Watching the Wheels Come Off Read Free

reaches Dickenson, who fixes him with bloodshot eyes and asks, ‘You American?’
    ‘No, sir.’
    ‘So how come the accent?’
    Mark looks genuinely puzzled at the question. He’d adopted a mid-Atlantic accent when he was a kid. It had come with American movies and American gum, and it had stuck. The hacks watch him, gleefully, waiting for an explanation. He’s grateful to be let off the hook when Ralph Wilder, studiously studying the flyer, interrupts with another question.
    ‘Wasn’t there a recent undercover exposé of this Dr Temple chap?’
    ‘Where did you hear that, sir?’
    Wilder looks to the other hacks for confirmation, but they show no interest. They’re may be too intent on keeping their breakfasts in place.
    ‘That’s what I heard, after some freelancer infiltrated the course in London. But the story was spiked when –’
    Mark rudely interrupts. ‘Sorry, buddy, but you’re on the wrong course. This is Dr Temple’s very first trip to the UK.’
    He moves quickly away from Wilder, just as the metaltrunk is shut and locked. Sunlight plays on the letters RT stencilled in gold on the lid like some royal insignia. Two seamen attach the trunk to a cable hanging from the jib.
    Dickenson says, to no one in particular, ‘I read somewhere that America is moving away from Europe at a rate of two centimetres a year.’ He sighs and casts his jaundiced eyes upon the trunk now being hoisted into the air. ‘Not fast enough, in my opinion.’
    More sniggers from the hacks.
    The wretched Wilder, still desperate for a story, catches up with Mark.
    ‘Didn’t Harry Houdini meet his end like this? Trying to escape from a trunk in New York Harbour?’
    ‘Nope.’
    ‘I thought he did.’
    ‘Facts don’t seem to be your strong point, then. He died from peritonitis.’
    The disappointed hack is distracted by the ship’s winch, which now screeches as it takes the strain. Under stress, the cable tightens and turns. A curly-haired photographer, half asleep until now, suddenly becomes active, jumping up, running, clicking. Mark unties a hand microphone from the ship’s rail and tests it.
    ‘One… two… three. Can you hear me, Reg?’
    ‘Like you were here beside me, Mark.’
    Reg’s voice crackles over the ship’s tannoy. Mark turns to the hacks: ‘Any further questions, gentlemen?’ A nasty smile plays on Dickenson’s face as he addresses the microphone.
    ‘What are your famous last words going to be, Reg?’
    Turpin, already struggling to shed the chain, raises his voice to hide the sound of his efforts.
    ‘The age of the individual is at an end, sir. We’ve all been fed into computers… as grist for the digital age …uh, the whole world’s now trapped in computers …’
    He grunts, groans and loses the plot as the trunk lurches over the water, swinging wildly about. Strands of rusted cable, at the point where it’s wound on to the winch and hidden from the crew, begin to twist and snap.
    ‘Computers have taken us over. They’ve absorbed us. We’re all just digits now. Grey digits. The world has become a grey place, sir, full of grey people. Don’t turn grey. Be like me. Stand up against the encroaching tide of –’ He never gets to finish the sentence.
    The last strand of cable breaks with a loud crack.
    For a split second the trunk seems to defy gravity, silhouetted against the horizon, seemingly frozen, before plunging towards the ocean, hitting it with a mighty splash. The hacks rush to the ship’s rail, as Turpin calls pathetically over the relay system.
    ‘What the hell was that?’
    ‘Holy shit,’ moans Mark, turning grey.
    The trunk settles momentarily on the surface. Then the ocean opens up, swallows its unexpected visitor, and closes again. Huge bubbles belch from the deep, seeming to transport Turpin’s panicky voice to the surface.
    ‘Careful, boys! You’re going too fast for me.’
    ‘Get out, Reg. Get out!’ screams Mark.‘Jesus! What’s that gurgling