Arabel's Raven Page 7

  There were no diamonds in the egg.

  "A freewheeling ball," said Mr. Jones, gloomily putting on his taxi-driving overcoat, "is six hours on your feet after a long hard day, with your best suit throttling you, and nothing to eat but potato chips."

  "Kaark," said Mortimer. He loved potato chips almost as much as diamonds.

  Arabel imagined them all in their best clothes, pushing a huge freewheeling ball round and round the Assembly Rooms.

  "You will go, won't you?" she said anxiously. "Then Chris Cross can come to babysit."

  "I daresay we'll have to," said Mr. Jones, looking at the hopeful faces of his wife and daughter. "But mind! If Chris comes he's not to play his guitar after eleven at night. Last time we had trouble from the neighbors right up to the High Street."

  He kissed his family good-bye and went off to drive his taxi.

  As he shut the front door Mortimer the raven fell headfirst into Arabel's boiled egg.

  "Oh my good gracious, Arabel," said Mrs. Jones, "why in the name of mystery can't you teach that dratted bird to balance I don't know. I'm sure you'd think a creature with wings would have the sense not to lean forward till he topples over, look at the mess, if I lived to ninety and ended my days in Pernambuco I doubt if I'd see anything to equal it."

  "Nevermore," said Mortimer. As his head was still inside the boiled egg, the word came out muffled.

  "Do they have boiled eggs in Pernambuco?" said Arabel.

  "How should I know?" said Mrs. Jones crossly, clearing away the breakfast things. "For gracious' sake, Arabel, put that bird in the bath and run the tap on him. How I shall ever get to the office in time I can't imagine."

  Mrs. Jones now worked at Nuggett & Coke, the coal order office. Arabel and Mortimer loved stopping in to see her there; Arabel liked the beautiful blazing fire that always burned in a shiny red stove, and Mortimer liked the sample lumps of coal in pink bowls on the counter.

  Arabel didn't put Mortimer in the bath. She put him, boiled egg and all, into her red wagon and pulled him into the garden. Mortimer never walked if he could ride. And he never flew at all.

  "That bird's got an egg on his head," said the milkman, leaving two bottles of Jersey, two of orange juice, a dairy cake, a dozen ham-flavored eggs, and three yogurts (rum, brandy, and Worcestershire sauce).

  "Why shouldn't he, if he wants to?" said Arabel.

  The milkman had no answer to this, so he went on up the street.

  Presently the egg fell off, Granny came in to look after Arabel and Mortimer, and Mrs. Jones went to work.

  Granny made pancakes for lunch and Mortimer helped toss. Granny did not entirely approve of this, but Arabel said probably there were no pancakes where Mortimer came from and he should have a chance to learn about them.

  Anyway, they got the kitchen floor scrubbed long before Mrs. Jones came home.

  On the night of the Furriers' Freewheeling Ball Chris Cross came in to babysit.

  Arabel loved Chris. He was not very old, still doing his A levels at Rumbury Comprehensive, and he had first-rate ideas about how to pass the evening when he came to the Joneses'. He thought of something new each time. Last time they had made a Midsummer Pudding, using everything in the kitchen. Also he sang and played beautiful tunes on his guitar.

  "Arabel's to go to bed at half past eight," said Mr. Jones.

  "What about Mortimer?" said Chris. He and Mortimer had not met before; they took a careful look at one another.

  "He goes when he likes. But he is not to get into the fridge or into the bathroom cupboard," said Mrs. Jones, putting on her coat. She was wearing a pink satin dress with beads on it.

  "Not too noisy on that guitar, now," said Mr. Jones.

  "I brought my trumpet, too; I'll play that instead if you like," said Chris.

  Mr. Jones said the guitar would be better.

  "And no trumpet after eight, definitely," he said.

  "Supper's in the kitchen," said Mrs. Jones. "Mince pies and cheese patties and tomatoes and chips."

  "Kaark," said Mortimer.

  "What flavor chips?" said Arabel.

  "Sardine."

  Mr. and Mrs. Jones went off in his taxi and Chris at once began singing a lullaby.

  "Morning moon, trespassing down over my skylight's shoulder,

  Who asked you in, to doodle across my deep-seated dream?

  —Basso bluebells chiming to ice as the night grows colder—

  Be off! Toboggan away on your bothering beam!"

  Arabel loved listening to Chris sing. She stuck her finger in her mouth and sat quite quiet. Mortimer perched in the coal scuttle, listening, too. He had never heard anybody play the guitar before. He began to get overexcited; he jumped up and down in the coal scuttle about a hundred times, opening and shutting his wings and shouting, "Nevermore!"

  "Doesn't he like it?" said Chris.

  "Oh yes, he does," said Arabel. "It's just that he's not used to it."

  "Maybe we'd better dress up as Vikings and play hide-and-seek."

  "How do we dress as Vikings?"

  "In towels and helmets."

  Arabel used a saucepan as a helmet and Chris used the pressure cooker.

  "A towel's going to be too big for Mortimer," she said.

  "He can have a face towel. And a sardine can as a helmet."

  Arabel thought a frozen orange-juice can would be a better shape.

  Mortimer was very amazed at his Viking costume. They fastened his face towel on with safety pins. When it was his turn to hide he climbed into the bathroom cupboard (they had opened it to get the towels out). While he was in the cupboard he had a good hunt for diamonds, tearing some sheets and pillowcases and leaving coaly footprints on Mrs. Jones's Terylene lawn nightdress. He did not discover any diamonds. His helmet fell off.

  "The cupboard is terribly hot," said Arabel, when she found Mortimer. (She had guessed where to look, as he was so fond of the bathroom cupboard.) "My goodness, Ma went out leaving the immersion heater switched on; the hot-water tank is almost boiling. I had better switch it off." She did so.

  "Ma will be pleased that I thought of doing that," she said.

  When it was Chris's turn to hide, it took a very long time to find him, as he had packed himself tightly into the laundry basket and pulled the lid down over his head. He had a book in his pocket and meant to read, but went to sleep instead.

  Arabel hunted for Chris all over the house.

  Mortimer, meanwhile, had another idea. He was wondering if there might be any diamonds in the hole inside Chris's guitar. He went off to have a look, leaving Arabel to hunt for Chris by herself. She found her right gumboot, which had been missing for a week, she found a chocolate egg left over from last Easter, she found three pancakes that Mortimer had hidden inside the record player and forgotten, but she did not find Chris.

  However, Mortimer was annoyed to discover that Chris, who never took chances with his guitar, had placed it and the trumpet on top of the broom closet. Since Mortimer never flew, the guitar was out of his reach.

  He looked angrily around the kitchen, with his bright eyes that were as black as privet berries.

  The ironing board stood not far away.

  Mortimer was very strong. He began shoving the ironing board across the kitchen floor. After five minutes he had it up against the cupboard.

  Meanwhile, Arabel was still hunting for Chris. She looked in the hat and coat closet under the stairs. There she found a plastic spade left over from Little-hampton last summer, and two bottles of champagne, which Mr. Jones had hidden there as a Christmas surprise for Mrs. Jones. No Chris.

  Mortimer considered, looking at the ironing board. Then he knocked over the garbage bucket, tipping out the garbage, got onto a chair, holding the bucket in one claw, and climbed from the chair onto the ironing board. He put the bucket on the ironing board, upside down, and got on top of it.

  He still could not quite reach the top of the broom cupboard.

  Arabel looked for Chris under all the beds. She did not find him, but she found one of her blue bed-socks, a ginger biscuit, last Sunday paper's color supplement, and a tooth she had lost three weeks ago.

  Mortimer got down from the garbage bucket and found a square cheese grater. He made his way back and put the cheese grater on top of the bucket; then he clambered carefully up and stood tip-claw on the cheese grater's rim.

  Still he could not quite reach the top of the cupboard.

  Arabel looked for Chris under the bath. She did not find him, but she found all the pearl-handled knives and forks, Mrs. Jones's wedding-present fruit set, that had disappeared shortly after Mortimer came to live in the house. It had been thought that a burglar had taken them.

  "Ma will be pleased," Arabel said. She carried all the knives and forks to the kitchen in a fold of her Viking towel.

  When she reached the kitchen the first thing she saw was Mortimer.

  He had jammed a milk bottle into the cheese grater, which was on top of the bucket, which was upside down on the ironing board, and he was now carefully climbing up so as to stand on top of the milk-bottle.

  "Oh, Mortimer," said Arabel.

  Mortimer turned his head at the sound of her voice.

  A lot of things happened at once. The bucket fell off the ironing board, which fell over, the cheese grater fell off the bucket, the milk bottle (full of best Jersey milk) fell out of the cheese grater with Mortimer holding on to it.

  The noise woke Chris, curled up asleep inside the laundry basket, and he came to see what was happening.

  Arabel had a brush and dustpan and was sweeping up bits of broken glass. Mortimer was sitting by the stove looking ruffled. There were splashes of milk all over the floor and some large puddles. Quite a few other things were on the floor, too.

  "It's a good thing we had two bottles of milk," Arabel said, remembering that Chris was very fond of milk.

  "What happened?" said Chris, yawning.

  "I think Mortimer wanted to look at your guitar."

  "Nevermore," said Mortimer, but he did not sound as if he meant it.

  "I'll leave the guitar there for the time," said Chris, giving Mortimer a hard look.

  "Shall we have supper, as we're all in the kitchen anyway?" said Arabel.

  So they had supper and Mortimer cheered up.

  He was not keen on cheese patties, so Arabel got some frozen braised beef (which he was very keen on) out of the fridge. While she was thawing it under the hot tap Mortimer sat on the cold tap, jumping up and down with impatience and muttering, "Nevermore," under his breath. When he was too excited to wait any longer he took the packet from her, whacked a hole in the foil with his big, hard, hairy beak, and ate the braised beef in a very messy way. Arabel spread the Evening Standard on the floor, and some of the gravy went on that.

  Then Mortimer realized, from the scrunching, that the others were eating potato chips.

  He climbed onto the arm of Arabel's chair.

  "Do you want some chips, Mortimer?"

  Mortimer jumped up and down. His black eyes shone like the currants on sticky buns.

  Arabel put a handful of chips on the table in front of him.

  Mortimer began treating them as he had the pancakes; he tossed each one in the air and then tried to spear it with his beak before it fell.

  All things considered, he was remarkably good at this; much better than Chris and Arabel, who began trying to do it, too. But they hadn't got beaks, and had to catch the chips in their mouths.

  Mortimer was spearing his forty-ninth chip when he hit the milk bottle which was standing beside Chris. It fell to the floor and broke.

  "It's lucky we'd drunk half the milk already," said Arabel.

  Unfortunately, Chris cut his hand while picking up bits of glass.

  "Ma says you should always sweep up broken glass with a brush," said Arabel. "What's the matter, Chris?"

  Chris had gone very white and quiet. Then he went green. He said, "I always faint at the sight of blood." Then he fainted, bumping against the broom cupboard as he went down. His trumpet was dislodged and fell to the floor.

  "Oh dear, Mortimer," Arabel said. "It was a pity you knocked over that bottle. I wonder what we had better do now?"

  She tried soaking a face towel in the spilled milk and rubbing it on Chris's forehead. Then she switched on the fan heater to warm his bare feet. Then she put a spoonful of ginger marmalade into his mouth. That made him blink. Mortimer shouted, "Nevermore!" in his ear. He blinked again and sat up.

  "What happened?" he said.

  "You fainted," said Arabel.

  "I always faint at the sight of blood." He looked down at his cut finger.

  "Well, don't faint again," said Arabel. "Here, put this around it." She tore a strip from the face towel and bandaged Chris's finger with it.

  He stood up, swaying a little.

  "You ought to have brandy to make you better," said Arabel. "But Pa keeps the brandy in his taxi, in case of lady passengers turning faint."

  "I'd rather have milk," said Chris.

  However, both bottles of milk were now broken.

  "There's a milk machine by the dairy in the High Street," Chris said. "I'll go and get some more."

  "Ma said you were not to go out and leave me," said Arabel. "I'll come, too."

  "It's your bedtime."

  "No it isn't, not for five minutes by the kitchen clock. We'd better go right away."

  Arabel decided that she did not need a coat, and she was still wearing her Viking costume, which was a very thick orange towel, and her saucepan helmet. She took the front-door key from the nail on the dresser.

  "Come on then," said Chris.

  "I wonder if Mortimer had better come, too? Ma doesn't like him left alone in the house."

  When they looked around for Mortimer, who had been very quiet for a few minutes, they found that he had got himself jammed inside Chris's trumpet, face towel and all. They pulled at his feet, which stuck out, but they could not shift him.

  "He must have been looking for diamonds," said Arabel. "We had better not wait. We can get him out when we come back; I expect if we trickle in a little cooking oil it will loosen him."

  "Thanks!" said Chris. "Am I supposed to play my trumpet when it's full of sunflower oil?"

  "Well, it would be better than sump oil," said Arabel.

  Luckily, Chris's trumpet had a hole in it (he had bought it for ten shillings at a junk shop and stuck a Band-Aid over the hole when he played), so Mortimer was not likely to suffocate. Arabel put him in her red wagon, with his feet sticking out of the trumpet, and they walked up to the top of Rainwater Crescent, where it joins Rumbury High Street.

  It was a dark, windy night. Nobody was about, though they could hear music and voices coming from the youth club at the other end of the street.

  When they reached the milk machine by the dairy Chris found that he had nothing but pennies and a fifty-penny piece. The machine would take nothing but fivepenny pieces.

  "We could get change at the youth club," said Arabel. "It would be silly to go back without any milk now we've come so far."

  They walked toward the youth club. There was an arcade leading up to it, with fruit machines on each side. Arabel had a penny of her own, so she put it in one of the fruit machines. Some little red balls lighted up and rushed about and clanked and shot through holes and bounced on levers and all of a sudden a whole shower of pennies and fivepenny pieces and tenpenny and fiftypenny pieces shot out into the metal cup on the machine's front and a big sign lighted up that said, "You are the winner. You are the next best thing to a millionaire! Why not have another go?"

  Mortimer was amazed. As it happened, he had been looking that way, through the hole in the trumpet, when all this happened.

  "Now we don't need to change your fiftypenny piece, which is good," said Arabel. "We can go back to the milk machine."

  So they turned around. Several people had noticed Arabel winning the money, because the machine made such a commotion. A couple of men looked at Mortimer. Nothing could be seen of him but his stomach, the tips of his wings, and his two feet sticking out.

  The men got into a Citroen car, which was parked illegally just outside, and followed along the street.

  Chris put a fivepenny piece in the slot of the milk-vending machine. Wheels whirred and levers went up and down inside; presently a carton of milk came thumping down into the space in the middle.

  This time Mortimer had been watching very intently through his hole. When the carton of milk came into view he said "Kaark!" several times and began to jump up and down, trumpet and all.

  "I think he'd like you to put in another fivepenny piece," Arabel said.

  This time when Chris put in the coin for some reason the machine went wild and shot out six cartons of milk.

  "My goodness," said Arabel. "We haven't paid for all that. You'd better put in five more fivepenny pieces."

  "I don't know," said Chris. "It isn't our fault if the machine goes crazy."

  "We can easily afford to. We've got ten pounds and forty-three pence. I've been counting."

  So Chris put in five more coins. Nothing happened. The milk machine was tired out.

  While Chris and Arabel were piling the seven cartons of milk in the red wagon beside Mortimer, one of the two men in the Citroen car (which was now parked a little way off) whispered to the other, "Reckon that's him all right, Bill, don't you?"

  The other man nodded.

  "The boss is going to be pretty pleased about this, hey, Sid? We'll snatch him back farther along, where it's quiet."

  "Guess they've got him in that trumpet for a disguise."

  "Loopy sort of disguise," muttered Bill, letting off the hand brake and letting the car roll slowly along the street.

  Arabel, Chris, and Mortimer were now on their way home. But Mortimer did not want to go home just yet. He had never seen automatic machines before; he thought they were the most interesting things he had ever come across, and he wanted to know all about them.