“We had cod for tea last night,” I told Mr Bluenose.
“I had an apple,” he said.
“Dad did it in parsley sauce.”
“I took out the core, put a date where it had been, sprinkled brown sugar on top, and baked my apple in the oven.”
“It was blue cod.”
“My apple was a Northern Spy. It is a good cooker, the Northern Spy.”
“I wonder,” I said, “I wonder if you eat enough blue cod, will your nose turn blue?”
“It was being seasick that turned my nose blue.”
“I just wondered.” I felt in my pocket. “I’ve got something for you.” I patted my hanky. “I brought you a boiled lolly, but somebody must have pinched it.”
“Did you stop and talk to somebody on your way here?”
I shook my head.
“I remember you had trouble before, trying to save a boiled lolly for me. There was that big red and white-striped one you told me about. You ate it.”
“I remember,” I said. “But I really saved one for you last night, a green and white-striped boiled lolly. True! I put it in the tin and screwed the lid on so the rat couldn’t get it. This morning I wrapped it in my hanky, to give to you.”
“Perhaps you have a hole in your pocket. No? You probably ate it without thinking of it,” said Mr Bluenose. “Somebody who likes boiled lollies all that much could easily swallow one whole without noticing.”
“You’d think it’d stick going down.”
“It is amazing what you can swallow, if you are greedy enough.”
“Dad said last night when I gave him a boiled lolly, he said I’m very generous!”
“You remembered to give one to your father, but you did not remember poor old Mr Bluenose.”
“That’s not fair! Sometimes I don’t give any to Dad. I sit under the hedge at the corner of our street and eat them all before going home. I’m scared he’ll find my boiled lollies after I’ve gone to sleep, and eat them all. He once said he’d do that, so I eat them or hide them from him now.”
Mr Bluenose looked at an apple, shook his head, and threw it into the four-gallon tin for the pigs. “Do you think he meant it?”
“Meant what?”
“That he would eat your lollies after you had gone to sleep.”
“He said so. I’ve tried eating them in bed, but Dad can hear me crunching.”
“Does your father bring you home lollies?”
“Sometimes.”
“Boiled lollies?”
“Yes.”
“He does not sit under the hedge at the corner of your street and eat them before coming home?”
“No. Why?”
“I just wondered,” said Mr Bluenose. “I never had any children, so I do not know whether I would eat their lollies after they had gone to sleep.”
“You know Freddy Jones, Mr Bluenose? Well, he woke up one Christmas Eve, and he saw Father Christmas stuffing a bag of boiled lollies into the sock at the foot of his bed. And he reckoned Father Christmas stopped and pulled out a lolly and ate it.”
“What did Freddy Jones do?”
“He yelled out, ‘Hey, that’s my boiled lolly!’”
“What did Father Christmas do?”
“He said, ‘Go back to sleep or you won’t get any lollies at all.’”
“What happened?”
“Freddy said he closed his eyes because he didn’t want Father Christmas to take away his lollies. He woke up next morning and was so busy looking at what was in his sock, he didn’t remember about Father Christmas pinching one of his boiled lollies till that afternoon.”
“What did he do?”
“He told his father, but he said Freddy must have dreamed it.”
Mr Bluenose thought. “Perhaps he did dream it. On the other hand, Father Christmas might like boiled lollies. It must be a temptation, stuffing all those bags of lollies in people’s socks on Christmas Eve. Then again,” Mr Bluenose shook his head, “people do make up stories, you know.”
I nodded.
“I think,” said Mr Bluenose, “people even make up stories without meaning to.”
“Oh?” I said.
“Yes. That Freddy Jones,” Mr Bluenose said, “I caught him one day, up an apple tree. I sat down on my wheelbarrow and waited.
“He tried to jump down and run away, but I got him by the scruff of the neck. ‘What were you doing up my tree?’ I asked, and I gnashed my false teeth at him.
“‘I was coming past the hall,’ gabbled Freddy Jones. ‘And I saw a hawk walk down the road towards your place, and I followed him. He climbed your gate, jumped down the other side, and walked along between the rows of apple trees. I followed him just to see what he did. He came to this tree, looked up at the apples, saw they were ripe, and climbed into the top of the tree and started eating them. I knew you wouldn’t like that, so I climbed up to chase him away, and that’s when you saw me and thought I was eating your apples.’”
“Did you believe him?” I asked Mr Bluenose.
“I let him go because it was a pretty good story.” Mr Bluenose laughed to himself. “But I told Freddy Jones, next time I caught him up my apple tree, I would kick his behind for him.”
“I think it’s a good story,” I told Mr Bluenose. “Next time I have some boiled lollies, I’ll save one for you, for telling me that story.”
“I will believe that when I see the boiled lolly,” said Mr Bluenose.