Friday 8 June 2012
Numbles, fumbles and rumbustical Ryf in Roma
Tuesday 28 September 2010
Rutterkins, Ryf and the Bouncing Book – a tremefying tale in which a giant (with a tomte heart) seeks a flurch of followers
Part 1
epi… ‘With a hey, and a ho, and a heynonny-no,’ twittered Mr Ryf, as he night-tripped through the orchard.…
epii…Then, by gum, a vile voice stopped him dead: ‘One more step and you’ll be a hylden, a haggersnash or a hurrion–’…
epiii… Our hero, Ryf (once upon a time a tomte, now a giant thing) screamed at the sight of a…
epiv…rutterkin. This vision of ugsumness left Mr Ryf completely terrified…
epv… The rutterkin roxled: ‘You lily-livered giant – you strut-speech Ryf, listen closely to this…
epvi…Loran.’ The rutterkin flicked a switch and the audio hissed: ‘The land of Nor’s boss, lord, beloved and most ostentiferous…
epvii…ogre speaking: You and your flothery follower are banished from Nor and its beblubbered bogs. We are confiscating…
epviii…every apple, orchard and twittering for my commercial conquering of the world. So be gone by a month’s mirknight or…
epix…there will be war …’ The tape stopped. The gubbertushed rutterkin disappeared in a spray of…
epx…pismire slime as the teary Mr Ryf, all in barlihood, crushed the rudesby rutterkin with his foot!...
epxi … Up popped a nosey nose: ‘Oh my, My Ryf. What a feff! You’ve made a verjuice of it,’ roxled his moldwarp mate, ‘And…
epxii …I hear the rumble of a million sullen-sick rutterkins crambling near. My dearest cowfyne tomte, I fear that …
epxiii…we have less than a month to prepare for a whipping war.’ Mr Ryf was in such a twee, all a-queachy and feeling guilty…
epxiv…and scraping a boot free of goo, he drumbled, ‘I’m such a croudling, a cumberworld. Darling moldywarp, what shall we do?’…
epxv…The moldwarp quoddled, ‘You must don your tweeds, and your ballop britches (because zips are too vulgar for…
epxvi…Brainbridge). Then, Mr Ryf, you must jog-trot to that crapulous capital of Campshire, and find fearless Followers who...
epxvii… will fisticuff.’ So, at dawn, the tristful tomte and true-penny moldwarp, exchanged farewell fears, then …
epxviii… a wauling Mr Ryf strode south in tailored tweeds and cocked copataine to the city of witworm fame, mumbling: ‘Googly,…
Part 2
epxiv…googly, googly,’ (thinking of a tucket of a talkie he thought he might have seen). Comforted by such tuzzymuzzy musings…
epxv…and the red ruly apple held close to his high-lone heart, Mr Ryf set off at a jeopartytrot, in a fluckadrift …
epxvi…to find rutterkin-fighting Followers. But our celibataire was soon in despair, on the rat-run road to Brainbridge…
epxvii…For the first flock of followers were a five-wit ferrywhisk of fun & frith: a jimp jemima, a jocund jo, a night-tripping…
epxviii…nanny, a fair-jannocks jester and a buncing bunny. But not a whiffinger or warmongerer amongst them. Ryf stroked his…
epxix…amulet apple and whispered the words, ‘I can’t lead such golden-sweet sequaces on a rutterkin ferd.’ And, as if...
epxx…from his Delicious Red, words filled Ryf’s unky head: ‘Tally-ho to Brainbridge! There live feisty franions who will fight…
epxxi…for sure,’ Without more causeywebs, our welwilly wonder whizzed into Campshire, then took on a wallopy gait at the sight…
epxxii…of the grammar-folks’ gates to Brainbridge. Everyone stared as he galloped through the Gogs, followed by the five-wits…
epxxiii…They tarried at a treating house in Trumpton St, and had a well-thawed game of weety winks. After squopping successes…
epxxiv…Ryf sidled out, now disguised as a sizar. He sneaked into Pepys and had pribbles and prabbles with lightfoot libidinists…
epxxv…and fizgigs who’d follow. In gardies’ cellar, they kissed the cap & glavered over Ryf’s rutterkin map. Meanwhile in Nor…
epxxvi…the land shuddered and the moldwarp mewed. Then Ryf’s wrinkly apple frightened them all with a hi-frequency fritinancy...
epxxvii…A message came through from a Queen’s College comsci: ‘You can hasten your pace with pigeons; gain 50,000 fighters in a…
epxxviii…single tweetin flight!’ After a swift meet with the Hugemm Rights, Ryf tied a missive to the writhled leg…
epxxix…of a flapping tabellarious. It said: ‘Ryf seeks Followers to fight. Meet me at the Wee-wow Tree at greking.’ …
epxxx…Wakeful Ryf, thru the night, davered in dark-house daymares – floating ice, devil’s smiles, caves of hair, fertile miles…
epxxxi… – scared that just jemmie duffs and gyrovagues might turn up. Meanwhile in Nor the land shuddered and the moldwarp…
epxxxii…mewed as ruthless rutterkins rumbled towards Spuddlham. At dawn, Ryf ran to Queens’, dreading deep-musing doppelgangers…
epxxxiii…But what a surprise, a stirring sight, as the bulldog opened the vomitory. Behind the finely farded feral bird,…
epxxxiv…glad-warbling crowds skipped freely forth, in a coranto towards the Wee-wow Tree. Ryf stood stunned by the sandillions…
epxxxv…of chucks & chaps; and with a glistening eye, spied famous familiars: a fried-bread lover, a hatless joker, mashers and…
epxxxvi…mumpers, a tabernarious trefusis and termagant of a wife; Ryf eyeballed comediographers, college commoners and ‘Lordy…
epxxxvii…oh my,’ he thought, ‘amidst this fine flurch of followers, I see a particular petanque player, a ruby spam fan, a …
epxxxviii…minimus moriarty, Brainbridge bedmakers, verecund Wagner fans, timid transcribblers, a gaudiloquent supporter of…
epxxxix…feisty folivores, and woweeee, now I see a Wildean lookalike smiling at me.’ Oh goodness, such goodness marched…
Part 3
epXL…toward the hero, giant and ever-truepenny tomte. Meanwhile in Nor, roisting, shard-borne rutterkins stripped dainty…
epXLI…trees of Ida Rems, their greylimbed armies oozing frothy phlegms into froglively bogs. And, as Ryf’s only apple …
epXLII…whinnied in his waistcoat, a little folky moldwarp was chained and chucked atop a pyre. ‘For recineration, after …
epXLIII…we’ve fired Nor,’ the rutterkins roared, deaf to a whisper from our mantic moldwarp: ‘There be a tiger-booted tomte…
epXLIV…who’ll make a tittynope of y’all, my dears.’ In Brainbridge, Ryf wiped a tear as his Followers cheered ‘Speech Speech!’…
epXLV…Ryf coughed: ‘Uhuhum’, then, ‘Tell me my Followers, Which of you shall we say doth love us most (oops by my sword, wrong…
epXLVI… speech)’. With tomte modesty, the giant spoke on: ‘Err… he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother!’…
epXLVII…His Followers shuffled closer. ‘Please, Fighters step to the fore, Stretcherbearers to the aft. Swords we shall find…
epXLVIII…and onward we will march!' quothered Ryf. There was no oppilation, no lithernesse, no supplosion of feet, as the sweet…
epXLIX…determined crowd did as they were told. Yet, there was an unpredicted force involved as thousands padded aft…
epL…and only twenty frim Fighters stepped to the fore. Silent in fealtie, his Followers waited. Ryf sighed in the mebby-scales…
epLI…and wondered what to do. ‘Twenty fighters can’t defeat the rutterkins,’ he knew. Blinking at the quackled giant, the 87000…
epLII…(plus) perky pacifists smiled from the aft. Ryf reached for his Delicious Red, hoping for advice from his wordpecker mate…
epLIII…‘Dearest moldywarp, I fear I too could never raise a sword,’ whispered the giant, now a disquixotted major general’...
epLIV…But Nor was out of range, and things were getting fraught. Moldwarp had cramp atop the pyre and the rutterkins were afire…
epLV... Woeful Ryf set up an HQ at the anchor drinkery, and talked with his Fighters of the battle ahead and their weaponry…
epLVI...After a nobbler, Ryf unbosomed his core concern, ‘We can’t slay mobs of reeky rutterkins with a posy of swords!’
epLVII...Then McWallis, a pensiful fighter, placed a calling card on the table as his answer. ‘This is where you must go,’…
epLVIII ...he whispered. The grimy card read: ‘Nicknackitarian: seller of curiously mixed-up inventions, past & present.…
epLIX ... from Pullikins to Petards.’ Yarely, McWallis and Ryf strode, to a darksome door in Kettle’s Yard to buy weaponry…
epLX...‘We’ve no groats,’ said McWallis. Ryf, the giant smiled. ‘No worries,’ he chuckled, mellifluously. ‘I pocketed a shiny…
epLXI...card.’ ‘Fie Ryf, you buffoon! You’ll be in the stocks someday soon,’ replied the nimmer’s mate. Through the squeaky…
epLXII...door they walked. In the shop’s gloom, a snogly gear’d fellow (the nicknackitarian) tipped his hat (a deerstalker)…
Part 4
epLXIII..., and while Ryf exchanged grins and greetings with the ebrious aproneer, McWallis found the weapon he was seeking...
epLXIV ...‘Just the trick,’ said McWallis. ‘One of my inventions, from many moons ago.’ ‘Skybosh!’ quarked Ryf, rather rudely,…
epLXV…‘It’s just an empty book, not even an abcedary!’ Indeed the damp dimpled casing held just a wodge of pockmarked parchment…
epLXVI…‘Woot weep?' asked McWallis. ‘Do not. We shall make a weapon of this yet, or you can call me a maidenmaker!’ The…
epLXVII…bousy seller popped the book in a bag. For Ryf, he put in a free pair of Persian slippers and peccable pipe …
epLXVIII… ‘To exalt the mind, dear man,’ said the giant’s pipe-smoking, trinkling fan. Then Ryf & McWallis to the Anchor ran …
epLXIX…Smoke rose in the northeast from fiery rampallion rutterkin feasts. Dizzy with distress for his moldwarp in Nor, Ryf got…
epLXX…sick on sicer. But as he sucked on the pipe and twiddled his softly slippered toes, he was no longer temulent, but wiser…
epLXXI…‘McWallis, my man, the game is afoot! What answer lies in that free-given book? If we miscarry, Nor will quob,’ called…
epLXXII…Ryf through the pub. ‘Shush yor roozles, this is no shilling-dreadful,’ McWallis replied, tossing the book on the table…
epLXXIII…From there it bounced into the giant’s lap. ‘Lordy, my tinkering works!’ grinned McWallis. ‘This will be our birdsnie…
epLXXIV…, our blore of a bomb!’ The book’s dimples were gone, its edges rounded, & the whole was now rolled, tight as a banderol…
epLXXV…‘Let’s quother of it to your Followers,’ said the potvaliant inventor, ‘They’ll fuel this crackling cosaque with…
epLXXVI…’‘…With charactery from concupiscent mortals,’ interjected Ryf, musing upon tomte tales of scrabbled silver signatures,…
epLXXVII…and facinorous words exploding like fairie dust. The plan was set and Ryf ran ahead, into the night with their weapon…
epLXXVIII…Thereabouts the Wee-wow Tree, Ryf fimmled his homely apple-john, fearing his Followers would be flarting or gone…
epLXXIX…But there was a crowd having fun, by gum. Such a hurly-burly, a ferlie, all greeting Ryf with ale & aeipathy, on & on…
epLXXX…Our bawcock, Ryf, begged the throng, ‘I need your words for a bouncing bomb. Witwright followers, please scrawl here…
epLXXXI…& bethumpt the rutterkins with witsnapper spears. Save all in Nor, my dear moldywarp & p’rhaps the world. Now, unfurl…
epLXXXII…the parchment here.’ Scabrous sceptics, & a bigot of the year, cronked at all who ran tantivy, to sign the greenhorned…
epLXXXIII…general’s book. Ryf dared not look at the scribblings of his weety winks kin, Hugemm mates, frim fighters, pacifists…
epLXXXIV…and the wilde antinomian. Thoughts of nightshade words now plagued him. Weeping-ripe, Ryf rowned, ‘Once the battle’s done…
epLXXXV…what will I become? a fool? fustilarian? a hero or a Gilbertian? Oh my…’ Once farced with a foison of foaming words,…
epLXXXVI…the tome and its secrets were furled. And the hody-moke crowd drank a toast, as Ryf was led to an unknown aerodrome…
epLXXXVII…Roaring like ceraunoscopes, merlin-powered flying machines waited. ‘Ryf flies?’ smiled McWallis. The giant nodded,...
epLXXXVIII…having faith in his gadfly glee-dreams as a tomte. Begoggled, Ryf pushed the throttles. Deep in the belly of the…
epLXXXIX…craft lay the boudic bomb of rutterkin destruction. Ryf rose into the vacivity, singing bravely http://tiny.cc/2rckh …
epXC…The sky cracked. Our airgonaut dived into the enemy flak. ‘No more mammering! I’ll save Nor and my moldwarp, & batterfang…
epXCI…those knavish cullions with this beastly bomb!’ Ryf flicked a switch. The book was released – just as his craft was hit…
epXCII…and exploded. In the bogs below, the bomb bounced, while our giant nepheliad floated earthwards. Bethumpt by sods and…
epXCIII…wappered by fire, Ryf flopped in a field of wet wooze. Spanwhengled near Spuddlham, he lay in a daze listening for the…
epXCIV...explosion. Then a flip and a flap, and the book landed on Ryf's lap, fizzing. From the mist, scuttled scabious scaly...
epXCV…lickspittles. Bearing tinder & scythes, ledgers & knives, ranks of red-eye rutterkins fleer’d at him. The Elder, an ogre…
epXCVI…poked the parchment with a mort-headed mace, ‘Ha! your bletcherous bomb & fantastical followers have failed you!’…
epXCVII…Ryf raged, ‘Read it! I dare you!’ then maffled an aside, ‘Now I’m fated to share a rutterkin grave, dug with senticous…
epXCVIII…sentences.’ Cullions’ claws unrolled the book. All amort, Ryf stood to the fore, ready to fall in flames of fulmination…
epXCIX…The ogre read. Yet no fiery blasts. To his army he said: ‘Close it. We must retreat to the Ratican. Ryf cannot be violated.’…
epC…Peace. Mirknight. Then oh joy! Dear moldwarp from the clods arose! Such croodlings & catchings-up in the softly falling snow…
epCI…Ryf stroked the scroll, ‘Why didn’t the words explode, poppet?’ ‘Ah, look here! Your Followers mistook the purpose of it…
epCII…‘See here, their quills bled not with war or rutterkin protests– for every tweet & twifable is a wuzzle of affectionosity…
epCIII…‘And Ryf, this applausive passion you inspired rid us of the rutterkins, without the loss of life! My igniparous angel…
epCIV…,your sweet power is truly heart-quaking,’ sighed the minnock moldywarp. ‘Now tarry no more, my prickmedainty tomte, for…
epCV…we must daff all & be off home for monsterful drynkyngs. Faustian friends are waiting.’ Danseyheaded & drumbled, the…
epCVI…pair joined the carousing crowd. But murklins, Ryf crept from his fervent Followers & the cataglottisms of fluffy fans…
epCVII…to fret upon his Followers: ‘How to I lead? What do they eat?’ A flower fell in Ryf’s lap & our dinkum tomte gazed about…
epCVIII…There at his back was the Wildean chap, smiling and tipping his hat…Starrified & ecstasiated, and no longer bajulating,…
epCIX…Ryf picked up the rose, adjusted his clothes and into the lief crowd he strode, knowingly, beautifully, & bursting with…
epCX…unked and unutterable love. Now a follower himself (of the Wildean man) the tweetable road looked blissfully good. THE END