Julius and the Watchmaker (20 page)

‘Professor. Professor,' he shouted.

He heard the sound of horses' hooves and cartwheels on cobbles, and he ran towards the sound. At Newgate Street crossroads he looked down Cheapside Street. Ironmonger Lane was only a few hundred yards away. Coming towards him from the direction of New Market Square was a horse and cart laden down with turnips. He could smell the country dirt still clinging to the vegetables. On the pavements women with threadbare shawls around their shoulders and wicker baskets under their arms marched in their usual no-nonsense manner. A waddling flock of geese, like visiting dignitaries, was being herded along by a woman with a stick. A costermonger pulled a handcart filled with offal.
Of course, Higgins—the market.
Julius ran to the costermonger. It was only when he got to him that Julius realised that he did not know what to ask.

‘Good morning,' he said, as he fell into step with the man straining against the foul-smelling handcart.

‘Mornin', squire,' said the man.

‘What…I mean…what I meant to say…what I meant to ask rather was…'

‘Wot you babbling on about, mate?' said the costermonger, stopping to lift his cap and wipe his brow. He swatted at some flies buzzing around a cow's heart.

Julius took a deep breath to calm his nerves.

‘On your way to New Market Square, then?' he asked, as casually as he could.

‘Aye, wot of it?'

The man heaved the cart into motion again.

‘Did you see the flying machine, a little while ago? Very big, it hummed and…and…it went overhead… near the Thames.'

‘Na, didn't see naffing, mate,' said the costermonger, although he did not seem surprised by the question.

‘Oh, I see…did you…um…did you hear it then, by any chance?'

‘Hear it? Na.'

‘Oh,' said Julius, beginning to think he had imagined the whole thing.

They walked in silence for a few paces before the man spoke again. ‘Them bleeding things is always droning along up there, rattling me bleeding bones, blowing me goods off me cart into the street. People complain about the grit in the goods. “Blame the bloomin' fart bags,” I tell 'em. But them's not the worst, mate. It's them bleeding buzz-kites wot gives me the bleeding irrits.'

‘Buzz-kites?'

‘Always buzzing around like a bleedin' bee wot's got naffing better to do wiv its time 'cept give me grief.'

They were approaching the entrance to the market. The costermonger heaved the cart to the left. Julius followed.

‘So…so…I mean…these buzz-kite things…what do they look like?'

The costermonger stopped and wiped his brow again. He studied Julius. ‘Wot you say, mate?' he said.

‘What do they look like?' said Julius, almost shouting to be heard.

The costermonger jabbed a finger skyward. ‘Like that, mate,' he said.

Julius looked up to see five gyroflyers flying in a V-formation. As they came directly overhead the buzzing of their propellers drowned out the hubbub of the market. In a few seconds they were gone—off towards the Thames.
Something's very, very wrong in the state of Denmark, Higgins.

‘What's going on, what are they doing here?' said Julius, staring up at the now empty sky.

When he got no reply he looked around for the costermonger. He was pulling his cart towards the pie shop. Julius felt dizzy. Everything was the same. The market was the same, the people were the same, the smell was the same, the noise was the same. So what were Grackack flying machines doing in the sky? And why was no one else as confused and amazed as he was?

Seconds later Julius found himself sprinting in confused panic through the market, veering left and right to avoid the carts and stalls and people swirling around him like performers from a nightmarish carnival show. He slipped on a rotting cabbage leaf and tore his trousers and the skin on his left knee. Squatting in a space between two stalls, he used his handkerchief to mop up the blood. The pain helped him to focus his mind.

When Julius limped through the western exit of the market he had a blood-stained handkerchief wrapped around his left knee and his clothes were stained and smelling of overripe cabbages. Streaks of dirt crossed his face where he had tried to wipe off imaginary filth with his dirty hands.

Although he looked like one of the walking wounded from the battle of Hastings, Julius had a plan forming in his head and he was going in the right direction to execute it. The western exit led out into the middle of Warwick Lane. Julius turned left. He was going to begin his search at Clements' pawnshop.

It did not take long to get there, but he was not prepared for what he saw when he arrived. Rather than a tatty pawnbroker's shop it was a pile of rubble.

Julius stood and stared at it as if hoping that the bricks and timber would magically rebuild themselves and he could go inside and give Clements a thrashing for leaving him to rot on the Grackack rooftop.

The morning wore on—nothing moved among the debris. But Warwick Lane was becoming noisier as shoppers made their way to the market. Finally, Julius sighed and hobbled away.

He limped on in a daze until he found himself at Black Horse Pond. Tendrils of vapour rose from the water's oily, black surface. A sulphurous stench flicked at Julius's nostrils and stung his eyes, and a muffled, rhythmic boom and hiss buzzed at his ears.

With nowhere else to go, Julius followed the sound, like a child following the Pied Piper. It grew louder as he limped across the waste ground by the bank of the canal. At Deptford Lower Road he had to jump out of the way to avoid being run over by one of the Grackack horseless carriages. The vehicle turned into a factory yard a little further along the road and huge iron gates slammed shut behind it.

A loud boom-hiss, boom-hiss was coming from the open factory doors. It sounded like the laboured breath of a dragon. Through the gates, Julius watched stooped blackened figures coming and going carrying large iron rods on their shoulders.

‘Oi, what you up to?' barked a voice behind him.

Julius jumped. He turned to see a police constable with mutton chop sideburns glaring down at him.

‘Nothing…I was just looking, sir.'

‘Well, if you looks much longer you'll find yourself on the other side of them gates, whether you wants to or not.'

‘What?'

‘Vagrants, vagabonds, beggars, orphans and the unemployed of the labouring classes may be compelled to take up gainful, though unpaid, employment, in any occupation deemed to be for the common good and prosperity of our glorious empire,' said the constable as if he were reciting from a textbook.

‘What?'

‘You heard. So hop it, before anyone sees you,' said the constable a little more quietly, before striding off down the road, swinging his truncheon.

Julius looked through the gates again and squinted his eyes to see in through the wide factory doors. Sparks flew and metal clanged and crashed in the dark steamy cavern as if the dragon were pulling on its chains to be free. The stooped figures went in and out, disappearing into and reappearing from the darkness, never stopping or lifting their eyes from the ground.

Julius looked up at the huge factory gates. The wrought iron had been twisted to form letters painted in gold. He gasped. The letters read:

SPRINGHEEL'S SYSTEMATIC
STEAM-CARRIAGE WORKS

Julius sprinted away as fast as his injured knee would carry him, desperately looking for the professor as he ran. When he stopped to catch his breath, his knee throbbed and his stomach gnawed. He heard a newspaper boy calling his wares.

Julius approached the boy and read the headline on the placard. ‘Bloody heavens above?' he said.

‘You got that right,' said the newspaper boy, and he went back to his hawking.

‘Read all about it! The Right Honourable Jack Springheel to open the Department of Grackack Cultural Affairs in the presence of 'er Majesty the Queen. Read all about it!'

‘Could you tell me? How long…how long have the Grackacks been in London?'

The newspaper boy whipped a newspaper from the pile under his arm and with an expert twist of his fingers folded it in two and presented it to Julius. ‘Free years, I'd say.'

‘Three years?' said Julius, staring down at the paper in the boy's hand.

‘Yeah. The first airship came fru the Westminster portal on July 22nd 1837 at twelve noon precisely. It's an 'istoric day, it is.'

‘So…so…I mean…why is Springheel opening the cultural whatsit?'

‘You buying the bleeding paper or what?'

‘Why is Springheel opening the cultural…?' said Julius and ended the sentence waving his arms, trying to find the words and keep his sanity at the same time.

‘Who else would?' said the boy, a little wearily. ‘'E's the Minister for Grackack Affairs so 'e does all that kind of fing, don't 'e.'

‘Oh, yes of course,' said Julius, then wandered away in a daze.

‘Oi! You forgot your paper,' yelled the boy.

Julius did not hear him.

‘Ponce,' said the boy.

Julius did not hear that either.

Springheel's the Minister for Grackack Affairs? The Grackacks are strutting around London like they own the place. So the professor's plan failed after all.

The afternoon turned chilly. Julius decided to go home to Ironmonger Lane. Maybe he could make his peace with his grandfather and settle down to a life among the Grackacks. What else could he do? He did not walk very fast and it was not just his throbbing knee that was holding him back.

His route took him past the end of Warwick Lane. He took a turn to have one last look at the pile of rubble that had been his home for those few eventful days—at least it would delay the confrontation with his grandfather for a few more minutes. Weeds were growing up through the debris.
In another fifty years this could be a picturesque mound of meadow grass and wildflowers. Wrens flitting around and a single robin posing for young ladies to sketch while they picnicked with earnest but bashful young men
, Julius was thinking when a hard, little voice broke into his daydream like a hammer through cut-glass.

‘Cost ya a duce if ya wanna watch the bricks, mista,' it said.

Julius looked down to see a small, stony-faced urchin standing there, his grubby hand stretched out for payment.

‘What?'

‘You 'eard.
Clements' Famous Jiggering Jerryshop
is one of the eight wonders of Cheapside and everyone wot looks at it's got to pay,' he said.

‘I haven't got any money.'

‘Well stop looking, then.'

Julius obediently looked away and carried out a quick survey of the street. He could not see any other urchins—which did not mean they were not there.

‘You wouldn't happen to know where Clements is, would you?' said Julius.

‘Might do, might not,' said the urchin. ‘If you ain't got no money 'ow you going to find out?'

‘Look, it's important. I need to speak to him. He might give you a shilling for taking me to him.'

‘Might?'

‘I mean, he will. He definitely will.'

‘Will 'e? An 'ole shillin?' said the urchin, with gleeful innocence.

‘Of course.'

The urchin's enthusiasm collapsed when he realised one small problem with the whole plan.

‘I don't know where the bleeder is though, do I?' he said.

Julius almost began to feel sorry for the boy, but then he recalled his previous encounters with the Warwick Lane urchins.

‘Oh, never mind,' said Julius, as he turned away.

‘'Ere, 'ang on, mista. I can find someone else for ya, fer a duce. I know everyone round 'ere.'

‘It's all right, don't worry about it,' said Julius, limping towards Paternoster Road. It was time to apologise to his grandfather and have a good long lie down. Nothing else mattered or made sense anymore.

‘I know 'em all, I do. All the blodgers and duffers round 'ere, anyone in the Family or the Fancy. I know 'em all, I do. Maggity Kate, Bill Sykes, Ratty McBlane, Danny Flynn, Ivan the—'