Mr Humperdinck's Wonderful Whatsit (2017 ed). Wynand Louw
it. Pete was amazed. There was no way that that engine could ever have fitted into the dustbin. Garbage kicked the bin again; it flipped over three times and stabilised in a horizontal position. He picked up the lid and slammed it in position, and then jumped onto the bin like a cowboy would jump on his horse.
“Yee-ha!” he shouted and kicked the bin in the sides. It reared, and then shot away with such force that Garbage made a full back flip and landed on his nose on the water tank.
“Whoopee! Now THAT’s what I call POWER!” he shouted excitedly.
But the dustbin was gone.
“Looks like you’ve lost your transport,” said Squeak.
“No problem.” Garbage wiped the grime off his face. “It has homing magic built into it. It’ll find me in a while.”
Pete was getting tired. The first red of the new day glowed in the east, and he needed to sleep. He had left his skateboard in the alley below, and he was afraid that someone might take it.
“It was nice meeting you, Mr Garbage. Have a nice day.” Pete didn’t want to be told not to be rude again. “Oh, and thanks for saving our lives.”
“No sweat. Where are you going?” asked Garbage.
“To … I don’t know. I have to find my skateboard, and a place to sleep.” Pete jumped off the water tank and walked to the edge of the roof.
“Wait, I’m going there too, so if you don’t mind, I’ll join you,” called Garbage and followed him. He looked like a mobile trash heap in the poor morning light.
“Where did you say you were going?” asked Squeak.
“To I don’t know,” Garbage answered. “It’s close by.”
Pete climbed down the iron ladder to the top landing of the fire escape. Garbage simply jumped over the edge. He hit the top landing of the fire escape with a bang and lost quite a few pieces of garbage in the process.
“Remind me not to do that again,” he said, straightening his nose. The next moment his dustbin came hurtling around the corner and slammed into the wall next to him, raising a cloud of dust. Mortar flew in every direction. Pete almost fell off the fire escape, and Squeak hid in his shirt.
Garbage dusted himself. “Well, the homing magic works fine,” he declared, “but the auto-pilot magic definitely needs some fine-tuning. Want a lift?” The dustbin hovered just above the landing. He jumped in.
“No thanks,” said Pete. “I’d rather take the stairs.”
When Pete and Squeak arrived in the alley below, the dustbin was standing next to the cardboard box they had slept in. Garbage handed Pete his skateboard.
“Follow me. I’ve found a better place for you to sleep in.”
They followed him to a big box that stood against the wall. It must have contained a big chest freezer or something. Pete crawled in. He stared in disbelief. On a low table next to a bed with the whitest and softest sheets that were turned back and ready, stood a bed lamp. Next to it was a steaming mug of cocoa for Pete and a small dish of seeds for Squeak. Pete sat down on the bed, and put Squeak next to the seeds on the table. Garbage sat down on the floor.
“Won’t the rats find us here?” Squeak wanted to know.
“Well, they could,” said Garbage, scratching his head, “but I don’t really know what else to do with you right now. I did a bit of hiding magic to prevent it. You must be Humperdinck’s mouse.”
“Do you know about everything?” asked Squeak.
“Only what I read in the papers,” said Garbage. “Nasty business.”
Between them, Pete and Squeak told Garbage the whole story. Then Garbage left them so they could sleep. When he got into the bed, Pete found a little chocolate sweet on the pillow, with a note, Sweet dreams, Compliments of the Management.
He fell asleep almost immediately.
Pete was dreaming that he was running from old Schiz when the lid of the dustbin fell with a clang on the ground just outside his box. He woke into a world even more unreal than his dream: the soft white bed, the cardboard box, confusing memories of the night before.
“Mgggnnhhm,” said a very real mouse with a piece of cheese in his mouth. The sun shone through the opening of the cardboard box.
“Morning,” said Pete, wiping the sleep from his eyes. “Didn’t your mother tell you not to speak with your mouth full?”
Squeak took the cheese in his right paw. “Sorry. It’s afternoon already.” He took another bite of cheese and chewed with obvious disgust.
“It’s a good thing humans think mice like cheese,” he said after swallowing a chunk. “Otherwise the whole of the world’s mouse population would’ve been caught in their traps.”
“So what do you like?” asked Pete.
“Why d’you ask?”
Pete grinned. “Well, you never know when I may want to set a mousetrap.”
A piece of cheese hit Pete between the eyes.
“Or buy a mouse friend a present,” Pete added, but Squeak had already gone.
Next to the bed there was a basin with taps for hot and cold water, a bar of soap and a towel. Pete turned the hot water tap, and it worked. He washed his face, and then followed Squeak outside. Garbage was sitting on top of his bin. He was wet and his ears and hair were full of soapsuds. His clothes were soaked, and since they were made of old newspapers and magazine covers, they were falling apart. He pinched his nose and blew, and a spray of suds squirted from the cool-drink straws on his head.
“Howzit, bro!” he greeted Pete. “How about lending me that towel you just used?”
Pete got the towel from the box and handed it to Garbage. He started rubbing his face with it.
“Did you take a bath?” Pete asked.
“Nah. I just went through the automatic car wash with my dustbin. Boy, does it give you a scrub. Whoopee! Now just hang in there while I get dressed.”
He disappeared into the bin. A moment later pieces of wet newspaper came flying out. When Garbage reappeared, he wore a brand-new suit made of old newspapers.
“I decided to do something about my image. People won’t think I’m poor for much longer! This suit’s made of the Business Times. Want to know how my shares are doing? It’s right here on my left arm.” He strutted around in a circle so Pete and Squeak could admire his outfit.
“See my pants? Fortune magazine. That should get them thinking!”
“Sure,” whispered Squeak, who had run up to Pete’s shoulder. “I have a friend who owns a book, now everybody thinks I can read.”
“I thought about your problem a lot in the last few hours,” Garbage said. “I have this friend who’s a VID (Very Important Dwarf). I’m sure he’ll know what to do. Get that skate thing of yours and let’s be off.”
Pete went back into the cardboard box to get his skateboard. The bed and table were gone, and the inside of the box was full of dust.
They flew straight up in the air among the towering skyscrapers. Pete stood next to Garbage in the flying bin, which now seemed to be empty. Squeak was in the top pocket of his jacket. Soon they were higher than the highest tower block in the city, and then even the biggest buildings seemed like little anthills, barely visible through a blanket of smog.
“Wow … The sky’s so blue!” exclaimed Pete. “And the sun!” He felt as if his problems had suddenly become as small as the buildings far below them.
Squeak stared in disbelief. “The world’s so big!”
“Being up here does tend to change the way