The Cockatrice Boys (6 page)

“Sir, I never get a chance to play my drum. Ser'nt Bellswinger won't let me. He says it makes too much finical row, that it would rouse up all the finical monsters between here and Gretna Green. Sir, when
can
I play it?”

“Don't you worry,” said the colonel, rolling over under the velvet bedspread to help himself to another cup of tea. “You'll get to play it soon enough.”

At that moment both Dakin and Colonel Clipspeak were greatly astonished to hear a voice apparently coming out of the colonel's early-morning teakettle. It said, “Hey, we gotta bloke here wants to get to Hempfields. What's it like out that way?”

“No go,” said another voice. “It's a regular breeding ground for Snarks. Tell 'im, if 'e goes, it's at 'is own risk. The corporation won't admit liability.”

“OK, I'll tell him that.”

“You got Snarks your way too?”

“
Have
we got Snarks! Like starlings. Warrens full of 'em.”

“They do say the young ones are harmless. You look at 'em, you don't vanish.”

“You ever tried?”

“No, but my cousin Albert did. His kid brought one in for a pet. Cuddly little thing, it was.”

“What happened?”

“It grew a bit older and looked at them and they all vanished.”

“Well, then.”

“What I mean is, if we could go after 'em when they're young…”

The two voices died away in a forest of crackle.

“Well, I'm blessed,” said the colonel. “My kettle seems to have picked up a radio frequency.”

“Yes, sir,” said Dakin. “Hempfields is a place in Manchester, sir. My Auntie Floss used to live there. Do you think I might get to see my Auntie Floss by Christmas, sir? Aunt Floss used to have a tea-maker set like yours, sir.”

“So did lots of people,” snapped the colonel. “You send Major Scanty to me right away.”

“Yessir.”

*   *   *

“Come in, Scanty, come in,” said the colonel, ten minutes later. “Help yourself to a glass of ginger wine. It was you, was it not, who received the radio message two days ago from Manchester?”

“Yes, Colonel.”

“How did they contrive to send the message? I thought Manchester was deprived of all basic services.”

“The mayor said—if I understood him correctly—that the vibrations set up by the wings of huge flocks of Snarks overhead created such exceptional static in the atmosphere that large portions of the city were infiltrated by electric current—even toothbrushes, carving knives, and hedge clippers became capable of transmitting electric messages—”

“Hmn, I see; like this kettle of mine. It just caught a chat between two radio cabs.”

“Indeed sir. That kettle will be a decided asset if it continues to pick up external transmissions. Perhaps by means of it we shall be able to discover something about the causes and origins of the problems that we face,” said Major Scanty hopefully.

*   *   *

The outskirts of Manchester were more devastated than those of London, in a different way. There were great greasy frozen swamps, with derelict factories, twisted metal girders, ruined concrete overpasses, and piles of snowy black coal-dust grown over with bindweed. But the town had not been flattened; far away in the distance highrise buildings could still be seen. The problem here had been Snarks, not the Shovel-tuskers which had knocked London flat.

Before it reached the city, the rail track sank down out of sight into a greenish peaty bog puddled all over with ice and rainbow patches of oil. A party of ten sappers was sent out to make good the track, layering it underneath with rapid-setting filler and plastic ties. The men wore well-greased Snark glasses and carried Kelpie knives for close combat; they were protected by another party in the driver's cab armed with flame-throwers and also December guns which fired explosive missiles of ice cooled to minus sixty degrees Celsius.

But despite this the work-party suffered badly. Dakin, dashing about in the cab, feverishly cleaning the big glass windows, wiping off Snark scales, Telepod fur, powder burns, and men's sweat, keeping the vision clear for the marksmen, was horrified to see how, man by man, the brave sappers were picked off. Six of them just vanished, when Snarks came too close, one was dragged away by a Telepod, one chopped in two by a Manticore and two were pulled into the swamp by Cocodrills. Just the same, in four days the task was finished. The track had been made usable and the
Cockatrice Belle
clanked slowly and cautiously over the doubtful stretch, and then very much faster up the slope beyond, Lance-Corporal Pitkin switching in half a dozen of his wind generators.

But the colonel was cursing long and bitterly as he paced about his cabin, with Major Scanty and Captain Twilight taking turns to look through the periscope that allowed a farther view of the track ahead.

“Some of my very best men! Those butterheads at supply just don't know the first thing about Snarks.”

“How many real Snark masks were we given, sir?” asked Captain Twilight.

“Only enough for half the troop! And it's plain we're going to have a pitched battle on our hands before we can get into Manchester. The men will
have
to wear masks for that. Ensign Catchpole!” he barked over the intercom.

“Sir!”

“Cut your engine. We'll stop here for the night and recharge. Sergeant Bellswinger!”

“Yessir.”

“We'll have a sally at first light tomorrow. Eighty men with full battle equipment—masks, Griffin capes, the lot. Meanwhile, tell the lads to take it easy and turn in early. And—harrumph—tell Mrs. Churt to give them something extra tasty for their evening meal. And, Bellswinger, send Drummer-boy Prestwich along here, will you?”

“Yessir.”

Dakin was feeling depressed. He had seen ten people he knew, men who had been kind to him, cracked jokes, given him butter tokens, shown him a fast way to load his pistol, told him tales of Cockatrices, and how to deal with Bonnacons—he had seen those men vanish like drops of water on a hotplate and it had upset him badly. His expression was very dejected as he knocked and entered the colonel's cabin.

“Now, Prestwich,” said the colonel, taking no notice of this, “there's a kind of monster in these parts that's hypersensitive to loud rhythmic noise.”

“Sir?”

“The monsters can't stand a regular row. All the ones in the Apocarpus family are like that.”

“I don't know no Apocarpuses, sir.”

“We don't have many round London. But here there are whole schools of them. Hydra, Cocodrill, Glyptodont, Telepod, Kelpies, Griffins—they all belong to the Apocarpus family.”

“Quite a big family, sir.”

“If they hear a loud, sustained regular noise they tend to fall in half.”

“Coo, sir.”

“So you'll be out there tomorrow, with those eighty men, Prestwich, and I want you playing your drum really loud, so long as the battle lasts. D'you understand? I don't want you to stop for a single moment. Can you do that?”

“Coo, sir, yes sir!” said Dakin joyfully.

“Ask Mrs. Churt to give you a mug of hot milk with malt and molasses and rum flavouring in it, last thing tonight and first thing tomorrow. Tell her I said so.”

“Yes, sir. Goodnight, sir!”

“Goodnight, Dakin.”

“That ain't a bad boy,” said Captain Twilight, as the brass-handled door closed behind Dakin. “He's got some sand in him.”

When Dakin went along to Mrs. Churt for his bedtime drink, he found her with a melancholy, distant look in her eye. She too had been grieved by the loss of the ten men. But she was working even harder than usual at her cross-stitch canvas (it had a picture of a stylized Cockatrice on it, transfixed by a crossbow quarrel). A lot of the men had somehow acquired the notion that Mrs. Churt's piece of handiwork was a lucky charm, and many of them came seriously to touch it with one finger before retiring to bed.

“It's like the bit of turf in the centre of the Manchester United football pitch,” said Private Tomkins. “Dead lucky,
that
is. You touch that with your finger, they say, you get all the good luck of everybody who ever stepped on it.”

But Mrs. Churt was not paying attention. She sighed.

“That Corporal Bigtoe, he was a real one for a laugh. Come to that, they was all nice boys. Lively. I'd like to set up some kind of memorial to them.”

“What kind, Mrs. Churt?” asked Dakin, sipping his hot molasses and milk.

“I'll have to think. Now, you hop it, off to bed. You got to keep busy, tomorrow.”

Next day at dawn Dakin, reporting to the galley for his morning toddy, was surprised not to find Mrs. Churt presiding over the big copper cooking plates that were heated by power from the engine. Instead, Orderly Widgery was back in charge, stirring the cauldrons of porridge and toasting raisin buns for the men's breakfast.

“Where's Mrs. Churt?”

“Having a lie-in, I daresay, after that beanfeast she cooked last night.”

Dakin thought this most unlike Mrs. Churt, but he had no time for more talk, the call for assembly was sounding on Catchpole's whistle; men were tumbling out of the big doors at the rear of the train, and forming into squares of ten. Dakin, who had been polishing his drum since 3:00
A.M.
, tumbled himself out likewise and took his place at the side of the troop, who all looked like unicorns in their pronged Snark masks. They carried long wicked December guns, squat, wide flame-throwers, and had Kelpie knives slotted all over their equipment wherever there was room.

“Now then—you little smitchy-faced article!” roared Sergeant Bellswinger to Dakin. “You keep your eye on Captain Twilight there, and follow wherever he goes. When I say the word
march,
you begins to play, and you doesn't stop till you hears Catchpole sound the recall. Understand? Comprenny? Troop! Shun! Verse—arms! Eyes—front! Left—turrrn! At the double—MARRCH!”

“Titherump, titherump, titherump, rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-
tum!
” sang Dakin's drum under his rattling drumsticks, as he panted along in Captain Twilight's rear beside the troop of men, who were hurrying grimly and gaily up towards the top of a long rough slope of moorland. When they reached the summit they could see down on the other side, through the morning mist, the battered tower blocks of Manchester.

Between the troop and the town, though, swarmed a wild medley of monsters, hopping, swooping, galloping on nine legs, gliding on slimy suckers, prancing on claw-fringed hoofs, floating on bat-wings.

“Croopus,” said Private Mollisk. “'Tis like ‘The Teddy Bears' Picnic'.”

“As good as a panto,” said Private Reilly. “All we need's the Fairy Queen.”

“Rumpa-tumpa, tumpa, tump!” beat Dakin's drumsticks.

“Squad-load!” bawled Sergeant Bellswinger. “On the word—
fire!
”

A sheet of flame and a black hail of missiles swept across the open space.

It was a ferocious battle. Out of the mists to the south a dim red sun presently mounted and cast patches of crimson light on the frosty slope, on the grisly many-shaped monsters and the men, who looked almost as wild, in their Griffin capes, Gorgon shields, and Snark masks.

Dakin, too, had been issued with a Snark mask. It was much too big for him and kept slipping; every few minutes he had to hitch his head back to shake it into position. He longed to take it off and sling it over his shoulder, but he did not, for three reasons: first, Sergeant Bellswinger had threatened to cut his tripes out if he did so; second, he observed Ensign Crisworthy take
his
mask off to blow his nose and, a second later, vanish like a burnt tissue as a Snark winged down on him; third, rattling away at the big drum like a mad woodpecker, Dakin simply hadn't time to do anything but keep drumming.

Sometimes the fight roared and seethed all around him, sometimes it swept away into the distance; sometimes he had the satisfaction of seeing some beast pause, hesitate, catching the sound of his desperate tattoo, and then suddenly fall in half like a tree struck by lightning. On the whole he received very little notion as to how the general trend of the battle was going, whether the Cockatrice Corps might be winning or losing. There seemed to be an unlimited supply of monsters; they kept pouring out of the sky, and from the towers of Manchester, like swarming seagulls or hungry locusts. Dakin thumped away, often ducking a whistling wing, or leaping aside to dodge a raking talon; once he was wrapped in slimy tentacles and had to slash himself loose at frantic speed with his Kelpie knife, transferring both drumsticks to his left hand temporarily; but not once did he stop drumming, not even when he thought he saw Mrs. Churt hurry across the hillside among the men in their dark-brown uniforms and the cream-coloured, salmon-pink, yellow, grey, and leopard-spotted monsters.