The Borrowers Afloat (7 page)

Chapter Eleven

As they filed through the crack of the door onto the stone flags of the washhouse, they heard the ferret again. But Homily now felt brave. "Scratch away," she dared it happily, secure in their prospect of escape. But when they stood at last, grouped beneath the mangle and staring down at the drain, her new-found courage ebbed a little and she murmured, "Oh, my goodness...." Very deep and dark and well-like it seemed, sunk below the level of the floor. The square grating that usually covered it lay beside it at an angle, and in the yawning blackness she could see the reflections of their dips. A dank draft quivered round the candle flames, and there was a sour smell of yellow soap, stale disinfectant, and tea leaves.

"What's that at the bottom?" she asked, peering down. "Water?"

"Slime," said Spiller.

"Jellied soap," put in Pod quickly.

"And we've got to wade through that?"

"It isn't deep," said Spiller.

"Not as though this drain was a sewer," said Pod, trying to sound comforting and hearty. "Beats me though," he went on to Spiller, "how you manage to move this grating."

Spiller showed him. Lowering the dip, he pointed out a short length of what looked like brass curtain rod, strong but hollow, perched on a stone at the bottom of the well and leaning against the side. The top of this rod protruded slightly above the mouth of the drain. The grating, when in place, lay loosely on its worn rim of cement. Spiller explained how, by exerting all his strength on the rod from below, he could raise one corner of the grating—as a washerwoman with a prop can raise up a clothesline. He would then slide the base of the prop onto the raised stone in the base of the shaft, thus holding the contraption in place. Spiller would then swing himself up to the mouth of the drain on a piece of twine tied to a rung of the grating. "Only about twice my height," he explained. The twine, Pod gathered, was a fixture. The double twist round the light iron rung was hardly noticeable from above, and the length of the twine, when not in use, hung downwards into the drain. Should Spiller want to remove the grating entirely, as was the case today, after scrambling through the aperture raised by the rod, he would pull the twine after him, fling it around one of the stays of the mangle above his head, and would drag and pull on the end. Sometimes, Spiller explained, the grating slid easily; at other times it stuck on an angle. In which event, Spiller would produce a small but heavy bolt, kept specially for the purpose, which he would wind into the free end of his halyard and, climbing into the girder-like structure at the base of the mangle, would swing himself out on the bolt, which, sinking under his weight, exerted a pull on the grating.

"Very ingenious," said Pod. Dip in hand he went deeper under the mangle, examined the wet twine, pulled on the knots, and finally, as though to test its weight, gave the grating a shove. It slid smoothly on the worn flagstones. "Easier to shove than to lift," he remarked. Arrietty, glancing upwards, saw vast shadows on the washhouse ceiling—moving and melting, advancing and receding—in the flickering light from their dips: great wheels, handles, rollers, shifting spokes ... as though, she thought, the mangle under which they stood was silently and magically turning....

On the ground, beside the drain, she saw an object she recognized: the lid of an aluminum soapbox, the one in which the summer before last Spiller had spun her down the river, and from which he used to fish. It was packed now with some kind of cargo and covered with a piece of worn hide—possibly a rat skin—strapped over lid and all with lengths of knotted twine. From a hole bored in one end of the rim a second piece of twine protruded. "I pull her up by that," explained Spiller, following the direction of her eyes.

"I see how you get up," said Homily unhappily, peering into the slime, "but it's how you get down that worries me."

"Oh, you just drop," said Spiller. He took hold of the twine as he spoke and began to drag the tin lid away toward the door.

"It's all right, Homily," Pod promised hurriedly, "we'll let you down on the bolt," and he turned quickly to Spiller. "Where you going with that?" he asked.

Spiller, it seemed, not wishing to draw attention to the drain, was going to unpack next door. The house being free of humans and the log box pulled out, there was no need to go upstairs. He could dump what he'd brought beside the hole in the skirting.

While he was gone, Pod outlined a method of procedure. "...if Spiller agrees," he kept saying, courteously conceding the leadership.

Spiller did agree, or rather he raised no objections. The empty soapbox lid, lightly dangling, was lowered onto the mud; into this they dropped the egg—rolling it to the edge of the drain as though it were a giant rugby football, with a final kick from Pod to send it spinning and keep it clear of the sides. It plopped into the soapbox lid with an ominous crack. This did not matter, however, the egg being hard-boiled.

Homily, with not a few nervous exclamations, was lowered next, seated astride the bolt; with one hand she clung to the twine, in the other she carried a lighted dip. When she climbed off the bolt into the lid of the soapbox, the latter slid swiftly away on the slime, and Homily, for an anxious moment, disappeared along the drain. Spiller drew her back, however, hand over hand. And there she sat behind the egg, grumbling a little, but with her candle still alight. "Two can go in the lid," Spiller had announced, and Arrietty (who secretly had longed to try the drop) was lowered considerately, dip in hand, in the same respectful way. She settled herself opposite her mother with the egg wobbling between them.

"You two are the light-bearers," said Pod. "All you've got to do is to sit quite still and steady the egg—move the lights as we say..."

There was a little shuffling about in the lid and some slightly perilous balancing as Homily, who had never liked traveling—as human beings would say—back to the engine, stood up to change seats with Arrietty. "Keep a good hold on that string," she kept imploring Spiller as she completed this maneuver, but soon she and Arrietty were seated again face to face, each with their candle and the egg between their knees. Arrietty was laughing.

"Now I'm going to let you go a little ways," warned Spiller and paid out a few inches of twine. Arrietty and Homily slid smoothly under the roof of their arched tunnel, which gleamed wetly in the candlelight. Arrietty put out a finger and touched the gleaming surface: it seemed to be made of baked clay.

"Don't touch
anything
," hissed Homily, shudderingly, "and don't breathe either—not unless you have to."

Arrietty, lowering her dip, peered over the side at the mud. "There's a fishbone," she remarked, "and a tin bottle top. And a hairpin..." she added on a pleased note.

"Don't even
look
," shuddered Homily.

"A hairpin would be useful," Arrietty pointed out.

Homily closed her eyes. "All right," she said, her face drawn with the effort not to mind. "Pick it out quickly and drop it, sharp, in the bottom of the boat. And wipe your hands on my apron."

"We can wash it in the river," Arrietty pointed out.

Homily nodded; she was trying not to breathe.

Over Homily's shoulder Arrietty could see into the well of the drain; a bulky object was coming down the shaft: it was Pod's tackle, waterproof-wrapped and strapped securely to his hatpin. It wobbled on the mud with a slight squelch. Pod, after a while, came after it. Then came Spiller. For a moment the surface seemed to bear their weight then, knee-deep, they sank in slime.

Spiller removed the length of curtain rod from the stone and set it up inconspicuously in the corner of the shaft. Before their descent he and Pod must have placed the grating above more conveniently in position: a deft pull by Spiller on the twine and they heard it clamp down into place—a dull metallic sound that echoed hollowly along the length of their tunnel. Homily gazed into the blackness ahead as though following its flight. "Oh, my goodness," she breathed as the sound died; she felt suddenly shut in.

"Well," announced Pod in a cheerful voice, coming up behind them, and he placed a hand on the rim of their lid, "we're off!"

Chapter Twelve

Spiller they saw, to control them on a shorter length, was rolling up the towline. Not that towline was quite the right expression under the circumstances; the drain ran ahead on a slight downwards incline and Spiller functioned more as a sea anchor and used the twine as a brake.

"Here we go," said Pod, and gave the lid a slight push. They slid ahead on the slippery scum, to be lightly checked by Spiller. The candlelight danced and shivered on the arched roof and about the dripping walls. So thick and soapy was the scum on which they rode that Pod, behind them, seemed more to be leading his bundle than dragging it behind him. Sometimes, even, it seemed to be leading him.

"Whoa, there!" he would cry on such occasions. He was in very good spirits, and had been, Arrietty noticed, from the moment he set foot in the drain. She, too, felt strangely happy. Here they were, the two she held most dear, with Spiller added, making their way toward the dawn. The drain held no fears for Arrietty, leading as it did toward a life to be lived away from dust and candlelight and confining shadows—a life on which the sun would shine by day and the moon by night.

She twisted round in her seat in order to see ahead, and as she did so, a great aperture opened to her left and a dank draft flattened the flame of her candle. She shielded it quickly with her hand and Homily did the same.

"That's where the pipe from the sink comes in," said Spiller, "and the overflow from the copper...."

There were other openings as they went along, drains that branched into darkness and ran away uphill. Where these joined the main drain a curious collection of flotsam and jetsam piled up over which they had to drag the soap lid. Arrietty and Homily got out for this to make less weight for the men. Spiller knew all these branch drains by name and the exact position of each cottage or house concerned. Arrietty began, at last, to understand the vast resources of Spiller's trading. "Not that you get up into all of 'em," he explained. "I don't mind an's' bend, but where you get an's' bend, you're apt to get a brass grille or suchlike in the plug hole."

Once he said, jerking his head toward the mouth of a circular cavern, "Holmcroft, that is.... Nothing but bath water from now on...." And, indeed, this cavern, as they slid past it, had looked cleaner than most—a shining cream-colored porcelain—and the air from that point onwards, Arrietty noticed, smelled far less strongly of tea leaves.

Every now and again they came across small branches—of ash or holly—rammed so securely into place that they would have difficulty maneuvering round them. They were set, Arrietty noticed, at almost regular intervals. "I can't think how these tree things get down drains, anyway," Homily exclaimed irritably when, for about the fifth time, the soapbox lid was turned up sideways and eased past and she and Arrietty stood ankle-deep in jetsam, shielding their dips with their hands.

"I put them there," said Spiller, holding the boat for them to get in again. The drain at this point dropped more steeply. As Homily stepped in opposite Arrietty, the soapbox lid suddenly slid away, dragging Spiller after. He slipped and skidded on the surface of the mud, but miraculously he kept his balance. They fetched up in a tangle against the trunk of one of Spiller's treelike erections and Arrietty's dip went overboard. "So that's what they're for," exclaimed Homily as she coaxed her own flattened wick back to brightness to give Arrietty a light.

But Spiller did not answer straight away. He pushed past the obstruction, and as they waited for Pod to catch up, he said suddenly, "Could be..."

Pod looked weary when he came up to them. He was panting a little and had stripped off his jacket and slung it round his shoulders. "The last lap's always the longest," he pointed out.

"Would you care for a ride in the lid?" asked Homily. "Do, Pod!"

"No, I'm better walking," said Pod.

"Then give me your jacket," said Homily. She folded it gently across her knees and patted it soberly as though (thought Arrietty, watching) it were tired, like Pod.

And then they were off again—an endless, monotonous vista of circular walls. Arrietty after a while began to doze; she slid forward against the egg, her head caught up on one knee. Just before she fell asleep, she felt Homily slide the dip from her drooping fingers and wrap her round with Pod's coat.

When she awoke, the scene was much the same: shadows sliding and flickering on the wet ceiling, Spiller's narrow face palely lit as he trudged along, and the bulky shape beyond that was Pod. Her mother, across the egg, smiled at her bewilderment. "Forgotten where you were?" asked Homily.

Arrietty nodded. Her mother held a dip in either hand, and the wax, Arrietty noticed, had burned very low. "Must be nearly morning," Arrietty remarked. She still felt very sleepy.

"Shouldn't wonder..." said Homily.

The walls slid by, unbroken except for archlike thickenings at regular intervals where one length of pipe joined another. And when they spoke, their voices echoed hollowly back and forth along the tunnel.

"Aren't there any more branch drains?" Arrietty asked after a moment.

Spiller shook his head. "No more now. Holmcroft was die last...."

"But that was ages ago ... we must be nearly there."

"Getting on," said Spiller.

Arrietty shivered and drew Pod's coat more tightly around her shoulders; the air seemed fresher suddenly and curiously free from smell. "Or perhaps," she thought, "we've grown more used to it...." There was no sound except for the whispering slide of the soapbox lid and the regular plop and suction of Pod's and Spiller's footsteps. But the silt seemed rather thinner: there was an occasional grating sound below the base of the tin lid as though it rode on grit. Spiller stood still. "Listen!" he said.

They were all quiet but could hear nothing except Pod's breathing and a faint musical drip somewhere just ahead of them. "Better push on," said Homily suddenly, breaking the tension. "These dips aren't going to last for ever."

"Quiet!" cried Spiller again. Then they heard a faint drumming sound, hardly more than a vibration.

"Whatever is it?" asked Homily.

"Can only be Holmcroft," said Spiller. He stood rigid, with one hand raised, listening intently. "But," he said, turning to Pod, "who ever'd be having a bath at this time o' night?"

Pod shook his head. "It's morning by now," he said, "must be getting on for six."

The drumming sound grew louder, less regular, more like a leaping and a banging....

"We've got to run for it—" cried Spiller. Towline in hand, he swung the tin lid round and, taking the lead, flew ahead into the tunnel. Arrietty and Homily banged and rattled behind him. Dragged on the short line, they swung shatteringly, thrown from wall to wall. But, panic-stricken at the thought of total darkness, each shielded the flame of her candle. Homily stretched out a free hand to Pod who caught hold of it just as his bundle bore down on him, knocking him over. He fell across it, still gripping Homily's hand, and was carried swiftly along.

"Out and up," cried Spiller from the shadows ahead, and they saw the glistening twigs wedged tautly against the roof. "Let the traps go," he was shouting. "Come on—climb!"

They each seized a branch and swung themselves up and wedged themselves tight against the ceiling. The overturned dips lay guttering in the tin lid and the air was filled with the sound of galloping water. In the jerking light from the dips they saw the first pearly bubbles and the racing, dancing, silvery bulk behind. And then all was choking, swirling, scented darkness....

After the first few panic-stricken seconds, Arrietty found she could breathe and that the sticks still held. A millrace of hot scented water swilled through her clothes, piling against her at one moment, falling away the next. Sometimes it bounced above her shoulders, drenching her face and hair; at others it swirled steadily about her waist and tugged at her legs and feet. "Hold on," shouted Pod above the turmoil.

"Die down soon," shouted Spiller.

"You there, Arrietty?" gasped Homily. They were all there and all breathing, and, even as they realized this, the water began to drop in level and run less swiftly. Without the brightness of the dips, the darkness about them seemed less opaque, as though a silvery haze rose from the water itself, which seemed now to be running well below them, and from the sound of it, as innocent and steady as a brook.

After a while they climbed down into it and felt a smoothly running warmth about their ankles. At this level they could see a faint translucence where the surface of the water met the blackness of the walls. "Seems lighter," said Pod wonderingly. He seemed to perceive some shifting in the darkness where Spiller splashed and probed. "Anything there?" he asked.

"Not a thing," said Spiller.

Their baggage had disappeared—egg, soapbox lid and all—swept away on the flood.

"And now what?" asked Pod dismally.

But Spiller seemed quite unworried. "Pick it up later," he said. "...nothing to hurt. And saves carting."

Homily was sniffing the air. "Sandalwood!" she exclaimed suddenly to Arrietty. "Your father's favorite soap."

But Arrietty, her hand on a twig to steady herself against the warm flow eddying past her ankles, did not reply; she was staring straight ahead down the incline of the drain. A bead of light hung in the darkness. For a moment she thought that, by some miraculous chance, it might be one of the dips—then she saw it was completely round and curiously steady. And mingled with the scent of sandalwood she smelled another smell—minty, grassy, mildly earthy...

"It's dawn," she announced in a wondering voice. "And what's more," she went on, staring spellbound at the distant pearl of light, "that's the end of the drain."