The Demon Vacuum Cleaner

by Jeremy Strong

  ‘Definitely not, sir. I’d say it was done by two human beings, probably drunk.’

  ‘Right.’ Sergeant Polski gazed calmly at Elsie and Mr Prentiss.

  ‘Come on, we’re taking you to the police station. No trouble now; off to the car with you.’

  Elsie got slowly to her feet. She looked Sergeant Polski squarely in the eye. ‘You’re making a dreadful mistake, officer, and wasting a lot of valuable time. Didn’t you see that film on TV last week, Silas Goldstein is Innocent? The poor man was hanged for a murder he never did. It was Burt Lancashire playing the hero – I do like him, such broad shoulders.’

  ‘Come along, come along,’ interrupted the sergeant in a tired voice. ‘Just get in the car.’

  The doors slammed. A minute later they were heading at a stately speed towards the police-station. Mr Prentiss put a comforting arm around Elsie. He began to sing softly and out of tune.

  ‘We all live in a blue police car, blue police car, blue police car.…’

  Elsie ignored him and drummed her fingertips together impatiently. Then the car slowed and stopped. The song died on the caretaker’s lips and all four stared ahead in stunned silence.

  Fatbag was sitting in the middle of the road. His body glinted with the light of a thousand raindrops reflecting the car’s headlamps. He was whirling his nozzle round his head and playfully slurping all the leaves off the trees around him. He took no notice of the police car.

  ‘What’s that?’ demanded Sergeant Polski in a hushed voice. He turned to Mr Prentiss but the caretaker had gone. He was on the floor of the

  car with his arms over his head and elbows tucked in. A faint, trembly moan came from the bottom of the back seat.

  ‘What is it?’ repeated the sergeant.

  ‘That’s Fatbag,’ said Elsie quietly.

  ‘I think it’s a vacuum cleaner sir,’ Constable Thomas declared.

  The sergeant pushed back his hat and rubbed his eyes. ‘Fatbag!’ he whispered, peering out through the windscreen. ‘Are those eyes, or switches? Difficult to tell in this light. I could swear he’s watching us. What do you think, Thomas?’

  The young constable swallowed quickly. ‘It looks a very big vacuum cleaner, doesn’t it, sir?’ His voice was unnaturally loud.

  ‘Biggest I’ve seen, Thomas.’

  ‘He’s grown,’ said Elsie, with a little shake of her head. ‘He’s bigger than he was before and he was quite big enough then. Look at him! He’s fatter, and he’s taller. I don’t like it, not at all I don’t. Vacuum cleaners shouldn’t grow. I knew he was evil the moment I saw him.’

  The sergeant sniffed and straightened his back. ‘It’s still only a vacuum cleaner and it must be stopped. We’ll soon have this little business sorted out.’ The sergeant clenched his teeth and stepped out of the car.

  At once Fatbag stopped sucking leaves and his snout came down upon the road with a shuddering clang. A fierce hiss rose from his domed head, and far behind him the plug on the end of the tail whipped backwards and forwards through the murky puddles. Sergeant Polski tugged his cap further onto his head, took a step forward and squared up to the waiting monster.

  3

  Trapped!

  ‘All right Fatbag!’ shouted Sergeant Polski, wiping the rain from his face. ‘Give yourself up!’ The machine didn’t move. All that could be heard was the steady drizzle and Fatbag’s low hissing. Sergeant Polski vainly tried to meet the cold gaze of the eyeless terror.

  Fatbag slowly raised his tube until the gaping mouth was level with the policeman’s head. A trickle of water ran back down the tube and dribbled off, splashing steadily onto the road. Sergeant Polski watched the dark mouth move slowly from one side to the other with the hypnotic movements of a snake about to strike. Beads of sweat broke on his forehead and he stuck a finger inside his collar so that he could swallow several times.

  A sudden roar exploded all round him and his cap was whisked away and blown high into the night sky. As it came tumbling down, Fatbag’s tail snapped up, cutting through the rain. The plug smashed through the cap, which fell in tatters at the sergeant’s feet.

  A moment later Polski had dived back into the safety of the police car, slammed the door, locked it and tried to wrap the seat-belt round his body three times.

  ‘What happened sir?’ asked Thomas. Sergeant Polski tried to control the tremble in his reply.

  ‘He… slurped me!’

  ‘He’s moving off!’ cried Elsie, stabbing a finger over the constable’s shoulder and pointing ahead. ‘We mustn’t lose him. I’m sure he’s up to something. Don’t let him escape.’ The sergeant uneasily started the car and followed at a distance, while Constable Thomas radioed through to Headquarters to ask for help.

  ‘Yes, I did say we need more cars to stop a vacuum cleaner!’ He shouted at the radio. He glanced uneasily at his sergeant. ‘They won’t believe me.’

  Polski snatched the intercom fiercely. ‘This is Sergeant Polski. I want extra cars out here immediately. Confirm it is a vacuum cleaner. It’s just destroyed half a school and smashed my hat. Now move!’ The sergeant banged the intercom back into Thomas’s hand. ‘The stupid fools,’ he snapped.

  Elsie gave a cry. ‘Look! He’s going down my road. I live just there. Oh dear, I hope the cat’s indoors – you know what happened in that terrible film Galactic Fangs don’t you? When that thing with teeth like elephant’s tusks landed in a Birmingham back garden?’

  The car swung round behind Fatbag and the headlamps splayed out down the road, lighting it from end to end. Constable Thomas suddenly leaned forward and grabbed the sergeant’s arm in excitement, so that the car lurched against the kerb, stalled and stopped.

  ‘Look sir – it’s a dead end! There’s a massive brick wall down there. Fatbag will never get through that. He’s trapped!’

  Sergeant Polski smiled and slowly folded his thick arms across his chest. ‘Well Thomas, we’ll just sit tight until the others arrive, and then we’ll nab him.’ Polski nodded to himself.

  A quiet voice from the back murmured, ‘You won’t get him like that. The Vagon from Planet X was smaller than Fatbag and not even the whole army could stop him. It wasn’t until they discovered he was allergic to soap that he was captured.’

  Sergeant Polski let out a long sigh. ‘I wish the Vagon would come and get somebody in this car,’ he muttered darkly.

  Up and down Elsie’s street, curious people were filling the road and staring up at the police car that blocked the entrance. Nothing so exciting had happened since the water pipes had burst six months earlier. Fatbag was lurking quietly behind a parked car and the innocent people had no idea of the hideous monster at their backs.

  ‘I can’t see my Harry there,’ said Elsie, and she glanced at her watch. ‘Oh! My cookery programme! I’m missing my TV cookery lesson and it’s curry tonight – Harry’s favourite, and I’m stuck here all because of that thing out there. First programme I’ve missed for a whole year. I ask you!’

  With some relief Constable Thomas noticed the arrival of a second police car. The car drew alongside, its flashing blue light casting an eerie glow through the drizzle. Sergeant Polski slid round the back of his car and ran over to the other vehicle.

  ‘What’s going on Polski?’ demanded the Chief Constable himself as he wound down his window. The sergeant pointed down the street.

  ‘There’s a vacuum cleaner down there sir. He’s wrecking everything in sight.’

  The Chief Constable frowned sternly. ‘Polski, vacuum cleaners don’t travel round by themselves wrecking things.’

  ‘I know sir, but Fatbag’s different you see. He’s smashed my hat.’

  ‘What! Didn’t you try to stop him?’

  ‘Yes sir.’

  ‘Well? What happened?’ snapped the Chief Constable.

  ‘He slurped me.’ And Sergeant Polski made a revolting noise. The Chief Constable drew back sharply.

  ‘All right Polski, all right. That’s enough of that.’ Chief Consta
ble Durkin pushed open his door and got out. He slapped a neat pair of leather gloves against his thigh. ‘You’d better show me this monster of yours, sergeant.’

  ‘Yes sir, but you see Fatbag isn’t an ordinary vacuum cleaner,’ Polski warned. ‘He’s more like a…’

  ‘Polski! Just show me!’

  ‘Yes sir.’

  The two men began to walk down the road. Sergeant Polski kept close against the garden wall, ready to dive for cover at a moment’s notice. A horrified voice called after them. ‘You’re not going down there, surely!’ Durkin turned and looked gravely at young Constable Thomas. He slowly shook his head. ‘That lad will never make the Special Squad. Come on Polski! Don’t drag your feet.’

  Hardly had they gone three paces when there was a shattering roar from the far end of the road and Fatbag appeared, moving swiftly from behind a parked car. A gasp went up from the crowd.

  ‘It’s a Vagon from Planet X!’ cried one, hurriedly wiping his spectacles on his jumper.

  ‘No, that’s the Galactic Fang,’ screamed an old lady, and she hastily scooped up her pet poodle and stuffed it inside her coat.

  ‘It’s a vacuum cleaner,’ piped up a small boy but he was instantly told to keep quiet.

  Fatbag ignored them. He cast a brief glance at the advancing police and trundled down to the end wall, where he snorted loudly and explored it all over with his mouth. He made vicious slurps at the crumbling surface. All he got was a nozzle full of moss and cement-dust, which he blew out with a loud sneeze, covering several cars with the dirt.

  When he realised that the wall was too high and thick to smash through he simply lost his temper and went wild. He attacked a row of dustbins. He knocked their lids off and, with a single sideways swipe, battered them mercilessly with his tube, sending them crashing from one side of the road to the other, the noise ringing and echoing between the houses. Dust, fire-ash, old cans and rotten food were launched into the air and showered the nearest gardens.

  People ran screaming for cover, dragging children off the road and slamming and bolting their doors. A moment later the same ashen faces appeared at windows, pressing white noses against the glass as they tried to keep track of the bellowing monster at their doors.

  Durkin and Polski rushed back to the sergeant’s car and piled in just in time, as Fatbag sent a dustbin lid skimming up the road like a giant frisbee. It zinged across the car roof and set the aerial quivering violently. The vacuum cleaner gave a satisfied grunt and laid his nozzle calmly on the ground. Elsie Bunce sniffed.

  ‘Well! What a nasty temper!’ she said.

  Chief Constable Durkin didn’t reply. He was sitting bolt upright in the back of the car, a strange look of horror on his face. ‘Polski!’ he hissed. ‘There’s a dead man in here!’

  The sergeant jumped. ‘Wh… where sir?’

  ‘Under my feet, man!’ The dead body groaned and heaved. A pale, bony hand came groping up the Chief Constable’s leg. ‘Urrrr! Get it off!’ cried Durkin, slapping at the hand again and again with his gloves.

  ‘Oh,’ gasped Elsie. ‘It’s Mr Prentiss! Goodness, I’d quite forgotten about him. He’s the school caretaker, you know. He suffers from nerves, I think. I keep telling him to see a doctor. Come on Mr Prentiss. You can come out now.’

  The caretaker struggled from beneath the Chief Constable’s feet and finally managed to sit up between Elsie and Durkin. He stared with blank alarm at Elsie and repeated over and over again, ‘I want to go home’. Elsie patted his knee comfortingly.

  Constable Thomas gazed down the road at the passive Fatbag. ‘What are we going to do now, sir?’ he asked anxiously, wishing he had joined his father’s shoe-shop instead of the police force.

  Chief Constable Durkin ground his teeth together. ‘I’ll tell you Thomas. We’re going to drive down this road and crush that horrible beast against the wall. It’s as simple as that!’ He nodded curtly at the two policemen in the front.

  ‘Simple as that,’ murmured Elsie, shaking her little head.

  4

  What Happened Next

  At the thought of going after Fatbag yet again Mr Prentiss began to tremble violently. Elsie insisted that she took the poor man to a nearby house where he was given hot coffee and ate six chocolate biscuits. The kind lady of the house offered brandy, too, but Elsie said that wasn’t a wise idea. She still had a bit of a headache herself.

  In the meantime, the Chief Constable returned to his car, started the motor and gave a thumbs-up signal. Constable Thomas winced.

  ‘Do you think the Chief Constable knows what he’s doing sir?’ he asked.

  The sergeant’s answer was drowned by the piercing wail of a siren as Durkin’s car moved forward. The siren of the other car reluctantly joined in chorus and they began to creep towards the trapped vacuum cleaner.

  At every window up and down the street pale faces stared out. Parents clasped their children close and the elderly peered out, grim faced, anxious and silent. The revolving lamps of the passing police cars flicked bands of cold light on each house in turn, making white faces eerie blue, while the whining sirens screamed down at the vacuum cleaner.

  Fatbag did not move his heavy body. Only his snout twitched and rumbled with an unpleasant growl. He gave a grunt and lashed out with his tail, smashing two headlamps, but the cars pressed on.

  The vacuum cleaner was getting annoyed at being followed everywhere. He wanted to reach the factory. Soon he would be strong enough to gather machines from all over the world and sweep away these wretched humans for ever. As for those big cars – they were traitors! Machines working for the enemy!

  His growl grew steadily louder until his body was shuddering with one long metallic howl. Out snaked his tube, rippling and rattling, gleaming red, the metal mouth black and wide and hungry. With a screeching crunch of tortured metal, Fatbag ripped off a car wheel. The Chief Constable’s car gave a sickening lurch to one side and ground into the body of the other police car. Fatbag belched, and swallowed the wheel whole. He thrust his snout at the unprotected belly of the car, lifting it half-clear of the road. With two great slurps he wrenched off the exhaust system and the whole back axle.

  Durkin clung to his seat in fear of his life while the car was slammed and banged and scrunched. He watched with horror as Fatbag wrestled with the axle, finally gulping it down like a python devouring a large and troublesome goat.

  Down came the ravenous mouth again and clamped onto the windscreen of Polski’s car, scraping across the smooth glass. Polski threw both arms across his face and muttered a prayer. Constable Thomas slid beneath the dashboard with his head between his knees.

  Fatbag demolished the wipers, siren, flashing light, aerial and door handles. He paused for a moment, balancing on his rear castors and eyeing the crippled car with a sneer. Then, with

  a single, brutal thrust he pierced the radiator, engine and gear-box. The engine groaned, shuddered, changed to a shrill whine and finally tore itself to shreds.

  Waving his snout triumphantly in the air, Fatbag thundered past the dying cars and roared up the road. His tail thrashed out as he passed, uprooting hedges, smashing fences and shattering windows. He disappeared into the night.

  A deathly silence fell over the street. Two long minutes passed before doors were timidly opened and people came out onto the road. They huddled in sombre groups as though they were at a funeral.

  Sergeant Polski discovered that the car doors were jammed because Fatbag had chewed off the handles. He wound down his window and squeezed himself through the gap, so that he ended on his hands and knees in a large puddle. He cursed wearily and struggled to his feet, just as a distressed figure came hurrying down the road.

  ‘Quick, oh quick, Sergeant Polski!’ Elsie cried. ‘That horrible thing! I saw its tail go right through our front window and my Harry’s inside and oh!’ She covered her eyes at the thought.

  Sergeant Polski steadied her and glanced down the road at the Bunce’s home. ‘Now don’t you worr
y. He’s all right, I’m sure. I’ll come with you. Take it easy now.’

  Together they picked their way carefully over crushed dustbins, banana skins and the waving fronds of scattered newspapers. When they reached Elsie’s front garden they saw her husband through the smashed window. He was sitting stiff and straight in the far corner of the room, with his eyes fixed in a glassy stare. His hands twitched nervously.

  Elsie started forward but Sergeant Polski held her back. ‘Be careful!’ he warned grimly. ‘Best if you stay here, Mrs Bunce. He’s in a nasty state of shock. I’ll deal with this.’

  ‘No, no!’ Elsie cried, giving an excited jump. ‘He’s watching the television! He’s all right! He always goes like that when it’s my TV cookery programme – oh he does love his food, my Harry does!’

  At that moment Harry Bunce sat back with a pleased smile on his large face and caught sight of Elsie and the stunned sergeant in the garden. He waved a pad of paper and shouted cheerfully.

  ‘I got it Elsie, word for word. You weren’t here so I wrote the recipe down for you – How to Make Bengal Chicken Curry!’

  Sergeant Polski’s eyebrows were almost on top of his head. He just goggled. He couldn’t believe that Harry had been happily watching television while Fatbag had been tearing two police cars into little pieces and eating them. He stepped forward and leaned through the empty window frame.

  ‘Excuse me sir,’ he asked, ‘but didn’t you hear anything just now?’

  Harry Bunce smiled. ‘Hear anything? No – I was too busy getting the TV recipe. Why, is anything wrong officer?’

  ‘Well sir,’ began Sergeant Polski, ‘I don’t know if you’ve noticed but your front window is missing. It’s in bits all over your lawn, smashed to pieces by an escaped vacuum cleaner!’ Polski, who had now survived three of Fatbag’s attacks, was becoming quite casual about his acquaintance with the dreadful monster.