Anyway, it all started with another of Mr Whybrow’s fixations. Airships. There I was, parading around the shop in Miss Creeggan’s gown with a host of Mr Whybrow’s rubies and diamonds, like a Christmas tree fairy but more majestic, when Mr Whybrow emerged from the posing stand he’d been mending and spoke around a spanner in his mouth.
“You know, Miss Bluebird, there’s still a lot of Caledon you haven’t seen?”
I suspected that he was about to take me out on that wickerwork motorised coffin again. “Indeed, sir. Should I change?”
“No need for that, Miss Bluebird.” He shook his head, beaming. “There’s plenty of room in an airship gondola. There’s even a lift to get you up to the platform.”
He could hardly have missed my face falling and in any case, I couldn’t be bothered to hide it. “An airship, sir?”
Nevertheless, he pretended that he hadn’t seen my misgivings. “Indeed, Miss. What better way to take in the whole community? You can see all the roads and houses laid out as on a map. You’ll learn your way around a thousand times faster than you could by road.”
My stomach started to do a remarkable impression of a paddlesteamer’s wheels labouring through porridge. It was time to start scrabbling for excuses. Preferably ones he’d understand. He certainly wouldn’t swallow the usual stuff about it going against the will of God who’d confined us to two dimensions and kept the third for Himself and the birds. “Yes, sir, but I won’t actually be delivering by airship, will I? I doubt I could land one at a hundredth of the places I’ll be seeing.”
It didn’t work. Mr Whybrow shook his head. “That isn’t the point of the exercise, Miss. You won’t be delivering by airship, just learning what’s where.”
“But sir, wouldn’t it make more sense to see Caledon by road, if that’s what I’ll be using?”
“Yes, but by air, you’ll understand the roads instantly and carry the memory with you. No more ‘Should I turn left or right here?’”
Desperation time. I donned a sheepish smile. “I’m also concerned about my attire, sir.”
It bounced off. He simply frowned back. “The airships are perfectly clean, Miss; they don’t leak a drip of oil.”
“I didn’t mean from the engine’s contents, sir. I meant from mine.”
I put a finger to my mouth and the penny dropped with an anvil-like thud. “Oh, I see. Yes, it could be an expensive experiment. There’s plenty of time to change into an old gown, though.”
“The end result would be the same,” I persisted.
Then, finally, a glimmer of light broke in his eyes as he saw the real reason I wouldn’t fly. I was scared
He made me wait outside, and scurried behind the shop. A minute later, a low thumping sound was heard which grew louder. At first, I looked around in panic for one of those nasty airship things, but the sound was too deep. What emerged onto the street struck me dumb. It looked like a carriage but there was an extension on the front with a mean-looking snarl and there in the middle of it, controlling the whole with an apparently tiny wheel, sat Mr Whybrow.
He pulled up right beside me, the engine turning over with a happy welcoming throb. “I call ‘er the Golden Grisset,” he beamed, and let me take in the massive conveyance for a moment. [Editor’s note: “Grisset” is an old term for a shopgirl. You’ll find a well-known example in Sterne’s “Sentimental Journey.” VB]
“It’s a – a – “
“Automobile, motor car, horseless carriage, call it what you will. Let’s start at the beginning. Follow me through.” He jerked on a long forked lever which jarred my nerves with a horrible grinding noise. Mr Whybrow grinned back. “That’s the handbrake,” he explained enthusiastically. “The second most important part of the whole works. And the first is?”
“The motor?” I chanced.
“The footbrake,” he corrected. “This pedal here. The handbrake is for keeping it stopped when you’re not in motion, and it serves as an emergency brake if the main ones fail. Which mine never do,” he added with a sharply pointed look.
Dismounting, he flipped open a big cover over the front of the thing, and bared its bowels to me. “Never go out in a vehicle unless you understand how it works, Miss,” he counselled. “Many have spent the night sleeping in their vehicles over a breakdown when a brief attention to its workings would have put the world to rights.”
I suspected he’d been aching for a chance to show this thing off. For an hour, he took me through the intimate relationship between of pistons, valves, cranks, carburettors and magnetoes until I could repeat back a useable resume of the engine’s anatomy. It was only then that the real shock came.
“Get in,” he told me. “Not back there, behind the wheel.”
So this was how he was going to punish me for refusing to fly. It beat being sent back to the workhouse, I suppose. I should have expected this. Brass switches and bezelled dials, all brilliantly gleaming, stared me in the face. Not to mention an army of levers in the most awkward of places.
“Starting it’s a whole different kettle of fish, and I’d sooner you learned that with the engine cold. So we’ll just proceed with the engine already running. Unless you stall it. Not that you’ve much chance of that,” he added. “Not with a six-inch stroke at your service.”
Anybody mentioning a six-inch stroke in the workhouse would have been knocked through the wall, but Mr Whybrow appeared to have missed his own rude pun. I’ll say one thing; he made a most practical instructor as well as a patient one. After explaining the controls in turn, he then had me feeling for one after the other with my eyes shut, as he called out their names. That was all right, I was beginning to feel more comfortable about the monster waiting, untiringly, for me to tell it to move. But I had not yet actually done anything.
Then the big moment came. “Now, put it into first gear – FULL clutch for the love of God!”
I couldn’t see him squirm at the spine-jarring crunch from somewhere beneath our feet, but I resolved not to make that mistake again.
“Now, give it a little throttle, clutch up – easy, easy, handbrake off – “ A hint of alarm crept into his voice. “You can open your eyes now, Miss Bluebird!”
A big greasy lump slid down my throat, all the way down to lodge in my midparts as the car slid smoothly forwards.
“Touch of wheel, Miss; I know it’s a lamp post but this thing weighs three tons and the lamp post will lose – “
“Which way, sir?”
“Right, which do you think? Gordon Bennett, don’t ever take this onto the pier! I’ll never get it up from the sea bed.”
The wheel was heavier than I’d expected, but nothing I could not manage. Miss Folger’s shop was more redoubtable than any timber jetty, but it had nothing to worry about as we swung smoothly round, bumping slightly over the railway line.
“Good, good,” commented Mr Whybrow. “Now, a bit more throttle and into second gear – “
I did not repeat my earlier mistake with the clutch, and the Golden Grisset settled into its stride and lurched up a short slope. Mr Whybrow’s explanations of the relevance of a long stroke began to make sense. He seemed more settled as I hauled us around a tight corner. That, in turn, made it easier for me to focus on what I was doing. I was already feeling a part of the automobile, or that it was an extension of myself.
“Just pull over a moment, please.”
I was a little overemphatic on the brakes, but Mr Whybrow had been expecting that. When he’d hauled himself out of the footwell, he told me, “Turn left up the hill at the end, and just keep going until you run out of road. Watch for trains and don’t be afraid to slow right up over the railway bridge. If you need to know anything, don’t forget the speaking tube by your head.”
With that, he dismounted and sat in the back, Lord Whybrow leaving everything to his chauffeuse. I didn’t mind. He obviously trusted me, and it was more relaxing without feeling that every movement of my hands was being monitored.
The Golden Grisset took the slope in her stride. At the top, we crossed into Caledon Downs, where the grandeur of the sweeping valleys took me out of my intricately mechanical environment to make me feel part of a vast, beautiful heaven.
Following Mr Whybrow’s advice, I dropped the speed right down for the railway bridge. I did feel slightly uneasy, traversing the gorge, but that bridge was built to handle the weight of trains. Even the Golden Grisset would not overstrain it.
I began to wonder if the car would offer better protection from exploding turkeys than the Dreadnought. With the bridge behind us, I sped up to a confident thirty miles an hour. But then the ground fell away sharply – dammit, I should have remembered that from my last trip out! The Golden Grisset had a firm understanding with Miss Gravity and plummetted like an anchor.
The speedometer was graduated up to eighty miles an hour and we were already doing forty-five. I stamped on the brake like a poisonous insect, but produced only a minor diminution in our speed and a nasty burning smell. I remembered Mr Whybrow’s advice over the handbrake and yanked on it hard.
Maybe too hard. The lever came away in my hand. What went through my mind is perhaps best left unsaid.
And still it made no difference. The needle wound smoothly past the sixty mark; that silly irrelevant part of my mind told me that we were now going faster than Conan Doyle’s character who was killed in a car crash in “How it happened.” I thought of switching the ignition off, but my instinct told me that would do more harm than good.
From the corner of my eye, I spotted an airship station leering at my predicament as I passed it; the irony of its name did not escape me. “Heaven’s Gate,” indeed. Then I noticed the railway line running parallel to our course. At this speed, the heavy car was fluid under my control and those grooves between rails and road looked to be similar in width to our tyres. Of course, I could just as easily hurl us into the cliffsides, but there was no time to ponder. It was this or take the consequences at the bottom.
A flick of the steering wheel and the car gave a small hiccup. Then a big bump that almost tore the wheel from my hands. The car lurched into the channel and unleashed a horde of screaming demons straight from hell’s gates to toss us about. The Golden Grisset shuddered and tried to wrest control from me, but I was mistress; I would not let go. In the back, Mr Whybrow was quiet; I was surprised he wasn’t yelling advice to me through the partition – was that good news, or bad? Surely he did not go through this ordeal every time he took the car north?
My idea only slowed the car a little, but it was enough to allow the brakes to do their work. My breathing danced in synchronisation with the speedometer needle as it quivered and shivered, gradually ebbing lower. We were still doing nearly forty miles an hour when we hit the bottom; I saw it coming and managed to ready myself, although I had no spare attention capacity to warn Mr Whybrow; he would have to take his chances.
Bracing both heels, and stiffening my arms against the wheel, I forced my eyes to stay open as a mighty brick wall slammed into my fundament and up my spine, driving my head between my shoulders. Everything depended on not letting go of the wheel. And a train not coming the other way; that would also help.
I held myself stiff until I was sure that the impact had run its course. The car felt all right; no apparent damage to the suspension. The rails were holding us on a course as steady as the trains they were designed for. But then I saw that not being satisfied with my having thwarted gravity, whatever manner of being that makes life difficult for shopgirls had decided to put another obstacle in our way in the form of the postman, who had just rounded the corner on his steambike.
I dared not try to flick the wheel, lest it send us into the nearest house, and nothing short of a substantial jerk would free us from the grip of the rails. Sorry, Postie, this one’s down to you, thought I.
I retain to this day an image of the postman’s mouth as an expanding chasm of horror at the sight of three and a half tons of car, jeweller and shopgirl hurtling towards him. He gave a sort of wiggle of his handlebars and a huge dark blue shape flew by. That was the last I saw of him until I dared chance a look in the mirror.
Aww, that’s good. He made it. Well, at least the legs poking out of the hedge were still moving, and in a most animated fashion.
We had slowed to a relatively sensible thirty miles an hour. Mr Whybrow seemed to be out for the count, but I could tell that everything was going to work out just fine. Then I noticed the railway junction coming up; the one that turned off to the Moors and Victoria City. No trains were in sight, the rails held us fast in their grip. Which way were the points set?
There was no time to ponder the matter. Again, I tensed just in time as wheel met rail with another bump that banged the leaf springs like guillotines, and almost threw me from my seat. But again, the car fought me for its freedom and again, I prevailed. This time I was able to steer us off the rails and onto the road, and pull to a smooth stop which might have convinced a casual onlooker that I knew what I was doing.
A blessed silence hung over the world. Well, apart from the engine’s interminable bomp bomp bomp to remind me that it was still there. Then a whistle in my ear almost blew my hair off; I realised that the speaking tube had been squeaking for some time now. Fumbling for the stopper, I put my ear to the cup. I was expecting the gates of hell to open again in the form of Mr Whybrow’s wrath, but what I got was more of a gurgle reminiscent of a plughole draining away.
I reached to set the handbrake but remembered that I’d throw it away some distance back. Keeping my foot on the pedal, I turned back and pressed lips to mouthpiece. “Sir? Are you all right back there?”
There followed a pause, with something scrabbling behind me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a hand grip the windowsill and pull up Mr Whybrow. I don’t think he’d been sick, but his complexion did not look healthy.
He looked to be trying to strangle the speaking tube as he gasped into it, rising above his own shock. “I’m fine. Got bounced out of my seat on that first bump. I was going to tell you to change down for that hill. But I should have done that before we set off. By the time I remembered, it was too late. You’d have blown the gearbox at that speed. What happened to the handbrake, by the way?”
“It came off, sir,” I told him, simply.
He looked slightly sick for a moment and then told me to wait where I was while he ran back to collect the lever. I was a little surprised at how collected I was. No aftershock jitters, nothing. But I felt I could master this machine. The Dreadnought had a certain derring-do appeal about it, but this thing carried Authority.
Mr Whybrow might have been collecting a box of cigars when he returned, briskly throwing the handbrake lever inside with a heavy clatter. Of his earlier malaise, nothing remained to be seen. “Stronger bolts are indicated, I think. You may proceed, Miss.”
My limbs knew where to go by themselves. But before I pulled away, I called down the speaking tube. “Sir? How fast can this car go?”
“Oh, I’ve had it up to seventy along the flat. The limiting factor here is the road surface. It’s not designed for speed and can shred tyres if you aren’t careful.”
“I see.” Gawd, what was he trusting me with? I was about to put the car into first when the speaking tube shrilled again.
“And Miss Bluebird? Well done. You’re a natural.”
“Thank you, sir,” I called back. Natural what? Many would consider that open to debate. I was sure he had only said it to preserve my self-confidence.
I continued along the same road at a moderate twenty-five miles an hour. We were heading for parts that I had not seen before. I remembered the forest ahead of us, which stretched westwards to infinity, from my time in the Dreadnought, but we would be cutting straight through it. I could see houses on the far side.
The forest parted like a curtain opening to spread before us a glorious Arcadia of plants of all colours, and a big house in a deep regal blue.
“The Blue Mermaid,” Mr Whybrow told me. “They hold dances – Watch the bridge, now.”
I had already seen the bridge. Caledonian bridges appeared to have been built sufficiently wide to take a locomotive, but absolutely no bigger. I sensed, rather than felt, Mr Whybrow’s approving grunt as I slowed right down to squeeze through the gap.
I had also seen an airship manoevring to dock in the far distance; its engine beat unsettled me. Even in this spot of paradise, I was not to escape them. Shoo! Go away. Horrid thing!
There must have been a loose fishplate in the line, or a rut in the ballast that I’d missed seeing. The car gave a great lurch and the wheel was torn from my hands. By the time I’d recovered control, we were heading for a flat patch of leaves – which was good; it could as easily have been a tree.
I grumbled something about platelayers skimping on the job in the hope of diverting any blame, which was futile since Mr Whybrow couldn’t hear me anyway, and the next thing I knew, everything went dark. The car was held immobile by a screen of veiny stuff through which the sunlight filtered thinly in places.
The speaking tube almost blew my hair off. “”Miss Bluebird, get us out of here!”
“What is it, sir? What’s happened?”
“You’ve hit one of Miss Rain’s man-eating plants. Now get us out of here before it does that.” He appeared more angry than afraid, but I knew better than to query him. If he said the plant would eat us…….
Without realising it, I’d left my foot on the clutch. It was this that had kept the engine going; had it stalled, we’d never have got out to restart it. The plant might have been listening as it clashed its great fleshy leaves in anticipation. I slipped into gear and tried to nudge the car forwards, but the plant was too strong.
Mr Whybrow had the answer again. “Leave it in neutral and rev the engine. Give it a bellyache.”
I did as he suggested and gunned the engine sternly. The only effect that had was to fill our still-contracting chamber with exhaust. As for the plant, it appeared to thrive on our car’s flatulence.
“It’s no good, sir; I’ll kill us first!”
The car’s body creaked, I began to realise the tension with which the plant was holding us. A surge of fury arose inside me. I was not going to die prematurely as a tinned lunch for an oversized artichoke that could get its own lids off. Dammit, where I come from, we eat cabbages; they don’t eat us!
As suddenly as they had clamped around us, the leaves fell away. I blessed that daylight that flooded in! But only for a moment. I was not going to waste time. Crunching into first again, I made the car lurch and bump across the ground and back to the road. There, I stopped and let my head thud onto the wheel, not caring if a train hit us.
“Are you all right, Miss?”
Groggily, I looked up. Mr Whybrow had dismounted and was standing beside me.
“Yes, thak you, sir. And yourself?”
“I’ll be all right. How on earth did you do that?”
“Me?” Only then did I connect our reprieve with anything I might have done. “I just – well, felt angry towards it, sir.”
Mr Whybrow gave me a squint. “Like you did when you started my Dreadnought?”
“Why – yes, sir; that must have been it.”
He nodded, and gave the side of the car an affectionate pat. “I can see that you’re going to be useful to have around. However you did it, well done, Miss Bluebird.”
“What is that thing, sir?” I jerked my head back to the plant that had almost become my coffin.
“As I said, a man-eating plant. Property of our Nyree Rain. She likes dragons. And man-eating plants,” he sourly repeated. “My God, I knew it was deadly, but both of us at once? And six and a half thousand pounds of car? What’s she feeding it on?”
“Probably shopgirls,” I mumbled. “It certainly fancied this one.”
Mr Whybrow gave me a wink. “Didn’t get her though, did it? Looks like it bit off more than it could chew with our Miss Bluebird.”
I repaid his misplaced wordplay with a sour look which he ignored.
“Come on, Miss – just pull in at the pier. Wagons roll!”
He clambered back in and I let the car take us down to the pier at its own leisurely strolling pace. I stopped, leaving the engine ticking over.
Mr Whybrow had remembered the late handbrake, too, and answered the question I was about to ask. “Kill the ignition, and when it’s stopped, put it in a high gear. That’ll stop it rolling into the sea. Keep your foot on the brake a moment.”
He burrowed around amidst the great columns supporting the pier and returned with a large stone, with which he chocked a back wheel. Then, with a magician’s flourish, he opened the door for me. “Welcome to Caledon on Sea, Miss.”
Somewhat shakily, I descended and took in the neighbourhood. The sea air smothered me with its invigorating fresh life. A few houses and a chapel stood apart from each other; the whole area seemed to marry cosiness with spaciousness.
Mr Whybrow might have been looking through my own eyes as I took in the idyll of neat houses and gardens overlooked by a mountain. “Much of the land on that side of the road is owned by Miss Rain, including the mountain. Her dragons live there.”
For all her taste in plants, Miss Rain had an eye for the fantastic. She had put an old tower in the middle of a garden whose vivid colours had been sprinkled by a wand from fairyland.
Then, of course, one of those airships had to intrude into the scene like a malicious flatulent bumble bee, heading for the docking tower which, as I’d surveyed the vicinity, I could not have avoided seeing in the distance – they really did have those things all over the place, like a fateful leitmotif in one of the grimmer operas. Mr Whybrow must have noticed my haunted looks, or the slightly forced way in which I was trying to ignore it.
“You know – you wouldn’t have to worry about maneating plants in an airship,” he told me, in a voice that reminded me of a father trying to laugh off a joke that had gone wrong.
Even as he spoke, a jolly little train came chuffing in to edge up to its buffers with a playful clonk before settling down with a weary hiss of steam. Why couldn’t Mr Whybrow have insisted that I use those, instead? I’m sure the rail network must have been comprehensive enough for my purposes, since I seemed to have been bumping over railway lines everywhere we’d been.
“I’d sooner take my chances on the ground, sir, if you don’t mind,” I tartly replied. “Now that I know what to avoid, the chances of being a plant’s dinner are somewhat less than the sort of ending offered by air transport.”
“Are they, now?” He chuckled at the ground. “Come on; let’s have a look at the pier.”
No comments:
Post a Comment