Hideous kinky - By Esther Freud Page 0,25

someone driving it. A man. And I could see a lady in a pink bikini sitting by his side.

‘Is it going to sink?’ I had watched it for five minutes, my heart in my mouth.

‘It’s made from plastic’ Bilal hardly gave it a glance. ‘With pedals.’

I shouted for Bea. ‘Quick, look, there’s a giant pedal car on the lake. Come and see.’

Bea stood transfixed. ‘Where did it come from?’

Bilal motioned further up the beach, beyond where the bus had set us down. The land there jutted out into the lake and swept in again, out of our sight. ‘There is a large hotel. It has boats and a swimming-pool.’ His voice was flat and careless. ‘I have worked there one summer.’

Bea and I threw ourselves at him. ‘Can we go? Please? Will you take us on a pedal car?’

Bilal shook us off. I had never seen him angry before. ‘You don’t want that. It’s rubbish. Of no use.’ He kicked a half-burnt piece of wood along the beach. Bea and I followed it with longing eyes. ‘Here we have everything.’ He spread his arms. ‘Everything in the world.’

The pedal boat began to turn slowly round and head back towards the invisible hotel.

Mum stirred under her blanket. ‘Is there any tea made?’

Bilal winked at us. ‘Nearly.’ We helped him scrape out the white ash and rebuild the fire. The plastic bottle was still half-full. Bilal poured it into the saucepan. ‘One cup each,’ he said, as if it were already made.

When the water boiled he added a handful of wilting mint. Mum got up and came to sit by the fire. She had slept in her blue caftan. The caftan Ahmed’s aunt had given her when she was brought back from the brink of death. It was crumpled and warm around her body. I leant against her. The sun tickled patterns of heat into my back as we sat and drank our tea and watched the fire go out.

I went with Bilal to refill our bottles from the well. I wanted to ask him about the hotel: whether you could get there by walking along the beach or whether it could only be reached by sea. He silently forbade it. Once we were out of sight of the others he hoisted me up on to his shoulders so that I could practise balancing the empty saucepan on my head. The third time Bilal had to stop and stoop for it, he didn’t pass it back. We walked on in silence.

‘Take hold of my hands,’ he said. We had arrived at the well.

I held on.

‘Now bend your head and roll.’

I sat still.

‘It’s a trick,’ he whispered. ‘A special trick.’

I held my breath and trusted him. I rolled forward, sliding into nothing. I twisted, felt myself spin round and and then with a thud I landed on the ground. Squarely on both feet. Bilal let go of my hands and clapped.

‘Was that really a trick?’

Bilal nodded.

‘Can I do it again?’

He lifted me back up. This time I kept my eyes open. Forward, turn, land. Bilal let my hands twist gently inside his, so that my arms wouldn’t lock. After the fourth landing it seemed almost too easy.

‘Now we must work on the speed. We must hear you whistle through the air.’

‘Did I whistle that time?’ I rubbed my wrists.

‘Like a little mosquito.’

He threw the bucket into the well. As we waited for the hollow splash, something rustled. Bilal swung round. A young man with very blond hair and a sunburnt face greeted us in Arabic.

‘Hello,’ I replied.

He laughed and knelt down. ‘So you’re the travelling circus. I saw you from the road. I thought this man here was going to drop you down the well.’ He looked up at Bilal.

‘I can sing too,’ I said.

‘Sing? Well, you’ll have to come over and sing for us.’

I wasn’t sure.

‘I’ll give you something,’ he encouraged.

‘Like what?’

He thought for a while. ‘A car that you wind up and then it drives along on its own?’

‘All right.’ I tried to contain my excitement.

‘Where are you staying?’ he asked.

Bilal pointed towards our particular clump of trees. ‘On the Barage.‘

‘Charlie.’ He held out his hand. ‘I’ll drop by.’

‘My wife is English,’ Bilal said as if in explanation.

I looked at him hard. I’d never heard him say ‘wife’ before. I wondered if they’d got married and forgotten to say.

‘Bee-lal,’ I said, drawing out the sound of his name. We were walking home hand in hand.

‘Yes?’

‘Am I your little girl?’

There was a