I was getting desperate. But at last I came to a plank bridge. And perhaps I could take advantage…I crossed over, spun round, grabbed hold of the plank and pulled it across after me.
The animals skidded to a halt. The trench was too wide for them to jump, too deep for them to clamber in and out. I had cut them off! They stood there baffled for a moment, snorting and bleating and bellowing.
But I had forgotten that some of them had wings. With a great flurry and bustle, the hen took off into the air. She flew up over the trench and hovered above my head.
“CARK! CARK! CARK! CARK!”
The other animals backed away and vanished into the smoke. I stared up at the hen. She was flying in a very ponderous and ungainly fashion. If only I could drive her off…I scooped up a handful of snow and made a snowball.
“CARK! CARK! CARK! CARK!”
I threw – and clipped the tip of her tail-feathers. She flapped and fluttered but remained airborne. I made another snowball and had another go. Another near miss. I was just about to have a third go when I became aware of the snorting bleating bellowing sounds again. Suddenly the other animals were approaching from the opposite direction!
I cursed. They must have crossed by another bridge further along, they must have circled right around behind me. I turned to run. But now the trench was blocking my way! I had made a trap for myself!
Desperately I grabbed for the plank. I had only seconds in which to re-erect the bridge. The animals apeared out of the smoke, charging towards me in a wide enveloping formation. They were snapping their teeth together with a sharp metal sound like the opening and closing of scissors. They could hardly wait to take a bite.
I swung the plank back over the trench, back into its original position. I dashed across just inches ahead of their snapping teeth. They were almost on top of me. No time now to pull the bridge away!
I ran as I had never run before. My heart was pounding fit to burst. I sprinted through the snow like an Olympic champion. And little by little I forged ahead. Six yards, eight yards, ten yards ahead.
Then there was a shout from somewhere off to the side. It was Mr Caulkiss giving orders.
“Fall back! Reassemble! Flanking to right and to left! Phelia with Quode! Margus with Melestrina! Move!”
Suddenly the animals were no longer chasing me. I looked around and there was nothing but smoke. Only the hen still remained. She had gained altitude and was now circling high overhead.
I slowed to a jog. My burst of speed had left me exhausted. All I wanted was to curl up and hide away somewhere. But where? How? Along with the problem of my footprints there was now the additional problem of the hen. I couldn’t think what to do.
I jogged on across the clearing, turning and swerving this way and that. Five minutes passed. Still nothing happened. Only the hen continued to hover overhead, uttering the occasional harsh “CARK!”
But I had the feeling that they were marshalling against me. Now I could hear muffled sounds in the smoke, animal cries and voices calling out. From every direction the sounds came and they seemed to be getting closer. There was another sound too, a kind of mechanical rumble. What it was I couldn’t guess.
I was still jogging along when Mr Caulkiss’s voice rang out once more at full volume:
“Duck assault! Two flights! Commence aerial attack!”
Then came a beating of many wings, followed by a high-speed approaching VRROOOOOOOOOOOOSH!! I looked up as three white shapes hurtled down towards me from a great height. I was being dive-bombed by ducks!
I flung up my arms. Just in time! The leading duck was aiming for the top of my head. Instead it struck against my forearm, tearing into my coat with its beak. The other ducks dived lower, going for the body. I dodged to the side so that one of them missed completely. But the other caught me full on the chest. I stumbled and staggered, winded by the force of the blow.
VRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH!!
I looked up and saw a second flight of three ducks descending. Again I flung up my arms and tried to dodge. This time they went for my legs. I was whacked around the knees and bitten on the calves. I slipped and skidded around helplessly. But still I didn’t quite fall.
“Left and right flanks deploy! Reserve to the rear! Centre advance!”
One of the birds had its teeth caught in the material of my trousers. I kicked it away. The other ducks had gone. I started to run in what seemed like the opposite direction to Mr Caulkiss’s voice.
I hadn’t gone far when I came to a mound of snow-covered earth. I climbed the slope and stood at the top. But now I saw a dozen or more shapes approaching through the smoke. Some of them looked like ordinary pigs and goats and cows. But the rest?
Then I realised. The strange-looking shapes were composed of animals and riders. The inhabitants of Morbing Vyle were now mounted. There was Mr Quode sitting on top of a pig, and Craylene side-saddle on a goat, and Melestrina with a large brown cow gripped between her thighs.
“Tally-ho!” they shouted.
“Forward the Vyle!”
“Up and at him!”
I ran back down the slope and tried another direction. Almost immediately I came to a low brick wall. I vaulted clean over without even breaking stride. But that was as far as I got. There were shapes approaching in this direction too. This time it was the sheep that were blocking my escape. And slung across the back of the leading sheep was the festering form of Mr Scrab.
It was the first time I had observed anything more of him than his face. He was wrapped up entirely in bandages – filthy green-stained bandages. He lay across the back of the sheep like a corpse. His feet hung down on one side and his head hung down on the other. But he was still sufficiently alive to open his eyes and see me. His upside-down mouth poured forth a stream of invective:
“There he is! The enemy! The traitor! Dang him! Drat him! The sanitary saint! The well-washed wonder! The dainty-skin! The germ-free juvenile! The self-abluter!”
Again I turned and raced away. Back over the wall, off in another direction. I seemed to be running around in circles. Thirty paces on, I came to a middle-sized trench, about five feet deep and five feet wide. Not too wide to clear with a jump. But even as I was preparing to jump, I heard Mr Caulkiss’s voice on the other side of the trench:
“Columns converge! On all fronts!”
I had run straight back towards him! And there was that strange mechanical rumble too! I couldn’t see the source, but it sounded like moving metal parts and revolving wheels.
KerCHUG-kerCHUG-kerCHUG! KLANK! KerCHUG-kerCHUG-kerCHUG! KLANK!
They had me trapped on all sides. How culd I break out? Already the shapes of the animals and riders were looming behind me!
I had only one hope. I stepped forward into the trench and dropped to the bottom. There was soft snow at the bottom, piled up over a foot thick. I chose a direction and started ploughing through the snow. I kept my head well down below the level of the surface.
The trench led me out between the advancing sheep and cows. Scurrying along at the bottom of the trench, I could hear hooves tramping above, passing by on either side. They were still closing in – on nothingness!
But my disappearance had not been entirely unobserved. With a sudden flurry of wings, the hen came down to block my way. Hovering high overhead, she must have seen everything. Now she landed in the bottom of the trench, rearing aggressively with her chest puffed out. She opened her beak and showed her teeth.
I didn’t know whether she was going to utter a cry or take a bite. I gathered my legs under me and launched myself forward through the air. With my right hand I grabbed her beak, with my left hand I grabbed her throat. Before she could move I clamped her beak shut. Desperation lent me strength. I wrenched sharply with both hands and broke her neck.
It took only a moment. I tossed the still-fluttering body aside on the snow. Now my way was clear! I continued along at the bottom of the trench as fast as I could go.
I passed a couple of inte
rsections: first a small shallow trench cutting across at right angles, then a large deep trench running off to the side. But I stayed with my original trench. It was taking me out towards the edge of the clearing. Now I could hear the crackle and roar of the fire in the forest.
After a while I risked raising my head. I peered out over the snowy surface of the ground. There was a reddish light reflecting on the snow, and a wide band of redness glowing through the smoke ahead. And the heat! I could feel it hitting against my face in wave upon wave.
I lowered my head once more and kept on going. I kept on going until I heard the baffled shouts of the Caulkisses and Quodes, the frustrated cries of the animals. Obviously they had discovered the failure of Mr Caulkiss’s strategy. For a moment I felt triumphant. But then I remembered the trail of footprints behind me in the trench. How long would it take Panker to track me down again?
I decided that it was time to leave the trench. It wasn’t easy to scale a five foot wall with snow at the bottom and snow at the top. But eventually I managed to scramble out.
The forest was only thirty yards away. Now I could see the flames leaping and darting around the trunks, licking voraciously over the branches. The black twisted trees were silhouetted in the firelight like martyrs on a pyre. But they didn’t seem to be actually burning away in themselves.
I rose to my feet. The heat was more intense than ever. Around by the edge of the clearing, it had melted the snow to a kind of soft porridgey slush. And right at the very edge, even the slush had melted away. A narrow strip of bare wet ground ran round under the trees.
Immediately I realised my opportunity. Where there was no snow there could be no footprints! This was my best chance yet! I headed for the slush and the bare wet ground.
The heat was incredible. I had to go right up beside the flames. I was sweating and sweltering and drooping on my feet. But I ran round over the bare wet ground as far as I could go. Fifty yards, a hundred yards – I kept on running until I was almost collapsing.
Then I turned and headed in towards the clearing again. I ran across slush, then back onto snow. Surely this time I couldn’t be followed…
Directly ahead of me was an arch. Strange coincidence! It was the very same arch that I had first sighted when I originally arrived at Morbing Vyle. A Gothic arch in the Perpendicular style, about thirty feet high, standing all by itself in the middle of nowhere. Now it loomed through the smoke as it had once loomed through the rain.
I ran towards it. Already I had an idea for the perfect hiding place. I came to a trench and crossed over by a plank bridge. Perhaps the very same plank bridge that I had first crossed over three weeks ago.
The arch was just as I remembered it, a hodge-podge conglomerate of cemented bricks and stone. And it was still framed in a cage of scaffolding. As I came up close, I saw that some of the wooden spars were starting to burn, some of the rope lashings were smouldering. The scaffolding must have been set alight by flying sparks, like the vicarage. But it still looked solid enough to climb.
That was my idea for a hiding place. If I could stretch out on top of the arch, I would be completely hidden from the ground. The Caulkisses and Quodes might search all over the clearing, but they’d never think of searching upwards.
I climbed the right-hand pier of the arch, where the scaffolding looked slightly less burnt. I took great care with my handholds and footholds, testing with my weight to make sure that the timber was sound. It didn’t take long to get to the top.
Once at the top, I stepped off the scaffolding and lowered myself onto the stone of the arch itself. The curve of the arch was relatively flattened and the span was like a sloping open bridge. It was about three feet wide and covered with partially melted snow.
I began to crawl cautiously up the slope. I moved out beyond the pier, suspended over empty space with a thirty foot drop on either side. I kept on crawling until I was almost in the middle of the span. Then I settled myself down in the snow.
At last I was safe! At last, at last! I pulled my coat tightly around me and lay out flat on my stomach. Even baby Panker couldn’t possibly…
But then I discovered that baby Panker could. Louder than ever came that inexorable highpitched squeak:
“WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!”
∨ The Vicar of Morbing Vile ∧
Sixty-Four
I jumped and almost fell off the arch. Again the sound shrilled out:
“WHEEEEEEEEEEEP!! WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!”
My first surprise was that he had managed to track me down at all. But my second surprise was that I still couldn’t see him. The sound was so very very close. Yet there was no place I could fail to see him up here on the arch. So where was he hiding?
And then finally the truth dawned. I lifted up my coat and there he was – bulging in the pocket on the left-hand side! I must’ve been carrying him around all the time! No wonder he had always been able to reveal my location!
I was furious. With both hands I took hold of the pocket and squeezed. Slowly I worked the bulge upwards. Baby Panker struggled every inch of the way. But eventually two small blue eyes emerged into the daylight, and a whir of tiny pink hands and feet.
I was just about to pop him out like the cork from a champagne bottle. But at the very last moment, he wriggled through my hands, back down to the bottom of the pocket. He was as slippery as an eel. I had to start all over again.
I was wasting precious minutes. I should’ve been thinking about getting down to the ground before my pursuers caught up with me. But all I could think about was getting rid of Panker. Again I tried, and again and again. But always he managed to evade my grip.
In the end I decided on a change of approach. Instead of getting Panker out of my coat, I had the idea of removing my coat with Panker still in it. Balancing precariously, I stood up on the narrow span of the arch and started to unbutton my coat.
But now baby Panker was wriggling more wildly than ever. The left-hand side of the coat flew and flapped in every direction. I slipped the coat off my shoulders, I got my arms out of the armholes. But the left-hand side of the coat wrapped itself around my legs. In the very act of flinging my coat over the side of the arch, I lost my balance and flung myself over too. Flailing and windmilling, I dropped thirty feet to the ground below.
BFFFFFFFF!!!
I landed with a tremendous impact. I was lucky I didn’t break any bones. I lay sprawling and half-stunned. For a while everything seemed quiet, ominously quiet. Beside me on the slush, my coat was now quite flat and empty.
Then I noticed movements, about twenty yards away. I raised myself up on one elbow. The animals of the Vyle were standing around me in a ring. Their flanks had a dull red sheen in the glow of the firelight. I was surrounded by open jaws and metal teeth, by dangling tongues and gloating eyes.
I rolled over to look on the other side. On the other side were the inhabitants of Morbing Vyle. The ring was complete. Melestrina, Craylene, Mr Quode and Mr Scrab were all still mounted upon their respective animals. But not Mr Caulkiss. He was mounted upon something else. I stared in disbelief. He was mounted upon his machine – the machine that ran on human blood!
It looked exactly as it had looked in the laboratory. The same caterpillar tracks, the same glass jars, the same pipes and rods and cogs. Only now the tracks turned, the rods slid back and forth, the red liquid bubbled in the glass jars. The whole machine was panting and throbbing with eager life. And there in the middle stood Mr Caulkiss, upright on the brown felt box.
I could see how he had made the thing work. It was a horrible sight. He had torn open the front of his cassock and connected the tube from the machine directly on to his own human heart. No syringe, no needle. Instead there was a great jagged crack down the side of his chest, a terrible gaping fissure in the flesh. And protruding through the fissure, the red rounded shape of his heart. He had pulled it forth like a soft wet turnip. The tube was attached to the severed end of the main ventricle.
KerCHUG-kerCHUG-kerCHUG! KLANK! rumbled the machine.
BLEEEEHHH! blared the goats.
MOOOOOOOMMM! roared the cows.
BAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! bawled the sheep.
WAKKERWAKKERWAKK! raged the ducks.
Mr Caulkiss threw a lever. The blood-engine changed to a slower rhythm, a sort of low idling chug.
“Dismount!” he cried. “Maintain guard! Officers advance!”
The human inhabitants of the Vyle dismounted. Mr Caulkiss got down from his machine, Mr Quode from his pig, Melestrina from her cow, Craylene from her goat, Mr Scrab from his sheep. Mr Scrab’s sheep was left with a filthy greenish discoloration all over its back.
“Vyle!” they chanted. “Vyle! Vyle! Vyle! Vyle! Vyle!”
They began to advance across the slush. Mr Quode had stripped himself naked and his corpulent body was grimed and black with smoke. Mr Scrab’s bandages had come undone and dragged along in a train behind him. Craylene seemed to have lost whole parts of her face, where the skin-coloured make-up had fallen away to reveal a sort of grey stuff underneath. As for Melestrina, her eyes had reduced to small dark buttons like dry clots of blood. But she had acquired another pair of eyes lower down, two tiny blue eyes peeping forth from the front of her gown. Evidently Panker had taken up residence in his mother’s cleavage.
Mr Caulkiss was in the worst state of all. He shuffled towards me with the tube still fixed to his heart. He was completely drained of blood. His skin was almost transparent, hanging and flapping in loose slack folds. He was a mere skeleton, a framework, a tottering tower of bones. But he reached up with his hands and squeezed the wet red turnip of his heart. He seemed to be pumping it manually.
“We are going to be vile with you, Mr Smythe,” he said in a whisper. “Nothing is forbidden.”
The others laughed and giggled in an ecstasy of madness.
The Vicar of Morbing Vile Page 22