Paws for Alarm (6 page)

There was a queue waiting to get into Madame Tussaud's, too, but it was a more reasonable length. Besides, it was moving. In the time I had paid off the taxi, it had shuffled forward a good two feet.

‘Hurry up, Mom!' Donald grabbed the hand I was holding out for the change the driver was laboriously counting into it and pulled me towards the end of the queue. Donna dashed ahead of us and staked our claim.

Just in time. My incipient protest died as I saw several dozen children pushing out of a school bus and charging for the end of the queue. It was worth forfeiting my change to get ahead of that mob.

‘Good thinking, kids,' I gasped, crowding in beside Donna. It gave me a real feeling of accomplishment to look back at the teeming hordes shoving in behind us while a couple of hapless teachers shouted instructions at them.

‘We're moving already!' Donna nudged me forward. ‘We'll be inside in no time. This is a lot better than the old Tower of London.'

‘I think so, too.' There were showcases – more like peepshow cases — embedded in the outer wall, giving glimpses of the delights waiting inside. I gazed bemusedly at a hologram of a skull that turned into a fully-fleshed face as you moved along, then realized the twins were too short to extract full value from it and had to lift them up in turn so that they could view it properly.

‘Wow!' Donald said. ‘This is swell, Mom. Why didn't we come here first? We'd be inside by now.'

‘We were blinded by history,' I admitted. ‘But so was everybody else or we'd be inside the Tower. Don't worry, we'll get there another day.'

By that time, we were turning into the entrance and could see the ticket booth ahead. The line moved forward slowly, punctuated by ripples of amusement. I was fumbling in my bag for my wallet and didn't notice the cause. We moved forward again and I was at the ticket window.

‘One adult and two children, please,' I said, pushing my money across the counter.

‘Not
her,
Mom!' Donald poked me in the ribs, then turned to glare fiercely at the schoolchildren behind us who had erupted into laughter.

‘Oh, sorry –' I apologized automatically before realizing that I had compounded my idiocy by apologizing to a wax model. It was very lifelike.

‘Oh, Mom, you're
funny
!' Donna collapsed in giggles against me. I bought our tickets from an unsmiling clerk for whom the joke had obviously worn thin to the point of disintegration and we headed for the Main Hall. I spotted the next decoy first.

‘Go and ask the guard what time it is –' I pushed Donald towards the figure. He was halfway to it when he caught on and dashed back to pummel my side.

‘You were going to! You almost did!' Donna danced with glee.

‘I'll get you!' Donald tried to thump his twin, but she was too quick for him.

I called them to order and we did the Main Hall and the exhibition set pieces, then headed for the Chamber of Horrors. The twins pressed close to me as we descended the stairs, pointing to the fake cobwebs overhead and the grisly heads of the aristocrats who had been guillotined during the French Revolution. I shuddered as I realized that they were Mme Tussaud's original work; the heads of friends, still dripping with blood, brought straight from the guillotine to the young Marie Tussaud who was forced to model them in wax. How had she kept her sanity?

Yet, there was her own figure: Mme Tussaud herself, in serene old age, self-modelled and smiling. Proving that a strong enough personality could live through anything; survive horrors, emigrate and become a great business success in another country. It was surprising that modern feminists had not adopted her as a patron saint of their cause; she had everything. It would be a pity if a husband and a few children disqualified her.

The huge main line station was deserted and curiously eerie as we walked through it. The shops were shut and dark; only a lone vendor with a pile of evening newspapers was in sight. It was past the rush hour and not yet time for the theatre crowd to be heading for the suburbs.

We found our train platform and, so that we wouldn't have to walk so far at the other end, we strolled almost the length of it, passing endless lighted windows illuminating empty carriages. It might have been a ghost train.

We settled ourselves in a compartment; soon a whistle blew, doors slammed and the train moved slowly out of the station. Arnold settled back and began reading the newspaper, the twins dropped into a light doze. I sat at the window looking out at what I could see of the scenery going past. Vignettes of life appeared and disappeared as the lighted windows flashed by.

I felt tired but restless. It would be nice to have stayed longer in London, taken in a show, and been one of the crowd on the last train home. Perhaps I could organize a childminding swap with Lania; I'd take her kids some evenings when she and Richard wanted to go out, and they could take the twins so that Arnold and I could get to a few theatres while we were here.

I looked across to say something of the sort, but it was too late. Arnold had fallen asleep, too. With a sigh, I twitched the newspaper from his hands and folded it. I'd read it later; I was still finding the glimpses of English life in the houses along the track more interesting than newsprint.

We had left the car in the station car park all day. The car park had been full when we left it there this morning, now there were only a few cars remaining. We relinquished our tickets to the ticket collector and headed gratefully for the car, congratulating ourselves on our forethought.

Yawning, Arnold slid behind the steering wheel. The twins both crowded on to the front seat and battled with the seat belt until it fastened around both of them.

‘Are you sure you're awake enough to drive?' I hesitated before getting into the back seat.

‘I haven't been asleep.' Arnold was immediately on the defensive. ‘I was just resting my eyes.'

‘Hmmph!' I got in.

‘It isn't easy, poring over old books and manuscripts all day, you know. This isn't a pleasure trip for me –'

‘I'm working!' He let in the clutch and the car lurched forward.

‘I suppose I'm not?' I couldn't let him get away with that. ‘If you think trailing the twins around the tourist traps is fun, why don't you try it? I'll swap my feet for your eyes any day!'

Arnold ground the gears by way of reply and we took a corner much too sharply. I was glad the twins were safely belted down. I was hurled from one side of the back seat to the other as the car plunged down the street like a bucking bronco.

‘For God's sake ... Arnold ... Ooof! ... find the ... right gear!'

‘It
is
in the right gear!' Arnold snarled. ‘There's something wrong with the car.'

‘Daddy's driving with the emergency brake on,' Donald reported in a calm practical tone that was more irritating than shouting would have been.

Arnold snarled again – wordlessly, fortunately – and wrenched at a knob by his knee. There was a scream of anguished metal and the car immediately dropped into a more sedate progress.

‘And you weren't sleeping!' I jeered.

Arnold deliberately muttered something too low for me to catch and took another corner on two wheels.

He was driving too fast and veering to the right, but I decided I'd better not say anything more. He could be pushed just so far. It was time to shut up.

We took the final corner and barrelled along the street as though we were going right past the house. Arnold drove towards the kerb but didn't slow at all.

‘Stop!' Donna shouted. ‘Daddy – we're here. Stop!'

‘I can't!' Arnold had gone pale, a fine film of perspiration broke out on his forehead. His knee was jerking frantically as he pumped the brake. ‘It won't stop.'

‘The clutch –' I called out. ‘You've got to do something to the clutch before you can brake!'

‘The emergency brake,' Donald shouted. ‘
Now
use the emergency brake!' He grabbed for it.

I could see cars hurtling past at the end of the street. The traffic light farther on had obviously just changed. If we couldn't stop, we'd plunge straight out across that stream of moving traffic.

‘Hang on!' Arnold shouted. ‘I'm going to –' he turned the steering wheel sharply. We lurched up over the kerb and across the sidewalk. There was a muted impact as we hit the hedge and the car tried to climb it.

We hung there, halfway up the hedge. Arnold switched off the engine. ‘Christ!' he muttered. ‘Christ, that was a close one!'

‘The emergency brake didn't work, Dad,' Donald informed him unnecessarily. ‘You must have broken it, driving with it on.'

‘Nothing worked!' Arnold mopped his forehead. ‘I'm going to go back and give those car-hire people hell. They've got no right letting a car like this go out on the road.'

‘Oh-oh!' Donna was looking through the hedge. The porch light had snapped on in the other half of the house. ‘I think we're in trouble, Dad.'

We were. Lania stormed down the path and shrieked with dismay as she saw the car hanging from her hedge.

‘See if you can get out, honey,' Arnold said. ‘Easy now. Then we'll lift the kids down. The back wheels are still on the ground. Don't slam the door behind you – we don't want to rock the boat.

‘Okay.' I opened the door and slid out cautiously, trying to avoid Lania's accusing gaze.

‘My hedge!' Lania wailed. ‘Look at what you've done to it!'

‘We're awfully sorry.' I was too busy getting the kids to safety to bother glancing at the hedge, although I sure could feel it. The sharp holly points scratched at me as I leaned into it to catch first Donna and lower her to the ground, then Donald.

‘It took years to grow that hedge.
Years
and now look at it!'

‘I apologize –' With the children safe, Arnold now opened his own door and scrambled out. I apologize deeply, Mrs Sandgate, but there was no alternative.'

‘No alternative?' Lania wasn't going to accept a feeble excuse like that. If we'd had any decency, we would have driven past and killed ourselves.

‘Arnold isn't used to manual clutch —' I said.

“The brake wouldn't hold —' Arnold began.

‘
Damn
your clutch!
And
your brake!' Lania's voice rose to a fishwife's shriek. ‘What about my hedge?'

The twins had dashed for the neutral zone under the portico and were busy pretending that they had never seen any of us before in their lives.

‘We'll get on to a garage right away,' Arnold promised. ‘They'll send a tow truck for the car. Once they've lifted it off, we can see what the damage is. It may not be as bad as it looks.'

‘It looks better already,' I said brightly. ‘Now that we've got our combined weight out of the car.'

‘Sure it does, Babe.' Arnold slid his arm around my waist and I clung to him limply, even though he was pretty limp himself. We propped each other up in the face of Lania's awesome wrath. There was something inhuman about it. You'd think she'd be glad the hedge was there – it had quite possibly saved our lives.

‘I'm sure the hedge can be fixed,' I offered weakly.

‘Sure, it can,' Arnold echoed.

‘You know
nothing
about it!' Lania turned on her heel. ‘Nothing at all!'

We spent the next few days lying very low. We all but crawled into a hole and pulled the top over us. I caught Arnold actually tiptoeing down the path on his way to the train one morning, hunched over and trying to lower his profile beneath the top of the ruined hedge.

The car-hire people had not been exactly warm and supportive, either. They claimed that there had been nothing wrong with their car – until we got at it. They were in no hurry to let us have a replacement car and, anyway, we decided it would be better to stick to the car we knew. The garage promised to let us have it back by the end of the week with everything fixed. It would be safer to keep it – who knew what problems we might find with another car?

Arnold had even promised to take a couple of days away from his research and drive us around some more. To that end, we were poring over maps at the breakfast table the day the car was due to be returned.

‘They sure have some funny names in this country,' Donald observed. ‘Lower Slaughter – isn't that crazy?'

‘No crazier than Medicine Hat,' Arnold said. ‘Or how about the Susquehanna River?'

‘Just the same –' I was studying the map and weighed in on Donald's side. ‘I'm glad we didn't have to tell our friends we were spending the summer at Potter's Bar – or Pratt's Bottom.'

‘Yeah,' Arnold retorted swiftly. ‘We'd have been the butt of some pretty awful jokes.'

We all groaned and hurled pieces of toast at him – the Harper accolade for a successful pun. (Even our friends in New Hampshire had gotten into the spirit of the thing and, during cocktail hour, joined us in bombarding him with olives, peanuts and lightweight snacks. Hostesses had been known to draw Arnold aside and implore, ‘Please, Arnold, no puns' unless you're standing on the linoleum.')

Esmond took one horrified look at the flying crusts, abandoned his soggy corn flakes and disappeared through the cat flap.

‘Oh, look –' I protested. ‘Now we've frightened Esmond again.'

‘Esmond is a scaredy-cat,' Donna said severely.

‘He's no fun at all,' Donald complained. ‘He's afraid of everything. I don't see why we couldn't have brought good old Errol along with us.'

‘I've explained a dozen times –' I explained again. “The English are paranoiac about rabies, so they have strict quarantine laws. Errol would have had to go into quarantine for six months – and we aren't even going to be here that long. It's much better for him to stay at home where he's happy and comfortable. Also –' I cut off the incipient protest – ‘the Blakes couldn't take Esmond with them because, although he'd be all right going into America if he had a vet's certificate saying he was in good health, he'd still have to go into quarantine for six months when he came back here. It wouldn't be fair to him — or to them.'