Sex and Drugs and Sausage Rolls

  ‘Are you laughing?’ Soap was heard to ask.

  ‘We are,’ said Leo. ‘Which is to say I am. Kindly sling your hooky-hook, Mr Distant.’

  ‘How about five figures, then?’

  ‘No, you misunderstand. This is not a matter for negotiation.’

  ‘Four,’ said Soap. ‘As long as the first one’s a nine.’

  ‘No,’ said Leo, laughing once again.

  ‘Three, then. As long as the first one’s a ten.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No?’ said Soap. ‘You’re saying no?’

  ‘I would like to say yes,’ said Leo. ‘Truly I would. But I regret that for the moment I cannot. You see, yesterday I sold the newspaper. I am no longer in a position to commission features.’

  ‘Sold the paper? What?’ Soap was aghast. Agape and a-goggle and a-gasp. ‘You’ve sold the Brentford Mercury. To who?’

  ‘It’s to whom, actually. To a major news group, as it happens. The major news group. Virgin News International.’

  Soap’s mouth became a perfect O. His bum an asterisk. ‘You have sold the Brentford Mercury to Virgin? You have prostituted the borough’s organ?’

  ‘I couldn’t have put it better myself,’ said Leviathan.

  ‘Have at you, sir!’ Soap raised his fists.

  ‘Calm your jolly self,’ said Leo. ‘What is all this fuss?’

  ‘You’re part of it!’ Soap shook a fist. ‘You’re part of this evil conspiracy, this changing of history!’ He shook another one. ‘I was going to close my eyes to it and let Inspectre Hovis sort it out. But now—’ Having no more fists to shake, Soap shook his feet instead.

  ‘That’s impressive,’ said Leviathan. ‘St Joseph of Cupertino used to do that. Mind you, he was in league with the Devil.’

  ‘Out, demons, out!’ shouted Soap, who was nearer the mark than he knew.

  ‘I could still offer you a job,’ said Leo. ‘A vacancy has just come up for a wire-worrier.’

  Soap’s leap onto the desk had a definite Dougie Fairbanks Jnr feel. Which certainly lived up to Soap’s self-appraisal on his CV. The trip and plunge forward, however, owed more to the work of the immortal Buster Keaton.

  ‘Ooooooooooooooh!’ went Soap, as he fell upon Leo.

  ‘Oooooooooooooooh!’ went Leo, as he fell beneath Soap.

  ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!’ went Leviathan, who objected to falling under anyone other than a paid lady wrestler with a wall-eye and a dandruff problem.

  And there’s fewer of them about than you might think.

  Soap punched Leo on the nose.

  And Leo went for the throat.

  Back in the more sedate and chat-things-out-in-a-pub-kind-of-world where most of the rest of us live, John Omally emptied another pint of Large down his throat.

  ‘All right,’ said John. ‘That’s enough for me now. I’m off to speak with his lordship. What of you, Jim?’

  ‘I’m taking the Gandhis on a shopping expedition. But first I intend to open a bank account in my name and stick most of this money into it.’

  ‘You’d better give me some petty cash before you do, then,’ said John. ‘A couple of thousand will do the trick.’

  ‘No,’ said Jim, shaking his head.

  ‘No?’ said John, dropping his jaw.

  ‘No,’ said Jim once more. ‘All monies must be accounted for. You must present me with receipts for everything. Legitimate outgoings will be covered.’

  Omally bridled, as bridle he might. ‘Have you lost all reason?’ he demanded to be told. ‘This is me speaking to you. John Omally, your bestest friend.’

  ‘There are no friends in business,’ said Jim. ‘I read that in a book somewhere. It’s always best to keep your business and your social life apart.’

  ‘Jim, we’re in this together. Everything shared fifty-fifty.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jim. ‘And I learned all about that yesterday. When I found myself owing Norman.’

  ‘That was mere tomfoolery,’ said John. ‘Fork out the money, if you will.’

  Pooley shook his head once more. ‘That would be unprofessional. It’s more than my job’s worth.’

  John made fists, as Soap had so recently done. ‘Now just you see here!’ he said also.

  ‘I’ll tell you what I’ll do,’ said Jim. ‘I’ll give you an advance on your wages.’

  ‘Ah,’ said John. ‘Yes. We haven’t discussed wages, have we?’

  ‘No, but I’m prepared to discuss them now.’

  ‘Right,’ said John. ‘Let’s discuss.’

  ‘Well,’ said Jim. ‘I thought a thousand each would be fair.’

  Omally made a doubtful face. ‘A thousand a week?’ said he.

  ‘A week?’ Jim made the face of shock and surprise. ‘I wasn’t thinking of a thousand pounds a week.’

  John now made a similar face. ‘Then what were you thinking? Not a thousand pounds a month?’

  ‘Not that either,’ said Jim.

  John Omally’s jaw began to flap, after the fashion of Jim’s hands in a panic. ‘Not a year?’ he cried. ‘Not a thousand pounds a year!’

  Neville raised his eyes from his bar-end glass-polishing.

  ‘Imagine wages like that,’ Neville said. ‘A man could live like a prince.’

  John Omally lowered his voice and spoke in a strangled whisper.

  ‘Are you telling me,’ he whispered strangledly, ‘that we should work for a thousand pounds a year?’

  Jim shrugged.

  ‘You’re shrugging,’ said John. ‘Why are you shrugging?’

  ‘I’m savouring, too,’ said Jim.

  ‘Savouring? What are you savouring?’

  ‘The look on your face, of course. And that strangled whispering.’

  ‘Then savour this,’ said John, raising his fist.

  ‘You hit me and I’ll stop your wages. And a thousand pounds is a lot of money.’

  ‘Not for a year’s work it’s not.’

  ‘No,’ said Jim, ‘it isn’t, which is why I was thinking of a thousand pounds a day. Would a week’s advance be enough to keep you going?’

  The man without the six-figure advance and the man who had prostituted the borough’s organ were going at it hammer and tongue. Soap hammered away upon Leo and Leo in turn gave tongue.

  It was a long black horrible tongue and it kept getting into Soap’s ear.

  Standing in a corner and pointedly ignoring the conflict, Balberith and Gressil talked of snuff.

  ‘I hear it’s making a comeback,’ said Gressil, The Magnificent.

  ‘Only when you blow your nose,’ said Balberith, The Lord.

  ‘Now I’m definitely off to Lord Crawford’s,’ said John, stuffing the last of his pounds in his pockets. ‘I’ll meet you back in here later, okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ said Jim.

  ‘And, Jim.’

  ‘Yes, John?’

  ‘When you take the Gandhis out shopping, do be sure to get that Honda seat for Pigarse’s dad.’

  ‘It’s right at the top of my shopping list. I’ll see you later.’

  ‘Farewell.’

  John left the Swan and Pooley stood finishing his pint.

  ‘I don’t know what you two are up to,’ said Neville, drawing near, ‘but just take care, will you?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Jim.

  Neville tapped his slender nose. ‘ I have extra-nasal perception, as I might have mentioned to you before. And my nose tells me there’s trouble blowing your way.’

  Jim put down his glass and picked up his bulging briefcase. ‘Thanks, Neville,’ he said. ‘You’ve always been a good friend to John and me, no matter what.’

  ‘There are no friends in business,’ said Neville, with a wink of his good eye. ‘But just mind how you go.’

  ‘I will,’ said Jim. ‘Be lucky.’

  ‘And you.’

  There is always an element of luck involved in every fight. Unless, of course, it’s managed by Don King (allegedly). Soap evidently had a great de
al of luck credited to his worldly account, because it seemed that he was actually getting the better of Leo.

  Soap had the editor’s arm up his back and was holding him down with a knee.

  ‘You spill the beans!’ shouted Soap, applying a Chinese burn, which tore the editor’s watch from his wrist. ‘Who are the men in the black T-shirts? Where do they come from and what do they want?’

  They came, as Jim Pooley knew, from the future, and the one on the flat block roof wanted Jim Pooley dead.

  Wingarde wiped sweat from his brow and squinted once more through his telescopic sight. Within the magnified cross-haired circle the Swan’s saloon bar door swung open and Jim emerged and stood taking the sun.

  Wingarde’s finger tightened on the trigger, but a look of indecision spread across his squinting face.

  ‘Are you sure I’m doing the right thing?’ he asked The Voice. ‘I know you keep saying it’s all right, but if he dies surely I’ll die too? I won’t even get to be born.’

  You must have faith in me, my son. You have done great things while in my service. All that is required of you now is that you pull the trigger.

  ‘That is a somewhat ambiguous answer,’ said Wingarde.

  Don’t talk back to God, you little tick!

  On the Swan’s doorstep Jim breathed in the healthy Brentford air. He felt good, did Jim. Up for it. On top. Ready to take on the world. And things of that nature. Generally.

  And he would not only take on the world. He would bring the Gandhis’ music to it.

  He would Heal the World.

  That was a good expression, thought Jim. He could live with that.

  Wingarde’s finger was tight upon the trigger, although most of the rest of him was shaking.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ whimpered Wingarde. ‘I’m just not sure.’

  You dare to doubt the Lord thy God? You dare to question His almighty wisdom?

  ‘No, it’s not that, exactly. Well, it is, sort of.’

  I will cast you down! cried The Voice in Wingarde’s head, rattling his dental work and popping both his ears. I will cast you down from this high place and into the fires of the pit.

  ‘No. I’ll do it. I’ll do it.’

  Wingarde’s finger tightened, sweat dripped down his nose, and, dead in the sight although not yet in the flesh, Jim took another deep breath and grinned a little grin.

  ‘You grinning ratbag,’ whispered Wingarde. ‘You’ll get yours.’

  The cross hairs quartered Jim Pooley’s forehead.

  Wingarde squeezed the trigger.

  According to the coroner’s report that was placed upon the desk of Inspectre Hovis, whose job it was to head up the murder inquiry, the bullet was a high-velocity, hollow-tipped titanium round, fired from an AK47. It entered the victim’s head at a downward angle of thirty-three degrees, indicating that it was probably fired from either a high window or the roof of the flat block opposite the Flying Swan.

  It passed through the right frontal lobe just above the right orbit and made its exit through the back of the victim’s neck, carrying with it much of the victim’s brain.

  The coroner stated that death would have been instantaneous.

  As he said to Inspectre Hovis: ‘One second he was a man with a briefcase, the next one he was a corpse.’

  16

  In a perfect world, where life is lived in little movies, everything would have been sorted by Friday.

  Soap would have swung his big newspaper deal.

  Norman’s horse would have been up and ready to race.

  Geraldo and his friends would have recorrected history.

  The Queen would have been back on the banknotes.

  Prince Charles would have been the people’s prince once again.

  Inspectre Hovis would have cleared his desk.

  Small Dave would have been banged up in another suitcase.

  The library clerk would have been suing the police for wrongful arrest and excessive use of an electric cattle prod.

  Pigarse’s dad would have got the new seat for his Honda.

  John Omally would have organized the Gandhis’ mega-concert in Gunnersbury Park.

  And Jim Pooley would not be lying dead in a mortuary drawer.

  Which all goes to prove, if any proof were needed, that we do not live in a perfect world. But rather in one where things can turn from good to bad and bad to worse and worse to far more worser still, in less than a single second.

  And in less, it seemed, than a single second, Soap got the shock of his life. There was a sound like breaking thunder and the walls of the office shook.

  Soap jerked upright and glanced all about, his eyes rather wide and a-bulge. He was still in the editor’s office, but everything had changed. The room was bare of furniture and also bare of Leo. The floor was mossed by an inch of dust. Damp stains mapped the cracking plaster walls.

  Soap took to gathering his senses.

  The last thing he could remember was giving the editor a Chinese burn in the cause of a little information. Leo’s watch had come off in Soap’s hand. A rather splendid watch it was, too. A big electronic jobbie with the words PERSONAL LIFESPAN CHRONOMETER printed upon it. And then—

  Crash went the breaking thunder sound and a lot of wall came down.

  Soap still held the editor’s watch. He stuffed it hastily into his trouser pocket, took to his heels and fled.

  He fled through the outer office, also empty, also gone to dust, down the fire escape and out into the High Street. And then Soap paused and gasped in air and got another shock.

  Half the High Street was gone. Just gone. Mr Beefheart’s the butcher. The launderette. The recently opened nasal floss boutique. And the bank that likes to say yes.

  Gone. Just gone.

  There were earth-movers moving earth. Big diggers digging. And a crane with a demolition ball. The crane turned on its caterpillar tracks, swinging the ball like a pendulum. The ball smashed once more into the front wall of the building. The roof came down in plumes of dust. The offices of the Brentford Mercury became no more than memory.

  ‘Oh, no,’ cried Soap. ‘Oh, no, no, no.’

  ‘Oi! You!’

  Soap turned to spy a chap with a clipboard hurrying his way. The chap wore one of those construction worker’s helmets, popularized by the Village People and still capable of turning heads at a party when worn with nothing else other than a smile.

  ‘Oi! You!’ the chap called out once more.

  ‘Eh?’ went Soap, and, ‘What?’

  ‘Clear off! Get behind the wire!’

  Soap said, ‘Now just you see here!’

  And then Soap said, ‘S**t!’ because Soap had spied the logo on the chap’s helmet. It was the Virgin logo and it quite upset poor Soap.

  The chap rushed up, waving his hands about, and Soap gathered him by his lapels and bore him from his feet.

  ‘What is going on?’ shouted Soap. ‘Speak at once, or by the worlds beloooow I’ll ram that helmet up your ars—’

  ‘This is a restricted area. Part of the Virgin Mega City development. You can be shot on sight for trespassing. Put me down, you madman.’

  Soap let the chap fall flat on his back.

  ‘How?’ Soap managed to say.

  The chap on the deck was now crying into a walkie-talkie set. ‘Security!’ he was crying. ‘Intruder on site. Dangerous lunatic. Bring the big guns.’

  In his state of near delirium, Soap almost put the boot in. But sensing that it was better to run, he took once more to his heels.

  The top end of the High Street was all fenced across with a steel-meshed barrier topped with razor-wire. There was a single entrance gate manned by an armed guard. The entrance gate was open. The armed guard was chatting to a lady in a straw hat. Soap slipped through unnoticed.

  But not, however, into a Brentford he recognized.

  The fine Victorian streets had disappeared and in their place were new homes. Built in that style which architects know as Postmodern and
the rest of us know as shite!

  ‘I’m in Legoland,’ whispered Soap. ‘What am I doing here?’

  Behind him arose the wailing of alarms and Soap was away on his toes. He was several streets further before he once more began to recognize his surroundings. He passed by Bob the Bookie’s and Norman’s cornershop. Neither of these had sported the ‘well kept’ look before, but now they looked decidedly wretched.

  Soap stumbled by. Ahead he saw the Flying Swan. He stumbled up to it and in. He stood there, framed by the famous portal, puffing and blowing and effing and blinding and sagging somewhat at the knees.

  A barman, wearing a sports top and shorts, looked up from an automatic glass-polisher. Soap lurched to the counter and leaned upon it for support.

  ‘Been at the gym, mate?’ said the barman.

  ‘No,’ mumbled Soap. ‘Where’s Neville?’

  ‘Neville?’ asked the barman. ‘Who’s Neville?’

  ‘Don’t come that with me.’ And Soap raised a wobbly fist.

  ‘I wouldn’t get lairey if I were you, mate. You’re on camera, remember.’ The barman thumbed over his shoulder towards a surveillance camera that angled down from the ceiling.

  ‘But…’ went Soap. ‘But…’

  ‘You’re drunk,’ said the barman. ‘And you’re wearing make-up! Out of my pub. Go on now.’

  ‘No.’ Soap’s fist became a palm of peace. ‘No, wait. I’m confused. I don’t know what’s going on.’

  ‘You look familiar to me,’ said the barman, studying Soap. ‘I’ve seen your face somewhere before.’

  ‘I don’t know you. Please tell me where Neville is.’

  ‘I really don’t know any Neville.’

  ‘But he’s the part-time barman here. The full-time part-time barman.’

  ‘Oh, that Neville. He retired.’

  ‘Retired?’ Soap steadied himself against the counter. ‘Why would Neville retire?’

  ‘There was a shooting incident. Bloke gunned down right outside the door.’

  ‘Gunned down?’ Soap did further steadyings. ‘Gunned down? Here? How? When? Why?’

  ‘This was five years ago,’ said the barman, staring hard at Soap. ‘It made all the papers at the time. Local bloke, shot down by a contract killer, they reckon. Sniper rifle off the flat blocks opposite. The ones they’re pulling down.’