The Exiles

you write and tell us when we are coming home so I can count the days off? Every day Big Grandma forces us out in the rain and we have to go and stand in the shed until she lets us in again. She thinks we go for walks, but she cannot make us. We have not got anything to read, but we have to work all day so we do not have much spare time. We talk about Robert in front of Grandma – she doesn’t care. She says she doesn’t believe in living in the past – she says you do. One of us has been stealing stuff from the garden, two people (or it might be three) have been stealing my socks, one of us is wearing nearly the same clothes that they wore when we came here. They have not worn anything else in-between. Two of us have learnt foul language off someone (me and one of us knew it already but at least we did not use it). Do you think we sound like we are getting worse? I heard Big Grandma tell you on the phone that we were all well. Well, some of us could hardly walk that day.
    Love Naomi.
    P.S. I hope you enjoy spending all that money.
    P.P.S. I do not mean to sound nasty.

Chapter Seven
    ‘Beastly boring to you!’ sang Rachel to the tune of ‘Happy Birthday’. ‘Beastly boring to you, Beastly Boring, Beastly boring, Beastly Boring to you!’
    ‘When is it going to stop raining?’ asked Phoebe.
    ‘Never,’ said Naomi.
    In this, as in so many other matters, she proved to be wrong. After four days of pouring rain they awoke one morning to a world of bright sunlight. Everyone’s spirits rose tremendously at this transformation, and Ruth, looking out of the window, voiced all their hopes when she said, ‘Perhaps the washing will dry today.’
    They had reached the stage when everyone’s clothes were equally dirty, and even Phoebe had taken to wearing her own again.
    The sunshine went straight to Big Grandma’s head. In celebration of the weather she cooked them fried egg sandwiches for breakfast, and sang, as she slapped the eggs onto the bits of bread, French words to a tune so eerie, so desolate and disturbing, that the hairs curled on the back of Ruth’s neck as she listened.
    ‘What’s that song?’ she enquired.
    ‘Lili Marlene,’ answered Big Grandma and swopped over to the English words.
    ‘It is awful,’ said Ruth admiringly, and was disappointed when Big Grandma refused to continue.
    ‘Nobody could sing with Rachel eating fried egg sandwiches only feet away,’ she said in excuse. Rachel, who with complete lack of foresight, had just taken a large and disastrous bite into the middle of her sandwich, smiled unconcernedly and licked the front of her T-shirt.
    ‘How poor Noah,’ said Big Grandma, ‘survived forty days cooped up with his relations in that ark is past my understanding.’
    ‘He probably had plenty of books with him,’ said Naomi.
    ‘And he could always go and sit with the animals,’ pointed out Ruth.
    ‘True,’ agreed Big Grandma, ‘and speaking of animals, you lot of gorging gluttons have eaten me out of house and home. What will I do with you while I go shopping?’
    ‘Why don’t you take us with you?’ asked Rachel.
    ‘Why should I?’ asked Big Grandma reasonably. ‘Much quicker and less embarrassing without you I should think. But what will my poor little grand-children do without their Big Grandma all day, especially as I intend locking them out of the house?’
    ‘Well, we’ll smash a window and come back in,’ said Phoebe in a moment of inspiration.
    ‘Oh really?’ asked Big Grandma. ‘It’s not that easy to smash a window in cold blood, my sweet little Phoebe!’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘Try it and see,’ said Big Grandma, and smirked complacently after Rachel had rushed outside, grabbed a large stone, and then, to her surprise, been unable to do more than grin weakly and slink back in again.
    ‘Mind over matter,’ explained Big Grandma arrogantly.
    At that moment Phoebe, who had been carefully selecting a likely looking missile, turned and chucked it through the kitchen window where it smashed a neat, but rather large hole in the dead centre.
    ‘Matter over mind,’ said Naomi. ‘Quite a good shot too!’
    ‘It’s easy,’ explained Phoebe modestly, coming in to view the damage from the other side.
    ‘You horrible child,’ snarled big Grandma. ‘I should never have judged you by human standards! Witless! Leave that glass alone Rachel, you’ll cut yourself ! And you two stop laughing,’ she ordered Ruth and Naomi. ‘Get on with the dishes