Tramp Life

by Tony Telford

  ‘Okay, I believe you,’ said Drae. ‘I mean, I believe he was up here. But there’s gotta be some other way down, man. People don’t just vanish like that.’ He started looking along the edge of the balcony, testing parts of the railing.

  ‘Drae, listen, don’t worry about that now. Just tell me where the others are.’

  ‘God knows. Haven’t you called Jean?’

  ‘My phone isn’t working. But what about Miri? I thought she was with you.’

  ‘She went back to get Hook and Jean. And then I got stuck in that tunnel, didn’t I. Someone locked both doors on me.’

  ‘Oh my God, so you were just on the other side of that door. I was stuck in that bedroom for ages. Didn’t you hear me calling? I was screaming my head off.’

  ‘Didn’t hear nothin’, man. That door’s solid iron. Know how I got through, though? I tore a strip of metal off the tunnel roof and then I used it like a chisel to loosen the bricks. Hard work, man. Took me a while. Soon as I got into that bedroom I saw this in the fireplace.’ He held up my fountain pen. It must have dropped out of my satchel when I was climbing the tower. ‘That’s how I found the ladder.’

  ‘So you haven’t seen Matty?’

  ‘I thought he was with you.’

  ‘He was, but we got separated in the factory.’

  ‘Factory? What you talkin’ about?’

  ‘Didn’t you see the door through to the factory?’

  ‘What door?’

  ‘Come on, I’ll show you. We’ve got to find Matty. I’m so worried about him.’

  I could never have got down that ladder if Drae hadn’t been there to lead the way and guide my feet onto the rungs. Even then, my boots kept slipping on the wet iron. By the time we reached the bottom I was trembling with exhaustion.

  Back in the white room there was a jagged hole in the wall where Drae had broken through from the tunnel. As I’d expected, the door to the factory was closed now, but it opened when I pressed the button, just like before. I led Drae out across the huge dark chamber, scrunching over piles of nuts and bolts and weaving between the squat black shapes of old machinery. I felt almost at home in the dark now, like some creature in the jungle.

  We found the ladder and climbed to the balcony where I’d last seen Matty. At the back of it there was a tall archway. We stepped through it into a narrow space filled with grey, blurry light. For a few seconds I felt like I was underwater, swimming down a passageway on a sunken ship.

  Drae clutched my arm. ‘What’s that?’

  I stopped, and then I heard it—a soft whirring noise, like something spinning very fast.

  ‘It’s coming from there,’ Drae whispered. ‘On the left.’ I felt along the wall. There was a handle, a big iron handle. I had to lean to force it down. With a loud clank, the darkness split and a heavy door swung back into half-light.

  We were at the entrance to a square chamber, about thirty feet across but at least twice as high. On the opposite wall there was a huge window with thousands of tiny panes of white frosted glass. The light falling through it was silence made visible. On each side of the chamber several big round doors were set into the wall, like washing machines in a giants’ launderette. In the middle of the room, on a raised platform and silhouetted against the window, there was a bulky, box-shaped thing on a stand. The whirring noise, much louder now, seemed to be coming from there.

  But then my ears tuned into other sounds—knocking, and a muffled voice.

  ‘Matty!’

  We shot across to the big round doors on the right. The knocking was coming from the third one along. In seconds Drae had got the door open and Matty spilled out like a heap of rags.

  ‘Matty, are you all right?’ We put our arms round him, trying to prop him up.

  ‘I’m okay, I’m fine—’ He was panting and gulping for air. ‘Look, Pearly—’ He waved his hand towards the open door of his prison. Two big dark eyes were watching us there.

  ‘Oh my God! Boo!’ Then she was in my arms, wriggling and licking my face all over, just like when she was a puppy. I kissed her silky ears and buried my face in her warm fur. I don’t care what anybody says, no fancy perfume can beat the smell of a dog.

  ‘She’s all right,’ breathed Matty. ‘She’s fine. Just hungry. She was there when I came in. Heard her scratching the door. But when I opened it, she—she wouldn’t come out. Too scared. So I climbed in to get her. Next thing I knew, the door closed. Couldn’t break the glass. God, it’s hot in there—But listen, we’ve gotta get out of here. We’re being watched.’ He nodded towards the box thing on the platform. It had stopped making the whirring sound, but now there was an orange light on one side of it.

  ‘Camera?’ I whispered.

  Matty just shook his head.

  I gave him Boo and climbed the steps to the box. Seeing it up close didn’t make me any wiser. It was just a small black metal box on a stand, about six foot high. I walked round it. No buttons or dials. Only that orange light smouldering like a distant fire.

  Drae had followed me up. ‘Don’t go too close.’

  A violet light, dazzling and intense, flared inside the box. When it faded, the dark seemed endless.

  Drae cursed. A grey light glimmered, like the ghost of his voice.

  I raised my hand in front of the box. A single white light burned for a few seconds, then slowly died. I moved my hand from side to side. A faint green light glowed in the depths of the box. It seemed miles away. Light years.

  ‘It can see us,’ I whispered. A red light blinked. ‘And hear.’ A silvery-blue light shimmered like a lone firework.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Draemon. ‘So what the fuck is it?’

  ‘I’m Bernard,’ said the voice of the machine, so soft and clear. ‘I’m Bernard O’Hare.’

  Suddenly I felt tired and cold and small, and everything in the world seemed utterly pointless.

  But then there was a shout and Drae was rushing at the machine and I was yelling and trying to hold him back.

  ‘Stop it, Drae! Just leave it! There’s nothing you can do.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ he growled, and swung his foot out at the box. He only just caught the edge of it, but that was enough. The thing wobbled for a moment on its slender stand, then whoomph—it plunged backwards, punching a massive hole through the bottom of the big white window. For a moment I held my breath as the remaining glass shook and shivered like a sail in the breeze. Then down it all came, exploding on the floor with a deafening, roaring crash.

  When I opened my eyes again, the backs of my hands, my hair and my coat were encrusted with thousands of tiny specks of light, and the window was just a big hole full of stars.

  Drae stood motionless, diamonds glinting in his black hair.

  ‘You all right, Drae?’

  He nodded, eyes lost in the stars.

  I touched his shoulder and stumbled down to where Matty was cradling Boo in a square of starlight.

  ‘Hey, Princess,’ he said, ‘do you think we can go home now?’

  17

  ‘Where is everyone?’ complained Miri. ‘I thought we were leaving at twelve.’ Her rucksack must have had at least a hundred badges with band names and messages like What now? and Stop pretending to be yourself.

  Matty was sitting next to me on the garden wall, juggling three white pebbles. ‘I’ve been ready since eight.’

  ‘Mr Efficiency ’imself,’ commented Jean.

  Suddenly there was the most god-awful noise, and Hook Morton staggered out of the house with what looked like a monstrous green caterpillar stuck to his back. I’d never seen such a huge, lumpy rucksack. Half a dozen saucepan lids and God knows how many kitchen utensils had been tied to it with bits of string, and they were all clattering, bonging and pinging against each other like instruments in some weird mechanical orchestra.

  ‘He’s a one-man band,’ sang Matty.

  ‘Nobody knows or understands,’ I completed the line.

  ‘What’ve you got in there, ’ook?’ Jean
shouted over the noise.

  ‘It’s only the basics,’ puffed Hooky. ‘I’ve h-had to leave h-half of it behind.’ He let the rucksack crash to the ground.

  Matty hopped down from the wall and peeped inside. ‘What’s this? Saucepans, frying pan, egg-poacher, kitchen scales, grater—’

  ‘Leave it, Matty,’ pleaded Hook. ‘It took me all morning to get them in there.’

  ‘—Sieve, measuring jug, breadboard, mixing bowl, baking tray, casserole dish. You can’t take all this, mate.’

  ‘But how am I going to manage with the meals?’

  ‘Hooky,’ I said, ‘you could do a banquet in just that frypan.’

  ‘And we’ve only got a two-burner stove, Hook, so what’s the point?’ said Jean.

  Hooky stared. ‘What’s the point? Do you know how much all this c-cost me? And we’re not going to be on the road forever, remember. One day we m-m-might have our own place, with a decent kitchen. Then you see if I don’t do you some proper meals. But I’ve got to have the right gear, haven’t I?’

  It was a fortnight since the events at Newland Crescent. During those two weeks we’d seen and heard absolutely nothing of Bernard O’Hare. Every day we’d scoured the local papers for reports of a death or strange goings-on at the old factory, but there was never a word. In fact, everything had been so quiet, so normal, it was hard to believe all that stuff had really happened.

  Until yesterday, that is.

  It was breakfast time, and Hooky had just served French toast. Suddenly there was a rush of footsteps and six black-clad figures burst into the room.

  ‘Oh God, the cops,’ groaned Matty.

  As soon as they came in they started shouting and screaming. ‘Stand up!’ Face the wall! Arms up!’

  Rough hands shoved me against the wall, rifled my pockets, prodded me all over.

  Jean started crying. ‘Take it easy with her, man,’ thundered Draemon. ‘Why you comin’ down so heavy? We ain’t terrorists. We ain’t even resisting.’

  Without a word, the cop searching Drae stepped back and pointed a taser at him.

  ‘Jesus,’ muttered Drae. ‘What kind of people are you?’

  ‘Be the tree, Drae,’ I heard Miri whisper. ‘The tree in the storm.’

  ‘Shut up, all of you! Sit on the floor! In a line! Hands on your head! I said, hands on your head! Now keep ’em there!’

  The one giving the orders was a red-faced giant of a man with shoulders like two sides of beef.

  ‘Right—’ He pointed at Hooky. ‘We’ll have a word with you first.’ Two of them marched poor Hook out of the room.

  Waiting in the silence, I could feel the eyes of the other cops picking over my appearance. It made my skin go all hot and tingly. How long were we supposed to keep our hands up like this? And what if we just couldn’t anymore? I tried to think of other things and found myself remembering that night at the church and how the police had turned up minutes after I’d left. I’d always thought that was O’Hare’s doing. Maybe this was, too.

  Hooky returned slumped between the two cops, shirt out, trousers half undone, his face grey and lifeless. When they let him go, he tumbled to the floor like a load of firewood.

  ‘What’ve you done to ’im?’ said Drae, half-rising.

  ‘Stay where you are!’ bawled the giant. ‘Hands on your head, all of you!’

  ‘I’m okay,’ whispered Hooky, but I saw him wince as he raised his arms.

  Miri saw it too. ‘Can’t we put our hands down now?’ she said to the giant. ‘You can see we’re not causing any trouble.’

  ‘You put your hands down when we tell you to,’ said one of the other officers, a blonde woman with a smooth, oval face like a doll. As she turned away she exchanged a smile with the giant.

  Drae was watching them through a curtain of dreadlocks. ‘You’re not part of the solution, man,’ he said. ‘You’re part of the problem.’

  ‘Shut it, Sambo,’ said the giant. ‘Or we’ll give you a few more problems to think about.’ The cop with the taser lifted the muzzle a few inches higher.

  Next they took away Matty, then Miri and Jean. And then it was my turn. The blonde woman and a gangling, hollow-cheeked man led me into the Octagon Room and made me sit on one of the crates while they stood on either side of me. Then the man started reading out questions from his tablet while the woman filmed me with a tiny camera. My interviewer read every question in a desolate monotone. ‘Are you or any member of your group involved affiliated or in contact with any extremist organisations or with any individual who has links with such organisations for example political activists, left-wing agitators, animal rights groups, environmentalists agitators, anti-fracking campaigners or anti-capitalists.’

  ‘Extremists?’ I stammered, not sure if I’d understood the question. ‘None of us are extremists.’

  He sighed. ‘Are you or any member of your group engaged in activism or protests of any kind.’

  ‘Any kind?’ I said. ‘Are all protests banned now?’

  He ignored that, too, and started asking about where I’d come from, and how long I’d been in the City, and how I’d met the others. I answered all the questions as honestly as I could, but I didn’t say anything about Bernard O’Hare. I didn’t think there was any point, somehow.

  After me, they interviewed Draemon. Then they searched the house from top to bottom. They even took up some of the floorboards. But whatever they were looking for, they didn’t find it. Before they left, the giant gave us a little lecture about how the law had changed and squatting was now illegal.

  ‘You understand, of course, that I could take you into custody right now, but just this once I’m gonna let you off with a caution. Try this again and you won’t be so lucky. All right? Now, don’t let me find you here tomorrow.’

  Matty asked if anyone had given them a tip-off about us. Like me, he was convinced that O’Hare was still alive and well. The giant shook his head. All such matters were ‘confidential’.

  After they left, Hooky went off to his room and we didn’t see him again till late in the afternoon.

  ‘I’ll make a start on dinner, then,’ he said, tying on his apron.

  ‘I can do it tonight, Hook,’ said Jean.

  ‘No, no,’ he said. ‘I want to do something sp-special for our last night here.’

  The meal was special all right. I could have eaten the dhal forever, and the biriyani was out of this world. But Hooky himself hardly ate a mouthful.

  Afterwards, we stayed up half the night talking about what to do now. Draemon and Matty were dead keen on hitting the road. Hooky wasn’t so sure, and Miri and Jean didn’t like the idea at all. As for me, I was quite used to tramp life by now, but I was worried about taking Boo out on the road again so soon. She’d been quite poorly after we got her back, and she still seemed a bit fragile. In the end, though, we agreed to hike round for a while.

  ‘A week maximum,’ said Jean. ‘Then we’ve got to find a place, okay?’

  It was amazing how cheerful we all were the next morning. Even Hooky seemed like his old self, I was pleased to see. He was still trying to squeeze the saucepans back into his rucksack when Draemon emerged from the house in a long yellow cape and a black stovepipe hat. Coloured ribbons were woven amongst his dreadlocks.

  ‘Wow, Drae,’ said Miri. ‘You look like you’re going to a carnival.’

  Draemon shrugged. ‘Every day’s a carnival, man.’

  ‘But where’s all your stuff?’ asked Jean. All he had was his guitar.

  ‘What stuff?’

  ‘You mean you’re not taking anything?’

  ‘Nup.’

  ‘Just your guitar?’

  ‘Yup.’ He smiled. ‘He who travels lightly, travels happily.’

  ‘I know another version of that,’ said Jean. ‘It goes, she who travels lightly.’ And she dumped her bulging pink rucksack at his feet.

  Me and Matty and Drae had got out of O’Hare’s house in no time at all. Amazingly, both of the tunnel d
oors were open when we came back through—proof, said Matty, that O’Hare was still alive and kicking.

  ‘I bet you anything he came through here after he got down from the tower.’

  In the TV room, the armchair still faced the rows of silent screens, but the golden tree had vanished. Somehow, despite everything that had just happened, I couldn’t help lingering for a moment in the room’s strange sunset glow. That smell was still there, I noticed. Just a trace of it now, like incense or anaesthetic… But already I could hear Drae wrenching open the front door, so I hurried though to the hallway.

  Out in the street everything was just the same as it always was, lights on in all the houses, sound of a TV, a kid’s scooter lying on the footpath. But where were Miri, Jean and Hook? We walked to the corner. They were nowhere in sight.

  ‘Oh God,’ I said. ‘Don’t tell me they’re still in there.’

  ‘Why don’t you call Jean?’ said Matty. ‘Come to think of it, why didn’t you call her before?’

  I was just telling him how my phone had conked out when the thing started ringing.

  It was Miri. ‘Pearly! Thank God! We’ve been trying to get you for hours. Are you okay? How’s Boo? Yeah, yeah, we’re fine. We’re just waiting—what, where are we? Back at the house, of course. Yeah, Blackbird House, didn’t you know? Oh well, don’t tell me now. Just get home soon as you can. Talk when we see you.’

  It was after midnight by the time we got back, but they were waiting for us with plates piled high with sandwiches and biscuits and chocolate fudge cake and baklava. And a massive pot of Hooky’s tea, of course. For the first time in my life I felt like I was coming home.

  ‘But where were you?’ said Jean as we hugged. ‘We thought you’d be ’ome hours ago.’

  ‘We’ve only just got out of there,’ I said. ‘You wouldn’t believe—’

  ‘But Matty said you were going to the vet’s.’

  ‘What you talking about?’ said Matty. ‘I never said that.’