“That’s enough, eh, Nick?” one of them said.
“Is he still conscious?” said Nick.
“Yeah.”
“Then it’s not enough.” Nick kept punching and kicking and might not have stopped, except another car was coming.
Michael wasn’t conscious by the time the dark car drove up, and Nick and the Boys scattered in the night.
“Is he all right?” the girl asked.
“Get back in the car, Jane. I’ll call for an ambulance.”
But she brought a blanket for Michael and waited with her father.
When the hospital doctor had him cleaned and stitched, Stanley Ford stepped into the pale room. “Want to tell me what happened, son?”
“Wrecked,” the boy answered. “My bike.”
And the nurse said, “Mm-hm.”
“Want to tell me what really happened?”
But he didn’t tell. He lay two days in the hospital bed, both eyes blackened, ribs bruised but not broken. The Little Ones needed him and he wasn’t there for them. He’d finally found something to care about, beyond his own small needs, and here he was stuck in a smelly bed in a smelly room with butter-colored walls.
Maxine Bellknap stood outside Folk-in-the-Clover, watching her breath hang in the cold air. Inside, Bertram, the wiry cook, brought the Chief Magistrate’s dinner of pig’s nose with parsley-and-onion sauce.
As the town bell struck seven, Horace Ackerby II began to eat by the chattering fire, looking out on the churchyard, listening to the wind in the yews. Maxine found her nerve and went to his table and said, “Mr. Ackerby. I’m sorry to bother you. And of course, I never would. But.”
The Magistrate set down his fork. “What is it, Ms. Bellknap?”
“Well. Then. The boy. Michael Pine.” The Magistrate was listening now. “Officer Ford says he was taken. The boy was taken. To the hospital, in a bad way, a slight concussion. He told Stanley it was a bicycle accident. But of course.”
“Of course it wasn’t.”
Maxine wished she’d never come, wished she were home in a warm robe, with a pot of tea and gardening magazines, choosing spring seeds to order.
“He wouldn’t say what happened. Still I thought. You should know.”
For a very long moment, Ackerby said nothing.
“Thank you, Ms. Bellknap.”
“Well, then,” Maxine said and they said their good-byes.
The Chief Magistrate chewed at his food, slowly, and fell into a silent solitary rage. A street fight, a gang brawl. And after he, Horace Ackerby II, had taken such a chance on the boy. After all the time and effort he’d invested.
Should he end the experiment now? Should he swallow his sizable pride and send Michael to the YOI where he belonged?
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE DAY OF THE UPENDED EGG
Charlie Ford, the policeman’s son, told Jimmy Bennet, and Penelope Rees overheard and told her mother, who called Frances Froth and that’s how Mr. Tiswas found out and let Gadbury know and once Esther and Stella got the news, everybody knew what happened at the crossroads. Gang warfare, in their own city, and one boy in the hospital with a concussion!
The people of Moss-on-Stone knew they had a problem and they knew it was Nick and his Boys. “The most pernicious race of odious little vermin that nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth,” Stella called them.
Stella and Esther decided to start a Merchants Watch Committee. The business owners would keep an eye on each other’s shops, taking turns patrolling the streets. It was a shame it had to happen in a village like theirs, but what choice was left?
On Wednesday, Michael was well enough for school, but still bandaged and bruised and sore. His teacher, once more, did not call attention to him but went on with their studies of the explorer Captain Cook:
“As his ship Endeavour rounded the tip of South America, it reached that point where two great currents converge, where Atlantic and Pacific Oceans meet. The seas are unpredictable here and violent storms explode with no warning. Cook’s sails were filling with a deadly wind . . .”
Charlie leaned to Michael and sniffled, “I have a fifty pound note in my shoe. My nan gave it to me for not failing school. You want t’see it?”
Michael shook his head, no. Charlie was always coming up with stories like that.
“You want, I’ll show you,” Charlie whispered. “Anytime.”
And Michael said, “C’mon, Charlie. Please be quiet.” He wanted to know if Captain James Cook survived the stormy sea.
As the bruises faded and the cuts healed, the boy didn’t notice the sunlight stretching longer and the air growing warmer around him. He didn’t notice the new weasels being born, and their weasel-parents needing extra food for them.
The monsters came to the Garden City more and more, on their murderous hunts. They seemed to grow bolder, sensing, somehow, that change was coming. Again and again, the tower bell rang and the Little Ones raced to their secret shelters.
When the all-clear sounded, their little lives went on. Construction crews returned to work on the Great Hall. They had built the walls and the impossible dome was taking form: wood scaffolds held the masons who lay the herringbone brick that vaulted to its peak.
Outside Flestrin’s Wall, in a meadow by the cottage, where the clover was ready to bloom, Lem taught Michael to use the old rifle and they practiced on weasel-sized bottles. He showed the boy how to cut back the weeds where the vermin might breed. He passed on every possible trick to keep the Little Ones safe from the dangers of a wide and heartless world.
On a warm morning in March, a coat of waterproofing beeswax was spread on the roof tiles and the Great Hall was finished. Burra Dryth’s dream was now real and stood twice as tall as any building in the city. Its fresh-cut stone shimmered in the sun as its flowing walls and windows rose to the startling dome. The main chamber was decorated with mural and mosaics and held the locked vault of the Inevitable MaGuffin. There was a celebration that afternoon, with speeches made and essays read by schoolchildren. There was dancing and singing to the ever-same, never-same tune.
Philament Phlopp had been working for weeks on a new fireworks display. As the night fell, the show began and rockets painted delicate pictures—brief sparkling scenes from the history of their Nation—on the dark still sky.
Michael leaned close when Burton Topgallant said: “Look at this little monster.” He was holding something, pinched between thumb and forefinger, but Michael couldn’t see anything.
“What is it?” the boy asked.
Topgallant put the thing in a small jar and gave it to Michael. And still the boy could see nothing. “It’s what our scientists call a flflfl,” the G.P. explained. “It’s not often you see one.”
Michael peered into the tiny glass. “I still don’t see one.”
“A flflfl,” Topgallant went on, “is a flea that lives on the back of a flea of a flea. They’re really very small.”
“Yes,” the boy nodded. “Really.”
“And yet, it doesn’t hesitate to bite me. Imagine! It has no sense of its smallness,” Topgallant said as he took back the jar and let the unseen creature go. “Just as it has no sense of my BIGNESS.”
From across the Garden City, the tower bell began a sudden pealing. A weasel had slipped over the Wall.
Lemuel came from the cottage and handed Michael the old rifle and said, “You better take care of that.”
And the boy said, “Why me?”
This was the day of Vernal Equinox, when the world reaches its own crossroads and seasons change. On this day, light and dark are equal. On this day and no other, it is said, you can balance an egg on its pointy end.
“Why not you? It’s your time.” The old man started away. “Besides, I have to go now. I can’t say when, or i
f, I’ll be back.”
The bell was clanging, louder and faster. More weasels were coming.
“Go where?” the boy asked. “What’re you talking about?”
“I’m going to find her,” Lemuel answered.
“Who, find who?”
“Maya,” said Lem as he headed out of the garden.
“Whoa-whoa, hold on,” called the boy. “You’re kidding me, right? This is a joke. You’re not leaving me here all alone, are you?”
PART TWO
ADRIFT
CHAPTER TWELVE
WHERE ALL ARE KNAVES
But he was. He was going. He was gone.
And the weasels were coming. They were swarming Lesser Lilliput and filling the streets with panic.
The boy took aim and fired and the first shots went wild, one taking out a corner of the church spire. It took half an hour to chase all the vermin from the Garden City.
Michael ran to the stone cottage, but Lemuel and the dog were gone. The boy checked every room, ran to the gravel drive, rode his bike to the crossroad. But they had vanished. In every way, and forever, they had vanished into thin air. It was as simple as that.
Had the old man been planning this all along? Was he just waiting till Michael was ready?
And how would the boy tell the Little Ones?
He knew they were a resilient People. They can deal with it. Michael told them the truth. He told them, “Quinbus Flestrin is gone.”
And the town exploded in riot. The Little Ones wailed and screamed and some darted around in their underwear. Wagons were toppled, set afire, store windows smashed, and there was a brief run on the bank.
Well, Michael thought to himself, that could’ve gone better.
It took him hours to get them calmed down. He promised he’d watch over them, would check on them every day, would keep them safe, as Lemuel had.
But by the second day, he knew this wouldn’t be easy.
He was clearing the drains when he raked open a writhing new nest of weasels, right there in the back garden. Hissing and screeching, the things scattered up and over the Wall, and Michael found the bottom of the nest littered with the tiny remnants of roast rib and leg of lamb and an empty tin of Uncle Joe’s Mint Balls, leftovers from Hoggish Butz’ many picnics.
When Topgallant asked the People to take better care with their refuse, so not to tempt Monsters from Beyond, Hoggish exploded in a red-faced rage: “What did I hear? Did I hear what I heard?! Is he blaming us?! Is he actually blaming US?!” His big belly trembled, his whole body quivering with anger. “It’s YOUR job to keep us safe!”
Brother Evet could take no more. “Leave him be. You’re the one who’s always lookin’ to blame somebody.”
Hoggish spun on his smaller twin and his great gut tremored. “You! Ha! Like you have any right to talk! The way you ANTAGONIZE the poor creatures, shooting your gun at them, you beast! Is it any wonder they’re upset!?”
“Ahhhhh, rattletraps,” Evet grunted. “I’m the farmer who grows the food to fill your bottomless gullet. I have every right to protect myself. You’re the one who brings ’em here.”
“Great Ghost of Bolgolam!” Hoggish hollered, hysterical. “Why do I even listen to this slander!? I’m a gentle, peace-loving soul who takes lovely picnics by the lake and ponders the meaning of meaning. I am as BLAMELESS as a newborn babe!”
“Now, boys,” said the Grand Panjandrum. “We can’t change the nature of these monsters. They are only interested in food and we must keep ourselves off the menu.”
“And if that means shootin’ ’em, we shoot!” added Evet.
Hoggish sputtered and spewed and waved a thick finger at the crowd: “Do you hear that?! They’re trying to scare you! Both of them! This is how they plan to control you! With FEAR!” And he stormed away, wailing, “Oh, remove me from this land of slaves, where all are fools and all are KNAVES!”
There were mumbles, there were grumbles. Some of the People saw Hoggish’s point and some saw Evet’s side and neither had much use for the other.
Michael had never known them to act this way, so angry with each other, and he had no idea what to do about it. But he knew he had to keep them safe from the peril that filled their small world.
He set his alarm for four thirty each day and left the flat while Freddie still slept. He rode his bike through the wind-whipped mist and reached the stone cottage before dawn. He made his rounds of the little Nation and saw that the People were safe. At seven thirty, he was back on his bike and at school as the last bell rang. Each afternoon, he finished at Fenn’s Market and bicycled to the Garden City. After that and check-in with the Court, he was home and in bed.
It wasn’t an easy schedule.
On Tuesday as on Monday, he left Fenn’s Market and set out for the cottage. But as he reached the crossroads, he sensed that something was different, something was wrong. He pulled to a stop and he saw.
A quarter mile behind him.
A pale yellow car.
Following him.
He stopped.
The car stopped.
It was too far back and Michael couldn’t see who was driving. But he would not lead them to the cottage, would not give away the ancient secrets of Lesser Lilliput. He turned right at the crossroads, away from Lemuel’s house, and the car went with him.
He stayed on the farm road and the yellow car followed and they left Moss-on-Stone together.
At about this same time, Father Drapier walked into the village for dinner. Robby and Peter and Phil pried a small gravestone from the ground and smashed the refectory door with it. They crawled into the old church and stole whatever was worth stealing. The rest, they left in shattered pieces.
The sun was fading when Michael reached the next town, Ambridge. He stopped near an Indian restaurant and a coin dealer’s shop. Edgy, antsy, and dripping with sweat, he pretended to look in the long window of coins as he slipped glances up the street. The car was parked a half-block away, engine off, lights out. Michael still couldn’t see who was in it, but it had to be someone from Youth Court, keeping track of him.
From inside the coin shop, a wary and balding young man squinted at the boy beyond his window.
As soon as a moonless dark took the town and the streets grew shadowed, Michael jumped on his bike and sped off. The car tried to follow on the narrow knotted lanes. But a block ahead, the street was closed for a festival and the boy got away.
He pedaled through the windy night, as fast as he could, the full fifteen miles to the crossroads. Every part of him ached, inside and out, as he stopped to look for the car. He saw no lights, heard no motor. He was alone and safe and he started for the stone cottage.
Michael made a careful check of the Garden City. The Little Ones were well and not a weasel to be found. Dead tired and muscles cramped, he lay in the still-warm clover to rest. There was a concert in the town square that night and the orchestra played Maya’s music, loud and soft and soothing. The boy closed his eyes and sleep was quickly on him.
In a little house near the pastry shop, Hoggish Butz was eating a third éclair and listening to Ethickless Knitbone: “Everything is moving as we planned. The others are beginning to question Topgallant, I’ve heard them. They’re starting to wonder if he’s all they thought he was, starting to question whether he knows what he’s doing. It’s time for the next step.”
“Ooooo, yessss, the next step, of course!” Hoggish giggled, gurgled. “And what . . . is the next step?”
“We shall call for an election.”
“Oooooo, and I, Hoggish Butz, shall run for Grand Panjandrum!”
“Yes, Hoggish,” said Knitbone. “And no, Hoggish.”
“No, Dr. Knitbone? And yes?”
“You will not run for office. You will run against Burton Topgallant,�
�� she went on.
“Ah, yes, of course. And is there a . . . difference?” he asked softly, unnerved by his own ignorance.
“Immense! You should know this, Hoggish.”
“Of course! I’m a clever freethinker, you’ll remember. I only thought you might state it the way you see it, to be certain YOU have it just right.”
She nodded. “To win an election, you destroy your rival. You rob him of all credibility, integrity, dignity.”
“Yes,” Hoggish nodded thoughtfully. “I’d say you have it about right.”
Knitbone took him by the hand and led him to her office, where she had set up a strange machine, old and dark and oily. Hoggish shivered at the sight of it. “Great Ghost of Bolgolam, what’s that awful thing?”
“It is the key,” she told him, “which will unlock the Hearts and Minds of your Countrymen.”
“I never saw such a key as that,” he said, taking a few steps back from the foul-smelling heap.
“It’s a printing press, you—! A press, Hoggish, for printing.”
“Ahhh,” said Hoggish, taking a bite of another éclair he’d stuffed in his coat pocket. “I see,” he said, though he didn’t at all.
“Put down the éclair, Hoggish, and listen to me. Information is Knowledge and Knowledge is Power and Power is Truth and Truth is what the Teller says it is. Do you understand?”
“Except the part after ‘Put down the éclair, Hoggish.’ Could you repeat that last bit?”
But Knitbone knew it was faster to show him. She began writing scandalous tracts about Burton Topgallant, terrible lies about his hygiene, diet, hairstyle, pets, and grandparents. Hoggish’s jaw hung loose at the words he read. “Is—is—is this true?”
“That’s beside the point!” she snapped and his eyes grew red and wet with tears. “Listen to me, Hoggish,” she went on, kinder, gentler. “What matters is this. He will have to deny these things and the People will ask themselves, ‘What sort of a man is it who must defend himself from such rumors?’ You see how this works, Hoggish?”
The Last of the Gullivers Page 7