The Taylor TurboChaser

by David Baddiel

  “OK. Where’s the horn?”

  “There,” said Rahul, pointing to a can that was hanging down on her right side. Its top half was poking through what appeared to be another cat flap in the roof. She reached up.

  “Don’t press it. It’s an air horn. They make a very loud noise. Plus they work on gas, and it might run out.”

  “Is that … a cat flap in the roof as well?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought so.” She pointed at the “dashboard” – a few bits of wood painted black behind the steering wheel. It had loads of bits and pieces fixed to it. “This clock …”

  “Yes, it’s an alarm clock.”

  “Isn’t it the alarm clock from the Alarm Clock-to-Dreams Device 4446?”

  “Yes. I’m suspending production of that for the minute so that we can use it just as the car clock.”

  “When is your dad leaving for Japan?” said Janet.

  “Late on Sunday,” said Amy.

  “No, but when exactly?”

  “Um …”

  “He’s getting a flight at two,” said Jack. “So he’ll be leaving his work about midday.”

  “Let’s set it for midday on Sunday, then,” said Janet. “So that we don’t miss it!”

  “Can we do that?” said Amy.

  “I’ll give it a go,” said Rahul.

  “Hmm,” said Jack. “If we do miss that time, how will the alarm clock going off help? Won’t it just make us feel worse?”

  Janet stared at Jack. “I’m glad you’re not coming with us.”

  “What is this little screen?” said Amy, pointing at something else on the dashboard.

  “It’s a sat nav,” said Rahul.

  “What, a real one? Not one you’ve knocked together out of a compass and some bits of string?”

  “No. My dad gets some direct from the factory that makes them. He gave me this one to play with a while ago, because there’s something wrong with its voice.”

  “What?”

  “You’ll see. Also,” said Rahul, “we now have lights!”

  He clicked on some switches next to the sat nav. The inside of the garage door lit up.

  “Wow! Bright. Kind of.”

  “Bit speckled. But I’ll keep improving it … plus, on the back, we’ve got indicators now.” He gestured to a series of black felt-tip pens, taped together to form a single stalk next to the steering wheel. Amy pushed it down. Rahul bent forward and from under the chair took out a small pyramid-like object. He opened it up – a little upright pendulum on the front of it went from right to left.

  “What’s that?” said Amy.

  “It’s called a metronome. Piano players use it to keep time. Listen.”

  Amy did. Each time the pendulum went backwards and forwards, the metronome went tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.

  “Have you brought a keyboard?” said Janet, from the back. “Are we going to be singing as we go?”

  “No! It’s a sound effect. For the indicator. You know, in your mum or dad’s car, when they click down on the indicator … that’s what the sound is … Tick. Tick. Tick.”

  “Wow,” said Jack. “You really have thought of everything.”

  “Thank you,” said Rahul, who, as we know, didn’t really get sarcasm. “I haven’t really worked out a sound system … although I have taped this portable wireless speaker to the dashboard … but I don’t have a phone.”

  “Your dad’s warehouse doesn’t have phones?” said Amy.

  “Yes, but my dad won’t let me have one.”

  “Does he let you steal most of his stock and drive it to Scotland normally?” said Jack.

  “No,” said Rahul, confused.

  “I’ve got mine!” said Janet.

  “Of course you have,” said Amy.

  Janet took out a pink sparkly phone. “With its new cover! I chose it specially, to go with this outfit!”

  “I think we should be getting on,” said Amy. “It’s already half past midnight. I was hoping to do most of the journey tonight.”

  “OK,” said Rahul.

  “OK,” said Janet.

  “OK,” said Jack, heaving the fish tank up again, and getting into the back of the car next to Janet.

  Amy turned round. “What are you doing?”

  “Getting into the car. Ow! Get your wing out of my face!”

  “Get your face out of my wings!” said Janet.

  “You’re coming with—?” began Amy.

  “Of course I am.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, I could say because I’m your older brother, and as your older brother I feel you need someone a bit more mature and responsible around to make sure you make it back in one piece. But the real answer is: this whole trip is going to be just SO JOKES!”

  “OK,” said Amy. “Let’s go.”

  She pushed the direction lever forward.

  The Taylor TurboChaser started to move forward.

  Slowly.

  “Oh …” said Rahul. “I hadn’t bargained for Jack coming. With a fourteen-year-old boy in the car …”

  “What are you saying, Rahul?” said Jack.

  “Well. We’re a bit heavier now than I planned. It’s going to use more power.”

  “How very dare you,” said Jack, with a raised eyebrow.

  “It’s OK. We’ve still got this.” Rahul pulled open the little door in front of him marked ONLY IN EMERGENCIES, containing the turbo button that Amy had pressed the other day. “I was hoping not to use it so early, but …”

  “What is it?” said Jack, peering at the little switch.

  “Turbo,” said Amy.

  “Cool,” said Jack.

  “And will it still work?” said Amy. “With the extra weight?”

  “I don’t know. I charged up the battery a LOT. So …” Rahul turned to Amy. Her face was hopeful. He blinked. “We should be OK. I guess.”

  “Let ME press it!” said Janet, reaching over from the back.

  “Ow! Now your wings are in MY face!” said Amy.

  “NO! Don’t press it, Janet! That button will make the car go really fast. At the moment, right into the garage door!”

  “Oh,” said Janet. “Yes.”

  She sat back again.

  “Ow!” said Jack.

  “Maybe you should take the wings off now, Janet,” said Amy.

  “Hmm,” said Janet, as if thinking, Maybe I will, but don’t blame me when the wings might be needed and I won’t be wearing them.

  “So …” said Jack, “you know, three minutes ago, that thing I said about this being jokes? So far it’s not as much as I thought it might be.”

  Amy tutted. “Rahul. Open the garage door. Please.”

  Rahul reached into his pocket and took out a remote control – a new remote control.

  “I will. And don’t worry. I’ve overhauled the whole system. This will definitely open the door the whole way now.” He looked round. “OK … are we all ready? Seat belts on?”

  “This thing’s got seat belts?” said Jack.

  “Yes – can’t you see yours?”

  “Ah yes. It’s under a bit of wing.”

  “Right,” said Rahul, “I’m pressing the remote button. Good luck, everyone. And remember – quiet as possible as we go out of the garage and out of the drive – we don’t want to wake up my parents …”

  Everyone nodded. Janet, slightly needlessly, raised her finger to her lips and went “SHHHHHHH!” really loudly.

  Rahul’s finger hit the button. The garage door began to move up slowly. It looked like this time it was definitely going to go the whole way up.

  Unfortunately, it did.

  Because just as it got high enough up for the Taylor TurboChaser to get out, the door, whose hinges had clearly not stretched quite this far for a while, started to make a screeching noise. A screeching noise that was less like a garage door opening and more like someone torturing a hundred bats. A hundred bats with microphones.

  “WHAT IS THAT NOISE?�
�� shouted Jack.

  “SHHHHH!” said Janet.

  “THERE’S NO POINT IN SAYING ‘SHHHH’, TINKERBELL!”

  “WHAT?” said Janet.

  “STOP THE DOOR MOVING, RAHUL!” shouted Amy.

  “I CAN’T!” shouted Rahul.

  There was a lot of shouting. Which probably didn’t make the noise level any lower. Lights went on in the flat above Agarwal Supplies – the flat where Rahul’s family lived.

  “Oh dear …” he said.

  “WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?” said Janet. And then, “SHHHHH” to herself.

  Amy’s face set in a determined way. Jack, looking over, thought, Hmm, I’ve seen that face before.

  But before he’d even finished having that thought, Amy had leant over, put her hand into the box in the dashboard and pressed the red turbo button.

  “WHAT IS GOING ON?” came Sanjay’s voice. Rahul looked up to see his dad leaning out of the window of their flat in his pyjamas.

  “HOLD ON TIGHT!” shouted Amy. And she pushed the lever forward as far as it would go.

  “Aaarggghh!” screamed everyone, as the car catapulted forward, much, much faster than anyone was expecting.

  “Where am I going?” said Amy.

  “Away from the warehouse door!” said Rahul.

  “OK!” she said, sweeping the car left – AAARGGGHH!” went the other three again, as they swung across the seats that way. “But then what?” She hung on as they rounded a couple of corners, faster than she’d like, the whole car leaning to one side, then the other.

  “Remember the brake!”

  “Oh yes!”

  She pressed on the brake button. The car slowed down instantly and stopped on the edge of the industrial estate. An actual road lay ahead.

  “Where do I go out of here?” said Amy.

  “Start the sat nav,” said Rahul. “It’s got your dad’s work address in Scotland already preloaded.”

  Amy turned it on. The screen lit up. And said:

  “Trowch i’r chwith!”

  “Pardon?” said Amy.

  “Trowch i’r chwith!”

  “Is it speaking backwards?” said Janet.

  “Sounds Welsh,” said Jack.

  “Yeah …” said Rahul. “It is. It’s faulty. The voice command offers you a number of languages. But this one’s stuck on Welsh.”

  “Brilliant,” said Amy.

  “RAHUL! WHAT ARE YOU DOING!”

  They looked round. Sanjay had come outside, with Rahul’s mother, Prisha, who were both in dressing gowns and just looking very confused.

  “Trowch i’r chwith!” said the sat nav.

  “What does it mean?” said Amy.

  “I think it means give up now, this is never going to work,” said Jack.

  “Do you speak Welsh?” said Rahul.

  “Oh my,” said Jack, “this is going to be a long

  “RAHUL! GET OUT OF THAT THING!” shouted Rahul’s mother.

  “There’s a picture, on the sat nav screen,” said Janet, pointing. “With arrows.”

  Amy did a double-take. “You mean a map. Of course there is! Thank you, Janet. Now, I’m the stupid one!”

  “Pardon?” said Janet.

  “Nothing,” said Amy. She peered at the screen. “Left! It means turn left!”

  “Trowch i’r chwith!,” said Jack. “Obvious.”

  Amy swung the steering wheel left, and the car moved into the road. It was dark. But then she clicked the light switch and the blackness in front of her lit up. She moved the direction lever gently forward.

  “Oh my days,” she said. “We’re off!”

  Jack was looking round. “Not for long. Rahul’s mum and dad are getting into their car. They’re going to chase us! And, I imagine, fairly soon catch us!”

  Rahul shook his head. “No, they won’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “I know my mum and dad. Very law-abiding.”

  Behind them, in their car, Rahul’s mum turned to his dad. “Come on, Sanjay! Why are you not starting the car! They are driving away! Rahul and his friends are driving that strange thing away! In the middle of the night!”

  “Prisha, have you put your seat belt on?”

  “Oh! No. Sorry … Where is it?”

  “Good question.”

  They both looked around for a while for their seat belts. And then, when they realised their seat belts weren’t there any more, they both looked out, to see the back of the Taylor TurboChaser driving away.

  For a while, everything was fine. Amy drove along the road, the lights, which were brighter than she expected, illuminating the way in the darkness.

  Amy found that by carefully adjusting the direction lever back and forth, she could make the TurboChaser go at a constant, not-too-fast speed. Every so often another car would come past, and the driver would frown at them, but then, because this was a big city and all sorts could be seen on the roads, they would forget about it immediately and just drive on. It felt incredible to be driving along an actual road. The sat nav kept on barking out orders in Welsh, because Rahul had programmed it to take the route with the least possible traffic, so they had to take quiet little back roads. Plus there was hardly anyone about because it was night. But still, it was all so exciting.

  In fact, for a while, it looked like Rahul had thought of everything. For example: within five minutes, spatters appeared on the glass in front of Amy.

  “Oh no,” she said, “it’s starting to rain!”

  “Don’t worry. Click forward on the indicator stick!”

  She did. And immediately, outside the glass, what looked to Amy like a bendy kitchen mop appeared, and ran across the wet glass, soaking it up.

  “Is that …”

  “A bendy kitchen mop? Yes.”

  “A windscreen wiper! Amazing!”

  And then:

  “I’m cold!” came a voice from the back – Janet.

  “Hmm. Wonder if that could be anything to do with the decision to wear a fairy costume. With no sleeves?” said Jack.

  “I think it probably is something to do with that, actually,” said Rahul.

  “I’m cold!” she said again.

  “Don’t worry.” Rahul reached for a circular dial in front of him. It was a plastic one, and round it had been placed an arc of coloured tape: first blue, then red. He turned the dial so that it faced the red.

  Out of the floor behind the front seats, in between Jack and Janet, emerged a pole. At the top of the pole was a black hair dryer.

  “Can you switch it on?” said Rahul. “It’s battery-powered. But I haven’t worked out how to do that from the front.”

  Jack blinked in amazement. But after a bit of fiddling around the handle to find the switch, he did so.

  “Arrgh!” he said, getting a blast of hot air in his face. He closed his eyes.

  “Sorry. You need to give it a slap.”

  “What? I can’t hear you! It’s still blowing in my face!”

  “Give it a slap!”

  Jack did so.

  “Ow! You just hit me!” said Janet.

  “Sorry!” said Jack. “I can’t see.”

  Janet tutted, and slapped the hair dryer herself. It started to revolve.

  “Aaaahhh …” she said, when it got round to her, “that’s nice.”

  Rahul beamed with pride. He pointed to the dial. “Heating system.”

  Amy nodded. She pointed at the blue bit of tape.

  “It can go cold as well?”

  Rahul shook his head. “No. That’s just to look right.”

  “I see,” she said.

  The journey seemed to really be going much more easily than Amy had thought it might do. She even decided to say this out loud.

  “It’s going much more easily than I thought it might do. If everything carries on like this, we’ll be in Scotland by the morning!” She looked at her watch. It was 1:30am on Saturday morning. Dad wasn’t leaving for Japan till Sunday. Loads of time!

  “Y
eah! Definitely!” said Jack.

  Amy didn’t like the sound of that. Jack never said anything positive – unless he was being sarcastic.

  “Because one thing Rahul’s parents will definitely do,” continued Jack, proving her right, “is sit in the car and just wait for us to come back. And not ring our mum, or anything …”

  Amy’s stomach fell.

  Rahul frowned, and shook his head. “No, I think they might do that.”

  “so, Mrs Taylor,” said DCI Bryant, sipping the tea that Suzi had made for him. They were sitting in the Taylors’ kitchen, round their small breakfast table. It was the very early hours of Saturday morning. “Your daughter is disabled …?”

  “Yes. She had an accident a few years ago and broke her back. Now she can’t use her legs.”

  “What kind of accident …?”

  Suzi’s face, already clouded with worry, turned even darker. “Her father was driving. It wasn’t his fault. Another car was on the wrong side of the road and … anyway, do you need to know all the details of that? Will it help find her?”

  DCI Bryant blinked. “No. I guess not. I’m sorry to intrude on a painful memory.”

  Suzi nodded.

  “I imagine it was painful, though,” said PC Middleton.

  Suzi looked over. PC Middleton was standing by, his notepad in hand.

  “PC Middleton …” said DCI Bryant wearily.

  “A car crash … Ow!”

  Suzi frowned. “That’s not quite what ‘painful’ means in that—”

  “Don’t bother, Mrs Taylor,” said DCI Bryant even more wearily.

  “I think it may be more important to tell you about the car, Mr Bryant,” said Sanjay, who was also sitting round the table, as were Prisha, and Colin and Norma Warner, Janet’s parents. It was pretty cramped. Not least because Colin and Norma were both happy to spread themselves out on their chairs. “The one they went away in,” Sanjay added.

  “The car? The children were kidnapped by someone driving a car?”

  “No, no, no!” said Prisha. “She was driving the car! Amy!”

  DCI Bryant turned to Suzi. “Your daughter, a child, was driving a car?”