The Deptford Mice 1: The Dark Portal (2 page)

This fine example of Victorian ironwork was in the cellar of the empty house. Beyond it lay a passage that led straight to the sewers. It nagged on the mind of every mouse. The Grille, with its leaf pattern of iron was all that divided them from the bitter cruelty of the ratfolk and their dark gods. All the mice in the Skirtings knew of the Grille. It was the gateway to the underworld, the barrier between life and death. Only whispering voices could discuss the sewers in case strange forces were awoken by their mention out loud. The mice knew that deep below ground, beyond the Grille, was a power, which even the rats feared. No one dared to name it in the Skirtings – it was enough to still any conversation and bring a sudden, sober halt to merrymaking.

And yet the Grille seemed to draw mice to it. In one corner there was even a tiny hole edged with jagged rusty iron which a mouse could just squeeze through, if he was foolish enough to want to do so.

One such mouse was Albert Brown. He could never afterwards understand what had compelled him to do such a crazy thing but through the Grille he had gone.

Albert had a wife called Gwen and two children, Arthur and Audrey, so you see he had everything to live for. He was happy and his family was content. There was just no reason and he kicked himself for it. With a shudder he remembered the warnings that he had given his own children: ‘Beware of the Grille!’ He had never been brave or overtly curious, so why did the Grille call to him that spring morning, and what was the urge to explore that gripped him so?

The sewers were dark, oppressive and worst of all smelly: Albert had gone quite a way before he shook himself and suddenly became aware of where he was. Quickly he stifled the yell that gurgled up from his stomach and raced out of his mouth. Then he sat down and took in the situation.

He was on a narrow ledge, in a wide, high tunnel. Below him ran the dark sewer water. Albert cursed the madness that had gripped him and sent him running into danger.

‘Yet here I am,’ he thought ruefully and wondered how far he had come. But he was unable even to recall how long since he had left the Skirtings. Alone, in the darkness, Albert sat on the brick ledge trying to quell the panic that was bubbling up inside him. He pressed his paws into his stomach and breathed as deeply as he could.

‘Got to get out! Got to get back!’ he said, but his voice came out all choked and squeaky and echoed eerily around the tunnel. This frightened him more than anything: the rats lived down here. Around the next corner a band of them could be waiting for him, listening to his funny cries of alarm and laughing at his panic. They might have knives arid sticks. What if they were already appointing one of them to be the mouse-peeler? What if . . .?

Albert breathed deeply again and wiped his forehead. The only thing to do was to remain calm: if he succumbed to fright then he would stay rooted to the spot and the rats would surely find him. He stood up and set his jaw in determination. ‘If I stay calm and use my wits then all I have to do is retrace my footsteps and return to the Grille,’ he told himself.

It was many hours later when Albert sat down on yet another ledge and wept. All this time he had tried to find his way out, but up till now he had been unable to recognise anything that could tell him he was on the right track. What hope had he of returning to his family? He sighed and wondered what time of day it was. Perhaps it was another day altogether? Then he remembered and hoped that it was not. The Great Spring Celebration was today, and he would miss it. He would miss the games, the dancing and the presentations. Albert groaned. His own children, Arthur and Audrey, were to be presented this year; they had come of age and would receive their mousebrasses. Today was the most special day in their lives and he would miss it. Albert wept again.

Then in his sorrow he put his paw up to his own mousebrass hanging from a thread around his neck.

It was a small circle of brass that fitted in the palm of his paw. Inside the golden, shining hoop three mouse tails met in the middle. It was a sign of life and an emblem of his family. Albert took new hope from tracing the pattern with his fingers – it reminded him that there were brighter places than this dark sewer and he resolved to continue searching until he found home or death.

Along the ledge he walked, his pink feet scarcely making a sound. Carefully he went – aware of the dangers, keeping close to the wall and the wet brick. Suddenly he heard a faint pit-a-pat from around the corner. Something was approaching.

Albert turned quickly and looked for a place to hide, but there was only the bare wall and no escape. His heart beating hard, he pressed himself against the bricks and tried to merge into the shadows. Albert held his breath and waited apprehensively.

From around the corner came a shadow – it sprawled over the ledge then flew into the darkness of the tunnel. Albert gasped in spite of himself when the shadow’s owner finally emerged. It was a mouse.

All his fears and worries melted and he was left with such relief that he hugged the stranger. ‘Gerroff!’ said the mouse, struggling. Albert stood’ back but continued to shake the other’s paw.

‘Oh you’ve no idea how glad I am to see another mouse,’ Albert said.

The stranger breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Me too, though you gave me an ’orrid fright pouncing on me like that. I’m Piccadilly. Wotcha.’ He took his paw from Albert’s and pushed back his fringe. ‘Who’re you?’

‘Albert,’ was the reply. ‘How did you get here?’

Piccadilly then told him his story while Albert looked him over. He was it young mouse, a little older than Albert’s children because he already had his mousebrass. He was also grey, which was unusual in the Skirtings, and he had a cheeky way of speaking. Albert put that down to Piccadilly’s lack of parents: they had been killed by an Underground train.

Piccadilly had been involved in one of the food hunting parties in the city when he had lost his comrades and, like Albert, strayed into the sewers.

‘And here I am,’ he concluded. ‘Mind you, where that is I’m not sure.’

Albert sighed. ‘Neither am I, unfortunately. We could be under Greenwich or Lewisham, or anywhere really . . .’ His voice trailed off and he looked thoughtful.

‘Anythin’ wrong Alby?’

‘Yes, and less of that sauce!’ Albert scratched an ear and looked seriously at the young mouse. ‘Apart from the fact that I shall miss my children’s mousebrass presentations, as yet I’ve seen neither hide nor tooth of any rats down here, so it’s only a matter of time before we run smack bang into them.’

Piccadilly laughed. ‘Rats! Slime-stuffers! Are you afraid of them?’ He paused to hold his sides. ‘Why, I’ll handle them for you, grandpa. A few bits of well-chosen chat from me will get ’em runnin’.’

Albert shook his head. ‘Around here the rats are different. They’re not the feckless bacon rind-chewers that you have in the city, Piccadilly. No, these are far worse. They will eat each other, let alone us. They have cruel yellow eyes and they are driven by a burning hatred of all other creatures.’

‘I’ll drive’ em!’ Piccadilly scoffed. ‘Ain’t nothing different Alby, rats is rats wherever!’

Albert closed his eyes and lowered his voice. ‘Jupiter,’ he whispered. ‘They have him.’

The young mouse opened his mouth but no cheek came out. ‘In the city we’ve heard rumours of Jupiter,’ he stammered at last. ‘The great God of the Rats, Lord of the Rotting Darkness . . . is he here?’

‘Somewhere,’ Albert replied unhappily.

‘Are the myths about him true then?’ continued Piccadilly. ‘Has he two great ugly heads, one with red eyes and the other with yellow?’

‘No mouse has seen him,’ said Albert, ‘but I don’t think that the rats have either – I’ve heard he lives in a dark hole and doesn’t come out. I’ll wager Morgan has seen him though.’

‘Who’s he?’

‘Oh Morgan is his chief henchrat, and slyer than a bag of lies. He does most of Jupiter’s dirty work.’

Piccadilly looked around him. The dark seemed to press in on him now. ‘So the rats are more cruel here then?’

Albert nodded. ‘Do you think we ought to find a way out?’ he said.

They set off together, searching the tunnels and exploring deep into black places. Paw in paw, the two mice found comfort in each other’s company; but both were terribly afraid. All they could hear were steady drips and every so often a sploosh sound in the sewer. Sometimes they had to turn back when the smells got too bad and made their whiskers itch. Then a tunnel would end abruptly and they had to retrace their steps back to the last turning point.

The sewer ledges were treacherous, the gloom hiding every kind of trap: holes, stones and slimy moss. Albert and Piccadilly went forward very carefully and very slowly.

Way above them the new moon of May climbed the night sky and only the brightest stars could be seen above the orange glare of the city lights.

‘Another dead end!’ said Albert in exasperation. Piccadilly ran his paw over the wall that blocked their path and rubbed his eyes.

‘Do you think we’ll ever get out?’ he asked quietly.

The older mouse could see even in the murky darkness that Piccadilly’s eyes were wet and already he was sniffing a little. Albert took his paw and they sat down. ‘Of course we will! Why, I’ve known mice in worse pickles than this come out tail and all. Take Twit – now there’s an example!’

‘Who’s Twit?’ asked Piccadilly.

‘A young friend of my children – must be your age though – got his brass you see: an ear of wheat against a sickle moon.’

‘He’s one of the country mice then?’ said Piccadilly, brightening a little. Talk of the outside and the chance of a story cheered his spirits. Albert was quite clever and tactful.

‘Yes, a fieldmouse Twit is, and the smallest fellow to wear the brass that I’ve ever seen. In the dead of winter he came to the Skirtings to visit his cousin.’

‘In winter, with the snow an’ all?’

‘Snow and all,’ said Albert. ‘A terrible journey he had and many unexpected happenings on the way.’ He paused for effect.

‘Foxes, owls and stoats he met. “Suave is Mr Fox”, Twit told us. You have to be careful of him – Old Brush Buttocks he calls him.’

Piccadilly laughed. ‘Twit’s an odd name,’ he mused.

Albert nodded. ‘Comes from having no cheese upstairs, if you understand me.’

‘And hasn’t he?’

‘That’s a tricky one: first sight yes, but then no.’ Albert sucked his teeth for a while. ‘If I had an opinion and the right to tell it,’ he said eventually, ‘it would be that Twit is an innocent. He’s forever thinking of the good: he’s not simple – no – or else he’d never have made it from his field. No, I think it’s something which other animals sense and they leave him alone. In the nicest possible way Twit is . . . green, as green as a summer field, as green as . . .’

‘The Green Mouse,’ Piccadilly said.

‘Exactly! Now that’s a better thing to think of The Green Mouse in His coat of leaves and fruit.’

‘I think I would like to meet Twit,’ Piccadilly said. ‘If we ever get out of here, that is.’

‘Oh he and Oswald are a pair indeed.’

‘Oswald?’

‘Twit’s cousin.’

‘Tell me about him.’

‘Another time,’ said Albert, getting to his feet; he had suddenly become aware of their position and how vulnerable they were. The darkness seemed to close around him.

‘On your feet lad. Time to go – and let’s make this the last stretch, eh?’ He pulled Piccadilly up. An uneasy fear was growing in him and he did not want the younger mouse to sense it.

They started off again. Piccadilly ran his paw along the bricks as they went. ‘I suppose it’s all a bit of an adventure really,’ he said. ‘Ought to make the most of it.’ Then he stopped and cried out.

‘Alby! I think I’ve found something here. Come see, there’s a small opening in the brickwork.’

Albert peered into the hole that Piccadilly had found. The air was still and strangely lacking in all smell. Albert twitched his whiskers and tried to catch a scent that would give them a clue to what lay beyond. There was nothing.

The hole was deeper and blacker than the darkness they were used to, but what choice did they have? At least it would be a change. They were bored with wandering around on sewer ledges; and they could always come back if this turned out to be yet another dead end.

The opening was just big enough for them to squeeze through. Once inside they found that they were able to stand quite comfortably, although the pitch dark was unnerving and they often stumbled over unseen obstacles.

Strange thoughts came to Albert as he led the way, holding tightly to Piccadilly’s paw. He felt that they were crossing an abyss, descending into a deep black gulf. He was unable to make out the paw in front of his face, and in the raven darkness his imagination drew images before his eyes: visions of his wife Gwen, and Arthur and Audrey, forever beckoning yet always distant. Albert despaired and held his sorrow, nursing it in silence.

Following blindly, Piccadilly clung to Albert’s paw. He had never experienced a darkness like this before, not even in the tunnels of the Underground in the city. This was a total dumbfounding of the senses; he could see nothing, he could smell nothing, and even sound was muffled by the suffocating night. He tried not to think of the sense of taste, as he had not eaten for a very long time. The only thing left to him was touch and he was kept painfully aware of this every time his toes banged against stones and fumbled over ‘rough brickwork. The dark seemed to have become an enemy in its own right, a being which had swallowed him. Even now he felt he could be staggering down its throat.

Albert’s paw was the only real thing. The pain of the stones and the passage walls were confused – vague contacts that made him giddy.

They had not spoken for a long time and Piccadilly wondered whether Albert had been replaced by some monster that was leading him to an unknown horror. This thought grew and turned into a panic. The panic seized him fully and became icy terror. He began to struggle from the paw which now seemed to be an iron claw dragging him to his doom.