The Guilty One by Lisa Ballantyne Page B

lived here then?” Beth asked, her eyes wide with glee, holding his notebook beyond his grasp.
    “Four days. Give me back my notebook or I’ll pull your hair.”
    “If you touch me, I’ll kick you in the balls. Me dad showed me how. You know Old Flynn’s an Irish witch, don’t you? Have you seen her broomstick yet?”
    Daniel pulled Beth’s hair, but not so hard that she would cry out. He reached across the table and snatched back his notebook.
    “You should be careful. She makes all the kids into stew. She ate her own daughter and then she killed her husband with a poker from the fire. Left him bleeding in the back garden, with the blood pouring all over the grass . . .”
    “What’s going on here?” Miss Pringle was standing with her hands on her hips.
    “Daniel pulled my hair, miss.”
    “We don’t tell tales, Sylvia.”
    Outside in the playground at lunchtime, Daniel ate the cheese and pickle sandwiches that Minnie had prepared, watching the lads play football. He sat on the wall to watch, sniffing in the wind, trying to catch someone’s eye. When he’d finished his lunch he tossed the bag onto the ground. The wind caught it and swept it to the gutters of the playing field, near the wire fence. He put his hands in his pockets and hunched over. It was cold, but he had nowhere else to go until it was time to go back. He liked watching them play.
    “Wanna game, man? One down, like.”
    The lad who asked him was short with red hair and mud splattered down his gray trousers. He wiped his nose with his sleeve as he waited for Daniel to reply.
    Daniel jumped off the wall and walked toward him, hands in his pockets.
    “Wae’aye, man.”
    “Can you play, like?”
    “Aye.”
    The game made him feel good. He had had a dark, heavy feeling in his stomach since the fight with Minnie over the necklace and he felt it lift for a moment as he ran the length of the muddy field. He wanted to score, to prove himself, but there wasn’t a chance. He played hard and was out of breath when the bell rang.
    The boy who had asked him to play came up at the end. He walked beside Daniel with the ball hooked under his arm.
    “You play all right. You can play again tomorrow, if Kev isn’t back.”
    “Aye.”
    “What’s your name?”
    “Danny.”
    “I’m Derek. Are you the new lad?”
    “Aye.”
    A boy with black hair tried to punch the ball out of Derek’s hands.
    “Give over. It’s mine. This is Danny.”
    “I know,” said the boy with the black hair. “You’re the new foster kid at Flynn Farm, aren’t you? We’re the next farm down. Me mam told me that Minnie the Witch had a new one, like.”
    “Why d’you call her a witch?”
    “ ’Cause she is one,” said Derek. “You better watch, like. She killed her daughter and then killed her husband on the grass outside the house. Everybody knows.”
    No secrets, Daniel remembered. Everyone knows your measure.
    “Me mam saw her husband dying and called the ambulance, but it was too late,” said the boy with the black hair. He was grinning at Daniel and showing the gaps between his teeth.
    “Why’s she ’ave to be a witch? She might just be a murderer?”
    “Why she never get arrested then? Me dad says you only ’ave to look at her to see she’s not right. You could end up like her last one.”
    “What d’you mean?”
    “She was only at Minnie’s for about a month. Nob’dy at school even knew her name. Right quiet lass. She went into this crazy fit in the playground and died.”
    The boy with the black hair dropped to the ground in imitation of the child having fits. He lay with his legs open and sent his arms flailing, palsied and electrified.
    Daniel watched. He felt an urge to kick him suddenly, but did not. He shrugged his shoulders and followed them back to the school.

5
    D aniel felt cold after his run. He appreciated the rare chill, knowing that the tube would be stifling on a day like this. Fixing his tie, he viewed the room behind him in the