Loki made his way to the big hotel Brunel. He had just been talking to a strange old man about possible employment in order for coppers to buy food.
So many children on the streets of New Babbage now were eating into all that was available out of kindness from the well off.
Armed with a set of Chimney Brushes he had found in someone’s back yard Loki now arrived at the Brunel Hotel. He thought that if he did a good job at such a grand hotel, then perhaps people would pay by the bucket load to have him clean their chimneys.
The scruffy dirty boy nodded at the occasional hotel guest that hurried past him trying not to get to close for fear of dirt or worst. Neither wondered what a scruffy street child would be doing in the Brunel.
Loki found the main upper room empty and the fire place out so he strolled up to it, rubbed his nose then set to work.
“wait till Mr V see’s what a fine job i does with his chiminny,” Grinned Loki to himself as he pushed the first part of the brush up, ” This will be easy coppers”
As Loki pushed the second pole in place he started thinking about all the food he would get with the reward given to him for such fine job. His stomach grumbled as the brush suddenly stopped moving.
Loki pushed harder, then even harder. He paused puzzled for a second before doing what anyone else would compulsively do which was to pull.
The brush had dislodged a vast amount of soot that at that moment decended down the chimney like an avalanche. Loki coughed loudly as a thick cloud of soot exploded from the fire place covering the boy and the surrounding fine carpets.
After regaining his composer Loki looked around at the mess.
“Oh bugger,” He said with a sigh before hurriedly picking up the brush and heading out the door leaving a large black mess in front of the fire place.
Now I want to buy Loki lunch!
I’m sure the inside of the chimney is spotless now. You did a fine job in dislodging all that soot, Loki.
Mr Mornington should count himself lucky. That chimney was so clogged there could have been a chimney fire, or Mr Mornington and all the guests might have been poisoned by deadly fumes!
You probably saved his life. *nods*
Mornington was having a quick up of coffee from a flask with the Port worker foreman over inthe docks of Port Babbage when a disgruntled resident of Brunel Hall came running up to him in slippers and a smoking jacket.
“Oi! Mornington! The fireplace in the restaurant has spewed out a load of soot!”
Mornington turned to look at the soot covered resident of the hotel…
“Ahhhhh Mr Palmersdale, you dont need to worry about the soot from the chimney, the wind will carry it off towards the Fells”
Palmersdale started to look visibly flustered by this point…
“Noooooooo Mornington! the soot has escaped from the fireplace!”
Mornington and the port foreman, a Mr Walker, both to Academy and into the restaurant of Brunel Hall…to be met with what can only be described as a dark thick fog of air suspended soot hanging in the air of the restaurant. Everything was covered in a fine layer of soot, the christmas tree, the restaurant tables… everything…
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The port foreman turned to Mornington and asked when the last time the chimneys was given a cleaning…Mornington thought about it…
“Ohhhhhh… lets see now…ummm…well…they was clean when they first got installed when the original building was refurbished! Yes!”
The look of horror on the Port foremans eye’s said it all.
“That was THREE YEARS AGO Mornington! You need all 12 chimney flu’s swept before the whole lot goes up in flames!”
Mr Palmersdale who lit up a pipe commented on a young lad who was seen at the entrance of the hotel carrying a chimney sweep brush and smiling at all the hotel guests. Palmersdale suggested the young lad was looking for work to sweep out Chimeys.
“Hmmmmm” said Mornington. “Perhaps i should pay the young lad to sweep out the lot…12 fireplaces in this hotel, and none of those chimneys have been cleaned out for at least 3 years…”.
Mornington drove over to Wheatstone, to pay A & H Wickertop Cleaning Company to send over all their staff to get the soot removed from the restaurant…this was going to cost a small fortune in cleanup.
“If only i had those chimneys cleaned out earlier….i’m such an idiot” Mornington said to himself as he sipped on a double Chivas.
Mr. Mornington, I’m sure once Loki realises he can be useful to you he will prove very useful to you indeed.
Tee Hee!
*Hears Mary Poppins music now* Can I have lunch too, Mr. Lighthouse?
Boxing Day lunch for all the urchins. Details to follow.
Wohhh!! I promise not to puke on the floor again!
We still have the Stormy-bucket next to the bar for just such emergencies.
great story!
That reminds me. It is probably time to make Lil Jo clean out the smoke stack.