Willard (Ratman’s Notebooks) Read online

  After tea, of course I had to help with the washing up. I always do. Mother washes and I dry. We’ve always done it that way, but it means I have to wait for her. And was she slow? I don’t know whether she does it deliberately to keep me talking or if it’s just another sign that she’s getting old.

  At last we were finished. I dashed into the hall and grabbed my hat and waterproof. Mother came doddering after me. “Are you going out, dear? It’s not a very nice evening.”

  Of course I was going out. What did she think I wanted my coat and hat for? But I just said, “Yes,” quite politely.

  “Well, don’t be too late, will you? I never get to sleep till I know you’re in.”

  “No.”

  As she says she never gets any sleep anyway, I don’t know what difference my being in or out can make.

  I rushed up to the shed. I’d some bits of liver in my pocket as a special treat for Socrates and the other furry-tails. They like liver. Of course they’re not dependent on me for food. At least I hope not. I don’t know how much a rat eats. But I count that I just provide a few extras, usually scraps from the house. The liver was an exception. I’d bought it with my own money (I mean not the housekeeping) in a cooked-meat shop in town. I never really mean to feed the scaly-tails at all. Only it can’t be helped. They’re there. Tonight I was in a generous mood. I gave them a few bits of bread to keep them quiet.

  I didn’t know what to do about the liver. My idea was that the team should eat it before we set off and travel with full stomachs. That way they’d feel warm and comfortable, and be less likely to make a noise in the bag. Not that they often do. They’re almost always very good. Just I wanted to take all precautions. This was where the time question came in. If I gave them the liver first, we’d be late starting and maybe not get the job done soon enough to catch the last bus home. Besides if they’d full stomachs they might get sleepy and not want to attack the tires.

  So I compromised and let them eat half, which they did fairly quickly. Then I popped them into the bag and showed them the rest as a promise of more good things after the tires.

  I set off with the bag in my hand. I went down to the bus-stop and caught a bus to the City Center. No trouble in that bus. No trouble in the bus out to where Jones lives.

  Nine-fifteen. I got off the bus at the stop nearest the end of Jones’s avenue—about twenty-five yards away. I thought the conductor gave me a funny look, but I’m not sure. Maybe he was wondering what was in my bag.

  I walked up the avenue, feeling excited but confident. Solid red-brick houses on either side, probably built about nineteen-ten. Most of the people were in their front rooms. Some had the curtains across, heavy curtains with the light just showing through. In other houses you could see in. Perhaps they like to be seen, show how well off they are, so other people can envy them. Standard lamps, polished tables, chintz-covered furniture, subdued light, cosy glow from the fire. It was drizzling slightly, more like a mist really. I felt it cold against my cheeks and my eyelashes were wet.

  I wondered if Jones would have his curtains across or not. It would be funny to see Jones at his own fireside in the bosom of his family. He’d never guess who was looking in at him. I wondered what he did in the evenings. Read? Talk? Probably both. He reads every line in the evening paper, the things about the child born with ducks’ feet in Arizona and the calf with two heads in Brazil. I thought I’d like to see Jones’s daughter, the one who caught me at the garage door, not that she actually caught me. It would be funny if she were pretty. I mean with Jones as her father.

  But Jones cheated me. The curtains were across and I couldn’t see a thing. Worse still. The lights were on in the garage and the door was closed. Jones must be in there, working. Footering about more likely. If he stayed there long I’d just have to turn round and go home again.

  At first I didn’t know how to shift him. Then I thought of a ruse. I remembered a telephone-box on the main road, near the bus-stop. I was now about fifty yards past Jones’s house. I’d keep on walking in case of someone coming out and seeing a suspicious figure, palely loitering. But in fact the avenue was quite deserted. Extraordinary how quiet the suburbs can be at times. You could cut someone’s throat in the middle of the road and no one would notice. If he yelled they’d just think it was cats.

  I walked down the avenue again very quickly. Time was getting on. I’d have liked to run. But you couldn’t tell. Someone peering from an upstairs window might see me under a street lamp. A man with a bag, running. A suspicious character. Phone the police! As I reached the main road a bus went by quite empty. Even the conductor was sitting down reading the paper. The phone-box was empty too. Every house has its own phone. If you economized by doing without a phone, you’d economize by living somewhere else.

  I had begun to feel the weight of the bag. I was quite glad to put it down for a bit inside the phone-box. “All right, children,” I said soothingly, “You’ll get out soon now.” I decided to leave the bag open while I telephoned, in case the rats were too hot and needed air. There they all were good as gold. They hardly even moved when the light shone in on them, but I saw Socrates looking up at me, just waiting to be told what to do. Bless his little heart.

  I know Jones’s number in my head. I’ve had to get it for him sometimes in the office, when the operator is out for her lunch or off sick or something. Of course Jones is too important now ever to get a number for himself. I dialed, heard it begin to ring, and before anyone could answer put in my four pennies. The moment the receiver was lifted I pressed Button A, I held my nose so that when I spoke I’d have an American accent.

  A woman answered, “Hello.” Rather snooty. His good lady, as he calls her.

  “Hallo there,” I said.

  I waited a moment and Mrs. Jones said, “Hello,” again. Not so snooty this time. My nasal voice had made her interested.

  I went on, “Hallo there. That you, Liverpool? New York here.” I stopped again. Someone told me once that all the New York calls came through Liverpool. I don’t know why.

  Mrs. Jones was really interested by this time. “Hello, hello! Hello?”

  I didn’t want her to hang up yet. “Just a minute, Philadelphia. I’m talking to Liverpool here, Liverpool, England. Can you hear me, Liverpool?”

  “I can hear you very well,” Mrs. Jones replied, “but I’m afraid it’s not Liverpool.”

  “Sorry, ma’am. I’m trying to get Liverpool to get me a Mr. Jones, but they’ve gotten hung up or sumfn.” Not good enough to convince an American perhaps, but Mrs. Jones and I have probably the same idea of an American accent. Why anyhow should she have been suspicious?

  She wasn’t. She’s proud and British. It’s not every day she gets a call from New York. “This is the Jones residence.”

  I hung up. I knew she’d have Jones in in two tides. A call from New York coming through. He’d hang about waiting for it. He’d be tickled to death. He once did have a real call from New York and he didn’t stop blowing about it for ages.

  I closed the bag, picked it up, and hurried back. All the houses just the same. Not a soul about. Nothing changed. Yes, there was, though. Jones’s garage doors were open, the light streaming out. I looked at my watch. A quarter to ten. No time to waste. But Jones might still be there on the other side of the car, bending over it, or crouched down doing something to one of the wheels.

  I’d have to chance it. I opened the gate. This time it squeaked like evermore. What if Jones heard and came popping out of the garage to see who was there? There was so much light he’d be bound to recognize me. Even if he didn’t and I turned and bolted, I didn’t stand a chance carrying that bag. He’d think it was “The Marauder” again and come tearing after me, yelling his head off to attract the neighbours. I’d have to face it out, think up some sort of excuse. “Oh, hello, Mr. Jones. Very mild isn’t it for the time of year. I was looking for some people called McEllhenny, friends of ours. This bag belongs to them and Mother insisted on me comin
g over to return it.” A bit awkward if there were McEllhennys next door. But it wasn’t likely. There aren’t an awful lot of McEllhennys about. Anyhow they could have turned out to be the wrong McEllhennys. I’d have said I was looking for the Theophilus McEllhennys. I’m sure they’d take a bit of finding.

  But Jones didn’t appear. I got off the crunchy gravel and approached the garage door stealthily. I put down the bag. I got right down flat on the ground and peered into the garage. No feet, no legs showing on the far side of the car. All clear in fact. He must have gone to the phone. I picked up the bag and walked boldly in. I opened the bag and took out the rate. “Tear it up! Tear it up!” Two rats to each tire. “Tear it up! Tear it up.” I kept Socrates with me. Whatever happened I didn’t want him hurt.

  I looked at my watch again. Ten to ten. I’d been quicker than I thought. All action of course.

  I went out again and hid behind a bush in the garden where I could see the front door, and at the same time get clear away to the gate if I had to run for it. I watched and waited, stroking Socrates and whispering to him to pass the time. “He’s a bad cruel man, Socrates. He deserves everything that happens to him. He wouldn’t let us have enough to eat if he had his way. He only pays starvation wages. And look at the way he lives himself. Doesn’t skimp when it comes to looking after Mr. Jones, as you can see for yourself.”

  Five to ten. I thought it would have been more. Was Jones still hanging about the phone? Perhaps he was reading the paper to put in the time. But how long would he wait before he decided to go back to the garage and finish whatever he was doing, or else close up for the night? “Dear me,” he’d say to Mrs. Jones any minute now. “That call’s a long time. I’ve left the garage open, and the light on! I think I’ll just pop out and lock up. Give me a shout if they come through again.” “Yes certainly, dear,” Mrs. Jones would say, and out he’d come all fuss.

  Ten o’clock. Surely the rats should be nearly finished by now. Of course rubber’s tough and there are only two of them to each tire. I never timed them before. I suppose I should have. I’d have been better to do only one tire. It would have been quite enough to impress Jones. I could have let them go at it in shifts. All the same, four tires ruined will impress him even more.

  Five past ten. I could bear it no longer. I went in to see how they were getting on. Air hissing. They’d done it. I should have realized they’d go on gnawing till I told them to stop, puncture or no puncture. I checked quickly. One tire flat. One almost flat. One just through and doing most of the hissing. One not quite through. I pulled out my pocket-knife and administered the coup de grâce to that one myself. We’d been too long already.

  And then I heard a door close. I’d never heard it open. Jones’s step on the gravel. In another second he’d be in on top of me. And no amount of McEllhennys could explain this away. I noticed a small door at the back of the garage. Perhaps we were saved. “Stop!” I whispered desperately to the rats. “Here!” They came. But what slow movers they are. Even at full speed rats are slow. I almost threw them into the bag. Socrates was there already. All in. I closed the bag, nipped through the small door, and found myself in Jones’s back yard. Dark. I felt about, tripped over the bin, discovered another door, opened it—and emerged into the garden. I tip-toed round the back of the garage. What was Jones doing? Ah! The open gate had caught his eye, and annoyed him no doubt, careful householder that he is. He had closed it and was now approaching the front door of the garage. Would he close that also and go away without noticing his ripped tires? I froze. He closed one half. The light was still on. He had to step inside to switch it off.

  “What the hell!”

  He’d noticed. What next?

  For a long time he did nothing. His footsteps had stopped. He must have been just staring into the garage wondering what had happened to his car. “It looks odd, doesn’t it, Mister Jones? Sort of sunk down.” Ah! A step. He’d gone in a little. Not very far. Some maniac had slashed his tires. The maniac might still be lurking near, ready to jump out and rip up Jones as well as his tires. Jones was frightened. So was I. If I made the slightest movement Jones would hear me and shout for help. I had a cramp in one foot, but I didn’t dare more than flex my toes.

  Another step. Jones had gathered up a little courage. No he hadn’t. He was coming out of the garage, not going farther in. I heard the gravel crunch again. He was going back to the house to ring the police. Now should be my chance. As soon as the front door was closed I’d dash out and down to the bus-stop. No one was going to worry about a respectable young man—well fairly young, and I look younger than my age—standing at the bus-stop with a leather travelling bag in his hand, and once I was on to the bus I’d be safe, whirled away into the city, able to get off wherever I liked.

  But the front door didn’t shut. Still on tip-toe, I got to the side of the garage where I could have a clear run to the gate. The light was streaming out from the hall across the little bit of lawn between the house and the road. “Emily, dear, would you come and look at this, please.” Wish he’d learn to speak like that in the office.

  Home is Emily’s office. “Look at what? Don’t you know I’m busy?” None of the sweet dignity with which she coos to trans-atlantic telephone operators.

  Dare I run for it? I might have got to the gate without being seen, but any moment he might have turned and caught sight of me. Then the chase would have been on. The click of the latch on the gate, the crunch of my foot on the gravel, anything might have attracted his attention. I couldn’t run fast with the bag. Better wait a little.

  “I want you to look at the tires on the car. They’ve been slashed.”

  “Slashed! How do you mean slashed?”

  “I mean slashed, cut down the sides.”

  “Well, what good’s it going to do, me looking at them? You’d better phone the police.”

  Jones pondered over this for a bit. Perhaps he couldn’t really believe his tires had been slashed. Afraid of calling the police and finding that it had all been an illusion. “Would you not phone them?” he said. “I’ll stay here and watch. There may still be someone hanging about.”

  That was enough for me. Now or never. I’d have to make a bolt for it. Maybe I could get through the hedge at the back and into the garden of a house in the next avenue.

  Jones’s garden isn’t big, but when I got to the back hedge I couldn’t hear any longer the conversation between Jones and his sweet Emily. This made me nervous. Though I knew it wasn’t possible yet, I felt that the police might be here any second. Perhaps Police H.Q. might already have radioed to one of their roaming patrol cars which might just happen to be in the next avenue. At any moment would come a scream of sirens to alert the whole district The hedge at the back wasn’t very thick. I burst into it, not caring what harm I did. But there was barbed wire—just one strand, I think. The rest must have rusted away. My trousers caught. I stopped very deliberately, put down the bag in front of me, and unloosed myself. Wouldn’t do to have torn pants. Not respectable. Attract attention immediately. More time gone. I felt increasingly frightened. I almost panicked.

  Free at last, in among trees and bushes. A bigger garden than Jones’s, classier. I stepped forward cautiously, but caution wasn’t much good. I was walking on broken branches and twigs.

  “Yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap.” The full-stop doesn’t mean it did stop. It went on. One of these blasted little dogs. A cairn or something, all yap-yap and fury, signifying that it knew jolly well I shouldn’t be there and wanted to warn the neighbourhood. I peered out through rhododendrons. I saw a big, square, detached house. There was a broad lawn on one side and the gate on to the road was clearly in view. I couldn’t see what was on the other side, probably a yard and garage with more dustbins to trip over. The dog was on the back lawn, about six feet away. He was afraid to come into the shrubbery because of the awful monster lurking there. I tried to think what to do. I could either dash straight across the lawn to the gate a
nd get clear, with the chance that someone might open the front door, just as I was passing, and see me. Or I could creep round the other side and perhaps come up against something I didn’t expect. In either case, I’d have the dog yapping at my heels. Perhaps a good kick would quiet him. On the other hand, he might nip me. I didn’t want that. I had to make up my mind pretty quickly. If the police came they’d hear the dog yapping and find me straight away. I decided on the quick dash. One, two . . .

  A door opened in the side of the house. Light shone out across the lawn. “Woofles! Woofles! Don’t be nasty to the hedgehogs.”

  So I was a hedgehog, was I? Better behave like one and stay in the rhododendrons with my bristles up.

  “Naughty Woofles. Woofles come to Mother.”

  “Yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap.”

  “Woofles, dear, come to Mother. Dear little hedgehogs never harm anybody, only eat up nasty slugs and snails.”

  “Yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap.”

  Woofles’ mother gave up. The door closed. I allowed a few seconds to make sure she wouldn’t change her mind. Now for it, I thought. I ran across the lawn with the bag in my hand, Woofles yapping and snapping all the way. I reached the gate and got out. I shut the gate in Woofles’ face, but Woofles has a hole in the hedge just beside the gate and was out almost before I’d time to turn round. I was puffed. I couldn’t run any more. I began to walk slowly down the avenue towards the main road.

  The beastly dog was still with me. “Woofles, go home!” He paid no attention. He kept jumping at the bag, snapping at it rather than me. He must have smelt the rats. If the police came along in one of their big cars they’d be sure to stop to investigate.

  “I wonder, Sir, would you mind opening your bag and let me see what’s inside it.” Not a question, a command. Perhaps he wouldn’t even say “Sir.” Probably they just put that in books to make everybody think how nice the police are.