This is not a complaint about tourists-at least part of my smugness was borne of being allowed a shortcut through spaces I’ve had to queue up to see in the past. (You may be, as I was, told off by an indignant small child.) You are repaid, however, with the chance to flash your reader’s card and walk smugly through the cordoned-off door at the end of the room. This isn’t quite as wonderful as it sounds-it also means that you have to navigate your way through a crowd of tourists, often walking in the opposite direction, many of whom probably think you’re jumping the queue. They manage without authority and they get on well enough together, though like everybody, they quarrel.To get to the archives at Trinity College, Dublin, you have to walk through part of what is generally considered one of the most beautiful libraries in the world. Consequently they have no real leaders, though someone may pop into prominence from time to time, perhaps because he has had a good idea and wants to carry it through. They delight in feeling independent and free and it is this feeling that is most important to them.
So Borribles are outcasts but unlike most outcasts they enjoy themselves and wouldn't be anything else. If that kid gets away he'll become a Borrible and make sure he isn't caught again.
One day a shout might be heard in a supermarket and a kid with the goods on him is hoisted out by a store-detective.
Sometimes it's given out that a kid down the street has been “put into care” because whenever he got home from school the house was empty no doubt he's been Borribled and is caring for himself someplace. It doesn't matter where they come from as long as they have what is called a “bad start.” A child disappears from a school and the word goes round that he was “unmanageable” the chances are he is off managing by himself.
“Normal kids are turned into Borribles very slowly, almost without being aware of it but one day they wake up and there it is.
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