My Dirty Little Book of Stolen Time by Liz Jensen Page A

hippopotamus. Professor Krak bade us enter it through a door that he swung open in its side:
‘Our means of transport, ladies,’ he said, & then, in a foreign tongue which I presumed to be English, commenced a rushed
conversation with the driver of this vehicle, who was – Lord! I could scarcely believe my eyes! as black as a coal-scuttle,
just like in the illustrations of man-eating cannibals I had seen in the cellar at the orphanage! But before I could scream
in terror & make my escape, the machine roared to life with a smooth lurch & we sped into the pellucid gloaming which in that
place seemed to pass for night
    The journey was punctuated by the frequent halts we were compelled to make in order that Fru Schleswig & myself who, having
found ourselves unaccountably hungry, had quickly devoured between us the cylindrical packet of chocolate biscuits proffered
by Krak – could vomit, which we both did copiously, arousing the wrath of the cannibal driver, whose white-teethed fury scared
the wits from me, for I had visions of him tearing us limb from limb & munching on our bones, just as they do in the godless
realms of Afric, or shrinking our heads to wear as tasteless jewellery. ‘Fear not, ladies,’ said Professor Krak. ‘I have told
him you have been to a fancy-dress party, & become merry, & I will tip him well for his pains.’
    Us? Fancy dress? Merry? Kidnapped, more like! The nerve of it! But I could say naught, so sick & discombobulated was I feeling,
& so anxious about the cannibal, whom I prayed had assuaged his hunger with a good meal earlier, though his fearsome mood
would indicate the opposite. London was first of all to me a land of seasickness. First the driving-machine made us sick,
& then as soon as we were free of the enraged blackamoor (what dizzy relief!) we were led (– dragged! Screaming!) into a building
bedazzled with lights (all up the front steps, embedded in the pathway, & shining from above, & from the sides, & all directions – never had I seen so much light at evening-time) & then bundled into a box whose door closed on all three of us. Professor Krak pressed a button & all at once we were scooped vertically upwards, leaving our stomachs at floor-level. My brain heaved, & had Fru Schleswig not caught me, I would have fallen to the floor & smithereened my skull there & then. Finally, the box’s motion ceased, the door slid open (do not ask me how, & what is more I care not to know!) & we exited, veering wildly as two bagatelle balls along a brightly lit corridor, where Professor Krak pointed us onward until we came to a door which he unlocked not with a key, but seemingly with a small piece of dull-looking ivory which he inserted in a hole until an odd noise sounded
& a small red light winked.
    There he led us to a pale room with slatted blinds & two plain beds of birchwood & a quiet woven rug on the floor. Lord, it
was a relief to see something familiar at last, that had the patina of home!
    â€˜It’s all from Ikea,’ he said, as though we should have heard of such a land, & then: ‘Drink that down, dear ladies, each of you. It will put you in a state of drowsiness, & help you sleep. I will bring you fresh nightwear – I have quite a supply of clothes for just such arrivals as yours – & run a bath. We have all the modern conveniences which, I assure you, you will be most impressed by.’
    â€˜I will be forced into a bath over my own dead body,’ I said defiantly, for I had heard of people taking baths, & drowning in them like Tragic Johanna, & I had seen the one in Fru Krak’s house, a deep enamelled tub that required much scrubbing from Fru Schleswig. The creature, too, weighed in at this point, just as negatively & vociferously as I, for she has her own annual midsummer washing ritual, dear reader, the details of which I will spare you, save to tell you they involve her stripping naked, rubbing her flesh