Nanny Piggins and the Pursuit of Justice (6 page)

‘Colonel!’ exclaimed Nanny Piggins. ‘What are you doing here? And why are you trying to blow everything up?’

‘I’m not trying to blow everything up,’ protested the Colonel. ‘I’m just trying to fine-tune my propulsion system.’

‘Propulsion system for what?’ asked Nanny Piggins.

‘My flying machine,’ said the Retired Army Colonel, whipping back a sheet to reveal a home-made helicopter crafted out of canvas and sticks.

‘That looks like something from the drawings of Leonardo da Vinci,’ said Derrick in awe.

‘It is based on the drawings of da Vinci,’ admitted the Colonel. ‘When I rang up the Air Force and asked for the specs on a Black Hawk helicopter they refused to give them to me. So I had to make do with this da Vinci postcard my niece sent me from the British Museum.’ He showed them a dog-eared slip of card.

‘But why do you need a helicopter?’ asked Nanny Piggins.

‘To escape, of course,’ said the Colonel. ‘When an officer is taken prisoner, his first duty is to attempt to escape.’

‘But couldn’t you just walk out the front door and catch a bus?’ asked Nanny Piggins.

‘I tried that,’ said the Colonel, ‘but I couldn’t get down the stairs with my legs like this.’

Nanny Piggins looked at the large plaster casts encasing each of his legs. ‘And how did you do that to yourself?’

The Retired Army Colonel blushed (which is something he usually only did after several glasses of the finest single malt whisky). ‘Um, I’d rather not say. Trifle embarrassing, I’m afraid.’

Fortunately dear reader, I can tell you, as long as you promise not to tell Nanny Piggins. You see the Retired Army Colonel was so desperately in love with Nanny Piggins that he really wanted to impress her. In the past he had tried to catch her attention by arranging aeronautical acrobatic displays over her house and military brass bands to parade up and down her street. But these attempts had gone largely unnoticed. So the Colonel, being a brilliant strategic thinker, had decided to change tactics.

He decided to play Nanny Piggins at her own game. Having never cooked anything in his life, he now embarked on teaching himself how to bake a cake. Unfortunately, it had all gone horribly wrong when he turned his cake mixer up too high, and egg whites had flown out all over his kitchen, causing him to slip on the linoleum and fall down his back stairs, breaking both legs. (The whole incident had
only given him an even greater admiration for Nanny Piggins because he knew she baked cakes every day, sometimes several times a day, and rarely broke any of her own limbs in the process.)

‘But how did you get all the materials?’ asked Nanny Piggins, looking around at the huge sheets of canvas, welding gear and C4 explosives.

‘A dear lady and a true friend,’ said the Colonel. ‘Mrs Simpson.’

‘Our Mrs Simpson?!’ exclaimed Samantha.

‘The one who lives next door?!’ exclaimed Michael.

‘And always gives us marshmallows, even if Nanny Piggins has been sending us over to raid her larder when she’s lying down taking a nap?!’ exclaimed Derrick.

‘That’s the one,’ agreed the Colonel. ‘Quite a lady.’

‘But where did she get it all from?’ marvelled Nanny Piggins.

‘Well, she borrowed the canvas by cutting down one of the sails from a yacht at the harbour and she got the sticks from Mrs Lau’s tomato patch,’ explained the Colonel.

‘What about the C4?’ asked Nanny Piggins.

‘I believe she plays bridge with a lady whose husband is very big in the mining industry, and
they did a swap for Mrs Simpson’s dolmades recipe,’ explained the Colonel.

‘Samantha, make a note to speak to Mrs Simpson next time we need high explosives,’ said Nanny Piggins.

‘But how did you end up in here?’ asked Michael.

‘The hospital arranged it,’ explained the Colonel. ‘I was hopped up on painkillers and couldn’t fight them. Well, I tried fighting them, but the head nurse got cross when I put her in a headlock. Anyway, they said I couldn’t go home on my own because there was no-one to look after me.’

‘We would have looked after you!’ protested Nanny Piggins.

‘That’s what I said,’ agreed the Colonel, ‘but they thought my stories of a glamorous accomplished flying pig swooping in to look after me were the product of my concussed mind, so they just upped my medication and dumped me here.’

‘That’s dreadful,’ said Nanny Piggins.

‘Not as dreadful as the food they serve here,’ said the Colonel. ‘You know I was a prisoner of war, and let me tell you the cockroaches I ate then were better and more nutritious than the meals we’re served here.’

‘Not for much longer,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I’m not having elderly people re-inventing da Vinci’s flying machines, robbing banks and catatonically staring into space on my watch. I’m going to do something about it.’

‘But Nanny Piggins, remember you’re here to do community service,’ said Samantha. ‘You’re not going to do something that gets you in even more trouble, are you?’

‘Some things are worth risking your personal liberty for,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Freedom of speech, freedom to vote, and freedom to not eat really horrible food. In fact, if you’ve got good food you don’t really need freedom of speech and voting rights. Which is why all sensible dictators hand out chocolate brownies if they want to maintain their evil regimes.’

As Nanny Piggins and the children made their way back downstairs they began to hear the rumble of noise.

‘What’s that?’ asked Samantha worriedly.

‘It sounds like people yelling,’ said Nanny Piggins.

And as they entered the common room they discovered all the previously catatonic old people were now extremely animated. Some were waving Zimmer frames and some were trying to stand up so
they could shake their fists. And they were all yelling at Boris who, characteristically enough, was fighting to hold back tears. (He did not like yelling, except when audiences yelled ‘Bravo!’, ‘Encore!’ and ‘You are the best ballet dancing bear I’ve ever seen.’ And even that made him cry.)

‘What’s got them so upset?’ asked Derrick.

‘Listen!’ urged Nanny Piggins.

The children listened to what the old people were yelling.

‘But who’s Bethany’s real mother?’ cried an old lady wearing a crocheted hat.

‘And how did Vincent kidnap Bridge and force him to become an international modelling superstar?’ called an old man with two hearing aids.

‘How can Brianna be Astra’s baby when she clearly isn’t African–American?’ asked an old lady, who was starting to sob because she was so confused.

‘Oh Sarah, I’m so glad you’re here,’ said Boris. ‘They loved watching
The Young and the Irritable
but they’ve got so many questions and this man keeps hitting me with his oxygen stand. What am I going to do?’

‘Turn the TV back on,’ advised Nanny Piggins, ‘and show them
The Bold and the Spiteful
. I’ll go to the kitchen and get them some lunch.’

‘Noooo!’ screamed the old people suddenly and in unison.

‘Please don’t feed us any more of that horrible muck,’ pleaded the old lady with the crocheted hat.

‘We promise to be good,’ said the man with two hearing aids.

‘I won’t hit the bear anymore,’ promised the man who had used his oxygen stand as a weapon.

‘Never fear,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I’m going to the kitchen to make sure you get a proper lunch.’

‘What does that mean?’ asked the crocheted-hat lady. ‘Are you going to give us proper vegetables?’

‘I can if you want,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘but I was planning to start with a really nice cake.’

The old people cheered joyously as Nanny Piggins marched off in the direction of the kitchen.

When she got there Nanny Piggins found three apathetic middle-aged women, emptying processed frozen nuggets onto baking trays and stirring giant pots of grey–green goo that the packet said was reconstituted powdered peas.

The women took one look at Nanny Piggins’ steely glare and realised the jig was up. They did not wait for her to start chasing them about with a cooking ladle before they tried to make a run for it. Luckily Nanny Piggins got in a good whack on each
of their bottoms before they escaped out the back door, as she yelled angry warnings at them never to attempt to mass-poison old people with horrible, overcooked vegetables again.

‘What are we going to do now?’ asked Derrick. ‘We’ve got half an hour to make lunch for 50 old people or they are going to start a riot.’

‘And there’s no real food here,’ said Michael, peering into the cupboard. ‘Unless you count generic tinned broccoli.’

‘Which I certainly do not,’ said Nanny Piggins, opening up her purse. ‘Fortunately I had the foresight to borrow your father’s credit card before I left the house this morning. Derrick, you’re best at forging his signature – take it down to the supermarket and buy 20 bags of flour, 20 bags of sugar, 10 dozen eggs, 20 litres of cream and 200 chocolate bars.’

‘That’ll make a lot of cakes,’ agreed Derrick, ‘but what about a main course?’

‘Cake will be the main course today,’ declared Nanny Piggins. ‘These retirees are clearly undernourished and need building up.’

By the time Derrick got back with the ingredients there was only five minutes left in
The Bold and the Spiteful
.

‘What are we going to do?’ wailed Samantha. ‘We can’t make enough cake for 50 old people in five minutes.’

‘You’re right,’ agreed Nanny Piggins. ‘We’re not going to.’

‘You’re going to let the old people starve?’ asked Michael.

‘Of course not,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I’m going to get them in here and make them do the cooking.’

‘Can you do that?’ asked Derrick.

‘Forcing people to cook is the greatest gift you can give them,’ said Nanny Piggins.

‘I thought you said cake was the greatest gift you can give,’ said Derrick.

‘Yes, which is why forcing someone to make cake is such a kindness,’ explained Nanny Piggins.

Just then they heard the closing theme music to
The Bold and the Spiteful
from the next room, then the sound of the old people starting to yell at Boris again.

‘All right,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Get them in here and get their ingredients ready.’

It soon became apparent that Nanny Piggins’ idea of setting the old people to work in the kitchen was even more brilliant than she could have imagined. Because the old people were so old they had all learnt to cook back in the days before anti-butter propaganda, when a woman could tip an entire litre of cream into a sauce without having to do nine hours of Pilates afterwards.

And it was not all cake. They soon discovered that Mr Lessandro had been secretly growing tomatoes on the fire escape. So after they had all had several helpings of dessert, he whipped up a delicious pasta dish with nothing more than tomatoes, basil, lemon juice and an entire bucket of cream.

Then Mrs Broomfield, who was normally so forgetful she could never recall her own cat’s name, suddenly remembered a delicious recipe for jammy dodgers she had been taught as a girl. So they spent the rest of the afternoon happily working away in the kitchen, fine-tuning her shortbread and jam recipe.

Finally, as the sun began to set, Mrs Clemenceau mentioned that she had been a pastry chef during the war, so she was put in charge of organising dinner. And they ate a three-course meal of cheese soufflé for entree, chocolate soufflé for dessert and chocolate soufflé with extra chocolate for second dessert.

‘That was the most delicious meal I have ever tasted,’ announced Nanny Piggins as she wiped the last smear of chocolate soufflé from her snout.

‘What about the chocolate meringue you made for dinner last night?’ asked Michael.

‘Mmm yes, that was good too,’ agreed Nanny Piggins. ‘But don’t distract me, I’m having another brilliant idea. You old people should open a restaurant.’

‘But we can’t do that!’ protested Mr Lessandro. ‘We’re old.’

‘But there are 50 of you,’ said Nanny Piggins, ‘so you can share the work and take lots of naps.’

Just then the back door burst open and a weedy 29-year-old in a suit walked in.

‘What’s going on here?’ he demanded.

The old people groaned.

‘I knew he’d turn up and spoil our fun,’ said Mrs Hastings. ‘He’s the 29-year-old investment banker who’s in charge.’

‘I’ve had complaints that staff have been assaulted with a cooking ladle,’ complained the 29-year-old, ‘and that old people have been seen climbing over the neighbourhood fences, stealing fruit.’

‘We had to make jam somehow,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘You’re the one who wouldn’t let the old people have a fruit and vegetable garden.’

‘We have to maintain the look of the exterior of the building,’ protested the 29-year-old, ‘or the neighbours complain.’

‘We’ve solved that problem. There won’t be any more complaints,’ Nanny Piggins assured him. ‘We’ve been blasting the neighbours in the face with a hosepipe if they are rude enough to poke their noses over the fence.’

‘Have you people been taking your medication?’ demanded the 29-year-old, speaking to the old people as though they were three-year-olds.

‘I’ve been medicating them myself,’ announced Nanny Piggins, ‘with proper food containing the five essential food groups – chocolate, cream, butter, sugar and cake.’