‘Yes, that day!’ Beth cut in sharply. ‘The day you gave Lisa breakfast in bed. The day something happened and you were scared to death and passed out. I know what happened!’
‘You don’t,’ Bunny said feebly. ‘You can’t!’
‘Oh, can’t I? Well, let me take a guess. You took her breakfast in to her. The room was dark, right? And there was a light of some sort –’
‘Like a rod, a whip!’ Bunny said eagerly. ‘No, it was more like a sort of pencil of light, it came straight down from the ceiling – right through the ceiling – and on to her bed –’
‘And into her brain,’ Beth said.
‘Yes! From above, right through the roof and ceiling and into her brain! Blue light or perhaps it was violet … And it flickered, very fast, all the time – flickered on and off –’
‘And her eyes, Lisa’s eyes, they were open, weren’t they?’ Beth said. She was on all fours, her face thrust right into Bunny’s face, her energy feeding the big, slack body of Bunny.
‘Her eyes were open,’ Bunny said. ‘Wide open. And she was sitting up in bed, all rigid. And her eyes … her eyes … they were alight! On fire!’
‘Her lips were moving,’ Beth prompted.
‘Her lips were moving,’ Bunny echoed. ‘And sounds were coming out. Mad sounds. Impossible sounds. So fast! Like thousands of starlings when they settle down for the night … They wheel round and round over Trafalgar Square, millions of them, all screeching and twittering at once … I’ve been to London, you know. Oh, yes. Her voice was like Trafalgar Square and the starlings.’
‘What do you think was happening?’ Beth said. ‘Come on, Bunny! What’s the answer?’
Bunny shook her head like a child refusing a dose of medicine. ‘How am I supposed to know?’ she whined. ‘What’s it got to do with me? Why always me?’
‘Come on, Bunny, out with it!’ Beth said. Now her fingers were firmly dug into Bunny’s arm.
‘Suppose she can hear us!’ Bunny said, staring with terrified eyes at Beth.
‘She can’t,’ Beth said flatly. ‘Go on. Tell me what was happening when the light came and Lisa’s eyes lit up and she talked that way.’
There was a long pause as Bunny again tried to refuse the nasty medicine. She hid her head, let herself surrender to hopeless tears, tried peevishly to pull away from Beth’s claw-like grasp. Then, suddenly, she gave in. She lifted her head, stuck out her lower lip and said, ‘She was talking to them. Them.’
‘Fine!’ Beth said. ‘Who’s them?’
‘Them, out there!’ Bunny said loudly. Suddenly her voice was raucous and defiant. ‘She talks to them, and they talk to her!’ she almost shouted. ‘They give her her orders or she gives them theirs. I don’t know which, and they talk through that rod of light! I’ve seen it more than once, but I didn’t want to see, I told myself, “No, it never happened.” But, it did happen, it does happen. They’re out there all the time, they’re out there now! They use her!’
‘What for?’ Beth said softly. She knew she was nearly there.
‘To trap us!’ Bunny burst out – ‘To make slaves of us! It’s got to be something like that, it stands to reason! And one day, perhaps soon –’
‘Quite soon,’ Beth said, ‘they’ll come. When Lisa tells them we’re ready! They’ll come, all of them. And almost all the world will be waiting to welcome them, do what they say – form queues to obey them, beg to become slaves! Unless we stop her. And them.’
‘We can’t stop her,’ Bunny said dully. She had slumped forward – had lost all her pride and strength again. ‘You don’t understand, you can’t possibly know, you don’t live with her as I do!’
‘But I did!’ Beth said. ‘Me and all my family! She was in our house, living with us. She looked different. She had a different name and body, she was an old lady we called Grinny. But it was her all right! And we beat her. We killed her. Timothy and me and Mac.’
‘Oh no you didn’t,’ Bunny said. ‘Lisa can’t be beaten. I know. She’s hardly human, you don’t understand! Listen – you remember that day when I spilled the boiling water –’
‘Oh, that,’ Beth said. ‘That was because she’s a machine. I mean, you won’t hurt a mincing machine by pouring boiling water over it. But you can still jam its works!’
Bunny was not listening. ‘The poor dogs!’ she blubbered. ‘I mean, they know what she is, so why can’t everyone see and understand? Humans, I mean. Dogs always know … that’s why they’re terrified of her – not just because she’s cruel, though she broke Prince Igor’s leg deliberately, did you know that? – but because she’s inhuman and evil and horrible. Yet to begin with, I worshipped her …’
She cried noisily, with her head between her knees.
Beth let her cry. She thought, ‘In Grinny’s time, we saw the spaceship that controlled Grinny. There’s been no talk of UFOs this time. I suppose they work at longer range, or something. They’ve become cleverer.’
When Bunny’s sobs died down, Beth said, ‘We’re going to kill her. Just as we killed Grinny. The one before Lisa Treadgold.’
‘How?’ said the muffled voice of Bunny.
‘I don’t know yet. But you’re going to help.’
‘Oh no I’m not! I’m probably dead already. If she’s heard us talking –’
‘You’re going to help us kill her.’
‘How? How, how, HOW?’
‘I don’t know yet. But it begins with you joining the Society. It’s a secret society and you have to join and promise not to tell anyone.’
For a brief moment, Bunny’s sobbing ceased. But then it started again, in a different way. Now the sobs were mixed with hysterical laughter. ‘Secret society!’ she half-laughed, half-cried. ‘A secret society … to kill … Lisa Treadgold!’ She hiccoughed and bellowed with laughter. ‘Oh, you’re marvellous!’ she cried, helplessly rolling on the ground with laughter. ‘You’re a scream, Beth!’
She fell forward on her face, racked with agonizing laughter. She clutched at the grass as she laughed, thrashed her legs, drummed her feet.
Buster the Dalmatian poked his nose into the heaving bundle of Bunny and looked anxiously at Beth, asking for guidance.
THE STRANGE DIET
‘There’s me,’ Beth thought. ‘I’m the most important, because I don’t go all foggy half the time, like Timothy and Mac. They can’t be relied on …’
The stalk of grass, mushy where she had chewed it, went into her mouth millimetre by millimetre.
‘There’s Bunny,’ she thought, ‘But she’s a wreck. Lisa has shattered her. She probably still can’t believe or understand that Lisa is really and truly a machine-monster.
‘All the same, she does know more than anyone else about Lisa – just as we knew more than anyone else about Grinny. So we need Bunny. But –’
As if she had been listening to Beth’s mind, Bunny suddenly said, ‘I can’t go on. I’m finished.’ She dabbed at her eyes and sat up in the grass, her big face slack and hopeless. ‘She did for me, Lisa Treadgold did,’ she said. ‘I mean, I was just made for her. She interviewed half a dozen of us for the job of being her Girl Friday, but of course I had to get it! It had to be big, clumsy, loyal, hardworking, ugly, stupid old Bunny!’ Her words ended in a despairing howl of self-pity.
Beth said, ‘That’s nonsense. She hypnotized you. She said, “You remember me” – and Bingo, you became her slave.’
Bunny hardly listened. She said, ‘She was my Pash, like in those old schoolgirl stories. Gosh, I suppose it’s funny, really …’
‘It’s not funny at all. It’s deadly serious. For the whole world!’
‘And your secret society is going to change it all, is that it?’ Bunny said, suddenly peevish. ‘Pardon me while I have a good laugh! Gosh, how old are you? About ten or eleven? But you’re old enough to save the world?’
Beth said, ‘I’m old enough not to keep saying “gosh” all the time.’
Her sharp nastiness silenced Bunny. She rubbed
her damp eyes for some time, then said, ‘It was all right at first. I mean, Lisa’s so terrific, so super-glamorous. She seemed to know everything, be everything, do everything. I just doted on her –’
‘What went wrong?’ Beth said.
Bunny thought hard before answering. ‘Nothing went wrong, exactly,’ she began. ‘It was just that … that no human could stand up to Lisa’s demands. I mean, humans aren’t machines. And Lisa is like a machine –’
‘She is a machine,’ Beth said. ‘I keep telling you.’
Bunny said, ‘I just couldn’t cope: it was as simple as that. I couldn’t keep up. She ran me into the ground – flattened me – got me into a state where even “You remember me!” had no effect any more. She expected the impossible of everyone else – and got it. But I was with her day and night, I just couldn’t cope …’
‘And then you saw the light,’ Beth interrupted. ‘The light in her bedroom, I mean. And before that, she broke Prince Igor’s leg. And now she’s given Banjo the D.D.D. treatment.’ She chewed her grass stalk, then said, ‘Why does she keep eating chocolate? Grinny didn’t do that. What else does she eat?’
‘That’s another weird thing about her,’ Bunny said. ‘She doesn’t eat! I mean, if I hadn’t been hypnotized, that alone would have told me … She hardly eats at all! She just goes through the motions of eating. She stirs the food about on her plate. Nobody’s ever noticed. Except me.’
‘But you gave her breakfast in bed, the day you saw the light,’ Beth said. ‘She asked for breakfast in bed.’
‘Oh, that. If you want to know what I think, she asked for it simply to get a news story out of it. “Lisa’s Day Off”, that sort of thing. She’d got the press coming that day, I think. And anyhow, she didn’t eat the food, just the lemons.’
‘The lemons?’
‘Oh, she sucks lemons. Gosh, I can’t watch! Slices of lemon, like a rugby player or something. One minute lemons, the next chocolates. Sweet and sour. She never seems to eat eggs or toast or anything like that. Sometimes I wonder if she flushes the real food down the loo.’
‘Those chocolates,’ Beth said.
‘Yes, she wolfs chocolates! That’s the thing she’s really greedy about, those special chocolates. Gosh, you’d never believe, we get crates of them delivered each week! From Fontenville in Bond Street. To her special order.’
‘No one can eat crates of chocolates each week,’ Beth said.
‘No, I suppose not. But Lisa certainly tries! Still, I suppose she gives a lot away – you know, Lisa Treadgold Special. Instead of signed photographs or personalized ballpoint pens. Anyhow, she’s a complete pig about her chocolates, she keeps them in every room and in the car. She takes them in her grab-bag, too. That little sling bag she carries. I have to remember to pack them for her but she always checks for herself. She hogs them.’
‘And the wrappers?’ Beth said, ‘Who clears away the wrappers? Does she? Do you? Timothy thinks there’s something weird about the wrappings. Is there?’
To Beth’s surprise, Bunny began to giggle. ‘Gosh, weird’s not the word!’ she said. Her giggling voice took on a spiteful edge. ‘You’ll never believe this, but it’s true all the same: she’s such a sow about those chocolates that she even eats the wrappings!’
‘You don’t mean that!’ Beth said.
‘I do! She didn’t know I saw, of course.’ Now Bunny’s mouth was twisted into an old-womanish expression of gossipy spite. ‘But I jolly well did! She was on the lawn, you see, with her cassette recorder, dictating; and stuffing herself with chocolates at every other sentence, as per usual! She was gabbling and stuffing, stuffing and gabbling – and she got a bit confused, poor dear! In went the chocolate, silver wrapping and all – then on went the mike and she continued yacking away into it! Oh, it was priceless, you’ve never seen –’
‘But she spat it out,’ Beth said, ‘She got rid of the wrapping somehow. How?’
‘But she didn’t!’ Bunny said triumphantly. ‘That was the cream of the joke! She was so full of yacketty-yack and chocketty-chocolate that she never even noticed! And that wasn’t the only time! I’ve seen her swallow down her precious chockies, wrappings and all, more than once!’
Bunny hugged herself at the memory of Lisa Treadgold’s greed. Beth mused silently. Then she said, ‘What does she drink?’
The question inspired another delightedly spiteful response from Bunny. ‘Oh drink!’ she said, her face old-womanish again. ‘Well, tea and coffee and all the usual things … fancy putting sugar in China tea, but she does! … but also – and wouldn’t the media be pleased to know about it! – she also has a fancy for the strong stuff!’
‘The strong stuff?’ Beth said. ‘You mean, spirits? She gets drunk?’
‘Drunk? Lisa Treadgold? Oh, my gosh, my dear, you’ve got to be joking!’ Now Bunny was rolling her eyes, wagging her head, bursting with clumsy malice. ‘Oh, not our Lisa, our golden girl! How could you even think such a thing! Lisa drunk! Oh, perish the thought!’
Her expression changed. ‘But I’ll tell you this – if you swear to keep it secret! – anyone else would be drunk on the amount she gets through! Stoned out of their minds!’
‘What does she drink?’ Beth said.
‘Vodka!’ Bunny cried. ‘What else but vodka! Almost pure alcohol, which means she can get good and stoned nice and quick! And of course it’s colourless and odourless, so people can’t see what’s she’s up to! I mean, anyone seeing her taking a swig would think it was water! But if anyone asked me, I could tell them the truth about Luscious Lisa. She’s simply a lush … on vodka!’
Beth chewed her grass stalk and scowled. She could not make sense of what Bunny had just told her. She thought it might be important, but could not think why or how. Had Grinny been like that? She tried to remember. Probably yes. She could not recall Grinny’s eating habits – only the French cigarettes she smoked all the time. But that had been to hide her absence of smell. Chocolate? No, Grinny had not been a chocolate-guzzler, like Lisa. What was the chocolate about? And the lemon slices? And the vodka?
Bunny interrupted Beth’s thoughts by saying, ‘So I’m not really surprised by her bickies.’
‘Her bickies?’
‘Charcoal bickies! By her bedside! Very special, of course. Charcoal biscuits in a tall round tin with lots of writing on it. She’s always at them.’
‘What do you mean, charcoal biscuits? I’ve never even heard of them.’
‘You take them for wind, dear. Like medicine. The charcoal’s supposed to absorb digestive gases.’ Bunny began to giggle. ‘Bet it never occurs to all the Lisa worshippers that their idol might occasionally burp! Belch! Rumble!’
‘On her diet,’ Beth said. ‘You know – lemons, chocolate and vodka, I’m surprised she doesn’t blow herself inside out.’
‘No such luck,’ Bunny said. All at once, she lost her spiteful pleasure in telling the awful truths about Lisa Treadgold. Beth saw her turn her head towards the big house. Her shoulders dropped. ‘Oh, gosh,’ she said, ‘what’s the use? I’ve just got to go back, there’s no escaping her.’
Beth said, ‘There’s another thing you’ve got to do: you’ve got to join my Society. Antiroll. All right, it’s just stupid kid-stuff, that’s what you think. But what else have you got? We beat Grinny. Smashed her: and we’ll beat Lisa Treadgold.’
‘Just how?’ Bunny said.
‘I don’t know. I’ll have to think. You’ve told me lots. We’ll find something, a weakness … Grinny was terrified of electricity. Is Lisa? Does she go all funny near electrical things?’
‘No. Never. She spends half her life in TV studios. She couldn’t do that if she were afraid of electricity.’
Beth threw away the last three inches of her soggy-ended stalk of grass. ‘She’s got to have a weakness,’ she told Bunny. ‘And we’ve got to find it. You’ve got to help. That’s why we need you in the Society. We’ll tell you where and when. I’m going now.’
Bunny watched he
r go. Beth was small for her age. Her favourite hat made her look still younger. She walked towards the gates of the big house; obviously she was going to collect her bicycle.
But Lisa was in the house! Bunny wanted to shout a warning to Beth – to say, ‘Don’t go in there! Come back!’ She did not. There was something about Beth that said, ‘I’m not frightened. I’m not a loser. I’m me.’
Sure enough, after a few minutes Bunny saw Beth, head high, spine straight and thin legs pumping vigorously, leave the big house on her bicycle. Beth waved. Bunny got to her feet, slowly and heavily. It was all right for Beth: she was leaving the house. But Bunny had to go back.
‘Oh, gosh,’ she muttered. And made herself start walking.
That evening
‘Chocolates contain sugar and sugar is a source of energy,’ Timothy told Beth. ‘Why this sudden interest? Are you doing biology or something?’
‘No, I just want to know. Why can’t I ask you a simple question without you –’
‘Well, that’s the answer. Sugar equals energy, OK? Now leave me alone.’
‘What sort of energy does sugar equal?’
‘Animal energy. Human energy. We convert sugar into energy. That’s one reason why we give horses lumps of sugar. A reward of energy.’
‘A girl I know says you can make a battery out of half a lemon.’
‘What’s that got to do with sugar?’
‘I don’t know. You put sugar in lemonade … I just thought of lemons because you were talking about sugar.’
‘You were talking about sugar, not me.’
‘Can you make a battery out of a lemon? An electric battery?’
‘Yes, you could. But you wouldn’t get much power.’
‘Don’t you have to stick something into the lemon for the lemon juice to act on to produce the electricity?’
‘Of course you do. Something metallic for the acid to destroy. And you have to have something to carry the electricity out. Carbon, or metal of a different potential. Something like that.’
Grinny Page 16