Johnny Swanson - Eleanor Updale [9]
A voice started shouting: ‘Hey! You boy! You boy. Get out of there!’
Johnny spun round. Through the branches of a holly bush he could see a black hat on the other side of the graveyard wall. A netting veil covered the face of the short, dumpy woman who was wearing it, but he knew at once that it was Miss Dangerfield herself. She was angry. ‘Get away from those graves,’ she cried. ‘What do you think you are doing?’
‘I was only looking,’ said Johnny. ‘I was just wondering if they were your family – if it was TB.’
‘That’s none of your business,’ snapped Miss Dangerfield, raising her walking stick.
‘But I just wanted to ask—’
‘How dare you? You nasty little squirt. They were worth a hundred of you. Be off with you.’
Johnny ran away to finish his deliveries, wanting to know more about the bodies under the slabs, but too frightened to ask again.
Chapter 5
LETTERS
Johnny asked his mother about Miss Dangerfield and the TB, but Winnie had not lived in Stambleton in 1916, and knew less about the epidemic than Johnny did. She reassured him about the disease. If Dr Langford said Johnny was healthy, she was sure he was right. But other children had been told more lurid stories, and for the next few days the talk in the playground was all about TB, with graphic descriptions of victims gasping for breath, coughing up blood, and wasting away or just dropping down dead. Everyone was watching their wrists for signs of a reaction to the test. Dr Langford had said he’d be looking for a red bump at the point where a tiny trace of bacteria had been introduced. In art class, Ernest Roberts dabbed on some paint to make it look as if his scratch had flared up into a livid inflammation, but in fact everyone was boringly clear.
Johnny was still worried about Olwen. But when he asked at school whether anyone had heard anything about her they just teased him, so he kept quiet. He wondered in secret what had happened to Olwen’s family. This disease was so bad that she had been sent away, and yet everyone said there was no cause for concern. Johnny was confused. But he was excited as well, hoping every day that he would get a reply from Box 23 containing the Secret of Instant Height. He met the postman in the street, and asked if he had seen an envelope addressed to John Swanson Esq. No, said the postman, there hadn’t been any letters for Johnny’s house that week. Even Hutch was concerned. He could see that Johnny was unusually anxious.
‘Have you heard from that aunt of yours yet?’ he asked.
‘No. Nothing,’ said Johnny. ‘I hope she’s all right.’
‘Is she your mother’s sister?’ Hutch paused for thought. ‘I suppose she must be. I knew your father all his life, and he never had a sister. Does she live where your mother comes from? Nottingham, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ said Johnny, feeling he should at least tell the truth about his mother’s origins, even if everything else was a lie. He was saved from further questions when a customer came in, but he realized that he would have to sort out this Auntie Ada business pretty soon. Maybe he should say that she had died. But then Hutch might send condolences to his mother. And Hutch might mention Ada to her anyway, dead or alive. It would be only natural if Winnie went into the shop. Johnny would have to keep Hutch and his mother apart. He needed yet another plan.
That night, Johnny got home first. There were two letters on the doormat, one addressed to him in his own handwriting, the other an official-looking brown envelope, with his mother’s full name, ‘Mrs Winifred May Swanson’, typed boldly across it. As Johnny picked them up, he heard his mother coming. He just had time to stuff his own envelope into his pocket before she reached the front door.
‘What have you got there?’ she asked.
‘It’s a letter. For you,’ he said. ‘It looks important.’
Johnny was desperate to get away to read his own letter, but he stayed and watched while Winnie