The boat had disappeared over the dam, and the little boys and the dog were racing after it, but the angry man shouted at them, very loudly, to come back. “We’ll get it later,” he yelled. “Take these boys to the house and tell Mum to get them warm and dry. They’ll catch their deaths! Run, all of you! Stop that noise, you two, and get going. Run, I said.”
He sounded so angry that Francis and Ram did not hesitate for a second. Coughing, gulping, and breathless they struggled to their feet and followed their swift, excited little guides. Shoes squelching, sodden clothes weighing them down, they stumbled across the field, tripping over tufts, slipping in cowpats, but never stopping for a moment because the angry man was coming along behind them, and they were more afraid of him than they had ever been afraid of anything else in their lives.
And just when they felt they were going to collapse, they made it. They crossed a yard, and the older boy held the door open, and a woman stood in the entrance, listening, while both her sons told her all about it at once as fast as they could go.
“How very, very naughty,” said the woman, fairly coolly. “And what a mercy you weren’t both drowned. Turn the bath on, Martin, and get in at once, both of you. Kate, rinse out their clothes and put them through the spin dryer, and they’ll just have to wait till they’re dry. I’ll find some old things, and they can sit by the fire. Now, hurry up, you naughty boys—get along upstairs!”
About quarter of an hour later they were sitting by the kitchen fire, sipping hot mugs of tea, Francis in a robe and pajamas rather too small for him and Ram in a similar outfit much too big for him. The angry man was by now snorting and splashing in the bath, and they both hoped that he would stay there for a long, long time. Kate, a girl of about fifteen, glanced at them rather scornfully as she spread out their clothes to dry in front of the blaze and marched away with a backward toss of her long, fair hair.
But to Martin and Chris, the farmer’s sons, they were heroes, for the fact that they had only just escaped being drowned made them wonderful adventurers. The four boys sat on the hearthrug, and Francis described their perilous journey in a whisper with one eye on the kitchen door, in case the angry man appeared. And as he told it, it grew more and more perilous, and his listeners’ eyes grew rounder and rounder. He was just beginning to wonder whether he dare introduce a crocodile, when the woman came in.
“Now, come along,” she said. “Your clothes are fairly dry now, and you must be getting home. What are your names and where do you live and how did you get here?”
Francis looked at Ram. Perhaps these people would tell the police, and perhaps they could give the wrong address, but as Ram would never think of it, it was no good. So they both gave the details meekly enough and explained that they had come on bicycles, which were hidden behind a hedge near the main road.
The woman glanced out of the window. Already the sky was orange behind the bare elm branches.
“It’s just about sunset,” she remarked. “Have you got lights? You’re a long way from home.”
They shook their heads. They had never cycled in the dark before.
“Well, perhaps your parents had better come and fetch you,” suggested the woman. “Do you have a phone?”
“Ram doesn’t,” said Francis quickly, “and my dad goes out on Saturday evening, and Mum couldn’t leave my little sisters. P’raps we could walk.”
“So dark,” murmured Ram, and Francis, as he turned to him, saw the fear and misery in his huge black eyes. If the angry man got anywhere near Ram’s father, Ram would be punished in true Indian style. He was even more afraid of his father than he was of the dark, so he added tremblingly, “Us walk quick now!”
Just then the door opened, and the angry man came into the room. But clad in dry clothes and no longer out of breath, he looked less angry. He listened to the problem and made up his mind at once.
“I’ll run them back in the Landrover and pick up their bikes on the way,” he said. “I’d like a word with their parents. They should know what their boys are doing.”
Francis glanced at Ram again.
“You oughtn’t to go to Ram’s father,” he said loudly and boldly. “It wasn’t Ram’s fault. He didn’t want to go. He was afraid of being left alone, and I told him to jump in.”
The angry man, who was really the farmer, looked steadily at Francis. His face was grave, but he was not angry any longer.
“I’d guessed as much,” he said quite kindly. “We’ll give him another chance. But you—whatever made you do a fool thing like that? And do your parents know where you are?”
Francis shook his head.
“Mum’s in bed with a headache,” he muttered, “and Dad went out with my sisters—and he’s not my dad anyway—he doesn’t care what I do.” The old chorus was starting up again, and he nearly said, “It isn’t fair!” but he stopped himself in time. After all, it was no business of theirs.
“I see,” said the farmer quite kindly. “Well, someone seems to have been taking care of you both, or you might be lying at the bottom of the river. I’ll just lock up, and then we’ll get along.”
He left the room, his boys behind him, and the farmer’s wife started turning the clothes while Francis leaned his head against an armchair and gazed around the room. He was beginning to feel very warm and drowsy and found himself staring at a large card stuck on the wall. In ragged, uneven letters were printed the words God Is Luv.
“That’s spelled wrong,” said Francis suddenly.
The farmer’s wife smiled. “I know,” she said. “Chris wrote it all by himself when he was four, for his father’s birthday. It made us laugh, and we’ve always kept it. You see, Francis, its true however you spell it. Loving is God’s way, and it’s a far better way than running off and taking what doesn’t belong to you. Now these are dry—get into them.”
They dressed by the kitchen fire. The farmer’s wife piled on more logs, and the flames leaped up afresh. Kate was setting the table, and there was a delicious smell of bread baking. Francis longed to stay, but there was nothing to stay for. The farmer returned and told them to come, and his wife escorted them to the door.
“ ’Bye, boys,” she said, “and don’t you ever do a silly thing like that again. Thank God you’re both safe!” She smiled into their upturned faces and laid her hands for an instant on their hair. A moment later they were climbing into the Landrover, and Francis, looking back through the window, could see Martin and Chris squatting by the fire, laughing, while clear on the wall above them stood out the words that seemed to embody the spirit of the house, God Is Luv. Then the engine started up, and the window was hidden behind the barn.
They dropped Ram and his bicycle at the end of the street, and he scuttled home without a backward look, while Francis pressed a little closer to the farmer. Somehow, he did not want to say good-bye to this big man who had appeared at that moment of terror and saved him, who was not angry any longer, and who had understood completely that it was not Ram’s fault. The farmer too was driving more slowly, as though uncertain of what to do.
“That’s my house,” said Francis rather sadly.
“Is it?” said the farmer, drawing up at the roadside. But he did not move. “Why on earth did you do such a silly thing as that, Francis?” he said at last. “You nearly drowned that poor little Indian. You knew he couldn’t swim, and, besides, it was stealing. It wasn’t your boat. Your parents should know about it, or you may do something like that again.”
Francis said nothing. He just climbed out of the Landrover, lifted out his bicycle, and led the farmer in through the back door.
The kitchen was in an awful mess. No one had cleared the table or washed the dishes. His mother’s voice, tearful and angry, called sharply from the top of the stairs. “Francis, where have you been? How dare you stay out so late! I shall tell your Dad when he comes in, and you deserve all you’ll get.”
“He won’t come in till midnight, not on Saturday he won’t,” whispered Francis. “And she won’t tell him nothing, ’cause he’s usually drunk.”
“I see,” said the farmer, looking around thoughtfully. He squatted down beside the boy and looked deep into his eyes.
“Promise you won’t do silly things like that anymore.”
“Promise.”
“And come and see us again.”
“Promise.”
The huge hand pressed his shoulder and a moment later the farmer was gone, leaving Francis standing irresolute in the kitchen, fighting back his tears. It had been a very big, important day for him, but now he felt tired, cold, and desolate. He had run away and tasted freedom. He had nearly been drowned. He had also had a glimpse of something-that-might-have-been—a glimpse of a firelit home where everyone seemed happy and of anger that was both just and kind and did not make him feel angry in return. He longed to run to his mother and tell her all about it, and he seemed in luck, for Wendy and Debby were sitting in front of the television absorbed in a film.
He ran upstairs. She had been lying down, and the bedclothes were thrown back, but she was sitting on the bed clasping and unclasping her hands. She had been very anxious about him, but now that he was safely home, the sight of him standing there looking so pleased with himself merely annoyed her.
“I don’t know how you can be so selfish, Francis,” she burst out. “You knew how worried I’d be. Don’t you care? Where have you been anyway?”
“Out on my bike, Mum. I fell into the river and the river’s flooded and I nearly went over the dam, but a man pulled me out. Mum, I nearly got drowned.”
Her face went rather pale. “You’ve no business to go anywhere near the river,” she snapped at him. “And I believe you’re making all this up, anyway. Your clothes look perfectly dry and clean. It’s very naughty indeed of you, Francis.”
“But Mum, the lady put them into the spin dryer, and we sat by the fire—and I did nearly drown, honest Mum. The man said so—he brought me home in his Landrover and—”
A car drew up outside. She leaped to her feet and ran eagerly to the window and peered out. A moment later she spoke again.
“I thought it was your dad,” she said in a dull flat voice, “but it’s for the house next door.”
She did not come back. She stood staring down the road, still clasping and unclasping her hands. She had forgotten all about Francis and the river.
He waited for a moment and then turned away. He went into the living room, gave Wendy a good pinch, clasped his hand over her mouth to shut her up, and settled down with her on the sofa to watch the end of the film.