And Hoggish did see, more or less. “Yes—but—it’s immoral, dishonest and unscrupulous. May I please try it now?”
When Michael finally woke, he saw a ruddy glow at land’s edge and a mist drifting by. He’d been here the whole night!
He jumped on his bike and started home. When he rounded the last corner, onto the street where he lived, he saw a police car at the block of flats. “Where’ve you been?!” Freddie screamed.
Michael had missed his check-in. The big policeman had come for him.
“Crud! I asked you where you been?!”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
IN THE HORSE LATITUDES
The church had been robbed that night and Stella and Esther were on the phone at dawn, calling an emergency meeting of the Merchants Watch Committee. “A tragedy,” said Stella. “What happened to St. Edwards. A senseless tragedy. That beautiful church, destroyed, for no reason.”
“Have they found out who did it, have they, have they?” Frances Froth wanted to know. “Well, have they?”
Tiswas stood at the door, dark and distant.
“The authorities know who’s responsible,” said Stella solemnly.
“Who who who?”
“Those pernicious little vermin, of course,” Stella told her.
“They’ve already arrested one of them,” added Esther somberly.
“Who, who, who did they get?” chirped Frances.
“That boy, of course,” added Stella.
“I knew it, knew it!”
“What boy?” asked Tiswas.
“The boy who robbed your store, Mr. Tiswas,” said Stella.
“That horrid delinquent—Michael Pine,” added Esther.
Tiswas grunted, still darker and more distant.
“Seems you’d be happy, Tiswas,” said Gadbury. “They caught him. Now they can put him where he belongs.”
But Tiswas only grunted again.
Michael had been taken to the police station the morning before and kept in protective custody overnight. At mid-day, he was brought to the Youth Court. Stanley Ford and Father Drapier sat near the wall, both silent, both solemn. Maxine Bellknap and Horace Ackerby were there, quiet and miserable. Mr. Fenworth, the Duty Solicitor, came running in late.
“All right. Tell us what happened.” The Magistrate never looked at the boy.
Michael knew by now that the church had been robbed, vandalized, the pipe organ destroyed, half the stained glass windows shattered. But he couldn’t tell them where he’d been, couldn’t give away the secret of the Little Ones.
“Mr. Fenworth?” Ackerby’s temper was rising. “Would he like to tell me or go straight to jail?”
Fenworth glared hard and Michael said, “I was in Ambridge.”
“With who?” Ackerby asked.
“I was alone,” the boy answered.
“Of course you were,” the Magistrate muttered. “And why were you in Ambridge? Conveniently alone, of course.”
There was no good answer to give. “I was just . . . there, I guess.”
“Someone must’ve seen you. Someone who can vouch for you.”
Michael had no answer. The courtroom door opened and a clerk stepped to the Magistrates and handed a note, which they passed among themselves.
“Let him in,” said Ackerby and the clerk brought Mr. Tiswas to the front. “You have something to share with us?”
“This boy didn’t break into the church,” said Tiswas.
“How do you know that?”
“I was driving home when I saw him on his bike. Thought he might be up to something, so I followed. I stayed with him a good three hours, ’bout five to eight o’clock, all the way to Ambridge.”
“That’s over ten miles,” said the Magistrate.
“Fifteen,” Tiswas told him.
“You’re certain? Certain it was him?”
Tiswas said he was and Ackerby said, “Still, the boy missed a check-in and he was warned. I propose a Curfew Order.” He turned to Michael: “That means you’ll stay indoors at your flat, between seven o’clock each night and seven each morning. If you break this curfew, I’ll send you to YOI, y’unnerstand?”
“Yes. Yes, sir.”
The Chief Magistrate got to his feet. “We make the Curfew Order.”
It was going to be tough, keeping that curfew. But Michael didn’t want to end up in the Young Offenders Institution. When he finished his work at Fenn’s, he hurried to check on the Little Ones.
He found them clustered in the streets, reading the latest pamphlet.
“What’s going on?” the boy asked Mr. Topgallant.
“If only I knew,” the Grand Panjandrum sighed, looking old and weary. “Our society has drifted off its course. The Trade Winds have forsaken us and we are stuck in a doldrums of our own making, caught in Horse Latitudes.” Topgallant had read about this in one of Lemuel’s books. It was a place feared by sailors, where ships lay trapped by a windless sea. In these latitudes, the water is flat as glass and a ship can be caught for weeks, not moving forward or back. It was Spanish sailors who gave it the name: when their ships lay in the stillness, supplies ran low and drinking water went first. There was nothing left for the horses, and these men cared deeply for their animals. They threw the doomed creatures overboard, weighed down, to save them from more miserable deaths. The superstitious ones know that ghost-horses still haunt these waters.
“When you find yourself in the Horse Latitudes,” said the G.P., “there’s nothing to do but wait and hope you make it out alive.”
That evening, with Michael gone, one of them was on tower watch when a weasel and another, another, another slipped over the eastern wall. The Little One leapt to the rope and sent the alarm belling over the Garden City. The People moved quickly to shelters and the Farmer was ready with his rifle. Evet’s aim was steady and the first weasel was dead before it hit the ground. The others scurried, barking to one another, up and over the wall.
But Topgallant knew they’d be back. The hawks he could deal with: there were only a few of those and they hunted when hungry. These monsters were worse; they were ruthless, toothy things and they killed for the joy of killing, madly murdering anything that wasn’t weasel.
I can see myself, Topgallant thought to himself, fading away peacefully at a very old age. I can see myself bravely going down with a ship at sea. But I will not end up as weasel food!
The next morning, a Sunday, Michael went to Jane’s house and waited under a beech tree across the street. The Mallery home was long and many-gabled, built of the sun-yellow stone, with a half-dozen chimneys scattered along the tile roof. Mountains of marigold bloomed everywhere and ivy grew up the front of the house, spreading as it went like angel wings. Jane came out in a bright Spring dress and waited by the car.
“Oh, no, no, noooo, Michael,” she said when he came over. “What are you doing here?”
“I need to talk to you,” he said.
“You better go.” She took a fast look at the house. “Dad’ll be coming any minute. Don’t let him see you here, please.”
“It’s important.”
“It’s Easter, Michael. We’re going to church.”
“I’ll see you after.”
When the house door opened, she said, “Here he comes,” but Michael had already gone.
He took a seat in a back pew, in the farthest dim corner. Father Drapier had repaired the church as best he could, but the Boys had worked it over. They’d broken most of the stained glass, and sheets of plywood covered the holes. The great Willis organ had been wrecked beyond fixing, the pipework hammered bent and useless.
Michael watched Jane and her father take seats near the front. The old priest began his Mass and its ancient rhythm made the boy think of the Little Ones’ music.
“‘Quem Quaeritas?’ the angels asked. ‘Whom seek ye?’”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
STORKS ON THE ROOF
When the service was done, Michael found Jane in the nave, alone and apart. Her father was talking business with a local television personality as the boy made his way to Jane’s side.
“I need your help,” he said.
He let her guide him back into the chapel, empty now.
“Help how, Michael, help with what?” she wanted to know.
“Can’t say, exactly,” he told her. Their words echoed off the old walls, no matter how softly they spoke.
“What does that mean, exactly? Why can’t you say, exactly?”
“Can’t, that’s all. I need to show you,” he said.
He waited for an answer, but she said, “You better get out of here, Michael. If my Dad sees you, mannnn, he’s going to—”
“There’s nobody but you,” he said, he pleaded.
It was another long moment till she told him, “All right.”
“Tomorrow? Nine?” The schools were closed that Monday. “Meet me here.”
She nodded, she would.
“You want to tell me what it’s all about?” she asked.
“I want to. But if I did, you wouldn’t believe me. Tomorrow. You’ll see then.”
“Wasn’t sure your Dad’d let you come,” he said when they met on the windy steps of St. Edwards. Esther and Stella watered boxed geraniums and watched the children closely. Francis Froth peered at them through the pet shop window. Michael walked Jane down the street, away from the many eyes of the Merchants Watch Committee.
“He thinks I’m at Nicole’s house,” she told him.
“What if he finds out you’re—?”
“Let’s don’t think about it. Now why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”
“Come on,” he said. “I’ll show you.”
They set out walking, not talking much. When they came to the crossroads Michael said, “If I told you there’s a place up here . . .” he chose words carefully, “like you never imagined, like you never dreamed . . .”
“I guess I’d say take me there,” she answered.
He gave her his hand and they walked together.
“Unbelievable,” was all Jane could say when she saw the Garden City. “How’d it get here, how long’s it been here, how’d you find out about it?”
“Wait,” he said. “There’s more.” He used a stick to tap the church bell and called, “There’s somebody you need to meet.”
“Who, who’re you talking to—” Then she saw. Jane saw the Little Ones come from houses, shelters, every corner of the Nation. They gathered in the new square, one hundred ninety-three of them, all in their best clothes. They stood on the fountain, watched from window ledges, in tree branches, rooftops.
“What are—” she asked quietly, “who are they?”
“They’re my friends.” Michael told her their story, as much as he knew. “They’re vulnerable,” he said, “to weasels and Sparrow Hawks.”
“Where’d they come from?” she whispered.
“Don’t know,” he answered. “They’re the only ones like them in the world, is what they tell me. Nantwuzzled, that’s their word for it.” He introduced her to the Grand Panjandrum, his wife, to the Tiddlins, Evet Butz, Thudd Ickens, Philament Phlopp, Mumraffian Rake, Burra Dryth, the rest.
“We will call her Quinbus Ooman,” the G.P. announced.
“Means ‘the Girl Mountain,’” Michael told her.
“Great Ghost of BOLGOLAM,” Hoggish shuddered, and left for lunch.
Topgallant declared another New Quinbus Day and the celebrating began. There were dancers, jugglers, food everywhere, and the music, always the music.
And again Jane said, “Unbelievable. I never imagined something like this could exist . . .”
“I guess there are whole other worlds all around us, if we bother to look,” Michael said. “The old man watched over them, him and his dog, for I-don’t-know-how-long. But they’re gone. And you and me are the only ones who know about them.”
“And you and me,” she said, “are we going to take care of them now?”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE GATHERING CLOUDS OF WAR
In their little flat above the bookstore, Stella and Esther Daniels had the same thought at the same moment.
“The key,” Stella began.
“Is knowledge,” Esther finished.
“That’s right, dear. And knowledge is information,” from Stella.
They decided that the Merchants Watch Committee, the MWC they called it, needed more information. With street brawls and children ending up in hospitals, the Merchants had to know what was going on in their little town. A newsletter is what they needed.
They went straight to Larry Tiswas and badgered him into putting one together for them. The Daniels were sure every merchant in Moss-on-Stone would want a copy.
Together through those stretching-out Spring days, Michael and Jane watched over the Little Ones. Together, they did their best to keep them safe.
Jane went to the Garden City whenever she could and told her father she was with her school friend. And Michael was there every day, at least twice a day, and was careful to keep the curfew.
They were busy every second, exhausted, exhilarated, and they kept each other going. When Michael was stressed, Jane was serene and her serenity calmed him. When he was scattered, she was focused.
And for his part, Michael had opened a whole new world to her, had shown her a place full of possibilities.
But these were dark days in Lesser Lilliput. The weasels knew the old man and his dog were gone. They came over the Wall one night and killed three of the Farmer’s cows, four sheep, a goose. Evet Butz heard the animal cries and ran to the field. But he found only mud and blood and monster-tracks.
The Grand Panjandrum ordered double-watch in the tower, but it didn’t stop the beasts. They came back and didn’t wait for darkness. They went to the farm and killed more cows, more sheep, a pig, another goose.
It seemed the bell rang every hour. Villagers ran from their homes, young ones to shelters, the rest to fight off the monsters. Armed with tiny guns and arrows, they chased the vermin over the Wall and into the Land of Naught and Nil, where all the bad things came from; but the weasels could not be stopped. Soon the livestock would be gone and the beasts would come looking for the villagers.
It was a warm windy night, some sour smell in the air, as Nick sat in the old Victor, in a puddle of streetlight, and watched his Boys work. The house was big and close to the street. It wasn’t empty, but these were desperate times for Nick. Michael was lost to him and the Merchants Watch Committee had all the shops guarded. He’d been seeing the 7-A-M tags around town, Lyall Murphy’s work, and he knew he had to do something. He had to take bigger chances on bigger hauls.
That’s why he sent his Boys into the house with ivy grown like an angel across it. Robby used a thin jimmy on a first floor window. The bedrooms were upstairs but they ought to find computers, televisions, and the like down here.
“Careful you don’t break it,” Peter hissed.
“Look, I know what I’m doing,” Robby hissed back, but he didn’t know this was Jane’s house and he didn’t know about the new security system. He pushed the jimmy hard and, as the window gave way, alarms and floodlights blasted from every corner.
Mr. Mallery was in Jane’s room in seconds: “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, but what”—she was still shaking sleep from her head—“Dad, what’s happening?”
Her father was already on the phone and the police were already coming.
Robby ran for the street, but Peter and Phil, addled and afraid, went the wrong way. “Fools!” Nic
k spat as he cranked the engine. Robby jumped in and they fled into the night and didn’t stop till they hit the crossroads.
“If they get Phil, that’s two times for him.”
“It’s three,” Nick rumbled back. “And the same for Peter.”
“They’ll get YOI. Eejits.”
The Lesser Lilliputians gathered in the Hall that night. There had been a dozen attacks in the day and panic was taking the city. “What do those monsters want from us?!” one of them cried.
“Breakfast, lunch, and dinner!” called another.
“Now, now. We’ve faced challenges before,” said the Grand Panjandrum, a lonely voice of calm and hope. “We’ll overcome this one.”
“That’s no ANSWER!” screeched Hoggish. “We have to understand why these things are mad at us.”
“Why? They only care about food, Hoggish, same as you. They only want to eat us!” said the Farmer.
“Evet has a point,” some murmured. “And Hoggish has another,” some mumbled.
“Ahh, rattletraps!” shouted the Farmer. “Don’t listen to that pig! He hates us more’n the monsters do!”
“I hate no one,” the big man bellowed. “I am in charity with the world.”
“I say we kill ’em all!” Evet yelled.
“A good idea,” muttered some.
“YES, BUT more will come and take their place!” wailed Hoggish. “If we leave THEM alone, they’ll leave US alone!”
“A good point,” mumbled others.
“No buts, no buts, no buts!” cried Evet. “If more of ’em come, we kill those, too! Use your loaf!”
And on it went, each with a piece of the answer, but neither with the answer.
“Simple country dunce,” screeched one brother. “Use reason!”
“Great blubberous slab!” screamed the other. “Use a gun!”
The Last of the Gullivers Page 8
