The World's Worst Mothers (13 page)

‘The only one who's afraid is that spoilt little boy,' said Kruschke.

‘Even a spoilt little boy has a right to happiness,' said Wohlfarth. ‘That's why the mothers are here. That's why I have invested not only my money but also my time. And you …' Wohlfarth was working himself up into a rage. ‘You're cobbling together some sort of loopy puppets that go into a spin when someone uses a remote control or who keep croaking the same old thing, like a parrot.'

‘That was a regrettable mistake, but the others, my other robots, are functioning beautifully. I can show you the photos,' said Kruschke eagerly. ‘Earth Mother's sons actually want to be adopted by Anna 08!'

‘Forget it.' Wohlfarth waved him wearily away. ‘We have a much more pressing problem. What are we going to do about Emily's mother?'

‘We could send her back,' suggested Kruschke.

‘Absolutely no way!' cried Wohlfarth. ‘So that she can go around telling everyone how horrible it is here? It is crucial that the mothers are delighted with their experience here. My plan is that, in future, mothers will come here to my mother improvement centre of their own free will. I want them to be tearing their hair out to spend thousands of euro to come here and learn how to become a perfect mother. I'll knock down the factory and build a lovely new school with nice bright rooms. There'll be single rooms, like in a hotel, a wellness centre and –'

‘And what's going to become of my Annas?' asked Kruschke, horror-stricken.

‘You and your Annas – bah!' Wohlfarth spat contemptuously. ‘Nobody has the slightest interest in your Annas any more.'

The children were sitting at the harbour eating shrimp rolls, all except Nicholas. As usual, he had one with fried fish fillet, the nearest thing to fish fingers.

Bruno counted the money he had left and gave a worried frown.

‘We can't sit around until the morning, waiting for the next ferry,' said Sophie, chewing on her roll. ‘We'd go nuts.'

‘No,' said Bruno, ‘but we can hardly swim it! Though I'd nearly prefer that than to set foot on another boat.'

‘I didn't bring my swimsuit,' said Emily.

‘Sofa has a bikini,' said Nicholas helpfully, ‘but she never wears it because it makes her tummy stick out.'

Bruno laughed and Sophie shouted, ‘You miserable skunk!'

Nicholas let his roll fall open and the fillet of fish landed in the muck.

Normally, Nicholas would have started to screech at this point, but instead he just picked up his fish, wiped the sand off it and stuck it back into his bread roll.

‘Ugh! He can't eat that!' cried Emily, horrified.

‘Oh, for goodness' sake,' said Sophie. ‘A spot of sand won't hurt. It'll do his tummy good.'

‘How many kids would you think filled out that questionnaire?' asked Bruno.

‘Haven't a clue,' said Sophie, ‘but I know now why my Aunt Anna tried to feed Nicholas cat food. She hadn't been programmed to cope with a cat. I ticked “none” in the “pets” category.'

‘What made you do that?' asked Emily.

Sophie went red. ‘I was so cross with my mother, I only filled in mean stuff in the questionnaire. I kind of thought, if I admitted that we had a cat, it would look as if she wasn't so awful after all.'

‘I wish my mother would let me have a pet,' said Bruno. ‘But she worries so much about the carpets.'

‘Do you really think Wohlfarth's school is going to make perfect mothers out of them?' asked Sophie.

‘Definitely not out of mine,' said Emily. ‘Frau Paulsen says she got detention three times.'

‘Cool,' said Bruno.

‘I'm being kept back this year for the first time,' said Sophie, ‘and it's not a bit cool; it's just stupid.'

‘But why?' asked Bruno. ‘What's the reason?'

‘I didn't do a tap,' admitted Sophie. ‘I sort of thought that if my mother saw I was doing badly at school, she might finally take a bit of notice of me – you know, worry about me.'

‘But she didn't, right?' said Emily.

‘Yeah, she only has eyes for the little fellow. Nicholas this and Nicholas that. That's how it goes, from dawn to dusk.'

‘Nicholas this and Nicholas that, Nicholas makes a rat-a-tat-tat!' sang Nicholas, his cheeks bulging with fish and bread.

‘He is kind of sweet, though, isn't he?' said Emily.

Sophie spoke softly. ‘Yeah, I suppose he is. I've always found him really annoying, but I have to say,' she added more loudly, ‘since it's been just the two of us, I've started to see what a smart little lad he is. Aren't you, Nicholas?'

‘I'm smart, smart, smart,' crowed Nicholas proudly.

‘Then maybe you can tell us how to get back to that island,' suggested Bruno.

Nicholas pointed at a couple of fishing boats bobbing up and down in the harbour. ‘On one of those!' he suggested.

Bruno wiped his greasy fingers on his trousers. ‘That's not a bad idea,' he said. ‘Come on, let's go.'

The children went over to the fishing boats and Bruno read out their names: ‘
Henrietta Helgoland
and
Seagull III.
That one looks a bit battered. But look at this one:
Swantje, Nordfall.
All we have to do is wait for the fisherman to come back and set sail for the island.'

‘Do you think he'd take us?' asked Emily.

‘We can always ask,' said Bruno. ‘All he can do is say no.'

Hinnerk was more than a little surprised to find four children waiting for him when he got back to his boat.

‘Could you possibly take us back with you to Nordfall?' asked Emily. ‘It's really urgent, and the ferry isn't going until tomorrow.'

‘We haven't got much money, though,' added Sophie.

‘Please,' said Bruno.

Hinnerk did sometimes take people over to the island. The vet, for example, if he needed to vaccinate the sheep and had missed the ferry. He'd never taken children, though. But he was in a good mood. He'd had a good catch.

‘I only have one life jacket,' he said.

‘Nicholas can have it,' said Sophie. ‘He can't swim.'

‘I can,' said Nicholas. ‘But only with water wings.'

‘All right, then,' said Hinnerk.

The children sat on upturned boxes that were normally used for carrying fish. You could tell by the smell. Emily wrinkled her nose, and Hinnerk said, ‘You can go down into the cabin if you like.'

Bruno shook his head. ‘We're fine here.'

‘So,' asked Hinnerk, turning the engine on, ‘what's this urgent business you have on Nordfall?'

‘We're going to see my mama,' said Nicholas.

‘Our mothers are in the WIMI,' explained Sophie, watching to see Hinnerk's reaction.

But he looked expressionless. ‘Well, I'm sure they'll be delighted to see you.'

‘If only Wohlfarth will let us,' said Emily. ‘He's a bit weird, isn't he?'

Hinnerk laughed. ‘Weird is right. My cousin, Sven-Ole, works for him – he could tell you a thing or two. Especially about that business with his mother. There are pictures of her all over the place. She's supposed to have been the best mother in the world.'

‘And was she not?' asked Bruno.

Hinnerk shrugged. ‘None of us knew her. She's been dead for ages. In my opinion, everyone is fond of his own mother, isn't he? But the way Wohlfarth goes on about her, it's just not normal.'

Emily's mother was sitting in the common room, chewing on her pen. While the others were at lunch, she had to write out twenty times:
I must not leave the school during class time, because otherwise I will never learn to be a good mother.

Her fountain pen ran out of ink on the word ‘class'. She stuck another cartridge in, but she got it upside down and ink came spurting out all over her copybook. The blue blots mixed with her tears and made a light blue streak.

If only Sven-Ole hadn't caught her, and if Wohlfarth hadn't been passing by just at that moment, she'd have been on her way home by now. On her way to Emily. Tears welled up in her eyes again. She had such a longing to see her daughter that she'd convinced herself she had, in fact, seen her. She'd imagined that Emily was on that ferry and had waved to her. But of course that was impossible. Emily didn't even know she was here.

And even if she did know, how could she have made her way to Nordfall? She was probably thrilled that this troll was at home with her instead of her mother and spent all the time ironing her stupid frilly blouses. Though she did have to admit, Emily always looked so sweet in those things.

Susie lifted her head. The door opened and Vibke Paulsen came into the room.

‘Have you finished your lines? You must be hungry. I've wangled you a piece of fish.'

‘I wasn't able to write,' said Susie, pointing at the blotted page. ‘My pen is broken.'

‘Oh, Susie, will you ever learn?'

‘I want to,' said Susie, jumping up. ‘I want to learn to iron, for Emily. She loves clothes and she has all these blouses with lots of frills and tucks and pleats.'

‘So I've noticed,' said Vibke Paulsen with a smile.

‘How can you have?' asked Susie, irritated.

‘Eh … well, on the videos that Kruschke has shown us,' said Vibke Paulsen. She added quickly, ‘Come with me to the sewing room.'

‘But what about my lines?' asked Susie.

‘We'll think of the ironing as a kind of punishment instead,' said Vibke Paulsen with a sigh.

Susie ironed like a woman possessed. At first, all she did was iron creases into the garments that Vibke Paulsen gave her. She scorched a collar and tore a button off. But the tenth blouse that she ironed was almost perfect, and by the time she got to the fifteenth, the ruffles were rippling along the seams like sails in the wind.

‘Snivelling Susie's problem is solved,' said Vibke Paulsen at the daily reporting session in Wohlfarth's office. ‘I think she has finally grasped what it's all about here.'

‘That's good news,' said Wohlfarth. ‘But do you think she can do it again, or is it just a fluke?'

Ramona Bottle and Sven-Ole were riffling through their papers.

‘She's stuck on an E in practical theory,' said Ramona Bottle. ‘She really needs a B to bring up her average.'

‘Well, she's not going to get that kind of mark from me,' said Sven-Ole. ‘In my group, she's easily the worst. She just can't seem to get a grip. Never has the right equipment. Yesterday I caught her scrabbling about in the sand with a spoon because she'd mislaid her spade.'

‘I don't think it's quite as bad as all that,' said Vibke Paulsen. ‘There are always people who pick things up quickly and ones who are late developers. Susie's problem is that she never has her mind on the thing in hand. She's always thinking about something else. When she concentrates, though, she can do it.'

While the other mothers were chattering about their homework, Susie bent over double on her chair.

‘What's the matter with you now?' asked Sophie's mother, who was sitting next to her.

‘That fish we had at lunchtime – I think it was a bit off,' groaned Susie.

‘Rubbish,' said Earth Mother. ‘We all ate it, even me. And nobody else is sick.'

‘You're just imagining it,' said Sophie's mother bossily.

Snivelling Susie gave a loud belch. Sophie's mother drew back in disgust.

Susie stumbled into the bathroom, her lips pressed together.

‘I bet she'll spend the next few hours on the loo,' said Bruno's mother with a smirk. ‘Her face was green.'

‘Then she won't have her homework done for tomorrow,' said Clingy Mum. ‘Again. There'll be trouble, mark my words.'

‘Not my problem,' said Earth Mother, putting her arm over her copybook. ‘Hey, copy someone else.'

‘I wasn't copying.'

‘No? So then how come you're always squinting over this direction?'

Squabbling broke out again and everyone forgot all about Snivelling Susie and the gone-off fish she might have eaten.

Susie was sitting on the loo, chewing thoughtfully on her bottom lip. She was going to have to find some way out of here. There wouldn't be a ferry until tomorrow, but Susie was sure that if she could just get out of the building she'd be able to find someplace where she could spend the night in safety. The day she'd arrived, she'd seen this guesthouse called Dune View. The whole population of the island couldn't be in cahoots with Wohlfarth and Kruschke.

Someone came into the bathroom to wash their hands. She gave a few horrible groans and flushed the loo.