Daniel and the Guilty Party
Jenifer Bennett is obviously a close student of the "William"
books by .
Daniel
sat in the drawing room at The Stables, scowling fiercely at the vicar
while his mother was in the kitchen preparing tea. Daniel and the Reverend
Janet Fisher enjoyed a mutual antipathy which was renewed at frequent
intervals, since she was one of his mother's closest friends, and Daniel
was, perforce, a regular church attender.
Miss Fisher would dearly have liked to have been capable of fond feelings
towards her friend's only child, but her most strenuous endeavours in
this direction were always defeated by Daniel's uncompromising truculence.
She hoped wholeheartedly that Mrs Hebden-Lloyd did not perceive the unchristian
shudder of distaste that always passed through her as she placed her hand
on Daniel's unendearing head to bless him at Family Communion. In truth,
Miss Fisher was not generally keen on the younger members of her flock
(she felt that they did not take her seriously ), but in Daniel's presence
she was often obliged to remind herself forcibly of Mark 10:14, whilst
simultaneously reflecting that the Good Lord might not have urged His
disciples quite so enthusiastically to "Let the little children come
to me" had He been confronted with Daniel Hebden-Lloyd. Indeed, Miss
Fisher might even have ventured to suggest that, faced with that child
frowning menacingly from the front row at the Sermon on the Mount (as
she was so often faced in church); by the time He had reached "Blessed
are the merciful" Our Lord would have been sorely tempted to abandon
the whole thing and go home.
Feeling the need to lighten the oppressive silence which had descended
upon the room, Miss Fisher assumed a voice of unnatural brightness and
asked, "Did you have a lovely time at your little cousin's birthday
party, Daniel dear?"
"Yes."
It had, in fact been a wonderful party, but Daniel did not see any need
to go into details with Miss Fisher. The celebrations had not had a promising
start, partly because cousin Josh, and most of his friends were only five
years old, and therefore beneath his, Daniel's, contempt; partly because
his Uncle David and Aunt Ruth did not excel in the skills of providing
party entertainment.
He quite liked being at their house, however, because no-one (unless Granny
was there) told you to get off the furniture, or minded if your shoes
were a bit muddy. This was a pleasing contrast to the regime which presided
at home.
"'S only a little bit of dirt!" he would protest in vigorous
astonishment, "I'm s'prised you c'n even see it. 'S only a bit untidy!"
Daniel's parents invariably made an entirely unnecessary fuss about that
sort of thing, in his opinion. "What's the point of havin' a cleaner,
if there's nothin' for her to clean?" he would enquire, but they
always failed to appreciate this wholly logical line of reasoning.
Josh's party, after its initial tedium, had livened up considerably with
the arrival of his Uncle Kenton, who had bestowed upon the fortunate Josh
the generous gift of a water-blaster, and to the delight of everyone under
the age of twelve, had then proceeded to chase the party-goers around
the garden with it. Daniel was now brooding enviously over the fact that
his five-year-old cousin was the proud possessor of this magnificent weapon
while he, aged seven and three-quarters was expressly forbidden to own
any such thing.
"No dear, of course you can't have a water-blaster! Look what you
did with that pen-knife Grandpa gave you!" his mother had exclaimed.
"I can't think how Kenton could have been so irresponsible, giving
Josh a thing like that! David was furious with him!"
Daniel's mutinous presence in the drawing room was occasioned by the
fact that Mrs Hebden-Lloyd had discovered (from that tell-tale, Jamie
Perks) the nature of his involvement in the escape and subsequent disappearance
of Mrs Snell's goat.
He'd tried to explain that it wasn't his fault. "I didn' mean to
leave the paddock gate open! I jus' felt sorry for the poor ole goat.
Anyone could see it didn' want to be tied up. I jus' thought I'd let it
move about a bit. How was I s'posed to know it'd run off like that?"
Anyhow, Mrs Snell was silly to get all worked up about an ole goat. It
would pobably have died soon anyway. Really he'd been doing her a favour
because she wouldn't have the bother of burying it now. She'd probably
be grateful to him when she'd thought about it a bit. "Anyone oughter
be jolly well grateful they'd got rid of an ole goat. Stands to reason!"
His mother, however was unmoved by this argument, and had confiscated
the pen-knife (a good one with four blades, a corkscrew and a thing for
taking the stones out of horses' hooves) with which he had committed the
offence. She was at this moment wondering how best to approach the delicate
matter of apologising to Mrs Snell.
Second (and final) part
