A Tour de Fate

by P R M Kinloch

  “What’s that, then?”

  “I think my wife said it was wind. She got it from her sister. Periodontic wind or something. Contagious apparently.” Said the screw.

  “Painful?”

  “Dunno. I’d have to try it first, I ’spect.” The Beagle escort had transferred from the Riot Squad based in a section house near Pong Street when the Squad had been upgraded to the bigger muscled Labradors.

  “So, who’s this bird, then? What’s her caper?” Asked Horn.

  “Who? Oh, her. She’s new. Was only inoculated to the Bench just last week I believe. Give ’er time, she’ll learn.”

  Horn felt better. Something of his self-respect came back as he led the way to the Pound. He’d been there before.

  For the next five weeks, his days would consist of a steady increase in his level of fitness as he pounded everything from laundry to laneways, from potatoes to pavements. Those activities were considered the good times. Most of the time would be spent reducing rocks to rubble.

  He would be hard at work with the other interns - he would know most of them - their days would be spent working round the clock. The clock was what the old lags called the timekeeping guard who sat in the middle of the yard. When he fell asleep, they would all stop and rest.

  There were no actual laneways or pavements, just the figurative expressions given to the daily walking and exercise times between shifts in the laundry, the kitchen, the rocks, maintenance room and toilet block.

  This time, he was to share a cell with a German pointer who spoke no known language but got on with everyone. He’d been declared an incorrigible rogue simply because he got on too well with everyone, especially the ladies who didn’t always want to be got on with. At least, not all the time.

  11 MENU

  Having, as it were, reviewed the survival manual he seemed to be developing, Monty Stump was reasonably satisfied with his efforts to explore the world to date. Not usually so reflective, he got up and stretched, ready to make his way out of Worrywart Woods. He was just within the edge of the Woods where the ferns and bracken gave both effective cover and useful sight lines among them.

  As he put one leg forward to leave, he heard something and froze. The sound was just a gentle... What? Like the beginning of a chuckle? A chuck? Was there such a thing? No, not a chuck... That was a cluck! Here? Now that was interesting. Without moving a muscle or an eye or an ear, finally he determined where the cluck came from. A hen a short sprint away had also just risen. Very hard to see, she blended exactly with the colours around her. Clever. He appreciated that. Obviously totally out of her element yet she’d found the perfect cover. She too was taking stock of her surroundings.

  She had no idea he was so close. Or had she spotted him? Unlikely. But he stayed, leg about to step forward, exactly still until he was confident he knew what her little world consisted of, which he assumed would not be very much.

  Soon enough he knew that whatever she was aware of it was not him. She was preoccupied with where she had made a little camp. If that was the case, a little practice of his newfound skill of patience might be worthwhile. He would wait for the moment she wandered just a bit too far.

  Where has she strayed from? He thought. Alone in the forest? Why would that be? Lost? Forced out of home? Or a kindred spirit? Obviously trying to fend for herself. But she is easy prey, very easy prey indeed. He waited, watching.

  Eventually she left her position to forage. Pickings were slim so she kept moving. He continued waiting. Finally, he decided she was far enough away and, perhaps stupidly, she was out of sight from her nest – unless it was of course empty. He moved, silent as ever and made his way to the spot.

  Of course, this was what being a fox was all about. But he had been learning there was more to being a fox than doing the obvious. Much more. While all creatures were bound to their own individual rulebook, not many had an ability to think beyond it. Not that he was in teaching mode just at that moment, but if he were, he would counsel that a good fox soon learns that the very rules which are designed to provide surety and success can also have their limitations.

  Simply following rules could lead the unwary to a premature, unnecessary and unfortunate death. For instance, predictability could be fatal, as chicks could find to their cost. From a fox’s point of view the most successful trick was to weigh up all possibilities, not just what the rulebook says.

  So here, Montague Stump, having asked himself the question, What is the best solution to this problem? he asked himself a further question: Are we talking short term or long term? He then proceeded on the basis of the best answer available.

  He surmised she would no doubt be a good mother - if given the chance - and obviously would be planning to have the company she must surely be craving? He inspected her nest with what was now a practiced eye. Ah yes! Having guessed there might be one egg he was delighted to find three.

  Well, Mother Dear, a slight change of plans, he thought. But here’s a bargain. My good nature versus your good breakfast. I’ll leave you one egg, and your life. We might meet again someday.

  12 CALL OF THE WILD

  This was certainly a far cry from the brash young fox cub that had left home in a cloud of self-righteousness, alcohol and ignorance suddenly determined to prove to the world – or at least himself if not his family – that he could live by his word whatever it might cost.

  But since his hurried departure, he had experienced quite a wide range of emotions and thoughts.

  Apart from the loss of his considerable inheritance, he had no idea of the cost of his conviction that he was doing the right thing except he couldn’t afford to do anything else. Having bet his entire future inheritance and lost, whether the gamble was honourable or not wasn’t even debatable. The only honourable thing to do had been to go. At least, that’s how he saw it. And the only place to go was out. Get lost. Vanish. He might have been drunk – well, no more than usual. But he hadn’t been drunk enough to mess up the going.

  So, he had gone. As the fumes of alcohol dissipated, he discovered that his sense of self-righteousness that had powered his walkout was being replaced by a self-doubt that was totally new to him. And very unnerving.

  A feeling of being totally unprepared for the big wide world threatened to engulf him. He was alone. No safety net. No one to clean up, straighten out, deflect the consequences or nursemaid him.

  Dammit, when for once in my life I want advice, there’s no one to give it!

  Rage swirled through him and took over. He raged at himself, at his own unpreparedness. He raged at his family for leaving him so unprepared. He raged at the fellow who now owned everything that should have been his.

  And what was to be done now? Murder the first – anyone - he sees! Destroy... something! Anything! Go back and destroy them! All of them for...

  Go back! Shout at them! Tell ’em what they’d done! That they had failed him miserably! He was miserable because they had failed him! Miserable! They had given him... Hadn’t given him... They should have... shouldn’t have... With all that wealth, they should have...

  I had all that wealth! Nothing to ask for! All mine for the – All gone. Stupid! stupid then, just as stupid now.

  13 THE TURNING POINT

  Later, the more Monty trotted on, the more he came to feel a different kind of stupid. At the same time, something had lifted from him. The whole thing before had been wrong from the start. At home, he had always felt trapped and had made everyone suffer for it. Why? Where did that come from?

  For that matter, did he know where anything came from? No. He’d never thought about that. He’d never even asked where their wealth came from. Why should he? Everything was free. He took everything for granted. Yet he got into trouble for doing that. He shouldn’t take things for granted? How did that work when he couldn’t do anything without doing just that? If everything was going to be his, was his or whatever, what were they complaining about?

  He had one thing in his satchel that
really proved the point. It was a waistcoat. It was his. Actually it wasn’t his. It was his father’s. His father had a lot of them. Most of them were quite fancy. The one in the satchel had gold buttons. Monty had worn it to Fullon’s rave, he’d come home, flung it off, but he’d stared at it and then stuffed it in his satchel. Why?

  He had as many reasons and feelings for taking it with him as against having it. He had seen his father wear it couple of times and Monty liked the flash of the buttons but he had never got round to thinking of wearing anything like that himself. Such things were for grown-ups.

  But then one day they had presented it to him. Something about not waiting any longer. But before anything else had happened his parents were talking across him about “cows coming home in vain” and stuff he didn’t understand. He had simply zoned out. To him the fact was that his father had not given it to him. His mother had produced it. When he’d looked at his father, what had his father said?

  “Be a while before he fills that up!”

  If that wasn’t a put-down, what was it? Monty didn’t know what else to make of a comment like that. Then they were talking about values again.

  They said he had no appreciation of values? Of course not. He could come and go as he pleased, do what he liked, everything was free. If it was free, it had no value. If he was free, and they insisted he was, then he had no value - which just proved the whole argument.

  So he wasn’t setting the right example, wasn’t up to their standards. Their standards? He could come and go as he pleased, do whatever he liked but they wanted him to live by their standards, their values? Oh, for his own protection? Well, if he was as free as all that, whatever they were protecting, it wasn’t him. So, if it wasn’t him they were protecting, it had to be them. Or their wealth.

  On the subject of all that wealth, he had his allowance, no questions asked. Well, maybe no questions, but lots of values. And expectations. And examples he was expected to be lived up to. Or sneakily implied. That wasn’t protection, even though they said it was. And if he wasn’t restricted as they insisted he wasn’t, why did he feel so constricted!

  He’d often tried to get it sorted. But whatever he tried to say, he wasn’t going to win. It always ended in stupid arguments, and they always had the last word.

  No wonder he got so angry! Constricted? Didn’t he have the right to make up his own mind about anything? If wealth tied you up into that kind of knot, he didn’t want any part of it - he certainly didn’t value it. And Fullon at least certainly didn’t have the same hang-ups.

  Fullon’s place offered release from those stifling constrictions. For Monty it was freedom just to go there. A breath of fresh air from all those stuffy expectations. Like up on a hill in the wind. Like going near the edge. He’s so full of himself, but he knows how to stir things up, get you closer and closer to doing something risky, dangerous -He’s the very opposite of - doesn’t set any, like, have the same... boundaries.

  I always knew they’d never approve of me going to Fullon’s, even though they had no idea what went on there. But let’s face it, I would have persisted in going even if they did know. Yeah, that was a word they often used. Persistently. Was that what they meant? Maybe stubbornness.

  Stubbornness. Admitted, at least in this light. And if that were true, it made him at least equally to blame for his lost relationship in the family, even before his walking out, even if he didn’t understand how it all worked.

  But there was something else, an inner voice, that had somehow crept in. Always telling him that someday he would leave home. To him it was clearest after the endless rows. Yet he even hated that idea. Leave so much and just go and live like... everybody else? It somehow only added to his conflict.

  Leaving, or having to leave seemed a bad move, yet every time there was conflict, the idea lurked until its sheer repetition brought acceptance. So when the chance suddenly presented itself as literally ‘all – or nothing’, drunken haze or not, that voice had never been so clear. Shoot the bloody ball! See what the hell! Surely it had to be better than all the meaningless conflict!

  Another reason he had taken the waistcoat was because, well, maybe his mother would have approved. After all, she was the one who had put it on him. And he loved his mother. She seemed to understand so much more. So where did that put his father, then? Well. Maybe he had taken it with him as much to spite his father as anything else. Certainly not to wear it.

  14 STEPS IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

  As the distance from home grew longer, that voice remained silent. The silence became apparent as his anger dissipated in the daily business of his life on the move. This gave him space to see not only the countryside, but also the need to interact with it. He found he could use – was using - his own intelligence, his own resources, his own wits to survive.

  Days turned into weeks. The rejection he had expressed so easily from the beginning, expressed as an unruly force pitted against everyone else, had in fact been a fight against the constraints of his own ignorance. With no need to shout and argue he was more at peace with himself. True, there were fewer opportunities but in his current lifestyle, argument was the last thing he wanted. The two-edged weapon of criticism that had been cutting others up and cutting him off was transforming. The more relaxed he became, the more he accepted everyone else, and the inner voice remained silent.

  15 A BALANCED DIET

  As he began to appreciate life around him, he found that his needs were on a par with everyone else’s. This led him to establish certain rules. Mainly, he would take only what was needed. For the life of him, he didn’t know whether he had actually been taught this or whether it was his own invention, but he had come to feel a certain satisfaction in tempering his needs to what was essential rather than what was available. It provided him with a nice feeling of balance in the way he was beginning to see himself.

  The idea of waste now upset him. He also learnt very quickly that where and what was taken was highly significant. Locals could be extremely close-knit, surprisingly vigilant and become angry very quickly. Carelessness would well be his undoing unless he learnt to be careful.

  The best balance of work and reward was out in the open. Food was cheapest and the dangers least in deep country as opposed to along or near a recognised highway. And the most expensive, the most dangerous place for his survival, was turning out to be the urban environment.

  Survival was now a challenge that he relished. As a youngster rebelling against life where he actually lacked nothing, he had impetuously pushed events into ruling his fate. Now, not only was there nothing to rebel against, he simply couldn’t afford an argument about anything. Thrusting himself into a life where survival depended on not being noticed, he needed to understand everything about the life around him. Necessity was moving him from street-feral to streetwise.

  The turning point came not because he had stopped fighting the world, but when he saw he was actually surviving in it. This led him to like what he was doing. He loved learning new tricks and things. It was becoming more than thinking outside the box. The game was to think outside the fox.

  16 A COMING OUT

  Something akin to the opposite was happening to Mr Hans “Hammerhead” Horn. When his five weeks were up, Hans Horn, half wolf half fox, stepped out of the police yard at the back of the Diddling Police Headquarters in Snarly. The front was in Upp Close, and the back had the cells, the exercise yard known as the Pound, and the door through which prisoners were released into Lung Lane.

  There were two familiar characters waiting for him on the other side of the Lane, the somewhat ageing boxer, Burt Blowback and his companion Hardly Skinner, the cross-eyed bull terrier.

  Blowback’s comeback tour in the ring had never eventuated after a knock-out had left him woozy whenever he exerted himself. As for Skinner, who still thought of himself as a stand-over artist, if push came to shove, he had long since forgotten when he had last used an ‘artists brush’ on anybody. The two of them were oddly
devoted to each other, and what passed for work, they did for Horn.

  What they had been doing while he was inside was another matter. While they had his key, they took from his piggy jar to pay his rent. They were supposed to keep the business going, but did little apart from paying the rent. Blowback had drifted back to his old haunt, the gym on Wellhung Street where at least maybe one or two regulars still remembered who he was.

  Skinner had gone to visit an aged aunt who had lost her mind and kept thinking he was going to attack her. But at least he could share her daily meal from the Charity Chop without having to steal.

  Two days before Horn’s release they had got together in a valiant attempt to make it look as if they had been diligently carrying on business in his absence. They put two additional pieces of stolen goods with the stuff already in his “storeroom” behind the chest of drawers, hoping he wouldn’t notice how little they had achieved - and they planned to blur his insight into such details by getting him blind drunk to celebrate his release.

  The other reason to get him sozzled was to cover the fact that they had raided his piggy jar to fund the celebration.

  “Thanks for coming, Boys,” said the now lean and quite hungry Horn as Blowback returned his key, “and thanks for the chewies.”

  “That was Skinny,” said Blowback as they fell in step with Horn, “right Skinny?”

  “Yup,” said Skinner, proudly, “got ’em from PC Mungle for services rendered.”

  “Oi,” Horn rounded on Skinner, “you stitching people up again?”

  “No Boss! Honest, nobody up top. I wouldn’t do that, you know that, Boss. It was just, you know like, low life.”

  “Like who, then? Hm?” Pursued Horn.

  “Just them Morgan family again.” Said Skinner. “Them cat kids was goin’ fru’ our regular spots on the river side. We can’t get nuffink after them. Takes weeks for the market to recover. Like then I put the word in, and PC Mungle got a credit for them getting nabbed, so he shot me the bits o’ crackle. You OK wiv’ it, Boss?”