‘It’s a bit spooky, ain’t it?’ said Torreycanyon. ‘Like floating through the sky.’
‘It’ll be worse the other side,’ said Knocker. ‘Between here and Swiss Cottage the streets get very posh, nowhere to lie low. We need to get right over to Kilburn; it’ll be better there.’
As the column approached the railway line a Borrible whistle floated over from the far side. Twilight sprang from the ground.
‘That was Coco,’ he said. ‘He sent me over to tell you we’ve got to cross the line and the scrapyard’s between this line and another one further on. It’s a kind of big square of wasteland. He says there’s no one about.’
One by one and taking infinite care the Borribles stepped over the rails. When they were sure that everything on the far side was safe Sydney led the horse forward. Here, on the far side of the track, the ground became even soggier, almost like a swamp, and it was impossible to move silently. Every pace they took made a loud squelching noise and the horse made more sound than all the Borribles put together. Knocker swore at the lack of silence, but there was nothing to be done.
After travelling a hundred yards or so they saw, or rather sensed, a huge fence rising up in front of them; guessing it was there only because it was slightly darker than the night sky. A train went by on a distant line. Doors slammed in a station away to the west and Orococco came out of the darkness and grinned.
‘This scrapyard goes on for miles,’ he said. ‘I ain’t seen anybody yet but that don’t mean they ain’t here.’
‘It certainly don’t,’ said an unknown voice, and the Adventurers crouched and made themselves small against the ground, drawing their catapults.
‘Catapults, eh?’ said the same unknown voice. ‘Don’t bother. First you’re surrounded, second we knew you were coming; them Conkers told us.’
‘We’re Borribles,’ said Chalotte, ‘on the run. Are you the Scrappers?’
‘Yeah, we’re the Scrappers,’ said the voice, ‘and we know who you are. I expect every Borrible in London knows a bit about you by now.’
‘We need somewhere to hide,’ said Knocker. ‘Only a few hours, then we’ll be on our way.’
Two silhouettes moved at the top of the fence. Knocker had an impression of heads and shoulders. There was a sound of people jumping, then the sound of a sheet of corrugated iron being lifted and let fall. Knocker felt someone near him, someone he didn’t know. He tensed.
‘Take it easy,’ said the voice that had already spoken. ‘Just follow us along by the fence a bit. There’s a bigger gap along there, we’ll be able to get the horse in, and don’t get any ideas about trying yer catapults. You can’t see us but we’re all here.’
The Adventurers did exactly as they were told, following the sound of Sam as he plodded along, over his fetlocks in mud.
‘Why is it so muddy?’ asked Stonks. ‘It’s nearly up to my throat.’
‘Wait till you get inside,’ said the Scrapper. ‘Mud is a way of life here. They chum it up with machines and lorries. You can swim in it. Have to.’
The noise of walking stopped and another sheet of fencing was pulled back, swinging on hinges, and Sam was taken into the scrapyard. The Adventurers kept close to him.
‘Welcome,’ said the Scrapper, ‘to the largest scrapyard in the world.’
The Adventurers soon discovered that their new companion had not been exaggerating about the mud. Inside the fence it was indeed much worse, and walking was more like wading and the wading released a long imprisoned smell into the air: a stale smell of grease and garbage, all touched over with a whiff of mouldy carpet.
Orococco whistled to himself. ‘This must be one of the great niffs of London,’ he said, ‘but at least it ain’t raining.’ As he said it the rain began to fall once more, diluting the mud and making it deeper.
The Adventurers trudged on. They were desperately weary now and could only lift their feet with great effort. It was only a few hours since they had left the warehouse and marched to attack the abattoir, yet it seemed like longer—days, weeks. How far away Battersea was. How far Brixton. A lifetime ago.
But although they were weary they were happy. They had recaptured Sam, they were still all together and at last they could see where they were going. At strategic corners electric lights had been set up, rigged on overhead cables by the mechanics who worked in the scrapyard and left burning from dusk till dawn for the benefit of the nightwatchman; a nightwatchman who spent all his nights curled round a hot-water bottle in his wooden shed.
‘He never gives us any trouble,’ said the Scrapper. ‘Never.’ He swept an arm out to indicate his vast domain. ‘It’s like us having our own city here,’ he continued, and there was pride in his voice. The Adventurers had to agree with him. The scrapyard certainly was an extraordinary place, laid out like a town but constructed entirely from the ruins of old cars and lorries.
The vehicles, many hundreds of them, all smashed and ruined, were heaped five or six high, one on top of the other, and piled side by side, each pile leaning against the next for support. It was a tidy yard and seemed to stretch on for ever and ever. The Adventurers, once inside, could not see or even guess where it ended. What was obvious was that the Scrapper knew his way round this labyrinth like an ordinary Borrible would his own home town, notwithstanding the scores of streets and the skyscrapers of cars that towered up and out of sight and into the rain.
The most solid of the wrecks had been turned into Borrible houses with sacks or carpets hanging at the windows to keep out the weather and keep in the warmth. In the highest cars were the lookouts, and as the column of Adventurers slogged by, warning whistles sounded out in the dark, echoing like catcalls across the roofs of metal.
At last the Scrapper brought the Adventurers to a dead end which led back to the iron fence. This street was so tall and narrow that here the cars had collapsed against each other on the fifth or sixth level to form a sinister-looking tunnel.
Napoleon Boot halted and grabbed the Scrapper by the arm. ‘I don’t like this,’ he said. ‘“It’s a dead end and dead ends tend to get you dead, in the end.” That’s a proverb.’
The Scrapper sneered and pointed. ‘This is the safest place in the yard,’ he said. ‘That’s why we’ve given it to you to sleep in. Believe you me, we don’t want the Woollies to find you … Wouldn’t do us any good.’
Napoleon looked where the Scrapper pointed and saw in the gloom—for the nearest light was some distance away—that at the end of the tunnel, parked sideways on, was the remains of a double-decker London bus.
‘You see,’ went on the Scrapper, ‘it looks rough enough from the outside, but inside we’ve made it very comfortable, and if you have to get away in a hurry, there’s an escape hatch at the back which comes out right opposite a hole in the fence. You could be away at the first sign of danger.’
Napoleon fingered his catapult. ‘Okay,’ he said, but he didn’t sound too sure.
Knocker was nervous too. He glanced upwards and saw that a dozen or so Scrappers were on guard above him, catapults at the ready.
The Scrapper smiled. ‘We travel through the cars,’ he explained, ‘from one street to another, along the top … You don’t want to start anything.’
Knocker nodded. ‘Don’t want to,’ he said. ‘All we’d like to do is get in the dry and get some sleep. I feel as wet as the bottom of a drain.’
The Scrapper laughed and led the way to the rear corner of the bus and touched a switch. There was a sound of compressed air being released and a door folded open. ‘It’s big enough for you to get the horse in,’ he said. ‘Our lads like horses and nicked some stuff from a pet shop in Chalk Farm. We got some grub for you too.’ The Scrapper advanced a little further and there was a fumbling. Then a light came on, though not all at once, only gradually did it glow up to strength.
Sydney took Sam by the leading rein and helped him climb the high step into the vehicle. The horse stumbled in exhaustion, both physical and emotional, and Chal
otte was obliged to push him from behind.
‘Poor bleeder,’ she said. ‘He must have thought every moment was his last all the time he was in that slaughterhouse. He must be in a right old state.’ Then Chalotte stopped speaking and just stared. The others came and stood close to her, glad to be out of the wind and the damp at last.
‘Well I never,’ said Bingo. ‘Look at that.’
The interior of the bus had been altered completely. All the seats had been unbolted from the floor and rearranged down both sides. There was a kitchen table and one or two kitchen chairs. On the table were plastic shopping bags with food spilling from them. Thick underfoot lay car carpets, and dotted about were small armchairs, rescued from rubbish dumps. What pleased Sydney more than anything else was the huge pile of clean straw and the sack of oats which she could see down at the driver’s end.
‘Oh,’ she said, leading the horse forward. ‘Come on, Sam, you’re in clover here, real clover.’
The Scrapper placed his hands on his hips and beamed at everybody. He looked very happy with himself. ‘The Conkers sent us a runner the other day,’ he said, ‘so we made it as comfortable as we could. Upstairs you’ll find enough mattresses for every one of yer … You’ll soon be warm and dry.’
The Adventurers fell on to the long upholstered bus seats with groans of fatigue. Now, in the light of the twelve-volt battery lamps, they could see each other.
‘Swipe me,’ said Torreycanyon. ‘Just look at us.’
It was true. Every single one of the Adventurers was covered in thick mud up to the waist and the rest of their bodies were splashed over with it; so were their faces and even their woollen hats. Under the mud was the gore of the slaughterhouse, and under that was the accumulated dirt and grease from the caverns of King’s Cross and the towpath of the Grand Union. Their clothes were tom too and their boots and shoes, casualties of the never-ending rains, were gaping along the uppers.
Chalotte removed her raincoat and then touched the Scrapper guide on the shoulder. ‘We know your tribe is called Scrappers,’ she said, ‘but what is your name?’
The Borrible grinned. ‘Strikalite,’ he said.
Chalotte nodded. ‘Well, Strikalite, yours is a very fine name and I hope that while we are here you will have the time to tell us how you won it. My name is Chalotte and this here is—’
‘So you’re Chalotte,’ said Strikalite. ‘I thought you might be. I’ve heard about you. The Great Rumble Hunt, eh? We’ve heard the tales. That is Sam the horse then; that must be Knocker and that little suspicious bloke, he’ll be the Wendle, Napoleon Boot.’
As he spoke Strikalite was joined by two of his friends carrying plastic jerrycans, heavy with liquid. ‘Hot broth,’ they said. ‘We made it with vegetables from Camden Market.’ And they began to pour it into some large mugs which they had brought with them for the purpose. The Adventurers held the mugs in their hands and warmed their fingers, scrutinizing the strangers closely as they gave out the food. When Borrible meets Borrible it is the usual thing to do.
In fact the Scrappers were very much like the members of any other tribe, although there were some minor differences due to their strange way of life. They were dirtier, if that were possible, than most other Borribles the Adventurers had met, but that was because they lived in old oily motorcars; their clothing was scruffier too, for the same reason. Not that a great deal of it was visible in wintertime for then the Scrappers always wore over-garments of yellow oilskins, sou’westers and Wellington boots. Where they lived mud and water were everywhere.
But these strange Borribles were nothing if not resourceful. As might be expected they were very talented mechanics and could fashion almost anything out of metal, diesel generators included. Some of the cars they lived in were marvels of comfort and design with radios and even television sets in them. Almost everything they needed they put together from junk, using their own clever hands only.
Unfortunately very little of what they made was destined to last long; the very nature of their home saw to that. The yard was there to gather in discarded vehicles, remove anything that was valuable, sell it at the front gate and turn what remained into piles of scrap. Only three or four labourers were needed for the job but they did it thoroughly, working their way round and round the dump and ripping everything to pieces until they were left with only hollow shells of steel. These were eventually shoved into a crusher and squeezed down so hard that each car was, at the last, transformed into a solid lump of metal no larger than an orange box.
Every day the men did their work and every day the Scrappers watched and only when it was necessary did they move their hideouts from one side of the yard to the other. Luckily for them this way of life was not as inconvenient as it might at first seem. The yard was acres wide and no one Scrapper would have to move his home more than once or twice every two or three months. The scrap men ignored the Borribles as long as they kept out of the way and, best of all, the SBG had no idea that anyone was using the place to live in. Given good fortune the Scrappers would never be discovered.
Sunroof and Chivvy, the Scrappers who had carried in the soup, explained all this and the Adventurers began to relax. Gradually the odd oblong room became warmer as a battery-driven heater hummed and hummed. To the Adventurers, that strange bus, lost in London between two railway lines, felt like a palace. Before long they had removed their outer garments and hung them up to dry, and a moment later had all fallen into the deepest of slumbers, lying awkwardly, too tired even to go upstairs to the mattresses that had been prepared for them. Napoleon, the last to succumb, tried to rouse himself before slipping into unconsciousness. He rubbed his eyes and shook his head.
‘Someone must go on lookout,’ he mumbled.
Strikalite glanced at the Wendle and paused in the act of throwing a rug over Stonks. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘Us three will keep watch … All you need to do is kip. Go on, get to sleep.’
Reassured, Napoleon did as he was told, and as soon as all was peaceful Strikalite and his two companions extinguished the lamps and climbed to the bus’s upper deck in order to take turns resting and watching, mounting a keen-eyed vigil over the grotesque and silent towers of scrap. All night they kept guard, staring through a rain that fell straight like spikes, a rain that washed the blood from the cobblestones outside the slaughterhouse in Baynes Street and riffled the black waters of the Grand Union Canal.
And in the scrapyard itself that same rain rattled on the tin roofs of a thousand gutted vehicles and half woke the Scrappers who lay curled up beneath them. And the rain fell further, down to the ground, and plucked at the surface of the mud itself, making it look pimpled and blistered all over and yet settling the earth, beating it deeper and denser, effacing the footmarks of all those who had passed through the city of broken motor cars, until at last there was no sign left that Borrible or horse had gone that way that night, or indeed any other night.
In the morning the tired light of dawn came only reluctantly to that corner of the scrapyard which sheltered the derelict bus. The rain was still falling from the low sky, but only lightly, swirling without direction in fitful gusts of wind. The Adventurers slept on, their bodies needing to recover after the exertions of the previous twenty-four hours.
They might well have slept for another twenty-four hours had they been allowed to, but eventually the steady silence of the bus was broken by the hiss of the vacuum door and Strikalite appeared carrying a large jug of cold water. He walked over to where Chalotte slept and shook her awake.
The Whitechapel girl sat up immediately and blinked her eyes. ‘Cripes,’ she swore. ‘I aches all over.’
‘You’d better wake ’em up,’ said the Scrapper. ’It won’t be long before the men start work and your mates might have to be ready to move out. You never know.’
‘Yes,’ said Chalotte. ‘Okay. Is it still raining?’
Strikalite swore in his turn. ‘Course it is,’ he said, ‘and the forecast is rain for the next twenty
years.’
Chalotte smiled at his remark and began to wake her friends while Strikalite filled a kettle from his jug and switched it on. ‘I’ll make some tea,’ he said to no one in particular.
As soon as Sydney woke she sat up in the straw where she had spent the night and looked at Sam who was lying next to her. The horse was still fast asleep, his legs stretched out, all his nervousness gone. Sydney smiled and stroked the animal, knocking the dried mud from the horse’s flanks with her hand. ‘You rest, Sam,’ she said. ‘It’s not far to Neasden now.’
The kettle boiled and Strikalite made the tea in a large metal teapot. There was plenty of food and fruit left over from the previous evening and the Borribles made a good breakfast. Every now and then, as they ate, a Scrapper scout came into the bus and told Strikalite what was happening outside. It was obvious, they said, that the scrap men were working at the other end of the yard that day and the fugitives could relax. Strikalite was delighted. ‘You see,’ he said, ‘it’s nice and peaceful here just as long as you keep your eyes open.’
The Adventurers spent the remainder of the day resting and eating, for they were well aware that they would need every bit of strength they had to cover the last miles to Neasden. They dozed, they chatted and they played fivestones, one of their favourite games. They also wondered about their friends the Conkers.
‘There was a bit on the wireless this morning,’ Strikalite informed them, ‘but they never mention Borribles do they? I suppose they don’t want to frighten the adults. Anyway, all they said was that a lot of animals had escaped from some lorries in Camden Town and caused a traffic jam, and that most of the animals had been rounded up during the night except some horses that were running wild on Hampstead Heath and beyond.’
‘Aha,’ said Orococco, ‘that’ll be Treld and Swish and the others. What a bunch! I sure hope they get away all right.’ And with that sentiment everyone present agreed.
The Borribles: Across the Dark Metropolis Page 24