Part 10 (1/2)

' Unnessary Unnessary,' I said, testing it out, ' undoutadly, professor, diarhea, nakijima undoutadly, professor, diarhea, nakijima. You're right, it's prety strong, isn't it?'

He replaced the jar bak in the dictosafe.

'Rampant before Agent Johnson's Dictionary in 1744,' commented Perkins. 'Lavinia-Webster and the Oxford English Dictionary keep it all in check but we have to be careful. We used to contain any outbreak and offload it in the Molesworth series where no one ever notices. These days we destroy any new vyrus with a battery of dictionaries we keep on the seventeenth floor of the Great Library. But we can't be too careful. Every Every mispeling you come across has to be reported to the Cat on form S-I2.' mispeling you come across has to be reported to the Cat on form S-I2.'

'There was the raucous blast of a car horn from outside.

'Time's up!' Perkins smiled. 'That will be Miss Havisham.'

Miss Havisham was not on her own. She was sitting in a vast automobile the bonnet of which stretched ten feet in front of her. The large spoked and unguarded wheels carried tyres that looked woefully skinny and inadequate; eight huge exhaust pipes sprouted from either side of the bonnet, joined into one and stretched the length of the body. The tail of the car was pointed, like a boat, and just forward of the rear wheels two huge drive sprockets carried the power to the rear axle on large chains. It was a fearsome beast. It was the twenty-seven-litre Higham Special.

8.

Ton sixty on the A419 'The wealthy son of a Polish count and an American mother, Louis Zborowski lived at Higham Place near Canterbury, where he built three aero-engined cars, all called Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Bang Bang, and a fourth monster, the Higham Special Higham Special, a car he and Clive Gallop had engineered by squeezing a 27-litre aero engine into a Rubery Owen cha.s.sis and mating it with a Benz gearbox. At the time of Zborowski's death at Monza behind the wheel of a Mercedes, the Special had been lapping Brooklands at 116 mph but her potential was as yet unproved. After a brief stint with a lady owner whose ident.i.ty has not been revealed, the Special was sold to Parry Thomas, who with careful modifications of his own pushed the land speed record up to 170.624 mph at Pendine Sands, South Wales, in 1926.'

THE VERY REV. TOREDLYNE The Land Speed Record The Land Speed Record 'Has she been boring you, Mr Perkins?' called out Havisham.

'Not at all,' replied Perkins, giving me a wink. 'She has been a most attentive student.'

'Humph,' muttered Havisham. 'Hope springs eternal. Get in, girl, we're off!'

I paused. I had been driven by Miss Havisham once before, and that was in a car that I thought relatively safe. This beast of an automobile looked as though it could kill you twice before even reaching second gear.

'What are you waiting for, girl?' said Havisham impatiently. 'If I let the Special idle any longer we'll c.o.ke up the plugs. Besides, we need all the fuel to do the run.'

'The run?'

'Don't worry!' shouted Miss Havisham as she revved the engine. The car lurched sideways with the torque and a throaty growl filled the air. 'You won't be aboard when we do I need you for other duties.'

I took a deep breath and climbed into the small two-seater body It looked newly converted and was little more than a racing car with a few frills tacked on to make it roadworthy. Miss Havisham depressed the clutch and wrestled with the gears.h.i.+ft for a moment The large sprockets took up the power with a slight tug; it felt like a thoroughbred racehorse which had just got the scent of a steeplechase.

'Where are we going?' I asked.

'Home!' answered Miss Havisham as she moved the hand throttle. The car leaped forward across the gra.s.sy courtyard and gathered speed.

'To Great Expectations Great Expectations?' I asked as Miss Havisham steered in a broad circuit, fiddling with the levers in the centre of the ma.s.sive steering wheel.

'Not my home,' she retorted, 'yours!'

With another deep growl and a lurch the car accelerated rapidly forward but to where I was not sure; in front of us lay the broken drawbridge and stout stone walls of the castle.

'Fear not!' yelled Havisham above the roar of the engine. 'I'll read us into the Outland as simply as blinking!'

We gathered speed. I expected us to jump straight away, but we didn't. We carried on towards the heavy castle wall at a speed not wholly compatible with survival.

'Miss Havisham?' I asked, my voice tinged with fear.

'I'm just trying to think of the best words to get us there, girl!' she replied cheerfully.

'Stop!' I yelled as the point of no return came and went in a flash.

'Let me see ...' muttered Havisham, thinking hard, the accelerator still wide open.

I covered my eyes. The car was running too fast for me to jump out and a collision seemed inevitable. I grasped the side of the car's body and tensed as Miss Havisham took herself, me and two tons of automobile through the barriers of fiction and into the real world. My My world. world.

I opened my eyes again. Miss Havisham was studying a road map as the Higham Special swerved down the middle of the road. I grabbed the steering wheel as a milk float swerved into the hedge.

'I won't use the M4 in case the C of G get wind of it,' she said, looking around. 'We'll use the A419 are we anywhere close?' are we anywhere close?'

I recognised where we were instantly. Just north of Swindon outside a small town called Highworth.

'Continue round the roundabout and up the hill into the town,' I told her, adding: 'But it's not not your right of way, remember.' your right of way, remember.'

It was too late. To Miss Havisham, her way was was the right way. The first car braked in time but the one Jasper Fforde - Thursday Next 03 - The Well of Lost Plots the right way. The first car braked in time but the one behind it was not so lucky it drove into the rear of the first with a crunch. I held on tightly as Miss Havisham accelerated rapidly away up the hill into Highworth. I was pressed into my seat and for a single moment, perched above two tons of bellowing machinery, I suddenly realised why Havisham liked this sort of thing it was, in a word, exhilarating exhilarating.

'I've only borrowed the Special from the count,' she explained. 'Parry Thomas will take delivery of it next week and aim to lift the speed record for himself. I've been working on a new mix of fuels; the A419 is straight and smooth I should be able to do at least a ton eighty on is straight and smooth I should be able to do at least a ton eighty on that that.'

'Turn right on to the B4019 at the Jesmond,' I told her, ' after after the lights turn to greeeeeeen.' the lights turn to greeeeeeen.'

The truck missed us by about six inches.

'What's that?'

'Nothing.'

'You know, Thursday, you should really loosen up and learn to enjoy life more you can be such an old stick-in-the-mud.'

I lapsed into silence.

'And don't sulk,' added Miss Havisham. 'If there's something I can't abide, it's a sulky apprentice.'

We bowled down the road, nearly losing it on an 'S' bend, until miraculously we reached the main Swindon-Cirencester road. It was a no right turn but we did anyway, to a chorus of screeching tyres and angry car horns. Havisham accelerated off, and we had just approached the top of the hill when we came across a large 'diversion' sign blocking the road. Havisham thumped the steering wheel angrily.

'I don't believe it!' she bellowed.

'Road closed?' I queried, trying to hide my relief. 'Good I mean, good- ness ness gracious, what a shame. gracious, what a shame.

Another time, eh?'

Havisham clunked the Special into first gear and we moved off round the sign and motored down the hill.

'It's him him, I can sense it!' she growled. 'Trying to steal the speed record from under my very nose!'

'Who?' I asked.

As if in answer another racing car shot past us with a loud 'p.o.o.p p.o.o.p!'.