Read Online Porky by Deborah Moggach - Free Book Online

the back porch. They moved away and looked our bungalow up and down. The way they did this, I suddenly saw it clearly: the green wood, stained under the windows; the rusting, corrugated-iron roof. One man rubbed on the window; then he wiped his fingers on his hanky and smiled at the other one. When he did that, I knew I wasn’t going to let them see me.
    Then Dad came up. He must have been down at our car park field. They talked for a moment, then Dad went inside and came out again with his jacket. As he put it on he bellowed,
    â€˜Heth!’
    I climbed down from the caravan.
    â€˜Where’s your manners? There’s two good friends of mine here.’
    I had to shake their hands.
    â€˜Say hello to . . . er –’
    â€˜Mike,’ said one.
    â€˜Tony,’ said the other.
    â€˜Just popping off,’ said Dad. ‘What’ll it be?’
    â€˜Pepsi?’ I asked.
    He gave a thumbs-up sign and climbed into the car.
    It was hours before he came back. Out in the depot the tea-time hooter was sounding when I heard the car returning. They must have enjoyed themselves because they were laughing and joking outside. I slipped out of the front veranda and sat down on the grass. I leaned against the wooden frame and watched the car bouncing away along the ruts. It turned left, into the traffic.
    I didn’t know, then, how I’d look back to that afternoon; how I’d try to remember it as it was, before everything happened. An ant was walking up my leg; it struggled over the pale hairs. I’ve got hairs, I realized; that was the first time I’d noticed them.
    â€˜Heth?’
    The inner door opened, then the veranda door. His trousers stood in front of me. His hands were behind his back.
    â€˜Go on,’ he said. ‘Guess.’
    I squinted up but the sun was in my eyes, so I couldn’t tell from his expression.
    â€˜Left,’ I said.
    He usually cheated and changed hands, but today he didn’t. He held out his palm; in it lay a scrunched-up paper napkin. He lowered himself down beside me and opened the napkin, carefully, on the grass.
    â€˜Whoops,’ he said. The little cheese biscuits were all broken. ‘Must’ve sat on them.’
    â€˜I don’t mind,’ I said truthfully. I picked up the bits and ate them.
    â€˜Had them in these bowls,’ he said. ‘Them and olives, but I know you don’t like the olives . . . Ever so smart, it was. Know the Global?’
    I nodded.
    â€˜In there. Got this Eurolounge . . . Velvet seating and all, with dinky little whatsits on them. Tassels. You’d have loved it, Heth. I told them . . . I said, my little girl would love this.’
    â€˜What were those men?’
    â€˜Who?’
    â€˜Those two men you went with.’
    He smiled and closed his eyes. He was leaning against the veranda.
    â€˜Know something, Podge?’
    â€˜What?’
    â€˜Promise you won’t tell?’
    â€˜Cross my heart.’
    He paused, still smiling. ‘We’re sitting on a gold mine, that’s what.’
    â€˜What?’
    Eyes closed, he put a finger to his lips. ‘Sssh.’
    â€˜A gold mine?’
    â€˜I knew it . . . Didn’t have to tell me. Didn’t have to tell old Frank. Not that they did, in so many words . . . Oh no, not them . . . Devious buggers.’ He looked at me with one eye, and tapped the side of his nose. ‘Mum’s the word, eh?’
    I stared at him, but his eyes had closed again. Then his head slid sideways and he started snoring.
    I sat there for a moment, too panic-stricken to move. Down beyond the pigs, a car bumped slowly out of our field and drove off. Bye-bye, 50p. I looked at my Dad’s poor, frayed cuffs. I thought of my Mum, working herself to the bone, she said, to make ends meet. Where’s the money to come from? she said.
    The problem was to find out where the gold was hidden. Why hadn’t