‘You really wouldn’t want to know.’
‘But who are you, guv? You look a bit of a toff. Should I call you “your honour” rather than “guv”?’
‘ “Guv” will be sufficient. I am from the Department of Roads.’ The official-looking gent flashed an official-looking ID.
‘Gawd luv a duck,’ said the bloke. ‘That has me fair impressed.’
‘And so it should. Now I want you to stop digging there at once and start digging over there instead. I will supervise.’
‘Whatever you say, guv. Where exactly do you want us to dig?’
‘Right there.’ The official-looking gent pointed to the bench outside the Memorial Library.
Now, the other chap who did a lot of pointing hadn’t been heard of for a while. But he had been busy and he was up to absolutely no good whatsoever. Dr Steven Malone wasn’t lecturing this morning, nor was he putting in any time at the Cottage Hospital. He was working alone in his underground laboratory at Kether House.
You might well suppose that as a chap who looked just like Paget’s Holmes, in black and white, Dr Steven would have had one of those Victorian Mad Scientist’s laboratories. All bubbling retorts and brass Bunsen burners, with squiddly-diddly glass pipes and red rubber tubing. There would be a lot of early electrical gubbinry also, sparking coils and polished spheres and a heavy emphasis on the switchboards with the big ‘we belong dead’ power handles.
But not a bit of it.
Because, let’s face it, nobody would have a laboratory like that nowadays. In fact nobody really had a laboratory like that in those days. Laboratories like that were invented by Hollywood. And although we are all eternally grateful for the way Hollywood has rewritten history for us, this is not Hollywood.
This, thank God, is Brentford. And we do things differently here.
Dr Steven Malone’s laboratory was a living hell. Anyone who has seen photographs of Ed Gein’s kitchen, or Jeffrey Dahmer’s bathroom, will be able to form an immediate impression. Somebody once said that ‘psychos never comb their hair’; well, neither do they wash their dishes. And Dr Steven Malone was a psychopath, make no mistake about that. Although he did comb his hair, and wash his dishes.
For the record, it is possible to trace the precise moment when the genetic engineer stepped out of sanity and entered loony-dom. The day five years before when he changed his name from Stephen to Steven.
It came about in this fashion. Dr Steven had been introduced to a certain writer of Far-fetched Fiction at a party in Dublin. This writer showed Dr Steven his pocket watch. The numbers on the face had been erased and replaced by the letters of the writer’s name. Twelve letters, six for the Christian name and six for the surname. Dr Steven viewed this preposterous vanity and, unlike others who have viewed it and responded with certain gestures below waist level, Dr Steven was intrigued and he knew that he must own one. The effect upon him was profound, because he realized that the name Stephen Malone has thirteen letters. And thirteen is an unlucky number.
And the man who would change the world would not have thirteen letters in his name.
There was some kind of Cosmic Truth in this, albeit one of a terrible madness. The body of the writer was pulled from the river the following day. His pocket watch was never seen again.
Except by Dr Steven Malone.
So back to his laboratory.
It smelt bad down here. Bad, as in fetid. Bad, as in the stench of death. There were Dexion racks down here, poorly constructed. Glass jars stood upon these racks, glass jars containing specimens. Human specimens. Pickled parts, suspended in formaldehyde. Here a tragic severed hand, its fingertips against the glass, and here some sectioned organ, delicate as coral, wafer thin as gossamer. And all around stared human eyes, unseeing yet reproachful from within those tall glass jars.
On the floor was litter. Crumpled cartons, empty bottles, discarded cigarette packs (for most psychos smoke), and magazines and books and newspapers and unopened letters and flotsam and jetsam and filthy rags and tatters. And there were bloodstains on the walls and on the ceiling and on the litter. And on the hands of Dr Steven Malone.
And on further Dexion racks, where stood six zinc water tanks. Each filled with a sterile solution and each containing a naked human torso. The arms, legs and head had been neatly and surgically removed from each, the wounds tightly stitched, plasma drips inserted. Electric implants caused the hearts to beat. And within each swollen female belly something moved.
Something living. Something newly cloned.
Dr Steven walked from tank to tank, examining his evil handiwork. And smiled upon it all.
What a bastard!
‘This could be a bit of a bastard,’ said the bloke from the hole as he viewed the concrete base of the library bench. ‘Now what we usually do when faced with a situation like this is go off to breakfast for a couple of hours.’
‘In keeping with your working class stereotype?’
‘I wouldn’t be at all surprised. So we’ll see you later, eh?’
‘I think not,’ said the official-looking gent. ‘Let us cast convention to the four winds this day. Let us tear off the woollen overcoat of conformity, lift the grey tweed skirt of oppression and feast our eyes upon the golden G-string of egalitarianism. Take up your pneumatic drill and dig.’
‘Gawd stripe me pink, guvnor. If that weren’t a pretty speech and no mistake.’
‘Just dig the damn’ hole.’
‘What’s going on?’ asked a casual passer-by, whose name was Pooley.
‘We’re digging a hole,’ said the bloke who had been digging, but now was mopping his brow. ‘It’s for cable TV. This official-looking gent says we’re to dig it here.’
‘Mind if I just stand and watch?’
‘Don’t you have any work to go to?’
‘Well,’ said Jim. ‘I used to be an unemployed, but now I’m a job seeker.’
‘Oh, you mean a layabout.’
‘No, I don’t.’
‘Well, stand back and don’t get in the way. This pneumatic drill is a fearsome beast. Mind you, it’s a joy to use. It drills in the key of E.’
‘Surely it’s A minor,’ said the official-looking gent.
‘No, E,’ said the bloke. ‘Like in the blues. The blues are always in E.’
‘The blues are always in A minor,’ said the official-looking gent. ‘I used to have a harmonica.’
‘It was a Hohner,’ said Jim.
‘How do you know that?’ asked the bloke.
‘Just a lucky guess.’
‘Well, the blues are always in E, take it from me.’ The bloke returned to his drilling.
A lady in a straw hat peered into the hole and nodded her head to the rhythm of the drill. ‘That’s C, that is,’ she shouted above the racket.
‘E,’ shouted the bloke, without letting up.
‘A minor,’ shouted the official-looking gent.
‘A minor,’ Jim agreed.
‘C!’ shouted the lady. ‘My husband used to play with Jelly Roll Morton, and he invented the blues.’
The bloke switched off his pneumatic drill. ‘Jelly Roll Morton did not invent the blues,’ he said. ‘Blind Lemon Jefferson invented the blues.’
‘He never did,’ said the lady.
‘Nobody did,’ said the official-looking gent. ‘The blues go back hundreds of years to the time of slave-trading.’
‘No they don’t,’ said a young fellow with a beard who’d stopped to take a look at the hole. ‘The blues are a form of folk music which originated amongst Black Americans at the beginning of the twentieth century.’
‘With Jelly Roll Morton,’ said the lady.
‘Blind Lemon Jefferson,’ said the bloke.
‘There is no specific musician accredited with beginning the blues,’ said the bearded fellow. ‘But the form is specific, usually employing a basic twelve-bar chorus, the tonic, subdominant and dominant chords, frequent minor intervals and blue notes.’
‘Wh
at are blue notes?’ Jim asked.
‘A flattened third or seventh.’
‘But always in A minor.’
‘In any key you like.’
‘Are you a job seeker too?’ asked the bloke in the hole.
‘No, I’m a medical student,’ said the bearded fellow.
‘Another layabout.’
‘Would you mind if we just got back to the drilling?’ asked the official-looking gent, consulting a wrist that did not have a watch on it. ‘The day is drawing on.’
‘Yeah, dig your hole,’ said Jim.
‘Listen, mate,’ said the bloke. ‘Just because I dig holes for a living doesn’t mean I’m stupid.’
‘I thought you said it did,’ said the official-looker.
‘I was being ironic. All right?’
‘Socrates invented irony,’ said the lady in the straw hat.
‘Like Hell he did,’ said the bloke.
‘No, she’s right,’ said the beardie. ‘As a means of exposing inconsistencies in a person’s opinions by close questioning and the admission of one’s own ignorance. It’s called Socratic irony.’
‘How would you like a pneumatic drill up your fudge tunnel, sunshine?’ asked the bloke.
‘Come now, gentlemen,’ said the official-looking one. ‘We all have our work to do.’
‘He doesn’t,’ said the bloke, pointing at Pooley. ‘Blokes like him are just a drain on the country’s resources.’
‘I resent that,’ said Jim, who did.
‘Punch his lights out,’ said the lady in the straw hat.
‘Do me a favour,’ said the bloke. ‘Look at the state of him. He’s got two black eyes already. Git!’
‘Come on now,’ said he of the official looks. ‘There’s work to do.’
‘You keep out of this,’ shouted the bloke. ‘Ruddy jumped-up little Hitler.’
‘I resent that.’
‘Oh yeah, do you want to make something of it?’
‘Excuse me,’ said the bloke’s mate, who had been quietly digging away with a spade throughout all this. ‘But I think I’ve found something here. It looks like a treasure chest.’
‘Let me take a look at that,’ said he of looks official.
‘No chance!’ said the bloke. ‘If my mate’s found something, then we’re keeping it.’
‘If I’ve found something, I’m keeping it,’ said the mate.
‘It could be an unexploded bomb,’ said Jim, in a voice that sounded unrehearsed.
‘Cobblers!’ said the bloke and the mate of the bloke.
‘It could be,’ said the lady in the straw hat. ‘They used to drop all these booby traps in the war. Disguised as tins of Spam and packets of cigarettes and electric vibrators and––’
‘We’d better cordon off the area,’ said the OLG. ‘You two chaps out of the hole and away to a safe distance. I will take charge of the bomb.’
‘Good idea,’ said Jim. ‘Come on, everyone, back, back.’
‘Did someone say “bomb”?’ asked Old Pete, who had been passing by.
‘Move along please, sir.’
‘Why are you wearing that false moustache and bowler hat, Omally?’
‘What’s all this about a false moustache?’ asked the bloke in the hole, climbing out of it.
‘Just a deluded old gentleman,’ said John Omally. ‘Come on now, all of you, clear the area.’
‘What’s your game?’ shouted the bloke, taking a swipe at Omally and tearing off his false moustache.
‘Oooooh!’ said the lady in the straw hat. ‘It’s the weirdo from the park who makes road drill noises in A minor while his mate here goes to sleep.’
‘His mate here?’ The bloke turned upon Pooley.
‘I’ve never seen this official-looking gent before in my life,’ said Jim, crossing his heart and hoping not to die.
‘Who’s in charge here?’ said someone else, pushing through the nicely growing crowd.
‘I am,’ said John.
‘You ruddy aren’t,’ said the bloke.
‘Well, someone better be. What have you done to my bench?’
‘Your bench?’ said John.
‘I’m the chief librarian,’ said the chief librarian.
‘He is,’ said Jim.
‘Oh, it’s you, is it?’ said the chief librarian. ‘I should have known. You’re always dossing about here. I knew you were up to something.’
‘Ruddy layabout,’ said the bloke.
‘Right,’ said Jim, rolling up his sleeves. ‘That does it.’
‘Right,’ said the bloke, punching Jim on the nose. ‘It does.’
‘Stop all this,’ cried Omally, stepping forward to grab the bloke, but tripping over his mate who was climbing out of the hole.
‘Fight!’ shouted the lady in the straw hat, stamping on the chief librarian’s foot.
‘Sandra’s armpit!’ yelled the chief librarian, hopping about like a good ‘un.
And then the crowd gave a bit of a surge and the fists began to fly.
Omally got his hands on the treasure chest, but the mate, who wasn’t giving up without a struggle, head-butted him in the stomach, knocking him into the hole. The lady in the straw hat began to belabour all and sundry with her handbag. The young man with the beard, whose name was Paul and who knew not only about the blues and Socratic irony but also Dimac, brought down the bloke who was kicking Pooley with a devastating blow known as the Curl of the Dark Dragon’s Tail.
And as if on cue, for always it seems to be, the distinctive sound of a police car siren was to be heard above the thuds and bangs and howls of the growing melee.
Omally clawed his way up from the hole. ‘The mate’s getting away with the chest, Jim,’ he shouted.
Jim, now in the foetal position, responded with a dismal groan.
The police car swerved to a halt and three policemen leapt from it. One had a face to be reckoned with, another rejoiced in the name of Joe-Bob.
‘Let’s give those new electric batons a try,’ said the one with the face.
And things went mostly downhill after that.
13
‘No,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘No, no and again no.’ He gestured to the muddy casket on his desk. ‘Impossible! Ludicrous!’
‘I’m sure it’s the real deal,’ said Jim.
‘Oh, I’m quite sure it is. But I have been searching for the scrolls for years – decades – and you...you...’
‘Found them,’ said John. We’re quite proud of ourselves really.’
‘Ridiculous! Absurd!’ Professor Slocombe shook his head.
‘We thought you’d be pleased,’ said Jim.
‘Oh, I am. I am.’ The Professor peered at Pooley. ‘Why is your hair sticking straight up in the air like that?’
Jim made a very pained expression. ‘I was doubled on the ground and this policeman came up behind me with an electric truncheon and stuck it right up my––’
‘Quite!’ The Professor waved his hands in the air. ‘I don’t think we want to go into that.’
‘Exactly what I screamed at the policeman. But it didn’t stop him.’
The Professor fluttered his fingers. ‘Just sit down,’ he told Jim.
‘I’d rather not, if you don’t mind.’
Professor Slocombe sighed and fluttered further.
‘Go on,’ said John. ‘Open the box. You know you want to.’
‘Of course I want to.’ The Professor sat down at his desk. ‘But it’s all so...’
‘Impossible?’ said Jim.
‘Ludicrous?’ said John.
‘Those, yes. How did you find the scrolls?’
‘We’ve Jim to thank for that.’ John patted his companion on the shoulder. ‘Jim put himself into a mystical trance and travelled mentally back in time.’
‘There’s no need to be facetious,’ said Professor Slocombe.
‘I’m not. That’s exactly what Jim did.’
Professor Slocombe shook his head once more. ‘You two mus
t have done something good in a former lifetime,’ he said.
Two heads shook.
‘Quite the opposite,’ said Jim.
‘Well, you must tell me all about it.’
‘There was this monk,’ said Jim, ‘and he––’
‘At some other time.’ Professor Slocombe ran his fingers lightly over the casket. ‘Have you opened it already?’
‘Ah, no,’ said Omally. ‘You see, we couldn’t run and open at the same time.’
‘I don’t think I quite understand.’
‘There was a bit of bother,’ said Jim. ‘A minor fracas.’
‘Hence the policeman with––’ Professor Slocombe made the appropriate wrist movements.
‘Amongst other things. Two yobbos nipped off with the library bench, you see, and the chief librarian ran amok with a pneumatic drill.’
‘They had to restrain him in a straitjacket,’ said John.
‘But not before he’d destroyed the police car,’ said Jim.
‘Was that before or after he fractured the gas main?’ John asked.
‘After,’ said Jim. ‘Remember, you were being beaten up by the hole-bloke’s mate when you smelt the gas.’
‘So it wasn’t the chief librarian who set off the explosion?’
‘No, it was the policeman’s electric truncheon. We were both running away by then.’
‘Most people were running away by then.’
‘Well, they would, what with all those blokes abseiling down from the helicopters and everything.’
‘And the tear gas,’ said John. ‘And the horses.’
‘That hole-bloke’s mate gave you a right seeing to,’ said Jim.
‘Yes. I loved every minute of it.’
‘What?’ said Professor Slocombe.
‘The hole-bloke’s mate was an eighteen-year-old college girl on work experience,’ Jim explained.
‘She was fast, too,’ said John. ‘She outran the police dogs.’
‘But a marksman brought her down with a rubber bullet.’
‘I thought it was the fellow on the water cannon.’
‘Gentlemen,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘Gentlemen.’
‘Yes?’ said John and Jim.
‘Will you both shut up!’ The professor rang his little brass bell.
Presently Gammon arrived with a bottle of champagne and three glasses.