Haroun and the Sea of Stories Read Free Page A

fist. Haroun followed him towards the Ticket Office across a dusty courtyard with walls covered in strange warnings:
     
IF YOU TRY TO RUSH OR ZOOM
YOU ARE SURE TO MEET YOUR DOOM

     
    was one of them, and
     
ALL THE DANGEROUS OVERTAKERS
END UP SAFE AT UNDERTAKER’S

     
    was another, and also
     
LOOK OUT! SLOW DOWN! DON’T BE FUNNY!
LIFE IS PRECIOUS! CARS COST MONEY!

     
    ‘There should be one about not shouting at the passengers in the back seat,’ Haroun muttered. Rashid went to buy a ticket.
    There was a wrestling match at the ticket window instead of a queue, because everyone wanted to be first; and as most people were carrying chickens or children or other bulky items, the result was a free-for-all out of which feathers and toys and dislodged hats kept flying. And from time to time some dizzy fellow with ripped clothes would burst out of the mêlée, triumphantly waving a little scrap of paper: his ticket! Rashid, taking a deep breath, dived into the scrum.
    Meanwhile, in the courtyard of the buses, small dust-clouds were rushing back and forth like little desert whirlwinds. Haroun realized that these clouds were full of human beings. There were simply too many passengers at the Bus Depot to fit into the available buses, and, anyhow, nobody knew which bus was leaving first; which made it possible for the drivers to play a mischievous game. One driver would start his engine, adjust his mirrors, and behave as if he were about to leave. At once a bunch of passengers would gather up their suitcases and bedrolls and parrots and transistor radios and rush towards him. Then he’d switch off his engine with an innocent smile; while on the far side of the courtyard, a different bus would start up, and the passengers would start running all over again.
    ‘It’s not fair,’ Haroun said aloud.
    ‘Correct,’ a booming voice behind him answered, ‘but but but you’ll admit it’s too much fun to watch.’
    The owner of this voice turned out to be an enormous fellow with a great quiff of hair standing straight up on his head, like a parrot’s crest. His face, too, was extremely hairy; and the thought popped into Haroun’s mind that all this hair was, well, somehow feather-like . ‘Ridiculous idea,’ he told himself. ‘What on earth made me think of a thing like that? It’s just plain nonsense, as anyone can see.’
    Just then two separate dust-clouds of scurrying passengers collided in an explosion of umbrellas and milk-churns and rope sandals, and Haroun, without meaning to, began to laugh. ‘You’re a tip-top type,’ boomed the fellow with the feathery hair. ‘You see the funny side! An accident is truly a sad and cruel thing, but but but—crash! Wham! Spatoosh!—how it makes one giggle and hoot.’ Here the giant stood and bowed. ‘At your service,’ he said. ‘My goodname is Butt, driver of the Number One Super Express Mail Coach to the Valley of K.’ Haroun thought he should bow, too. ‘And my, as you say, goodname is Haroun.’
    Then he had an idea, and added: ‘If you mean what you say about being at my service, then in fact there is something you can do.’
    ‘It was a figure of speech,’ Mr Butt replied. ‘But but but I will stand by it! A figure of speech is a shifty thing; it can be twisted or it can be straight. But Butt’s a straight man, not a twister. What’s your wish, my young mister?’
    Rashid had often told Haroun about the beauty of the road from the Town of G to the Valley of K, a road that climbed like a serpent through the Pass of H towards the Tunnel of I (which was also known as J). There was snow by the roadside, and there were fabulous multicoloured birds gliding in the gorges; and when the road emerged from the Tunnel (Rashid had said), then the traveller saw before him the most spectacular view on earth, a vista of the Valley of Κ with its golden fields and silver mountains and with the Dull Lake at its heart—a view spread out like a magic carpet, waiting for