Painting A Picture

Sir Cadogan was often told he was not a particularly interesting character. He'd actually asked in the past, and hadn't got very satisfactory replies. Rather flat, was the response he often got. Not very well-rounded. Two-dimensional. That sort of thing.

But Sir Cadogan was a rather curious little man, if only you gave him a chance. In fact, he was, perhaps, the most curious character you could ever hope to come across - if you would only sit down and bear his bluster long enough to hear his tale.

You see, Sir Cadogan had not always been a knight. He had, in fact, never been knighted. Sir Cadogan had not even come into this world anywhere near the sort of century in which people had knights dressed in armour and brandishing swords.

He'd been born on the twelfth of February, in nineteen-eighty-seven. His father worked at the local fishmarket, and his mother did the washing for the neighbours in exchange for meals and pennies. He spent his childhood drawing things in chalk on the sidewalk and playing in the fields around his house.

One day, about three weeks after his fifth birthday, his father had to take his mother to the hospital to have her teeth filled.

"You'll be alright, won't you, Norman?"

He'd nodded. Then he'd watched as they walked up the street and disappeared from his sight. Then he'd turned. And gasped.

"Helloo, my ickle darrrrling flufffffffff," said the woman with overlarge nostrils and grey eyes, standing about five feet away, "Would you like some chocolate?"

She pronounced it "choc-oh-let". Norman was instantly suspicious.

She inched closer. She scratched at her hair. It shifted a bit on her head. She reached up and set it right.

"Durr! Aren't you a cute little thing," she continued, "I could just eat you!"

She turned her head away and seemed to gag. Then she advanced. And as she bent closer, little Norman noticed her eyes changed from grey to blue, and then to a strange, unnerving sort of violet. He backed away.

"Don't be afraid, boy, I'm not going to hurt you. I just want to give you a bit of chocolate. You like chocolate, don't you? Oh, yes, you do. Do you want this?" She held out a huge chunk of brown gooey goodness.

Norman couldn't help himself; he nodded.

"Well, you just follow me, and I'll give it to you." She lowered her voice. "Oh no, can't do it here, little one, the other children would see, and then they would be jealous. You don't want them to steal your chocolate from you, do you?"

Norman shook his head, glancing around furtively. He followed her as she slipped into a sort of deserted field behind his house. The neighbours used it as a dumping ground. She turned back to him and continued walking, backwards, holding out the piece of chocolate to him. He followed, eyes trained on it. Then she stopped by a pile of things thrown out by Mr Richards before he'd moved: a vase, an old football, a mouldy armchair, and a painting.

She squealed and clapped her hands together, smearing the chocolate over her fingers. She seemed extraordinarily excited by the painting. Norman didn't look at it; he came close to her and stretched out his hand.

"Oh, yes, mustn't go back on our word, now, must we? A promise is a promise."

And she put the chocolate in his hands. He started to eat it. It was a dark chocolate, bitter and velvety, a little too thick for his liking, but he ate it all the same; children will be children, after all, and children are fond of sweets and treats.

And as he ate, he hardly noticed the laughter of the strange woman, or how it became high-pitched and rather foul, and how it was lost in the wind that was suddenly blowing all around him, lifting him off his feet, and spinning him off into blackness.