Nanny Piggins and the Rival Ringmaster (20 page)

She was just about to finish up her routine when something dreadful happened. One of the concession vendors called out, ‘Fairy floss, fairy floss for sale,’ and Nanny Piggins’ concentration lapsed. One of her trotters slipped off the tightrope and she stumbled. She might have got away with that, if the judges had been looking away at that moment (perhaps trying to buy fairy floss themselves). But then Nanny Piggins entirely ruined the end of her performance by refusing to continue until someone threw up a stick of fairy floss to her. Even the more sympathetic judges, with a weakness for peacock-feathered bottoms, could not mark her highly for that.

‘I don’t see why they should be so pernickety,’ said Nanny Piggins as she sat on her bench, licking the last of her fairy floss off its stick. ‘Everyone has to stop for a snack. Even open-heart surgeons.’

‘I’m not sure that’s entirely true,’ said Samantha. ‘They certainly don’t eat fairy floss in the middle of operations.’

‘Well they should,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘It would help them concentrate. It would be awful if they sewed up the aorta when they meant to sew up the pulmonary vein just because they were feeling peckish.’

When Madame Saváge took to the tightrope a few moments later and performed a textbook perfect routine, with no stumbles, no slipping and no stopping for refreshments, she easily won the first round.

The children went to see if Nanny Piggins was okay, but she did not seem at all bothered.

‘It doesn’t matter if Madame Saváge wins one round,’ she reassured them. ‘It would be cruel to destroy her in every discipline. And everyone knows who the better tightrope walker is. It’s just that I have a slight problem with high GI foods. Which, really, allowances should be made for; it’s practically a disability.

The next round was lion taming. Madame Saváge went first this time and she put in a solid performance. She had all the necessary authority of tone and excellent wrist strength (which is essential both for whip cracking and chair waggling). So she
put the lions through their paces and turned in an impressive performance. Madame Saváge thought she had won her second point.

But this time Nanny Piggins had a trick up her sleeve. What Madame Saváge did not realise was that Nanny Piggins was close personal friends with all the lions. She had helped Ethel renegotiate her employment contract (for further information see
Nanny Piggins and the Runaway Lion
), she had taught Amy how to speak Portuguese and she had coached Cassandra when she took the Bar exam.

So when Nanny Piggins faced the lions she did not bother with a whip or chair. She simply said, ‘Cassy, if I set this hoop on fire, would you be so kind as to jump through it for me?’ and ‘Amy darling, is that back molar still troubling you? Would you let me put my head in your mouth to get a closer look?’ And so Nanny Piggins put in an effortlessly brilliant performance as a lion tamer, even doing never-before-seen tricks like riding a lion bareback while reading a recipe book to another lion who whipped up a Black Forest chocolate cake. Nanny Piggins took the second round.

Next came the trapeze.

‘This should be a cinch,’ said Nanny Piggins confidently. ‘If I can perform a quadruple double
backflip on a moving bus –’ (this was something she did whenever she caught the bus to school with the children) – ‘then I should be able to pull of something really spectacular with an actual trapeze swing.’

‘You won’t stop to buy snacks this time, will you?’ asked Samantha worriedly.

‘Of course not!’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘Have you seen the prices we charge?’

‘Good,’ said Samantha with relief.

‘No, this time I’ve sewn some chocolate bars and half a lemon drizzle cake into my leotard,’ explained Nanny Piggins, ‘so if I have any hunger pains mid-backflip I can help myself to an in-flight meal.’

The children thought Nanny Piggins would do very well at trapeze. And indeed she did. But alas, she did so well she got carried away. Nanny Piggins was so busy waving to the audience after pulling off a sextuple flip that she almost missed her catch. Min Lee only just managed to grab one of her trotters (his other hand caught a fistful of peacock feathers). So when Madame Saváge gave her clinical trapeze performance, even though there was no canasta-shaking or raspberry-blowing, the judges had to award her the win because she never looked like plummeting to her death.

Things now stood at two-to-one in favour of Madame Saváge. Nanny Piggins did not have quite as much swagger now. She actually looked a little nervous, largely because the next competition was juggling, a discipline that Nanny Piggins had always thought was rather stupid.

‘I should have vetoed this round,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I don’t see how juggling can be classed as a ‘circus skill’. All it is is throwing things in the air and catching them again. Any child with two eyes and some degree of depth perception can do that.’

‘Yes, but it’s impressive if you can throw lots of things in the air and still catch them,’ said Derrick. ‘Especially if they are dangerous things.’

‘I suppose,’ conceded Nanny Piggins. ‘I never really paid much attention to the juggler at our circus because he was always on right before me, so I never caught his act.’

‘But you do know how to juggle, don’t you?’ worried Samantha.

‘Oh yes, of course,’ said Nanny Piggins. ‘I’ve never actually tried it, but I know the theory and it doesn’t look too hard.’ At that moment her name was called and Nanny Piggins strode back out into the arena. Which was probably a good thing because then she did not have to see Samantha collapse on the floor with an anxiety attack.

As it turns out, Nanny Piggins could juggle. She soon had eight tennis balls, a chainsaw, a butcher’s knife and (to her mind the most precious and fragile thing imaginable) a small portable television sailing through the air. The audience applauded and she thought she had done enough to win.

But when Madame Saváge came out she went one better. She juggled eight tennis balls, a chainsaw, a butcher’s knife, a portable television and a live kitten. The most gorgeous little ginger kitten imaginable, with blue eyes and a cute little purr. The audience was horrified to see it go flying up in the air following the chainsaw and butcher’s knife, but each time Madame Saváge caught it there were cheers of relief from the crowd.

Thanks to her total disregard for animal welfare, there was no denying Madame Saváge had upstaged Nanny Piggins and won this round too. Which put the score at three-to-one in Madame Saváge’s favour. It was impossible for Nanny Piggins to beat her now. Madame Saváge just had to complete the cannon blasting and both circuses were hers.

Nanny Piggins was in shock. She had never been bested before. And by a mere human too! It was too much for her to take in. She just sat on a bench muttering, ‘I don’t believe it. I don’t believe it.’

Madame Saváge naturally came over to gloat. ‘Don’t worry, Nanny Piggins, or should I call you Poop-Scooper Piggins now, because that is what your new job will be when you come to work for me.’

‘There’s still the cannon blasting to go!’ said Michael. ‘You haven’t won yet.’

‘Hah!’ scoffed Madame Saváge. ‘Cannon blasting isn’t even a proper circus skill. It’s just a trick. Any idiot can climb into a cannon and wait for someone to light the fuse.’ Madame Saváge walked away, laughing wickedly.

The children had to concede she had a point. While they had an enormous amount of respect for their nanny, and she was brilliant at being blasted out of just about anything in the most spectacular way, being blasted out of a cannon was something cannonballs did all the time. It was not so complicated. Madame Saváge was sure to win.

Madame Saváge’s cannon (custom built for the occasion) was wheeled out into the arena. Madame Saváge climbed up into the barrel before turning and waving to Nanny Piggins. ‘Eat my dust, Poop-Scooper Piggins,’ she called, before sliding down to the base of the cannon, ready to be blasted.

‘I can’t believe I’ve let everyone down,’ muttered Nanny Piggins. ‘All my friends, Boris, myself,
you three children – we’re all doomed to 50 years’ servitude to that dreadful woman.’

‘You did your best,’ said Samantha, giving her a hug. (She could not think of anything more supportive to say. The fact was they were all doomed and it was their nanny’s fault.)

The drum roll began. Nanny Piggins and the children looked up to see the final knife in all their hopes and dreams. Madame Saváge’s cannon assistant lit the fuse. The audience waited breathlessly as it slowly burnt down to the tiniest stub and the flickering sparks disappeared into the cannon. There was a moment of silence. And then – BOOM!!! – the biggest explosion any of them had ever heard. Smoke billowed everywhere.

The audience were all coughing and fanning smoke away from their faces. When the dust cleared, the children could see Nanny Piggins smiling.

‘Where did she go?’ asked Samantha.

‘I couldn’t see anything,’ said Michael.

‘There was nothing to see,’ said Nanny Piggins happily. ‘She didn’t go anywhere – look!’

They turned to see a spluttering, soot-covered Madame Saváge struggling to climb out of the barrel of the cannon.

‘What went wrong?’ asked Derrick.

‘Just as I predicted,’ said Nanny Piggins smugly. ‘Too much training. She’s too skinny. She didn’t make a perfect seal with the barrel of the cannon. Instead of forcing her into the sky, the explosion escaped around her. An amateur’s mistake. If you are not lucky enough to naturally be the exact circumference of your cannon you need to add wadding around yourself, otherwise you won’t go anywhere. It’s all just simple physics. Madame Saváge is obviously not as familiar with Newton’s laws as she should be.’

‘So that means she didn’t complete the round. She’s disqualified!’ said Derrick excitedly. ‘Now you just have to complete your cannon blast and you win.’

‘Oh I’m not
just going to complete
anything,’ said Nanny Piggins, proudly getting to her feet. ‘When Sarah Piggins, the world’s greatest flying pig, is blasted out of a cannon she does it in style! Boris, fetch me my cannon please. I have to show this audience what it means to really be blasted.’

And that is exactly what she did. After a night of watching two great circus performers go head-to-head in some of the most complicated and dangerous circus disciplines, everything they had already seen
was soon wiped from their minds by the far most spectacular event of the night, because Nanny Piggins was not a pig who believed in half measures. When she came flying out of her cannon, it was so fast and with so much power that she soon disappeared into a purple dot far in the night sky. When she landed, five kilometres out to sea, it took her two hours to swim back to shore and another two days to walk back to the circus.

By which time it was as though nothing had ever happened. All her old friends were back at their old jobs, sitting around drinking tea, playing cards and generally avoiding work as they always had. But as soon as they saw Nanny Piggins they all rushed forward to give her the biggest hug ever. They were just throwing her in the air singing ‘For she’s a jolly good flying pig!’ when Nanny Piggins caught sight of a flash of red and gold.

‘The Ringmaster!’ exclaimed Nanny Piggins. ‘He’s escaped from jail!’

Everyone laughed.

The Ringmaster came forward, grabbed Nanny Piggins by the shoulders and kissed her twice, once on each cheek. To which she responded in the traditional way, by stomping hard on his foot.

‘Sarah darling,’ said the Ringmaster. ‘It is so good to see you. I shall be forever in your debt.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Nanny Piggins. ‘Are you grateful to me for saving your circus, rescuing all your performers or humiliating your ex-wife?’

‘Oh, all those things of course,’ said the Ringmaster, ‘but I am also grateful to you for reintroducing me to that wonderful man – my old school chum, Lysander Green.’

‘Mr Green! Wonderful?!’ marvelled Nanny Piggins.

‘His duplicity and underhandedness when it came to interpreting the tax code was awe inspiring,’ said the Ringmaster. ‘He had me spellbound.’

‘So he got you off then?’ said Nanny Piggins.

‘More than that,’ said the Ringmaster. ‘Once he had gone through all my paperwork and found every loophole and waver he could apply, he didn’t just get me out of jail. He got me a tax refund too. The government actually owed me money. They are sending me a cheque for fifty dollars!’

And so Nanny Piggins ushered Boris and the children into the Rolls-Royce and drove them home, before
the Ringmaster could forget his undying gratitude and try to kidnap any of them.

‘Thank you for rescuing us from fifty years of circus servitude,’ said Michael, hugging his nanny.

‘We never doubted you,’ added Samantha. ‘At least, not very much.’

‘It was my pleasure,’ said Nanny Piggins, kissing each of them. ‘You’re much too young to have jobs. And it would be ridiculous to train you to be circus stars when you’re so good at being children.’

‘You must be pleased with how it all worked out,’ said Derrick. ‘You’ve saved the circus and rescued the Ringmaster from jail.’

‘Yes, it is good to have a happy ending,’ agreed Nanny Piggins. ‘But I can’t help but feel a little uncertain. Freeing the Ringmaster is a little like catching a rat in your kitchen, then letting it go in the garden because you haven’t got the heart to give it rat poison. I know it was the right thing to do. But I’m not one hundred per cent sure I won’t come to regret it later.’