The Gang of Four

  Russell awoke to find himself alone in a small featureless room. No Gordian knot, no sign of the others at all. Where was he?

  As his eyes slowly focused on the heavy metal door he came to realize that he was lying in a police cell. Fragments of memories returned but how he’d ended up here remained a mystery. He unsteadily rose to his feet and lurched towards the door. Locked, obviously. He began to bang hard.

  ‘Hey, let me outahere!’

  After about ten minutes of fruitless banging there came the sound of rattling keys and heavy footsteps. A gigantic police constable unlocked his cell.

  ‘Alright, Mr. Tebb, you can clear off now!’

  ‘What am I doing here?’ asked Russell.

  ‘Don’t you recall, sir? No, I suppose you don’t. You were arrested last night for drunk and disorderly behaviour; given a formal caution and shown to our guest quarters.’

  ‘Guest quarters?’

  ‘Here, you pillock!’ replied the constable ushering Russell out of the cell. ‘We threw you in the cells to cool down. We’d have let you out earlier but you promptly passed out.’

  After a short ticking off from the sergeant Russell was released. He stepped out of the police station and onto a bustling early morning high street. Clearly this was not the crop circle village.

  The red Bentley was parked directly outside the police station and standing in front of it was Michael.

  ‘Morning, Michael; another lovely day,’ Russell said in a cheery voice.

  ‘Hmm,’ replied the spider.

  Russell glanced inside the car – empty. ‘Where’s Ceres?’ he asked.

  Michael pointed at the police station: ‘In there!’

  ‘Oh,’ replied Russell, sheepishly.

  ‘Precisely!’ replied Michael.

  The memory of his arrest, though blurry and confused, and shrouded in a drunken rage, returned. Both he and Ceres had been arrested at the same time. But that was all he could remember.

  ‘What happened?’ he asked Michael.

  ‘Well, let’s see: both you and ma’am started needling Gerry and his chums aggressively after about the fourth pint. They responded in kind and inevitably–’

  ‘–a fight broke out,’ finished Russell.

  ‘Not exactly,’ replied Michael, ‘you threw your drink over Gerry and at that point the landlord threw us all out. The spat subsequently continued in the car park.’

  Russell felt ashamed: ‘I’m sorry you had to witness all that, Michael. I don’t normally get involved in pub brawls.’

  ‘Hmm,’ replied Michael.

  Russell rubbed his left eye which was throbbing painfully. ‘Did Gerry punch me?’

  ‘No, you both engaged in a lot of pushing and shoving but I never noticed anyone actually landing a real punch.’

  ‘But my eye is killing me!’

  ‘I think you can put that down to the very high levels of congener by-products in the Red Lion’s scrumpy, not to mention the wormwood that Pete surreptitiously adds into the mix. Gerry was correct: that stuff is not fit for human consumption.’

  ‘Wormwood? Isn’t that toxic? Who’s Pete?’

  ‘Can be, it used to be an ingredient in absinthe, but Pete – he’s the landlord and barman, obviously – likes to add it to his scrumpy for some reason. No wonder it sends everyone demented!’

  Russell shook his head: ‘Ow!’

  ‘Serves you right!’ replied Michael.

  ‘So how did plod get involved?’

  ‘They turned up in their panda car almost as soon as we hit the car park; you decided to square up to them; ma’am knocked off one of the constables’ helmets and insisted she was entitled to use it as a toilet; you demanded the same and tried to urinate into it. Then you both got nicked.’

  ‘Shit! Is that true?’

  ‘Of course it’s true, why would I lie?’ replied Michael, indignantly.

  ‘I mean about urinating into a policeman’s helmet. I’ve heard somewhere that it is the right of every British citizen, or something.’

  The spider snorted: ‘Well, I don’t know where you, or ma’am for that matter, got hold of that particular urban myth but I can assure you that it is not one of your statutory rights!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Michael. It was the scrumpy!’

  ‘Hmm, you don’t say,’ replied Michael.

  ‘What about Gerry?’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘Did he get arrested?’

  ‘No, Gerry and the others melted away when the police arrived.’

  ‘Typical!’

  ‘It’s just as well they did! They went on to construct another crop circle and…’ Michael retrieved a picture from the car’s back seat, ‘…it’s one of ‘ours’: see, another 120 degree segment. Similar busy design.’

  Russell studied the picture. As with Gerry’s earlier pictogram it was magnificently detailed. ‘So we have parts one and two now, correct?’ he enquired.

  ‘Yep,’ replied Michael, ‘and I can’t make head-nor-tail of this one either!’

  ‘Why is that?’ asked Russell, ‘Can’t you crack any code?’

  ‘Hmm,’

  ‘I wish you’d stop saying that!’ said Russell. He regarded the busy high street and its scattering of old sandstone buildings: ‘Where the hell are we?’

  ‘This is Trowbridge.’

  ‘Is that in England?’

  ‘We’re still in Wiltshire!’

  ‘Oh.’ Russell checked the car again: still empty. ‘Where is Mr. Waterstone?’ he asked. He hadn’t seen the cat since the previous afternoon.

  ‘He’s hooked up with a bunch of druids,’ replied Michael, ‘they’re over at Avebury right now, checking out the stones. We’ll sweep by later, see if he’ll deign to join us.’

  At that moment Ceres emerged from the police station. It was hard to tell how she felt. Maybe some of the usual swagger was missing but there were no obvious signs of a hangover, or shame.

  ‘Morning,’ she said in a slightly flat and distracted voice.

  ‘Morning, ma’am,’ replied Michael, ‘I trust you slept well!’ he added sardonically.

  ‘Like a log, thank you, Michael, but…’ Ceres rubbed her forehead, ‘I’m not feeling…’ she turned her attention towards Russell: ‘That “more-than-fighting” scrumpy certainly lived up to its name, didn’t it, Mr. Tebb!?’ she declared, giving Russell a sudden playful shove.

  ‘You are hungover!?’ asked Russell.

  ‘Yes! …and you?’

  ‘Most definitely, but it is all concentrated behind my left eye!’

  ‘Are you sure that wasn’t where Gerry hit you?’

  ‘Well, according to Michael–’

  ‘Oh yes, that’s right, you both fought like girls, haha! What a sight!’

  Russell rubbed his eye.

  ‘Let me look at that.’ Ceres moved close to Russell and, stooping slightly, examined his eye. ‘Would you like me to remove the pain, Mr. Tebb?’

  ‘That would be appreciated, thanks!’ replied Russell, taken aback somewhat by this unexpectedly generous gesture.

  Ceres opened the front passenger door and reached into the glove compartment; after a brief rummage she fished out a packet of paracetamol tablets and handed them to Russell with a smile.

  ‘Take two of these with water,’ she instructed a nonplussed Russell.

  ‘And don’t exceed the dose,’ added Michael.

  ‘Thanks,’ replied Russell, ‘and the water?’ he asked.

  ‘Do we have any water, Michael?’ enquired Ceres.

  ‘Negative,’ replied Michael, rather abruptly.

  ‘What’s with him this morning!?’ Ceres asked Russell.

  ‘I think he’s a bit peeved with us,’ replied Russell.

  ‘Oh!?’ Ceres raised her eyebrows at Michael.

  ‘Yes,’ Russell remarked, ‘apparently we almost stopped Gerry and his gang from making their second crop circle.’

  ‘Nonsense! …Did they make it?’


  ‘Yes, ma’am, here.’ Michael showed Ceres the new picture; she squinted at it briefly before returning it to the spider. ‘I’ll study that over breakfast, come on, let’s find a café and some water for Mr. Tebb.’

  Ceres led the others down the high street and into the nearest greasy spoon. She ordered a bacon sandwich and Russell did the same. Michael, as always, stuck to his black coffee. Over breakfast she restudied the crop circle picture:

  ‘Gibberish,’ she finally declared, ‘just like the first one! What the hell are they playing at!?’ There was disappointment and perhaps even frustration in her voice.

  ‘You mean Gerry?’ asked Russell.

  ‘No, not the monkey, the organ grinder – your collective unconscious! We’re putting ourselves out for you lot and you appear to be responding by taking the piss!’ Ceres shot a furious look at Russell.

  ‘Hey! Calm down,’ said Russell, ‘maybe we simply don’t care for the choices on the table! And besides, how much information does it take to say: “we’re plumping for dumbass”?’

  ‘There’s probably more to it than that!’ replied Ceres, ‘some form of statement or testimony will be presented I would suppose, something for posterity before you transform. But maybe I expect too much from you as a species.’

  ‘Do you think they are going to go for the hominid option, Russell?’ asked Michael, taking a noisy slurp of coffee.

  ‘Well.., I dunno,’ replied Russell. He glanced over at the picture still in Ceres’s hand: ‘I presume you’ll need all three parts to crack the code.’

  ‘Hmm,’ replied Ceres, handing Russell the picture, ‘presumably!’

  Russell took another long look at the new pictogram but it meant nothing to him. Michael then tapped it with one of his forepaws; he turned to Ceres: ‘I took the liberty of visiting the site first thing this morning and it seemed to me that every single plant had been specifically positioned. It’s therefore possible, ma’am, that in order to decode this we will need to take standardized images: each taken at the exact same time of day and from the exact same height. I recommend sending up a couple of UAVs at noon and retaking the photographs of parts one and two from a height of precisely one hundred and fifty metres.’

  Ceres shrugged: ‘Alright, but we’ll drop into the Red Lion first in case part three has turned up, then we can do them all at the same time.’

  ‘Agreed, ma’am.’

  ‘Wow, this is some operation!’ remarked Russell, ‘this is going to be one stonking crop circle when all the pieces can be viewed together!’

  ‘Indeed!’ replied Michael, ‘it’ll be “stonking” alright, but–’

  ‘–still gibberish!’ finished Ceres, glumly.

  ***