11.
-oo00oo-
A small boat bumped its way out of the tunnels and onto the propelling slats but none present paid it any mind, all eyes were on the watery row and its ensuing chase into the nighttime surroundings.
Polly leaned forward, bobbing up and down so much in excitement she sent the little boat rocking from side to side. "There! Over there - Ben and Jamie are after him!"
The attendant was waving his arms after them. "Hey! Hey!" he called as the young men pelted past him, ignoring him. Frustrated, he turned his attention to the Doctor and Polly as their boat drifted up to the landing. "Those men," he started, but was cut off.
"I'm so sorry," the Doctor interjected. "Don't know them at all. Ruffians, I expect. I'm afraid I've worse news for you than unauthorized swimming my dear chap: I regret to tell you several of your so-called historic scenes have fallen into severe disarray."
"Disarray?" Polly looked both amused and disbelieving.
"Terrible mess. Terrible. You really ought to do something about it before someone thinks you keep an untidy display. Now go on." He gestured authoritatively with a damp Scottish bonnet. "Go on. You need to close the ride and get cracking on those repairs! Immediately!"
"Of c-course sir, right away," the attendant stuttered uncertainly, for lack of knowing what else to say. He turned to pull up a scroll-worked sign, running out the chain to close it off. The boat finished bumping along the slats so they could climb out.
"At least the water's washed off some of that horrid stink," Polly said as she gathered up her rumpled skirts. "I never did like French perfume, and now…ew. I'll fetch that packet," she added. "You better catch up with those boys."
"Oh yes," the Doctor agreed, cheerfully stuffing Jamie's lost bonnet in his coat pocket. "We don't want them to hurt themselves."
---
The Doctor found the trail easy enough to follow, all three men dripping with water as they were; the lines led straight towards the carousel.
The band-organ's paper rolls blared their cheerful tune from among the rotating menagerie. Though steam power had only recently given way to the inevitable march of electricity, the music rolls themselves hadn't changed a bit. Electric fairy lights sparkled on the sweeps and rounding boards, reflected in the mirrors and spun along the barley-twist poles.
A good jump ahead of him and following the wake of startled or offended patrons, Ben and Jamie pounded, squelching, after their fleeing quarry. Both of them expected he might duck around the colourful attraction, trying to take advantage of the crowds and confusion, so they were a bit surprised as the man went straight on, hurdled the low fencing and pushed over the operator to leap right onto the moving ride.
"You there! Get off!" challenged the operator from the dirt, only to be jostled aside by two more young men following the first.
"Sorry."
"'Scuse me."
A few of the ride's patrons began to protest, others stared in alarm or, in a couple of cases, began to try jumping right off. The operator, a young man who'd only taken the job for pocket-money, wasn't inclined to challenge them now that there were three ruffians instead of one; he ran for help. Unfortunately, he didn't stop the carousel first.
Ben made a leap, pulling himself up onto the rotating platform and disappeared among the bobbing menagerie. Jamie hesitated then followed, puffing out a breath in frustration as he found he'd lost sight of both of them. The motion, lights and music were momentarily disorienting, but following a lad's protesting screech as a beacon, he began making his way around the circle, trying to not lose his balance.
"Shut your trap!" Rawdon was snapping at the child, who promptly burst into tears. He crouched, watching the surrounding observers whirling past outside, trying to spot his pursuit. Only a surprised gulp from the child behind him warned him of Ben's arrival before he was tackled.
The two of them struggled briefly, ricocheting awkwardly between the undulating animals as Ben tried to wrest the packet out from Rawdon's jacket until they overbalanced and fell, still locked together. Ben tried to roll, but Rawdon was quick and almost immediately had him pinned to the wooden platform between two plunging horses.
"Give it up, Benny," Rawdon grunted, shoving the other sailor's back up against one of the shifting poles and pinning his wrists. "You know I could always best you, y' bar rat."
"That's about to change," Ben grated back at him, shifting his weight. Watching the timing overhead, he suddenly grit his teeth and arched his back. There was a satisfying thump as a wooden hoof connected with his opponent's shoulders; Ben broke free, rolling and grabbing onto a stirrup to pull himself back up. He noted the lad was now nowhere to be seen, which was just as well, as Rawdon was loosing a string of expletives that would've gotten the boy's ears boxed if he'd had the audacity to repeat them.
Rawdon was shaking out his arm, trying to get some feeling back into it. Ben shifted his feet, putting the solid wood of the horse to his back as the two sized each other up once again.
By now, more alarmed riders were abandoning the carousel, children leaping out into the arms of their parents as they went by. Somewhere in the distance a whistle was being blown, barely heard over the music. Seeing Jamie approaching from the other way, Rawdon grimaced, feinting one way then abruptly turned back with a hard tackle that sent Ben tumbling over a sleigh-shaped bench and off the ride. He ducked into the animals and was whirled away.
Jamie started to go after Ben in dismay, then backtracked after the elusive man with determination. He ducked past a wooden hog decorated in bunting, an oversized rabbit and a stag. A fat woman shrieked at him as he passed, grabbing up a wide-eyed child protectively, huddling in one of the chariot-shaped seats. He ignored her, climbing up onto a bobbing ostrich where, half-standing, he hung onto its neck for balance, and scanned for his target.
All around him animals were bobbing up and down, a few with worried riders still clinging to them. Mirrors flashed, women screamed, children cried and his water-heavy kilt was making the painted wood bird slippery. It was certainly not how he'd hoped to go on the ride.
There he was! Jamie spotted him just a little ahead, slipping between the rows, his eyes again focused outside, apparently watching for them. Jamie started to swing down just as Rawdon's head came up. His eyes widened as he realised he was still being pursued on the ride itself. He abruptly dove beneath a lifting horse towards the middle, bumping along the tall mirrors until he found an opening. He vanished into the central workings.
Jamie followed him, frustrated as he had to circle the middle nearly all the way around before he could find the obscured wooden doorway Rawdon had used. He came through it ready to fight.
It was the only door. Rawdon, who had found himself in an unexpected dead-end was attempting to climb up the blaring band-organ, whose metal pipes seemed to offer some escape out the top. Jamie jumped after him, trying to reach his legs to pull him back down, causing Rawdon to scrabble his feet sideways across the instrument. Paper music rolls wrinkled and tore and the band-organ blasted out a strangled cacophony of sound.
Jamie grimaced and leaped again to grab a wet leg hauling on it as hard as he could. Rawdon, half-deafened from the pipes, snarled in alarm and anger as the larger pipe he was clinging to popped from its supporting bracket. He kicked back, hard before he realised Diesel's much-abused suspenders were giving way.
A snapping suspender popped him in the face as Jamie fell back to the earth, a pair of wet trousers in his hands. A shoe bounced to the ground along with them. Looking up at Rawdon in his wet linen drawers, he laughed; a mockery that did nothing to improve the man's red countenance.
Ben in the meantime had skidded off the platform to land on the hard-packed earth beside the ride and simply lain there for a moment, the wind knocked out of him. An older couple approached, dragging him to his feet and chastising him, but he didn't even hear whatever it was they intended to say. Strongly shaking them off he leaped back up, grabbing one of the brass barley-twists to swing back onto the ride. Where had Rawdon and Jamie gone? Frustrated, he shinnied up one of the poles, then stood on a cow.
Polly was suddenly running beside him down beside the sweeps. "The money, it's gone!" she called up to him over the racket before falling back, gasping for air.
"That scalawag has it!" he yelled back and seeing something, suddenly launched from the cow to plunge toward the center of the ride.
A hand plucked at her elbow and Polly looked up from where she was half-bent, catching her breath. The Doctor smiled past her at the carousel. "The police seem to be taking their time. Let's slow him down a bit, shall we?"
"How?" asked Polly. "Every time they catch him, he gets away!"
"Yes, quite. Ah, just the thing," the Doctor said and suddenly trotted to the side. Polly followed him in confusion; he was headed to the neighboring booth with its fishnet full of souvenir Parisian dolls.
"What? We're going to throw dolls at him?"
"No, no, no…."
With two good yanks to the anchoring ropes the net fell free, Polly exclaiming as the wave of cheap dolls tumbled down over her. Ignoring the toys, the Doctor trampled right through them, shaking out the net and dragging it with him. Polly more carefully picked her way through and followed, her eyes widening as he trotted along, making a beeline for the moderately sized hot-air balloon ride just down the path.
The balloon was a small one for its type, essentially just a multicoloured ball on a tether, a small wicker basket serving as its gondola. It was a novelty that spent its days lifting the curious public for a briefly exotic experience in sightseeing and was not permitted to lift off after sunset, though a boy was always left on duty through the early evening hours, tending the burners and keeping it looking full and attractive amid the glow of the nearby electric lights.
By the time Polly caught up with him, the Doctor had made a rapid motion at the rope-winch and was now bundling the net into the little wicker gondola, completely ignoring the protests of the boy who'd been left to watch over it. He stuffed himself in after it, smiling happily when he saw Polly. "Ah, there you are! Good girl. Quickly now, climb in!" She obediently stuffed her skirts through the little door and joined him in the basket. The Doctor swung the wicker door shut and reached over to release a pair of sandbags.
"Are you sure this thing will carry both of us?" she asked, giving the support ropes a death-grip as it promptly began to swing off of the ground.
"No, no, Monsieur!" the boy was protesting hysterically, jumping up and down beneath them. "You'll fly away forever! You'll drown the lady in the river! You'll die!" Beside him the anchor-rope's winch made a whizzing sound as the rope played out from it freely.
"Nonsense," the Doctor called down cheerfully, releasing another weight. "The wind isn't even going that way." He glanced up at the balloon and then over at Polly in a way that made her think he was measuring her mass in relation to the lift, which he probably was. "And yes, or at least I think so. Very likely."
The balloon began to lift up out of reach. He looked down, waving reassuringly at the few people who had come to see what the boy was shouting about. "Should take them a little time to reset the winch once the rope runs out," he said to Polly. "More than enough time, I'm sure." He reached up to manipulate the burner controls again, glad to note it was burning petrol, rather than spirits as one never knew at this point in the timeline what to expect from aircraft. They hadn't quite got the hang of making them non-flammable yet. Heat and flame shot up; the balloon somewhat sluggishly lifted up over the tops of the booths then, filling more fully, caught the light breeze and silently drifted out towards the brightly spinning carousel.
Back in the heart of that same carousel, Ben barreled through the small doorway and skidded to a stop with a bark of disbelieving laughter. In the middle of the incredible noise Jamie had his wet plaid off his shoulder and was making a valiant attempt at tying one of Rawdon's ankles to a brass organ-pipe with it. Rawdon sans trousers was clinging to the blaring, honking pipes, cursing and climbing higher to reach the bracing rafter poles overhead.
"Get his other leg, Ben!" Jamie shouted back over his shoulder, trying to be heard over the noise. Taking advantage of that brief distraction, the man pulled his ankle free of the plaid, losing his remaining shoe in the process. In a burst of renewed effort he climbed up the creaking pipes like a monkey, triumphantly grabbing ahold of the poles overhead to pull himself up and out of the center.
Balancing on the canvas-covered framework as only a rigging-trained sailor might, he looked down at them and gestured rudely, shouting something that it was just as well they couldn't make out. Jamie and Ben looked up at him in frustration, torn momentarily between chasing him upward and going back out to try intercepting him when he came down then they both gaped.
Up in the darkened sky, up behind Rawdon's mocking head the darker shape of a balloon drifted into view.
-oo00oo-