The duo hastened to his aid.
‘Get off me. Just give me that frigging newspaper.’ Fred snatched away the copy of the Brentford Mercury and began to pace up and down, reading as he paced. Words all beginning with the letter F spilled from his mouth but, what with the law of diminishing returns and everything, they will remain unrecorded.
‘No!’ cried Fred. ‘No! No! No!’
‘I’m afraid it’s yes,’ said one or other of his visitors.
‘If I say it’s no, then I damn well mean it.’ Fred tore the newspaper to shreds and flung the pieces all about. ‘We’ve worked too long and hard on this,’ Fred shouted. ‘How could it happen? Tell me how?’
‘One of Compton-Cummings’s books escaped the pulping. It fell into the hands of this Pooley chap and somehow he and another chap called Omally located the Brentford Scrolls.’
‘I wasn’t speaking to you.’
‘Sorry, Fred.’
‘Don’t you Fred me, you frigger. I want this sorted and I want it sorted now. Don’t you realize the gravity of this?’
‘Well, I do, sir, yes. But it might be helpful if you were just to run through it all one more time.’
‘To clear up any confusion that might exist, sir.’
‘Which one of you said that?’
‘I did, sir.’
‘Are you sure it wasn’t him?’
‘No, but I was thinking it, sir.’
‘Right,’ said Fred. ‘One more time and try to pay attention. First question. Where are we now, at this precise moment?’
‘In the Chamber of Ultimate Power, sir.’
‘Correct, not just any old Chamber of Power, you will notice. But the Chamber of Ultimate Power. And who am I?’
‘You are our worst nightmare, sir.’
‘Correct again. And why am I this?’
‘Because you are a jumped-up, talentless un-charismatic little nobody who, driven by ruthless ambition, has managed to claw his way to the top of the tree and now occupies the position of absolute control, literally holding our very lives in the palm of his grubby unwashed hand, sir.’
‘Correct once again. And how did I achieve this?’
‘Popular opinion would sway towards the belief that you sold your soul to Satan, sir.’
‘And popular opinion would, upon this rare occasion, be right on target there, wouldn’t it?’
‘It certainly would, sir, yes.’
‘And so, bearing all this in mind, what exactly do you think I would be up to now?’
‘You would be furthering the hideously evil schemes of your unspeakable master, sir.’
‘Which are?’
‘Too numerous to mention, sir.’
‘Yes, well, I do try to keep myself busy. But within the parameters of the present discussion, would you care to clarify my position?’
‘You represent, indeed embody, the nexus of power behind the millennial celebrations. It is your job to see that these do not take place on the correct day of the correct year, as he of the cloven hoof would be dead miffed to have peace and love breaking out all over the world.’
‘Wouldn’t he just! Go on.’
‘And so you, and others before you, have striven to see that the Brentford Scrolls are not recovered and the Days of God are not used to ensure that––’
‘Yes, well, that’s pretty much all of it. But somebody has fouled up, haven’t they?’
‘I think we’re all agreed on that,’ said the form-fetcher, or it might have been the other one, it didn’t really matter.
‘So,’ said Fred. ‘What are you going to do about it?’
‘He means you,’ said the form-fetcher.
‘He doesn’t,’ said the other one. ‘It’s you he means.’
‘Oh well. If it’s me,’ said the form-fetcher, ‘I think I’ll just panic and run around like a headless chicken, if that’s all right by you.’
‘It’s fine by me,’ said Fred. ‘So what are you going to do about it?’
‘Me?’
‘You.’
‘Could I just run about like that too?’
Fred shook his head.
‘Then I suppose that I must put certain wheels into motion.’
‘I like the sound of that. Would you care to be a little more specific?’
‘Not really.’
‘Then I shall tell you both exactly what you are going to do.’ Fred took up a fire-iron from the fender and struck the chap who was running around like a headless chicken a blistering blow to the skull. ‘Firstly I want Brentford sealed off from the outside world. I do not want the media getting in and I do not want the scrolls to get out. What I do want is a professional team in position, to buy off whoever can be bought off and dispose of anyone who can’t. Who has the scrolls now?’
‘ A chap named Professor Slocombe, sir.’
Fred drew a finger across his throat. ‘He gets this,’ he said. ‘As for the rest of them, use your discretion.’
‘I don’t have any discretion,’ said the fellow with the dented head. ‘In fact, I’m a God-damn crazy ape-shit one-man killing machine when I get going.’
‘Fine. I’ll put you in charge of the disposing side of it, then.’
‘Thanks a lot, sir.’
‘Call me Fred.’
‘Cheers, Fred.’
‘But listen now and hear me well. I want this thing done quickly. Quickly and quietly and efficiently.’ Fred stood with his back to the fireplace and rose upon his down-at-heels. And Fred began to tremble. A terrified look appeared on his face and it stayed. A tortured look it was, as of one tormented from within. Muscles twitched and spasmed. Eyes bulged from their sockets. Sweat broke from the pores. ‘I want those scrolls,’ cried Fred in a voice no longer his. ‘I want them here to rip them and to burn.’ The voice was a growl, an atavistic growl, a real bowel-loosening bed-wetter of an atavistic growl. And the lips of Fred turned blue and the tongue of him grew black. And that tongue darted from the mouth and curled all around and about. ‘Bring the scrolls to me, and bring me more. Bring me the heads of Pooley and Omally.’
The anonymous two were prostrate now, their faces pressed against the cold marble floor. And the floor trembled and shook to the sound of that hideous voice.
That terrible voice. That eldritch voice.
That voice of the Evil One himself.
‘This world is mine!’ The voice boomed and echoed. ‘Mine for another thousand years and I will not be denied it. Nothing and no one will stand in my way. Nothing and no one, do you understand?’
‘Oh, we do. We do.’ And cowering and trembling, the minions of Fred crawled to the mighty door, clawed it open, pushed on through, flung it shut and ran.
Ran and ran along that Corridor of Power. And the voice came after them, rushing like a great and fiery wind. Ripping at the curtains and tearing at the gilt-framed canvases.
And the two men ran before it. Ran and ran.
‘Nothing and no one.’ Howl and shriek and scream.
And howl and shriek and scream.
In another chamber of some power, in Brentford, something small and pink and soft and shiny howled and shrieked and screamed.
And Dr Steven Malone wrapped it in a towel and held it to his chest. ‘Just two alive,’ said he, ‘but two will do nicely for my purposes. And nothing and no one will stand in my way.’ And Dr Steven laughed aloud.
And howl and shriek and scream.
15
Howl and shriek and scream.
‘Will you please turn off that appalling racket?’ asked Professor Slocombe.
Brentford’s mayor, the worshipful Puerto Rican Don Juan Lopez Carlos de Casteneda, switched off his ghetto-blaster. ‘That is not a racket,’ he said. ‘That is my favourite band, the Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of Death.’
‘And highly derivative they are too,’ said the Professor. ‘I detect the influence of both Slayer and Deicide.’
‘Huh,’ said the mayor, chewing on a small cheroot.
They sat at the big table in the council chamber of Brentford Town Hall. Curtains of sunlight wavered from upper windows. Rich oak panelling shone with a mellow patina, smoke hung in the air.
John and Jim were there, with several members of the council, hastily gathered, the secretary of the late Mr Compton-Cummings and Scoop Molloy with his notebook.
‘This is all so much dog-donuts,’ said the mayor, cuffing his copy of the Brentford Mercury. ‘I am woken from the arms of my lover by a march-past. Peons on the streets are hanging balloons from the lamp posts. Someone has passed word around that I have declared today a public holiday.’
John Omally, up since dawn and busy with it, rolled himself a cigarette.
‘Yesterday riots and today we have dancing in the streets.’ The mayor threw up his hands and made excitable gesturings. ‘It is all too much.’
‘My dear Don Juan,’ said Professor Slocombe, ‘I will agree that events have proceeded with some alacrity. More alacrity, in fact, than I might have wished for.’ He waggled the fingers of his gloved hand beneath the table and John Omally’s roll-up fell to pieces. ‘But we are gathered here to discuss what may be done and how it may be done.’
‘Such as this?’ The mayor snatched up a piece of foolscap and took to the cuffing of it. ‘Proposal to construct the Hanging Gardens of Brentford on the site of the allotments, to be called the John Omally Millennial Tower.’
Professor Slocombe curled his lip. John grinned painfully.
‘Beauty Pageants and Beer Festivals, a rock concert in the football ground, who the hell are Devo anyway?’
‘Please remain calm.’ Professor Slocombe raised a calming hand.
‘And I tell you this.’ The mayor screwed up the foolscap and flung it aside. ‘These scrolls that make all this possible. That make these two gringos here’, he shook a fist at John and Jim, ‘think that they can run all this. These scrolls were dug up on council property. I should take these scrolls.’
‘The scrolls were located by Mr Pooley. Under the Finders Keepers law––’
‘And what is that?’
‘It’s a tradition, or an old charter, or something. But under it, the scrolls belong to Mr Pooley.’
‘He didn’t find them. A young woman dug them up.’
‘Under his instruction.’
‘On council property. And who will pay for a new library bench?’
‘That will be included in the budget for the new library,’ said John. ‘The John Omally Mil––’
‘Shut your mouth, home boy!’
‘Make a note of that, Jim,’ said John. ‘Dock the mayor a week’s pay.’
‘What?
‘Gentlemen,’ said the Professor. ‘Nothing is ever achieved through acrimony. We must act as one or we will not succeed.’
‘I’ll dock him two weeks,’ said Jim. ‘Just to be on the safe side.’
‘You think to make fun of me, huh?’ The mayor smote his chest. ‘You think I am some stinking wet-back?’
‘Surely that’s a somewhat racist remark,’ said Scoop Molloy, writing it down.
‘Your mother!’ said the mayor, thumbing his teeth.
‘Gentlemen, please.’
‘I tell you this,’ said the mayor, all pointing fingers now. ‘No one will swallow this dog-dumplings. Who will swallow it, huh? The real Millennium Committee? The Prime Minister? The Queen? The world? Who?’
‘I will swallow it.’
Faces turned towards the new speaker.
‘And who the hell are you?’ asked the mayor.
‘Celia Penn. I was secretary to the late Mr Compton-Cummings.’
‘And you will swallow, will you?’
‘I will swallow with pleasure.’
Here we go again, thought Jim. Carry on up the Council Chamber.
‘Call out the mariachi bands,’ said the mayor. ‘The day is saved.’
‘If you will just let me speak.’
‘Speak on, lady. Be my guest.’
‘Thank you. I represent certain interested parties who are determined that the millennial celebrations go ahead on the correct day of the correct year. The Professor knows what I am talking about.’
‘I do, but how––’
‘SUCK,’ said Celia Penn.
‘Oh dear,’ went Jim Pooley.
‘SUCK,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘The Secret Unification for the Coming King, an occult organization dating back to before the Knights Templar. Keepers of the Great Mystery.’
‘Protectors of the Brentford Scrolls,’ said Celia Penn. ‘It was I who encoded the location of the scrolls into Mr Compton-Cummings’s book. And I who sent the last remaining copy to Mr Pooley. I knew I had the right man.’
‘Eh?’ went Jim. ‘But I never––’
‘Aha!’ went the mayor. ‘Oh yeah, I get this. Another one looking for a handout. What do you want, lady? A new car, is it? Well you can SUCK my––’
Click went the Professor’s fingers.
Lock went the jaw of the mayor.
And KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK came a knocking at the council chamber door. And duck for cover went John and Jim.
‘Come out,’ called the Professor. ‘It’s only the tea trolley.’
The door opened and in came the woman with the tea trolley. She was wearing a straw hat and she trundled over to the mayor. ‘Coffee, your holiness?’ she asked.
‘Grmmph mmph,’ went the mayor, clutching his jaw.
‘Only what you see on the trolley, I’m afraid.’
‘Excuse me,’ said a councillor with a mean and hungry look. ‘But as the mayor seems to be experiencing some difficulty in speaking, perhaps I might take the chair.’
‘Certainly,’ said Professor Slocombe. The councillor got to his feet, took the chair and left the chamber.
‘The old ones are always the best,’ said Jim. ‘Although this hardly seems the time.’
‘Excuse me,’ said a councillor who was old and rough and dirty and tough. ‘But as the mayor is incapacitated and Councillor Cassius has gone off with the chair, perhaps I might put in my threepenny-worth.’
‘Certainly,’ said the Professor.
And the councillor placed three pennies on the table. ‘Where do you think this is leading?’ Jim asked.
‘Excuse me,’ said a third councillor, this one cool as a mountain stream, yet as corny as Kansas in August. ‘But as the mayor is incapacitated, Councillor Cassius has gone off with the chair and Councillor Starguard of the Galactic Brotherhood has put in his threepenny-worth, perhaps I might just ask a question.’
‘Go ahead,’ said Professor Slocombe.
‘Why does a brown cow give white milk when it only eats green grass?’
‘Is it just me?’ asked Jim. ‘Or have things taken a distinct turn for the weird?’
‘Would you like an octopus in your tea?’ the lady in the straw hat asked Omally. ‘I’ve a camel outside that will go four days if you brick it.’
‘Cover your faces,’ cried Professor Slocombe.
‘Don’t you start,’ cried Jim.
‘Cover your faces quickly and make a run for the door.’
‘My husband once made a run for the chickens,’ said the lady in the straw hat. ‘But then he was a Jesuit.’
‘Talking of eggs,’ said Celia Penn. ‘There was this sausage and this egg in a frying pan. And the sausage said–– “My, it’s hot in here” and the egg said “Eeeek! A talking sausage.” ’
Celia Penn began to laugh and the lady in the straw hat began to laugh and Scoop Molloy began to laugh and Councillor Starguard began to laugh. And then they all began to cry and to shout and to hit one another.
‘Mmph grmmph,’ went the mayor.
‘Out,’ cried the Professor. ‘John, Jim, out, quickly.’
‘What is going on?’ asked John. ‘And who brought that horse in here?’
‘Jim, help Ms Penn and hurry.’ Professor Slocombe tugged at Pooley.
‘I love you, Suzy,’ said Jim. ‘Let me show you
the trick with the ice cubes.’
‘Hurry, Jim.’ Professor Slocombe tugged again at Pooley and Pooley tugged at Celia Penn.
‘Fly with me to my plantation,’ he crooned. ‘There may be snow on the roof but there’s a beaver in the basement.’
‘Hurry, Jim. Come on, John.’
‘Everybody conga,’ said Omally, kicking up his legs.
And pushing and shoving in a bumbling line, Jim followed John, Ms Penn followed Jim and the Professor followed all of them and thrust them through the door.
Along a corridor which had no power at all, and out into the car park.
‘Sit down, stay still and take deep breaths.’ Professor Slocombe forced them to the tarmac, where they sat giggling foolishly.
Binding, the scrofulous attendant, issued from his sentry box. ‘They can’t sit there,’ he complained. ‘They don’t have official permits.’
‘Bring water quickly,’ commanded the Professor.
‘I can’t go giving out water to any old Tom, Dick and Hari Krishna, it’s more than my job’s worth.’ Professor Slocombe fixed the car park attendant with a certain stare. ‘I’ll bring three cups,’ said Binding, hurrying off at the double. ‘And a glass for your good self.’
Jim Pooley was struggling to his feet. ‘I will fight for the woman I love,’ he shouted. ‘Bring on your best guitarist.’
Professor Slocombe looked both ways, then felled Jim with a nifty uppercut. ‘I’m sorry about that,’ he said. ‘But you’ll thank me for it later.’
‘Thank you,’ said Jim, somewhat later. ‘But what exactly happened?’
‘Someone drugged us, didn’t they?’ Omally held his head.
Professor Slocombe nodded his. ‘I had Binding drive us here in the mayor’s low-rider. A charming fellow, Binding, when you get to know him.’
Pooley sat once more in the Professor’s fireside chair. Celia Penn lay unconscious upon the chaise longue. ‘Is she going to be all right?’ Jim asked.
‘She’ll be better sleeping it off.’ Professor Slocombe placed a hand upon the young woman’s forehead. ‘She’s running a bit of a temperature. I’ll have Gammon fetch an ice-pack.’ He returned to his desk and rang his little bell.
‘Who did this to us?’ Jim rubbed his face. ‘And who punched me? My chin’s bruised too now.’