The case of the missing books (5 page)

'A bit like life really then,' said Israel feebly.

Ted ignored this comment. 'You helping, then, or your hands painted on?'

Israel started fiddling with the ropes. 'These are tight knots. I'm not sure if I can—'

'Quit your gurnin' and get on with it,' advised Ted.

So Israel did.

'Now. Pull,' commanded Ted eventually, and he started pulling, and Israel started pulling, and 'Pull!' commanded Ted again, and Israel did again, and 'You're as weak as water,' shouted Ted, and 'Pull!' again and suddenly the whole big damp dirty tarpaulin came off in a storm of dust and bird and chicken shit, right on top of Israel, who lost his balance and fell back onto the filthy dust and bird- and chicken-shit floor.

'Aaggh!'

'What?' said Ted. There was a muffled sound from under the tarpaulin. 'You there, you big galoot?' More muffled sounds. Ted lifted up the heavy tarpaulin and helped Israel out and onto his feet: he was covered, head to foot, in grey dust and black and white and bright green bird and chicken shit.

'Aaggh,' said Israel.

'There she is,' said Ted.

'Aaggh,' said Israel, rubbing his eyes.

The van came into focus. He could just make out what looked like the remains of a bus in a faded, rusting cream and red livery: there were rust patches as big as your fist, and what looked like mushrooms growing around the windscreen.

Ted was down on his knees, examining the wheel arches and the paintwork.

'Aye,' he said to himself, lost in rapture. 'Aye, aye.' Having eventually circled the bus and patted it fondly, as though calming a beast, he stood back. 'Well?'

'Well,' agreed Israel.

'Well?' said Ted. 'What do you think?'

'Erm. It looks like a bit like a…bus,' said Israel. 'Except without windows.'

'You're not wrong, Sherlock Holmes,' said Ted. 'It's a Bedford. Built on a VAM bus chassis. Beautiful, isn't she?'

'Beautiful' was not quite the word that Israel had in mind: the words he had in mind were more like 'write-off', 'wreck', 'filthy dirty', 'yuck', and 'I want to get out of here and go home.'

'You are joking me, are you?' he said.

'Joking?' said Ted.

'This is not the mobile library,' said Israel.

'That she is.'

'But we can't possibly drive that…thing. It's a wreck.'

'Lick of paint, be as good as new,' said Ted.

Israel put his hand into a rust hole.

'Come on,' he said.

'And a bit of bodywork,' admitted Ted.

And then there was the soft sound of something heavy and metal falling onto the ground and Ted got down on his hands and knees and looked underneath the vehicle.

'And some spot-welding,' he admitted. 'But she's no jum.'

'I see,' said Israel, who had absolutely no idea what a jum was. He was up on tiptoe trying to peer into the bus's dark interior.

Ted produced some keys from his pocket and weighed them heavily in his hand, as if they were precious jewels. He then placed them ceremonially in Israel's hands.

'Over to you, then,' said Ted.

'No, really,' said Israel.

'She's all yours,' said Ted.

'No. I—'

'Take. The keys,' said Ted insistently.

'Right,' said Israel.

'So,' said Ted.

'Well,' said Israel, hesitating and trying to think of something appropriately moving to say. He couldn't. 'It's an—'

'Get on with it.'

'Right.'

He went to open the door on the driver's side of the mobile library, but there was no door on the driver's side.

'Oh,' said Israel.

'Other side,' said Ted.

Israel went round to the right side and placed the key in the lock, turned, and nothing happened. He looked helplessly at Ted.

'Jiggle her,' said Ted.

Israel jiggled as best he could, but he was getting nowhere. He let Ted have a jiggle. That was no good either.

'Ach,' said Ted, examining the keys. 'Rust.'

'Oh well. Another time maybe.'

'Not at all,' said Ted, pointing up at the top of the van. 'Skylight.'

'What about it?'

'Way in,' said Ted. 'Catches wore away years ago. Should have got them fixed. Lucky I didn't. Come on.' He bent down slightly and clasped his hands together ready for Israel to climb up.

'Hang on now,' said Israel. 'Wait a minute. You want me to—'

'Come on,' said Ted, 'none of your old nonsense now,' and nodded to him to put his foot on his hands.

Israel hesitated. 'This is ridiculous.'

'Set yourself to it. Come on. Quickly. We're not on holiday, are we?'

'No.'

'So then. Come on, you big glunter.'

So against his better judgement–and partly because no one had ever called him a big glunter before–Israel did what he was told and placed a foot on Ted's big joint-of-meat hands and Ted grunted and puffed and straightened up and Israel scrambled for handholds and footholds up the side of the van, and by grappling and struggling he made it up onto the roof of the van, where there was only a few feet clearance from the roof of the barn, and he knelt down, puffing and scraping dust and rust and chicken shit out of the way.

'Eerrgh.'

'Good man you are!' shouted Ted. 'Go on then!'

'All right. Give me a minute,' said Israel, catching his breath and crawling on his belly towards the skylight. 'It's filthy!'

'Get on with it.'

'But—'

'Just pop it.'

'What?'

'The skylight. Pop it.'

Israel had a hold of the skylight and was wiggling and wobbling the Perspex from side to side.

'Got it?'

'Not yet.'

'Pop it!' shouted Ted, like a boxer's corner man.

'I can't pop it!'

'Go on!'

'I am going on!'

'Put some effort in.'

'I am putting some effort in. It's stuck.'

'Are you sure?'

'Yes!'

'Might be rusty,' granted Ted.

'Might be? It's all rust.'

'Just yank her then,' said Ted.

Israel got a hold of the two sides of the skylight and braced himself, half kneeling and half standing, and put all his weight into pulling up and back and he took a deep breath and then he pulled up and back, and the skylight gave a sound of cracking, and the ancient Perspex came away in his hands.

And Israel straightened upwards and backwards…smashing the back of his head on the roof of the barn.

'Aaggh!' he screamed.

'You done it?' said Ted.

'Aaggh!'

'What?' said Ted.

'Aggghh!'

'What's the matter?'

'Aaggh, shit!'

'Will you mind your bloody language!' shouted Ted.

'Aaggh!' shouted Israel back. 'I nearly brained myself.'

'Aye. Knock some sense into you.'

'Ow,' said Israel, rubbing his head. 'I'm injured. My head.'

'Only part of you safe from injury.'

'I'm in agony here!'

'Aye, but you've not lost the powers of speech.'

'It hurts.'

'All right. You got a bump. Now just get on with it.'

'Get on with what?'

'What do you think? Your eyes in your arse or what?'

'What?'

'Climb in, you fool.'

'What do you mean climb in? There's no ladder.'

'Of course there's no ladder. Jump!' said Ted.

'I'm not jumping in there,' said Israel. 'It's dark.'

'Of course it's bloody dark. Just jump,' said Ted. 'What's wrong with ye, boy? Just mind your bap, eh.'

'My bap?'

'Your head, you eejit.'

'It's quite a drop,' said Israel, peering down into the dark interior of the van.

'Get on with it now,' said Ted. 'Christmas is coming, and it'll be here before we are if you keep carrying on.'

'I don't like the look of it.'

'Well, you're not going to like the look of it when I come up there and throw you down. Now, jump.'

'I don't know if I'll fit.'

'Of course you'll fit. What do you want us to do, grease you like a pig? Get in there and stop your yabbering, will ye. Come on.'

'Ah, God. All right,' said Israel. 'But I'm blaming you if I get hurt.'

'Fine. Just jump.'

'My head hurts.'

'It'll hurt even more if you don't shut up and get on with it,' said Ted reasonably. '
Jump!
'

And lowering himself over the gap, supporting himself by his arms, Israel did.

And 'Aaah!' he cried, as he landed awkwardly on his ankle inside the mobile library.

'Ach, God alive, Laurence Olivier, that's enough of your dramatics now,' said Ted. 'Open the door.'

'I've hurt myself,' called Israel from inside the van.

'Ah'm sure,' said Ted. 'But come and open the door first.'

'I've hurt my ankle,' shouted Israel. 'I don't think I can walk.'

'Well, crawl.'

'I think I might have broken it!'

'If you've broken your ankle then I'm the Virgin Mary,' said Ted.

Israel stood up. 'I can't walk!' he cried.

'I tell you, if you was a horse I'd shoot you. Now stop your blethering and open this door before I lose the head and batter the thing in on top of you.'

Israel hopped down the bus and, after some fiddling with catches and locks, managed to open up the side door.

Ted entered.

'Ah,' he said. 'At last. Smell that.' It was not the smell of a library–books, sweat, frustrated desire, cheap but hard-wearing carpets. It was more the smell of a back-alley garage–the smell of warm corroding metal and oil. 'That's beautiful, sure,' said Ted, sweeping his arm in an expansive, welcoming kind of gesture. 'Welcome home.'

Maybe in her day the mobile library had been beautiful: maybe in her day she'd have been like home. These days, however, she was no longer a vehicle any sane person could possibly be proud of, unless you were Ted, or a dedicated mobile library fancier, or a scrap-metal merchant, and she wouldn't have been a home unless you were someone with absolutely no alternative living arrangements; also, crucially, and possibly fatally for a mobile library, there were no shelves.

'There are no shelves,' said Israel, astonished, still rubbing his head, and staring at the bare grey metal walls inside the van.

'No.'

'None at all.'

'Aye,' agreed Ted.

'Well, I don't want to sound all nit-picky, but shelves are pretty much essential for a library.'

'True.'

'Essential.'

'You could stack books on the floor,' said Ted.

'Yes. We
could
. But generally, we librarians prefer shelves. It's, you know, neater.'

'All right. Don't be getting smart with me now.'

'Right. Sorry. But there are no shelves. And no books, as far as I can see. So…the books?'

'The books?'

'The library books?'

'Ach, the books are fine, sure. You don't want to worry about the books. They'll be in the library.'

'This is the library.'

'Not this library. The old library.'

'The one that's shut?'

'Yes.'

'You're sure the books are there?'

'Of course I'm sure. There's been books there since before Adam was a baby.'

'Really.'

'We'll take a wee skite over later on, sure.'

'A what?'

'A skite. And we'll get Dennis or someone to knock us up some shelves.'

'Who's Dennis?'

'He's a plumber.'

'Right.' Then Israel thought twice. 'What?'

'He's a joiner. What do you think he is, if he builds shelves? I mean, in the name of God, man, catch yerself on. I'll give him a call later. So, do you want to try her?'

'Sorry?'

'Try her? Start her? For flip's sake, d'they not speak any English where you come from?'

'Yes. Of course they speak English. I am English!'

'Ah'm sure. And you can drive, can you? Or do they not teach you that over there on the mainland either?'

'Of course I can drive,' said Israel, grabbing the keys from Ted's hands.

Israel
could
drive–sort of. He had a licence. He'd passed his test. But he was a rubbish driver. And he was tired and he had a headache and what he really needed now was a lie down in a darkened room, preferably at home in lovely north London, rather than attempting to drive a clapped-out old mobile library under the scrutiny of a half-mad miserable minicab driver in the middle of the middle of nowhere. Nonetheless, he wasn't going to lose face, so he climbed into the thinly padded driver's seat, the foam coming out of the leather-effect PVC, put the key in the ignition, turned the key and…

Nothing.

Thank goodness.

'Oh well,' he said, 'we can always come back—'

Ted's heavy hand fell on his shoulder.

'It'll only be the battery,' said Ted. 'I'll take a look.'

It was the battery. And the alternator. And the air filter. And the fuel filter. And a lot of other things Israel had only ever heard rumour of–the gasket, the plug circuit, wiring looms, cylinder barrels. Ted spent a long time examining the engine.

'No. We'll have to get her into the workshop to get the guts of it done,' he concluded.

'Oh dear,' said Israel. 'That is a shame.'

'Aye,' said Ted. 'Offside coil spring,' he continued, to himself. 'Brake drums.'

'Right,' said Israel, as if he had any idea what Ted was talking about, which he didn't. 'My foot's fine, by the way, thanks for asking. And my head.'

'Aye.'

'You've not got any headache tablets, have you?'

'What for?'

'For my headache?'

'Ach.'

'That's a no, is it?'

Ted locked up the shed and walked back to the car. Israel walked back with him.

'You're wanting a lift then?' said Ted.

'Er. Yes.' Israel looked around him at the middle of the middle of nowhere: mountains; the sea; hedges; the barn. 'Yes. That would be nice. I've been on the road now for…' Israel checked his watch.

'Aye. Well. I've a couple of fares I need to pick up first.'

'Right.'

'I've to pick up George at the Strand, at the pork dinner.'

'Right. I see.' Israel had really had enough for one day. 'And what's a pork dinner, just…out of interest?'

'The
pork
dinner,' said Ted. 'The Pork Producers' Annual Dinner. At the Strand. Same every year. First Friday in December.'