In the afternoon the neighbors on both sides telephoned to complain of the music in number 10. As the neighbor in number 8 said, quite politely, they could stand the Salvation Army or the “Ride of the Valkyries,” but not both at once.
Howard had the idea of digging a hole in the back garden and burying all the musical implements. Fine, said Quentin. But they were not to touch the television. That was to remain as a memorial to his lost art. So Howard and Awful carried the drums, the radio, the tape deck, the violin, and the pieces of clarinet out into the garden and piled them in a thumping, yodeling, twanging, roaring heap on the lawn while they tried to persuade the Goon to dig them a hole deep enough for the drums. But the Goon refused to move from where Fifi was. He had taken to following Fifi about, sighing dismally. And Fifi refused to have anything to do with Howard’s idea.
“I think Mr. Sykes deserves it for what he’s done to Archer,” she said.
“What have I done to Archer?” Quentin asked. “Told him no for the first time in his misbegotten life.”
This argument was interrupted by the neighbors in the houses behind phoning to complain about the noise in the Sykeses’ garden. Howard and Awful went and fetched all the things in. And the phone rang again. Howard answered it wearily.
It was Dillian. Howard winced at her sweet, chuckling voice. He wanted to tell her angrily that she had made a fool of him and to give the words back, but it was difficult to do in the face of Dillian’s sweetness and politeness. “Howard, dear,” she said, “will you give your father a message from me? Tell him I hear that Archer, Torquil, and Hathaway are all wanting him to write words for them. Poor man! He must feel so pestered! But tell him I shall be very cross if he’s naughty enough to do what they want. Have you got that, dear?”
“Yes,” Howard said gruffly. “And he’s not. He’s just given his typewriter away.”
“How wise of him!” said Dillian. “Tell him I’m very pleased.”
Howard was determined that he would not please Dillian by telling his father this. Unfortunately Torquil must have wanted to listen in. The music stopped in time for Quentin to overhear the word “typewriter.” He shouted to know who it was. So Howard had to tell him.
Quentin took it more calmly than Howard expected. “The glamorous Dillian?” he said. “Naturally she’s pleased. She’s the one who’s got the missing words. So she’s put her oar in now. That makes four of them. I wonder when I’m going to hear from the others—which are they?”
“Shine, Erskine, and Venturus,” said Awful. “I’m keeping count.”
“Yes, them,” said Quentin, and he turned his face to the ceiling. “Calling all eavesdroppers!” he shouted. “This is a message to all bug-eared monsters! Where are you, Shine? Venturus, don’t you want your chance to rule the world, too? Don’t miss this unique offer!” He got up and ran to the sink. “Erskine!” he shouted down the plughole. “Erskine, are you sleeping there below? Why are you three all holding back?”
The only answer was the “Dam Busters’ March” from the hall cupboard and the front room. Catriona remarked that she thought Torquil and Archer were doing quite well on their own. And this was true. By evening everyone was hungry, shivering, and half-deaf.
“Go and cook in the garden?” suggested the Goon.
“Bless you, Goon!” said Catriona. “Why didn’t I think of that before? I think this noise must have destroyed my brain!”
They lit a campfire on the lawn and sat around it, wrapped in coats and blankets, toasting sausages on forks. From there the music almost sounded romantic. “Today’s been fun,” Awful announced. “I like it when things go wrong.”
“Lucky you!” said Fifi. “I shall move out if Mr. Sykes doesn’t change his mind soon.”
The Goon sighed and stared at Fifi’s firelit face. “Going to get worse,” he confided to Howard.
He was right. They had a wretched night. All of them were too cold, and Torquil gave them a squirt of various music every quarter of an hour or so. Eventually the Goon uttered a great howl and marched upstairs to Howard’s room, where he lay on the floor, filling it to overflowing and shivering pathetically.
The next day Archer allowed them almost no electricity or gas at all. Torquil went on squirting them with music indoors. Out of doors he sent them a steel band on a truck, which drove up and down Upper Park Street the whole morning, making sounds Howard thought he might have liked had they not been mingled with Verdi’s Requiem indoors. They gave up trying to eat in the kitchen and lit campfires in the garden instead. The Goon was good at lighting fires, but that was the only thing he would do, apart from sitting staring gloomily at Fifi.
“He’s beginning to frighten me,” said Fifi. “Do make him stop.”
Howard and Awful coaxed the Goon through the house into the front room. There was no chance of being overheard here because of the tireless tinkling of the piano and the music blaring from behind Hathaway’s letter on the television. Through the window they had an excellent view of Hind’s gang, standing listening to the steel band. The ginger boy had given up writing “ARCHER” by then, probably because there were no more spaces left to write it on. Still, Howard thought, you can get used to everything. He could even hear through the noise today.
“See here,” he said to the Goon, “you’re going the wrong way about it with Fifi. If you really want her to like you, pretend you’re not interested. Play hard to get.”
“Easy to get, though,” the Goon pointed out. “Fifi knows.”
“But girls are strange,” Howard said. “Aren’t they, Awful?”
“I’m not,” said Awful. “I don’t love anybody.”
“We’re not talking about you!” Howard said. “Honestly, sometimes I think you’re as selfish as—as Torquil!” Awful became very quiet at this and spent a long time moodily poking her toe into a frayed place in the carpet. “Fifi’s frightened of the way you stare at her,” Howard told the Goon. “Try not to keep looking at her at least.”
“Eyes keep turning that way,” the Goon explained. “Like looking.”
Howard had a burst of inspiration. “Yes, but,” he said, “Archer never looked at her once.”
The results of this conversation were not quite what Howard intended. It took the Goon most of the rest of the day to work out how not to look at Fifi. When she came near, he simply turned his back on her. “What have I done to him?” Fifi kept whispering. And Awful, instead of taking revenge on Howard for what he had said to her, seemed to be trying to prove that she was not as selfish as Torquil. She was unnervingly kind to everyone, even the Goon. By lunchtime Catriona was anxiously feeling Awful’s forehead. “Are you sure you’re all right, darling? You’ve been so quiet this weekend.” Howard tried to persuade Catriona that Awful was quiet because she was enjoying the crisis. Ordinary life was not exciting enough for Awful. But Catriona still thought Awful might be ill.
Quentin said he had had enough. The only thing to do was to go out for a drive in the car. “Not you,” he said to the Goon. “Even if I wanted to waste gasoline on you, there isn’t room for all that leg.” They left the Goon standing in the side passage like a dog that has been told to stay at home and piled into the car. Naturally it would not start. “Is this Archer, too?” Quentin wondered.
“Hathaway farms transport,” Howard remembered.
“Then we’ll go for a walk instead,” said Quentin. He climbed out of the car and hailed the Goon. “We’re walking. Give me back my coat.”
The Goon shook his head. “Freezing,” he said pathetically.
Quentin took Howard’s anorak instead, and Howard had to make do with a third sweater. Their motley party set off down the road. The truck with the steel band did a three-point turn and followed after. Hind’s gang followed after that, kicking a tin can to avert the boredom of it.
“I feel like the lord mayor’s procession,” said Quentin. “But for once in my life I’m getting the attention which is my due. Tell me about Hathaway,” he said to the
Goon.
The Goon thought. “Don’t know much. Runs transport. Recluse. Lives in the past.”
“Maybe that explains why there are never any buses,” Fifi said.
“And the potholes in Park Street,” added Catriona.
They walked down nearly as far as the Town Hall, with the steel band and Hind’s gang following faithfully. Quentin turned into Corn Street, and the rest of the procession came, too. There Quentin winked at Howard and dived into the tangle of little, gray, narrow lanes around the cathedral. At the bottom he led them into Chorister Lane, where there were posts to keep traffic out. The truck tried to turn after them and stalled when the driver saw it could not be done. And Hind’s gang was stuck behind the truck.
“Quick!” said Quentin. “Before he sends the cathedral choir after us!”
They ran and then walked fast, up Chorister Lane, past the rather prim modern shops there called Kiddicloes and Boddikare, and around under the cathedral. There Quentin led them at a trot through the museum yard, past the park, to the deserted Polytechnic. The diggers excavating for the new building had all been parked over on the far side. They threaded between them and came to Zed Alley.
“That was a lot of work just to shake off one steel band,” Catriona said. “But I expect the walk did us good.”
“Put your car right for you,” offered the Goon.
“Oh, if you would!” said Catriona. “I’d been wondering what I’d do tomorrow.”
For the rest of the afternoon Howard helped the Goon tinker with the car. Hind’s gang filtered back after a while and stood watching sarcastically. But it seemed as if even ten to one, they did not want to tangle with the Goon. They just stood. The steel band seemed to have given up. The Goon proved to be good with cars. He seemed to think that it was quite easy to undo whatever jinx had been put on it.
“Hathaway,” he said. “No good if it was Archer. Genius. Artist.”
They got the car to work. Then they went indoors to find that Catriona had taken the hammers out of the piano. Fifi and Awful had packed the drums, the radio, the tape deck, and any other instrument they could find into sleeping bags and put them back under the sofa cushions in the cupboard. The only thing making a noise now was the television. Outside in the garden Quentin was frying chops for supper. It looked as if they were holding their own against Torquil, Archer, and Hathaway.
But that was before they knew what Torquil, Archer, and Hathaway could really do. The following week was dreadful.
Chapter Eight
On Monday they were awakened at dawn by workmen drilling holes in Upper Park Street. Catriona wailed and tied her head up in a thick woolly scarf. It was clear to everyone that this was Hathaway’s contribution. They looked out to find that a little red and white striped hut had gone up in the middle of the road. The rest of the street was marked out with red cones and strips of plastic with fluttering orange tags. Among these, swarms of men in earguards were busily running drills from half a dozen yellow bean-shaped machines labeled “Plant Hire.”
“They plant them,” Quentin bellowed above the din, “and they grow into giant pneumatic drills.”
The Goon looked puzzled at this notion. Howard and Awful smiled politely. They knew it was the kind of remark writers felt themselves bound to make from time to time.
Before long there was so much noise and so many holes in the road that the vanload of folk singers Torquil had sent that day were forced to back down into Park Street and drive away. Hind’s gang, when it began to gather, had to hop and jump among red cones and piles of tarry rubble. Howard’s heart sank rather when he saw them because today he and Awful were going to have to go to school.
“At least there still seems to be plenty of water,” Fifi said as she staggered with a bucket into the frosty garden. There was no power at all that day. “How long before one of them cuts that off?”
“As soon as Erskine gets around to asking me for two thousand words,” Quentin said. He was sitting cross-legged like a rather chilly Buddha, helping the Goon light the campfire. “How silly they all are—Torquil and Hathaway particularly. How could anyone write anything with all this noise going on?”
“Why not?” demanded Fifi. “It’s so stupid! You don’t have to put up with any of this. The moment you wrote the words for Archer, he’d put everything right in half an hour!”
“So you think,” said Quentin. And he remained utterly obstinate, in spite of all the things that happened that week.
To Howard’s relief, Catriona’s car still worked. He had been afraid she might lose her job that way, whatever Quentin or Torquil decided to do. Catriona was heartily relieved, too. She waved cheerfully as she threaded her way among the red cones and the drilling workmen.
“Walk you and Awful to school,” said the Goon. “Keep Shine off your back.” He nodded at the fifteen boys waiting across the broken-up road.
“Thanks,” Howard said gratefully. And he was still grateful to the Goon, even though Hind’s gang followed behind as they walked, making loud, jeering remarks about people who needed the Goon as nursemaid and calling rude things about the way the Goon’s arms stuck out from Quentin’s red and black checked coat.
“Used to it,” the Goon said placidly.
“Are they really from Shine?” asked Awful.
“Have to be,” said the Goon, “the way they keep after you.”
“What’s Shine like?” asked Awful.
“Vicious,” said the Goon. He thought. “Plays fairer than Dillian. Acts up like Torquil sometimes. Likes shooting people.”
Awful skipped along, happily ignoring the shouts from Hind’s gang. “I might like Shine,” she decided. “What’s Erskine like?”
The Goon gave that tremendous thought. “Don’t know. Smelly.”
“Now tell me about Venturus,” said Awful.
The Goon seemed to find that hard to do, too. “Bit like Archer,” he said at last. “Brains and all.”
That seemed to satisfy Awful. She skipped happily into school, leaving Hind’s gang to follow Howard and the Goon. They looked very frustrated when they found that the Goon went all the way to Howard’s school with Howard. But they seemed to have a hearty respect for the Goon. All they did was call more remarks. But they did not give up. They were waiting outside at the end of the afternoon.
So was the Goon. He loomed into sight, dragging Awful by one hand, just as Howard had decided he had better make a rush for it. Hind’s gang cast the Goon resentful looks and melted away. And that was really the last Howard saw of them for some days, although he did not know it then.
He came home to find most of Upper Park Street dug away. Quentin was sitting in the cold dark kitchen, looking more obstinate than ever. Torquil had doubled the noise from the television that day, to make up for the folk singers. Nobody could go in the front room from then on. There was a fair amount of noise coming from under the sleeping bags and cushions in the hall cupboard, too.
That was not all. That evening they ran out of matches to light the campfire. Quentin and Awful went down to the corner shop for more, but they found the shop was shut. They went on to the next shop. That was shut, too. “It’s Torquil,” said Awful. “Howard says he farms shops.” But Quentin did not believe her. He said they had gone out too late. He borrowed matches from number 8 and said he would go shopping early on Tuesday. They needed more food by then. The fridge was melting and dripping, and the things in it were smelling strange.
On Tuesday Hathaway’s men drilled right down to the pipes and cables under the road, and there was almost no way to get to the houses. Park Street was jammed with the parked cars of Upper Park Street. Catriona had to leave hers at the Poly. That day both she and Quentin had tried to draw money from different banks. They came home with glum faces. Archer had stopped both their accounts.
“No money,” Quentin said. He was exasperated and still unbelieving. Determined not to be beaten, he went to the shopping precinct with his credit card. And he could not get int
o any of the supermarkets there. “I don’t understand it!” he said. “There were people inside, all buying things, but the doors wouldn’t open and the ‘CLOSED’ notice was up.”
“Torquil,” said the Goon.
“I suppose I must believe you,” Quentin said angrily.
They had to borrow food. They borrowed up and down Upper Park Street and from everyone else they knew. Quentin borrowed from the Poly buffet, and Fifi borrowed from the students. Fifi was very good at it. She even borrowed some bacon and a big tin of cookies from Miss Potter. Howard would have felt more grateful to Miss Potter if Miss Potter had not sent a forgiving little note with the cookies. “Children are trying at times,” Miss Potter wrote. “It is not what they did to me that I mind, but the way they behaved to dear Dillian. But Dillian has forgiven them, angel that she is, and I can do no less.”
“Grrrrrr!” said Awful, which went for Howard, too.
“I’m only doing this to bring you to your senses, Mr. Sykes,” Fifi said, dumping the tin of cookies in front of Quentin. “Nothing would possess me to go near Maisie Potter otherwise. You can’t go on like this. You must see that.”
“Fifi,” said Quentin, “if I give in to Archer, I shall have money and electricity, no doubt; but Torquil would not let me spend my money, and Hathaway would probably dig up my house. Besides, I’m getting interested. I want to know what they’ll do next.”
Howard found he agreed with Fifi. He spoke to Catriona privately about it, standing in the bathroom, where the floor was vibrating from the television below and the drilling from outside. “Mum,” he said, “can’t you persuade him? I know I said it was worth it, but it’s getting terrible. And you’re not even trying to persuade him now.”
“I know,” said Catriona. “But I made a mistake getting angry with him. It just made him obstinate. All I can do now is wait for him to come around. I hope Torquil realizes that. I’m scared about my job, Howard. You must know I do most of the earning in this house. If your father earns enough to pay the taxes, it’s the most he ever does.”