‘That was six months ago,’ said Sydney. ‘Where’s the horse now, I wonder?’
‘Well,’ said Spiff, ‘I looked in a phone book and the RSPCA have got an office in Battersea Bridge Road, by the traffic lights. What I reckon is that a couple of you ought to go down there and say you’re distant relatives of Dewdrop. You know, kid them you’ve just heard about the horse and would like to see it, make sure it’s all right. Bingo’s good at that kind of thing, with that innocent face of his.’
Bingo, lying full length on his stomach, scratched a pattern in the dirt. ‘I wouldn’t mind a little run down the road,’ he said. ‘I could be there and back in half an hour.’
‘I’ll come with yer, if yer like,’ said Stonks.
‘And me,’ added Twilight.
‘OK,’ agreed Bingo, ‘the rest of you can wait here.’ He pushed himself to his feet and Stonks and Twilight did the same.
‘You be careful,’ said Chalotte, ‘we don’t want any complications.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Twilight, ‘I move very fast; they call me the black mamba of Whitechapel Road, you know.’
Battersea Bridge Road was scorching underfoot, wide and cluttered with hot traffic. The heatwave hung over the city like blue enamel and breathing was like drowning in warm water.
‘Strewth,’ said Twilight, ‘I’m glad I don’t live in one of those tropical places abroad.’ He backhanded the sweat out of his eyes.
Stonks gazed into the distance. ‘You can bet your life,’ he said, ‘that if you want a number in a road that has a lot of numbers then the number you want is always the number at the other end of the road.’
‘Yes, Stonks’s Law,’ said Bingo.
They trudged on and on for what seemed miles until at last they came to a row of shops by the traffic lights at the corner of Westbridge Road. Here they found, among others, a dull shopfront with its plate glass smeared over with bilious green paint. Above the window was written, in dim yellow letters: RSPCA, Local Office.
‘Well, here we are,’ said Bingo, ‘and in I go. You two better stay out here, in case there’s trouble.’
‘Trouble, what trouble?’ said Twilight. ‘They ain’t interested in kids, ain’t got the time, it’s all “puss-puss” and “down Rover” with them.’
Bingo looked at Stonks, who said, ‘There’s enough of us, we should be all right.’
Bingo opened the door and the three Borribles found themselves in a bleak office furnished only with a cheap desk and a few chairs. There was a typewriter, a telephone, a lady in a brown cardigan and a thick-set man dressed in a shiny black suit. The strange light from the painted window made everything a ghostly green, especially the two adults. They looked like they’d been recently dug up in some damp and mouldy cemetery.
The lady raised her head from the papers on her desk and smiled like a dentist. The man, his buttocks overflowing the small perimeter of his chair, smiled too. Bingo didn’t like either of the smiles.
‘Yes,’ said the lady, ‘and how can we help you three nice little boys?’ She patted the crust of lacquer on her lifeless hair and her eyes glinted. The man rolled his lips around and said nothing. Inside his heavy suit his body was cooking like a chicken in a microwave and sweat gleamed and trickled across the acres of his pale skin. Bingo looked to the floor expecting to see a puddle of perspiration—he was disappointed. He looked back at the lady, confused. ‘Is this the NSPCC?’ he asked.
The lady’s laugh jangled about the room like an armful of brass bracelets. ‘Oh no, my dear,’ she said, ‘this is the RSPCA. We’re the ones with the Royals in front. We look after animals and the ones without the Royals do the children.’
‘That’s what I meant,’ said Bingo. ‘I always get them mixed up. My parents sent me … to ask about a horse.’
‘A horse,’ said the man suddenly, ‘what kind of horse?’
‘Well,’ explained Bingo, ‘there was this horse found, in King George’s Park, about six months ago, and my mum and dad, they are related to the person who owned that horse. Do you know what I mean?’
The lady nodded. ‘Of course we do, boys,’ she said, purring like an untrustworthy cat.
Bingo went on, ‘You see my mum’s mad about horses, and I was coming over this way, to visit my friends ’ere, and she said I was to ask you what had happened to the horse, that’s if you knew, like.’
‘And where do you live, sonny?’ asked the man, pushing kindness into his face as hard as he could.
‘Clapham Common, South Side,’ said Bingo. ‘We looked you up in the phone book.’
‘I see,’ said the man, ‘how very enterprising.’
The lady tittered like a toy piano and pulled open a drawer. ‘It’s not really our part of London,’ she said, and her hand appeared holding an address book, ‘but I’ll phone up Central Records for you, they’ll be bound to know something.’
Bingo nodded and shifted his feet. There was something about these two adults he didn’t like. Twilight stepped nearer the door, staring at the lady while she composed the telephone number. Her expression went vacant as she put the receiver to her ear and her eyes spun inside out to show only blank whites, though when someone spoke at the other end of the line her face lit up in a series of flashes so that she looked like a fruit machine.
‘Ah, hello, Central Records … of course you are. This is Battersea here, Battersea. I have three lovely little boys in my office who are very worried about a horse, yes. It was lost in King George’s Park about six months ago … Yes, certainly.’ Her eyelids fluttered and found Bingo. ‘They’ve gone to get the file,’ she said, ‘we’ll have to wait,’ and she pursed her lips in a gesture of affection, making her mouth hard and unlovely like a chicken’s arse.
‘I don’t reckon this,’ whispered Stonks, ‘there’s a cop shop just up the road from here, what if that old biddy has tipped ’em the wink?’
‘Hello,’ said the lady, smiling fiercely into the telephone as if the person at the other end might be improved by it. ‘Yes, name, Samson, found in King George’s Park, badly cut, now in good health and working for the park keepers on Eel Brook Common … Splendid, thank you so much. I’ll do my best, bye-bye.’
‘I hope you had nothing to do with that poor defenceless creature being wounded,’ said the man, still trying to look kind but unable to keep the vicious tone out of his voice. ‘I’d horsewhip any child I found hurting a horse.’
‘I love animals,’ said Bingo, ‘and so does my mum, she’ll be ever so pleased it’s all right. We’ll be able to go and visit the horse now, won’t we?’
‘Of course,’ the lady screeched, and then she giggled like a lunatic baby-strangler.
‘We’d better get going,’ said Stonks, ‘we’ll be late for our tea.’ The Peckham Borrible tugged at Bingo’s sleeve and nodded towards the door where Twilight hovered, ready for flight.
‘Oh, don’t go yet,’ cooed the lady. ‘I’ve got some sweeties here somewhere, and I’ve got more to tell you about the horse.’
‘Yes,’ snarled the man, ‘you wait a minute.’ He sprang to his feet and the stiff smile fell from his face like a shutter falling from a shop window. ‘I want your addresses,’ he said, and, suddenly agile, he took one long stride and folded the flesh of his damp right hand round Bingo’s neck and began to squeeze.
Twilight threw open the door and sunshine flooded in. Stonks hesitated, anguished. How could he leave Bingo, but what could he do?
The man squeezed harder at the muscles of Bingo’s neck and the Borrible’s feet left the floor.
‘Run, Stonks,’ he yelled in pain, ‘run as fast as you can.’
Still Stonks hesitated. The lady began to stand up, still smiling. Stonks charged towards the desk and pushed it at her.
‘Oooer,’ she said, falling back into her chair, ‘you little horror, I’ll spank you.’
At that moment a door at the rear of the office opened and a uniformed policeman burst into the room; there was a chequered band cir
cling his hat and SBG in letters of silver on his shoulder.
‘Run,’ gasped Bingo. ‘Run.’ The air was scarcely passing through his throat and his limbs were no longer moving. His face was purple.
Stonks hesitated no more. There were three adults already in the office and perhaps more policemen at the back of the building. He shoved Twilight through the doorway and leapt with him onto the pavement. They made as if to turn to their right but the wailing of a police siren stopped them. Three hundred yards away and bearing down in their direction, its blue light whirring round and round like an evil and disembodied eye, was a blue Transit van, a van of the SBG.
‘Cripes,’ said Twilight, ‘time for a touch of the opposite directions.’ And he and Stonks turned and ran like they’d never run before, pumping their arms and legs as fast as their hearts could stand, away round the corner and into Westbridge Road.
‘We’ve got a couple of minutes before that van catches up with us,’ panted Stonks. ‘We’ve got to get off the street and out of sight, otherwise we’ve had it for good and proper.’
Vulge saw them first and he didn’t like the way they were running, fast and panicky. He was sitting by the hole in the fence, on watch; the others were playing fivestones behind him and Spiff was winning. Vulge’s face showed worry. ‘Oh no,’ he said.
The Borribles dropped the stones and got to their feet just as Stonks and Twilight came through the fence. Chalotte was the first to speak and she was angry.
‘Where’s Bingo,’ she snapped, ‘what the hell’s happened?’
Stonks looked at the ground.
‘He’s been caught,’ said Twilight. ‘there was a big RSPCA man there, and a lady, and a Woollie. We only just got away … They must have had it set up with the SBG.’
‘We couldn’t do anything,’ said Stonks. ‘A van arrived and we had to run for it. We hid in the Somerset Estate.’
‘This is terrible,’ said Vulge. ‘Bingo caught … bloody RSPC-Bloody-A.’
‘Will they clip his ears?’ said Twilight in a small voice.
‘What else will they damn-well do?’ said Spiff, clenching his fists in anger. ‘That is they will if we don’t get to him quick enough.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Vulge. ‘Rescue him?’
‘We’ve got to do something,’ said Spiff. He looked as unhappy as anyone had ever seen him. Lines of anxiety pulled at his face.
Chalotte rounded on Sydney. ‘I told you the horse was a bad idea, now we’ve gone and lost another Borrible, one of the best too.’
‘All right,’ cried Sydney, ‘so it’s my fault, say what yer like, but arguing don’t help. We’ve got to save him if we can.’
‘Of course we have,’ said Spiff. ‘There’s no question of adventures or horses now. It’s Bingo, Bingo alone, and the sooner the better. Anyone who doesn’t want to help should say so.’ He looked straight at Chalotte.
‘I didn’t want any trouble,’ she said, ‘but this is different. Bingo is Bingo. I’m in.’
‘All right,’ said Spiff. ‘Now this is what I say, anyone who thinks they’ve got a better plan can say so afterwards … Did they tell you where the horse was?’
‘They said something about Eel Brook Common,’ said Stonks, ‘working for the park keepers.’
‘Right,’ continued Spiff. ‘I’ve got some good catapults indoors, some of those steel ones left over from the Rumble Hunt, one each. Stones we want, food we want, good running shoes. We’ll get into Sinjen’s School tonight and get a blazer each so we look like proper kids. If we get stopped on the road we’ll pretend we’re out on some holiday project. We’ll leave tonight, as soon as it’s dark. We’ll break into the RSPCA office on the way, see if we can find out anything about what’s happened to Bingo. Failing that we go on to Eel Brook Common, I know where it is, over Fulham way. You see I reckon they’ll take Bingo there as soon as they can, show him to the horse and see how the horse reacts. If that horse recognizes him the SBG will know they’ve caught someone involved in the Southfields murders, and they’ll soon make him talk and they’ll be on to us in no time. We’ve got to get there before the law does. A rescue is the last thing they’ll be expecting. Anyone got a better idea?’
‘No,’ said Vulge, ‘only get a telescope.’
‘A telescope,’ said Spiff, ‘all right. Get down the market the lot of yer and take what we need before it closes. I’ll go back to my house and look out the catapults and see what else I’ve got. Meet yer back there and we’ll rest and eat before we go. And for Pete’s sake don’t get caught, one rescue a day is enough.’
At ten thirty that night a window at the back of Sinjen’s School slid open and Spiff’s leg came out of it, followed, a second later, by his face. ‘It’s all right,’ he whispered, ‘no one about.’ He pulled his body across the window ledge, twisted and then dropped to the ground. The others came after, one by one, all of them clothed in stolen blazers and grey flannels, even the two girls. On their feet were trainers, excellent for running. In their pockets were torches, high-grade steel catapults and enough stones to see off an army of coppers. They weren’t the best equipped of expeditions but for a trip to Fulham and back they were more than adequately provided for.
Spiff led his five companions into the blackness of the playground and then out into the yellow light of the streets. The Borribles spread out in single file, three yards between each, ready to disperse at the first sign of danger. It was getting late and traffic was heavy; people were driving home from cinemas and bingo halls, the pubs were turning their customers out on to the pavements and everywhere there were drunks stumbling home, lifting their feet high over imaginary kerbstones, tottering backwards down non-existent slopes. Police cars lurked in the dark side roads too, lying low in the gutters like feral cats waiting for carrion.
Resolute and vigilant the Borribles tramped and jogged along and when, after about a quarter of an hour, they reached the traffic lights at Westbridge Road, Spiff slid into the dark entrance of the RSPCA office and tried the door. It was firmly locked. He stepped back and looked at the plate glass window and then up at the two smaller windows on the first floor.
‘I won’t have any bother getting in here,’ he said. ‘You others get over to that bus stop and pretend you’re in the queue. If you see anything suspicious give a whistle.’
The bus stop was in fact only twenty yards from the office but by the time the Borribles had reached it Spiff had disappeared.
‘Look at that,’ said Vulge, ‘he’s inside already. He must be one of the best Borrible burglars ever.’
‘The stories say he’s got at least twenty names, you know,’ said Stonks. ‘I’ve even heard tell that he’s been a Borrible for a hundred years, but I find that hard to believe.’
‘There’s certainly more to Spiff than meets anyone’s eye,’ agreed Chalotte, ‘but nobody knows what it is. I wouldn’t trust him further than I could spit upwards. He’s got enough neck to look up his own ear’ole, he has.’
‘Steady,’ said Twilight, ‘here he comes now.’
Spiff joined them at the bus stop. ‘Not a lot in there,’ he said, ‘but it looks like an SBG set-up all right. I found a notepad on the desk with Sussworth’s address and telephone number written on it. There was also tomorrow’s date, and it said Eel Brook Common, nine o’clock.’
‘Well,’ said Sydney, ‘when Sam sees Bingo he’s bound to recognize him, and then he’s had it.’
‘And we’ll have had it too,’ said Spiff.
‘In other words,’ said Stonks, ‘even if we didn’t want to rescue Bingo, which we do, we’d have to try anyway, to save ourselves.’
‘Dead bleedin’ right,’ said Spiff, ‘either that or we’d all have to move a long way away from where we live now.’
‘It’s Hobson’s,’ said Twilight. ‘Hobson’s as usual.’
‘We’d better get going,’ said Spiff looking round. ‘It wouldn’t be a bad idea to be hidden somewhere near Eel Brook Common before the Woollie
s arrive tomorrow morning. That way if it looks like a trap we can stay hidden and keep quiet.’
And the Borribles moved on from the bus stop and began to trek up the long slope towards the crest of Battersea Bridge. Once over the bridge they would be in unfamiliar territory and danger would be all around them. They each knew this but they marched on with spirit and determination; they knew very well that they had to rescue Bingo—what they didn’t know was that the second great Borrible Adventure had begun.
3
The headquarters of the SBG were not located in a police station and they were not easy to find, which was exactly how Inspector Sussworth liked it. His aim was to pass through life unnoticed by the general public; that was where his strength lay. He wanted to work quietly and secretly. Only the men who took orders from the inspector knew where to find him and their orders were to tell no one.
With concealment as their main objective the SBG had taken over a house in the crumbling hinterland behind Fulham Broadway, an unobtrusive place in Micklethwaite Road, a road that led nowhere. From the outside it looked dilapidated, a ramshackle establishment with varnish peeling from the front door and cracked windows hidden under white paint so that no one could see in and no one could see out. But inside it was different; it was antiseptic, it was smart and it was systematic, Inspector Sussworth saw to that. He liked things to be polished and properly arranged.
Behind the front door, and adorned with thick sick-green linoleum, was a narrow hallway leading to a narrow staircase which climbed steeply to three landings. On each landing were two rooms; each room had a desk, a telephone and a couple of deep, plastic-covered armchairs. At the rear of the ground floor was an enormous stainless-steel kitchen and dining room combined where the men of the SBG cooked meals and made their tea. In the garden a large sports room had been constructed; it contained showers, ludo boards, ping-pong tables and chest expanders. Inspector Sussworth insisted that the constables who formed his group were fit, keen and spotless.
The Borribles Go for Broke Page 5
