Hamish X and the Cheese Pirates

by Sean Cullen

  A huge hunk of rock expelled from the volcano fell on Tubaface. The stone obliterated the ugly man, leaving a gaping puncture in the ice sloshing with black seawater.

  Pianoface looked at the yawning black hole with astonishment. “Holy cow. A few more inches and I’d be dead, too. I guess I’m just lucky. Ha!” He giggled and danced around in a circle. “I’m lucky! I’m lucky! I’m still alive.”

  A strange sound stopped him short. A low growl followed by soft barking yaps came from all around him. Slinking out of hiding places all around him were tiny white doglike creatures with bushy white tails and glittering black eyes. They formed a ring around him and began to converge, licking their sharp teeth hungrily with long pink tongues.

  Pianoface whispered in terror, “Arctic foxes. Just my luck.”79 And then they were on him.

  Parveen and Mimi saw the eruption from the bridge of the airship. The red glow was visible in the sky from an incredible distance.

  “Wow. That was close,” Mimi said in a voice tinged with awe.

  “One more hour and we’d have been killed for certain,” Parveen said, chewing on his pencil. “It makes me wonder …”

  “What?”

  Parveen frowned. “Was that really a coincidence? It seems a little too close to be anything but deliberate.”

  “But who has the power to make a volcano erupt at will?” Mimi asked.

  “I don’t know.” Parveen shook his head. “But I find the notion extremely disturbing.”

  “Know what I find disturbin’?” Mimi asked.

  “What?”

  Mimi pointed at Hamish X, who sat cross-legged on the floor in the corner of the bridge. He hadn’t moved in the whole time since the Schmidt incident. His face was buried in the book as he read page after page with a feverish intensity. Nothing of the Hamish X they knew was present in his eyes. It was as though he’d become a machine of some kind designed only to read the book.

  “It’s creepy,” Mimi whispered.

  Parveen silently agreed.

  The airship sailed southward through the arctic morning.

  EPILOGUE

  If you happened to come to Windcity a month later, you would hardly have recognized the Windcity Orphanage and Cheese Factory. The electric fences were gone. The gates stood open. The brick walls were painted a cheerful green and white. The airship, newly rechristened The Orphan Queen, bobbed above the factory roof. The greatest change of all, however, was that children played in front of the factory. Certainly, they were tethered to the ground to prevent them from blowing away in the stiff gale, but they were happy. They were smiling. They were playing. They were doing exactly what children should be doing: having fun!

  Mr. Kipling was finally up and around after weeks of recovering from the wound inflicted by Mr. Schmidt. He was still the same tall and elegant gentleman, only his clothes were cleaner and lovingly mended. He spent a lot of time with Mimi. She taught him how to throw a knuckleball and a slider. He taught her the finer points of fencing. If one didn’t know better, one would have mistaken the tall girl with the wild hair for Mr. Kipling’s daughter, a mistake that would have delighted them both.

  Parveen spent long hours in the common room drawing plans and making blueprints. He had converted the space into a workshop where he tinkered day and night with his inventions. He dedicated himself to finding ways to streamline the cheese-making process, making it safer and more profitable and allowing the children to work shorter hours. They now had more time to play and to learn, just as children ought to do. Parveen also tinkered with The Orphan Queen, making improvements here and there, keeping the giant gasbags inflated and generally figuring out how it all worked.

  Hamish X spent almost every waking hour poring over the book. Parveen and Mimi tried to lure him into games with the other children, begged him to tell them the tale of their journey north across the ice. Though he could be coaxed away from it for an hour or more, he would always be drawn back to its pages, sitting on his cot with the book on his lap. Mrs. Francis became worried when she saw the dark circles under his eyes. He wasn’t eating well and he barely went outside. The pull of the book was disturbing and unnatural.

  One night, as the children sat down to dinner, Mr. Kipling asked for silence. The children always ate together now, and Mrs. Francis outdid herself in the kitchen to provide the most delicious food imaginable for every meal. Porridge was never on the menu (except for Parveen). Today, southern fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and sweet corn steamed on huge platters. The children’s stomachs rumbled in anticipation. Even Hamish X had been enticed into the newly painted cafeteria (now sky blue rather than goat’s-intestine pink). He poked at his food, the book resting by his plate.

  Mr. Kipling tapped on his glass with a fork until all the children were silent. He stood and cleared his throat awkwardly. For the first time anyone could remember, the tall, elegant man looked nervous.

  “Ahem,” he cleared his throat again. “Thank you for your attention. I won’t take long. I know you are all hungry so I’ll get straight to the point.” He fumbled with his napkin for a moment, then continued. “I would like to thank you all for being so kind to me. If it weren’t for the efforts of Parveen, Hamish X, and of course Mimi,” he smiled at her and she grinned back, “I would be a pirate still, or worse, I might have perished in the eruption. You’ve all become the family I thought I’d lost forever, and I thank you.” Everyone clapped and cheered. “Yes. Well. I think we are creating a very nice life for ourselves here, and there is one person in particular who deserves a large part of the credit.”

  He turned to Mrs. Francis. Since she’d returned home she’d taken to dressing in more colourful clothing, taking care to do her hair up nice. Her cheeks were very red as she felt everyone looking at her.

  “A toast,” Mr. Kipling said, raising a glass of sparkling grape juice. All the children raised their glasses. “To Mrs. Francis: a truly kind and wonderful woman.” Everyone clinked their glasses together and repeated the toast. Mrs. Kipling went even redder in the face. Mr. Kipling then knelt down by her side and looked into her eyes.

  “Mrs. Francis,” he said softly. “Isobel … You have saved me in more ways than one and I want to know if you would consent to becoming, um, Mrs. Kipling.” He produced a golden ring from his pocket and held it out to her. Everyone gasped in astonishment.

  Mrs. Francis couldn’t speak. Her eyes filled with tears. Finally, she threw her chubby arms around Mr. Kipling’s neck.

  “Rupert!” she cried. “Yes! Yes! Of course, yes!”

  All the children started clapping and cheering again. (Some of the younger ones were frightened by the noise, but the older children soothed them.)

  Mimi, Hamish X, and Parveen sat in the midst of the celebration.

  “It’s kinda wonderful, ain’t it?” Mimi said.

  Hamish X smiled, his face drawn but happy. “I should have known.”

  “They’ve been all goo-goo since we got back.” Mimi stuck out her tongue in mock disgust. “Yer face has just been stuck in that book all day and night!”

  “I know.” Hamish X hung his head, fingers straying to the green leather cover. “I just can’t seem to put it down …” He shook his head as if to clear it. “Where’d Mr. Kipling get the ring?”

  “I made it,” Parveen piped up.

  “And you didn’t tell us?” Mimi demanded.

  Parveen shrugged. “He told me not to.” And then Parveen did something they’d never seen before. His dark face broke into the brightest smile, full of white teeth.

  “Parv! You’re smiling!” Mimi whispered.

  “Indeed!” Parveen said, smiling even wider. “Like my mother always told me: Smile, you’re home now.”

  Mimi hugged the little boy, knocking his glasses askew. Even Hamish X smiled and ruffled Parveen’s hair. Mrs. Francis and Mr. Kipling held each other close and kissed in a shy way, eliciting choruses of “Yayy!” and “Ewwwww!” in equal measure. Such a moment of happiness had never
before been felt in Windcity Orphanage and Cheese Factory.

  IF ONLY THE STORY ENDED HERE! But it doesn’t. This story is a lot like life: you can’t make it stop at a good part and stay there forever. Those who try to do that end up miserable in the end. Don’t be afraid. Embrace change in this story, and in life. Change is what makes everything interesting. But I digress …

  THE EXPLOSION KNOCKED EVERYONE to the floor. Dishes shattered. Chunks of plaster rained down from the ceiling.

  Mr. Kipling managed to haul himself up. A cut over his eye dripped blood down the side of his face. “Isobel! Get the children under the tables! We’re under attack!”

  “Oh, dear!” Mrs. Francis began to herd the children to the relative safety of the tables. They all waited for the next explosion, tense and fearful. None came. Instead, into the anxious silence blared an amplified voice. The voice was soothing and feminine.

  “Hamish X.”

  Hamish X stood up. He had a beatific smile on his face.80 “Mother.”

  “Hamish X,” the voice continued, “come to me now.”

  “Yes, Mother.” Hamish X picked up his book and walked towards the door.

  “Hamish X. Don’t …” Mr. Kipling laid a hand on the boy’s shoulder. Instantly, Hamish X spun and drove his right boot into the tall man’s stomach. There was flash of light and a smell like burning rubber. Mr. Kipling sailed through the air and crashed into the far wall, his shirt front smouldering with a scorch mark in the shape of a boot print.

  “Rupert!” Mrs. Francis cried, rushing to Mr. Kipling’s side. Hamish X stood looking down on them. His face showed no emotion.

  “Hamish X!” Mimi cried.

  The boy turned to her and she gasped. His face held no recognition.

  “It’s me! It’s Mimi!”

  His golden eyes seemed to look right through her. They glowed faintly with an inner light, making him seem bizarre and inhuman. “I must go to Mother now,” he said in a flat, lifeless voice.

  Hamish X turned without looking back and pushed through the doors of the cafeteria.

  Mimi and Parveen dashed after him.

  They caught up to him as he stepped through the ruined front doors of the factory. They were a smoking wreck, destroyed by a blast of some kind. The wind was swirling into the front, carrying sleet onto Mrs. Francis’s meticulously vacuumed carpet.

  “Hamish X.” Mimi reached for him but Parveen grabbed her arm.

  “Don’t touch him,” Parveen warned. “He’s not himself. He’ll hurt you and won’t know he’s doing it.”

  They followed him out into the freezing rain.

  “Hamish X,” the voice of the woman cooed loudly, cutting through the gale. “Come to me. Come to Mother.”

  Hamish X smiled and looked up into the sky. Bright lights lanced down from above, bathing him in a bluish glare. “Mother!” he cried.

  Parveen and Mimi followed his gaze and saw a black helicopter hovering above, its glossy black surface glittering with frozen rain. In the narrow glass cockpit, two grey figures sat side by side in grey coats, grey fedoras on their heads and goggles over their eyes. They looked like a pair of insects huddled in the belly of a dragonfly. From speakers on the craft’s undercarriage, the voice thrummed.

  “Come to me, Hamish X.” The voice was rich and clear, full of love and motherly concern. Mimi felt its pull even though it wasn’t aimed at her.

  The helicopter lowered itself towards the earth. Hamish X moved forward and stood waiting for it to alight. He clutched the book in his arms and smiled as though he were seeing the most beautiful thing imaginable. Mimi stared in helpless horror as the helicopter landed. The noise of the rotors blotted out everything but the woman’s voice.

  Mr. Candy and Mr. Sweet stepped out into the freezing rain. The wind tore at their coats but, oddly, their hats didn’t blow off. They stepped towards Hamish X, stopping a few metres in front of him.

  “Come, Hamish X,” said Mr. Sweet, holding out a gloved hand.

  “Mother is waiting,” Mr. Candy added.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I’d like to thank everyone who had a hand in this book:

  Barbara and Helen for their encouragement and excellent criticism. Lorne, my agent, who gives me so many opportunities to succeed.

  My mother, father, sisters and brother, nieces and nephews, each and every.

  Mrs. Lonergan for teaching me to love stories.

  And the Narrator’s Guild of Helsinki for the loan of their excellent narrator.

  1 Hello. It’s me, the narrator again, only down here at the bottom of the page. In the footnotes I will be clarifying difficult words or comments, providing pertinent historical facts, or distracting you with humorous nonsense. For example, the term “footnote” comes from the monks of medieval France who, while copying down manuscripts, would write notes on the soles of their feet. Often they were riddles or jokes for their monk buddies. They would extend their foot towards their friends and giggle endlessly while they were supposed to be working. This led to the introduction of sandals by irritated abbots (chief monks).

  2 “In situ” is just a high-browed way of saying “there.” That’s the beauty of words: there are so many ways to say exactly the same thing!

  3 Restaurants in Ancient Rome were rewarded for their excellence by receiving a scale model of their owners carved out of rock salt. The sculpture would be proudly displayed in front of the establishment, and patrons were encouraged to lick it as they entered. The phrase remains to this day but, thankfully, the practice went out of favour because of a rash of tongue infections caused by the unsanitary nature of the licking.

  4 The caribou is the North American cousin of the reindeer of Lapland. The animal is more difficult to domesticate than the reindeer because of its wild nature and its intense dislike of Christmas.

  5 Stilton and Roquefort are stinky blue cheeses from England and France, respectively. Both are left to grow mouldy for a while before they are eaten. Weird.

  6 One might ask oneself, Why eat something if it might kill you? Dangerous foods are not uncommon around the world. The Japanese eat a form of puffer fish that, if prepared improperly, can kill the eater. In Kazakhstan, some peasants eat hand grenades boiled in tomato sauce. Even a cow can be dangerous to eat if, for example, the cow is still alive. Ice cream can be dangerous, if fired out of a cannon or if very, very, very, very, very, very cold.

  7 This led to Caribou Blue being banned in the state of Wyoming.

  8 The day the wind changed was called “Flip Day” and was celebrated twice a year by a change of clogs. Flip Day usually fell on the spring and autumn solstices.

  9 Sometimes they found themselves even farther from home. Homer Cudgeons, a Windcity resident, was discovered confused and wandering in downtown Minneapolis. When questioned, he said, “My nose was itchy. I only let go for a second.”

  10 They were eventually banned from the competition.

  11 Dutch immigrants were among the most numerous of the new townsfolk. The Dutch were naturals when it came to building propellers. After all, they’d had centuries of experience building windmills. The invention of the airplane gave proof to the rumour that had persisted for many years: that Holland could fly. The whole country would lift off for short trips up and down the Baltic, until finally the authorities grounded her after a near collision with Latvia.

  12 Freakish indeed because birds do not carry rabies, but Mr. Francis was a very unlucky man. He once tripped over a stone and managed to swallow his own foot. What are the odds?

  13 Recall, the only other resident was a very old man named Mr. Nieuwendyke who believed he was a cat. He stayed in his house, meowing loudly and licking himself.

  14 The native people in the Arctic go by the name Inuit. They are commonly known as Eskimos. They don’t like this name because it is a derogatory term in another aboriginal language and it means “eaters of raw fish.” While it’s true that they do eat raw fish, they’d rather be called by the name they give t
hemselves, not a name someone else gives them. Which is fair, but Eskimo is fun to say.

  15 The agency is called “Mean and Ugly Security Options.” Check out their website at meanandugly.com.

  16 The Ticklestick is just one of the products available from Nonviolent Options Inc. of East Orange, New Jersey. They also offer a device that reproduces the sound of fingernails on a chalkboard and a hand-held projector that displays pictures of people getting paper cuts. All are extremely effective.

  17 Rennet is essential to cheese making. It is an enzyme found in a sheep’s stomach that causes the milk to curdle. How anyone discovered this quality is uncertain. Perhaps a sheep had the flu and threw up in a milk pail. We may never know. And do we really want to?

  18 Curds, not Kurds. Curds are immature morsels of cheese that must be ripened and aged over time. Kurds are a people who inhabit a region that encompasses southern Turkey and northern Iraq. No one knows if Kurds ripen with age, but it is likely that if they were pressed, liquid would come out of them.

  19 The Spartans were a bunch of Ancient Greeks who lived in a town called Sparta. They were warriors who lived with very few personal comforts: no playing, no toys, no ice cream or video games. The video games weren’t such a hardship because they hadn’t been invented yet. Not even Donkey Kong or Pac Man. As a result, the Spartans excelled at fighting. Another example of misdirected energy. Spartan is now synonymous with frugal, harsh living conditions. If you read a holiday brochure and it says the hotels are wonderfully Spartan, don’t go.

  20 Viggo omitted mentioning the carnivorous Arctic foxes that, though small, have been known to gently eat sleeping people without waking them. Also, hordes of lemmings might run over anyone caught unawares, but the likelihood is minuscule.

  21 Viggo is correct that orphans don’t grow on trees, but there are orphans who grow in trees. In the Turgwazi tribe of Central Africa, orphans live in tree houses because it is deemed unlucky if orphans touch the ground before they are sixteen years old. They grow to adulthood in the trees and then become members of society in full standing. So, technically, some orphans do grow, if not on trees, in them.