“I was worrying about us.”
“I’m not worried,” said Jem, and he jumped into the seat of the red car (everyone knows red is fastest). The moment he got in, the arms of the seat closed around him and held him tight. There was a faint whirring noise as a mechanical arm hoisted a padded helmet onto his head. It did all feel very safe.
“Me driving!” yelled Little Harry.
“No, Little Harry,” said Lucy, climbing into the blue car. “It’s not safe. You stay with Nanny.”
“Oh, but he will be driving,” said Nanny as the seat folded its arms around Lucy. “They’re remote-controlled cars.” She passed Little Harry a console with a little driving wheel on it just like the ones Dad had used for the toy cars. Little Harry pressed the button gleefully, and Jem’s car lurched forward at terrifying speed, then stopped suddenly.
Nanny was in charge of the blue car. Clearly she’d spent many happy hours over the years playing with remote-control cars, and now it slid smoothly round the track with Lucy in the driver’s seat, easing into bends and hurtling down the straights.
Little Harry, on the other hand, had never played with remote-control cars before. I don’t know if you’ve ever ridden in a full-size turbo-charged racing car operated by an inexperienced three-year-old, but it’s not an experience you’d ever forget. Jem’s car spun and skidded round the first bend, then pootled very slowly down the straight bit before powerfully accelerating into a terrifying chicane. Jem was buffeted from side to side as the car fishtailed from left to right. His brain was so pulverized that he almost forgot to scream with terror as the car hurtled toward a huge ramp that ended in midair. Right on the brink of the drop, the car screeched to a halt. Then very, very slowly it slid backward down the ramp. Phew! thought Jem. Then, without any warning, the car raced up the ramp again, hit the end, and rocketed into the air. Jem screwed up his eyes and heard the wind whistling past his ears. Then the car thumped down on the other side. A second later, Lucy’s car landed deftly next to his and sped quietly on its way — already on its second lap.
After the first, terrifying circuit, Little Harry began to get the hang of the controls, and Jem began to enjoy the sound of the engine growling like a box of angry bears, the sunset washing over the broad glossy bonnet, the fragrance of the wind that blew in his face.
The orange-scented sunset turned to moonlight, and Jem noticed that he hadn’t seen Lucy’s car for a couple of laps. The stars came out. The air grew chill. Still Jem was going round and round the racetrack all on his own. “Hello?” he called. “Hello? Would someone stop the car, please?”
No one answered.
No sound but the growl and squeal of the car as it sashayed through bends and leaped over the ravine again and again, faster and faster with each lap.
“Hello?” called Jem. “Excuse me!” He thundered into a steep bend, banking right at the tip of the track. “Excuse . . . oh!” The engine had stopped dead. The car slithered down from the top of the track and rolled over twice onto the verge, ending up on its back.
When Jem crawled free, the first thing he saw was Lucy looking down at him with Little Harry in her arms. Nanny put her finger to her lips, telling Jem to shush, then pointed at Little Harry. “Fast asleep,” she whispered. “He dropped off right on top of the remote control. We tried to prise it out from underneath him or sneak it out of his hands, but he kept waking up and objecting.”
“I’ve got him now.” Lucy smiled. “Let’s put him to bed. Come on, Jem. Let’s go and open up Chitty.”
“No,” said Nanny. “No sleeping in Chitty tonight. Tonight you’ll sleep in Proper Beds.”
Proper Beds.
Until Nanny said those words, Jem and Lucy had been perfectly comfortable sleeping in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Yes, it was a bit cramped. Yes, the beds were really only shelves with thin mattresses on them. But it was cosy and warm and nice to lie there, chatting while the stars popped out.
The phrase “Proper Beds” made them remember what it was like to have space to roll over in the night, to stretch out, to read under the duvet. They were so tired by then that Proper Beds seemed even more exciting than real racing cars.
Bats were flitting in and out of the pillars as they followed Nanny along the moonlit cloister, up the broad white steps, and into the house itself. The floor of the entrance hall was tiled black and white squares — like the chequered flag in motor racing. Dangling from the ceiling was an enormous chandelier made of hundreds of little cardboard pine trees — like the air fresheners you see in cars. Standing on the floor was a massive silver statue of Saint Christopher, the Patron Saint of Motorists. At his feet was a big model of a dog made of some sort of furry material. As Nanny led the children past, the dog’s head nodded slowly up and down. All the lamps looked like various kinds of car headlights, and the banisters were huge chrome bumpers. “Tiny Jack really does like cars,” said Jem.
Nanny smiled. “He really does.”
“We never played with him,” said a sleepy Lucy.
“Maybe tomorrow,” said Nanny.
All the way up the stairs were framed photographs of Tiny Jack. There was one of him eating a Toblerone. Next to him the chocolate bar looked as big as a ladder.
“He really is small,” said Lucy.
“He really is.” Nanny smiled again, as though being small was a great achievement. “Now it’s time for bed.”
She opened a door that was unusual for a bedroom door — yellow, made of metal, with a shiny handle and a little window — but would have looked perfectly normal on a New York taxicab. The room inside, though, looked nothing like the inside of a car. Well . . . the picture window did have windscreen wipers and the mirror did look like a big rearview mirror, but apart from that, it just looked like a very comfortable bedroom. A log fire blazed merrily in the grate, and by its warm, flickering light, the children saw three big beds made up in crisp white linen. Beside each bed was a little table, and on each table was a glass of milk, a flashlight, and a choice of books. On each pillow was a neatly folded pair of cotton pyjamas. Just looking at those pyjamas made you feel dreamy and contented. The wall and ceiling around Lucy’s bed were painted matte black. Lucy clapped her hands and said, “How did you know?”
Nanny didn’t answer. She quickly and quietly turned down one of the duvets so that Lucy could slip Little Harry underneath without waking him. Then she wished them pleasant dreams and tiptoed out.
It was the best night’s sleep Lucy had ever had. Every now and then she woke in the night, but only just enough for her to have that delicious feeling you get when you realize it’s still not morning and you can go back to sleep.
Jem, on the other hand, didn’t sleep a wink. At first it was because he was so excited. He wanted to tell Dad all about driving the racing cars. Then he didn’t sleep because he was thinking, Why aren’t they back yet? And why are there so many snakes in this place? And why didn’t we ever see Tiny Jack?
The sun stole into the room. Lucy stretched and yawned. Jem said, “Mum and Dad aren’t back.”
“How do you know? They’re probably by the pool having breakfast right now.”
“I think I would have heard the muscular but musical engine of an Aston Martin DB5 pulling up, don’t you?”
“So what if they’re not back yet? We’re not in any hurry to leave, are we, Little Harry?” He had climbed into her bed at some point in the night. “We’re going for another big swim. . . .” She started to get the swimming things together.
“Nanny kept saying that Tiny Jack would be thrilled to meet us, but did he come and meet us? Did we even see him?”
“She said he was having a nap.”
“A nap? Hibernation, more like. And why is she just called Nanny?”
“Because she’s just the nanny. I think that’s quite cool actually.”
“The nanny of the invisible hibernating boy. And she never takes her sunglasses off. Even at night.”
“Also quite cool.”
“OK. Well, this last thing is definitely worrying.”
“What?”
“Cairo has gone.”
“What does that mean, ‘Cairo has gone’?”
“Cairo was there, and now it’s not there. Look out of the window . . .”
Cairo is sometimes called the City of a Thousand Minarets — because it has so many beautiful mosques, all with towers and spires and domes and minarets. But looking out the bedroom window that morning, Lucy and Little Harry saw not a thousand minarets but none. Cairo is home to over ten million people. Lucy, Little Harry, and Jem looked through that window as hard as they could. They saw . . . not ten million people — but no people. None. Not one.
The beautiful gardens of Château Bateau and the lovely figure-eight racetrack where they’d driven the racing cars — they were all still there. Beyond the garden gate — nothing but water as far as the horizon.
“We seem,” said Lucy, pushing open the window, “to be at sea.”
Now that there were seagulls squawking around their heads and blue waves rolling all around them and a salty breeze blowing through their hair, something was obvious that had not been obvious the night before. Château Bateau was not a house. Château Bateau was a boat.
“The clue was in the name, I suppose,” said Lucy.
The beautiful villa, the gardens, the racetrack, these were all nothing but the top deck. Château Bateau was a boat, and it had set sail with the children on board. And their parents . . . not on board.
“Judging from wind direction and the angle of the sun, and taking into consideration the maximum amount of time that we could possibly have been on the high seas without actually noticing, I would say we’re in the Arabian Sea, heading south toward Madagascar.”
“I want my mummy!” yelled Little Harry.
“I think we need to ask Nanny a few questions,” said Lucy.
“What a beautiful morning,” said Nanny when they found her by the pool. “Look, Nanny’s made you a lovely breakfast.”
“Nanny,” said Lucy, “this is a boat.”
“Of course it is — that’s why it’s called Château Bateau. Mr. Fink got it for Tiny Jack on his birthday.”
“Who’s Mr. Fink?”
“Tiny Jack’s father, of course — you must have heard of him. He was quite famous. Man-Mountain Fink? Poor Tiny Jack always feels that he is not really the kind of son that Man-Mountain expected.”
They hadn’t heard of him — and besides, they were more interested in their own parents than in Tiny Jack’s.
“Isn’t this just the most fun ever?” Nanny smiled. “We’ve run away to sea. Don’t all children secretly yearn to run away to sea?”
“I want my mummy!” bawled Little Harry.
“Let’s all have tea and toast and marmalade in the shade,” said Nanny. “And look, Nanny’s made some eggs and bacon — your favourites.” The table was spread with a fresh gingham cloth and a vase of flowers, a toast rack full of toast, a hot plate laden with bacon and scrambled eggs, a jug of orange juice, all in the shade of . . .
It was then that Jem noticed what was making the shade. A massive stone face was staring out across the dunes from behind the orange blossom.
“Nanny,” he said, “isn’t that the Sphinx?”
“Good heavens!” said Nanny. “So it is.”
“But what is the Sphinx doing here?”
“That little scamp Tiny Jack must have stolen it. He is a good boy, but he can be very light-fingered.”
“Light-fingered? The Sphinx . . . Nanny, he can’t have stolen the Sphinx. The Sphinx has been there for four and a half thousand years. Or three thousand, depending which theory you believe.”
“So definitely time for a change, then,” said Nanny. “Tiny Jack’s not all bad.”
“I want my mummy!” yelled Little Harry.
“He really does want his mummy,” said Jem.
“Don’t worry about Mummy and Daddy. They are having a wonderful time cruising around in a fabulous car.”
“We can’t just leave them behind. They’re our mum and dad.”
Nanny looked puzzled. “But you said it would be more fun without them.”
“I didn’t say that,” said Jem. He looked at Lucy. “Did you say that?”
“I don’t think so. No.”
“You said that they would never have let you drive.”
“Yes . . . but . . .”
“He wouldn’t let you drive Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, even though you practically built her.”
“That’s true,” said Jem.
“He’s mean,” said Nanny.
“I want my mummy! I want my mummy!”
“He’s not mean. He’s just safety-conscious. Please take us back now.”
“Why, certainly.” Nanny smiled. “We’ll go back right away.”
“Thank you.”
“Of course what with currents, prevailing winds, shipping lanes, and all that nonsense, a vessel this size can’t just do a three-point turn. We have to go all the way around the coast of Africa to get back to where we started. What fun! Haven’t you always dreamed of doing something like this? We’re pirates!”
“But . . .” said Jem.
A whiny voice was screaming somewhere nearby.
The children looked round. Finally they were going to meet Tiny Jack. But the sound was coming from a little plastic bluebird with an aerial, sitting on the breakfast table.
“Excuse me,” said Nanny, switching it off. “The alarm. That means I’m wanted . . . and just as I was about to feed the fish.” She lifted up her sunglasses and possibly winked at them. Possibly, because her eyes were hard to see. They were very tiny with long, tangled lashes caked in mascara. Against the deathly white of her face, they looked like two squashed spiders on top of a wedding cake. “Enjoy your breakfast and your swim,” she said, and hurried off into the house.
“Swim!” said Little Harry, toddling toward the pool.
“No!” yelled Lucy, pulling him back and hoisting him into her arms. “We have to get out of here. Nanny just tried to kill us.”
“What?”
“The fish in the pool, the little silver ones — notice anything about them yesterday?”
“They were quite tickly.”
“Piranhas. Capable of stripping every ounce of flesh from a human body in thirty seconds.”
“But we were swimming with them.”
“Piranhas will only attack you if they’re hungry. Yesterday they weren’t hungry. Today, she’s just told us, she hasn’t fed them.”
“How did you know they weren’t hungry yesterday?”
“They didn’t look hungry. And anyway, I thought, well, if you’re going to die young, then being stripped to the skeleton by a shoal of starving piranhas in the grounds of a mysterious château is a pretty impressive way to go.”
“But I don’t want to die young.”
“If we don’t get out of here,” said Lucy, “that’s exactly what’s going to happen.”
“I suppose she might have forgotten that they’re man-eating fish.”
Lucy picked up some bacon from the hot plate and tossed it into the pool. Immediately the water churned and boiled as the ravenous piranhas swarmed in a frenzy around the meat. “That might have been us,” said Lucy. “We should get out of here. But how?”
“Well,” said Jem, “we do just happen to have the greatest getaway vehicle in the history of the world. . . .”
Lucy grabbed Little Harry and followed Jem to the garage, where he quickly found car bedroom number 23. He yanked open the door, and they all hurried inside. They stared in horror.
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was in there.
In pieces.
Someone had taken her apart.
The mighty engine sat in the middle of the room, but the wheels, the axles, the doors, the wings, the roof, and the seats had all been pulled off and piled up in corners.
“She’s dead,” gasped Lucy. “Dead, dead, dead.”
br /> “Chitty Chitty no go.” Little Harry sighed.
“What are we going to do?” asked Lucy.
“I want my mummy,” said Little Harry.
For a long moment, Jem said nothing. He was looking around the room, ticking things off in his head, remembering the days when he had first helped Dad put this van together. “It’s all right,” he said. “It’s going to be all right. She’s all here. She’s just not in the right order. We can fix her. Lucy, pass me that spanner.”
“You can’t build a whole van,” said Lucy.
“Done it before,” said Jem. “Now pass that wrench there.”
She passed the wrench.
“A van like Chitty,” said Jem, “is not just a heap of components. You can take her apart. You can take bits away. But somehow she’ll still be Chitty.”
“That’s what Dad said when we first got her.”
“Exactly.”
“And it took him two months to put her together. Do we want to spend two months piranha-dodging?”
“It’ll be different this time. The most important part of Chitty is here, in my head.”
“How come? Did you swallow it or something?”
“Help me put this wing back onto the frame here.” What was in Jem’s head was the memory of those summer days helping his dad piece the van together. If you’ve solved a puzzle once, you can always solve it again more quickly. More than that, this time Jem knew that Chitty would help him. That the van wanted to be herself again.
“Why would Nanny do a thing like this?” said Lucy, lifting the wing panel into place.
“To stop us from escaping, of course. Can you get this jack underneath? That’s it.”
“No, she doesn’t care about us. She was going to feed us to the piranhas. It’s all about the van. She wants Chitty. Or Tiny Jack does. But why? When he’s got so many amazing cars already.”
“Chitty’s amazing, too,” said Jem. “And she’s going to be amazing again. Headlights, please.”
Soon Chitty Chitty Bang Bang began to look like herself again. Because Dad and Jem had done such a good job the first time — every screw was clean and oiled, every bolt and nut perfectly aligned — she was now slotting together quite easily. They were just beginning to feel optimistic when a voice behind them said: