The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (23 page)

And there was a pattern on the walls which was like this

And there was a pattern on the seats like this

Then the train wobbled a lot and I had to hang on to a rail and we went into a tunnel and it was noisy and I closed my eyes and I could feel the blood pumping in the sides of my neck.

And then we came out of the tunnel and went into another little station and it was called
Warwick Avenue
and it said it in big letters on the wall and I liked that because you knew where you were.

And I timed the distance between stations all the way to Willesden Junction and all the times between stations were multiples of 15 seconds like this

And when the train stopped at
Willesden Junction
and the doors opened automatically I walked out of the train. And then the doors closed and the train went away. And everyone who got off the train walked up a staircase and over a bridge except me, and then there were only 2 people that I could see and one was a man and he was drunk and he had brown stains on his coat and his shoes were not a pair and he was singing but I couldn't hear what he was singing, and the other was an Indian man in a shop which was a little window in a wall.

And I didn't want to talk to either of them because I was tired and hungry and I had already talked to lots of strangers, which is dangerous, and the more you do something dangerous the more likely it is that something bad happens. But I didn't know how to get to 451c Chapter Road, London NW2 5NG, so I had to ask somebody.

So I went up to the man in the little shop and I said, “Where is 451c Chapter Road, London NW2 5NG?”

And he picked up a little book and handed it to me and said, “Two ninety-five.”

And the book was called
LONDON AZ Street Atlas and Index, Geographers' A–Z Map Company,
and I opened it up and it was lots of maps.

And the man in the little shop said, “Are you going to buy it or not?”

And I said, “I don't know.”

And he said, “Well, you can get your dirty fingers off it if you don't mind,” and he took it back from me.

And I said, “Where is 451c Chapter Road, London NW2 5NG?”

And he said, “You can either buy the A-to-Z or you can hop it. I'm not a walking encyclopedia.”

And I said, “Is that the A-to-Z?” and I pointed at the book.

And he said, “No, it's a sodding crocodile.”

And I said, “Is that the A-to-Z?” because it wasn't a crocodile and I thought I had heard wrong because of his accent.

And he said, “Yes, it's the A-to-Z.”

And I said, “Can I buy it?”

And he didn't say anything.

And I said, “Can I buy it?”

And he said, “Two pounds ninety-five, but you're giving me the money first. I'm not having you scarpering,” and then I realized that he meant £2.95 when he said
Two ninety-five.

And I paid him with my money and he gave me change just like in the shop at home and I went and sat down on the floor against the wall like the man with the dirty clothes but a long way away from him and I opened up the book.

And inside the front cover there was a big map of London with places on it like
Abbey Wood
and
Poplar
and
Acton
and
Stanmore.
And it said
KEY TO MAP PAGES.
And the map was covered with a grid and each square of the grid had two numbers on it. And
Willesden
was in the square which said
42
and
43.
And I worked out that the numbers were the numbers of the pages where you could see a bigger-scale map of that square of London. And the whole book was a big map of London, but it had been chopped up so it could be made into a book, and I liked that.

But Willesden Junction wasn't on pages 42 and 43. And I found it on page 58, which was directly under page 42 on the
KEY TO MAP PAGES
and which joined up with page 42. And I looked round Willesden Junction in a spiral, like when I was looking for the train station in Swindon, but on the map with my finger.

And the man who had shoes that did not match stood in front of me and said, “Big cheese. Oh yes. The nurses. Never. Bloody liar. Total bloody liar.”

Then he went away.

And it took me a long time to find Chapter Road because it wasn't on page 58. It was back on page 42, and it was in square 5C.

And this was the shape of the roads between Willesden Junction and Chapter Road.

And this was my route

So I went up the staircase and over the bridge and I put my ticket in the little gray gate and went into the street and there was a bus and a big machine with a sign on it which said
English Welsh and Scottish Railways,
but it was yellow, and I looked around and it was dark and there were lots of bright lights and I hadn't been outside for a long time and it made me feel sick. And I kept my eyelids very close together and I just looked at the shape of the roads and then I knew which roads were
Station Approach
and
Oak Lane,
which were the roads I had to go along.

So I started walking, but Siobhan said I didn't have to describe everything that happens, I just have to describe the things that were interesting.

So I got to 451c Chapter Road, London NW2 5NG, and it took me 27 minutes and there was no one in when I pressed the button that said
Flat C
and the only interesting thing that happened on the way was 8 men dressed up in Viking costumes with helmets with horns on and they were shouting, but they weren't real Vikings because the Vikings lived nearly 2,000 years ago, and also I had to go for another wee and I went in the alleyway down the side of a garage called
Burdett Motors,
which was closed, and I didn't like doing that but I didn't want to wet myself again, and there was nothing else interesting.

So I decided to wait and I hoped that Mother was not on holiday because that would mean she could be away for more than a whole week, but I tried not to think about this because I couldn't go back to Swindon.

So I sat down on the ground behind the dustbins in the little garden that was in front of 451c Chapter Road, London NW2 5NG, and it was under a big bush. And a lady came into the garden and she was carrying a little box with a metal grille on one end and a handle on the top like you use to take a cat to the vet, but I couldn't see if there was a cat in it, and she had shoes with high heels and she didn't see me.

And then it started to rain and I got wet and I started shivering because I was cold.

And then it was 11:32 p.m. and I heard voices of people walking along the street.

And a voice said, “I don't care whether you thought it was funny or not,” and it was a lady's voice.

And another voice said, “Judy, look. I'm sorry, OK,” and it was a man's voice.

And the other voice, which was the lady's voice, said, “Well, perhaps you should have thought about that before you made me look like a complete idiot.”

And the lady's voice was Mother's voice.

And Mother came into the garden and Mr. Shears was with her, and the other voice was his.

So I stood up and I said, “You weren't in, so I waited for you.”

And Mother said, “Christopher.”

And Mr. Shears said, “What?”

And Mother put her arms around me and said, “Christopher, Christopher, Christopher.”

And I pushed her away because she was grabbing me and I didn't like it, and I pushed really hard and I fell over.

And Mr. Shears said, “What the hell is going on?”

And Mother said, “I'm so sorry, Christopher. I forgot.”

And I was lying on the ground and Mother held up her right hand and spread her fingers out in a fan so that I could touch her fingers, but then I saw that Toby had escaped out of my pockets so I had to catch him.

And Mr. Shears said, “I suppose this means Ed's here.”

And there was a wall around the garden so Toby couldn't get out because he was stuck in the corner and he couldn't climb up the walls fast enough and I grabbed him and put him back in my pocket and I said, “He's hungry. Have you got any food I can give him, and some water?”

And Mother said, “Where's your father, Christopher?”

And I said, “I think he's in Swindon.”

And Mr. Shears said, “Thank God for that.”

And Mother said, “But how did you get here?”

And my teeth were clicking against each other because of the cold and I couldn't stop them, and I said, “I came on the train. And it was really frightening. And I took Father's cashpoint card so I could get money out and a policeman helped me. But then he wanted to take me back to Father. And he was on the train with me. But then he wasn't.”

And Mother said, “Christopher, you're soaking. Roger, don't just stand there.”

And then she said, “Oh my God. Christopher. I didn't . . . I didn't think I'd ever . . . Why are you here on your own?”

And Mr. Shears said, “Are you going to come in or are you going to stay out here all night?”

And I said, “I'm going to live with you because Father killed Wellington with a garden fork and I'm frightened of him.”

And Mr. Shears said, “Jumping Jack Christ.”

And Mother said, “Roger, please. Come on, Christopher, let's go inside and get you dried off.”