this it? Was this the end? Was Ned about to be eaten by a bookish monkey? But George the Mighty, George the Ferocious, George the Terrible, only yawned, and said in the queen’s best English: “My dear boy, are you lost?”
That was it, the final straw. The room started to spin and a blackness came over Ned. As he fell to the floor, the last thing he saw was the metal box slipping through his fingers and tumbling away.
When he eventually crossed over from deep slumber to the first glimmers of being awake, Ned was smiling. There was a gentle hand patting him on the head. Dad hadn’t woken him like that for years. It didn’t matter, he’d either dreamt the whole circus thing up, or his dad had come to get him. Life was going to go back to normal, or at least the Waddlesworth version of normal.
“Hi Dad, I had the weirdest dream …” he said groggily.
There was no answer, which wasn’t the only thing that was strange. Dad’s skin felt rough and clammy. It also smelt horrible.
“Now, Alice, come on girl, we talked about this. You can’t go pestering the boy, he’s trying to sleep.”
Ned opened his eyes abruptly. An elephant, oddly like the one in his dreams and apparently called Alice, had opened a window from the outside, reached in to his room and was stroking him with her trunk. A man, who Ned couldn’t see but assumed was her trainer, was clearly trying desperately to move her away.
“Morning, Mr Waddlewats,” wheezed the man, poking his head round the door, “I’m Norman, sir, Alice’s trainer. So sorry about this, but I think she likes you.”
Ned could see from looking around that he was no longer in George’s container. He seemed to be on the ground floor of a huge, pink, multi-storey bus. Judging by the beds and the equipment he could see, he guessed it must be the circus infirmary – the perfect place to recover from the shock of the last twenty-four hours. At least it would have been without an elephant trying to break in through the window, or the three emperor monkeys he now saw approaching his bedside, finishing off the remains of his breakfast.
“No, no, no, this won’t do at all!” squeaked an elderly lady, as she hobbled in through the infirmary’s entrance. “How many times have I told you to leave the newlings alone. He’s a josser, for goodness’ sake! Julius, Nero, Caligula … out of here this instant!”
The three emperors stuck out their tongues and leapt out of the window, sliding down Alice’s trunk, which disappeared seconds after them.
“Name’s Kitty,” warbled the elderly woman, holding her hand out to Ned for shaking, which he did. Her skin was old-lady soft. Ned guessed she must be in her late eighties at least. She had grey-white hair, but, somewhat strangely, she was carrying a pink plastic schoolbag, which Ned noticed had a Hello Kitty label on it. In fact, she was dressed from head to toe in Hello Kitty merchandise. She wore Hello Kitty shoes, badges, bracelets, and even Hello Kitty hair clips.
“So, here we are, my little gum-drop,” she said, breaking into a beautiful smile.
“I’m Ned, Ned Waddlesw—”
“Yes, I think you probably are. But how are you, dearie? That’s the question.”
Ned had plenty to say on that subject.
“Honestly? Well, let me see … The most safety-conscious dad on the planet has abandoned me to a bunch of –” Ned paused for a second – “a bunch of weirdos, no one will tell me why I’m here, I’ve been chased by homicidal clowns, and last night I walked in on a giant talking gorilla. It talked, you know? Actually talked. And Dad is somewhere—”
“Tea, dear?”
“Oh, err, yes that would be nice, thanks. But—”
“Now. That wasn’t really what I meant, Ned. What I want to know is how you are inside, what it is exactly that you’re made up of. Whether it’s snips, snails or puppy dogs’ tails. Benissimo needs to know about you before he can tell you about us. I’m the circus’s Farseer. It’s my job to see where our new arrivals are heading and where they aren’t.”
Ned had no idea what she was talking about.
“I’m not really sure what you mea— oi!”
The old woman had taken an alarmingly large pair of scissors and cut a strand of hair from the side of his head.
“Jossers always yelp the first time!”
Kitty giggled like a small schoolgirl, before busily tying his hair with a knot of old lace. Job done, she locked the bundle in a tiny safe nearby.
“Wha … why, why did you just do that?”
“Well, to make a spirit-knot, dearie, why else? All the newlings get them. They’re quite dangerous in the wrong hands, but only one can exist at a time. Now I have yours, you’ll be quite safe from any of that sort of mischief.”
It was at this point that Ned realised Kitty was as mad as a box of frogs.
“Why don’t I show you?”
The old lady reopened the safe and reached into a tray of tiny containers, pulling out a bundled curl of elephant hair, tied together with grey ribbon.
“What goes around comes around,” she announced, before chanting something under her breath and stroking the bundle with a small white feather.
Through the bus window, Ned could see Alice the elephant and Norman. As Kitty stroked the knot, Alice’s leg started to twitch, before kicking back gently and knocking her trainer into a barrel of water.
“Don’t worry, dear, he’ll dry out soon enough, and next time he might just stop the old girl from waking up my patients!”
Ned’s mouth was hanging open. Where had his dad sent him?
“Umm, I’m sorry, but I think there’s been a mistake.”
The old woman’s face shifted, to clear, cold focus.
“Mistake? I don’t think so, my little seedling. Those clowns don’t make mistakes, and if they’ve seen you, things from here on in will be different. Your old life may well be over, dear. What we need to find out is where your new one might take you.”
Ned suddenly felt very small.
“I don’t want a new life, I just want to go home. My dad sent me here but I haven’t heard from him and I don’t know if he’s—”
“Safe and long gone, dearie, and don’t worry, you’ll see him again,” cut in Kitty.
Ned lit up. It was the first glimmer of hope that he’d had since leaving his father, though he didn’t understand how she knew. The last time he’d checked, his dad’s phone had been disconnected.
“Are you sure? Did he contact you?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes. You’ll be staying with us for a little while, anyway. Now have a sip of that tea and we’ll take a wee look at you, shall we?”
The tea tasted strange but was hot, sugary and soothing. It seemed to flow through his body, warming him right to the ends of his eyes. Somehow it managed to make him feel calm.
What happened next did not. Kitty took his hands into her own and gave them a good long squeeze, checking over the length of his fingers one by one.
“Hmmmm,”