The Book of Dave (24 page)

'How're you going to do it, then?'

Dave looked sideways at Michelle, but her drained face didn't respond. How would he do the baddest thing? There were so many
ways. The plunge from Suicide Bridge, drowning in the Serpentine, a shotgun at the West London Shooting Centre. Then there
were the things Dave could throw himself beneath: the wheels of a hated fellow cabbie's cab, a police car,
shit…
if he timed it right he could probably sever his miserable head with the incisive wheel of a speeding bicycle courier.

The racing bike clattered away over cobbles splattering blood–it had a trachea for a chain. Its clakka-clakka-clakk resolved
into the rat-a-tat-tat of the doorknocker. Dave clawed on a balding, black towelling robe and fell down the stairs to the
front door. It was a brilliant morning, and the postie – who was a squat African woman with chipmunk cheeks – thrust an envelope
and clipboard at him. 'Sign heah, date an' print!' she cried, and when he protested 'Wha?' she reiterated it so forcefully
'Sign heah DATE AN' PRINT YOUR NAME!' that he instantly obeyed. It wasn't until Dave had shut the door and was padding back
upstairs while tearing the envelope open that it hit him. He'd been served.

Although the thick, bonded paper was headed with an embossed letterhead Dave didn't recognize, UNDERCROFT, MENDEL AND PARTNERS, 22 VIGO STREET, LONDON WI, the text was clearly addressed to him:

Dear Mr Rudman

We also give you notice that pending any appeal on your part, all
existing arrangements for visitation to your son, Carl, are held to be
cancelled. Should you attempt to contact your son, we will view this as
prejudicial and inform the police.

If you have any queries regarding this letter, please feel free to
telephone me on my direct line, listed above.

Yours sincerely,

                  Mitchell Blair

7

Broken on the Wheel

510-13 AD

For four days Mister Greaves sat in session and heard the evidence against Symun Dévúsh. One after another the Hamsters scuttled
before him to recant and to give evidence of the Geezer's flying behaviour. The weather remained exceptionally fine throughout,
a bigwatt foglamp beating down on the island. The Chilmen, despite their disciplined array, were as overawed as any other
newcomers to Ham, and they soon began to relax and leave off their carcoats. So it was a considerable surprise to the Hamsters
when, at first tariff on the fifth day, they rose to discover that the Hack's pedalo had been pulled back into the water and
was being made ready to depart.

– Bring ve fliar dahn, Mister Greaves ordered Fred. 4 Eye an arf mì dads ul B leevin 4 Wyc vis tariff. Ve uvvas ul stä eer
2 mayk shoor vares no maw bovva. Eyel B bakk in free mumfs wiv ve sikkmen. Eye want yaw moto reddy 4 slorta, an ve briks an
bubbery an fevvas 4 yaw tikkit. U lot av slungaht viss Geezer, but if vese blokes Eye leev Bhynd katch U ló á í agen vare wil
B maw Xeyels!

Cowed, the Hamsters stood and waited in silence as Fred, together with a posse of dävine dads, hustled Symun Dévúsh down from
the travelodge and brought him to the jetty.

Far from subduing him, Symun's confinement seemed to have given him new vigour. Kids had smuggled him in extra food and drink,
and old Ozmun Bulluk had even slipped him some of the fags the Chilmen had brought. It was while puffing on one of these that
the Geezer said farewell to his fares. Before wading out to the pedalo, he turned back to confront the Hamsters, who had gathered
on the shore. His gaunt old mummy, Effi, crippled Caff, whom he loved, Fred Ridmun, his mate and his betrayer, the Edduns
brothers, Dave and Dick, Fukka Funch with his snub snout and bow legs, old Bettë Brudi, her wrinkled face clenched with pain
and sadness. They were all there, from the oldest boiler to the youngest sprog. It was said later that even the motos, led
by Runti, filed down from the woods and stood softly lisping their goodbyes, as tears rolled down their pendulous jowls.

Fred Ridmun, fearful of his regained authority being undermined, was disposed to hustle Symun aboard the pedalo without more
ado; however Mister Greaves motioned him to allow the Geezer to speak. Symun put one foot up on a pile of bricks, brushed
his hair away from his face and, fixing his restless gaze on the Ferbiddun Zön, threw an arm up towards the aching blue screen.

– E oo ayts lyf wil keep í, thass wot í sez in ve Búk, innit?

There was a mutter of acknowledgement from his listeners.

– Wel, Eye doan luv lyf ennymaw wivaht Am, so Eye spose Eye must ayt í.

Another mutter like a response.

–
Awl Eye did woz 4 Am, awl Eye evah wannid woz 4 us ló 2 B cumfy.

The mutter swelled into a groan.

– Dave did givus ve nú Búk – U ló nó thass ve troof! Ven Eyem gawn … by now most of the cab – for that is what they had
unwittingly become, the Chilmen included – were openly weeping … yul unnerstan vat, an yul C ow fings gesswurs an wurs,
coz ve troo Nolidj az bin loss, an ven ve Nolidj iz loss iss ve end uv Am –

This was by no means the end the Geezer intended for his address, but Mister Greaves, apprehending the powerful effect of
his words, seized Symun by his shoulder and dragged him bodily through the shallows. Two of the Lawyer's chaps then pulled
him into the vessel. The others splashed across and leaped in, then, with a flurry of pedals, the pedalo made fast for the
reef. Yet not so swiftly that the Geezer's inflammatory words couldn't still be heard for some time floating over the lagoon,
until eventually they became but mangled sounds, a peculiar presentiment of the fate that awaited he who had uttered them.

Besides, there was work to be done, work that had been neglected during the whirlwind of licence that had been the Geezer's
time. Hard work – all the harder for the unseasonable pedalo fever, the extra mouths to feed, and the Hack's imposition of
a substantial ticket. Once again the mummies and opares became beasts of burden. The barrels of moto oil that had been rendered
down the previous autumn were brought to the pier, together with truckles of London bricks, bolts of bubbery and sacks of
gull feathers. Fred Ridmun and the dävine dads made it clear that there was but one priority alone for the community: the
rent must be paid to the Hack.

Away from the Guvnor's hearing, and especially among the boilers, there were those who muttered that, whatever the seriousness
of his transgressions, the Geezer had been denied a proper hearing. He himself had not been allowed to speak before the Hack,
and this weakened the bonds of fealty between the Hamsters and their Lawyer quite as much as any flying they may have been
party to.

It was Meshell Brudi, out gathering yellowdye flowers near the Mutha's grave, who first saw the returning pedalo. She ran
back to the manor and told the other mummies, Ees bak an vairs sumuvva bloke wiv im – nó a Chilman. Eye seen im, sittin up
in ve pedalo, big tall bloke wivva wyt barnet! Ees gotta bituv shynë stuff stukkup bì iz mush! This was the first sighting
of the new Driver, who was to come to dominate the lives of the Hamsters – dominate them more than their isolation, dominate
them more than their peculiar symbiosis with the motos, dominate them, perhaps, even more than the Book itself.

Who was the Driver? No one on Ham ever knew. He never told them his real name – he was always the Driver. He came, like other
visitors to the island, out of a void. This much can be said: when he made his landfall on Ham, the Driver was a vigorous
man in his early fifties, long and angular of limb, full of beard and severe of countenance. His nose was sharp and prominent,
his brows beetling. He did not deign for the pedalo to be tied up to the pier, but splashed overboard and waded ashore, his
mirror waggling. He was clad in a full-length black robe, beneath which could be glimpsed black jeans and a black T-shirt
of fine London cloth. His trainers – a form of footwear hitherto unknown on Ham – were orange and laced high up on his narrow
ankles. In the Hamsters' eyes this raiment gave him the appearance of a giant and savage crow, an impression strengthened
as it never altered in any way during the time he was among them. Neither the heat of the summer nor the damp of the kipper
seemed to affect the Driver. No one ever saw him disrobe, not even the succession of opares who attended him in his semi.

The deeply credulous Hamsters, still reeling from the deposing of the Geezer, were powerfully impressed by the Driver. Leaving
the pedalo to be beached by his retainers, Mister Greaves came over the shingle after him and, seeing the whole population
assembled exactly as he had left them three months before, prepared to introduce the alien. The Driver ignored him and turned
his back on the peasant gaggle, so that it was his own deep and gravelly voice, speaking not in dialect but the refined accents
of Arpee, that rolled over their bowed heads:

– Greetings, good Hamsters! he cried. I am the Driver, and I come to you from the PCO in London. Before news even of this
abominable flying reached the Inspectors' Faredar, it had been decided to once again send a circuit driver here, to this remote
place, to remind you that Dave sees each and every one of you, daddies and mummies alike, in his mirror.

In later days it was said that as the Driver called over that first time, an unearthly stillness descended upon Ham. The children
stopped fidgeting, the motos ceased ruminating. The gulls, crows, ringnecks and flying rats – all, in short, of the aerial
flotsam that swirled in the screen above the island – came spiralling down to the bare ground at the bottom of the village,
where the tightly clustered birds formed a bizarre, multicoloured carpet of feathers. The winged ants – which were swarming
on that muggy summer's day – doodled in to pitter-patter against the back of the Driver's robe, then fell at his feet, writhing
in the dust. Even the chafers' legs became motionless, adding to the mounting silence.

Whether any of this actually took place, or it was only the fabulous counterpoint to the tale of the Geezer's final address,
is obscure. What is certain is that the Driver had spent the uncomfortable pedalo journey from Wyc – four long days on the
open water, four damp nights anchored in densely wooded creeks – hearing the full story of the Geezer's insurrection; and
he had concluded, quite rightly, that to establish a rapid ascendancy over the Hamsters it was necessary to employ all the
theatricality of his adversary.

Cupped in its grassy bay, the little manor of Ham was a natural amphitheatre. The Driver continued his declamation:

– I have heard all about the disgusting practices that you have indulged in these past months – daddies and mummies consorting
in grotesque propinquity – yet I shall not censure you for them any more than your Lawyer already has. I have heard how you
abandoned the Knowledge and took up with a vile flyer – yet I shall not punish you for it. I come to bring you the Book! He
flourished a huge, leather-bound copy from beneath his robe. See the Wheel! Read the meter! Know that the final tariff is
at hand! Leave this place at once, you miserable, perfidious mummies! Sullied by rag and blob – whorish, licentious creatures!
Chelle spawn!

He waited while the mummies, opares and children shuffled back to the mummies' gaffs, then rounded on the remaining Hamstermen:

– Do not be mistaken, for I know what happens to dads' minds when they do not honour the Breakup and observe the Changeover.
I comprehend how you begin to doubt that Dave forsook the Lost Boy for your own miserable fares. The separate compartments
into which Dave has poured all goodness and all badness become once again mingled. The hapless knave begins to think himself
dävlike, possessing a freedom to act without the precepts of our faith. He no longer hears Dave speak to him over the intercom
– instead mummyness spills into his every thought like piss from a ruptured bladder into the pure milk of burgerkine! The
Driver spat as if disgusted by his own figure, then continued: It is for Drivers, queer and untainted by any vile contacts
– tittyrub and cunnëlyk – to decide which fares shall for ever hail the cab in vain, and which will ride with Dave to New
London!

The Driver fell to his knees.

– Thanks be to Dave! he called.

– 4 pikkin uz up! the Hamstermen responded.

– Let all you dads who have the Knowledge of it kneel down and call over the first run. Forward on left Green Lanes!

– Fawud Green Layns! the dads cried in unison.

– Right Brownswood Road!

– Rì Brahnswúd Röd.

When it was done, and the dads had called over the points, the Driver – to their considerable amazement – went on:

– In the beginning there was Dave's word and Dave's word alone. All that we have comes out of the Book. All that is, all that
has been, and all that will come again. You are not the only fares to do a runner, you are not the only ones to breathe the
smoky cab of apostasy, you are not the only miserable know-it-alls to look for a shortcut to New London! For three centuries
now the Book has been the very rock upon which Ing itself has been built. O yes, a new London has been erected, with wide
avenues and grand buildings, with workshops and markets even – yet this is not the city foretold by Dave! This is not New
London! For this city has also saunas and spielers, bullrings and cockpits, lewd theatres and pleasure gardens. Only the PCO
can build New London, either here on earth or – if Dave so ordains it – beyond the screen!

The Driver lifted the Book up to that screen and cried out: