – belong to the Horse Guards – the special regiment that guards the Queen – and they are so, so beautiful. The Guards are all very young and each one of them has his own horse and has to look after it day and night. They work with the horses every day and live with them all the time – it is a very intense life and they don’t really get any time off at all. I was very impressed by them all – these lads who live and breathe their animals and have a very close relationship to each other as well. It must be very hard work, but also very rewarding.

Today is also special because my Stunt Double (see Glossary), Ray De Haan, is on set. He is dressed exactly like me but has to do one thing I can’t do – and that is to drive the motorcycle right up to the horses’ bottoms and brake hard to avoid running into them. I have had lessons on the bike (I LOVE it) but I am not experienced enough to do this bit without everyone worrying about me actually ramming the bottoms and hurting either the horses or the children. So I will do the close-up motorcycle riding, like when Nanny arrives at the War Office and leaves and so forth, and Ray will do the expert stuff that takes years of experience.

It is very peculiar having someone on set who looks the same as me. He has the nose and everything.

‘It’s so HOT and HEAVY,’ he said, which was a great comfort to me. I also have another double who stands in for me while they get shots ready and sometimes has to do what we call Second Unit work (see Glossary), stuff like faraway shots that don’t need actors to speak or that use animals and would therefore take too much time to shoot with the main cameras. She is called Abbie James and is a living saint. She came up to me the other day and said she’d been working with the Second Unit on set at Shepperton during the hot weather and had a very hard time.

‘I couldn’t breathe properly,’ she confessed, which was also very comforting to me. It’s nice to know that I’m not the only one suffering . . .

I’ve just found out that a lot of the young guardsmen are just back from stints in Iraq and that some are off soon to Afghanistan. Gives one food for thought. They have done all their stuff wonderfully well – we have taken over a London street and there are lots of people watching and waving. It’s very jolly. The horses get taken off to Regent’s Park for a rest and some water and food so you can go and pat them there without getting in the way. Gaia is playing a little evacuee, in a hat and coat from the 1940s that make her look miles younger, for some reason. Clothes do make such a difference.

We decided to go and have a little lunch out with mates who’d come to visit the set, and we walked down the street and into a nice Spanish restaurant and had tapas, which all sounds very nice and normal until I tell you that I was in the FULL Nanny McPhee costume and make-up and no one took a blind bit of notice. Seriously. People glanced up and looked away as though it were perfectly normal to see a gigantic lady in black with a huge nose and warts walk into their eatery and sit down to order ham. Interesting. Maybe they did notice and felt sorry for me and didn’t like to stare. Anyway, it was fun.