The Exploits of Engelbrecht Read Free Page A

raspberry back and helps his man up the ladder into the ring, which is the top of an old gasometer. Then they settle down in their corner to wait.
    And how they wait. At last Lizard Bayliss complains to the committee of the Surrealist Sporting Club that if they have to wait much longer, Engelbrecht will be too old to fight. But soon after the New Year there’s a stir in the crowd along the canal side and Grandfather Clock and his gang are seen gliding along towards the ring in a barge. There is a roar of cheering from the crowd and the band strikes up The Black Waltz followed by The Clockfighter’s Lament For His Lost Youth.
    Grandfather Clock is hoisted into his corner and he stands there during the preliminaries while they pull the gloves on his hands, wearing his dressing gown of cobwebs, looking a regular champion every minute of him. And when they hand him good-luck telegrams from Big Ben, the Greenwich Observatory chronometer and the BBC Time Pips, he strikes thirteen and breaks into the Whittington Chimes.
    But over in Engelbrecht’s corner Lizard Bayliss is in despair. “The whole set up is against us, kiddo,” he says. “Every protest is overruled. They won’t even let me look inside his works. And who do you think you’ve got for ref? Dreamy Dan!”
    “What! That schizophrenic tramp!” says Engelbrecht. “Why, he’d sell his grandmother for five minutes! Never mind, Lizard. I’ll go down fighting. Fix me my spring heel shoes and I’ll try and land one on his dial as soon as the bell goes.”
    Dreamy Dan says “Seconds Out.” Chippy de Zoete whips off the cobweb dressing gown and just as the bell goes Tommy Prenderghast gives Grandfather Clock a shove that sends him gliding out of his corner sideways along the ropes. He’s got a nice classic stance, hour hand well forward, minute hand guarding his face. They’ve mounted him on castors with ball bearings, and his footwork is as neat as a flea’s.
    “Time,” says Dreamy Dan, late as usual, and all that huge arena is one vast hush except for the quick breathing of little Engelbrecht, three foot eleven in his spring heel shoes, and the steady tick tock, tick tock, tick tock—with a nasty emphasis on the tock—of his giant opponent, ten feet of black bog-oak and brass, coffin-lead and hangman’s rope.
    Engelbrecht gathers himself together, leaps up high in the air, comes down heavily on his spring heels, then bounds like a rubber ball straight for Grandfather Clock’s dial. But Grandfather Clock sidesteps light as a kitten and Engelbrecht sails harmlessly past his dial and falls flat on his face in the middle of the ring.
    There’s a roar from Tommy Prenderghast of “First blood to Grandfather Clock,” and an answering yell from Lizard Bayliss, who claims it’s a slip, not a knock-down. They wake up Dreamy Dan and he awards the point to Grandfather Clock who, meanwhile, is standing over the prostrate Engelbrecht trying to drop his weights on him. But Engelbrecht comes to just in time, rolls over to one side and scuttles away to safety.
    So ends the first round. Grandfather Clock sidles back to his corner with a self-satisfied smirk on his dial. But Lizard Bayliss is more pessimistic than ever and as he flaps the towel, he says: “I suppose you know you’ve started going grey, kiddo?”
     
    Soon after the start of the second round Engelbrecht tries another spring but Grandfather Clock smacks him down in midair with his minute hand. Then the door in his front opens and he lets drive with his pendulum. Wham! It catches Engelbrecht at six o’clock precisely and sends him spinning out of the ring into the canal. He swims ashore and climbs back in time to take the most fearful dose of punishment ever handed out in the annals of the surrealist ring. Grandfather Clock gives him everything he’s got; Hour Hand, Minute Hand, Second Hand, Pendulum, both Weights, the Dance of the Hours and Death’s Scythe. When at last Dreamy Dan falls asleep on the