I made a dive for the back door and ran home as fast as I could. I ran down to the tree house and climbed my favourite branch. I knew I should be in the kitchen ready to study, but I couldn’t go inside yet.

I tried to think happily of nursing Sixpence, but every time I thought of her, I saw Mr Johnson’s red face and set of big yellow teeth, and so I had to stop and think of my friend Maynard’s dog Rastus, which helped a bit. I heard Mum calling my name after a while, and decided I’d better go in.

‘What a nice surprise,’ said Mum, in a voice that didn’t match the words. ‘You’re late.’ She was standing with her hands on her hips, looking at me with her head turned to the right, favouring her left eye, which was not a good sign.

‘Sorry, Mum,’ I said. Ruthy and Caleb were smiling at me in a not-very-nice way.

‘Did you call your brother a bad name?’ she asked.

‘Don’t remember doing that, Mum,’ I said. ‘What was the bad name I called him?’ I spoke innocently, knowing the others would never disclose a single word from our swearing vocabulary.

‘They wouldn’t tell me, but it had better not be a swear word, my girl,’ she warned. She leaned over and peered into my face, as though she would be able to see a lie in my eye.

‘Nope. I can promise you I never cussed,’ I said confidently, because of course this was true.

‘Well, I should hope not. Now get your books out and open to your revision chapter.’

I went into my room and took out my Sunday school busy bag from under my bed. It was blue with big spots on it; Aunty Maisie had made it for my last birthday. I decided to put one of Ruthy’s dolls, Milly Molly Mandy, right into the middle of the wee patch. Mum called out for me to hurry up. I sat at the table and sighed as I opened my book, which made Mum crabby again.

I had four questions to review: Who is the chief cornerstone in the temple God is building today? What had David done as a boy that helped him to be a good king? When David became king in Jerusalem, what did he want to do for God? and What sort of man was Nehemiah?

I had no idea about the answers to any of those questions. I thought of answering the one about Nehemiah and making up a picture of him. I thought he might be tall, good-looking and obedient if he was an important character, but then a lot of stories were about people who had been bad and then come good in some way, so I thought that might be too risky.

So I decided I’d have a stab at David as a boy. I started to write down all the things I could do that would make Mum and Dad happy, and hoped I’d ‘cornered the market’, as my Aunty Maisie used to say all the time.