The Kensington Reptilarium

by N. J. Gemmell

  ‘Bas-teeee!’ Pin squeals. And he’s off as fast as his fat little legs will carry him.

  The rest of us wince, know with sickening certainty what’s next – he’s off on another grand Pin-adventure, his Pin-curiosity unleashed. But the hill’s steep, it’s getting dark. Plop! Yep, he’s down. Flat on his front with a horrible thud. He picks himself up without so much as a whimper and continues his fearless charge, just as he does at home.

  ‘I’m coming, Basteeeeeeee!’

  What can we do? Nothing but follow. We thunder down the steep slope of Campden Hill Square.

  And there, in the middle of a traffic intersection at the bottom, is our uncle. Standing among a huge crammed crowd of terrified and indignant pedestrians and drivers and passengers, who are all shaking their fists and screaming, their cars and buses and bikes and trucks halted, stuck. And these people aren’t shouting and shrilling because a man in a red velvet coat is standing, dazed, in the middle of winter, in the middle of their very busy avenue . . . oh no. They’re shouting and shrilling because this man has a very large cobra wrapped around his body. A cobra that’s puffing its neck, and flicking its tongue, and lashing out in a most terrifying way. As if it’s about to strike anyone who gets too close.

  Ssssss!

  ‘Bas-ti!’ Pin claps his hands in delight.

  Bert makes a beeline for the snake, thrilled, ready for her big starring moment: the Great Uncle Rescue. Ready for the adulation of the crowd. I yank her back.

  The situation’s not good.

  The crowd’s closing in. They want their dinners and warmth and they’re late. They’ve just been through six long years of war, they’re jittery and suspicious and tired and they don’t want any scary new surprises in their lives; they just want a quiet, unthreatening Christmas this time around, it’s all they can bear.

  The cobra’s getting increasingly furious; the crowd louder, jumpier; Basti’s in the midst of it just staring, bewildered and oblivious, at the war damage around him – as if he had absolutely no idea. He looked so terrifying and imperious in his own house but now, outside, he looks shrunken. Befuddled. Almost like a child.

  Lost. Completely, utterly lost. Just like us.

  I step towards him. Can’t help it. He needs someone. The grown-ups are getting angrier, there’s roaring and bellowing, children are screaming, babies wailing. A stone’s thrown. Ow! Another. It strikes Basti’s leg and he snaps out of his gaze, looks around wildly.

  I can read him, he doesn’t know what to do; his hands fluster to the snake, he needs calm for his unpredictable pet and he’s not getting it anywhere. He needs to retreat, find quiet, but it’s like he’s frozen. Dogs strain their leashes, desperate to take on the creature that’s lashing out with fury at anyone who gets too close, hissing and flashing its fangs.

  No one knows how to proceed. This cluster of Londoners has endured all manner of horrors over the past six years – Horatio’s told us about homes smashed to smithereens and fire storms of intense heat and whistling doodlebugs dropping from the sky and buses falling into craters and men not coming home and sudden orphans and endless sleepless nights – but these people never had to deal with this before: a live cobra in the middle of their street.

  The angry crowd inches closer, screaming for some kind of resolution to this most bizarre of traffic jams. An invasion of an utterly different sort but an invasion nonetheless. And they’re not having a bar of it. Who knows where a snake will end up.

  There’s a deafening whine. We cover our ears; the noise hurts in our heads.

  ‘Siren!’ Scruff yells, and he dives for the ground.

  Horns blast, people shout, a police van screeches to a halt.

  ‘Get up,’ hisses Bert, ‘the war’s over.’

  Ten officers pour out ready for a fight. Catch sight of what they’re dealing with and, as one, reel back.

  Collect themselves.

  Everything goes deathly quiet; everyone holds their breath.

  The men circle Basti in his slippers and flying cap; batons raised, swaying with menace. ‘Stay back!’ the tallest policeman suddenly barks. ‘Everyone – back!’

  We most certainly obey. Oh yes. Because no one wants to get too close to a cobra; no one wants it biting them or swallowing them or whatever those creatures do; no one wants it slithering off into the wilds of Holland Park to suddenly reappear in a school satchel or a lavatory or (gasp) a bed.

  Three policemen clamber from the van and creep forward with some kind of long, huge weapony thing over their shoulders. My mouth goes dry. This means business and not the good kind. It’s aimed straight at Basti.

  ‘A bazooka,’ Scruff whispers in awe. ‘No, couldn’t be. But something like it. Maybe? I don’t know. Dad told me about them, Kick. He saw them in North Africa in May 1943. But surely not, here.’

  ‘I’ve got no idea,’ I rasp. ‘But whatever it is, I do not like it.’

  ‘Maybe it’s got sleeping gas in it. Or a net. Or poison darts. Or something . . .’

  Scruff lowers his slingshot, can’t compete. Because this terrifyingly huge and effective-looking weapon – whatever it is – looks like it’s been captured from the Eastern Front and that the men behind it are just itching to try it out. Basti looks even more odd and bewildered now, in front of the officers; completely out of place but with a deadly weapon wrapped about his neck.

  ‘No,’ I whisper, hand over mouth in horror. ‘Don’t do anything silly. Please, Basti, please.’

  Because Scruff’s right, he’s our closest living relative, the only person we’ve got in this country – and this terrible situation he’s found himself in is all our fault.

  ‘Bang bang!’ Pin jumps up and down with excitement, not helping matters in the slightest.

  Basti suddenly catches sight of the weapon. Stands like a rabbit frozen in headlights, trembling, staring as if transfixed, his face deathly white like he’s seen a ghost.

  ‘I –’ He stumbles, addressing it. ‘I was just looking for, for Charlie Boo . . .’

  He starts shaking. No longer able to speak. Stuck again. And it’s obvious none of the adults have a clue what to do next: if Basti falls, his cobra will be on the loose . . . and no one wants that.

  It’s a stand-off. Policemen: paralysed. Basti: paralysed. And me?

  Sharply propelled forward by two sets of Bert knuckles firmly on my bottom. ‘It’s our chance, Kick. Come on.’

  ‘Kicky, fix!’ Pin commands.

  ‘It’s this or the orphanage,’ Scruff adds.

  I look at them in panic. Right. So. No choice then, eh? Lick my lips. Step forward. ‘Uncle? We’re here. We’re taking you home.’

  Deathly silence. Walking on eggshells. You could hear a pin drop. It’s as if everyone senses that something very peculiar is going on here. Slowly, slowly Basti turns. Raises one eyebrow.

  At least he’s listening.

  ‘Come on,’ I coax. ‘Everyone’s waiting for you. They miss you. They need you.’

  ‘Home,’ Scruff echoes wistfully.

  Basti’s other eyebrow raises.

  ‘We’re here now,’ I say firmly. ‘We’ve arrived. To help you.’

  Once again I reach out my hand to him. Once again it’s unshaken, just hovering in thin air. The sting of that, all over again. I bite my lip but it will not stop me. I step closer to Basti, to the snake.

  ‘Careful,’ someone in the crowd pleads in horror, ‘that thing could kill you.’

  Basti stares at the four of us then the ring of policemen then the crowd then us once more – trying to work out which is the best bet. All equally traumatic. The tension’s as tight as a stretched rubber band.

  My hand’s still stuck out. I will not lower it. The cobra hisses in fury as if it’s going to bite something, anything, any second, can hardly contain itself; the crowd gasps in horror, steps back. In a trance I move forward, barely thinking, barely knowing what I’m doing. I step right up close and stroke the snake on the back of its neck: ‘There yo
u go, girl, there there.’ Dad’s taught me how to handle them, on our private hunting expeditions, just him and me – ‘because you have to protect the family, Kicketty, when I’m not there, I’m relying on you’ – and it’s all coming back.

  Basti’s rigid. Just his eyes swivel to me and the cobra, in amazement.

  The bazooka men inch closer. The tallest policeman raises his hand, signalling me to vacate, fast. He’s losing patience, something needs to happen here quick.

  I whisper to Basti, ‘Come home,’ and slip back, hoping he’ll follow.

  He doesn’t move.

  The policeman shrills a whistle around his neck. Basti’s transfixed, can’t run, can’t remove the snake, is stuck. No, Basti, no!

  The policeman gives the signal to fire –

  ‘I love my uncle! Hip hip hooray for the snake man of Holland Park!’

  It’s Bert, clapping her hands madly and jumping up and down. Everyone turns, distracted, at this crazy intervention. The bazooka men lower their bazooka thing and team Caddy seizes its chance: Pin runs to his uncle with little arms outstretched and grabs him around the legs; Scruff dashes forward and gives him the most radiant smile (the one his father says that no one but his family can ever resist) and I grab the opening: step forward calmly, strongly, a hand once again outstretched.

  ‘I’m taking you home.’ Firm. Reassuring. I smile – crooked as usual, one side up one side down, just like Dad’s, everyone tells me that; that with my hair chopped off I could be him.

  Basti looks at me intently, head cocked. Relaxes. Uncurls his cobra. Hugs it like it’s now the cheekiest of kittens. Smiles and nods apologetically at the crowd – ‘Good evening to you all, terribly sorry’ – and walks mildly towards his brand new nieces and nephews.

  Just like that.

  We’ve got him.

  A family, at last.

  And yes, I am now trying to pretend that a man with a deadly snake beside me is the most normal thing in the world – la la la, happens all the time. Jolly good, yes yes. Everyone lets out a sigh of relief.

  ‘He’s with us,’ I declare loudly to all and sundry. ‘We’re taking him home.’

  ‘He’s our uncle,’ Scruff adds, with something like pride.

  I explain to the policeman in charge that this most esteemed man is, actually, a world expert on exotic snakes. Of the subcontinent. A most renowned member, in fact, of the Royal Geographical Society. (Dad was always ending his wonderfully wild bedtime stories about wrestling piranhas in the Amazon and outswimming white pointers off Cape Horn with a lecture on his latest escapade at that hallowed institution; he was always getting me to read accounts of Livingstone and Stanley and Shackleton and Scott and the place was always mentioned by those men; Dad dreamed all his life of being a most honoured member of the Society – ‘The roguish Aussie one, in his old bush hat, the most adventurous adventurer of the lot!’)

  And yes indeed, Mr Police Officer, of course there’s a permit to keep this totally harmless specimen in our uncle’s house. ‘Which he never leaves. Ever. But there’s been, um, a slight mistake. And this situation will never happen again. It’s now firmly under control. Thank you very much. Good evening to you.’

  ‘Right, Miss. Yes. What – hang on – what are you saying?’ The policeman’s spinning, trying to keep a handle on everything – answer me, the spectators, his men, and get the traffic moving, the good citizens of Kensington home – but I’m off in the confusion, grabbing Basti’s elbow and steering him away, quick smart, before the crowd puts two and two together. Before they demand the, er, elimination of the deadly creature in their midst and the immediate search of the house it comes from and then – horror – finding out what else is in there and – gulp – demanding a swift disbandment of the entire operation.

  Imagine. The Kensington Reptilarium shut down. Just like that. After years and years of operation. Just as Basti predicted: that we will fatally draw attention to it.

  ‘Quick,’ I whisper to Scruff, ‘we need to disappear. Fast. Grab Pinny.’

  The crowd murmurs; cars and trucks begin to move off; three men in pinstripe suits argue that there really should be arrests here, this gentleman should be taken into custody and his house – wherever it is, it must be close – be declared a danger zone. ‘Gentlemen, you must act.’ Their voices are rising most alarmingly as we slip away to a cluster of enormous, black looming trees, what looks like a wild and impenetrable park.

  We flit past huge trunks, breathing fast, until we find ourselves in a clearing among the ruins of a beautiful old house: smashed to pieces, abandoned, its pale stone ghostly in the dark.

  ‘Oh,’ Basti keeps saying with infinite sadness. ‘Oh.’ As if he can hardly bear the sight.

  ‘How do we get out of here?’ I ask. ‘We need to get home. Safe. All of us.’

  ‘This way,’ Basti says, and swiftly he leads us through a small building whose smashed skeleton is some columns of bricks and whose flesh is the air, the sky. ‘But this was the orangerie!’ he cries. ‘No. And these, the stables, twenty-four horses, they had, and two donkeys, just for us. And this, a most charming folly –’

  His hand is at his mouth; he is spinning around in wonder and shock. It’s been years since he left his house, of course, and the world beyond it has been utterly transformed. Forever. Obliterated, and there’s no going back. It’s all in his face.

  ‘Basti, we need to move fast,’ I urge gently. ‘The police might be following.’

  He leads us on through a maze of trees in the thick, spooky dark; surefooted, certain, swift, like he’s done this a thousand times before. As a child, I bet. Now we’re out in a steep, cobbled lane; we cut through an alley between two houses and voila, we’re in Campden Hill Square again with the Reptilarium rising in dilapidated splendour at its crest. I lead the way up the steep hill, quick, before anyone can take note of exactly where we’re going.

  ‘Snakey! Here, snakey!’ Bert squeals in joy at the cobra and mimes wrapping it around her neck, her new winter accessory. How to keep her away from it . . . how to stay with Basti . . . how to get warm, and fed. So much to think about, so many people to worry over and we’re not even inside yet, hurry everyone, hurry!

  The snake flicks its tongue, right at Bert. She shivers with glee. Pin walks backwards in front of the lot of us, arms wide, beaming. At his brand new uncle, at his sister’s snakey delight, at his brother’s bare feet in the freezing cold, at his funny fierce biggest sister who’s always making everything right. As she does.

  I smile back. Because this crazy posse around me is the start of a brand new family. A brand new life. Jumbly and ragtag and reluctant and impossible and scruffy and contradictory as it is, it’s family, yes. Pin’s puffed up by the very idea, full of chuff, and I can just tell he’s going to make the most of it.

  We all are. Because we must. However peculiar this new family might be.

  As long as Basti agrees we can now stay . . . this is the main thing to think about of all the things roaring in my head this night. He has to. He’d better not change his mind once the door is shut. I’d better not let him through it first. I stare at his back. Do I trust . . . no, can’t. Quite. Just can’t. We’ve saved him, but who knows if that counts for anything in this new life . . .

  ‘So we can stay?’

  I’m enquiring cheekily as we trudge up the hill.

  ‘Er . . .’ Basti stumbles.

  ‘Just for the night?’ Scruff jumps in.

  ‘But this wasn’t in the plan.’

  ‘Just for a little while?’ Bert pleads.

  ‘The orphanage awaits. Didn’t I say that already?

  A rather luxurious one, I might add. Much better than what I could ever provide.’

  ‘We’re starving,’ I announce firmly.

  ‘There’s absolute nothing to feed the desert variety of child, I’m afraid. No goanna guts, no witchetty grubs.’

  ‘We’d settle for some porridge!’ Scruff exclaims.

  Basti do
es not take the bait.

  ‘Freeeeeeeeeeeeezing. Any chance of some new clothes?’ Bert, of course.

  Basti shakes his head. ‘Nothing that fits.’

  ‘Naming no names, troops –’ I look at them all ‘– but some of us might be in need of a snuggly bed and a kiss goodnight. It’s been a long day.’

  ‘I do not provide kisses nor snuggles nor touching of any variety, nor warmth, for that matter. You would be sorely disappointed hanging about with the likes of me.’

  Good grief. It’s like the closer we get to the Reptilarium, the more obvious it is the building’s got some strange kind of power over Basti, pulling him in, changing him; he’s turning more and more into his old, cantankerous self. Nup. Not on. He owes us for the past twenty minutes.

  I stand in front of him. Hands on hips. ‘We just saved you, mate.’

  He looks at me in horror: desert variety of girl-child = absolutely terrifying.

  ‘For which I am eternally grateful, young . . . er . . . lady? It is a lady, isn’t it?’ He lifts his glasses and peers; raises an eyebrow, examining close. ‘Actually, you could be rather fetching if one could somehow extract you from under all those layers of dirt. Rather fetching indeed. You just need to be chiselled out.’ With the end of his glasses he gingerly lifts a matted piece of my hair – it’s quite a stick. ‘Hmm. Rather too close for comfort to a bird’s nest. Good for the rats, I suppose.’

  I turn brusquely away, scowling, hurting; not changing for anyone, not even Dad and didn’t he try. I liked looking like him. He didn’t get it. ‘Your mum was such a lady,’ he’d sigh. Well, I’m not. Don’t want a bar of it; lace and frills and perfume and hairbrushes and sighing and giggling and boys and whatnot, no time for any of it.

  ‘Actually, I’m not sure if there’s a young lady in there at all,’ Basti sighs, dropping the matted hair in defeat.

  ‘I don’t want to be “chiselled out”, thank you very much. I’m happy the way I am and far too busy to be something as silly as a girl. Too busy rescuing uncles. Hmm, yes, that’s right. And finding shelter for my little brothers and sister and keeping our family together and –’