The Greatest Show Off Earth

  Anything but THAT. But they had.

  Simon stared up at the high barred window.

  Upon that little tent of blue

  Which prisoners call the sky.

  That was Oscar Wilde, wasn’t it? Oscar Wilde . . .

  ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!’ went Simon again.

  The nasty little steel shutter on the cell door shot open and the mouth of Constable Derek said, ‘Shut your bloody gob in there.’

  ‘Let me out,’ screamed Simon. ‘I have to take a shower. I have to see a doctor. I probably need rabies shots. I’m tainted. Let me out.’

  ‘Just keep it quiet.’ The nasty little steel shutter shut.

  Simon’s wild eyes took in the rest of the cell. He was all alone. The poacher and his dog had been released. Dick had probably been given his bus fare home by Inspector D’Eath. God, perhaps the policeman had actually looked on while Dick and his dog . . .

  Simon managed another ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!’ But ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaghs!’ weren’t going to help him in here. ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaghs!’ were the general unit of currency in a place like this.

  Nothing was going to let him out of this place but himself. He had to get out of here. Right now. Right at once

  He had to escape. Escape and make good.

  Because Simon had finally come to realize that the mess he was in was all of his own making.

  He had witnessed his best friend being sucked into space by a flying starfish from another world. He had met up with the men in grey and learned that human beings are snatched away from Earth on a regular basis, that they are treated as a trade commodity. And that a huge conspiracy exists to cover this up.

  He had learned this awful secret and then into his hands had come the book from the future. The Greatest Show off Earth. A book which, had he used it wisely, could have helped him to expose this dreadful business and save the lives of innocent victims. But what had he done with it?

  What had he, Simon the bastard, done with it? Why, he’d used it to seek personal gain. To enrich himself. And where had this greed got him? It had got him right here, that’s where!

  His greed had led him to encounter Sate-Hen, spawn of the bottomless pit himself. His greed had led him into the clutches of Long Bob and his satanic loonies. And now he had lost the lot. The book. The money. His girlfriend. THE OTHER THING!

  And here he was. Lying on the floor of a police cell, in a strait-jacket and a leather mask, bullied into making a false confession that he was a serial killer and branded The Butcher of Bramfield.

  Friendless, hopeless, damned. And all his own fault.

  He really did have to get out of here. Get out. Make good. Right now. Somehow.

  But how?

  Simon recalled a book he had once read about the great Houdini, and how that now legendary fellow could find his way out of a locked safe with little more than a cat’s whisker and a piece of crystal to aid him. Or was that something entirely different?

  And strait-jackets? Houdini scoffed at strait-jackets. Pooh-poohed them, he did. Held them to ridicule.

  Simon struggled in his strait-jacket. It clenched him very firmly. Scoffed at, it would not be. Pooh-poohed? I think not.

  Simon ceased his struggles. It was probable that the design of strait-jackets had been improved since the days of the great escapologist. And where could he get a cat’s whisker from at this time of the day?

  No, if he was going to get out of here he needed just the one thing. A miracle.

  Not easy to come by, you might think. But this is Simon we’re dealing with here.

  Simon closed his eyes. ‘Dear God,’ he prayed. ‘I’m terribly sorry to bother you. I’ve never done it before and I know I should be doing it kneeling down. But as you can see, if you happen to be looking, I’m just a mite immobilized at present.

  ‘The reason I’m intruding on your valuable time is because I came face to face with the devil last night. And if he’s here in the flesh, then I suppose that what Long Bob said about the End Times having come, must be right.

  ‘So I would like to offer my help. I know I’ve been a sinner in the past, but I’d really appreciate it if you could see your way clear to letting me make good and do the right thing for once.

  ‘So. With your kind permission, I am volunteering to take up the sword of righteousness against the powers of darkness and go forth to do battle with the Evil One.

  ‘There’ll just be me on my own, I’m afraid. Because I don’t know who else I can possibly trust in this village.

  ‘Anyway. I hope you’ve been listening and if you have and you’d like me to help, then just say the word and I’m your man.

  ‘For ever and ever. Amen. Love Simon.’

  And with that said, Simon lay back and prepared himself to wait. You didn’t chivvy up the Almighty, everyone knew that. If God in His infinite wisdom decided to enlist you to his holy cause, then He got around to it in His own sweet omniscient time. That was how He did business.

  The nasty little steel shutter on the door flew rapidly open.

  ‘You’ve got a visitor,’ said Constable Derek.

  ‘Praise the Lord,’ said Simon. ‘Praise the Lord.’

  ‘That sounds about right pal. It’s a nun.’

  It’s a none too big bump on ze head,’ said Monsieur LaRoche. ‘Ze mad dog Englishman will survive I think.’

  ‘A gallon of cold water is the thing,’ said Aquaphagus. ‘ Shall I up-chuck on his head?’

  ‘No no, I’m quite all right.’ Raymond struggled to get up from the wheelhouse floor. ‘Where are we?’

  Beyond the broken wheelhouse windows the sky was black as night. Blacker. And with more stars.

  ‘We are back in space.’ Professor Merlin helped Raymond to his feet. ‘We have escaped the planet Saturn and are on course for Earth.’

  ‘Phew,’ said Raymond. ‘We did it then.’ ‘You did it, my boy. A hero, so you are.’

  ‘We did it. In fact, Zephyr did most of it. Where is she?’

  Professor Merlin shook his head. Dusty, battered artistes looked from one to another of themselves and said nothing.

  ‘Where is she?” Raymond asked again.

  Professor Merlin turned up his hands. ‘Regretfully she is gone from us.’

  ‘You mean we’ve left her behind on the planet? We must return at once to find her.’

  ‘She will not be found, Raymond. She is gone.’

  ‘Dead? You mean she’s dead? She’s not dead. She told me she couldn’t be killed.’

  ‘She is lost, Raymond. Remember her fondly.’

  ‘No,’ said Raymond. ‘No no no. She can’t just be gone. No.’

  ‘Raymond, I’m sorry.’

  ‘No,’ Raymond found tears welling up in his eyes. ‘She can’t have just ceased to exist.’

  Professor Merlin nodded gravely.

  ‘No.’ Raymond plucked at his leather suit. ‘See this outfit? She magicked it up for me. She did. If she doesn’t exist any more then this . . .’ he paused. The leather suit was crumbling from his shoulders. It fluttered down in flakes of dust to vanish on the floor. Leaving him alone once more. A poor cold naked schmuck.

  ‘Nooooooooooooooooooo!’

  ‘Let me find something for you to wear.’ Professor Merlin put a hand about Raymond’s shaking shoulder. The artistes turned their faces from his nakedness and nursed sorrows of their own.

  ‘Come with me now and we will speak of this.’

  Professor Merlin led Raymond to a sumptuous suite. The furnishings were lavish, ornate, marvellous. Overstuffed settees. Fine Persian rugs. Walnut tallboys. Pale gilded whatnots.

  Their antique splendours meant nothing to the broken man who slumped down into a settee, a paisley quilt about his sagging shoulders.

  Professor Merlin handed him a crystal glass containing something alcoholic. ‘She wasn’t real, you know,’ he said.

  ‘She was real to me.’ Raymond slurped at his drink.

  ‘She looked as you wanted her to
look. She felt how you imagined she might feel.’

  ‘What else could any man dream of?’

  ‘She was just a dream. Our dream.’

  Raymond knocked back his drink and slammed down his glass. ‘Then let us dream again. If she was your magic, bring her back to me.’

  ‘I cannot. I helped to bring her into being, but now her time has passed.’

  ‘I don’t understand any of this. If you brought her into being, how did you do it? Tell me how.’

  ‘We prayed for her.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘When the circus was captured so many years ago and taken to Uranus. It was the cooking pot for us. For my wonderful artistes. This is no ordinary circus, Raymond, you have no doubt come to realize this. The feats my artistes perform are feats which simply cannot be performed. You had read of Monsieur LaRoche, many have tried to duplicate his act. None can. Because without magic, real magic, it cannot be done.’

  ‘So you’re all black magicians, is that it?’

  ‘Hardly black. A little grey at the temples perhaps. Each of my artistes is unique. The gift that each possesses is unique. Precious. Unrepeatable. We put our talents together in a time of great mutual crisis and she came to us. Zephyr came to us. Freed us. And now she is gone. Her time has passed. Now is your time.’

  ‘My time? Don’t look at me. I don’t have any magical powers. I don’t have anything.’ Raymond sank lower in his gloom.

  ‘But you have. You are of the now. My time, the time of my circus, that time is passed. We have all grown weary. Our world is weary of us. It is weary of the circus. It is weary of magic.’

  ‘Huh,’ said Raymond.

  ‘But it is. You yourself, to fight the foe and free the people, you called up a motor bike and a fearsome gun. I would have called up a snow-white charger and a shining sword.’

  ‘The police would have shot you then.’

  ‘And perhaps a magic shield,’ said the professor. ‘But you get my point. We have had our time. That time is done. Now is your time. Our magic fades. I do not think my circus will play again.’

  The plaintive tone in the old man’s voice made Raymond look up at him. ‘Of course you will play again.’

  ‘There is no planet now that we may play on. None but Earth, and I fear not even there.’

  ‘You’ll play again,’ said Raymond. ‘And on Earth.’

  ‘The Earth is doomed I fear.’

  ‘Is it, be damned.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘All right.’ Raymond smacked his naked knees. ‘Your sorrow is no less great than my own. But we cannot give up, can we? There’s billions of people on Earth, our sorrow is somewhat less than theirs will be when the Edenites fill up the polar openings and suffocate the lot of them. I’ve got a family down there. I’d like you to meet them.’

  ‘I would be most honoured.’ The professor bowed.

  ‘So we’ll have to save them, won’t we?’

  ‘Then you will . . .’

  ‘I will do everything I can, though without Zephyr . . .’ Raymond shrugged sadly.

  ‘I knew I had not misjudged you.’ Professor Merlin poured Raymond another large drink. And one for himself as well. ‘Your very good health,’ said he.

  ‘To Earth and to magic and to the circus.’ Raymond paused. ‘And to Zephyr.’

  ‘I will drink to that.’ Professor Merlin drained his glass. ‘Now tell me, Raymond, what is a Millwall supporter?’

  ‘What?’ Raymond spluttered into his glass, sending something alcoholic up his nose. ‘Whatever makes you ask me a question like that, at a time like this?’

  ‘Well,’ the professor gave his moustachios a pluck, ‘it would appear that we have two hundred of them running riot in the hold.’

  ‘Well bless my soul,’ said the nun, in that Irish accent that nuns always have in American movies, well, in all movies really. ‘If you’d be after closing the cell door on your way out, young man.”

  ‘No way.’ Constable Derek shook his head fiercely. ‘I can’t leave you alone with this maniac.’

  ‘Sure and he looks pretty harmless to me. All trussed up like a Christmas turkey.’

  ‘He’s evil,’ said the constable.

  ‘I shall call you if I need you, go with God’s blessing.’

  ‘Well, all right then.’ Constable Derek left the cell. But not before giving Simon a passing kick in the ribs. ‘Yell out if you need me, I’ll be just down the corridor.’

  Slam went the door and clunk went the key in the lock.

  The nun looked down at Simon. ‘Will you look at yourself?’ she said. ‘You’re a sight to be seen, so you are.’

  ‘Get these straps off,’ whispered the lad on the deck. ‘Set me free.’

  ‘Set you free, is it?’ The nun swung her foot and kicked Simon viciously between the legs.

  ‘Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!’ went Simon.

  ‘Shut your gob in there,’ came the voice of Constable Derek from just down the corridor.

  The nun kicked Simon again. She had a fine kick on her for a nun. A fine young kick. From a fine young foot. Set, where Simon always considered a fine young foot should be set, if it was a female one, inside a white, winkle-pickered shoe, with a three-inch stiletto heel.

  ‘Liza,’ wailed Simon. ‘It’s you. Stop kicking me.’

  ‘You bastard.’ Liza kicked him again. ‘Get up on your feet.’

  ‘So you can head butt me? No thanks.’

  ‘So I can set you free.’

  ‘Oh right. Yes please.’

  Liza helped the battered one to his feet and plucked at the buckles on the strait-jacket. ‘So, you saw the light, did you?’ Simon asked.

  ‘What are you babbling about?’ Liza undid the straps.

  ‘The light of the Lord.’

  ‘Are you taking the piss, or what?’

  ‘Why have you come here?’ Simon asked.

  ‘Long Bob sent me, of course.’

  ‘Long Bob?’ Simon tore off the strait-jacket and flung it to the floor.

  ‘You look a right prat in that mask.’

  Simon ripped it away from his face and checked his teeth. Intact. But they could do with a brush. ‘So Long Bob sent you.’

  ‘Of course he did. Dick turned up at the farm at about three in the morning. He told us the police had arrested you. I don’t know what was up with him though, he couldn’t keep a straight face. And his dog looked really shagged out.’

  Simon flinched. ‘Did you bring a gun or something?’

  ‘Are you crazy?’ Long Bob’s going to blow the side wall off the police station.’

  ‘Is he?’ Simon nursed his tender parts. Most of his parts were tender.

  ‘What do you mean, is he? You’ve read the book from the future, haven’t you? You know what’s going to happen next.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ Simon put his brain into gear. ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘Yeah, well. But what Long Bob wants to know is, how come, if you knew the police were coming, you let yourself get captured?’

  ‘I’ll bet he does.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Well,’ Simon paused. ‘Because that’s what it says in the book. That’s why. But I couldn’t tell Long Bob that. Like I said at his farmhouse, he isn’t supposed to know. Only me. That’s how it works.’

  ‘That makes sense,’ said Liza.

  Then you’re a bigger fool than I took you for, thought Simon. But he was now extremely puzzled. Where was the book? Who had it? The constable who had gone searching had said that it wasn’t in the hideaway bush, but that the bush was covered in feathers and stank of a horrible smell. So Simon had assumed the Sate-Hen and his acolytes now had the book. But obviously they didn’t.

  So who the hell did?

  Simon adjusted his hair and made a puzzled face.

  ‘You’re acting bloody strange for a man who’s supposed to know what’s going to happen in the future,’ said Liza.

  Simon looked her up and down. She’d been a real disapp
ointment to him, this woman. Joining the satanic loonies. Taking up with Military Dave. A real disappointment. God would permit a small act of justified revenge, surely?

  ‘Actually,’ said Simon, ‘I am just a little disorientated. You see it says specifically in the book, and I quote, “Simon and Liza were making love in the police cell when Long Bob sprung him,” and I do not have a watch on me. How soon might we expect him?’

  ‘About five minutes from now.’

  ‘Then quick, take off all your clothes.’

  ‘It’s called a habit,’ said Liza.

  To which Simon didn’t reply.

  20

  ‘Two hundred Millwall supporters?’ Raymond slumped back on his seat. ‘Rioting in the hold?’

  ‘And chanting,’ said the professor.

  ‘Chanting?’

  ‘Oh lay oh-lay-oh-lay-oh- lay ooooh-lay ooooh-lay.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Raymond. ‘Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.’

  ‘Warriors though.’ Professor Merlin offered a salute. ‘Most martial.’

  ‘And are they all still naked?’ Raymond didn’t much fancy the thought.

  ‘They were.’

  ‘But you clothed them?’

  ‘They clothed themselves, so to speak.’

  ‘With what?’

  ‘With the big spanking new auction house lorry. They stripped it to pieces and they’ve made themselves suits of armour.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose they would.’

  ‘Most enterprising young men. Interesting tattoos. But somewhat turbulent. I felt it wise to keep all the hatchways to the hold locked and barred for the time being.’

  ‘I think that would be for the best, yes.’

  ‘But they seem intent on breaking out. They’re taking it in turns to head butt the doors. I wonder if perhaps you might go down and have a word with them. Explain things, as it were.’

  ‘Have you tried?’

  ‘I did.’ The professor stroked at his mobile chin. ‘I waved to them through one of the little windows in the doors. They didn’t seem too pleased to make my acquaintance.’

  ‘What did they say?’

  ‘They chanted. Old iron old-iron-old-iron-old-iron, Ooooold-iron, Ooooold-iron. What does that mean exactly?’

  ‘It’s Cockney rhyming slang. Iron hoof, it means—’