Concrete pencil

I shall try to be calm. It’s only my imagination, itself made fat as a sewer rat on the scraps of information offered up by the media in the past few days.

Rentokil announced demand has risen by more than a quarter. Poisoner Killgerm said sales were up about the same. Long summers, floods and increased food waste are to blame.

We can argue later about how much modern reporting relies on PRs. What matters now is the appalling facts that were included in these articles merely as asides.

They breed five times a year with seven or eight in each litter. Imagine being there, opening the door to your airing cupboard just as the filthy mother spews out her bloodied brood. I’d pass out. Then they’d probably eat me alive.

They’ve started living in cars. Cars! In one paper they interviewed a couple from Palmers Green – ABOUT TWO MILES FROM MY HOUSE – who returned from holiday to find their gear stick and seatbelts chewed through.

At night, you start the engine. You’re driving in weak orange light down York Way, that deserted bit by King’s Cross. What’s that noise? Why can’t I press down the brake? It’s so squishy. Ah, I’ve been bitten.

Remember that trawler, the Spinning Dale, that was pushed on to the rocks off St Kilda in last month’s storms? And the National Trust dispatched a team to see if rats from the ship had come ashore and were endangering wildlife. (They can swim? Jesus!)

And, again a typical fault of papers, they never told us what happened. Did the rats overwhelm the team? Maybe they’ve taken the island and are building rafts and sharpening their teeth ahead of an assault on the mainland.

And the ugly thoughts just keep coming. In Michael Dibdin’s Ratking, his phlegmatic sleuth Aurelio Zen describes how in his native Venice you have to put rocks on the toilet seat to stop them climbing out.

And don’t think you can escape them on the Wharf. Why do you think they’re called Wharf rats? Dining on leftover of Pret prawn sangers in the park. In the pub. What was that running over your shoe?

We had one outside our house last year. It brought bread and apples to its little flower pot. Like this was his home now.

Is that the postman, or are they trying to get through the letter box?

Dear God, help me.