Arabel and Mortimer (16 page)

He was still walking slowly and purposefully toward the LawnSabre, which Mr. Walpole had left
parked just beside the little hut in the middle of the garden where he kept his tools.

In order to reach the LawnSabre, Mortimer had to cross the paved area where the skaters were gliding about on their skateboards.

"Watch out!" yelled a boy, whizzing past Mortimer on one wheel. Mortimer jumped backward, and two other skaters nearly collided as they tried to avoid him. Three more skaters shot off the pavement and ended up in a bed of daffodils.

"You mind out for my daffs, or I'll report ye to the
Borough!" bawled old Mr. Walpole angrily. He had been walking toward the toolshed to put away the LawnSabre, but now he stepped into the flower bed and began indignantly straightening up the bent daffodils and tying them to sticks, shaking his fist at the skaters.

Mortimer, taking no notice of what was happening behind him, stepped off the pavement and walked on to where the LawnSabre was standing.

The LawnSabre was bright red. It was mounted on four smallish wheels, and it had a pair of long handles, like a wheelbarrow, and a switch for the fuel, and a lever to raise or lower the blades (so as to cut the grass long or short). At present, the lever was lowered so that the blades would cut the grass as short as possible.

The motor had to be started by pulling a string, as Mortimer already knew from watching Mr. Walpole through the window.

The switch for the fuel was already switched to the ON position. Mr. Walpole had left it that way when he went off to talk to Mr. Dunnage.

Meanwhile, Arabel was beginning to feel a little better, and she was able to open her eyes. She looked around her for Mortimer, but could not see him anywhere. She stood up, holding on to a tree to balance herself, because the ground still seemed to be rocking about under her feet. She could see Sandy in the
distance; he was now pedaling about, holding an open umbrella in one hand and a top hat in the other; he waved the top hat to Arabel and then put it on his head.

"Sandy, have you seen Mortimer?" called Arabel, but Sandy did not hear her.

"Are you feeling all right, my dear?" said a lady in a blue hat, walking up to Arabel. "You look rather green."

"Yes, thank you, I'm all right," said Arabel politely. "But I am anxious about my raven, Mortimer. I would like to find him. Have you seen him, please?"

"Your raven?" said the lady. "I'm afraid, my dear, that you are still a little bit dizzy. You had better sit by me quietly on this seat for a while. Then
we will look for your mummy. I am rather surprised that she let you do that dangerous ride on that boy's shoulders."

The lady obliged Arabel to sit beside her on a bench; she held on to Arabel's hand very tightly.

"Now tell me, my dear," she said, looking round the garden, "what sort of clothes is your mummy wearing? Is she a tall lady or a short one? Does she have a hat and coat on?"

"She has an overall covered with flowers," said Arabel. "But—"

Taking no notice of Arabel, the lady began stopping people as they passed by, and saying: "This little girl seems to have lost her mummy. Will you tell her, if you see her, that I have her child and am sitting on this bench?"

"Excuse me," said Arabel politely. "It isn't my mother that I have lost, but my raven, Mortimer. He doesn't have a coat, but he is quite tall for a raven. And he is black all over and has hair on his beak."

"Oh dear," said the lady, "I am afraid you are still feeling unwell, my poor child. Perhaps we had better look for a nice, kind policeman. I am sure
he
will be able to take you to your mummy, who must be very worried, wondering where you have got to."

By this time Mortimer had climbed up on top of the LawnSabre, and had found the string that was
used to start the motor. He took firm hold of it in his strong, hairy beak.

Mr. Walpole was still crossly propping up his battered daffodils and tying them to sticks with bits of raffia which he took out of his trouser pocket. He did not notice what Mortimer was doing.

"Are you feeling a little better now, my dear?" said the lady in the blue hat.

"Yes, thank you," said Arabel, at last managing to wriggle loose from the lady's grasp. And she climbed down from the bench.

"Then," said the lady, grabbing Arabel's hand again, "we will go and find a nice, kind policeman."

"But I don't want a policeman," said Arabel. "I want my raven, Mortimer."

Just at that moment Mortimer gave the cord of the LawnSabre a tremendous jerk. The motor, which was still warm, burst at once into an earsplitting roar.

"Kaaark!" shouted Mortimer joyfully.

"Hey!" shouted old Mr. Walpole, looking round from his broken daffodils. "Who the pest has started my mower? Hey, you! You get away from that-urr machine. Don't you dare start it!"

But it was too late. Mortimer jumped from the starting string to the right handle of the LawnSabre. There was a switch on the handle which had four different positions:
START, SLOW, FAST, AND VERY FAST.
Mortimer's jump shifted the switch from the
START
to the
FAST
position, and the mower began rolling over the grass.

"Oh my goodness!" said Arabel. "
There's
Mortimer!"

And, pulling her hand out of the lady's clasp, she began running toward Mortimer and the LawnSabre as fast as she could go. The LawnSabre, at the same time, was rolling equally fast toward Arabel.

"NEVERMORE!" yelled Mortimer, mad with excitement, jumping up and down on the handle of the mower. His jumping moved the lever into the VERY FAST position, and the LawnSabre began to go almost
as quickly as Sandy on his wheel, or the skaters on their skateboards, careering across the grass toward Arabel.

"You there! You stop that mower directly, do you hear me?" shouted Mr. Walpole.

But Mortimer did
not
hear Mr. Walpole—the LawnSabre was making far too much noise for him to be able to hear anything else at all. Even if Mortimer
had
heard Mr. Walpole, he would not have paid the least attention to him. Mortimer was having a wonderful time. The LawnSabre crashed through a bed of daffodils and tulips, mowing them as flat as a bath mat.

Mr. Walpole let out a bellow of rage. "Stop that, you black monster!" he shouted. "You bring that-urr mower back here!"

But Mortimer did not have the least intention of stopping the LawnSabre. And, even if he had meant to, he did not know how to stop the motor.

The LawnSabre went on racing across a stretch of grass which had already been cut once, and then it crossed the paved strip where the skaters were skating. The noise made by the metal blades on the stone pavement was dreadful—like a giant mincer grinding up a trainload of rocks.

"Oh, my blades!" moaned Mr. Walpole, putting his hands over his ears.

Now Mortimer noticed Arabel running toward him.

With a loud shriek of pride and enjoyment, he drove the LawnSabre straight in her direction.

"WATCH OUT!" everybody shouted in horror. Mr. Walpole turned as white as one of his own snowdrops and shut his eyes. The kind lady in the blue hat fainted dead away into a bed of pink tulips. For it seemed certain that the LawnSabre would run over Arabel and mow her as flat as the daffodils.

But just then, luckily, Sandy, who had seen what was happening from the other side of the garden, came pedaling over the grass at frantic speed on his wheel. He swung round in a swooping curve and just
managed to catch up Arabel in his umbrella and whisk her out of the way of the LawnSabre as it chewed its way along.

"Oh, WELL DONE!" everybody shouted.

Mr. Walpole opened his eyes again.

Sandy and Arabel had crashed into a lilac bush, all tangled up with each other and the wheel and the umbrella, but they were not hurt. As soon as Arabel had managed to scramble out of the bush, she went running after Mortimer and the LawnSabre.

"Stop him, oh please stop him!" she panted. "Can't somebody stop him? Please! It's Mortimer, my raven!"

"All very well to say stop him, but how's a body
a-going to set about that?" demanded Mr. Walpole. "That-urr mower's still got half a tank o' fuel in her; her'll run for a good half hour yet, and dear knows where that feathered fiend'll get to in that time; he could mow his way across half London and flatten the Houses o' Parliament 'afore anybody could lay a-holt of him. What we need is a helicopter, and a grappling iron, and a posse o' motorcycle cops."

But before any of these things could be fetched, it became plain that the headlong course of the LawnSabre was likely to end in a very sudden and drastic manner. For Mortimer and the mower were now whizzing at breakneck speed straight for the
huge crater at the bottom of which the round stone table with the sword in it had been discovered.