Jack pulled back the covers and peered blearily at the alarm clock by his side. Six o'clock. He hadn't set any alarm for six. Why was the blasted thing ringing then? Anyway, it didn't matter. He was wide awake now. Grumbling and muttering to himself, he pulled the duvet all the way back and stepped out of his bed. The windows weren't drawn, but the first rays of dawn were already peeking through the transparent cloth. He rubbed his eyes.

Another noise reached his years then. The alarm again? No, he had shut that off. What the hell? Some kid was screaming his lungs out. The words were indistinguishable. What was very distinguishable to his sorely irritated mind that the noise was loud. Very loud. In fact, it was now bordering on the unbearable. Time to do something about it. He ripped open the curtains to get a grip on what was happening. He took it all in a glance.

Quite simply, a child was stuck in the tree. A dirty, scraggy youth who looked in his mid-teens, wearing the shabbiest clothes that Jack had ever seen, was dangling from one leg, from the branch of his tree, Jack's tree. And the clincher, Jack saw, was the sack clearly full of apples from the very same tree. Which made them Jack's apples. Well, well, what a way to start the day.

Grinning, he pulled off his pyjamas and quickly slipped on the first clothes he found in the wardrobe. He began to hurry out of his bedroom and down the stairs, when a thought struck him. Why hurry? The kid looked athletic enough, and it wasn't that much of a drop anyway. Serves the rascal right anyway, Jack thought. He slowed down, made his way to kitchen and set a pot of coffee on the stove. He then spent the next five minutes waiting for that to happen while humming a favourite song loudly to himself. The kid screamed again, something Jack couldn't make out. Jack hummed a little louder. The stove rang. He turned, and poured himself a steaming hot cup of coffee. Indeed a nice way to start the day, he thought to himself. Different, at the very least.

He strolled out the front door to the sounds of birds chirping and a young boy's tiring cries for help, taking his time walking over to the tree, no great distance from his front door. He sipped his coffee as he walked, careful not to tread all over his neatly trimmed lawn. He had mowed it the night before.

He reached the tree and stopped. The boy had managed to contort himself into quite a position. One leg lay frantically looped around a thick upper branch, and he had managed to get his hand on a small knot on the trunk of the tree, a few feet down. His other arm and leg lay dangling in the air.

'Morning there,' said Jack with exaggerated cheer.

'Gemme down gemme down gemme down I'm stuck - Lor' I'm gonna fall break sumfin gemme down please Mister!' the youngster rattled off breathlessly.

'Sure. Just let go and I got you.'

'Really yer don't let me fall Mister!'

'I won't,' and he promptly did. Luckily, the fall was but of a few feet, and the kid scrambled quickly to his feet, frantically checking himself for bruises and broken bones. None were to be found. He slowly looked at Jack. The small sack lay next to him. An apple rolled out. A guilty look crept into the child's eyes.

'Been stealing?,' Jack asked amiably.

There was no point in lying. The apple lay glinting in the morning sun. No, no point in hiding. The boy was going to try another tactic. He removed his dirty cloth cap and did a small curtsey. He then brought a pitiful expression onto his face - that puppy expression with the enlarged brown eyes, melt the man's heart if nothing else.

'You see guv', my family's starving. I haven't eaten nuthin' in two days but don' care, it's my sister you see - three she is and the most adorable thing - the thing is, she hasn' had a morsel and I had to do something for little Mary, you can throw me in jail guv', just get some food to her, she's down by the street waiting. I swear.'

Jack stared intently into the boy's eyes. A glimmer of a tear was surfacing, but the boy wasn't crying. A hint of truth in his story, maybe. Hey, it was a sack of apples. Apples. There were probably hundreds in the tree. And he didn't like apples. In fact, he'd probably never eaten one. And there was a poor young boy and girl starving for food. What a boy. If you really thought about it, there was nothing he could do. Morally, that is.

As it ended, the boy skipped down the road with his apples, a broad smile of satisfaction on his face. He removed one, and lovingly munched on it, the juice squirting down the side of his face and onto his tunic. As this happened, he turned towards Jack, still standing and waving on the lawn, and muttered under his breath.

'Gotcha guv'.'

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