The bortrekker held his breath as they passed, the dried flowers covering his human scent. Soon they were gone and he laughed to himself, having beaten them once again. In the opinion of the bortrekker it was fear that had given rise to the Removal Firm, and fear that kept them going. Fear, he was often heard to tell his two dancing rats, is a corrosive thing in itself when it leads to prejudice and irrational action.
The bortrekker went on his way. When he was certain the Removal Firm were out of earshot he took his fiddle out of its case and began to play a jaunty jig. The two rats Arthur and Harold leapt out of his pockets in glee and began dancing on their hind legs around his feet. Arthur’s choreography was nothing short of genius, he being the light-footed one with inventive steps, while Harold’s rhythm was vastly superior, as he swayed in time to the music. ‘O what jolly boys are we,’ sang the bortrekker, ‘rattling the boards of a wooden sea …’
Once the storm had abated Chloe and Alex were able to forge ahead. Nelson stayed with them, hopping tirelessly alongside. Without realising it they were approaching the forest of tall clocks from the most difficult side. The weather here was always inclement and the boards showed it. Instead of the landscape being flat it was violently undulating where the boards had become warped. Extreme cold and heat had shrunk and expanded the planks in rapid motion, causing them to twist out of shape. Humps and dips made walking difficult and both children tripped several times when catching their feet on a board that had come loose or had twisted like a rope. There were gaps out there, large enough to fall through, though Nelson skipped between and around them as agile as any tri-cornered cat.
‘Watch out for splinters if you fall over,’ Alex warned. ‘Some of the planks are split and broken.’
Indeed, there were ragged plank ends in places and shards lay here and there. Bare nails protruded like fangs, some by as much as three or four centimetres.
The rough going got worse before it got better. They crossed an area where a water tank had overflowed, flooding the boards. Some of the planks had actually curled back on themselves here and were like sleigh runners. However, once over this patch they returned to normal undulations caused simply by dampness and swift drying. The reason for the bad weather appeared to be a series of skylights that had been left open. Now they let in the elements: the wind and the rain, the heat of the summer sun, and any birds who cared to venture in from the outside world.
‘Hey, guys – how do you like my skateboard park?’
Chloe looked up and her face broke into a smile. It was Jordy. Somehow he’d found a skateboard and was using the undulations to practise his moves. Even Alex, who often found the sporty side of Jordy a bit hard to take, had to grin at his step-brother’s antics.
The three of them hugged and slapped each other on the back, then Jordy suggested they go to his camp in the forest of tall clocks. When they got there they found he had made himself very comfortable, using a dust cover over four of the clocks to make himself a tent. He couldn’t stop talking at first, running over all that had happened to him since he’d been alone. The other two gave him their accounts and he seemed a little disappointed to find that Chloe and Alex’s adventures matched his own, if not surpassed them.
‘So, you got a camping stove?’ marvelled Jordy, giving Alex due praise. ‘Can we get a cup of tea?’
‘We could if we had some tea,’ Alex replied.
‘Never mind. Perhaps we can send Nelson out looking for some, eh, Nelson?’ Jordy fondled the cat’s nape. ‘Good old Nelson. Kept me company, he did.’
‘He did us too!’ cried Alex. ‘He must have been going back and forth between the three of us.’ He went on, ‘Nelson brought me a pigeon, and a rat. I stripped and gutted them and cooked them up. They tasted good.’
‘You ate a rat?’ said Jordy, studying Alex now as if for the first time since they had been reunited. ‘What’s all that gear for?’
‘What gear?’
‘The kit. The big coat. The boots. The hat. The mask.’
‘Oh, these.’ Alex laughed carelessly. ‘I just took a fancy to them.’
Chloe caught Jordy’s eye and the older brother stopped asking questions about the way Alex dressed.
‘So, my little brother’s becoming self-sufficient in his old age,’ said Jordy after a while. ‘How did all this come about?’
‘I just woke up one morning – and there I was.’
Jordy for some reason felt a little uncomfortable probing his step-brother like this. He was afraid he was going to find out something he didn’t particularly like, though there was no real evidence that he would. But for one thing he was a little disturbed to find such a change in Alex in so short a time. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with the way Alex was behaving. It was just that it was wrong for Alex. Indeed, his step-brother seemed just as shy and quiet as he always had been: still the reserved young man. But now there was a strong quiet confidence in him that shook Jordy a little. A determination about him that seemed to have come from nowhere. And the clothes he wore were a little eccentric, even for the attic. Chloe had immediately shed her layers once out of the stormy section of the attic, but Alex continued to keep his on, as if they were now part of his make-up, part of him.
‘I learned to navigate the attic,’ he told the other two brightly, ‘from the bortrekker. The guy you met by the trapdoor.’
‘He was some character, wasn’t he?’ Alex said, agreeing with Jordy. ‘I really liked him.’
Jordy was even more put out now. Alex was encroaching on his territory. Jordy was the adventurer, the orienteering expert. Alex was supposed to be interested in engines and science and all that sort of nerdy stuff. It was a bit annoying to find his little brother copying him. Unfortunately he said as much, and had to witness another new side to Alex, as his young step-brother gave him a withering look. He muttered something about Alex copying him.
‘Copying? I’m not copying you. You don’t own the rights to map-reading, do you? What did you ever invent that anyone would want to copy?’
‘Now you listen here—’ began Jordy angrily, but Chloe interrupted.
‘Please, boys – we’ve only just met up again.’
Jordy’s eyes were still smarting, but he managed to blink, and soon had his feelings under control. He admitted to himself in the next minute or two that he had lost his cool a little. Thinking about it again, he decided ‘So what?’ – so Alex was becoming more like him. Did that matter? In one way he ought to feel flattered that his brother was beginning to follow in his footsteps. A good leader makes good leaders of others, he told himself, and Alex was simply learning from him. Good on Alex. Good on him.
‘Sorry, Alex.’ Jordy put out a hand to shake. ‘Just lost it for a moment – this place, you know.’
Alex grinned and shook Jordy’s hand. ‘Yeah, I know. Me and Clo have fallen out once or twice too. It’s the attic.’
‘Hey,’ cried Jordy, changing the subject, ‘what do you think of the dust sprites? They’re weird, aren’t they? Look, there’s one now. Oh, he’s gone. Really weird.’
It was clear from their faces they didn’t know what he was talking about. Their heads swung back and forth and finally brother and sister looked at each other and shrugged.
‘Dust sprites,’ explained Jordy, amazed that they were so slow at seeing the obvious. ‘I’d seen them but it was the bortrekker who told me exactly what they are. They’re the spirits of the attic. They’re everywhere – in the rafters, on the boards, in all the nooks and crannies. Sometimes they form themselves into little figures of dust, run along for a bit, then they sort of go puff and settle back as dust on the boards again. Don’t tell me you haven’t seen them?’ He stared at their faces, before adding, ‘You haven’t, have you?’
‘No,’ admitted Chloe, biting her lip. ‘We’ve seen movements, out of the corner of our eyes, but I thought that was just an overactive imagination – along with the funny light up here.’ She was a little upset to realise that an A
riel might be here in the attic and it was Jordy and not her who was aware of him. The attic could be a little spiteful in that way: revealing things to those who had no interest in them, while others yearned to see such sights. How contrary was this land of boards and rafters. It played with its visitors like toys.
While they had been sitting there talking, clocks had been striking at odd times in the distance. Jordy had systematically disabled all the clocks within an hour’s walk, so that the constant ticking and chiming would not drive him crazy. Now the more distant chimes were like owl hoots to a camper: for most of the time his brain didn’t register them. Once he concentrated, of course, they were there, but he could soon switch them off again.
‘We saved you some honey,’ Chloe told Jordy. ‘We found a bees’ nest in an old suitcase.’
‘Oh, wow – thanks.’ He really was grateful. ‘I’ve been eating veg until I look like a cabbage.’
Chloe said, ‘You don’t look like a cabbage. You look very – very swashbuckling.’
‘Thanks.’
At that moment Nelson slunk away. Jordy watched him go and said, ‘What’s the matter with him?’
Alex answered, ‘He’s heard something. Listen!’
They all tuned their ears.
‘All I can hear,’ said Chloe, ‘are the clocks.’
‘More and more of them,’ said Alex. ‘The number of strikes has increased and I can hear the ticking now.’
Jordy cried, ‘Alex is right. Someone’s repairing the clocks as they come this way. We’ve got to move.’
They were all experienced enough now in the ways of Attica to know that every new encounter was dangerous. On the one hand they had met some helpful characters, like the puppets and the bortrekker. But for the most part the creatures they’d met had proved to be hostile. Here was a new encounter coming their way. It was best to avoid it. If this thing repaired clocks, it might very well prove a menace to those who had disabled them. There was something a little crazy about a being who took the time to make sure all clocks had been wound up, even though they were telling the wrong time and striking falsely.
Jordy put his arm through the leather loop of his skateboard carrier and slung it over his shoulder. Then he followed Alex and their sister, hastily packing things. They hoisted their packs on their backs, and set off in the opposite direction to the clock-menders. This woodland of theirs could be likened to a forest of dwarf oaks. There was no height to it, but the squared trunks were solid enough to impede rapid progress. Here and there a grandfather clock had fallen over, just as real trees topple in the forests of the earth. If it was on its face there was glass everywhere, sometimes a pathetic hand or two, and in extreme cases, cogs, wheels, ratchets, a large shiny pendulum, chains and weights and other internal works. These were clocks with pretty faces too: pastoral pictures of goosegirls leading their flocks, or ploughboys at the plough. Chloe thought that if she ever owned such a clock she would never banish it to an attic.
When they emerged from the forest they came across two massive armies of toy soldiers. A great battle was taking place. Although the generals and their troops were not interested in the human children their numbers were so great they formed a sea of uniforms – many different kinds – spread across the attic’s boards. The noise, for such tiny creatures, was astonishing. There were no guns going off, nor rifles which worked, but there was a clatter of tiny swords, bayonets and other metal objects against metal chests. So far as Chloe could see, none of the soldiers could hurt each other, but seemed intent on doing so. Generals of course were having a fine time, ordering battalions here, divisions there, and corps everywhere else.
‘Stupid creatures,’ she muttered, trying to step between them. ‘If they get squashed, it’s their fault.’
In the end the three travellers found it easier to sweep a path through the armies, brushing the soldiers into heaps either side. When they first did it they prepared to run, thinking they might anger the troops. But the toys were not interested in revenge. They just wanted to get back into the battle again. The objective appeared to be a line of forts and castles at each end of the boards and Chloe could foresee it ending in stalemate, with one lot of attacking soldiers occupying their enemy’s forts, and the other lot overrunning their foe’s castles. It was all pretty much a waste of time so far as she could tell. She wondered if Nelson came to this corner of the attic: he loved little moving things he could chase and bat about with his paw.
Jordy and Alex had started to take their newly learned navigational skills quite seriously. They lined up sunshafts sent down by skylights at a set hour of the day in order to keep to a straight line. This was much like using a sextant to navigate a ship. And another aide which had been employed by early sailors: celestial bodies. The square stars embedded above lofty networks of beams and rafters were excellent direction-finders. Jordy had learned about the clusters of skylights and the star patterns they created.
The bortrekker had given them a route to follow and Jordy and Alex found their way across the boards with unerring accuracy now. Of course they made one or two mistakes but these were corrected by going back to a known point and beginning that section again. They were beginning to familiarise themselves with the constellations of the attic, with its changing landscapes.
Fortunately the weather remained mild. There was a heavy mist one morning, rising from a group of water tanks, but though this hid any likely dangers from the voyagers, they encountered no trouble. For the most part it was simply a long slog which had Chloe wondering if they would ever see home again. To make such a journey back again, across that vast and troubled land, would take an enormous amount of fortitude.
Still, she remained outwardly optimistic, being a girl with a naturally cheerful disposition.
‘Come on, you two, step it out,’ she cried, her shoes echoing on the hollow floor. ‘Let’s get to our destination.’
‘I’ll tell you what,’ said Jordy, going to the side pockets of his huge backpack, ‘I just remembered. I’ve got skateboards for you two as well. Here,’ he produced them, ‘I found them in a bunch of sports equipment. I always said skateboarding was a sport, didn’t I? Well, that sort of proves it.’
Alex was not the best skateboarder in the world, but he could still kick and run with the other two. Thus the three travellers were soon speeding on their way, leaving any followers trailing far behind them.
CHAPTER 16
Atticans in Khaki Coats
‘The Removal Firm is very near.’
I know, I know. It’s those damn kids. They brought them by using fire.
‘It’s not the fault of the kids. You know how relentless the Removal Firm is. They’ll hunt you all down in the end.’
Not me, says the board-comber, I’ve been here since the beginning of time.
‘Yes, yes, ancient fossils were real buttons and spoons when you came – but that won’t save you, any more than that carnival mask you wear will fool the Removal Firm. You’re an outsider and that’s that, fake friar or not. That’s all the Removal Firm cares about.’
The board-comber knows the bat is right. The Removal Firm aren’t interested in how long you’ve been in residence. You’re an outsider and therefore you have to be watched closely and ejected at the slightest suspicion of any wrongdoing.
‘If you had a board with wheels on, like those newcomers, you’d be able to out-distance the Removal Firm every time.’
Well, I don’t and I wouldn’t know how to use one if I did.
‘Don’t they just whizz along?’
Too fast, if you ask me.
‘All I’m saying is, if you had one, you’d be a flying board-comber.’
They let the subject drop. The board-comber is a little aggrieved by the boards with wheels. Although they assist the human children in racing ahead of the Removal Firm, they also put a lot of kilometres between the board-comber and his charges. How can he look to their welfare if they are so far ahead of him? How can he watch over th
em if he can’t see them? It is all so frustrating. And to what end? What will he get out of it? Probably nothing.
‘They’re going in the right direction at last.’
For what?
‘For the Great Water Tank.’
And remind me what is it that they want there?
‘The map, of course. But in any case humans always head towards the shores of great waters, wherever they are.’
Is that true? I don’t.
‘You’re hardly human any more, but all the others do. They seem to need the sights and smells of wide open waters. It’s because they were once fish, I suppose, before they crawled out and used their legs.’
Look, the visitors have stopped. They’re camping for the night. Oh! Oh my, look what the girl creature is taking from her pack. Look. Look! A carving. A wonderful Inuit carving. I knew these young people would come up with something. New ones always do. Look what it is! It’s a walrus. I haven’t got a walrus. I want it.
‘Where do you think she got it?’
Down below, of course. When she went through the trapdoor and dropped into the house underneath. She must have stolen it.
‘Stolen goods,’ says the bat, sucking in its breath. ‘She could get arrested for that. And you. You could get arrested for coveting stolen goods. That’s against the law.’
No, it isn’t. You can’t be arrested for wanting things. Anyway, I have to have that carving. How do I get it?
‘Trade with the boy – you know what he wants.’
The board-comber is overjoyed at this suggestion.
Of course, bat – you’re a genius.
‘Oh, please,’ demurs the bat, fluttering its wings, ‘just highly intelligent, nothing more.’
There’s one near here. I remember hiding it for just such a trade as this.
‘There you go then!’
Look, the children are resting for the night.
‘Ah, the night, the night. The children of the night.’
They could hear the howling of a thousand wolves above the shimmering metallic sound that seemed to run in waves. It was both frightening and fascinating. It didn’t sound menacing, exactly, but until he knew what it was, it was certainly worrying.
Attica Page 20
