Free Organ Music by Margaret Mahy Page A

car for a minute or two? They could always get out again.
    â€˜Wow!’ Harley was squinting at the shelf below the instrument panel. ‘CDs. Great!’
    Then he put his hand on the key. The silver ball on the end of the chain swung slightly, seeming to glance from one to the other of them.
    â€˜It’s watching us,’ exclaimed David. ‘Autovisulati! Come on, Harl! Let’s go or we’ll be in big trouble.’
    â€˜Got to get home to Mummy, do you?’ said Harley. ‘Is it getting too late for you? Scared the spooks’ll come out?’ He flicked at the key chain with a fingernail. ‘You just do that word-thing to try to make out you’re brave.’
    Harley was always accusing David of being frightened of something – of teachers, parents and ghosts.
    Harley twisted the key. The car started up, running so smoothly that David had to listen hard to be sure it really was ticking over.
    Harley released the handbrake. The car slid forward. David sat back and said nothing. What they were doing was beyond word invention. Harley changed gear. They were really moving now, gliding faster all the time between dingy brick walls. The words Quinta! Come home! flashed past, sprayed on the bricks in luminous green paint. But David barely noticed. He and Harley were stealing a car. Actually stealing it. They were involved in vehicularrobberation. From here on in, they were men on the run.

‘Let’s have some music.’ Harley’s hands were clenched on the steering wheel.
    David squinted at the panel in front of him. One of the buttons said CD, and he pressed it.
    â€˜You’ve got to shove a CD in first,’ Harley cried, but music was already pouring in from every direction. Some rock band was really letting go – guitars, amplifiers, keyboards, drums ...
    â€˜Cool!’ yelled Harley, as David strained to make out the words.
    Dilly, dilly ! Dilly, dilly! Come and be killed
    For you must be stuffed And my customers be filled.
    David’s finger shot out to hit the stop button.
    â€˜What did you do that for?’ asked Harley crossly.
    â€˜Didn’t you hear what they were singing?’ David asked.
    â€˜Nah,’ said Harley. ‘Good beat, though. Put it on again.’
    As the music played they had been sliding smoothly through decaying streets. Now they were out on a well-maintained one-way system – familiar territory.
    â€˜Don’t speed, or they’ll pick us up,’ David said.
    â€˜I’m not speeding,’ Harley snapped, but somehow he sounded less sure of himself. He certainly looked small in the driver’s seat; he could barely see over the steering wheel. ‘What was so mind-blowing about the words, anyhow?’
    â€˜They were about death,’ David said.
    â€˜Is that all?’ Harley said. ‘Anyone’d think you were scared of dying. Dilly, dilly dill-head!’ His left hand shot out to jab the CD button. ‘Let’s have that one again.’
    Music filled the car once more, but this time the voices were ethereal, the pure voices of some wonderful choir. Yet the words of the song were the same – or almost.
    Dilly , dilly! Dilly , dilly! Come and be killed
    For you must be unstuffed So that my customers are filled.
    â€˜Great counter-tenor!’ Harley said in a suddenly gentle, appreciative voice, reminding David that Harley, rather unexpectedly, enjoyed classical music. In more normal tones, he added, ‘Freaky words!’
    â€˜Too freaky,’ said David. ‘And they’ve changed a bit, since the last version. Stop the car. I want toget out .’
    Harley clucked like a chicken.
    â€˜Okay! So I’m chicken!’ said David. ‘Just stop.’
    He noted the confident press of Harley’s foot towards the floor. There was a pause, followed by anxious shuffling.
    â€˜What’s wrong?’ David asked sharply.
    â€˜Nothing,’ Harley replied, his