Page 118 - Bridget Jones's Diary - by Helen FIELDING

there was hysterical sobbing. I rushed downstairs, where Magda was outside the

flat in floods of tears fiddling under the steering wheel of Jeremy's Saab
convertible, which was emitting a 'dowee-dowee-doowee' of indescribable
loudness, all lights flashing, while the baby screamed as if being murdered by a
domestic cat in the car seat.

'Turn it off!' somebody yelled from an upstairs window.

'I bloody well can't!' shrieked Magda, tugging at the car hood.

'Jerrers!' she yelled into the portable phone. 'Jerrers, you fucking adulterous
bastard! How do you open the hood on the Saab!'

Magda is very posh. Our street is not very posh. It is of the kind which still
has posters in the windows saying 'Free Nelson Mandela.'

'I'm not bloody coming back, you bastard!' Magda was yelling. 'Just tell me
how to open the fucking bonnet.'

Magda and I were both in the car now, pulling every lever we could find,
Magda swigging intermittently at a bottle of Laurent-Perrier. By this time an
angry mob was gathering. Next thing, Jeremy roared up on his Harley-Davidson.
But instead of turning off the alarm, he started trying to grab the baby out of the
backseat with Magda screaming at him. Then the Australian guy, Dan, who lives

below me, opened his window.

'Oy, Bridgid,' he shouted. 'There's water pouring through my ceiling.'

'Shit! The bath!'

I ran upstairs, but when I got to my door I realized I'd shut it behind me with
the key inside. I started banging my head against it, yelling, 'Shit, shit!'

Then Dan appeared m the hall. 'Chrisd,' he said. 'You'd biddah have one of

these.'