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‘Oh no.’

Robbie ran down the stairs so fast that he almost fell. His mother had sounded very upset. She was standing in the kitchen holding something black in her hands.

‘What’s up, Mum?’

'Oh Robbie, look at your football shirt.’

‘That’s not my football shirt.’ Robbie wondered what was wrong with his mother.

‘Yes, it is.’

She began to rummage inside the washing machine, pulling the rest of the washing out and dropping it on to the kitchen floor.

‘Not that as well.’ She held up the short pleated skirt that Robbie’s twin sister Louise wore for games. It was black too. ‘I must have put something black in the washing and all the colours have run. So much for fancy washing powder. I’m going back to the old stuff.’

‘Mum, there’s nothing black in the wash. Oh no, there’s a match tomorrow. Only the goalie wears black. Mum, what am I going to do?’

His Mum thought for a while and then said, ‘Ring Andy and ask to borrow his. He can’t play with his leg in plaster.’

When Robbie came back from the telephone he looked very puzzled. ‘Andy’s mum went to get it. She says it’s turned black – and it’s not been in the wash.’

They were interrupted by the sound of the front door opening.

‘I don’t know what this government will do next.’ It was Robbie’s dad coming home from work. ‘Do you know what they’ve done now. You won’t believe this. All the pillar-boxes have been painted black.’

‘Perhaps someone important has died. I didn’t hear anything on the radio.’

‘Honestly Debs, you do get some silly ideas. Maybe you should join the government.’

Robbie rushed out into the garden and leaned over the wall. Dad was right. The old Victorian pillar-box at the end of the road was black.

‘Can I go out on my bike? I’ll go round to Andy’s. Be back for tea.’

Robbie went the long way round to Andy’s. He wasn’t prepared for what he saw. The world was a different place than it had been this morning. West Milton village was proud of its old red telephone box. Except now it was an old black telephone box. Things were getting worse. A black and yellow Post Office van came to collect mail from another black pillar-box. Mrs Liptrot, who ran the Post Office, came out carrying some parcels to go in the van. Robbie heard her saying to the postman that she hoped this would all be over by Valentine’s day or the business would suffer. Robbie didn’t bother going to Andy’s. He turned round and rode home. Louise was waiting for him. She was very upset.

‘Something awful’s happened, Robbie. Come in the dining room. Louise liked to watch the birds in the garden from the dining room window. In winter she put food out for them. ‘It was here a minute ago. It’ll come back; it never goes far.’

It wasn’t long before Robbie spotted the bird. The robin redbreast, which practically lived in their garden, was now a robin blackbreast. ‘Well, he’s not been in the washing machine.’

Robbie pinched himself but it hurt so he knew he wasn’t dreaming. His father, who liked to watch the teatime soap on TV, shouted from the lounge, ‘hey kids, come here. There’s something wrong with the telly.’ Sure enough, all the red had gone from the picture.

‘We interrupt this programme for a newsflash.’ The announcer who came on looked very solemn. ‘All the red seems to have disappeared from the world. Reports from as far away as Australia indicate that nowhere has been spared. In the USA there have been demonstrations against the desecration of the American flag, which is now black, white and blue. In Britain we are experiencing the same problem with the Union Jack. The Prime Minister will address the nation at eight ‘o’ clock.’

The whole family sat round the TV at eight ‘o’ clock. The Prime Minister looked more odd than usual. Everyone had got used to his red jacket. Dad used to say he looked like a clown and that all that was missing was his red nose. He’d have to wear a black nose now, thought Robbie.

‘My friends, the first thing I would emphasise is that there is no need to panic. Only the colour of things has changed. Underneath they are still the same.’ To show this he held up a black tomato and then ate it. ‘The governments of the world are doing their best to solve the problem and have their top scientists working on it. My government will keep you informed of the situation. Meanwhile keep up that old British spirit.’

‘A fat lot of help he is,’ muttered Robbie’s Dad.

Anything else he might have said was drowned by the sound of thunder. The sudden storm continued all night and it was still raining the morning after.

‘What rotten weather for Saturday,’ said Louise as she and Robbie sat in her bedroom, watching the rain run down the window. ‘The sun only shines when we’re at school.’ Just before noon the rain stopped. The sun came out from behind the black clouds and a rainbow appeared. The rainbow got brighter and then disaster struck. As Robbie and Louise watched, the red began to disappear. It started at one end as though it was disappearing down a hole at the other end.

‘Let’s see if we can find out where it’s going,’ said Louise.

The rainbow ended just behind the wall at the bottom of the vicarage garden. As they got close to the wall they heard a voice.

‘This’ll teach them to go on at me. There’s so much red here everyone will be happy. It’s not my fault there are only six colours left in the rainbow. I didn’t lose the other one; it just got used up.’

The twins tiptoed up to the wall and peered over. Holding a bag that was bigger than it was, they saw a creature with four arms and two legs. It was completely bald and its skin was covered with patches all the colours of the rainbow. Except red. As it filled the bag, black patches on its skin began to turn to red.

Louise chose this moment to hiccup. The creature stopped what it was doing and turned round. ‘Oh hello,’ it said. ‘How are you?’

Before they had time to reply, it continued. ‘I’m very well. Or at least I will be when I’ve scooped up all the red. I say, you wouldn’t care to give me a hand, would you?’

‘What a cheek.’ Louise was so angry she forgot to hiccup. ‘You’re stealing all the red.’

The creature looked surprised. ‘Well I never! I didn’t know that was your red. We’ve not got any.’ Its face brightened. ‘Got lots of blue. I don’t like blue; it makes me so depressed I can almost feel it. You can have some blue instead. I want red for the poppies and the sunset.’

‘But you’re taking all of it,’ Robbie blurted.

‘I need all of it.’ Then it thought for a while. It tried to scratch its head but seemed to have trouble deciding which of its four arms to use. ‘Do you have a rainbow crystal? We’re quite out of them. That’s the problem. We have to rely on natural rainbows now because all the rainbow makers have gone on strike.’

‘What’s a rainbow crystal?’ asked Louise.

‘Don’t you know anything,’ replied the creature. ‘It’s what you make colours with. It’s my job to colour our world. The rainbow makers destroyed all the crystals except theirs; said they didn’t like the competition. Now we’ve run out of red. Green will be next. I can see it coming.’ The creature gave a big sigh.

Louise was running out of patience with this strange creature who talked too much.

‘What do these crystals look like?’

‘How should I know. I’ve never seen one. I know how to use them though. We’re all taught the rhyme at school.’

‘What rhyme?’ Robbie was close to losing his temper.

‘Shine beam of light upon the wall.
Newton’s crystal shows you all.’

As he finished the creature pushed the last of the red into the bag and disappeared.

Louise and Robbie looked at each other.

‘What’s Newton’s crystal?’ asked Robbie.

When they were younger they always asked their Dad. Dads knew everything in those days. But now they had a computer and computers really did know everything.

‘Look up crystal,’ instructed Robbie.

There was a lot of information about crystals; how they were made, what they were used for and how some of them were very valuable. Nowhere did it mention Newton’s crystal.

‘I’ll try Newton,’ said Louise. Helmut Newton was an Austrian photographer. That didn’t help. Sir Isaac Newton was a scientist. He found out about gravity and showed how to make sunlight into a rainbow. And there was a picture showing a strange piece of glass. The sun shone in at one end and a rainbow came out at the other. Actually it wasn’t quite a rainbow on the computer screen; the red was missing.

‘There’s one of those glass things in Great Grandpa’s box,’ shouted Robbie. Great Grandpa was an eccentric old man who had left his box to the twins in his will. It was full of fun things such as magnets, ball bearings and tubes that made scary noises when you blew down them. The triangular piece of glass was in a small black drawstring bag made of soft material. The twins had never discovered what it was for.

For two days the sun stayed hidden behind the clouds, but on the third day it shone into the dining room. First Robbie and then Louise held the glass to the sunlight but nothing happened.

Then Louise remembered the rhyme. ‘It’s in the picture as well, Robbie. It has to be a beam of light.’

Quickly they found a piece of black card -Robbie remembered that it used to be red- and made a hole in the middle. They held it up to the sun and the beam of light coming through the hole passed through the glass and made a rainbow on the dining room wall. And it was a complete rainbow. The piece of card turned red, as did Robbie’s football shirt, which was in its usual place on his bedroom floor. Red was back. The world was right again. Robbie and Louise grinned at each other.

‘I think I’ll have this.’

The creature appeared in front of them and snatched the glass from Robbie’s hand.

‘You can’t take that. It’s ours,’ the twins shouted together.

‘It’s mine now.’ The creature backed away out of reach. ‘They’ll never laugh at me again. The rainbow’s mine, mine, mine!’

The creature’s voice faded away as he disappeared, taking Newton’s crystal with him.

Neither red, nor any other colour ever disappeared from the world again but every time they see a rainbow, Robbie and Louise are convinced that they hear a voice shouting, ‘MINE, MINE, MINE!’

Copyright © 2001 CHRIS WOOD

Ashton Writers would be very happy to hear from anyone about this story. Please email them at Ashtonwriters@aol.com