The Bromeliad 2 - Diggers

Chapter 5

V. And he said, What are these frogs of which you speak?

VI. And she said, You wouldn't understand.

VII. And he said, You are right.

-From the Book of Nome, Strange Frogs I, v. V-VII There was a busy night ...

It would be a journey of several hours to the barn. Parties went on tomark the path and generally prepare the way, besides watching out forfoxes. Not that they were often seen, these days; a fox might be quitehappy to attack a solitary nome, but thirty well-armed, enthusiastichunters were a different proposition, and it would be a very stupid foxindeed that even showed an interest. The few that did live near the quarry tended to wander off hurriedly in the opposite direction wheneverthey saw a nome. They'd learned that nomes meant trouble.

It had been a hard lesson for some of them. Not long after the nomesmoved into the quarry a fox was surprised and delighted to come across acouple of unwary berry gatherers, which it ate. It was even moresurprised that night when two hundred grim-faced nomes tracked it to itsden, lit a fire in the entrance, and speared it to death when it ran out, eyes streaming.

There were a lot of animals that would like to dine off nome, Masklin hadsaid. They'd better learn: it's us or them. And they'd better learn rightnow that it's going to be them. No animal is going to get a taste fornome. Not anymore.

"Of course it might all be nothing to worry about," said Angalonervously, around dawn. "We might never have to move."

"Just when we were beginning to get settled down, too," said Dorcas.

"Still, I reckon that if we keep a proper lookout we can have everyone onthe move in five minutes. And we'll start moving some food stores upthere this morning. No harm in that. Then they'll be there if we needthem."

Nomes sometimes went as far as the airport. There was a garbage dump onthe way, which was a prime source of bits of cloth and wire, and theflooded gravel pits further on were handy if anyone had the patience tofish. It was a pleasant enough day's journey, largely along badgertracks. There was a main road to be crossed, or rather, to be burrowedunder; for some reason pipes had been carefully put underneath it justwhere the track needed to cross it. Presumably the badgers had done it.

They certainly used it a lot.

Masklin found Grimma in her schoolhole under one of the old sheds, supervising a class in writing. She glared at him, told the children toget on with it-and would Nicco Haberdasheri like to share the joke withthe rest of the class? No? Then he could jolly well get on withthings-and came out into the passage.

"I've just called to say we're off," said Masklin, twiddling his hat inhis hands. "There's a load of nomes going over to the dump, so we'll havecompany the rest of the way. Er."

"Electricity," said Grimma, vaguely.

"What?"

"There's no electricity at the old barn," said Grimma. "You remember whatthat meant? On moonless nights there was nothing to do but stay in theburrow. I don't want to go back to that."

"Well, maybe we were better nomes for it," mumbled Masklin. "We didn'thave all the things we've got today, but we were-"

"Cold, frightened, ignorant, and hungry!" snapped Grimma. "You know that.

You try telling Granny Morkie about the Good Old Days and see what shesays."

"We had each other," said Masklin.

Grimma examined her hands.

"We were just the same age and living in the same hole," she saidvaguely. She looked up. "But it's all different now! There ... well, there are the frogs, for one thing."

Masklin looked blank. And, for once, Grimma looked unsure.

"I read about them in a book," she said. "There's this place, you see.

Called South America. And there are these hills where it's hot and rains all the time, and in the rain forests there are these very tall trees andright in the top branches of the trees there are these, like, great bigflowers called bromeliads and water gets into the flowers and makeslittle pools and there's a type of frog that lays eggs in the pools andtadpoles hatch and grow into new frogs and these little frogs live theirwhole lives in the flowers right at the top of the trees and don't evenknow about the ground and the world is full of things like that and now Iknow about them and I'm never ever going to be able to see them, and thenyou," she gulped for breath, "want me to come and live with you in a holeand wash your socks!"

Masklin ran this sentence through his head again, in case it made anysense when he listened to it a second time.

"But I don't wear socks," he pointed out.

This was apparently not the right thing to say. Grimma prodded him in thestomach.

"Masklin," she said, "you're a good nome and bright enough in your way, but there aren't any answers up in the sky. You need to have your feet onthe ground, not your head in the air!"

She swept away and shut the door behind her.

Masklin felt his ears growing hot.

"I can do both!" Masklin shouted after her. "At the same time!"

He thought about it and added, "So can everyone!"

He stamped off along the tunnel. Bright enough in his way! Gurder wasright, universal education was not a good idea. He'd never understandwomen, he thought. Even if he lived to be ten.

Gurder had turned over the leadership of the Stationer! to Nisodemus.

Masklin felt less than happy about this. It wasn't that Nisodemus wasstupid. Quite the reverse. He was clever in a bubbling, sideways waythat Masklin distrusted; he always seemed to be bottling up excitementabout something, and when he spoke the words always rushed out, withNisodemus putting "urns" in the flow of words so that he could catch hisbreath without anyone having the chance to interrupt him. He made Masklinuneasy. He mentioned this to Gurder.

"Nisodemus might be a bit overenthusiastic," said Gurder, "but hisheart's in the right place."

"What about his head?"

"Listen," said Gurder. "We know each other well enough, don't we? Weunderstand one another, wouldn't you say?"

"Yes. Why?"

"Then I'll let you make the decisions that affect all nomes' bodies," said Gurder, his voice just one step away from being threatening, "andyou'll let me make the decisions that affect all nomes' souls. Fairenough?"

And so they set off.

The good-byes, the last-minute messages, the organization, and, becausethey were nomes, the hundred little arguments, are not important.

They set off.

Life at the quarry began to get back to something like normal. No moretrucks came up to the gate. Dorcas sent a couple of his more agile youngassistant engineers up the wire netting, just in case, to stuff therusty padlock full of mud. He also ordered a team of nomes to twist wirearound and around the gates as well.

"Not that it'd hold them very long," he said. "Not if they weredetermined."

The council, or what was left of it now, nodded wisely, although franklynone of them understood or cared much about mechanical things.

The truck came back the same afternoon. The two nomes watching the truckhurried back into the quarry to report. The driver had fiddled with thepadlock for a while, pulled at the wire, and then driven off.

"And it said something," said Sacco.

"Yes, it said something. Sacco heard it," said his partner, NootyKiddies-Klothes. She was a plump young nome who wore trousers and wasgood at engineering and had actually volunteered to be a guard instead ofstaying at home learning how to cook; things were really changing in thequarry.

"I heard it say something," said Sacco helpfully, in case the pointhadn't sunk in.

"That's right," said Nooty. "We both heard it, didn't we, Sacco?"

"And what was it?" said Dorcas encouragingly. I don't really deserve this sort of thing, he thought. Not at my time of life. I'd rather be in myworkshop, trying to get this radio business sorted out.

"It said," Sacco took a deep breath, his eyes bulged, and he attemptedthe foghorn mooing that was human sound, " 'Bbbllllooooooooddddyyykkiiiddddddssss!'"

Dorcas looked at the others.

"Anyone got any ideas?" he said. "It almost s seems to mean something, doesn't it? I tell you, if only we could understand them-"

"This must have been one of the stupid ones," said Nooty. "It was tryingto get in!" "Then it'll come back," said Dorcas gloomily. He shook hishead.

"All right, you two," he said. "Well done. Get back on watch. Thank you."

He watched them go off hand in hand, and then he wandered away across thequarry, heading for j the old manager's office.

I've seen Christmas Fayre come around six times, he thought. That's sixwhatd'youcall'ems, years. And almost one more, I think, although it'shard to j be sure out here. No one puts up any signs to say what'shappening, the heating just gets turned down. Seven years old. Just aboutthe time when a nome ought to be taking it easy. And I'm out here, wherethere aren't any proper walls to the world, and the water goes cold andhard as glass some mornings, and the ventilation and heating systems arequite shockingly out of control. Of course-he pulled himself together abit-as a scientist I find all these phenomena extremely interesting. Itwould just be nicer to find them extremely interesting from somewherenice and snug, inside.

Ah, inside. That was the place to be. Most of the older nomes sufferedfrom the fear of the Outside, but no one liked to talk about it much. Itwasn't too bad in the quarry, with its great walls of rock. If you didn'tlook up too much, or look toward the fourth side with its terribly hugeviews across the countryside, you could almost believe you were back inthe Store. Even so, most of the older nomes preferred to stay in thesheds, or in the cozy gloom under the floorboards. That way you avoidedthis horrible exposed feeling, the dreadful sensation that the sky waswatching you.

The children seemed to quite like the Outside, though. They weren'treally used to anything else. They could just about remember the Store, but it didn't mean much to them. They belonged Outside. They were usedto it. And the young men who went out hunting and gathering ... well, young men liked to show how brave they were, didn't they? Especially infront of other young men. And young women.

Of course, Dorcas thought, as a scientist and rational-thinking nome Iknow we weren't really intended to live under floorboards the wholetime. It's just that, as a nome who is probably seven years old andfeeling a bit creaky, I've got to admit I'd find it sort of comforting tohave a few of the good old signs around the place. "Amazing Reductions," perhaps, or just a little sign saying, "Mammoth Sales Start Tomorrow." Itwouldn't hurt, and I'm sure I'd feel happier. Which is of course totallyridiculous, when you look at it rationally.

It'd just be like Arnold Bros. (est. 1905), he thought sadly. I'm prettysure he doesn't exist in the way I was taught he does, when I was young.

But when you saw things like "If you do not see what you require, pleaseask" on the walls, you felt that everything was somehow all right.

He thought: These are very wrong thoughts for a rational thinking nome.

There was a crack in the woodwork by the door of the manager's office.

Dorcas slipped into the familiar gloom under the floor and padded alonguntil he found the switch.

He was rather proud of this idea. There was a big red bell on the outsidewall of the office, presumably so that humans could hear the telephonering when the quarry was noisy. Dorcas had changed the wiring so that hecould make it ringj whenever he liked.

He pressed the switch.

Nomes came running from all corners of the quarry. Dorcas waited as the underfloor space filled up, and then dragged up an empty matchbox to stand on.

"The human has been back," he announced. "It didn't get in, but it'll keep trying."

"What about your wire?" said one of the nomes.

"I'm afraid there are such things as wire cutters."

"So much for your theory about, um, humans being intelligent. A intelligent human would know enough not to go, um, where it wasn't wanted," said Nisodemus sourly.

Dorcas liked to see eagerness in a young nome, but Nisodemus vibrated with a peculiarly hungry kind of eagerness that was unpleasant to see. He gave him as sharp a look as he dared. "Humans out here might be different from the ones in the Store," he snapped. "Anyway-" "Order must have sent it," said Nisodemus. "It's a judgment, um, on us!"

"None of that. It's just a human," said Dorcas. Nisodemus glared at him as he went on, "Now, we really should be sending some of the women and children to the-" There was the sound of running feet outside and the gate guards piled in through the crack.

"It's back! It's back!" panted Sacco. "The human's back!" "All right, all right," said Dorcas. "Don't worry about it, it can't-"

"No! No! No!" yelled Sacco, jumping up and down. "It's got a pair of cutter things! It's cut the wire and the chain that holds the gates shut and it-" They didn't hear the rest of it.

They didn't need to.

The sound of an engine coming closer said it all.

It grew so loud that the shed shook, and then it stopped suddenly, leaving a nasty kind of silence that was worse than the noise. There wasthe crump of a metal door slamming. Then the rattle and squeak of theshed door.

Then footsteps. The boards overhead buckled and dropped little clouds ofdust as the great thumping steps wandered around the office.

The nomes stood in absolute silence. They moved nothing except theireyes, but they moved in perfect time to the footsteps, marking theposition, flicking backward and forward as the human crossed the roomabove. A baby started to whimper.

There was some clicking, and then the muffled sound of a human voicemaking its usual incomprehensible noises. This went on for some time.

Then the footsteps left the office again. The nomes could hear themcrunching around outside, and then more noises. Nasty, clinking metalnoises.

A small nome said, "Mom, I want to go, Mom-"

"Shh!"

"I really mean it, Mom!"

"Will you be quiet!"

All the nomes stood stock-still as the noises went on around them. Well, nearly all. One small nome hopped from one foot to the other, going veryred in the face.

Eventually the noise stopped. There was the thunk of a truck doorclosing, the growl of its engine, and the motor noise died away.

Dorcas said, very quietly, "I think perhaps we can relax now."

Hundreds of nomes breathed a sigh of relief.

"Mom!"

"Yes, all right, off you go."

And after the sigh of relief, the outbreak of babble. One voice roseabove the rest.

"It was never like this in the Store!" said Nisodemus, climbing onto halfa brick. "I ask you, fellow nomes, is this what we were led, um, to expect?" There was a mumbled chorus of "nos" and "yesses" as Nisodemus went on.

"A year ago we were safe in the Store. Do you remember what it was likeat Christmas Fayre? Do you remember what it was like in the Food Hall?

Anyone remember, um, roast beef and turkey?"

There were one or two embarrassed cheers. Nisodemus looked triumphant.

"And here we are at the same time of year-well, they tell us it's thesame time of year," he said sarcastically, "and what we're expected toeat are knobbly things actually grown in dirt! Um. And the meat isn'tproper meat at all, it's just dead animals cut up! Actual dead animals, actually cut up! Is this what you want your, um, children to get used to?

Digging up their food? And now they tell us we might even have to go tosome barn that hasn't got proper floorboards for us to live under asArnold Bros. (est. 1905) intended. Where next? we ask ourselves. Out ina field somewhere? Um. And do you know what is the worst thing about allof this? I'll tell you." He pointed a finger at Dorcas. "The people whoseem to be giving us all the orders now are the very people who, um, got us into this trouble in the first place!"

"Now, just you hold on-" Dorcas began.

"You all know I'm right!" shouted Nisodemus. "Think about it, nomes! Whyin the name of Arnold Bros. (est. 1905) did we have to leave theStore?"

There were a few more vague cheers and several arguments broke out amongthe audience.

"Don't be stupid," said Dorcas. "The Store was going to be demolished!"

"We don't know that!" shouted Nisodemus.

"Of course we do!" roared Dorcas. "Masklin and Gurder saw-"

"And where are they now, eh?"

"They've gone to ... well, they've gone to ..." Dorcas began. He wasn'tmuch good at this, he knew. Why did it have to be him? He preferredmessing around with wires and bolts and things. Bolts didn't keepshouting at you.

"Yes, they've gone!" Nisodemus lowered his voice to a sort of angry hiss.

"Think about it, you nomes! Use your, um, brains! In the Store we knewwhere we were, things worked, everything was exactly as Arnold Bros.

(est. 1905) decreed. And suddenly we're out here. Remember how you usedto despise Outsiders? Well, the Outsiders are us! Um. And now it's allpanic again, and it always will be until we mend our ways and ArnoldBros. (est. 1905) graciously allows us back into the Store as better, wiser nomes!"

"Let's just get this clear," said a nome. "Are you saying that the Abbotlied to us?"

"I'm not saying anything like that," said Nisodemus, sniffing. "I'm justpresenting you with the facts. Um. That's all I'm doing."

"But ... but ... but the Abbot has gone to get help," said a ladynome uncertainly. "And ... and ... after all, I'm sure the Store wasdemolished. I mean, we wouldn't have gone to all this troubleotherwise, would we? Er." She looked desperate.

"I know this, though," said the nome beside her, "Say what you like, butI don't fancy this old barn everyone's talking about. There's not evenany electric there."

"Yes, and it's in the middle of"-another nome "egan, and then lowered hisvoice-"you know. Things. You know what I'm talking about."

"Yeah," said an elderly nome. '''Things. I've seen 'em. My lad took meblackberryin' a month or two back, up above the quarry, and I seen 'em."

"I don't mind seeing them a long way off," said the worried lady nome.

"It's the thought of being in the middle of them that makes me come overall shaky."

They don't even like to say the words open fields, thought Dorcas. I knowhow they feel.

"It's snug enough here, I'll grant you," said the first nome. "But allthis stuff you get outside, what d'you call it, begins with an N-"

"Nature?" said Dorcas weakly. Nisodemus was smiling madly, his eyessparkling.

"That's right," said the nome. "Well, it's not natural. And there's asight too much of it. 'S not like a proper world at all. You've only gotto look at it. The floor's all rough, 'n' it should be flat. There'shardly any walls. All them little starry lights that come out at night, well, they're not much help, are they? And now these humans go where theyplease, there's no proper regulations like there was in the Store."

"That's why Arnold Bros. established the Store in 1905," said Nisodemus.

"A proper place for, urn, nomes to live."

Dorcas gently grabbed Sacco's ear and pulled the young nome toward him.

"Do you know where Grimma is?" he whispered.

"Isn't she here?"

"I'm quite sure she isn't," said Dorcas. "She'd have had something verysharp to say by now if she was. She may have stayed in the schoolholewith the children when the bell went off. It's just as well."

Nisodemus has something on his mind, he thought. I'm not certain what itis, but it smells bad.

And it got worse as the day wore on, especially since it began to rain. Anasty, freezing sort of rain. Sleet, according to Granny Morkie. It wassoggy, not really water but not quite ice. Rain with bones.

Somehow it seemed to find its way into places where ordinary rain hadn'tmanaged to get. Dorcas organized younger nomes to dig drainage trenchesand rigged up a few of the big lightbulbs for heat. The older nomes sathunched around them, sneezing and grumbling.

Granny Morkie did her best to cheer them up. Dorcas began to really wishthe old woman wouldn't do that.

"This ain't nothing," she said. "I remember the Great Flood. Made ourhole cave right in, we was cold and drenched for days!" She cackled androcked backward and forward. "Liked drownded rats, we was! Not a drystitch on, you know, and no fire for a week. Talk about laugh!"

The Store nomes stared at her, and shivered. And you don't want to goworrying about Grossing them open fields," she went on, conversationally.

"Nine times out o' ten you don't get et by anything."

"Oh, dear," said a lady nome, faintly.

"Yes, I've been out in fields hundreds o' times. It's a doddle if youstay close to the hedge and keep your eyes open, you hardly ever have torun very much," said Granny.

No one's temper was improved when they; learned that the Land-Rover had parked right on the patch of ground theywere going to plant things in. The nomes had spent ages during the summerhacking the hard ground into something resembling soil. They'd evenplanted seeds, which hadn't grown. Now there were two great ruts in it, and a new padlock and chain on the gate.

The sleet was already filling the ruts. Oil had leaked in and formed arainbow sheen on the surface.

And all the time Nisodemus was reminding people how much better it hadbeen in the Store. They didn't really need much persuading. After all, ithad been better. Much better.

I mean, thought Dorcas, we can keep warm and there's plenty of food, although there is a limit to the number of ways you can cook rabbit andpotatoes. The trouble is, Masklin thought that once we got outside theStore we'd all be digging and building and hunting and facing thefuture with strong chins and bright smiles. Some of the youngsters aredoing well enough, I'll grant you. But us old 'uns are too set in ourways. It's all right for me, I in tinkering with things, I can be useful, but the rest of them, well ... all they've really got to occupythemselves is grumbling, and they've become really good at that.

I wonder what Nisodemus's game is? He's too keen, if you ask me.

I wish Masklin would come back.

Even young Gurder wasn't too bad.

It's been three days now.

At a time like this, he knew he'd feel better if he went and looked atthe Cat.