The Loblolly Boy and the Sorcerer (8 page)

Again the waiter stepped forward, ready to concur, but once again retreated in confusion.

‘You should have what you want,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘Go for it.’

‘Yes,’ mused the Sorcerer. ‘I think I will. I will have the fish … and to drink?’ He flicked through the menu to
the beverage section. ‘Ah, a pot of oolong tea, I think.’

Now the waiter did step forward with a strained smile as the Sorcerer repeated his order. ‘So, I’ll have the turbot. And a small pot of oolong. Please ensure that the pot is heated before the tea is infused.’ The waiter nodded and made a note on his pad.

‘Thank you, sir,’ he murmured, and then hurried away.

He returned shortly carrying a tray with a small pot of tea, a jug of hot water and a fine porcelain cup. ‘Your meal will not be long, sir,’ he said softly, before gliding away again.

‘So, little loblolly boy,’ said the Sorcerer, ‘you’ve lost your father.’

‘You know I have,’ said the loblolly boy.

‘Not for the first time, either, I’ll warrant,’ said the Sorcerer.

The loblolly boy glanced down. The Sorcerer had struck home and he did not want to be caught in his glittery, penetrating stare.

‘So what do you want, then?’

The loblolly boy did not respond. He sensed he was being goaded and did not like it.

‘You want him back, I suppose?’

This time the loblolly boy did look up, and he nodded.

‘I can’t imagine why,’ mused the Sorcerer. ‘In my view fathers are very over-rated.’

The loblolly boy looked about the dining room. The waiter was studying the Sorcerer with some alarm, and one or two of the other guests were staring at their table oddly. The loblolly boy realised that to the others in the room,
the elegant man in the corner was having an animated conversation with himself.

‘I got rid of mine as soon as I discovered enough magic,’ continued the Sorcerer, oblivious of the effect his one-sided conversation was having.

‘What did you do?’ asked the loblolly boy, curious in spite of himself.

‘Do? Oh, I turned him into a rat!’ laughed the Sorcerer. Then he dipped his hand into his jacket pocket and withdrew the ivory rat he had flourished in front of the loblolly boy on the street corner.

The loblolly boy looked shocked.

Seeing his expression, the Sorcerer laughed. ‘No, little loblolly boy, I jest. I would not have turned my own father into a
rat
!’

The loblolly boy looked relieved.

‘No, I turned him into a parrot,’ laughed the Sorcerer. ‘Silly squawky old fool!’

For two or three seconds he flapped his elbows and made a loud parrot imitation.

This was far too much for the waiter. He strode swiftly over to their table and whispered urgently to the Sorcerer. ‘I’m sorry, sir, but I must ask you to desist from talking so loudly to yourself. It is disturbing our other guests.’

At that he hurried away.

The Sorcerer gazed at his departing back and laughed again. ‘Odious, fool!’ he exclaimed. ‘Who, I may ask, is paying that officious little man’s wages?’

He turned back to the loblolly boy.

‘Are you a little fool too, little fool?’ he asked.

‘I must be,’ said the loblolly boy.

‘A good answer,’ said the Sorcerer nodding. ‘In fact, the only possible answer.’

‘The song …’ began the loblolly boy.

‘Song?’

‘You know the one about the Jugglers and all, the one you played and sang …’

‘Oh yes. Of course.’

At that point the Sorcerer launched into another rousing rendition of the chorus. The loblolly boy whirled around in alarm to see several of the guests staring pop-eyed towards the Sorcerer, frozen in mid-fork and consternation. The waiter, fortunately was nowhere to be seen.

Luckily, too, the Sorcerer stopped at the refrain.

‘Yes,’ the loblolly boy said hurriedly, ‘that one.’

‘What of it?’

‘Well, you sang a verse after that, didn’t you?’

The Sorcerer nodded.

‘I don’t remember the Captain singing that verse.’

‘No?’

‘What was it all about?’

‘Oh that,’ said the Sorcerer airily. ‘About being trapped in the clock with people like me and the others?’

The loblolly boy nodded.

‘Quite simple really, the clock with two dead hands is a clock that doesn’t move. It means you’re beyond or perhaps out of time. It means you’re trapped in the limbo land of the loblolly boy along with a few other odd sods.’

‘Like?’

‘Well, as the song says — the Jugglers, me, the Gadget Man. There are others. Surely the Captain warned you about them.’

The loblolly boy nodded. ‘Sort of … He warned me about you.’

‘Quite right, too,’ said the Sorcerer.

At that point, the waiter arrived with the Sorcerer’s meal. He did not look happy. Placing it before him, he whispered angrily, ‘I’m very sorry to have to repeat my request, sir, but your ongoing and very noisy conversation not to mention your very loud and unnecessary singing and other impressions are creating considerable disturbance and perturbation among our other guests.’

‘Is it?’ asked the Sorcerer. ‘Perturbation, you say?’

‘Yes it most certainly is, and once again I must ask, nay implore you to stop!’

‘Must you?’

‘Yes!’ The waiter’s face was red with the effort of being polite.

‘So you’re begging, then?’

‘If you put it that way, sir …’ the waiter hissed through gritted teeth.

‘You’re not a very good beggar, you know. Do you know who the best beggars are?’

‘I don’t believe I do, sir,’

‘Dogs, my good chap. Dogs. Dogs make singularly excellent beggars.’

‘Do they, sir?’

‘Yes, and personally I think you’d make a much better fist of begging were you a dog!’

The waiter was about to make a response, when the Sorcerer waved his long fingers before his angry face. At once the waiter’s eyes glazed over.

‘Sit!’ commanded the Sorcerer.

Obediently, the waiter crouched and brought his arms, bent at the elbow, up under his chin.

‘Doesn’t he make a good little beggar now?’ asked the Sorcerer.

Appalled at the waiter’s transformation, all the loblolly boy could do was nod. One or two of the other diners were already looking curiously at the little tableau.

‘Beg!’ ordered the Sorcerer.

The waiter half-rose. ‘Woof!’ he barked. ‘Woof! Woof!’

‘Good boy,’ murmured the Sorcerer encouragingly. He slipped the waiter a piece of broccoli drizzled in tamarillo jus and the waiter snatched at it greedily with his teeth.

Grunting with delight, the waiter chewed avidly at the broccoli and then looked eagerly and lovingly at the Sorcerer. ‘Woof! Woof!’ he barked again.

The Sorcerer shook his head, ‘Uh uh,’ he remonstrated. ‘Too much broccoli makes a waiter a fat waiter, and fat waiters need exercise!’

By this time, the entire restaurant was staring
open-mouthed
at the scene. One or two of the other diners had half-risen from their seats.

Unperturbed, the Sorcerer reached for one of the rolled napkins. Nodding cheerfully at the still crouching waiter,
who by now was panting with expectation, and drooling a little down one corner of his mouth, the Sorcerer drew the napkin back over his head and then flung it wildly across the dining room.

‘Fetch!’ he cried.

The waiter needed no second bidding. Instantly, he bounded off on all fours, barking furiously. ‘Woof! Woof! Woof!’

In his mad stampede he bounced past a number of diners knocking them off their seats. He dived under tables, upending them and their meals. There were screams and cries of alarm, but the waiter was deaf to this in his pursuit of the napkin. When he found it on the far side of the dining room, he snaffled it into his mouth, turned, and began to leap and bounce joyously back to the Sorcerer.

Meanwhile, another waiter, the maître d’ and one or two of the chefs had rushed into the dining room. Momentarily stunned by the sight of the waiter’s antics, they quickly recovered and the maître d’ and one of the chefs brought the man down in a clumsy but reasonably efficient tackle. He was manhandled to his feet and frogmarched unceremoniously into the kitchen.

Some time later, the maître d’ re-emerged, his hair still in wild disarray, and visited each table, apologising profusely for the appalling breakdown of his colleague and offering each table complimentary desserts. Even before he’d finished his circuit, there could be heard the approaching siren of an ambulance.

The final table he visited was the Sorcerer’s.

‘A thousand apologies, sir,’ he said. ‘Most unfortunate. Most uncharacteristic. A sudden breakdown, we can only presume.’

‘Not a problem,’ said the Sorcerer generously. ‘I can only suppose you’ve been working the poor sod far too hard.’

The maître d’ gave him a thin smile. ‘And could I offer …’

‘That’s kind of you,’ said the Sorcerer, ‘very kind. I’ll have a large chocolate mousse if you don’t mind.’

After the maître d’ left the Sorcerer finished the mousse, then poured himself another cup of tea. ‘Very satisfying,’ he said.

The loblolly boy knew he wasn’t just talking about the dessert and the tea.

‘That waiter …’ he asked tentatively.

‘Tiresome little man,’ said the Sorcerer.

‘He’ll be all right, won’t he?’

‘Of course he’ll be all right.’

The loblolly boy was relieved.

‘As a dog,’ the Sorcerer added. ‘He’ll find life much easier. Probably find some nice little cocker spaniel and settle down.’

The loblolly boy’s reassurance vanished.

‘You mean?’

The glittering eyes of the Sorcerer beaded in on him.
‘You’re not getting sentimental are you, little fool?’

Quickly, the loblolly boy shook his head.

The Sorcerer treated him again to his bleak grin. ‘I mean, you have to admit it was all rather amusing?’

The loblolly boy stared at him. Whatever it was, the mayhem and chaos of the dining room was not funny. Once more he remembered the Captain’s warning that the Sorcerer was the most fickle. Fickle? Dangerous, more like, the loblolly boy thought.

The Sorcerer looked at him with glittering eyes.

‘Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘Dangerous, not fickle.’

Then he raised his cup, and silently toasted his dinner companion.

Later, they stood on the street outside the restaurant. Darkness had not quite fallen, but the clouds that had threatened before now covered the sky and the loblolly boy thought it might rain.

‘I can’t imagine why you want to give up being a loblolly boy,’ remarked the Sorcerer.

He had lit a long, narrow cigar and was now blowing perfectly formed smoke rings.

‘Don’t you know, smoking’s bad for you?’

‘I hope so,’ said the Sorcerer.

‘It’s bad for other people too,’ added the loblolly boy.

‘Even better,’ said the Sorcerer.

The loblolly boy wondered what part the Sorcerer would play in reaching his goal and shuddered a little at the memory of the waiter reduced to a gibbering canine idiot. He glanced up nervously at the tall, silver-haired man beside him.

The Sorcerer blew another perfect smoke ring and watched it sail away, expanding into thinness as it did so. He looked down.

‘You didn’t answer my question, little fool,’ he said.

‘Your question?’

‘Yes, why for the love of reason would you want to give up being the loblolly boy?’

The loblolly boy didn’t respond.

‘I mean, think of the flying, the invisibility, the … the opportunities for
fun
!’

The loblolly boy knew that by opportunities for fun, the Sorcerer really meant opportunities for mischief, for may hem, for cruel jokes and pain. He wanted to tell the Sorcerer this, but didn’t dare. He also wanted to tell the Sorcerer that he didn’t want to live any more in a clock with two dead hands. He wanted to be out there in the real world in real time. Even this answer, though, he suspected, might irritate the Sorcerer, and the last thing he wanted to do was irritate the Sorcerer.

He shrugged. In the end, the only answer he could find was the one he’d given to the Captain.

‘I want to be
me
again,’ he said.

The Sorcerer flicked his cigar away and looked down at him with a mocking smile. ‘That’s absolutely
pathetic
!’ he said.

CHAPTER FIVE

B
ENJY

F
or the next three days and nights, the loblolly boy was reduced to the drudgery of flying up and down streets on the off-chance of catching a glimpse of his father once more, or of Janice, or even of the boy who had taken his life.

They were long days and nights, and were utterly fruitless. From time to time he’d spot somebody who looked familiar, but when he flew closer to inspect, all likeness fell away and he found himself yet again in the company of a complete stranger.

Nor did he see or hear the Sorcerer again. It seemed that for the time being, he had given up busking. He was never a real busker, anyway, thought the loblolly boy.

Thinking about it though, he was rather pleased the Sorcerer had disappeared from his life.

Every so often he flew over the park where he’d met the girl, Mel. However, these were weekdays and school was in, so the skateboard area was largely deserted apart from a few
bigger kids and the odd truant.

It was hopeless. He knew that, but was at a loss as to what else he could do.

As far as he could tell, his father hadn’t returned to the coffee shop either.

All this might have made him quite downhearted but for the knowledge that he was at least in the right city, that he
had
seen his father and that somehow, somewhere, he’d see him again.

Eventually, he realised that his best hope, in fact his only hope, was to haunt the skateboard area in the park. Sooner or later, he trusted, Mel would turn up once again. And if she did, there was a remote possibility she’d found out a bit more about the runaway Benjy, the boy who may or may not have been the one who stole his life. Accordingly, he decided to shift from his platform on the church tower to a tall tree in the park.

Four days later, he was sleeping in the branches of this tree, a sweet-smelling linden, when he was wakened by the cracked chime of a bell ringing the hour. It was four o’clock. The sun was shining, and bright light dappled through the leaves. He stretched and rubbed his eyes, then swung a leg across the branch and peered down to check out the activity below.

The park was busy. School was out and the skateboard ramps were full of kids gliding up or rocketing down. The place was loud with shouts, laughing and the clatter of boards as the better kids practised their jumping moves.

He glanced about checking them out and this time
was pleased to see that Mel was among them. He didn’t immediately fly down to greet her. She was surrounded by other kids. Instead, he sat in the tree and watched her for a while. She was pretty good. In fact, as he continued to watch, he saw that she was very good — able to manoeuvre her board like a seasoned surfer riding tricky waves. He’d always been hopeless on a skateboard, no sense of balance whatsoever. Weird really, now that he could fly through the air in every dimension, perfectly poised and so beautifully balanced he could land on a slender branch and stand there like a tightrope walker.

Eventually, Mel tired of the skateboard ramps and, with a couple of mates, moved off to an adjacent playground for smaller children. Here there were swings, see-saws and a rope climbing frame. Mel and her mates sat on the swings for a while, not swinging, just chatting. Still, the loblolly boy refrained from joining her. It was easy enough hidden in the leaves to wait for the right moment.

Finally, that moment came. Mel’s mates, two equally scruffy girls about her own age, climbed off the swings and, giving Mel a half-wave, sauntered back towards the ramps.

The loblolly boy parted the leaves and leapt into the air. He glided down and across and landed on the top of the swing frame.

‘Hi,’ he said.

Mel had been lost in thought, swaying gently on the swing. She looked up, startled to find a voice coming from directly above her.

‘You!’

He grinned. ‘Me!’

‘You scared me!’

‘Didn’t mean to.’

‘Hi, anyway,’ she said. ‘I was hoping I’d see you again.’

The loblolly boy was immediately hopeful that this was because she had some news for him, but instead Mel simply added, ‘I’d begun to think that the other day was a crazy dream.’

‘No, I’m real,’ said the loblolly boy.

‘I reckon,’ said Mel, looking up. The sun was in her eyes and she blinked against it. The loblolly boy dropped down to ground level and then took a seat in the swing next to her.

‘Did those kids get their stuff out of the lake?’ he asked.

‘I dunno,’ said Mel. ‘And I don’t care. I hope not, anyway.’

‘Have you seen them since?’

‘No, thank god.’

‘Perhaps they’ve seen you first,’ said the loblolly boy.

Mel grinned. ‘Yeah, that was pretty cool, wasn’t it? They probably don’t want to mess about with Big Mel ever again!’

‘What about the other guy?’ asked the loblolly boy carefully. ‘The one that ran away. The Benjy guy. You’ve seen him?’

Mel shook her head. ‘Nah. I don’t want to see him, either.’

‘Did you find out anything about him?’

She looked at the loblolly boy. ‘Oh my god, that’s right. I was going to find out some stuff for you.’

‘So nothing?’

‘Whoops,’ she said. ‘Sorry.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said the loblolly boy, swallowing his disappointment. ‘I’d be pleased if you could try, though.’

‘I will,’ said Mel. ‘I promise.’

‘And you’ll let me know?’

She nodded enthusiastically. ‘I really will.’

Feeling reassured, the loblolly boy grinned at her once more. First impressions aren’t to be trusted, he thought. First off, he’d thought her a no-hope type. Mel was wearing the same sloppy clothes and still had the ridiculous baseball cap on back to front. But he rather liked her now. In fact, thinking about it, she was the only really friendly person he’d spoken to in months, even years. He looked again at her, persuaded by her enthusiasm that she did mean to let him know. But then a problem occurred to him.

‘How?’ he asked.

‘How what?’

‘How will you let me know?’

Her face fell. This was a problem. ‘Have you got a phone?’

The loblolly boy shook his head.

‘No,’ he said. ‘But I’ve got a tree.’

‘Problem,’ said Mel, then: ‘Which tree?’ she asked.

The loblolly boy pointed to the linden tree. ‘That one,’ he said.

‘Okay,’ said Mel.

And the loblolly boy felt that the problem had been solved.

He saw nothing more of Mel for a couple of days. In that time he continued the endless scouring of the suburban streets only to realise, quickly enough, that nobody lives in the streets. They live in the houses and they rarely leave the houses except to climb into cars, and they only climb into cars to ferry themselves to other buildings into which they retreat until it’s time to climb into their cars once more.

Often he’d fly up and down a succession of two, three, perhaps a dozen streets and see no human being at all except maybe a person on a bike delivering mail, or an old lady wandering out to check a letter box.

He could have flown past his father’s house a dozen times but there would have been no way of knowing. He no longer knew what sort of car his father or Janice drove.

It was hopeless. Hopeless and fruitless.

And it was tiring.

Then two days later he was again resting in the branches, when he was woken by a loud, ‘Psst!’

He opened his eyes to find Mel sitting straddling a branch just beneath him. She must have scrambled up the tree while he was dozing. He grinned at her in admiration. It was quite a climb.

‘Mel!’

‘Glad I found you home.’

‘What is it. News?’

She screwed her up her nose and shook her head. ‘Not
much really, or rather good news and bad news.’

‘Okay,’ said the loblolly boy. ‘Shoot.’

‘Well, the bad news is that I’ve found nothing about where he lives or anything. Nobody seems to know anything except that he’s a bad dude and he’s in a heap of trouble.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘He was caught shoplifting, they say, and he’s in real deep.’

The loblolly boy stared down at her. This was bad news.

‘Are you sure?’

She shrugged. ‘Sure as. He was caught with that rat Jason.’ She giggled. ‘Jason was probably trying to nick another iPod to replace the one at the bottom of the lake.’

‘So, what’s the good news then?’

‘The good news is that if you do want to say hello to Benjy, he’s over at the ramp right now.’

The loblolly boy leapt from the tree quite forgetting in his hurry to thank Mel and to ask her what the boy Benjy was wearing. However, he should be able to recognise his previous self, surely. And if he didn’t recognise him then they must have been talking about different people. In a way, given Mel’s bad news, he rather hoped this Benjy guy was the wrong person, was some guy who had nothing to do with him.

He flew above the crowd of skateboarders scanning left and right.

And then he saw him.

And he knew instantly that this was the person he’d flown through the night to find.

It was strange. It was like seeing yourself in a movie. The kid was wearing the dark hoody Mel had described, but the hood was down off his head. It seemed the loblolly boy was looking at his own twin, his identical twin, except of course that he didn’t have an identical twin. He was looking at the person he had been, the person he was no longer, the person who had stolen his life. And he thought irritably, the person who had stolen his name and twisted it into Benjy.

Apparently he didn’t have a skateboard with him as he kept approaching other kids and indicating he wanted to have a go on theirs. He was not very popular from all appearances as every time he was told to get lost.

Finally giving up, Benjy left the skateboard area and slumped down on a park bench, staring balefully at the kids with their boards.

At this point the loblolly boy dropped to the ground and landed just before him.

Benjy looked at him without surprise.

‘So you finally made it,’ he said. ‘I’ve been expecting you.’

‘Have you?’

‘Yeah, spotted you the other day. Thought you’d find me sooner or later.’

‘You didn’t wait around?’

‘Why should I?

‘To talk.’

‘What is there to talk about?’

‘You should know that.’

Benjy didn’t respond. He seemed to find it difficult looking at the loblolly boy and this reluctance gave him a shifty look. The loblolly boy, on the other hand, was intrigued by Benjy’s appearance. It was rather like looking in the mirror after a makeover. Benjy was wearing his hair much shorter. It was almost shaven. Then there were the clothes: the loblolly boy recognised none of them. Benjy was wearing the sort of clothes he’d never have worn even if he’d been allowed to. This kid looked meaner all round and street-smart in a way he’d never been.

For some time there was the sort of silence where people are weighing up their options. And then Benjy said in an accusing way, ‘So you dropped Gavin’s skateboard and Jason’s bag into the lake? What do you think you are? Robin Hood or caped crusader?’

‘You know why I did that.’

‘That little mole Mel? She asks for it. She gives as good as she gets. She doesn’t need some super-boy to come to her rescue.’

‘Possibly not …’

The loblolly boy did not want to get into an argument with Benjy. The guy already seemed deliberately quarrelsome and needling. He hoped this could be because he was unhappy. The unhappier he was, the more ready he might be to Exchange. It didn’t seem to be unhappiness though. It
seemed to be more that he was just sullen.

‘So how are you?’ the loblolly boy asked as neutrally as possible.

‘What’s it to you?’

The loblolly boy paused, considering how to answer that. ‘Well, it’s like, I did have a connection with the life you’ve got now.’

This time Benjy did look up at him. ‘It’s crap,’ he said. ‘This place is a dump. The school’s an even bigger dump with dropkick teachers and dipstick kids. Be pleased you’re out of it. Be very pleased.’

The loblolly boy felt a slight glimmer of hope.

‘What about home?’

Benjy shrugged. ‘Janice is okay, I guess, except she can’t cook. The takeaway kid, I call her. At least she laughs. Your father’s so wet, though. How’d you ever stand it? He’s never off my bloody back. Do this. Do that. Don’t do this. Don’t do that. I wish he’d just get over it and chill out a bit. He’s such a no-fun guy. I can’t believe Janice ever saw anything in him.’

The loblolly boy considered this. When he’d been there, it was Janice who’d given him a hard time, and given him a hard time all the time. Janice was the ogre. His father had been the peacemaker, the one who was at least reasonable. What had happened?

There was another long, awkward silence.

‘I hear you’ve been in a bit of trouble?’ the loblolly boy asked carefully.

Benjy looked up at him suspiciously.

‘Who told you that?’ he asked. ‘That little mole, I suppose.’

The loblolly boy didn’t reply.

‘It’s all rubbish. Something that got blown out of all proportion.’