Hamish X and the Cheese Pirates (5 page)

“Thank you, Mrs. Francis.”

Viggo's finger stabbed out at the boots on the boy's feet. “The boots,” he snapped.

“Yes?” the boy smiled.

“Take them off,” Viggo demanded.

“I can't.”

“What do you mean, you can't?”

“I mean they won't come off.”

Viggo snapped his fingers at Hammerface, who came to attention as best he could.

“Take his boots off,” Viggo ordered.

“I wouldn't if I were you,” Hamish X warned.

Hammerface leered at the boy and pushed him onto his back. He planted one foot on his chest and grabbed his right boot in both hands, heaving with all his might.

There was a flash and the smell of burning hair. The air crackled with static electricity. Hammerface cartwheeled across the floor, landing on his back, steaming softly. Hamish X hopped to his feet and shrugged. “I warned you. They don't come off.”

Hammerface struggled to his feet. His hair stood out at all angles. “They don't come off,” he mumbled stupidly.

Viggo crossed his arms and glared at the boy.
He's a born troublemaker,
he thought to himself.
But I have to keep the ODA happy if I want the cheap labour to keep coming. Orphans don't grow on trees.
²¹
I'll just have to keep a close eye on him
. To Hammerface he said, “Take him to the dormitory. He'll join the day shift.”

Mrs. Francis stood to one side, completely unnoticed by Viggo, the rucksack behind her back. Her heart went out to this little boy. He seemed so strangely self-assured, but she could sense a loneliness in him that was common to all the children in Windcity: they were alone in the world without family to love them. She did her best to
give them a little bit of that love they desperately needed, but there were so many of them and she could spare them so little time.

Hammerface laid a heavy hand on Hamish X's shoulder and marched him through the metal door that led to the dormitory. He looked so small. Mrs. Francis bit her lip and wrung her hands, a look of concern in her eyes. Suddenly, she realized Viggo was staring at her.

“Mrs. Francis. Don't you have somewhere to go?” the cheese master demanded.

“Oh. Dinner!” Flustered, Mrs. Francis turned her back on Viggo and hurried up the hall towards the kitchen, where the oatmeal porridge simmered in a vast steel cauldron.

Viggo stood for a moment in the OPR trying to identify a new feeling he was experiencing. When he'd looked into the face of the new boy he'd felt a shiver run up his spine. Finally he concluded that he was probably coming down with a cold. He couldn't possibly be feeling afraid of a boy who couldn't be more than ten years old. He barked a quick, uneasy laugh and stalked off to his personal quarters to get ready for dinner.

Mr. Candy and Mr. Sweet

High above the grey chop of Hudson's Bay, Mr. Candy and Mr. Sweet sped eastward through the night.

“Well Mr. Sweet, I wonder how long the subject will take to escape this time.”

“Indeed, Mr. Candy. It should be very interesting to watch.”

“Fascinating in fact, Mr. Sweet. We are so close. Shall we return to Providence HQ to monitor his progress?”

“Let's.”

Chapter 4

Mrs. Francis hurried into the kitchen, her pudgy torso wrapped in a dingy brown apron stained with the memories of porridges past. She picked up the canoe paddle she used as a spurdle
²²
and began to churn the oatmeal, trying to break up the slimiest of the lumps. Mrs. Francis knew the children hated the taste of the porridge passionately, so she did her best to keep it as smooth as possible. At least, she reasoned, the vile food would be easier to swallow.
²³

Feeding one hundred children is a big job, even if the only food you have to prepare is oatmeal. The cauldron Mrs. Francis used was more like a large bathtub than a cooking pot. A gas element burned underneath it, setting the greyish, lumpy mixture to a seething boil.

The cauldron doubled as a serving tureen. Mrs. Francis had only to swing open a pair of metal shutters on the wall above the cauldron to ladle the oatmeal into the bowls of the children who were lining up impatiently. She dipped
and doled, dipped and doled the hot goop, all the while keeping an eye out for the new boy.

OUT ON THE FACTORY FLOOR
, Mimi leaned her pick against the wall with all the other tools. She joined the mob of children shuffling to the change room. Parveen fell in beside her.

“Ya oughtta keep yer ideas to yerself, Parveen,” she said. “Viggo isn't interested in makin' things easier fer us.”

Parveen shrugged. “There is no logic to Mr. Viggo's attitude,” he said in his softly lilting English. “Certainly, it is in his own interest to increase the levels of production.”

“Logic don't enter into it,” Mimi drawled. “He's just a mean fellar and mean fellars ain't interested in makin' things better fer anyone, even themselves. Heck, he already makes more money than he knows what to do with! He enjoys makin' us suffer.”

They stripped off their face masks and grey overalls, hanging them on hooks that ran the length of the changing room. The stink of the cheese followed them into the room from the factory hall, clinging to their hair and coating their skin. In the hall the stench of the cheese reached dangerous levels, hence the face masks. Exposure to raw Caribou Blue fumes for an extended period was fatal. The smell clung to the children every moment of their waking lives, and even coloured their dreams. Their overalls were cleaned once a week and the masks boiled every other day, but they never lost that wretched stench of the factory.

The two meals they received each day were a respite for the orphans. While the food itself was barely palatable, they were allowed to sit down while they ate. To the children coming off shift who'd been on their feet all day, sitting down was like a holiday. They trudged into the cafeteria, picking up a bowl from the stack by the door and shuffling
into line in front of the hole in the wall where Mrs. Francis ladled out the oatmeal gruel with a splash of whey that was their nightly ration.

The cafeteria
²⁴
was a place to steal the last warmth out of any beleaguered soul. It was furnished with battered aluminum benches and tables, scuffed and gouged by continuous use. The walls were painted pink, but not a happy pink. No, this pink was not the pink of delicate wildflowers in a waving sea of prairie grass or the glorious pink of a summer sunset after a cool rain. No, the pink Viggo chose to coat the walls of the orphanage cafeteria was the pink of slimy creatures that live under rocks and never see sunlight, or the pink found on the inside of an ailing goat's intestine.
²⁵
Guards stood in the four corners of the room to make sure none of the children made any trouble.

Mimi glared at the guard who stood by the door. Three more guards worked in the factory itself. She'd tangled with all of them, singly and in groups. Mimi had regular run-ins with the powers that be, but usually in reaction to some cruelty or other the guards perpetrated on the orphans. Parveen was a favourite target for humiliation. The guard answered her glare by shifting his gaze to his left shoe. Mimi wasn't worth provoking.

Mimi's stomach rumbled as she picked up her bowl. She handed one to Parveen and they took their place in the line. She was so exhausted she almost didn't notice the boy in front of her in the queue. What drew her attention to him was the whistling. A happy sound like whistling was totally out of place in the Windcity Orphanage and Cheese Factory. He wore new overalls, meaning he was a new inductee.

“Hey!” Mimi poked the boy in the shoulder.

The boy stopped whistling but didn't turn.

“Who are you?” Mimi asked. “I ain't seen you around before.”

“Mind your own business, lady.”

“Who are you callin' lady?”

The boy turned around and looked at her, up and down. His eyes were strange, golden like no eyes she'd ever seen.

“My mistake,” he said, frowning. “You aren't a lady. In fact, I'm not even sure you're a girl.” He smiled at her sweetly.

Mimi planted her fists on her hips and stuck out her chin. “Are you tryin' to make fun of me?”

“I'm not trying,” the boy said, squaring up to her even though she stood a few inches taller, “I
am
making fun of you.”

All the children in line gasped. Quick as a wink, the boy and Mimi stood alone in the centre of a circle of empty floor. Every eye in the cafeteria was glued to them. Hamish X looked around at the crowd of children with their faded grey faces and faded grey overalls. Then he turned back to the tall, raw-boned girl standing in front of him. He cocked his head to one side, studying her.

Here's what he saw. Mimi was quite tall for a girl her age. She stood just over five feet and was thin as a fence post. And just like a fence post, one would certainly feel it if you
ran up against her. Her skin was pale and her hair was black as coal, curly, and profuse, sticking out like a wiry cloud around her head. She had a sharp face with a hatchet for a nose that looked like it had been broken at least once. Not that she wasn't pretty … Well, maybe she wasn't exactly pretty, but there was something handsome about her face: there was strength in her brilliant green eyes.

The tension in the room was as thick as the porridge in Mrs. Francis's cauldron. All four guards leered happily. They loved to watch a fight. Even more, they loved to punish those involved.

Mimi and the boy stared at each other for a few long seconds. Finally Mimi spoke.

“What's your name?” she asked in a dangerously soft voice. “So's I know who it is I'm beatin' on.”

The boy stepped back and straightened his new overalls, ran his fingers through his hair, and smiled. “The French call me L'Orphan des Bottes. The Germans call me Der Wunderknabe mit die Grosse Schwartze Schuhwaren. The Chinese call me Golden-Eyed Booted Devil Child. The Russians, Rot Kid. In Spain, I'm known as El Niño con Grandes Botas Negras. In Australia, they call me Greg.”
²⁶
The boy stopped and looked straight at Mimi. “But my mother called me Hamish. Hamish X!”

The guards scowled and Mrs. Francis dropped her ladle into the porridge. A collective gasp went up from the children. “Hamish X?”

“He escaped from Orphan Island by building a raft out of inflated underpants,” one child whispered.

“He defeated the Emperor of Mongolia in a two-day ankle-wrestling match,” whispered another.

“He climbed Mount Everest and danced with the Yeti's mom!” squealed yet another.

Parveen cocked his head to one side and looked at the new boy with frank curiosity. “Hamish X? But … how could that be?”

A flicker of uncertainty danced across Mimi's face, but she held her ground. “You're Hamish X?”

“Yes. You still want to fight me?”

Mimi sneered. “I ain't got nothin' better to do.” Parveen reached up and held her arm.

“It's not worth it,” he said. “Let it go.”

Mimi shook him off and glared at Hamish X.

“Now that the introductions is over,” she snarled, “let's dance!” She launched herself at her opponent.

Though she lashed out as quickly as a viper, Hamish X ducked easily under her. He rolled neatly through her legs, stood up behind her, and gently tapped the back of her knee with his boot. Mimi's leg folded and she stumbled to her hands and knees.

Furious, Mimi leapt to her feet. She whirled around to find Hamish X standing, arms folded, looking smug. “Nice try! I've trained under some of the finest martial artists in the world. I've studied kung fu with the Xaing Xuo Monks of Ti Twa!”
²⁷

“I ain't been trained by monkeys,” Mimi gritted, “but I kick like a mule.”

Mimi kicked out at his belly. He caught her foot with his free hand and turned it, dumping her onto her face on the floor.

The children were shouting and cheering now. They all wanted Mimi to teach the new boy who was boss.

“Oh dear!” Mrs. Francis was looking out through the serving hutch. She covered her hand with her mouth. While she didn't want to get the children into trouble, she also couldn't bear the thought of them hurting each other. She ran off to find Mr. Viggo.

Mimi was up again. She brushed the dirt off her overalls and glared at Hamish.

“Now tell me
your
name and we'll just call this a draw,” Hamish said.

Mimi snarled and dove for Hamish's feet. He leapt forward, tucked into a ball and tumbled, landing easily on his feet as Mimi skidded across the floor on her belly. Scattered applause greeted Hamish's landing.

“I studied tumbling with the Flying Crimini Brothers in Italy,”
²⁸
Hamish said to the crowd by way of explaining his last manoeuvre. “They asked me to join their troupe, but I got bored with the circus. Too many clowns.”

He wheeled around and ducked a roundhouse kick from Mimi, who had crept up for another attempt. Mimi's momentum swung her around so that she faced away from Hamish. He grabbed a handful of her overalls and, falling backwards, flipped her over his feet so that she fell flat on her face again. Hamish bounced to his feet once more.

“Judo—I picked it up from a guy in Mexico.
²⁹
Not really appropriate culturally, I know, but there you are!”

Mimi pushed herself up onto her hands and sucked at the air. She'd had the wind knocked out of her. Raising her head slowly, she looked at Hamish.

“So,” Hamish said sweetly, “will you just tell me your name and we can put all this nastiness behind us?”

Mimi gritted her teeth and staggered to her feet. She was about to launch herself at Hamish again when a voice piped up.

“Mimi!”

Mimi froze and turned to glare at someone in the crowd. Hamish followed her gaze to find Parveen. “Her name is Mimi.” Parveen pushed his thick glasses back up his nose.