Wilkins’ Tooth

Chapter 1

Frank and Jess thought OWN BACK LTD was an excellent idea when they first invented it. Three days later, they were not so sure. The trouble was that they were desperate for money. They had broken a new chair and all pocket money was stopped until the summer. They had to face four penniless months and, somehow, as soon as they knew this, they found all sorts of things they could not possibly do without.

“I can’t go anywhere,” said Jess. “The other girls expect you to pay your share. It isn’t fair. Just because it was such a badly made chair. The other chairs turn upside down without breaking. I don’t see why this one had to go and fall to pieces.”

“Nor do I,” said Frank, who was worse off than Jess. “I owe Buster Knell ten pence.”

“Why?” said Jess.

“A bet,” Frank answered. Jess was sorry for him, because Buster Knell was not the boy you owed anything if you could help it. He had a gang. Frank, in fact, was desperate enough to go down to the newsagent and ask Mr Prodger if he wanted another boy for the paper round. But Mr Prodger said Vernon Wilkins was all he needed and, besides, Vernon needed the money.

So Frank came dismally home and, after some thought, he and Jess put up a notice on the front gate, saying ERRANDS RUN. It had been up half an hour when their father came home and took it down. “As if you two haven’t done enough already,” he said, “without decorating the gate with this. When I said no money, I meant no money. Don’t think I’m going to let you get away with immoral earnings, because I’m not.”

It was the talk of immoral earnings that gave them the idea.

“I say,” said Jess. “Do people pay you to do bad things for them?”

“If they want them done enough, I suppose,” Frank answered. “If it’s something they don’t dare do themselves, like pull Buster Knell’s nose for him.”

“Would they pay us?” said Jess. “If we were to offer to do things they didn’t dare do?”

“Like what?” said Frank. “I don’t dare pull Buster Knell’s nose either.”

“No. More cunning than that,” said Jess. “Suppose someone came and said to us: ‘I want something dreadful to happen to Buster Knell because of what he did to me yesterday,’ then we could say: ‘Yes. Pay us five pence, and we’ll arrange for him to fall down a manhole.’ Would that work?”

“If it did,” said Frank, “it would be worth more than five pence.”

“Let’s try,” said Jess.

So they spent the rest of the evening making a notice. When it was finished, it read:

OWN BACK LTD

REVENGE ARANGED

PRICE ACCORDING TO TASK

ALL DIFFICULT TASKS UNDERTAKEN

TREASURE HUNTED ETC.

The last two lines were put in by Frank, because he said that if they were going to arrange things like booby-traps for Buster Knell, then they might as well agree to any dangerous task. Jess put in the LTD to make it look official.

“Though it shouldn’t be, really,” she said, “because we’re not a proper company.”

“Yes,” said Frank, “but if anyone asks us something too difficult, we can always say it means Limited Own Back, and we don’t touch things too big for us.”

The next morning, they pinned the notice to the back of the potting shed, where it could be seen by anyone who went along the path beside the allotments, and sat in the shed with the back window open to wait for orders.

All that happened, that entire day, was that two ladies exercising their dogs saw it and shrieked with laughter.

“Oh look, Edith! How sweet!”

“Limited too! The idea!”

Frank and Jess could hear them laughing about it all down the path.

“Take no notice,” said Jess. “Just think of when the shekels start to pour in.”

That was all very well, but Frank began to wonder if they were going to spend the entire Easter holiday sitting in the potting shed being laughed at. It was a dismal place at the best of times, and the view over the allotments always depressed him. They were dank and low. Beyond them, there was the marshy, tangled waste strip beside the river where everyone threw rubbish, and, under the trees, the hut-thing where old Biddy Iremonger lived. The only real house in sight was as damp-looking and dreary as the rest – a big square place, the colour of old cheese. The trees had been slow to put out leaves that year, so it was all as blank and bleak as winter.

The next day was, if anything, worse still. To start with, it was raining on and off, with a cold wind steadily blowing showers up and away again. Draughts whined through the potting shed and fluttered all the cobwebs. Jess and Frank sat in their coats and began to think their idea was a failure.

“And we can’t even buy sweets to console ourselves with,” Jess was saying, when somebody rapped on the window.

They looked up to see old Mr Carter, who had the nearest allotment, leaning on the sill of the potting shed window.

“This your notice?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Frank, feeling foolish and rather defiant about it. “Why?”

Mr Carter bent down and read the notice, out loud, so that Frank felt even more foolish by the time he finished, and Jess went very pink. “My, my!” said Mr Carter. “Just wait till the Prime Minister hears of this. He’ll have you in his Cabinet. Got any customers yet?”

“Not yet,” Frank admitted.

“We’ve not been in business long,” Jess said.

“Well,” said Mr Carter, “I can’t help with the revenge part, but I know where you’ll find some treasure.”

“Do you? Where?” they said. Jess reached for her notebook to take down the details.

“Yes,” said Mr Carter. “Rainbow, this morning. Ended right beside Biddy Iremonger’s place. Saw it with my own eyes. You dig there, and there’ll be a crock of gold for you.” And, before either of them could answer, he went away laughing.

“Beast!” said Jess.

Frank was too angry even to say what he thought. Instead, he suggested taking the notice down. Jess said that would be giving in too easily.

“Let’s keep it the rest of today and tomorrow,” she said. “Maybe the news will get round.”

“Then we’ll have the whole town knocking on the window to laugh at us,” said Frank, and he went indoors to cadge some biscuits to cheer them up with.

They were eating the biscuits when they heard quite a crowd of people coming along the path. There was a noise of wheels turning and sticks being trailed along the allotment railings and the fences of the gardens. There were also loud, crude voices, swearing. Frank wished most heartily that Jess had agreed to take the notice down. He did not even need to hear the voices to know that it was Buster Knell and his gang – and, to judge from the language, Buster Knell and his gang in a very bad mood indeed. They all stopped outside the potting shed, and Jess said afterwards that she saw the air turn blue.

“Cor! Take a blanking look at this!” said someone. “Look, Buster.”

“Blanketty Own Back!” said someone else.

Frank and Jess sat and looked at one another, while yet another boy read the notice out in a jeering squeaky voice. “Whose blanking idea is this?” he said.

“Blankery-blue Pirie kids,” they heard Buster say. They knew it was Buster, because his voice was louder and his language nastier than any of the others’. “Always got some blank idea or other.”

“Fwank and Jessie,” squeaked someone. “Come on, let’s tear it down.”

The whole gang agreed, at the tops of their voices and the full width of their language. Frank and Jess had resigned themselves to losing their notice, when Buster shouted:

“No! I got a much better blanking blue-and-purple idea than that. Wait a blanketty minute, can’t you!” Then, before Frank and Jess had time to escape from the shed, he was pounding on the window, yelling, “Anyone in? You too blanking scared to answer? Open purple up, can’t you!”

There was nothing else for it. Frank got up and opened the window. Buster put his arms on the sill and pushed his face inside. It was not a nice face at the best of times – all thick and narrow-eyed. At that moment, it was mud down one side, and thicker than usual down the other. There was even blood, just a little, on Buster’s stumpy chin.

“What do you want?” asked Frank.

“My crimson Own Back,” said Buster. “Like it says. And you blanking-blue owe me ten pence anyway.”

“So?” said Frank, as bravely as he could. Beyond Buster was all the gang, glowering and muddy, carrying sticks and air guns, and towing their usual number of home-made go-carts. They never moved without all this equipment if they could help it, and they knew how to use it too.

Buster stuck his face sneeringly into Frank’s. Jess began gently collecting flowerpots for ammunition. It looked as if they were going to need all they could get.

“I’ll let you off that purple ten pence,” said Buster, “if you can get me my blanking Own Back on that blue-and-orange scum. Only I bet you’re too blanking scared.”

“No, I’m not,” said Frank. “Who do you mean?”

“Crimson scum,” said Buster. “Vernon Wilkins. Just look what he done to me. Here, take a look.” He pushed his hand towards Frank’s face, and held it open, palm upwards. On it was something small, dirty and red at one end. “See that?” said Buster. “That’s a tooth, that is. That crimson scum knocked it out for me. What do you say to that?”

The only thing Frank could think of to say was that it was rather clever of Vernon Wilkins, but he did not dare say that.

Buster pushed his hand further into the shed. “And you,” he said to Jess. “You take a purple look too. A good long, orange look.”

So Jess was forced to come and inspect the tooth too. She brought a flowerpot with her, just in case. It was a double tooth, worn down to a flat disc-shape. “Yes,” she said. “What do you want us to do about it?”

“Get one of his,” said Buster. “You’re arranging crimson revenge, aren’t you? Well, you go and knock me out one of Wilkins’ blue-blanking teeth and bring it back here so I can see you done it. Then I’ll let you off that ten pence.”

“It’s worth more than ten pence,” said Jess.

“Is it?” said Buster. “What’s the orange matter? Do you want to lose a tooth too?”

“Shut up,” said Frank. “When do you want it?”

“It’ll take at least an hour,” said Jess.

“All right,” said Buster. “Meet you back here in an hour. And you’d better bring that green-blue-muddy-violet tooth with you, or it won’t be only ten pence you owe me.” Then he took his hand, and his tooth, and finally his face, away from the window, and led his gang clattering and wheeling and swearing away up the path.

Jess and Frank stared at one another and felt that everything had gone wrong. The idea seemed to have turned back to front. Instead of other people asking them to get their Own Back on Buster Knell, here was Buster Knell sending them for other people’s teeth. The nasty thought was that Vernon Wilkins was a good two years older than Frank, and, if he could actually knock a tooth out of Buster’s head, then there was no knowing what he could do to Frank.

“And it was only a baby tooth too,” said Jess. “I bet it was ready to come out anyway. What shall we do, Frank?”

“Go and see Vernon, I suppose,” said Frank.

So Jess wrote out another notice, which read:

AWAY ON BUSINESS

Signed OWN BACK LTD

and this they propped in the window of the potting shed, before getting out their bicycles and pedalling off to find Vernon.

Vernon lived just outside the town, because his mother and father worked for the people in the big house on the London Road. Luckily, this was the same side as the allotments and the Piries’ house, but it was still some way. It came on to rain again while Frank and Jess were cycling there.

“All for nothing, too,” Frank said miserably, bending his head to keep the rain off his face. “If we get a tooth, it’ll only be for ten pence I owed him anyway. Oh, I hate Buster Knell.”

“It’s quite horrid,” Jess agreed. “Just like the Bible. You know – an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth – or whatever it is.”

“Is that Bible?” said Frank. “I thought it was: If thine eye offend thee pluck it out. Buster’s eye offends me. Both his eyes. And I bet mine are going to offend Vernon.”

“If his eye offends thee, black it,” said Jess. “Only Vernon’s black already, so it won’t show.”

The shower blew over. By the time they reached the London Road, the sun was shining brightly and bleakly. Frank and Jess propped their bicycles outside the tall iron gates of the big house and walked rather slowly inside the grounds. It could not have been more awkward. The Lodge, where Vernon lived, was just round the corner from the gates. Vernon was sitting on the doorstep. As Frank and Jess came up, they heard his mother saying something inside the Lodge, so they knew that whatever they did or said to Vernon his mother would hear. To make things even more awkward, Vernon was minding his tiny sisters, who were all three playing happily round him in the mud, and the youngest, as soon as she saw Jess, came toddling up, smiling in the most friendly way imaginable. It could not have been less like a tooth-hunting expedition.

Vernon looked up and saw them. “What do you want?” he said, not unpleasantly, but a little guardedly.

Jess just could not think what to say. She did not know Vernon at all well, but his littlest sister had plainly decided Jess was a great friend. She took Jess’s hand and beamed up at her.

“Er,” said Frank. “One of your teeth, I’m afraid.”

“I got none loose,” said Vernon. “The last one came out a year ago. You have to go without.”

“You don’t happen to have kept one, do you?” Frank asked, rather desperately.

“No,” said Vernon. “What for?”

Frank looked at Jess for help. Jess held the little sister’s hand tightly, for encouragement, and said, “Buster Knell wants it, Vernon. He says you knocked one of his out just now.”

Vernon’s face became what Jess thought they meant when they said “a study”. Anyhow, she could tell he was surprised, pleased, indignant and suspicious, all at once. “So I did,” he said. “What’s it got to do with you? You in his gang now?” Then he stood up.

“No,” said Frank fervently. Jess backed away, towing the little sister with her. Vernon was quite frighteningly tall.

“Then why do you want a tooth off me?” asked Vernon.

It was a natural enough question. Frank felt very stupid having to answer it. He tried to explain about Own Back Ltd, and the more he explained, the more stupid the whole idea seemed. Vernon did not help at all. At first he was puzzled; then, as he saw the idea, he seemed more and more amused. Then, when Frank had finished, Vernon suddenly stopped grinning, and said: “It was evens anyway. He’d no call to send you for teeth. His lot set on me with sticks while I was doing the papers, and I got this. Look.”

Vernon held out his arm, and Frank and Jess were once more forced to make an inspection, this time of a very nasty-looking scratch all down the inside of Vernon’s arm.

“Have you put something on it?” Jess asked. “I wouldn’t put it past them to tip their weapons with poison. Then it’s not fair, Frank, wanting a tooth too, is it?”

“I suppose not,” Frank agreed, wondering what Buster would do to them with his sticks. “How did you knock his tooth out, Vernon?”

“Didn’t know I had,” Vernon said cheerfully. “I just knock him down and get out. Nice to think he lost a tooth through it.”

“Except it was only a baby tooth,” said Jess. “Which makes it unfairer than ever.”

“Was it?” said Vernon. “Sure? Then I think I got an idea to settle it. Wait a moment.” He darted away round the side of the Lodge, and came back a second later dragging his younger brother by one arm. “Silas got one all ready to go,” he said. “Open up, Silas.”

Silas squirmed and protested. Jess felt rather sorry for him. It seemed very hard luck on Silas, particularly as Vernon never thought to ask him if he minded. He simply tipped back his brother’s head, wrenched his mouth open, and plucked the tooth out as easily as the eye in the Bible. Silas roared. Frank felt rather glad it had not happened to be an eye that Buster had sent them for. Silas, when he saw the tooth being passed over to Frank, roared louder than ever.

“Vernon,” called Vernon’s mother, “what you do to Silas?”

“Nothing,” called Vernon. “Pulled that tooth out for him.”

“But Vernon,” Jess said, “it’s his tooth, and if you give it to us, that means he won’t get any money for it.”

“I’ll give him five pence,” Vernon said hastily. It sounded as if Silas’s roaring was going to bring Mrs Wilkins out any second. Vernon fetched out a coin and pushed it into his brother’s hand. “There. Stop,” he said.

Silas stopped, in mid-roar, with a set of tears halfway down his cheeks, and closed his fist round the five pence. He looked at Frank and at Vernon so resentfully that Frank felt he ought to explain a little.

“We need your tooth,” he said. “It’s terribly important. Really. We’ve got to give it to Buster Knell, because he told us to bring him one of Wilkins’ teeth.”

Silas looked more resentful than ever, but Vernon laughed. “So then you don’t need to say which Wilkins,” he said. “That’ll settle it.”

“But it’s still not fair,” said Jess. “Because you’ve lost five pence.”

Frank wished Jess would not always find something to argue about, particularly things which were quite true. He remembered Mr Prodger said Vernon needed money. “I tell you what,” he said to Vernon, “when we’ve earned some money out of Own Back, we’ll pay you back. OK?”

“Fine,” said Vernon. “Maybe I’ll send you a customer.”

“That’ll be lovely,” said Jess. She disentangled herself from the little sister, who showed an inclination to roar like Silas. Vernon had to pick her up. Then the Piries mounted their bicycles and pedalled home with the tooth, rather perplexed to find that, far from earning any money, they were now five pence in debt again.

“Well,” said Frank, trying to look on the bright side, “we’ve got it down by half. Maybe we’ll get it down to two pence with the next customer.”

“Only if whoever it is pays us real three pence,” said Jess.

Nevertheless, when, a quarter of an hour later, the gang began to muster in the path by the allotments, grinning, flourishing sticks and plainly ready to give those purple Piries lawfully what-for, Frank felt it was worth five pence. They waited until Buster himself hammered on the window. Then Jess shoved it open in his face and held out the tooth in a silver-paper tart-dish.

“There you are,” she said triumphantly. “Wilkins’ tooth, just as you said.”

Buster glowered at it, then at Jess and Frank. “I bet it’s purple not. It’s one of yours.”

“It is not, then,” said Jess. “Look.” And she bared her teeth at him. “See. No gaps.”

“Then it’s one you kept. Or one of his,” said Buster.

Frank came up and bared his teeth too. Luckily, he had no gaps, and only one tooth loose, at the back.

“And we always burn ours,” said Jess. Then, because a horrid thought struck her, she left Frank to do the talking.

Buster looked incredulously from the tooth to Frank, and back again. “This is Wilkins’ tooth?” he said. “Honour bright and may you die?”

“Honour bright and may I die,” said Frank. “If you want it, take it. And don’t forget I don’t owe you ten pence now.”

“No. All right. I let you off,” said Buster. He was too astonished, and too respectful, even to swear. He took the tooth. Frank slammed the window on him, and on all the gang crowding round to inspect the tooth and exclaim as if they had never seen one before.

“That’s that!” said Frank thankfully.

“Oh, I do hope so,” said Jess, “because I’ve just realised Vernon hasn’t any gaps either, and – and—”

“That’s his look-out,” said Frank. “If he’s got any sense he’ll paint one out or something.”

Jess had not the heart to speak of her really horrid idea just then. Instead, she watched the gang moving unusually quietly away along the allotments, and tried to think on the bright side. “There is one thing, Frank. If they think you can knock out Vernon’s tooth, they won’t bother you again.”

Unfortunately, she was completely wrong.

Chapter 2

After the affair of Wilkins’ tooth, both Frank and Jess had secretly had enough of Own Back, but since they owed Vernon five pence, there was nothing for it but to stay in business for another day at least. So they sat in the shed for the third day and, all the while, Jess worried about Silas Wilkins’ tooth. She had lain awake at night worrying. Now, that morning, she just had to tell Frank her horrid idea.

“Frank, I wish we hadn’t given them the tooth. I keep thinking of witch doctors. You know, when they want to hurt a person, they take a tooth or just a hair from the person, and do awful things to it. Suppose Buster does? And then it’ll be poor little Silas who suffers, not Vernon at all.”

“But it’s not real,” Frank said uneasily. “They always tell you witch doctors can’t really do magic – only that people think they can. Anyway, you know what that gang’s like. They’re bound to lose it before they decide what to do with it. Or they’ll get them mixed up and magic Buster’s.”

“Oh,” said Jess. “I do hope they do. And give Buster face-ache for weeks.”

“Months,” said Frank, who had suffered a great deal more from Buster than Jess had. He was thinking of saying that Own Back could offer to do the magicking, and get the teeth mixed on purpose, when Jess noticed that someone was tapping on the window.

She jumped up to open it. Frank followed her, and found two pale little girls outside, hand in hand, their hair flapping in the wind, looking up anxiously at the window. He knew them a little by sight. They were the funny, old-fashioned girls who lived at the one house you could see from the potting shed – the cheese-coloured one. He knew the elder one was called Frances Adams, because people shouted “Sweet Fanny Adams!” after them sometimes, because they were so odd and because the younger one walked with a limp.