The officer in charge was a gnome of the old school, fierce and unapproachable. Face to face meetings began, only to be broken off again. Re-started, the atmostphere became even more tense; chairs were over-turned and a water carafe – purely symbolic – was upset down the entire length of the green baize table-top.
Lunch break was taken in separate tents and, apart from some noticeably strident whistling, in total silence. There was no sign of movement from either party. Deadlock was complete.
Then a pale diffident-looking figure, obviously a conciliator, appeared. He was carrying a briefcase. His companion was of a different sort, half-chauffeur, half-assistant. But it was obvious that he knew his stuff. Without hesitation he marched up to the door of the Field Office and announced his master’s arrival. The unapproachable officer immediately became polite, even welcoming. The officer, the local representatives and the conciliator remained together for nearly half an hour. Then the conciliator went across to the contractors’ men and there was the sound of muffled whistling. But all was well. By four o’clock some kind of settlement must have been reached because conciliator and representatives trudged off to see the army authorities again.
This was the longest session of all. It occupied a full sixty-five minutes. The outcome, however, was evidently satisfactory. The soldier gnome, his ribbons ablaze in their distinctive colours, and the representatives with their shining ball points, all emerged into the open and shook hands with the pale, diffident-looking one. Immediately, wheelbarrows, Super-market trolleys and push carts began being laboriously trundled up to the very edge of the battlefield itself.
Even so, things were not yet quite ready. All eyes were now turned towards the gnome chaplains. And about time, too. The pair of them – one for each side – were furious at having been kept waiting. They were stamping up and down indignantly. But, as soon as they were called upon, they subdued their resentment. Dignified and calm-looking they stepped forward, their white vestments trailing. These surplices were of the simplest; merely surgical overalls of the kind that do up at the back, leaving not so much as a single button showing. They had come out of the go-cart ambulance field-sets and fitted the part perfectly. Because of the lateness of the hour the services were, by mutual agreement, cut down to the permitted minimum. But there was no scimping of the Battle Hymn. In identical versions it was whistled simultaneously by both sides. The wind at the time was from the north west and the last verse, the ff one, was reported as clearly audible as far away as South Kentish Town and Chalk Farm.
As so often happens in military matters, the opening was marred by a complete fiasco. From the Hampstead side a single helicopter suddenly rose up engine spluttering like a machine-gun, hovered for a moment a full thirty feet above the empty ground and then sank slowly down again in the middle of No Man’s Land, its blades gradually coming to rest. At once, a breakdown rescue vehicle, complete with hand-operated crane, tore through a gap in the front line defence beside the launching pad and bumped its way over the intervening turf. But it was too late. Already a commando contingent on fairy cycles, armed with sacks of golf balls – a sports shop in Thames Ditton had been raided only a week before – had reached the stranded machine and began pelting it. They were a specialized branch, these commandos, trained in sabotage and destruction. Leaping from their saddles they climbed up on the stationary rotors and seesaw-ed up and down on them, snapping them off like celery. The rescue vehicle came to a halt, the driver, regardless of all risk, standing up to survey the spectacle through a pair of plastic binoculars. He then turned his truck around, and the wrecked helicopter was left where it had landed, merely one more tragic piece of detritus in the indiscriminate rubbish heap and wasteland of modern war.
Faced by this morale-destroying setback, the High Command changed tactics. Instead of reserving the full strength of its air force to support the coming advance, it brought them forth as an initial challenge. Suddenly a couple of miniature World War II Hurricanes and a Spitfire came into view over the ranks of massed infantry, and began performing aerial acrobatics in front of the house.
It seems doubtful whether these acrobatics were exactly what the High Command had intended; and, a moment later, when the three aircraft roared, flat-out, down the length of the terrace scattering reporters, cameramen, sound engineers and personal assistants, it was evident that all was not well. A peremptory order must have reached the three airmen. Before they had time to make a second run, they peeled off and made straight for the enemy.
It was now that the Highgate army showed its true fighting quality. As soon as the attackers were in range, they were met by a formidable barrage. A cloud of upwards of a hundred and fifty toy balloons of all colours were simultaneously released, and a series of startling pops and wheezes marked the inevitable collisions. This balloon barrage, however, was no more than the first of the prepared defences. By the time the planes had returned for their second sortie the anti-aircraft battery was ready. And its fire power was impressive. No fewer than twelve archery units were involved. The arrows were heavy, high calibre missiles, all with round rubber suckers on the tip. The first of the Hurricanes, flying fast and very low, ran into a hail of them. The result was inevitable. With a whole cluster of these harpoon-like objects clinging to the fuselage, the plane faltered, dipped, plunged to earth and went cart-wheeling away in the direction of the makeshift field hospital and row of waiting go-cart ambulances.
Hilda was still asleep while this was happening. Because of her illness her sleep nowadays was much disturbed. Absent for hours on end during the night, the need for it became uncontrollably pressing in the afternoon, and it was a sudden and alarming blast of noise that woke her. Here it was the Vicar who was at fault. In the ordinary way no great lover of television, he had slunk downstairs to take a quick peep and get back to his room again before Hilda was around. What he saw, however, held him fascinated. And, in the hope that he might be able to see even more, he began fiddling with the controls. Without his reading glasses, however, it was a gamble; and it was a gamble that he lost. Mistaking ‘Volume’ for ‘Brightness’ he had the set suddenly roaring and bellowing at him.
It was at this point that Hilda joined him. Quick and resourceful as ever, she went over and subdued the set. And only just in time. Already the supreme moment had come. The Highgate army was on the move. It was attacking.
By now Hilda had pulled up a chair and was sitting four-square in front of the screen like a guard dog. She could see everything. As a result, the Vicar had been driven over to the corner of the couch. Even there, however, his seat was well-nigh useless. Every time Hilda leant forward, her head blocked out the picture completely.
The scene was certainly a memorable one. The fairy cycle patrols were out again, wheeling and turning. Two squads of boomerang throwers had moved up, supported on the left flank by a company of light archers; and, in the centre, the array of heavy armour was now visible. A Centurion tank and a couple of Crusaders – both certified scale models – an open troop-carrier and a radio scout car were all advancing in strict battle formation. Most remarkable of all, however, was that the column was led by a single jeep, with a crouched down driver and a solitary figure standing up in it.
Hilda recognized the solitary figure immediately. It was Little Nelson. He was secured to the windscreen by a webbing strap to keep him steady, and in his good hand he was brandishing something. Hilda recognized that, too. It was the Vicar’s paper-knife. In the slanting evening sunlight, the ivory gleamed brighter than silver.
The jeep was now occupying the very centre of the screen and the television cameras had their zoom lenses fixed upon it. Every detail was visible. Hilda could count each scroll and piece of braiding on Little Nelson’s hat. What is more, under the open collar of his battle dress, she could see the edge of the woolly pullover that she had knitted for him. He seemed so close that it was almost like having him there, cuddled up in the corner of the chair beside her.
What she was
not prepared for, however, was the technical performance of the directional microphones. The result was most startling. Separate murmurs were clearly detectable – the swish of the small rubber wheels upon the grass, the creaking of Little Nelson’s webbing strap, and the peep-peep of the miniature klaxon horn which the crouched-down driver kept on sounding.
Then came the moment which left Hilda temporarily unhinged. Turning towards the cameras as for a Royal Salute, Little Nelson stuck the paper-knife into his waist-band and doffed his admiral’s hat. His lips parted and he uttered two syllables, ‘Hil’ and ‘Da’.
The controversy which succeeded this comparatively simple utterance has been both long and embittered. What, however, is no longer challenged is that it is the only oral communication other than a whistle that can with reliance be attributed to any of the gnome population. The meaning of these two monophones is still the subject of debate. There is one school that holds that they come from a bastard form of Pushtu, correctly spelt ‘H I J D Y L’ and ‘T A H A R’, meaning ‘Danger ahead’ or ‘Keep off’. Another school has traced the symbols back to a purely oral Amharic dialect, and contend that their meaning lies somewhere between ‘Look at me’ and ‘Here I come’. For Hilda, however, the message was plain enough and in her emotion she caught hold of her brother’s hand and would not let it go.
Meanwhile, Little Nelson’s battle jeep was plunging on its way. Being pedalled flat out, it bounced and became temporarily airborne with every tuft of grass that was in its way.
But still it carried on, bearing Little Nelson ever nearer to the enemy. And the defences looked impregnable. The front row of extremely small young gnomes, armed with large-calibre captive missiles on elastic, were sprawled out on the turf, all at the ready and simply waiting for the signal.
In the event, these youngsters were never called upon. As the hostile armour bore down upon them, matches were already being struck somewhere in the closely assembled ranks behind them, and immediately the significance of that hi-jacking of the fireworks delivery van became apparent. Sparklers began to fizz, Roman Candles spouted upwards, Rockets suddenly began to roar overhead. Lit by clouds of Golden Rain, the south lawn of Kenwood was now basking in its own false dawn. The air was full of the fumes of gunpowder and saltpetre. Nor was this all. A special branch of gnome engineers had been working for weeks on the Catherine Wheels and had succeeded in mounting them on small wooden trolleys. Once ignited, they careered terrifyingly forward, scattering circles of fire and fury all around them.
Hilda could bear it no longer. She shut her eyes. That is how it is that she came to miss the climax. And those who were still watching are by no means unanimous as to what happened. Some claim that there was a blinding violet flash, others an orange one. One group of observers noted that everything suddenly went jet black and that the sky was streaked by lightning flashes. Others again referred to displays of sheet lightning against a noticeably pale sunset. Thunder, or something remarkably like, there indubitably was: and a low rumbling, usually associated with earthquakes, was independently recorded. Where there is universal agreement is that a wind of hurricane strength tore with no warning through the adjoining tree-tops, and that a water-spout some five or six feet in height suddenly erupted in the nearby lake, carrying fish, weed and water fowl up into the air with it. Some camera tripods unaccountably went off balance, and the two mobile generators over the old kitchen wall, fused simultaneously.
By the time Hilda had opened her eyes, it was all over.
Chapter 10
There are many who contend that the sudden noiselessness was even more alarming than the clamour that had preceded it. It was as though time itself had stopped. Nothing stirred. The battlefield of Kenwood lawn became simply a tapestry, a majestically spread-out still-life. Tiny plaster-of-Paris corpses in a variety of uniforms lay motionless, piled everywhere amid the litter of up-turned go-carts and abandoned fairy cycles. The only sign of what had been so violent a conflict were the stray wisps of acrid smoke still ascending from the partially burnt-out Catherine Wheels.
The sheer awfulness, the unbelievable magnitude of the transition broke upon a nation wholly unprepared for it. Only the Deputy Commissioner was unperturbed. So far as he was concerned, all that remained was for the powdery mess, the shambles, to be cleared up. And, even here, he had shown his resourcefulness by careful forward planning. Stand-by teams of clearance and removal men were already on call in Finchley, Muswell Hill and Upper Holloway.
Even so, disturbing things were still happening. In Ross-shire, a bicycle leaning up against a wall of Presbyterian church unaccountably burst into flames; and, to the surprise of the simple villagers, the weather-cock on a Suffolk steeple began crowing lustily before flapping its way to some distant and uncharted farmyard. Again, at the village of Uffington, the White Horse, carved in the turf of the hillside, went missing for a full forty-eight hours, returning on the third day even more painfully emaciated-looking, but with nothing else to show for its prolonged excursion except for a nasty snick in the left foreleg.
The prevailing aura thus remained one of cosmic turmoil and anarchy. It seemed that Nature itself had gone awry. And it could not have been more upsetting for anyone in Hilda’s delicate state of health. Not that she really cared. With Little Nelson gone, she was not really interested in living much longer. Shut away in her bedroom, emerging only for the odd cup of tea or the occasional visit to the bathroom, she pined.
Then, one day, she remembered those rolls of film which she had never dared to have developed in case they could be traced – the three good rolls and the other one, the roll which Little Nelson had spoilt. There was no longer any danger of letting a chemist see them now, and she was able to walk quite boldly into the local shop with the yellow Kodak sign outside.
Such fears as she had were of a quite different kind. Within those four small cardboard packets were all that remained of the most precious moments of her existence. Suppose, she kept asking herself, that the films were somehow accidently destroyed? Or simply over-developed so that nothing any longer showed? There was no cause, however, for anxiety. The snaps all came out beautifully, including all the silly ones of chair legs and skirting boards that Little Nelson had taken.
There was a single photograph that stood out as a prize-winner among all the others. It was more than a snapshot. It was a half-length portrait study of Little Nelson, full-face and smiling. As soon as she saw it, she immediately went back to the chemist to get the print enlarged and buy a suitable frame. And, for once, she found herself in one of those rare beams of sheer happiness that every so often penetrate life’s gloom. For the enlargement was even better. There was just a suggestion of a shadow falling across the corner of Little Nelson’s good eye. But it was enough. Every time she walked past the hand-worked ornamental frame, it was as though the face behind the glass were winking at her.
And, as the days passed and weeks turned themselves into months, eventually maturing into years, Hilda found another source of consolation. Kenwood and the adjoining heathlands had been thoroughly cleared up and the earth-works, archery emplacements and rows of trenches all filled in and levelled over. Everything was as it had been before the two armies had met in battle there.
With one exception. The Orangery was no longer devoted exclusively to the Arts. It was now a museum, a museum of a highly specialized and distinctive kind. It commemorated the day of the encounter. At one end stood the Mobile Section, with the mini-cars, fairy cycles and pedal motors, all mostly dented or otherwise damaged. Then, separated by an arrangement of canvas screens, came Armour, showing bows, arrows, boomerangs and lengths of elastic as well as the remains of rockets and bangers, and one carefully-restored trolley for the Catherine Wheel attack. Aerial Warfare, with the barrage balloons and the burnt-out Hurricane, occupied the far corner.
But it was to the central showcase that Hilda always went first and left last of all. This showcase contained the small exhibits picked up mostly from the
battle field itself. Conspicuous among them was Little Nelson’s admiral’s hat. It was mounted on its own slender chromium stand, as in the display window of an exclusive establishment for ladies. What made Hilda so cross, however, was that the caption read; ‘Gnome replica of ceremonial naval head-gear, c. 1860.’ Only she knew how long it had taken her to sew back all that original braiding, or how hard she had been forced to press to get it all into place. The silver-gilt thimble from her workbox, a twenty-first birthday present from an overseas cousin, had proved quite useless and, in the end, it was a common steel one, a relic of boarding school days, to which she had been driven.
And it was the same with the other chief exhibit, the ivory paper-knife. This was described as; ‘Gnome staff symbol, Birmingham ware, 20th century.’ As soon as she saw it she was glad that her brother did not accompany her on these visits. It would have upset him. At the time of the presentation he had been assured that it was a piece of prized Ashanti work from the pagan Gold Coast, and he had always treasured it as such.
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