“That was a nice cup of tea, Mrs Webb,” Jane Fisher said to her newly acquired neighbour.
She was actually thinking that it was very good to have landed so well in her new home; it had been a distinct gamble, buying this very pleasant house at the end of a long Wharfedale Lane, not knowing the area at all. They were only there because Mike had been moved across the Pennines from one Ministry of Transport Office to another. They had only one day to house search; it had been such a rush. And Mrs Webb was a treasure, full of good advice and terribly kind.
“Your little boy is still settling in well at the village school, is he?” Mrs Webb asked.
“Oh yes,” Jane said. “It is a great relief. He hated the one back in Cheshire. Too many children and too much discipline, I think. He just loved it from the day he came here, and he is slowly starting to learn. He seemed to more or less go on strike at the previous establishment.”
“Yes, the village school does have a good reputation now with the young new headmistress, though I would not have let my children go there with the old headmistress. She really was a bit of a fruitcake, if you know what I mean. Anyway, my husband loathes state schools, thinks only private is good, so they would not have gone there anyway.”
“Yes, I am sure,” Said Jane awkwardly, not liking to say that she and her husband had both done well at grammar schools.
“I hope you are well prepared for the winter weather, are you?” Mrs Webb asked solicitously.
“It does not seem to be that cold yet, and the new Aga is working so well. The kitchen is very snug,” Jane replied almost defensively, for she and Mrs Webb had discussed this before.
“Do make sure there is salt down your drains; they freeze up so easily. And I wish you could afford these modern windows. When we got them the heat of the house improved enormously, but they are terribly expensive.”
“Anyway, thank you for the cup of tea, but I ought really be getting back. There is my son to collect and food to prepare,” Jane said, meaning what she was saying, but not liking her husband’s relative lack of income to be referred to in this way, which Mrs Webb always seemed to manage to get in to the conversation at some point.
“Yes, I quite understand,” Mrs Webb replied, and showed her guest out politely enough.
When Mrs Webb had closed the door, she thought to herself, ‘Damn it! I should have warned her about Mischief Night. I bet they don’t have the faintest idea it exists, coming from the other side of the Pennines! Anyway, with luck the village kids won’t come so far, even to tease a newcomer to the village. I wonder if I ought to go back and warn her, but probably it won’t happen. They really ought to be leaving some lights on; that usually keeps them away.’
“I really don’t like this new house!” Gillian Hurley said angrily to her twin, Margaret. “Dad spent a fortune on it, just to please mum; central heating and double glazing and all. I wish we were back at the old house. I loved the box room at the top, and the orchard and the sheer amount of space we had. I cannot think why mum wanted to leave it.”
“Because mum wanted to be warm of course!” Margaret replied with an air of practicality. “And there is some space here, though not what we had before. But yes, I agree. And I really hate the idea of new people living in our place, especially as they are outsiders. I would not have minded people from the village buying it quite so much.”
“Not much we can do about it,” Gillian grumpily replied, sounding as if she rather wished there was something to be done.
“It is Mischief Night tonight and we could do something to really shake them up, even make them move out somewhere else,” Margaret said thoughtfully.
“But Mischief Night is for kids, and we are eighteen. I mean, I know it’s the rule kids can do anything short of murder and get away with it on Mischief Night,” Gillian replied awkwardly, not quite sure either way.
“We are under twenty-one,” Margaret observed.
“It’s not quite the same somehow. It is normally twelve-year-old boys lifting gates off their hinges or letting a few bangers off. People just shrug about that, though they don’t really like it. If the new people caught us, it could end up with the police being called. Being outsiders, they won’t know about Mischief Night. But I would like to do something, I really would,” Gillian havered.
“Mum and dad are going to be out really late tonight to have a meal with the Hartley’s. Mum was even saying that if it gets to one o’clock they might well stay the night,” Margaret pondered.
“Yes, mum was saying we must be careful to leave a lot of lights on to stop kids doing any mischief, and we had better not have any dates tonight, not that we have,” Gillian replied. “I think she is worried because it is such a new house and it might be a target.”
“So the coast would be clear for us to get in and out without anyone knowing,” Margaret said.
“It would be almost pitch black, though there should be just a touch of moonlight, but we know the old track over the fields like the back of our hands, so we wouldn’t be seen in any car headlights. At any rate, we would only have to go a couple of hundred yards each way on the main road,” Gillian added.
“Yes, it is do-able!” her twin declared. “But what would we do? It ought to be something really vicious, or it is not worth doing.”
A decision had seemingly been made, but they both paused, worried both by the seriousness of the decision and puzzled how to carry it out.
“Why Mischief Night anyway?” Gillian questioned, putting off the discussion for the moment. “Nowhere else has anything like it. The headmistress says it every year at school.”
“I always thought it was connected with Guy Fawkes,” Margaret answered. “It is supposed to be because he was born near here, though why that means children can be naughty I really don’t know. Perhaps it is a revenge for him or something.”
“That thought might be useful tonight, though we could still get it in the neck if they don’t consider us as children,” Gillian said, shrugging her shoulders.
“I know dad has some old engine oil in the garage. That would really mess up their downstairs windows. That would do, though we would have to carry it,” Margaret observed decisively.
“It should not need that much, and if we took it all dad could easily notice, so better not take it all. An old petrol can and some rags to put it on with, that should be ok,” Gillian said.
“We are really going to do it! I am looking forward to this,” Margaret said gleefully.
“I wonder what Mum and Dad would do if they found out?” Gillian queried with sudden unease.
“Probably dad would think it was a good Mischief Night prank. He was in the Commandos after all; and we have not been spanked since we were eleven,” Margaret firmly observed.
“There is that awful cane dad keeps in the wardrobe in their bedroom, not that he has ever even threatened to use it, but I expect you are right. I hope you are. Though mum might not be as nice about it, she might push him to do something, and she usually gets her way. Anyhow, we had better act as normally as possible till they go out, and we must give the new people enough time to go to bed. The main thing is not to get caught. And we’ve got that essay to do anyway,” Gillian said.
The twins returned to the question of an English essay on Tennyson’s ‘Lady of Shallot’ that was due on Friday; they usually did their homework together, even in the Upper Sixth. The art of it was for each of them to use a different title from the various ones Miss Hobbs had given, while using more or less the same material. Both were quite keen to earn county scholarships and get to university, which offered a secure route into the outside world, or so they hoped.
However, while they were working hard on their essays, Gillian, for one, kept imagining touching her toes and the cane swishing. But would it hurt much? Some boys always said it didn’t, though that might be bravado. But probably they would be spanked, which was boringly familiar, and did not actually hurt that much, at least it had not in the past. However, the chances were ninety-five percent they would not be caught, which was pretty good odds. And yet something in her almost wanted to be caught.
“That’s a good job on the kitchen and the hall,” Margaret muttered in a gloom through which the moonlight was barely breaking. “But it is a nuisance that we have run out of oil. I wanted to do the front windows as well and make a really good job of it.”
“Probably just as well!” Gillian whispered back. “The bedrooms are that side and they might just have heard something. Come on, we had better make sure we have got everything in the bag and get home. We had better not leave anything.”
They scrabbled about, wiping their hands on the rags they had not used to daub the windows and carefully putting everything into the bag they had brought. Then they headed back through the little orchard at the back, occasionally tripping, and, after some rather nervous fumbling, found the little gate onto the track and set out for home, tossing the rags into the bushes as they went.
Getting home, they put the old petrol can back in the garage and rinsed their hands under the outside tap. Inside the house, they washed their hands again very thoroughly with soap, gave the back door handle a wipe, and went upstairs and put on their pyjamas. Then they went downstairs again and made some cocoa to warm themselves up, for it had been quite cold out.
They had barely sat down to drink it when they heard the noise of the car and then the sound of a key in the front door.
“They are early, it is only twelve,” Gillian exclaimed.
The kitchen door opened and mum was putting her head in and saying, “Mr Hartley had an appointment in the morning, so we are a bit early. I am glad to see you kept the lights on like I told you. I was really worried about Mischief Night, though you didn’t really have to stay up, but it is good of you. Anyway, you had better get to sleep, you have school in the morning.”
The two pranksters said they were glad to help. Mum went to her room and Gillian and Margaret were soon asleep. Gillian, for one, felt more than a slight touch of remorse at being praised for guarding the house against mischief makers.
It was only next morning as the twins were getting ready for school that Gillian noticed her gloves were missing from her coat pocket. They were rather nice gloves that Mrs Webb had given her last Christmas. She had deliberately taken them off to avoid getting oil on them and stuffed them into her pocket. She must have dropped them, but surely the chances were they had been dropped on the track and not by the house, or she hoped so. Anyway, it was unlikely anyone would recognise them. She decided to firmly forget it, which she did for the rest of the day, well almost. That half-exciting, half-terrifying vision of touching her toes for the cane kept coming back and being put out of her mind.
“My turn to get the tea,” James Fisher announced rather gallantly to his wife.
He said that every few days as if they really took turns to do it, but at least he did it sometimes. Jane snuggled gratefully under the bedclothes as he put on his dressing gown, opened the curtains and struggled off down the stairs to the kitchen to get the morning tea. It was definitely getting colder, she decided, though it was not yet on the scale of Mrs Webb’s prophecies.
About ten minutes later, she was woken from her half sleep by the noise of James putting a mug of tea down on the small chest beside her. She hauled herself upright, reached for her bed jacket, put it on and started to drink the tea.
“Didn’t you say the old biddy up the road was muttering on about heavy frosts to come?”
“Yes. Why?” she asked.
“Oh, the hall window is black with it and the kitchen is the same.”
“That is odd,” Jane exclaimed, “There is no frost on the windows in the bedroom. Do you mean black? Surely you mean white?”
“It looks black,” he replied.
“It really is so kind of you to give me lunch on top of all the help you have given me this morning already,” Jane said to Mrs Webb about twelve-thirty the following day.
“It was the least I could do. I really should have warned you about Mischief Night. I meant to and never did it,” Mrs Webb responded.
“Whether you should have warned me or not, lending me your handyman was so helpful. And I doubt if I would have had enough detergent to get that horrible oil off, if he had not gone and got some. It would have been too late by the time that James came home. It is the trouble with husbands; they are never there when you want them. It would have had to wait till the weekend if you had not me lent me Mr Henderson.”
“I am so glad to be able to help, my dear. Not that I would have been able to help if it had not been for still keeping on running my market garden, which really I am getting a bit old for. Mr Henderson is such a treasure,” Mrs Webb replied at rather too great length, thinking Jane Fisher was even prettier when she was cross and upset.
“I suppose it is useless going to the police?” Jane asked wearily. “Though there are those gloves that they must have dropped in the orchard. It was your Mr Henderson who found them. I would never have noticed.”
“But nothing to identify the owner. It is a bit like Cinderella’s slipper, and we cannot really expect the police to try them on every child in the village,” Mrs Webb said very firmly.
“No, I suppose not,” Jane said wearily. “Oh well, we will know to put all our lights on next year.”
“It never fails, dear, but come on, eat your lunch,” Mrs Webb said, not liking to say that she knew very well who those gloves belonged to, for she had knitted them herself. She found it all very shocking. It was a peculiarly nasty piece of mischief, and those girls were much too old for such nonsense. However, she did not want to start a feud between her old neighbour and her new one. Such things could cause ripples in the village and beyond. No, she would keep it to herself, but surely there was something she could do.
Jack Hurley knew the signs; his wife undoubtedly wanted something. It always meant that whenever she baked an apple pie for tea. Not that he minded, he genuinely liked apple pie and his wife’s version was exceptionally good. But what did she want? He could not think of anything obvious. Still, the arrangement that he and his wife had their meal by themselves after he came in from work had a lot to recommend it. With the girls at the other end of the house, hopefully doing school work, they could really talk about significant issues, and more often than not more minor ones, without interruption.
“That was excellent dear,” he said. “One of your best,” and waited expectantly with a half-smile on his lips.
“I don’t suppose you remember those gloves Mrs Webb kindly knitted for the girls last Christmas?” Janet Hurley asked demurely.
“Not really, I am afraid. Why? Is it important?” Jack answered, sounding puzzled.
“Mrs Webb invited herself round for a cup of tea this afternoon,” his wife replied, sounding oddly dramatic.
“Scarcely unusual!” Jack responded.
“It was on this occasion. That nice couple who bought our house had their kitchen windows daubed with oil last night. It was Mischief Night, of course, but as Mrs Webb said, it went way beyond normal Mischief Night pranks. She lent them that man who works for her in her market garden, and it took him all morning to get it off again. And guess what he found?”
“I dread to think!” her husband replied, though he was all too well aware what might have been found.
“It was Gillian’s gloves. She must have dropped them in the orchard as they were getting away through the side gate. Mrs Webb very neatly put a red line of wool on the wrist of Gillian’s gloves and a blue one on Margaret’s, so they would not get muddled.”
“She could not have dropped them before we moved?” Jack suggested, half hopefully.
“I wish I could say that, but I am sure Gillian had them on to go to school yesterday.”
“And if Gillian was there then Margaret was there as well. Those two always do things together. But it is so unlike either of them. It is close to vicious, and they are normally such pleasant girls. Anyway, what the hell are we going to do? We really can’t let them get away with it. I suppose I will have to act the heavy father and give them a real lecture,” Jack said wearily.
“Quite honestly dear, your attempts at lectures have not usually been very successful in the past. Don’t you think something more severe is called for? I know you never liked doing it, but spanking them when they were younger was very effective.”
Jack groaned inwardly. He had never been that keen on the spankings he had been forced to inflict when the twins had gone through a bad patch when they were ten and eleven. Now they seemed rather too old, but there again, maybe this appalling behaviour needed to be nipped in the bud before it was repeated.
“I really don’t think they should have their bare bottoms smacked; it just would not be decent at eighteen,” Jack said uncomfortably.
“There is that cane you inherited from your father which has taken up space in the wardrobe ever since,” his wife said.
“That would be pretty severe,” Jack replied. “But I suppose it would be over and done quite quickly, if they will accept it. I am not going to do it if they have to be held down. If they won’t accept it, they had better not go out till January, or even Easter.”
“I will go and get them,” Janet said abruptly, anxious the punishment should happen before her husband changed his mind.
“I will get the cane from the bedroom,” Jack said, surprising his wife by the sudden note of determination in his voice.
Gillian was sitting in her bedroom by herself trying to read a novel. Later, she and Margaret would do some work together, but for now she was as much day dreaming as reading. She had spent rather a pleasant day at school. At least the double periods of History and English had been enjoyable, for it was nice to do something she really enjoyed and get praised for, though the games afternoon playing hockey had been rather less than fun. Margaret would have enjoyed the hockey more than her, she knew. Margaret was keen to play for the school. There had been no come back about last night and almost certainly there would not be, she thought, but if only she could be sure she had lost her gloves on the track. Anyway, it had been Mischief Night, hadn’t it?
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of feet on the stairs and the sound of mum opening the door to Margaret’s room. Their mother’s voice sounded unusually loud. Mum had not bothered to knock, which seemed ominous. Then, without warning, her own door opened and she was confronted with mum looking very angry.
“Your father wants to see you both, downstairs in the sitting room, now.”
Gillian felt oddly mixed emotions. She was frightened at the consequences she was almost certainly going to face, and oddly excited at having been really naughty for the first time in a long time.
“Now, young lady!” mum more or less shouted at her.
She got to her feet and walked rather unsteadily downstairs, just as Margaret reached the bottom. Mother was following her. All three of them walked into the sitting room with its new, rust coloured three-piece suite. The curtains were drawn and the light was on. Father was pacing up and down in front of the fireplace, which rather oddly had an electric fire in it.
‘Just a really bad telling-off and probably an apology to Mr and Mrs Fisher,’ Gillian thought to herself, but then she noticed the cane that was leaning over the end of the settee.
‘Oh god, NO!’ she thought.
At that moment she realized Margaret’s eyes were meeting hers and they had tears in them. She no doubt had seen the cane too.
Dad stopped pacing and said, “I am not going to argue about this. It is quite clear you two were responsible for the oil on the windows at Mr and Mrs Fisher’s house. I know it was Mischief Night, but you are both too old for such nonsense, and it was a singularly unpleasant piece of mischief. Have either of you anything to say?”
“I suppose we went a bit mad,” Margaret was saying awkwardly. “We just did not like them being in our house. We won’t do anything like it again. Please, not the cane!”
“That, I suppose, shows some contrition, but nothing like enough,” dad replied. “What about you Gillian? Anything to say?”
“Not really. I am sorry too, and we should not have done it, but please not the cane,” she found herself pleading, rather to her own disgust. She should just have said nothing; it wouldn’t have made any difference.
“Let us get it over with. I cannot say I am going to enjoy this. Four strokes each. I suppose you both have reasonably thick knickers on?”
“I have only got panties on. I only wear panties now,” Gillian found herself saying rather hysterically.
“Then go up to your bedroom and put your gym knickers on,” mother was saying briskly. “And don’t be too long coming back.”
“Come on then, Margaret, you are first, it seems. Pull your skirts up and bend over the end of the settee,” dad was saying in a voice of horrible detachment.
As Gillian turned round to close the sitting room door, which something told her was required, she was just in time to see her twin’s plump bottom inside its navy school knickers bent over the end of the couch, which she found extremely frightening. As she went up the stairs, she heard a loud yell. Clearly it hurt; she had half hoped it would not, at least not much.
Getting to her bedroom, Gillian was all fingers and thumbs, which was not helped by three more yells somewhere in the distance, but eventually she found her second pair of gym knickers. They kept one for PE and one for hockey, and the one for hockey was in the wash. However, in the end she struggled into the garment she was to be punished in and felt very odd.
She emerged on the landing just as the door in the hall into the sitting room opened and a weeping Margaret emerged and staggered upstairs.
“It really hurts!” Margaret said, and vanished into her bedroom, slamming the door.
Nothing to do but face the music! Gillian plucked up her courage and walked downstairs with as much dignity as she could manage. She took a breath and opened the sitting room door. Dad was standing there with the cane in his hand, looking as if he really was not enjoying this at all. Mother, by contrast, was looking oddly excited and Gillian wondered why.
“Right, let us get it over with,” was all dad said. “Haul your skirts up and bend over the end of the couch.”
Gillian obeyed, feeling oddly detached. Dad would normally have been embarrassed to see his daughters in their underwear, wouldn’t he? But perhaps gym knickers were different. After all, people saw girls every day in their gym knickers.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the cane hitting her. Her immediate reaction was that it had not hurt as much as she expected and then that it had hurt at least as much as she had thought it would. She bit back her yell, but burst into tears instead. The other three hurt quite a lot, but not quite as much as she had expected after the agony of first stroke. She half stood up and clutched her throbbing bottom, feeling more than slightly nauseous.
“Alright, that is it,” dad was saying. “I sincerely hope I never have to repeat this. It is not a nice punishment to have to carry out and anyway you are far too old. Get off to your bedroom, Gillian.”
Gillian obeyed, somehow finding her way to the sitting room door.
“It is a pity they are girls. Operational planning as good as that would have been useful in the Commandos,” dad said, half laughing.
“I found it very embarrassing,” his wife replied. “I have always wondered what a caning looked like and now I know, but it was very embarrassing. I only stayed because I was worried they would need to be held. But they were so brave. I could not have taken a punishment like that at their age.”
“Yes, they both took it like troopers,” her husband said.
Back upstairs, Gillian was trying to see what her marks looked like in the dressing table mirror. She felt an odd mixture of guilt and pride.
‘Not many girls get the cane,’ she thought. ‘But there again, I really did deserve it and I will never do anything like that again.’
Then it struck her that her twin had seemed more upset than she had, and would was probably in need of comforting, so she resolutely adjusted her clothes and walked out of the door to see how Margaret was doing.
The End
© Jane Fairweather 2024