A little girl.
Dressed in rags. Her face, hands and feet blackened with dirt. She was a pathetic sight.
“All right?” chirped the girl.
“Who are you?” demanded Alfred.
“Who are you?” she asked back.
“I asked first.”
“What do you think you’re doing sneaking in here from the outside?” demanded Nanny. “Well?”
Alfred noticed that the girl was pongy. Pongy was putting it politely. Pongy is low on the STINKY SCALE.
However, being well brought up, Alfred was far too polite to mention that the little girl smelled something rotten.
Nanny snatched a broken candelabra and brandished it like a weapon.
“Don’t beat me!” pleaded the girl.
“How do we know you’re not one of the revolutionaries?” demanded Nanny.
“I am not. I swear.”
Alfred noticed the girl was dripping wet.
“You’re soaked!” he exclaimed.
“How did you get into Buckingham Palace?” said Nanny. “This place is a fortress. Come on! Out with it!”
“I swam.”
“Nonsense!” scoffed Nanny.
“No, it ain’t,” snapped the girl. “Years ago, there was all these trains that ran under the city.”
“The London Underground?” replied Alfred. “I have a book on it upstairs in my room. It hasn’t run for fifty years.”
“Yeah. Most of the tunnels collapsed ages ago, but there is one that is all flooded.”
“Flooded?” asked the boy.
“Yeah. This tunnel is underwater. Leads all the way from the Thames to right under the palace.”
“Well, in all my years of working here I never knew that,” remarked the old lady.
“It’s a secret,” hissed the girl. “Nobody knows.”
“Well, I know now,” replied Nanny.
“Me too!” added Alfred.
“Silly girl,” said Nanny.
But the girl was not going to be mocked like this. “You don’t know exactly where it is, though, do ya?” she retorted, before a smug grin settled on her face.
Alfred smirked. This little one had spirit!
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Mite.”
“Might what?”
“No, just Mite.”
“Might as in M I G H T or as in M I T E?”
“I dunno spelling. They call me ‘Mite’ cos I’m a little mite.”
“That’s M I T E,” he said.
The girl just shrugged her shoulders, as if to say, “I don’t care.”
“You still haven’t told us why you’ve broken into Buckingham Palace!” snapped Nanny.
Mite gulped. “I was starvin’. My belly hurts something horrible with the hunger. I was looking for the kitchen to rob some food, then I heard footsteps and hid in here.”
“Did you not have your dinner?” asked Alfred.
“Dinner?” she exclaimed. “What planet are you on? A nibble of a mouldy old biscuit is all I’ve had all day!”
“Really?” The prince was flabbergasted.
“You have absolutely no idea about life outside this place, do ya?”
“Well, I er…”
“In here, you’ve got everything. Outside we’ve got nothing. The story is there’s mountains and mountains of food in this palace, but the King just won’t share it,” continued Mite. “Stuff I’ve only ever dreamed of. Cakes and sweets and chocolate!” she said, her eyes gleefully lighting up at the thought.
“Don’t have the eggy-wegg,” offered Alfred.
Nanny gave the boy a filthy look.
“Well, I’m sure we can give you some food,” he added.
“We will do no such thing!” huffed Nanny. “We don’t want to encourage her. First it’s her, then we will be swamped by the great unwashed! No! She is very lucky not to have been shot on sight by the guards.”
“Shot or starved to death,” mused Mite. “I was willing to take me chances. You don’t know what it’s like out there. That’s why one day there is going to be a revolution!”
“I have heard quite enough of this!” snapped Nanny.
“I’m sure there is something we can do to help all those on the outside,” said Alfred.
“Oh yeah? What are you going to do, then, posh boy?”
Alfred stammered. “Well, I, er…”
The truth was, he didn’t have the faintest idea.
“Who are ya anyway?” she asked.
“You don’t know?” spluttered the prince.
“Should I?”
“I am the prince!” he announced grandly. As if there were no other way to announce you were royalty.
“Prince of what?” asked the girl.
“Prince of…” For once the prince was lost for words.
“Prince of Nothing!” she announced.
Judging by the look on Nanny’s face, she had heard quite enough.
“How dare you be so rude!” snapped Nanny.
“It’s true! No one out there has seen you royals for years. All we see is the face of this Lord Protector. Goodness knows what he’s up to!”
“I don’t want to hear another word out of you!” chided Nanny. “You show me where this underground river thingy is, and I’ll let you go.”
The girl thought for a moment. “I’ll show you where it is if you give me some chocolate!”
“The cheek of it!” exclaimed Nanny.
“Please, Nanny,” implored Alfred. “Let’s give Mite some chocolate. And some for her family.”
“I don’t have any family. Me mum and dad were shot by the royal guards when I was only three.”
“Oh no,” whispered Alfred. “I am so sorry.”
“I am sorry too.”
“There must have been a reason,” said Nanny. “Perhaps they were revolutionaries?”
“They were shot for stealing a loaf of bread.”
Alfred was shocked to his core. So this was what his country had become!
“That’s evil!” he said.
“Show me how you got into the palace,” said Nanny, changing the subject, “and I will bring you the biggest bar of chocolate you could ever imagine.”
“I can imagine a really big bar! Like ginormous!”
“Then show me where you broke into the palace. RIGHT. NOW.”
The little girl looked at her with suspicion in her eyes. “I don’t trust you, old lady. I don’t trust you one bit.”
“Nanny has looked after me my whole life!” announced Alfred, jumping to her defence. “I couldn’t trust her more!”
Mite looked the boy up and down. “And I don’t trust you either, Prince of Nothing! I’ll find me own chocolate!”
With that, she threw the dustsheet over their heads.
Alfred and Nanny coughed and spluttered in all the dust. When they’d pulled the sheet off, the girl was gone.
“Mite?” called out Alfred. “Mite?”
They paced around the junk room, but there was no sign of the little girl anywhere. She had simply disappeared. Perhaps
she
was
a ghost,
after
all…