The Race Against Time

by Frank Cottrell Boyce

  “Basildon has got so congested.” Mum sighed.

  “I get the feeling that this is not Basildon,” said Jem.

  “I get the feeling that this is not the twenty-first century,” said Lucy. “Judging by the hats and cars, I’d say this was in the 1920s. Judging by the fact that the sign says ‘Broadway,’ I’d say we were in New York.”

  “I’ll get us out of here,” said Dad, jumping out and tugging at the crank handle.

  “Why would you want to get out of New York in the 1920s?” said Mum, looking around in wonder at the shops, the coats, the architecture, the faces. “Can’t we stay awhile?”

  “I suppose going through the Ice Age has damaged the starter motor,” said Dad. “And look at this . . . no wonder she won’t start.” Great skeins of Cretaceous spider’s web had got themselves wrapped around the crank shaft, and now it wouldn’t budge. Car horns honked louder. Drivers yelled more furiously. Dad got stressed.

  “Don’t get stressed,” said Mum.

  Jem tried to help. He held the spanner, fetched the oil, apologized to the other drivers as he tried to unravel the prehistoric spider’s web. It was surprisingly strong and sticky. It was just beginning to come loose when two immaculate leather shoes walked past him. A dashing young man with a curly moustache and a long silk scarf leaped gracefully onto Chitty’s bonnet and put his hands in the air. “Ladies and gentlemen of this New York,” he called in a rich, commanding English accent, “do calm down. Yes, you are stuck in traffic. But is that such a terrible thing? You are at least stuck outside my house”— he waved his hand at a magnificent brick building with a flight of steps rising up to the front door; in front of the door was a ridiculously tall butler in white tie and tails —“which makes you my guests. Crackitt, crack it open!”

  Crackitt must have been the name of the ridiculously tall butler. And what he cracked open was champagne. Gallons of it. From inside the magnificent house, a dozen or more neatly dressed young ladies came tap dancing, all carrying bottles and glasses. In and out of the traffic they danced, pouring champagne for the motorists and passengers. But it wasn’t the dancers or the champagne that interested Jem. It was the young man in the scarf. He had seen him before somewhere, or at least a picture of him. “Don’t look on this as a traffic jam!” he was crying. “Think of it as an unexpected party.” Then he looked down at Jem and at the hank of sticky white stuff he was holding. “I say,” he said. “What on earth is that?”

  “It’s prehistoric spider’s web,” explained Jem. “Amazingly strong and quite sticky. Chitty got caught up in one this morning — or sixty-six million years ago, depending on how you look at it. Our car can travel back in time.”

  “Can she really? Extraordinary. No use to me, of course. I’m more interested in going forward in time — toward the finishing line.”

  Suddenly Jem knew where he had seen the man. “Are you,” he asked, “by any chance, are you . . . Count Zborowski?”

  “The very same.” The Count smiled, bowing his head. “My compliments on your rather magnificent car. A Paragon Panther, if I’m not mistaken.”

  “That’s right,” said Jem. He patted Chitty’s gleaming wheel arch and thought, I don’t know why you brought us here, Chitty, but I do know it’s not a coincidence that you stalled outside the house of your first owner.

  “I had a Panther myself,” said the Count. “I was reliably informed she was the only one of her kind. But perhaps my informer was not as reliable as I thought.”

  “No, no,” said Jem. “This is her. This is your car. This is Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”

  “That can’t be quite right, you know,” said the Count. “I was racing my Chitty at Brooklands — Lightning Short Handicap, 1922 — and I’m afraid the dear old thing went stark-staring bonkers, drove straight through the timing hut, dashed near killed me. Completely wrecked herself.”

  “That’s her,” said Mum. “The very same Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”

  “Dad restored her to her former beauty,” said Jem proudly.

  “Even though I’m talking,” said the Count, “I’m speechless. Really. I have no idea what to say. She looks even more beautiful now than she did when she was new. Sir, you must surely be the finest mechanic in the world.”

  “Well,” said Dad, “if I were really that good, we wouldn’t be having all this trouble getting her started.”

  “Step aside,” said the Count. “I have a wrinkle for Chitty’s engine that works on even the coldest morning. Crackitt!”

  Crackitt passed the Count a short sword and a bottle of champagne. The Count took the bottle in one hand and the sword in the other, and with a single sweeping gesture, he sliced through the neck of the bottle, as easily as if it had been made of butter. Champagne gurgled out, bubbling over Chitty’s bonnet.

  “Oh!” gasped Mum, impressed. Lucy and Jem applauded, but, more importantly, Chitty’s engine spluttered.

  “Give the starter a shove, Jem,” said Dad.

  Jem jumped into the driver’s seat and tried Chitty’s starter motor. Her splutter turned into a roar. The Count placed his hand on the bonnet. The roar turned to a purr, as if Chitty recognized the touch of her favourite hand in all the world.

  “Hear that?” yelled Dad. “The word today is we are back on the road again.”

  “Champagne,” said the Count. “An infallible cure for engine trouble. Has to be a good year, of course. This is the ’98. Chitty was always very particular about her champagne. Chin-chin, by the way . . .” He took a gulp of the champagne and then offered the bottle first to Mum and then to Lucy.

  A strange sound like a mouse being strangled came from somewhere inside Lucy. Jem, Mum, and even Little Harry stared at her. She’d never made a sound like this before.

  “Lucy,” said Mum, “I know this sounds unlikely, but . . . Did you just giggle?”

  “I have never giggled in my life,” said Lucy, narrowing her eyes, “and you know that.”

  “Oh, but what a shame! You do it so dashed nicely.” The Count smiled and took another gulp of champagne.

  The strangled-mouse sound came from inside Lucy once more.

  “You just did it again!” said Mum. “You are definitely giggling.”

  “I’m not giggling,” growled Lucy. “I’m thinking. For instance, I’m thinking . . . if this is New York in 1926, then alcohol is illegal.”

  “Oh,” said the Count, “dash it. I always forget champagne is alcohol.”

  A little way farther up Broadway, the yowl of sirens split the air. It was the sound of the New York City Police Department coming to arrest someone for distributing gallons of hooch. Up and down Broadway, the other motorists threw away their glasses, leaped into their cars, chewed mints, and tried to act like they’d never touched a drop.

  “What a dashed nuisance,” said the Count. “I’m going to be carted off to jail for the rest of my natural, just as I was going to drive the most important race of my life.”

  Then, “Chitty, chitty,” said Chitty’s engine.

  And, “Bang, bang,” said her exhaust.

  Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was ready to go.

  The Count leaped in next to Jem. “How are you at getaway driving?” he said.

  The sirens were louder now, but they were almost drowned out by the revving of the other cars’ engines, the sounding of their horns, and the yelling of their drivers, all desperate for Chitty to move so that they could get away from the police.

  Before Jem could explain that Dad was the driver and that he was only in the driving seat in order to press the starter button, Chitty barged away from the kerb and roared off down Broadway.

  “Wait!” called Dad, who was still on the pavement. Chitty, of course, did not wait, but she did swerve to miss a fire hydrant, giving Dad just enough time to jump aboard as she swung around the corner into West Thirty-first Street.

  “Smooth work,” said the Count, ruffling Jem’s hair.

  “It’s not me; it’s the car,” said Jem, clingi
ng on to Chitty’s steering wheel, hypnotized with fear as pedestrians and red lights whizzed past. But Chitty’s engine drowned out everything he said.

  “Bang! Bang!” yelled Little Harry.

  “Yes,” cooed Mum. “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”

  “Bang! Bang! Bang!” insisted Little Harry.

  He’s not talking about the car, thought Jem. I wonder what he is talking about.

  “Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!” yelled Little Harry, and just then a swarm of bullets buzzed past Jem’s head like furious wasps.

  “Trouble ahead!” called the Count. Two police cars were powering toward them, lights flashing. “By the way, they seem to be shooting at us.”

  Jem tried to keep hold of the wheel, but it spun out of his hands as the car swung left and then right.

  “What a nuisance.” The Count sighed. He poked his head up and shouted at the police, “I say! Be careful, can’t you! You’ve burst our back tyre!” Then he turned to Jem and said, “Would you mind driving her on two wheels? You know, sort of tip her on the side and keep her steady as she goes?”

  Before Jem could speak, Chitty lurched over to one side, brakes screaming for mercy as she shimmied onto Fifth Avenue, on her two left wheels, her two right wheels up in the air.

  “Perfect.” The Count smiled, clambering out onto the side of the car, crawling along her bodywork toward the rear wheel.

  “What are you doing?” yelled Mum.

  The Count balanced on the running-board, bullets whistling round his head. “It’s not too sticky once you get the hang of it,” he yelled back. “Just like surfing. Except for the bullets, of course. Keep her up on two wheels, old chap, while I change the tyre.”

  The Tooting family watched in awe as the Count removed Chitty’s back tyre while hurtling along Fifth Avenue at full speed. “Did it all the time at Brooklands,” he said. “Can’t afford to stop to change tyres when you’re in a race, you know. Have to do it while you’re on the move. There she goes.” He pulled the flat tyre off and hurled it from the back of Chitty, toward the police cars. Swerving to miss it, the police cars rammed into one another. “That’ll teach them to shoot at a chap while he’s doing his car maintenance. Now, where’s the spare?” Within a few seconds, the Count had the new tyre fitted and was back on the passenger seat next to Jem. “Drive on all fours wheels now,” he said. “Faster that way.”

  Just as he said this, a pair of police motorcycles flew out of the side streets, sirens blasting. They raced along, one on each side of Chitty.

  “Couldn’t we just stop and explain?” said Mum.

  “Explain what?” said Dad.

  “That we didn’t know about their alcohol laws because we have come from the future via the late Cretaceous period.”

  The riders crouched over their engines, gripping their handlebars with massive leather gauntlets, staring into Chitty with their goggled eyes. They didn’t look like they were interested in explanations.

  “Trouble is,” said the Count, “this is not the first time I’ve forgotten about the No Champagne law. Last time, I believe the electric chair was mentioned as a distinct possibility. Best head for the river.”

  “Why?” said Dad.

  “The river is absolutely the only place to go when you’re in lumber with the law,” said the Count. “Head for the river, I always say. Not sure why, but it has a ring to it, don’t you think?”

  “What river?” said Jem.

  “Not sure what they call it,” said the Count. “But it’s a jolly fine river. Just at the bottom of West Seventy-ninth.”

  “That’s the Hudson River,” said Lucy. “The official border between New York City and New Jersey.”

  Chitty was already spinning on her back wheels, skidding into West Seventy-ninth, rushing toward the Hudson River. Jem could see the funnel of a ferry boat and the dazzle of wide, cold water.

  “You might want to brake now,” said the Count. “River’s coming toward us a little bit quickly . . .”

  Jem could see an esplanade. An old man was feeding the seagulls. A family was looking over the metal railing, waving at passing boats. He tried to press the brake, but the brake seemed to press back.

  “I honestly would brake now,” said the Count, leaning back in his seat. “If you drive into fences too quickly, they break. I know because I’ve done it.”

  “Jem! Brake!” yelled Dad.

  “Fasten your seat belts!” yelled Jem. No matter what Jem did, he couldn’t make Chitty turn left or right. She was heading straight for the railings. “We’re just going to have to trust Chitty.”

  “Bang!” banged Chitty as one of the police motorcycles tore ahead and dodged in front of her, trying to force her to slow down.

  “Bang!” banged Chitty as she stopped as suddenly as if she had hit a brick wall. The police motorcycle in front tore into the distance without noticing that Chitty wasn’t following. The police motorcycle behind tried to swerve but too late, and hit Chitty’s huge chrome bumper side-on. It spun round and round on its back wheel, blue smoke billowing from its tyres. Finally it toppled gently onto its side. The rider tried to stand up, but all that spinning had made him too dizzy.

  The Count turned to Lucy. “What ho,” he said.

  “What ho,” said Lucy, who wasn’t sure what the polite response to “What ho” was.

  “What ho, ho,” said the Count.

  “What?” said Lucy.

  “Conversation is not my strong point, I’m afraid,” said the Count. “Especially with ladies of the opposite sex. I’m all right as far as ‘What ho,’ but then I tend to get stuck.”

  “Very nice to meet you,” said Lucy.

  “Corking great coincidence strolling into you on Broadway like that.”

  A coincidence, thought Jem, is exactly what this is not. Chitty wants to be here for some reason.

  Before he had time to think about that reason, a storm of blue lights flickered across the esplanade. Police cars. A fleet of them. Lined up across the bottom of the street, like a troop of cavalry, ready to charge.

  “Well, toodle-oo,” said the Count. “Perhaps I’ll run.” He tried to undo his seat belt, but it seemed to be stuck, and when he tried to slide out from under it, he seemed to get only more stuck.

  Without even noticing himself doing it, Jem found that he had placed his foot on the accelerator. Such a nice, comfortable accelerator, so perfectly designed to fit your foot. You just had to press it. The hand brake, too, the way its ebony handle fitted so snugly and warmly into your hand, you just wanted to lift it up and let it . . . It was as though Chitty were whispering to him, persuading him to let her go. She was so difficult to say no to. Jem let slip the hand brake. Jem pressed the accelerator. Chitty rushed toward the blockade of police cars.

  “Brake!” yelled the Count.

  Chitty barged the police cars aside and tore across the esplanade.

  “Brake! Brake!” yelled Dad.

  The Count covered his eyes as the metal barrier splintered all around them.

  “Actually . . .” said Lucy, as the car tumbled off the quay.

  “In fact . . .” she said, as the freezing water rushed up to meet them.

  “I think . . .” she went on, as Chitty rushed through the cold air. “I think you’re going to like this.”

  Detective Finbar O’Shaunessy had joined the New York City Police Department in 1901 when he was sixteen years old. For twenty-five years, he had walked the streets of Manhattan, upholding the law. He’d dealt with robbers and riots, gangsters and gangs. He’d arrested a man who claimed he could saw the island of Manhattan in half. He’d seen Houdini escape from a straitjacket while dangling from a crane high above the river. He’d seen a man jump off the Brooklyn Bridge and survive. He’d met Charlie Chaplin and Babe Ruth. But in all that time, he’d never seen anything as surprising as what he saw on the esplanade that afternoon. A big jalopy of a racing car with a little kid at the wheel had smashed through the barrier and belly flopped into the cold
black waters of the Hudson. Detective O’Shaunessy had taken off his hat. He believed it was important to show respect when people died — even if they were bootleggers and joyriders. But the car didn’t sink! It rocked unsteadily for a moment on the waves, then swung its bonnet round in the direction of Liberty Island and began to chug across the river and out of his jurisdiction.

  “What in the name of Liberty . . . ?” said Detective O’Shaunessy, who did not know that under the waves, the wheels of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang were realigning themselves until they were all pointing backward. They turned, churning the water like propellers. Too confused to think, the detective waved his hat at them.

  “What an absolute corker of a car!” said the Count. “I must say I had no idea she could float.”

  As if she had heard him, Chitty’s engine went from churning to spinning as quick as a heart can leap, and the car sped through the water, shooting spray from her prow. The Tootings waved merrily from the backseat as she carved a great bow wave through the bay.

  “I say,” said the Count. “You really have done a marvellous job on her, Mr. Tooting.”

  “I don’t know about that,” said Dad modestly. “The fact is we’ve been having a bit of trouble with the Chronojuster. It seems to be stuck. You don’t have any handy hints about that, do you? Would champagne work, maybe?”

  “What’s a Chronojuster?”

  “The Chronojuster is the thing that makes her travel through time.”

  “Never heard of it. She didn’t travel through time in my day. You couldn’t sail her, either. All I knew was that she went really fast. I seem to have underestimated the dear old girl. I couldn’t take a turn behind the wheel, I don’t suppose? For old times’ sake?”

  The sound of Chitty’s engine deepened from chugging to purring. Instead of bouncing over the waves, she cut smoothly through them, as though inviting the Count into the driving seat. Jem shuffled out from behind the wheel. The Count stood up.

  “Do you have a new car now?” asked Lucy. “A safer one?”