Mathias Ardizzone - The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart

I want to tell her how much I love her and how grateful I am, there are so many words jostling on my tongue, but they refuse to cross my lips. All that’s left are my arms, so I hug Madeleine tight.

‘Careful, you’ll hurt your clock if we hug too hard!’ she says, in a voice that’s gentle and ravaged. ‘You must go now, I don’t want them to find you here.’

We pull apart and Madeleine opens the door. I’m still inside the house but I’m already feeling cold.

I get through a whole flask of tears as I run down the familiar path. It lightens my load, but not my heart. I wolf down the oatcakes to soak up the alcohol and my tummy swells up like a pregnant woman’s.

On the other side of Arthur’s Seat, I can see the police officers. Joe and his mother are with them. I tremble with a mixture of fear and euphoria.

A carriage is waiting for us at the foot of the mountain. In the glare of the street lamps, it stands out like a piece of the night. Anna, Luna and Arthur clamber in quickly. The coachman, with his moustache stretching all the way to his eyebrows, shouts at his horses in his deep voice. With my cheek pressed against the window, I watch Edinburgh disappearing into the mist.

The lochs extend from hill to hill, measuring out the distance I’m committed to putting behind me. Arthur snores like a steam engine. Anna and Luna dangle their heads; they look like Siamese twins. The tick-tock of my clock echoes in the silence of the night. I realise that this little world of people will set off again without me.

At daybreak, the twisted tune of ‘Oh When the Saints’ wakes me up. I’d never heard it sung so slowly. The carriage has come to a stop.

‘We’re here!’ says Anna.

Luna puts an old birdcage on my knees.

‘This is a carrier pigeon that a romantic customer gave me a few years back. It’s a very well trained bird. Write to us with your news. Roll your letters around his left claw, and he’ll deliver the message to us. We’ll be able to stay in touch that way, he’ll find you again wherever you are, even in Andalusia, the land where women look you straight in the eye. Good luck, pequeñito ,’ she adds, hugging me tightly.

CHAPTER FIVE

In which Little Jack tries to find a decent clock-doctor in Paris

As the train pulls out of the station, it snorts loudly making a haunting din. The locomotive’s syncopated rhythms set me on edge and my heart might as well be made of popcorn – I’ll have to learn to travel better. When I panic, my clockwork heart is like a steam engine turning a bend with its wheels coming unstuck. I’m travelling over the rails of my own fear. What am I frightened of? Of you, Madeleine, or rather, of me without you.

The steam and my own clockwork panic seep under the rails. I want to turn back time, put my old rattletrap of a heart in your arms, Madeleine. Our last hug is still warm, but I’m already as frozen as when I first met you on the coldest day on earth. Oh Madeleine, I hadn’t even left the shadows of Edinburgh behind before drinking all your tears. I promise that at the next stop I’ll consult a clockmaker. You’ll see, I’ll come back to you in fine condition, or rather just out of kilter enough for you to exercise your mending talents over me once more.

The more time that goes by, the more this train frightens me, its puffing, rattling heart seems as dilapidated as my own. It must be terrifically in love with its engine. Unless, like me, it’s suffering from the sadness of what it’s left behind.

I feel alone in my compartment. Madeleine’s tears have installed a revolving door inside my head. I’ll be sick if I don’t speak to somebody. I notice a tall man leaning against the window, writing something. From a distance, he looks like Arthur, but that impression disappears the closer I get. Apart from the shadows he casts, there’s nobody near him. Tipsy on loneliness, I launch right in:

‘What are you writing, sir?’

The man gives a start and hides his face under his left arm.

‘Did I frighten you?’

‘You surprised me, it’s not the same.’

He continues writing, concentrating as hard as if he was painting a picture. The turnstile in my brain starts to pick up speed.

‘What do you want, little one?’

‘I want to go and win the heart of a woman in Andalusia, but I don’t know anything about love. The women I knew never wanted to teach me anything on the subject and I’m feeling all alone in this train . . . I thought perhaps you might be able to help me.’

‘You’ve landed on the wrong person, my boy. I’m not very gifted when it comes to love . . . not with living people, at any rate. No, it never really worked out for me with living people.’

I start to shudder. I’m reading over his shoulder, which seems to annoy him.

‘That red ink . . .’

‘It’s blood! Go away now, little one, go away!’

He’s copying out the same phrase, methodically, on several pieces of paper: ‘ Your humble servant, Jack the Ripper .’

‘We’ve got the same first name, do you think that’s a good sign?’

He shrugs, vexed I’m not more in awe of him. The engine whistles itself hoarse in the distance, the fog creeps through the windows. I’m shivering.

‘Go away, little one!’

He strikes the floor with his left heel, the way he might scare a cat. Not that I am one, but it does have a certain effect on me. The sound of his boot competes with that of the train. He turns towards me, his features razor sharp.

‘Go away now!’

The fury in his eyes reminds me of Joe. It’s like a remote control that switches my legs to tremble mode. He heads towards me.

‘Come on, you mists,’ he drones. ‘Let the doors of haunted trains slam shut! I’ll give you the ghosts of handsome women to carve up in the mist, a twist of blonde or brunette . . .’

His voice becomes a groan.

‘I can rip them open without even frightening them . . . signing off your humble servant, Jack the Ripper! Don’t be afraid, my boy, you’ll soon learn how to survive by frightening others! Don’t be afraid, my boy, you’ll soon learn how to survive by frightening others . . .’

My heart and body are racing out of control, and this time it’s got nothing to do with love. I tear down the train corridors. Nobody. The Ripper chases after me, smashing all the windows with a dagger. A black swarm of birds dives into the compartment, clustering around him. He’s making faster progress by walking than I am running.

New compartment. No one around. The racket of his footsteps gets louder. The birds multiply, emerging from his jacket, coming out of his eyes, hurling themselves at me. I jump up on to the seats to put some distance between us; I turn around, and Jack’s eyes light up the whole train. The birds are catching up, the shadow of Jack the Ripper looms and I’m aiming for the driver’s door at the end of the carriage. Jack’s about to rip out my guts. Oh Madeleine! I can’t even hear my own clock ticking any more, though it’s stinging in my chest. The Ripper grabs my shoulder. He’s going to kill me, he’s going to kill me and I won’t have had time to fall in love.

The train slows down. It’s pulling into the station.

‘Don’t be afraid, my boy. You’ll soon learn how to survive by frightening others!’ Jack the Ripper repeats for a last time, as he stows his weapon away.

I’m trembling with terror. Then he steps off the train and disappears into the crowd of passengers waiting on the platform.

Sitting on a bench at King’s Cross station, I begin to come to. The tick-tock of my heart is slowing down, but my clock’s wooden casing is still scorching hot. Falling in love can’t be as terrifying as finding yourself alone on some ghost train with Jack the Ripper. I thought he was going to kill me. How could a songbird of a girl damage my clock any more than a Ripper? With the tantalising mischief of her eyes? Her army of extra-long eyelashes? The formidable curve of her breasts? Impossible. It can’t be as dangerous as what I’ve just lived through.