Bruce Dickinson - The Adventures of Lord Iffy Boatrace

Bruce Dickinson The adventures of Lord Iffy Boatrace Acknowledgments This book was written in various hotel rooms across Europe during 1987. It was finished in Tokyo in May of that year. To all those hotel proprietors who kindly supplied reams of hotel stationery to the peculiar long-haired man at four in the morning, thank you. To Paddy, who thought it was funny and stayed for the sequel, thank you. Robert Smith thought it was okay and that’s why you are reading this. . . Merck, whose second name is too long to spell, did the dastardly deal . . . Rod and Andy looked on in bemusement (as usual). . . Shaun Hutson’s chest exploded in a geyser of blood and intestines . . . Steve Harris threatened torture is it wasn’t published . . . To all of the above, and to all who suffered an ear bending in the creation of this book, a very big thank you

The Characters Locals Lord Iffy Boatrace, Laird of Findidnann Educated ineffectually at Thigwell Boarding School, his early life resulted in the Laird being somewhat tainted physically. Although now around thirty-five years old, his childhood fetish for stockings and stiletto heels has persisted and, at the time of writing, he is still a virgin. The Butler A tall distinguished-looking male of around forty years old. Balding significantly from the front of his hairline; has some relative unusual hobbies and personal pursuits. Wing Commander Bill Symes-Groat (Retired) Sixty-year-old RAF officer living as Iffy’s closest neighbour. A penchant for young male recruits resulted in his dismissal from the service. Awaiting his recall eagerly.

The Secret Army An acquaintance of Symes-Groat, loaned to Lord Iffy under false pretences. By definition, his appearance is secret. Jock Mc.Vitie Barcelona The grumpy innkeeper, station master, telephone supervisor and petrol station owner of the local village.

Guests Roderick Morte D'Arthur Tennison and his wife, Margot Smith Roderick is a large, bumbling, blue-blooded upper-class twit. His wife (who refused to change her name with they married) is short, fat, feminist and dangerous. They have two children. Brian and Laetitia Taylor An alcoholic Scottich editor and his American consort, the octopoid, well-endowed Mrs. Laetitia P. Taylor, childless. Mark and Cynthia West The perfect couple, or so it seems. They are good-looking, young and well-off. Have not been married long enough to have children. As it happens, that is the last thing on their mind.

PART ONE

The Problem

1 Building the Perfect Beast ґPhaw! Lord Iffy Boatrace snorted in disgust as he slapped the paper down on the oakcovered sidetable, sending up a cloud of dust. ‘Not even any bloody money in fruit any more.’ One monocled eyeball raged over the headline: ‘Three thousand people eat one strawberry.’ Bah!’ he exclaimed and stood up from his faded, high backed Victorian chair. The grandfather clock against the oak-panelled wall ticked soporifically around to four o’clock and the double doors swung open as the Butler arrived with a tea trolley. ‘Your tea, sir’, said the Butler. ‘May I ask if your Lordship will require hot water this evening?’ ‘Yes, I shall, Butler, of course I shall, ‘Lord iffy retorted. ‘Ahem.’ Butler cleared his throat and stretched out his upturned palm. ‘Oh, very well then, very well,’ railed Iffy irritably, digging deep into his tailcoat pocket and producing a fifty pence piece. ‘Will this do? ‘That will do nicely, sir’, affirmed Butler, his hand closing over the meter money and dropping it gently into his waistcoat pocket.

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Money, money, money,’ groaned Iffy. ‘We haven’t bloody got any, can’t afford hot water, can’t afford a mistress, can’t even afford to buy a really nice pair of crocodile stilettos for meself. How many cars do I have left?ґ. ‘Six, sir.’ ‘Six? Is that all? I’m sure I had seven.’ ‘No, sir, you conjugated with an earthmover two weeks ago; now you have six.’ ‘Oh,’ mumbled Iffy absent-mindedly. ‘Earthmover. So that’s what it was. My god, only six left. ‘He paused. ‘I must sell one, Butler. Drive the white one into town tonight and sell it.’. ‘Why impossible?’. ‘Because we don’t have any petrol and can’t afford to buy any, sir.’ Iffy slumped back down in his chair; the Laird of Findidnann estate in the remote Highlands of Scotland was stumped. No money, no income. He stared down at his scuffed patent-leather stiletto-heeled shoes and wriggled their pointed toes. ‘What’s to be done, Butler?’ he groaned. ‘Ahem.’ Butler cleared his throat again. ‘I have been studying Japanese and oriental solutions to this problem, sir, and may have stumbled upon something.’ ‘Huh,’ interrupted Iffy. ‘Japs, orientals, not likely. The Duke of Edinburgh was right, we’d all

end up yellow with slanty eyes. No, I’m not prepared to turn Findidnann estate into a Celtic bloody bath-house. We won the damn war and that’s it. God save the King, Butler.’ Iffy sank even deeper into his chair and began furiously polishing his monocle. ‘I would rather be poor, Butler, than sacrifice myself to the rising yen.’ He continued polishing intently. Butler took a deep breath. ‘Sir, I....I... I... I have an IDEA, ‘he finally announced. Iffy screwed his monocle back into his eye and regarded Butler suspiciously. ‘You,’ he said whispering incredulously. ‘have and idea?’. His eyes flicked uncertainly from side to side, then his lips 2 Flashed a predatory smile. ‘Well, let’s hear it then, old boy.’ he boomed. ‘Sir, robotics, er, automation, the improvement of certain natural functions by the use of technology to . . .’ ‘Yes, yes,,’ dismissed iffy loudly, leaping to his feet again. ‘All very well to speculate, -but what will we automate?’ He sprang on to the dining-room table in a single bound, scraping the varnish with his high heels. ‘What?’ he roared, flailing his arms like a dervish. ‘What?’ he intoned in a hoarse whisper, as his eyes met the portrait of his dead uncle on the wall. Butler continued. ‘I myself have almost completed a project which I’m sure your Lordship. . .’ ‘Time enough for projects,’ screamed Iffy and stood up dramatically. ‘Your time is not yet come but perhaps. . . ‘ His eyes caught the stuffed trophies adorning the walls and ceilings; pheasants, badgers, stoats, lions, tigers, geese, ferrets, moose, bears, snakes, fish. His gazed continued: eagles, doves, armadillos, hamsters, gerbils, horses, dogs, the twenty-third Laird of Findidnann - also stufed. This was it, thought Iffy. ‘Sir, my little invention is beautifully compact and it wouldn’t. . .’ ‘Brilliant, Butler, brilliant idea,’ raged Iffy. He leapt off the table and hurtled towards his sixfoot-long brass astonomical telescope which pointed out across the moors. He thrust his eye eagerly up to it and ranged it around the horizon. ‘Hunting, Butler, shooting, fishing all year round, inexhaustible, indestructible, electronic . . . Unbelievable.’ ‘Totally inedible though, sir.’ ‘Piffle, man, piffle,’ exploded Iffy in reply. ‘A minor detail. Did Columbus stop investigating the globe because he couldn’t eat it? Did the flavour of the apple that hit Newton on the head affect his theory of gravity, eh? Iffy grabbed Butler enthusiastically by the shoulders and shook him warmly. ‘Well?’ he shrieked. ‘Of course it didn’t.’ ‘But, sir,’ whined Butler, ‘my idea . . . ‘ 3 ‘Your idea.’ Iffy smashed his hand on to the tea trolley in rage. ‘Your idea,’ he said mockingly, ‘but my genius. I, the twenty-fifth Laird of Findidnann, Lord Iffy Boatrace, will go down in history as the man who . . .’ He broke off. ‘What’s the date today?’. ‘The twenty-third sir.’ ‘Perfect,’ he hissed, ripping open a desk drawer and flinging the contents around the room. ‘Aha!’ he exclaimed, as he pulled out the British Field Sports Yearbook, feverishly turning to the month of September. ‘Here, look, the twenty-third, and here.’ He turned the page to the next month ‘THE GLORIOUS TWELFTH.’ He slammed the book shut triumphantly. ‘Do you realice what this means? I, Iffy Boatrace, will institute the most outrageous sporting coup in history. Grouse shooting all year round. This place will be overrun with people. All

absolutely dripping with boodle an I can cop the lot. We must experiment immediately. The Glorious Third, there’s a starting date for you. A couple of weeks. Invite every-one’, he roared. ‘Sir?’ interrupted Butler. ‘Sir?’ ‘Oh, what is it now?’ ‘You don’t have any grouse.’ ‘Then, I shall build them,’ declared Iffy in triumph. ‘Now,’ he continued. ‘Invites. I wnat half-a-dozen pillocks who can’t shoot straight. Who do we know? ‘We don’t have any friends any more, sir, we owe them all money.’ ‘We’ll use the old Thigwellonians book then, old school tie and all that. Play pin the tail on the donkey or play darts with it and dig out six names. Say that it’s an official Thigwellonian reunion or something. Only a real twit would go to one of those. Whatever you do, don’t mention grouse shooting till they’re up here. I don’t want anyone else getting wind of this one.’ ‘Sir, I really do feel that you’re getting a little carried away here. I don’t wish to carp on but my little invention is waiting below stairs for you to try out and . . .’ 4 ENOUGH!’ shouted Lord Iffy. ‘I pay you as a Butler, not a bloody Heath Robinson inventor. Now sod off and run my bath. Butler stiffened and sniffed the air noisily. He had not been paid for four months, but the alternative was a spell in Wormwood Scrubs. ‘Will that be al, sir?’ he enquired archly. ‘Yes, yes, go away.’ Iffy was staring at his library shelves. He was deep in thought. Books on astronomy, the occult, military matters, philosophy, religion and the like filled the upper shelves: pornography, stiletto shoe catalogues and Burke’s Peerage lined the lower shelves. Nothing, he mused, that would help him build a flock of high-speed, realistic, obedient mechanical grouse. He looked up at the portrait of his uncle, the man he had admired so much, and returned his cracked gaze. ‘Where can I find a man to create such a thing?’ he murmured. Realization of possibility dawned in his eyes. He lent forward and reached for a book of semaphore signal codes.

2 The Secret Agent

Iffy trudged up the gravelled path towards the turreted gothic nightmare which was the residence of his next-door neighbour, Wing Commander Bill Symes-Groat. The Lord of Findidnann was not accustomed to such an indignity as a walk across three miles of sodden moorland, and was totally unprepared for the ruggedness of the terrain. As a result, his best pair of Italian blue leather stilettos had snapped their heels and this, coupled with the appallingly early hour of seven-thirty in the morning, had left him most distressed upon arrival. He reached the front gate.

‘Halt, who goes there?’ squeaked an unidentified and invisible child-like voice. ‘I’m Lord Iffy Boatrace and I’ve come to see the Wing Commander. Would you tell him I’m here?’ ‘Advance and give the countersign’, squeaked the voice again, higher in pitch this time and mysteriously emanating from a clump of ivy by the side of the huge oak, iron-studded front door. ‘Just tell the Wing Co. I’m here,’ groaned Iffy, wobbling

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on his fractured shoe heels. ‘In fact, bugger it. I’ll tell him myself.’ He strode towards the front door. The first shotgun-blast shattered a garden gnome. Iffy let out a fearful shriek. ‘You silly senile old sod,’ he screamed, as he ran for cover behind the garden wall. The second barrel ripped both coat-tails off his jacket as he dived headfirst over the lower garden wall, leaving his stilettos stuck vertically, point first in the gravel. There was a loud splash as he hit the ornamental moat which lay beyond. ‘Cease fire!’ bellowed a voice, rather more grown up. ‘Sorry about that, old chap. You can come out now, it’s quite safe.’ Iffy cautiously peered back over the garden wall. There, by the front door, stood Wing Commander Groat, patting a small child, who was clad in lederhosen an a cub scout top, and clutching an enormous double-barrelled shotgun. ‘Run along now, Rommel,’ roared the Wing. Co. ‘Go and play with Goebbels. Goering can serve the tea.’The child scuttled of round the back of the house. Iffy spat some foul green water out of his mouth and stood up. He was soaked to the skin with water, mud and green slime. He looked down. His best fishnet stockings had been ruined, and sludge encrusted his toenails. His monocle, however, remained firmly in place. ‘What the fucking hell is going on?‘ he cried. ‘Security, old man, can’t be too careful, what? Sorry about the pancake in the briny, still at war, eh? Come on in, brekky’s ready.’ And with that, he went back inside. ‘So,’ said the Colonel pouring tea in the wooden-beamed and galleried dining room. ‘I got your message by semaphore last night. Still don’t know why your uncle never got a phone. . .’ He didn’t like the GPO,’ muttered Iffy, who was covered in a blanket from head to foot and shivering. ‘They refused to accept telegrams by homing pigeon, so it’s a condition of his will; no telephones at Findidnann Hall.’

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‘Bit inconvenient,’ muttered the Colonel, ‘Still’, he leaned over and put the teapot down, ‘more secure’ he hissed.

‘Anyway, about this caper, you said something about Japs.’He clutched Iffy’s leg violently. ‘Don’t like ‘em, never have.’ ‘I believe I mentioned the oriental solution which was suggest by my colleague,’ remarked iffy slyly. ‘Who do you work for?’ demand the Colonel suddenly. ‘I really can’t say’, returned Iffy, removing his monocle dramatically. ‘Hush hush, eh? Mused the Wing Co. ‘Sworn to secrecy,’ said Iffy firmly. ‘Must be damned important for them to call on me, damned important. Twenty years I’ve waited for this crisis. I knew they’d call me back.’ He turned misty-eyed to the leaded glass windows.’Need a boffin?’ he demanded suddenly. ‘Three Para, RSM, SAS, VCMO, etc., etc.’ Iffy replaced his monocle and beamed, in spite of his frozen bones. ‘Yes,’ he said quietly, ‘that was the request.’ ‘You really can’t tell me what it is?’ pleaded the Wing Co. Eagerly. ‘You know the rules we operate by,’ declared Iffy sternly, warming to the deceptino, if not to his wet clothes. ‘Need-to-know principle.’ ‘Jolly good, jolly good. Walls have ears, eh?’ The Wing Co. sat down again and thrust a piece of army ration cake at him on Luftwaffe china. Iffy peered at the offering and wrinkled his nose. ‘No thanks.’ ‘Goering,’ bellowed Groat. ‘Come and take these plates away, please my angel.’ A surplice-clad choirboy appeared and glided around the table, collecting the breakfast dishes. ‘There’s a good chap, Goering. You can leave the silver stuff until later.’ He indicated the enormous roast beef tray and silver cover that was the centrepiece of the table. ‘Might 8

Drop it you know,’ he said to Iffy. ‘And then I’d have to thrash him.’ He trembled slightly, his eyes misting over. ‘All local boys, you kmnow, from the village. Damn good for them of course, bit of discipline, cold showers, pilow fights . . . A good thrashing when they deserve it; and they’re pretty damn deserving I can tell you.’ He chortled and seemed to come back to reality. ‘Course, some of ‘em can’t take it. Had a couple of boys burst on me last week, sent’em back, but . . .’ He driftled off again. ‘New ones come all the time for their old Uncle. . .’ He licked his lips’ . . . Groaty.’ He bared his fangs ‘Woaty.’ Goering made a rapid exit. Iffy was quite horrified at the idea of this lecherous old man buggering his way through the local adolescent population, but, being an English aristocrat and therefore a pervert himself, he decided to take a more pragmatic approach. ‘Where is this boffin then?’ he demanded. ‘And when can he start?’ ‘He’s here, and he starts now,’ declared the Wing Co. Proudly. ‘In fact, he’s been here all the time we’ve been talking.’ Iffy looked up in alarm. The galleried landings were covered in swords, firearms and model aeroplanes. The man might be a maniac. ‘Where is he?’ he asked urgently. ‘REVEAL YOURSELF!’ roared Groaty Woaty as he ripped the lid off the roast beef carving tray to reveal a huge plum pudding with a cherry on top. The plum pudding spoke.

‘Morning, Wing Commander,’ it said in a gruff Aldershot monotone. Iffy was speechless. ‘Morning, Wing Commander,’ it said in a gruff Aldershot monotone. Iffy was speechless. ‘Well, old man, there he is. SAS, Borneo, Malaya, Northern Ireland, Oman; explosives, guns, knives, cheese wire, poison. You name it, he’ll kill it. A master of disguise and concealment, the very soul of discretion.’ Iffy recovered some of his composure and looked into the two large plums which he assumed were eyes. ‘Can you build me a flock of grouse?’ he asked intently

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‘Of course I can,’ replied the plum pudding, deadpan. ‘Nuclear tipped; air-to-air grouse; poison gas, early warning grouse. Whatever you want.’ ‘On a grouse?’ exclaimed an astonished Iffy. The plum pudding swivelled in its base of brandy liqueur and turned toward the Wing Commander. ‘Who is this idiot?’ ‘Shhh, hissed the Wing Commander. ‘Hush hush. Can’t say, need to know, know what I mean?’ ‘For your information, Lord Boatrace,’ the pudding lectured, ‘the grouse is one of the special forces’ most fearsome weapons. When you’ve been in Her Majesty’s service as long as I have, you’ll realize the value.of a good tactical flock of grouse.’ Iffy was beggining to glow with triumph. ‘Yes, yes,’ he interrupted. ‘That is, of course, common knowledge, but what these grouse have to do is not get shot down. Can you manage it?’ ‘Nobody shoots down my grouse without answering to me first,’ declared the pudding. ‘Perfect, you’re hired. I want those grouse without answering to me first,’ declared the pudding. ‘Perfect, you’re hired. I want those grouse flying on the third of October at two p.m. out on the moor. Well done, Wing Commander.’ He shook the crusty old pervert’s hand warmly. ‘You’ve saved my bacon.’ ‘Am I dismissed now then, sir?’ said the pudding. ‘Yes, you are,’ said Wing Commander Symes-Groat. ‘From now on you’re on your own. Stay out of sight and only contact myself of Iffy in an emergency - got it?’ ‘Understood, sir. One more thing, sir. I suggest you destroy all evidence of this meeting.’ ‘Damn good idea,’ replied the Wing Commander. ‘What evidence?’ enquired a suspicious Iffy. ‘Might I suggest that you flambй me with brandy and cream?’

3 Butler’s Invention Iffy sat in his study, with his feet in the steaming hot salt water of a zinc tub. He was covered in towels as he sat before his telescope studying the night sky, wrinkling up his nose from time to time in intense concentration.

Butler arrived noiselessly through the double doors. ‘I have sent out invitations to three couples, sir,’ ‘Do you suppose they shoot grouse?’ asked Iffy, still peering up the lens. The Old Boys book doesn’t contain that sort of information, sir.’ ‘No, no, you fool, up there.’ He pulled his head away and refocussed his eyes on planet earth. ‘In the sky, on Mars, do you suppose, they shoot grouse, or maybe something else? Fascinating thought, eh?’ ‘Fascinating,’ echoed the Butler, not fascinated at all. ‘Well, what are they called?’ shouted Iffy, returning to his telescope. ‘Roderick Morte D’Arthur Tennison, Brian Taylor and Mark West. They are all married and none of them know each other because of their differing ages.’ 11

‘Well I know one of ‘em,’ declared Iffy. ‘Roderick, a real prat. We used to stand on his ears after rugger and smear jam on his balls. Those were the days, eh? Well, splendid work, Butler. If the other two are as dumb as him, we’re away. He paused. ‘God I wonder what sort of woman would marry a carthorse like that? Anyway, Butler, I’ve done my bit too.’ ‘What’s that, sir? ‘I’ve persuaded that lecherous old paedophile Wing Commander across the moor to lend me some lunatic spy chappie to build these grouse for me. He’s coming to work for me immediately. I tell you Butler; in the words of the immortal Sherlock Holmes, the game’s afoot!’ ‘Am I to understand that my services are no longer required?’ demanded Butler, feigning hurt. ‘Eh? Snorted Iffy. ‘No, of course not. This bloke’s not a butler. When I saw him he was a plum pudd. . .’ Iffy hesitated awkwardly,’ . . . a er, er plummy sort of chap. Peach of a fellow if you get my drift.’ ‘Where will he stay, sir?’ asked Butler coldly. ‘Oh you won’t see him,’ replied Iffy in a more jolly tone. ‘He’s sort of undercover. Could be anyone. Could be in that teapot over there, haw haw haw.’ ‘Will that be all, sir?’ ‘Yes, Butler. Yes, off you go. Great days ahead, eh? Great days.’ He looked at his feet and began to sing in a nasal, toneless monotone . . . ‘ And did these feet, in ancient times, walk upon England’s mountains green, and was the holy, er, grouse of Iffy . . Haw, haw, haw. The laughter faded as Butler, with supreme self-control, closed the door and stood outside the study. He pressed back against the cold stone wall, his thoughts racing. New chap,spies,undercover agents. It was bad enough ignoring his idea, disregarding his invention, but getting in somebody 12

else? Butler could see his future usefulness fading fast and that would mean unemployment and that would mean. . . He stiffened as sweat started to form on his palms. His face turned pale as memory returned. ‘John Butler’ declared the Judge. ‘Fraudulently selling the mortal remains of the deceased is a serious charge; no less serious is burying the wrong bits of the wrong bodies in the wrong graves. You will go to prison for ten years.’ John Butler had not meant to go into crime but death was just not what it used to be. His job as a driver for an undertaker’s firm did not pay well. People were living longer dying more violently and paying less for burial. He got the idea when he buried one of the victims of the famous ‘Tandoori Dismemberment’ murders. He left the little finger of the deceased and filled the rest of the coffin with sandbags. Nobody was any the wiser. It was but a short step for Butler to start burying the wrong people substituting the remains of demised local villains for ‘Loving Jeffrey 75 taken suddenly by the hand of God, RIP’. Loving Jeffrey meanwhile was being carved up by medical students at the London Hospital in Whitechapel. ‘Bodies ’ muttered Butler aloud still rigid against the Laird’s study wall. ‘Cold smooth neat and orderly. Nothing out of place not like this bloody spy thing. Fucking out of order.’ His cultured tones gradually diminished into a gravelly cockney slang. For John Butler was really from the East End. Butler was his nickname in Wormwood Scrubs where he acquire the false accent and practised better butling on the more important inmates. His face contorted in agony as the flashback continued. Cell 10; to jack ‘Five Quid a Slash’ Munro (‘Slasher’ for short) who had been given four life sentences for disembowelling his uncle and his family with a Stanley knife ‘He took tea to after a disagreement over a game of conkers. ‘Your tea sir ' he announced, standing in the cell doorway 13 ‘Sling it on the bed, my man,’ wheezed Slasher, an asthma-sufferer since childhood. Butler sttod by the grey, coarse blankets which covered Slasher’s bunk and bent over to pour the tea into the cracked prision mug. As the tea arced into in, John Butler froze. He could feel the erection bulging against his prison suit; a huge lump, like a baby’s arm, was trying to punch it’s way out of his fly zipper, struggling restlessly beneath the material. Butler blushed bright red; he couldn’t understand it. He had never had such a stirring. This may have been a result of his father’s ‘character training’. His favourite method was to tie a rubber band around Butler’s scrotum and beat his balls with a cricket bat. ‘You’ve got a fucking bonk on,’ coughed Slasher indignantly. ‘You’re pouring my tea wiv a fucking stork on.’ Slasher dropped his paper and leapt to his feet. ‘Sorry, Slasher,’ the horny tea maid croaked, frightened out of his wits. Slasher brought his corrugated, unshaven face right up to Butler’s nose, so close that Butler could smell his foul breath. It was as if a cow’s bottom had exploded every time he spoke. ‘You’re a bleeding poof, aren’t you Butler?' Butler’s jaw moved, but no sound would come. ‘I like poofs,’ grinned Slasher, dropping his pants to reveal filthy yellow-stained Y-fronts, ‘and I’m going to ‘ave you.’ Butler’s eyes opened. He had been outside Iffy’s door for only thirty seconds, but he was already drenched in sweat from head to foot, his heart palpitating wildly.

Since that day, in the Scrubs there had been no trace of an erection, no stirring of physical sexual desire, only the detached clinical search for an expression of his tortured mental desires. He had escaped from the prison immediately afterwards. Lord Iffy had found him on the run, naked in a ditch on Findidnann estate. Butler recognized a kindred tortured soul in Iffy, with his top hat, tails, stockings, suspenders and thigh boots; whilst Iffy took the opportunity to fire all. 14 his servants and replace them with this new, horrendously low-paid alternative. Butler knew he owed everything to Iffy, and he wasn’t going to let him become ensnared in this latest insane escapade, for both their sakes. He lurched across the hall towards the servant’s quarters. He had to see it, his own invention, touch it, caress it. He fumbled in his waistcoat pocket for the key to his dream. The locked door swung open, and Butler’s eyes lit up. ‘There your are, my beauty, your time will come.’ he breathed reverently. It stood there. A gleaming riot of steel cylinders and pistons, two feet tall, on telescopic mountings. It ran on twin caterpillar tracks, each six inches wide, which could pursue a victic across all terrain at speeds of up to thirty miles an hour. ‘Iffy was mad no to listen to me’, Butler whispered. ‘Mechanical grouse,’ he snorted. ‘Spies, weirdos. But he can’t kill us my beauty, oh no. ‘ He sat down next to the machine. I have a plan to make Iffy see sence, and then you and me and the good Lord Boatrace will make pots and pots and pots of money.’ He smiled and took a last look at his brainchild, his creation, the mechanical expression of his tortured psyche, the engineer’s dream - Pelvotron, the perfect penis.

4 Upper Cut and Upper Crust It was a small, three-bedroomed, middle-management-level new home, in a new town slightly north of London and almost in the countryside. The man of the house had been in the Navy for a short period of time after leaving Thigwell public school but had left, under the advice of his Commanding Officer, after his three-year, short-service commission was up. During his brief spell in the service of Her Majesty, our man at number 33 Nouvelle Drive had succeeded in bending the sharp end of a frigate, hitting a mine in a minesweeper and almost sinking a submarine he was visiting by omitting to close the door on the top of it. Subsequent to his departure from the Navy he had become a moderately successful insurance salesman. He seemed to have an uncanny knack of pre-guessing all risks. He had met his sweetheart in the local supermarket near Portsmouth, where he had just recently demolished a fifteen hundred-tin display of South African sliced peaches. ‘Awfully sorry,’ he cried, wading through the mass of dented cans to rescue the small, bulletlike human beneath them.

‘Bastards!’ screamed the woman, for that was what she appeared to be. 16 He blushed. He had never heard a woman swear before. He wasn’t even sure what it meant. ‘Oh, er, AWFULLY AWFULLY SORRY,’ he gushed. ‘SOUTH AFRICAN BASTARDS!’ she yelled, glaring at the shop management who had gathered round menacingly. ‘I shall have to ask you to leave the store. . . ‘ ‘Capitalism, greed and racism hand in hand!’ interrupted Margot, thumping the be-suited employer in the chest with a half-pound tin, ‘and you are selling it, and persecuting me.’ Our exnaval officer stepped boldly forward to interject. ‘Excuse me, sir, but it was I who . . . ‘He broke off. The woman had just broken the other man’s nose with her tin of peaches and there was blood everywhere. ‘Gosh,’ mouthed Tennison. ‘Come on, you berk.’ She grabbed him by the wrist and smashed through the emergency exit to her waiting Morris Minor. She jumped into de driving seat. ‘Push it then, you dumb shit,’ she screamed. He pushed. It started he jumped in and off they roared. ‘I say,’ he shouted. ‘I’ve left my trolley in the supermarket. . .’ She smacked him across the head with incredible violence. ‘FOOL!’ she exploded. ‘But you are a man, and ALL men are fools.’ ‘Oh, . . . Yes,’ agreed Mr. Tennison, stunned. ‘But I need a man, and you are a man,’ she continued logically. ‘Oh, er, yes,’ agreed Roderick, brightening up. ‘You are a very tall man, a very big man.’She swung the wheel into a right-hand turning, almost flinging Roderick out of the door. ‘And I need a big man to improve my stock. . .’ She gritted her teeth and sweerved to avoid a bus, ‘. . . to improve the women of the future to continue the STRUGGLE.' She slammed her foot on the brakes and skidded to a stop. ‘We’re here,’ she declared, flinging open the door. ‘Where?’ enquired Roderick. ‘The registry office. We’re getting married.’ 17 ‘What? Exclaimed Roderick in horror. ‘We’re jolly well not.’ And so they married. Her maiden name was Margot Smith and so it remained, for she refused to change it. ‘Do you think my ears are too big?’ enquired Roderick Morte D’Arthur Tennison, eyeing his reflection in the kitchen window. His ears were, in fact, alarmingly large, as were his nose and protuberant front teeth, but then, Roderick Morte D’Arthur Tennison was a giant of a man. He puffed his chest out, but the bulge in the belly of his Aran chunky-knit sweater simply eased upward like some swallowing abdominal Adam’s apple. ‘Damn fine dinner, dear.’ he roared, thumping himself approvingly in the belly. He looked down at the gluey, speckled grey mess in the sink. ‘What was it anyway, dear?’ ‘Mushroom bake,’ screamed his wife from the lounge. ‘And hurry up with those dishes. Don’t

use all the hot water, ‘cos the kids have got to the bathed. Vacuum the carpet while I’m gone. . .’ The screech faded for a moment but re-emerged as the kitchen door burst open and Margot Smith, vegan, feminist and arden hunt saboteur appeared, ‘. . . And stop looking at yourself in the bloody window all the time. God, you men are so vain.’ Roderick stared down at the frying pan in his enourmous hairy paws. He tried to speak, but missed his chance. ‘I shall be gone awhile so don’t wait up. Don’t watch ITV, it’s one of those bastards Charles Bronson things and I don’t want Emily seeing that sort of thing while her awareness is impressionable. Got it? ‘Jolly good, love,’ mumbled Roderick amiably while Margot heaved a deep breath. ‘Where is it tonight?’ ‘Church hall meeting. Anti-leather goods. We’re organizing a boycott of the new shoe shop in town, murdering bastards. . .’ Roderick looked down nervously at his new leather sandals and crossed his gigantic, sockencased toes. ‘Gosh, dear, jolly good show.’ 18 Righto, well I’m off then,’ said Margot, struggling to get an anorak over her denim overalls. ‘AAAurgh,’ she stamped her feet finally into bright yellow wellington boots and opened the back door. ‘Byedear,’ called Roderick, waving a white soapy hand. ‘Oh yes,’ said Margot, totally ignoring him. ‘And no bloody wanking while I’m gone. I want a full load when I get home tonight, not the usual ten ccs.’ The door slammed shut and she was gone. He finished the washing up, washed the kids, hoovered the carpet and watched BBC 2. Finally, he picked up the letter that had arrived that morning addressed to him - not many letters arrived like that anymore - and whch he had secreted away for this moment. He opened it, read the invitation, then carefully folded the paper and slipped it into his apron pocket. ‘Good old Iffy,’ he exclaimed. ‘I jolly well shall go.’ 19

5 A Friendly Pair

The Edinburgh express screamed through the night, twin Paxman Valletta diesels pushing the ‘Durham Light Infantry’ locomotive past 125 miles an hour. The hundreds of millions of pounds spent on developing the world’s fastest diesel train had provided comfort and safety for millions of passengers but, as Laetitia P. Taylor, formerly of Dallas, was explaining in the

bar coach, the service could always be improved upon. ‘. . . And that goodamn smell when the brakes come on. Yuck. I mean, couldn’t they use an air freshener or something? I suffer from Rhino Hyper Acuity Sindrome. You know what that is? You know how much that costs to get fixed?’ She eyed the Rastafarian train guard curiously. Methuselah Claude Bimby Gary Smith had never seen a Rhino, although Laetitia would probably have believe him if he said he had, but despite his long Rasta dreadlocks and rakishly tilted conductor’s cap, he did know a thing or two about trains. ‘I think you’ll find dat it’s de disc brakes, ma’am.’ He grineed a row of perfect white choppers at her. ‘And dey nothin’ we can do wid de bloodklaat ting.’

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Laetitia cocked her heaad to one side. Had she heard right? Bloodclot? She couldn’t see what that had to do with anything. Still, she thought, who cares, bloodclot or no bloodclot she wanted to be fucked by a black man, and here he was. He even had the remmants of a uniform on. ‘Oh dear, oh dear.’ She fluttered her black eyelinered eyelids. ‘I guess I’ll have to put up with my little sniffle then.’ She pinched her thumb and forefinger together to emphasize the particular nature of her medical condition, and Methuselah observed her tastefully enamelled false nails. ‘It’s so hard to breathe like this,’ she sighed and inhaled a massive lungful of air. The effect was instantaneous and astonishing. The coach seemed to shrink and Methuselah could feel the air being pushed from his body. He looked down at the massive pair of breasts pinning him against the wall. Sweat broke out on his brow. He struggled to think of a parallel experience. . . St. Paul’s Cathedral dome, the Hinderburg. . . ‘Where does one go pee pees?’ whined Laetitia flasing her drilled, filed, flattened, plated, crowned and very expensive teeth. ‘In the Khazi, ma’am,’ croaked Methuselah. ‘Er, I mean de toilet.’ ‘Oh good.’ The chest receded as if planning its next move. ‘In America we call it the Rest Room.’ ‘I don’t tink you want to sleep in dere, ma’am.’ ‘I wasn’t planning to, er, what is your name you cute little man?’ ‘Methuselah, ma’am.’ ‘Wow, named after a bottle of champagne. I’ll go for that. I’ll call you Meths for short. Now, you show me where this li’l уle rest room is, and I’ll give you some more of those beads to hang on your wig.’ Methuselah was yanked off down the corridor towards the nearest toiled. He wondered where she kept her beads. 21

‘Worraloadofshite’ slavered Brian Taylor, spraying his oppo-nent with Scotch and ginger ale, two pieces of pork pie and a small spit of mustard. ‘Fuck off,’ came back several pieces of crisps and a shower of bitter. ‘You’re not an

alcoholic.’ ‘I fucking well am.’ ‘Just because you’re pissed up every fucking day doesn’t mean you’re an alky. I read the other day that you can be an alky on two pints a day, or you can get pissed all the bloody time and be perfectly all right.’ ‘Look, I’m an assistant editor. I’m Scottish. I’m a journalist, I’ve got a poxy American bint who’s spent all my fucking money AND THAT’S WHY I’M AN ALCOHOLIC.’ Brian observed the bottom of his glass. It as clear, transparent to his watery gaze. Time for another one he thought. ‘Dyewant another bevvy? He asked. Silence. He peered over the table at the postrate figure lying on the floor, arm half over the chair, tongue hanging out, small traces of puke beginning to dribble out of his salivating mouth. ‘Fucking brain surgeons,’ he muttered in disgust. ‘No bottle.’ ‘But there must be a bathroom that works on this train somewhere,’ hissed Laetitia in frustration. ‘I know the English have self-control but this is ridiculous.’ ‘De only one left is de staff toilet in the bar, next coach down, and dat is strictly for the use of employees only.’ Laetitia cast him a leering glance. ‘Well you’re an employee, aren’t you. . . aren’t you?’ She shoved him down the aisle, past the old lady in a woolly hat, past a man with very large ears and his torpedo-shaped female companion, and past a businessman intently studying the Daily Mail. ‘Shit,’ she hissed. ‘Get in quick.’ ‘What, ma’am? ‘My fucking husband, Brian. GET IN, or your job’s on the line.’

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The door slammed shut behind them. They were alone in the tiny cubicle, with its washbasin, roller towels and foo-operated loo. ‘Madam,’ started Methuselah, trying vainly to exert author-ity. ‘I don’t do nutting to upser your old man. . .’ ‘We are alone,’ grinned Laetitia evilly, inflating her breasts until they threatened to displace the roller towel dispenser. She grabbed Methuselah’s dreadlocks. ‘Ouch,’ he yelled. ‘Leave it out, woman.’ ‘Go down on me you Zulu you, pierce me with your assegai, spear me on your woolly woomera, you gorgeous spear chucker.’ Her eyes blazed with missionary zeal. ‘And when you skewer me on your rod of iron,’ she added, ‘leave your hat on’. ‘You’re fucking barmy,’ he shouted. ‘I’m from Walthamstow.’ ‘Though shit, honey, sneered Laetitial. ‘You’re mine.’ She grabbed his balls with one hand and yanked hard, while her other hand ripped open the front of his trousers and closed around his penis. ‘Well, well, big boy. ‘She licked her lips in anticipation. ‘Oh Christ,’ groaned Methuselah in agony. ‘Let go of me bollocks.’ It was too late. His cock disappeared into her jaws. He watched in horror as he saw it swallowed inch by inch, down to the root and beyond, until all that was left were two straggly little pubic hairs sticking out of the side of her mouth. Laetitia came up for air.

‘I give the best head in Dallas, sonny, and I . . .’ She broke off as she looked down at the lavatory pan. It was about six inches long, brown and hard, several days old and deposited by a British Rail porter who had eaten a very heavy fried breakfast. ‘Ugh!’ Laetitia screamed, pointing one painted digit at the offending jobbie. ‘Gross, double gross. Yuck, excrement. Yuck, I mean what a turn off.’ ‘Well,’ she said, addressing the bowel movement more 23

formally. ‘You are going walkies right now.’ And she reached upwards to pull the chain. Brian Taylor heard the scream. ‘No miss, no miss, don’t pull that, it’s not . . . ‘ But his voice was drowned out by the screech of tortured metal as the emergency brakes slammed on and a lot of objects formerly moving in one direction demonstrated the principle of equial and opposite reaction in a way that would have warmed the heart of many a psychopathic physics teacher. ‘What’s happening?’ shrieked Laetitia, cannoning off the walls of the toilet, propelled by her bouncing boobs. ‘You pulled the communication cord not de fucking bog chain, your rassklaat crazy woman.’ Laetitia grabbed the door handle to steady herself but over-balanced, wrenching the door open as she fell backward onto the loo wedging her bum in the pan. ‘Waagh!’ screamed an old lady as Methuselah and his privates were exposed to the rest of the carriage. ‘Oh oh oh diar, oh oh,’ she gribbered helplessly as her tea tray flew into the air and the full teapot landed squarely in the lap of Roland Wilkinson, businessman, still engrossed in his Daily mail. ‘AAArgh!’ screamed Roland, leaping into the air and clutching his steaming genitals, the copy of Men Only hiding behind his newspaper falling open on to the table, to be grabbed by a ferret-like Margot Smith. ‘Sexist pig, child abuser, paedophile, bastard!’ She felled poor Roland with one rabbit punch to the throat. ‘Filth!’ she yelled, hitting him with the magazine. ‘Frightening old ladies with mucky magazines!’ She ground her teeth together. ‘AAAurgh!’ she exclaimed finally as she kicked him in his tea-stained privates. ‘Help me!’ screamed Laetitia, worried that the jobbie floating inches below her large bottom might re-enter from whence it came. ‘Oh man, oh man,’ groaned Methuselah, cowering in a corner and shaking like a leaf.

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Roderick Morte D’Arthur Tennison stood up to his full height of six foot four. ‘Righto,’ he boomed, ‘Who’s in charge here? Is there a doctor in the house?’ He strode

towards Brian Taylor, who was still slumped in his chair, paralytically drunk. ‘See him,’ slurred Brian, indicating the body lying on the floor. ‘He’s a fucking brain surgeon.’

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Food Glorious Food

Mark West woke up at nine a.m. In his large double bed and flailed his arm in search of his wife. The bed was empty. He looked at the clock, sat up and investigated the room. No sign of her. He flopped back into bed. ‘Oh shit,’ he muttered. Holding his fifteen-inch penis in one hand so as to prevent it wrapping around the furniture, Mark investigated the bathroom. She was not there. ‘Not again,’ he groaned and pulled on some slippers and a dressing gown. Finally, he took his fifteen-inch long hand-knitted willy warmer and tied it firmly around his knob, fastening the woolly toggle at the top end to the hook attached to the armpit of his dressing gown. He smirked as he recalled Cynthia’s explanation of the knitting of his penis cover as ‘something to keep the garden rake warm in winter, mummy’. ‘Yawning and stretching as the morning sun streamed through the windows, he went downstairs and picked up the post. He wondered carelessly where the hell Cynthia was. Scratching at his itching scalp, he opened the lounge door.

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The air was thick with infernal blue-grey smoke, like huge floating dollops of atmospheric phlegm waiting to slide in his lungs. Mark could almost taste the twelve-hour-old stale cigarrette butts as he beheld his wife Cynthia, aged twenty-five, sprawled out on the carpet, her legs around the neck of the next-door neighbour and her tights hanging from the rubber plant. Cynthia was snoring loudly and wheezing from last night’s cigarrette-and-brandy binge. Her face, normally attractive - the kind of face that men like to come all over in Danish magazines - was contorted and twisted by her drunken application of make-up at forty-five degrees to her natural features. The record on the turntable was still rotating uselessly as the arm flopped against the end stop. The evidence of alcoholic excess lay all aroud the room: dirty sticky glasses, poisonouslooking stains of spilt Scotch and brandy, and half-empty beer cans filled with old cigarrettes. ‘Morning, dear,’ remarked Mark dryly, delivering a kick to her exquisitely shaped rear end. The velocity of his kick propelled her pubic bone with not inconsiderable force into the face of Arthur Desirйe Whale, the transexual music journalist from next door. ‘Ouch.’ Arthur rolled over, rubbing the bridge of his nose. Cynthia snored on.

‘Hard day at the office, dear ?’ asked Mark sarcastically. ‘Must’ve fallen asleep.’ said the she-male, rubbing its eyes. ‘Good job for you you’re wearing trousers for once, otherwise I might have saved you the Surgeon’s bill and chopped it off myself,’ Mark returned acidly as he trudged off towards the kitchen. He made himself a cup of tea and read the mail. Two final reminders; a free film offer; and a long, slim white envelope, embossed with a crest of some description, postmarked somewhere in Scotland and sent with a second-class stamp. He opened it and read the invitation.

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The 25th Laird of Findidnann, Lord iffy Boatrace, cordially invites you on behalf of the Thigwellonians to a most extraordinary dinner party and sporting weekend at his country residence, Findidnann Hall. Mark turned the gold edged card over. No RSVP he thought. His Lordshipe will be glad to entertain you from the afternoon of the second of September until the morning of the fifth, all accomodation, entertainment and meals will, of course, be provided. Mark took a sip of tea. ‘Why not?’ he thought. ‘It would keep Cynthia away from her weirdo friends for a while. Who knows, he and Cynthia might even manage to make love for the first time in six months. He did still vaguely love her, he supposed. ‘Mmmm,’ he said out loud, nodding approvingly to himself. The door handle moved slowly and a claw-like, broken-finger-nailed hand pushed open the kitchen door, followed by an arm and then the trunk of the drunken, cross-eyed Gorgon Cynthia West, alcoholic, friend of strays and waifs, and downwardly mobile amateur bag lady. ‘I hate you,’ she spat, swaying on the door handle for support. ‘Oh?’ said Mark brightly, ‘Why?’ ‘Because you’re always fucking right.’ ‘Yes, I suppose I am,’ sighed Mark and walked past her, out of the kitchen. Cynthia staggered to the fridge door and pulled it open, her eyes performing tumbling rotations as her cracked, lipstick-rimmed mouth repeated her post-alcohol culinary litany. ‘Chocolate spinach cheese Locuzade.’ One by one, the dietician’s nightmare became reality. ‘Ham eggs crisps milk prawn cocktail tandoori chicken.‘She wobbled to the table and began to consume all these things.The grill was turned on and

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she cooked more food. Then she consumed that as well. Fried eggs swallowed whole, sausages, tomatoes, mushrooms. Twenty minutes later she threw up voluminously, spraying the kitchen with tandoori

spinach, prawns in Lucozade and two fried eggs which splattered yellow all over the Laura Ashley wallpaper. Mark re-entered and saw Cynthia’s head in the waste disposal unit. He was tempted to switch it on, but he did still vaguely love her. ‘You’re not well, are you dear?’ ‘Yuri Gasgarin,’ she vomited loudly. ‘First Russian in space,’ announced Mark brightly. ‘Vostok One.’ ‘I hate you.’ ‘Oh dear’, Mark responded, unperturbed. ‘Never mind. I’ve fixed up a nice weekend for us in Scotland, away from all those perverted friends of yours. You never know, we might even FUCK.’ He turned swiftly and slammed the door. Cynthia looked up from her internal evacuations. ‘Scotland,’ she barked hoarsely. ‘I hate Scotland.’ ‘I hate you,’ she screamed. ‘I hate you.’ ‘I hate you.’ ‘Yuri Gagarin,’ she finished, and stuck her head back in the sink.

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PART TWO The Solution

30-31-32

7 A Dubl’une Welcome

The remote village of Dubl’une was named after the Spanish galleon which, in the days following the rout of the Spanish Armada in 1588, had run aground on the rocks of the nearby coast and spilled its cargo of men and gold. Despite being fel-low Catholics, the local Scots had slaughtered the survivors in a most ungentlemanly manner until the last remaining Spaniard, Josй Barcelona, had revealed the whereabouts of the treasure. The village became known as ‘Dubloon Town’, and by the twentieth century it had acquired an apostrophe and an origin known only to the most exacting local historian. The only clue to this strange past lay in the name of the village pub, ‘The Bonny Hacienda’, and its landlord Jock Mc Vitie Barcelona. Apart from this, the village had one petrol pump, run by the same gentleman. Jock also operated the post office (never open), a small chapel, and a ship which sold most things, including contraceptives. But none big enough for Mark West, who was sunning himself on the gently sloping main street, admiring himself in the shop windows, and generally thanking God for having created him in his image.

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‘Why did you bring me here? It stinks,’ moaned Cynthia, who was trailing ten feet behind him and sweating profusely in the late summer heat. ‘You’re so unromantic,’ Mark replied. He took a healthy-sounding deep breath. ‘The land of heather and haggis, lying contented in the pastures, roamin’ in the gloamin’. . .’ ‘Get lost. You’re only after one thing,’ sneered Cynthia. ‘Find yourself ab knocking shop and someone to match your own maggot-infested mind.’ They had arrived on the morning train (there were only two a day) and Mark had decided to delay their arrival at Findidnann Hall so as to have a look around. He was particularly fascinated by the antiquity of the petrol pump mechanism, which he dated at 1925, and on the subject of which he was an expert. So much so that he was entitled to use the initials PS, meaning ‘Pump Specialist’, after his name, although he never did. He thought it rather pretentious. Cynthia meanwhile, not thrilled by Mark’s liquid passion for pumping apparatus, had retired to the chapel with a handbag full of kit-kats, where she had prayed fervently for an Act of God to strike down her petroleum-obsessed partner. ‘The rest of the chaps should be on this train,’ declared Mark brightly, turning to Cynthia, who was now at the bottom of the station approach drive, staring misty-eyed at a vending machine full of whole-nut chocolate. Mark strode confidently on to the platform. He admired the way that the station, with its single track but two platforms, symbolic of greater days, had nevertheless been immaculately cared for. The wild flowers suspended from the white-painted wooden canopy seemed to glow in the afternoon haze. The tranquility of the scene and its contemplative effect on his psyche was only improved by the earnest efforts of a wasp he observed paying ardent attention to the immaculately clean and empty wastepaper bin, circa 1920, about which he was also an expert. ‘Any minute now,’ he muttered eagerly, looking at his wrist-watch.

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The train was late. A good half an hour late. Cynthia had emptied the vending machine and retired to the ladies toilet to examine a chocolate-inspired boil on her neck. Mark read the timetable repetedly, but found little of interest since there were only two trains a day. Then he heard the whistle and, eagerly standing on the edge of the platform, saw the yellow-painted face of the small engine heaving four coaches up the single line some five hundred yards away. ‘Class 31, dear,’ he shouted excitedly, being also an expert on trains and their origins. ‘Gosh, what a stoke of luck.’ Mark was beside himself with joy.The sound of the engine’s whistle threw the entire village into panic. A taxi pulled round the corner to enter the station car park (actually the taxi, the only one in Dubloon); the local publican checked that he had change in the paper in the loo; and a dog barked. It was almost a state of emergency. Mark peered at the taxi throug the station archway. ‘Good lord,’ he exclaimed in astonishment. The petrol pump, the station and now this, a veritable antique on wheels, a beautifully maintained Austin of 1930s vintage. Its lovingly polished coachwork glowed black in the sun, darkened glass obscuring the re-polished, leather-clad interior; a real-life time machine on wheels. Mark looked for the Station Master; surely someone would clip the ticket. No museum would be complete without a fossilized servant to doff his cap. He ran over the taxi, its engine still chuntering amiably. ‘Excuse me,’ he shouted in a tone of voice normally reserved for imbeciles. ‘Where is the Station Master?’ The driver’s side window erupted in a hail of phlegm, which flew through the air and ricocheted off the ladies’loo window some twenty feet away. Mark recoiled in horror. The Boy’s Own Paper was never like this. Poking its head out of the cab window was the most horrific-looking monster Mark had ever seen. A Mohican haircut, covered in superglue and hardened like a porcupine’s necklace, bristled out at him. Massive, 35

Continuous, dyed-green eyebrows ran like a halo around the monster’s entire skull. A nail had been hammered vol-untarily through its nose and a piece of two-year-old cheese hung from each ear lobe. As it flashed and unpleasantly surly grin at him, Mark obsreved its ghoulish ripped-appart T-shirt, depicting a monster even more foul than itself, erupting from a welldeserved grave. ‘Station Master?’ ask Mark nervously. The apparition in the taxi turned momentarily green. ‘Eddie,’ it hissed, phlegm ricocheting off the ladies’ window once more. ‘Well, shouldn’t Eddie be looking after his customers?’ inquired Mark. The cab door flew open and the monster stood erect before him, a filthy smirk on its hellish features. One of its legs was noticeably shorter than the other, emphasized by its hunch back, which contributed to a remarkable rolling gait as it staggered toward the platform on its hobbit-like, three-toed feet.

‘Mine,’ it yelled, pitching toward the approaching carriages, arms outstretched. Mark thought of Cynthia. Perhaps the creature would get her. He . . . he . . . he paused. ‘No,’ he corrected himself firmly. He did still vaguely love her. The train creaked to a halt and two doors opened. Out stepped Roderick Morte D’Arthur Tennison, carefully ducking the low exit. ‘Lovely day, darling,’ he declared, sniffing the air with his alarmingly large, and therefore excepcionally sensitive, nostrils. The suitcase hit him in the back of the head, sending him hurtling to the floor, where Margot Smith unceremoniously trod on him as she leapt out the carriage both feet first. ‘Wildlife,’ she screamed, flinging her arms out in greeting to the wilderness. ‘Eddie,’ gasped the punk hopping towards her and slavering ravenously. 36

Laetitia P. Taylor put one hideously overdressed foot on to the platform as if the ground had rabies, balancing precariously on her spine-deforming high heels. She inflated her breasts dangerously and puckered her patent-wet-look glossy lips. ‘Bonnie Scotland,’ she declared proudly. ‘From whence my ancestors may have come.’ ‘Fuck that shit,’ replied Brian Taylor, who really was Scottish, and Glaswegian at that. ‘Where’s the pub?’ ‘Wonga, wonga, wonga,’ grunted the punk, squeezing Margot’s breasts. ‘Rape !’ screamed Laetitia, wondering if she should get her camera. Roderick, meanwhile, had composed himself. ‘Unhand my wife, you bouder!’ he roared. ‘Stick the nut on him,’ shouted Brian. ‘I’m going to count to three,’ said Roderick, adopting the public school fisticuffs position, ‘and then I’m going to give you a jolly good hiding.’ ‘Rape, rape!’ screamed Margot, whose attempt at kneeing her attacker in the crutch had simply led to shrieks of renewed delight. ‘You’re so brave.’ Laetitia clasped her hands together, purple nais gleaming in the sun. ‘One.’ Roderick stiffened his jaw. ‘Two.’ Roderick flexed his biceps. The depraved hunchbacked punk span round. The first kick caught Roderick in the solar plexus. The follow up roundhouse hit him in the side of the head; then the monster performed two backflips and bounced off its hump to deliver the coup de grвce, a drop kick between the ears. It all happened in a second. Roderick lay groaning on the floor; the creature grinned evilly at Margot. ‘Carry your bags, ma’am?’ it leered, snatching up the suitcase an scuttling off to the taxi. ‘You half-blind pillock!’ screamed Margot slamming a yellos, wellington-booted foot into her laid-out husband.

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‘Half man, half fucking biscuit, that’s what you are.’ ‘Don’t you think you’re being a little hard on him?’ squirmed Laetitia. ‘I mean, he was awfully brave.’ ‘Fucking shut up, Michelin woman,’ Margot spat. ‘I don’t think we’re going to get along on this vacation,’ muttered Laetitia, casting an evil glance at Margot and clenching her teeth. ‘Well, how extraordinary,’ gasped Mark, surveying the chaos littering the small platform. ‘Who the fuck are you?’ demanded Brian Taylor bellinger-ently. ‘The Mayor?’ ‘Mark West actually, fellow Odl Thigwellonian.’ He strode across the platform, arm extended.‘Jolly pleased to meet you.’ Laetitia aimed a kick at Brian’s heel. ‘Go on then, shake his hand,’ she hissed. ‘Have you been dwon the pub yet? Asked brian, swaying gently in the sunshine and supporting himself on Mark West’s hand. ‘no, actually I don’t drink,’ Mark smiled Brian Taylor’s face froze as his pickled brain analyzed the situation. A lunatic vegetarian feminist still remonstrating with her prone monster of a husband, a mentally retarded prince Charles special if ever he saw one. Behind, was his own spendthrift, dick-hungry wife, stinking of perfume; and now here was mark West, a chinless wonder par excellence. God knows waht his missus was like ‘Mark!’ screamed Cynthia, from the ladies. ‘Help, Mark, help me!’ ‘Cynthia!’ yelled Mark, alarmed. ‘Mark!’ she screamed again. ‘Cynthia!’ Mark roared, even louder. ‘What is it?’ ‘MARK!’ she screamed the voice, close to breaking point. Roderick scrambled to his feet and lurched towards the old stone-faced lavatory building. Many full-backs had quaked in terror at seeing six foot four inches of number eith Tennison bearing down on them - SMACK - but since the door was only six-feet hich and the stone was notably unbending, Roderick

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Found himself felled like an ox. He was hit squarely on the forehead and left with a bright red bruise. Margot jumped out of the way as her husband fell back towards her, letting him slam into the ground, the wind knocked out of him. ‘We women,’ Margot announced ‘can look after ourselves, thank you very much.’ She strutted towards the toilet door. ‘Like Mussolini with tits,’ Brian Taylor mouthed. ‘What did you say?’ exploded Margot, who had hearing like a bat. )Some would say a face like one too.) But any immediate feminine thoughts of violence ceased as Cynthia appeared. ‘Mark, Mark.’ The loo door opened and Cynthia staggered out, her fingernails a white gooey

mess and her eyes tight shut. ‘I can’t see.’ ‘Open your eyes then,’ Mark advised. ‘I can’t. I was doing my nails an I stuck my eyelids together with superglue.' ‘OH, VAIN WOMAN!’ cried Margot, like some hellfire preacher. ‘You need some sisterhood,’ she proclaimed and pushed Cynthia back inside, treading on Roderick’s solar plexus as the toilet door swung shut. Muffled cries could be heard from inside. Roderick lay silent on the floor. ‘I need a bloody drink,’ declared Brian ‘That’s all you think of, your goddamned liver! When I was on that train, almost overpowered by that . . . that creature, you were drunk. When we got married you were drunk and pissed into my brother’s trouser pockets during the wedding photos; and now, when that monster tries to rape Margot, what are you? You’re drunk!’ Laetitia spat, turning upwind and giving Mark an overpowering wave of man-repellent perfume. ‘I think we chaps ought to stick together,’ said Mark, clearing the nervous blockage in his throat. ‘if I hadn’t pulled that communication cord, God knows what I would have had on my hands. . . ‘ Laetitia continued.

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‘Sperm probably,’ remarked Brian and belched. Laetitia’s mouth opened wide, and Mark found himself peering inside. It was huge, he marvelled. He wondered if it was big enough for him to . . . ‘Well,’ Brian continued in a jolly tone, pleased at having shut her up. ‘I’m off for a pint of heavy, see you in hell.’ And he woobled off across the cobblestones, chuckling to himself in a beery, Glaswegian fashion. Laetitia’s mouth remained open, her bottom lip twitching. It was a trick she had learned from watching bad soap operas. She thought it made her look more vulnerable. Mark thought it made her appear even more stupid than she looked already. ‘Are you all right?’ he enquired, using his imbecile and taxi driver tone. Laetitia’s feature hardened up suddenly, as if her skin had been covered with leather. The dollar signs came back to her eyes and her cheerleader’s grin returned as she licked her lips and ran her tongue over her lovingly polished canines. ‘My husband,’ she drooled viciously, ‘is an impotent asshole.’ Roderick stirred in the corner, sitting up and holding his temples in agony. ‘I’ve got a frightful headache,’ he moaned. ‘You poor man, and so chivalrous, so daring.’ Laetitia tottered fifty-two steps towards him, in her excessive little shoes. She bent over and cradled his head in her hands Mark marvelled at her clothes. Every possible devide of feminity had been perverted, to suggest maximum sexual availability. Even her shoes made it impossible for her to walk witouth gyrating her hips wantonly; and when she bent over, the thinness of the materialwhich composed her diaphanous dress, revealed the suspenders and stays underneath. ‘Now you come along with me and sit in this taxi,’ she chided gently. ‘With that awful friend?’ winced Roderick. ‘I’m afraid it is the only taxi in Dubl’une,’ said Mark unhelpfully.

‘Oh, very well then, if we must we must.’

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The taxi sat outside, Iron Maiden music blasting out of the driver’s side window. Roderick was already in the passenger compartment with his head in Laetitia’s lap; and with Mark West, who was moaning in pain as the bass guitar notes hammered through his spine and the vocals set his teeth on edge like a dentist’s drill. ‘Where the hell is Cynthia?’ he shouted above the noise. ‘She’s been nearly fifteen minutes in there now.’ He pushed his head through the window and peered outside. The monster-movie taxi driver leant nonchalantly against the headlamp, chewing on the piece of hardened glue he had extracted from his nose. ‘Oi!’ shouted Mark. ‘Oi!’ he roared, his voice cracking under pressure. The monster flashed a green grin as it turned. ‘Turn the fucking music off, we can’t hear ourselves think,’ Mark shouted. The monster looked away. ‘TURN IT OF, you fucking mutation!’ yelled Mark opening the door and half getting out. ‘AAAGH!’ screamed the punk, and rushed at him. Mark slammed the door shut and cowered in his seat as the hairy hand of the beast grped through the open window. Laetitia screamed. ‘Eddie,’ it hissed, ‘says listen. . . ‘ It paused, its eyeballs growing white as it looked at her, her breasts heaving and swelling. ‘But for you,’ it continued slyly, winking one glue-encrusted eyelash. It slashed suddenly at the leather of the back passenger seat. It threw white stuffing over the occurpants and filled the air with powdered chaff, as if possessed by a demon upholsterer. Then it ripped ut a bundle of wires and thrust them between its teeth, biting and tearing until the cables parted and the cheese on its earlobes began to sizzle. The repulsive creature chuckled as Margot and Cynthia approached. The monster flung open the door and bowed deeply, gesturing with its hand towards the car. Cynthia stepped

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in gingerly, casting an anxious look at Margot who had remained outside, hands on her hips. ‘You animal!’ she said through clenched teeth. ‘Get in,’ it ordered. ‘Don’t talk to me like that.’ The punk rose from its kneeling position and lifted Margot across its shoulders. Then, swinging twice through 360 degrees, it released its load and Margot hurtled through the open door, landing across Roderick’s knees, which cracked loudly. The cab door slammed shut and the monster grinned once more. ‘Fuck you,’ it slavered. ‘Bitch.’ The engine roared as the accelerator was floored and first gear span the rear wheels as the

thirty-year-old antique catapulted out of the car park, handbrake turning on the gravel at the bottom of the road. It set off for Findidnann Hall, disregarding road signs, junctions, other road users and especially pedestrians.

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8 JOURNEY TO FINDIDNANN

The sun hung like a glowing white-hot poker in the deep blue sky, as the cab continued its manic progress along the hot black strip of tarmac that wound its way, eventually, to Findidnann Hall. Lord Iffy sat on a milking stool atop the highest stone turret of his house, following their progress through his telescope. He tracked them as they sped over blind, hump-backed bridges, scattering flocks of animals; and as they wreaked havoc on the construction site down the road, where new sheep-dip pens were being built. The cab made the concrete trucks and cement mixers abort in panic as it scattered workmen and mowed down unwary theodolites. Iffy sat back. ‘They’re coming, Butler. Dammit, they’re coming.’ He beamed a grin at the impassive servant standing behind him. ‘Be prepared man, be prepared.’ He stood up and rubbed his hands with glee. ‘Shall I prepare tea?’ asked Butler. ‘No, no, no,’ exclaimed Iffy, in an inspired tone of voice. ‘When the cab comes, grab their bags and chuck’em inside. 43

Take old what’s ‘is name, er, er you know, the fellow who runs the taxi service. . .’ ‘Jock McVitie Barcelona,’ said Butler. ‘Yes, yes, yes,’ interrupted Iffy. ‘Grab him and shove some brandy down him, he drinks like a fish, the old fool, all publicans do. Then, nip outside and syphon off the petrol in the tank. That’ll get us into town so we can flog one of the damn cars. Good wheeze, eh?’ ‘Very good, sir,’ replied Butler. ‘Of course it’s very good,’ snapped Iffy. ‘I thought of it, didn’t I? Now then,’ he settled back on to the well-scrubbed wooden seat and screwed his eye back up to the lens of the telescope, ‘let’s see what we can see out there.’ Inside the cab, everyone was silent. Everyone, that is, except Laetitia P. Taylor, who had been busy spotting her potential origins as the car roared past the quiet, stonebuilt terraced cottages of Dubl’une. She had already recounted the events leading up to her persuading Brian Taylor

to accept Iffy’s invitation, and the resultant debacle of the northbound express train earlier that morning. She paused in mid-flow to heave a silent breath. ‘Anyway, there we were, in the middle of nowhere, me surrounded by drunks, my husband totally useless, and that awful black man trying to rape me. If I hadn’t pulled the communication cord then God only knows. . . ‘ ‘Coloured man,’ corrected Margot, snapping her head upright as if she were a light, suddenly switched on. ‘Oh yes,’ chirped Roderick, taking the cue from his wife. ‘He certainly was. Black as the ace of spades. . . Oof.’ He jack-knifed forward as Margot slammed a karate elbow strike in his ribs. ‘Racist,’ she hissed. ‘Sorry dear,’ mumbled Roderick, head between his knees. Laetitia cleared her throat and turned to Mark and Cynthia. ‘You make a lovely couple,’ she began primly. ‘How long have you been married?’

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‘Too fucking long,’ moaned Cynthia in a low but very audible voice. ‘Er, about five years,’ corrected mark, through clenched teeth. ‘The odd tiff now and again. . .‘ he trailed off distantly. As soon as five years was mentioned. Cynthia turned bug-eyed and thrust her claw-like hands and plastic finger-nails into the mail sack which hung off her side like a bloated windsock. She called it her handbad. ‘Mars bar?’ She drew the confection out and thrust it like a pistol at Laetitia, her hand gripping the shiny black wrapper which crackled as her arm shook in withdrawal ‘My last one,’ she drooled, one eye on the chocolate, one eye on Laetitia. She lent across the cab conspiratorially. ‘We can share it,’ she confided. Laetitia looked horrified. ‘Oh, no,’ she replied sharply. ‘Er, I mean, oh no, I have to watch my figure.’ Mark West had been watching her figure for some time. ‘Yes, yes, I have to watch it too,’ he murmured absent-mindedly, his retinas locked on to her bullet-like nipples. ‘Fucking bastard,’ added Cynthia and crammed the entire Mars into her mouth at once, propelling the last two inches with her index finger as her lips closed over the chocolate brown end. Mark put his arm around her and whispered in her ear. ‘Why don’t you ever do that with me in bed?’ ‘Because you’re not a fucking Mars bar.’ Cynthia screamed and burst into floods of tears of saliva. Margot looked up again, hawk-like ‘Leave her alone,’ she ordered, ‘She’s upset.’ ‘She’s not the only one,’ Laetitia protested, indignant at being written out of the script. ‘I was nearly raped by a black . . .’ ‘Couloured,’ screamed Margot. ‘NOT BLACK.’ ‘But I was nearly raped,’ insisted Laetitia. ‘What difference does that make?’ yelled Margot. Laetitia smiled wacenly at her and placed her hand on Margot’s knee, patting it gently for

emphasis. 45

‘But don’t you think,’ she said slowly, ‘that black men are kind of . . . yucky?‘ she smiled. Margot, for the second time taht day, was dumbfounded, but Laetitia -more sensitive than a brick but perhaps less so than a bull elephant-interpreted silence as permission to continue. ‘I mean,’ she added, unwisely. ‘I think, on balance, that I’d rather be raped by a white man.’ ‘Oh really?’ exclaimed Mark enthusiastically. ‘You fucking would too, you pervert!’ screamed Cynthia, grabbing him by the throat. ‘Now break it up you two,’ cried Roderick looking up from between his legs. ‘I mean, all of us chaps are here on hols you know and . . . oof.’ His ribs cracked again as Margot repeated her elbow smash. ‘Leave him to me, sister,’ she commanded, pulling Cynthia off and looking Mark fiercely in the eyes. ‘You sort. . ..’ she began, waggling her finger, but the cab had slammed on its brakes ans spun round on the gravel drive of Findidnann Hall, throwing the occupants around like poker dice. Butler stood sombrely on the second step of the great stone staircase that led to the huge double front door. The approaching Austin hit the driveway at about fifty miles an hour. The wheels spun hard and the terminal, velocity-inspired maniac driving it giggled in delight as the vehicle slewed broadside on towards the steps, pebbledashing the stationary butler with damp chippings and sprayed mud from the drive. Butler spat out a piece of limestone and turned purple beneath his grey coat of Scottish road diggings. He clenched his fist in anger, dropping the stirrup pump and zinc bucket he held in his right hand. ‘Jock McVitie Barcelona,’ he growled, sounding very un-butler like. ‘I’m going to fill your’ed in for this.’ He strode towards the driver’s compartment. Inside the taxi, the passenger doors had been locked and the windows began to look like a tropical piranha tank as

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the occupants struggled to escape. Breasts, ears, teeth and a chocolate-covered face all vied for attention, when the driver’s door suddenly burst open and lay hanging from one splintered hinge. ‘You’re not Jock!’ cried and astonished Butler ‘Eddie,’ it hissed, slithering over the bonnet. Butler backed away, but the creature sprang from the headlamp mounting and grabbed him by the throat, thrusting him against one of the stone pillars which flanked the entranceway. Butler could feel its foul breath, just like Slasher’s. He closed his eyes. No, it couldn’t be, not

after all these years. ‘What. . . do. . .you. . . want?’ he choked. ‘Who are you?’ The monster eased its grip and lowered Butler to the floor. ‘Heh, heh,’ it chuckled, and nutted him on the forehead. The skillfully delivered Gaswegian kiss put Butler uncon-scious across the steps for several seconds, long enough for the three-toed, green-eyed mutant to tear open the luggage compartment and stand on top of the cab roof, hurling suitcases and holdalls all over the reception area. Finally, it jumped down and straddled the face of the semi-comatose Butler. It put its face inches away from his throat. ‘Mission accomplished, old man,’ came the deadpan Alder-shot monotone. ‘Sorry we had to meet like this. Got to make it look convincing you know.’ He thumped Butler’s face making his nose bleed. ‘OK,’ it continued. ‘That looks a bit better. Tell Iffy that the grouse are OK for tomorrow.’ ‘You. . . you . . .’ stammered Butler, flabbergasted. ‘Fraid so,’ returned the green-eyed, three-toed, glue-encrusted punk. ‘Can’t wait to get back to base and burst this bloody water-filled humpback.’ ‘Whom shall I say called?’ groaned Butler, in agony. ‘Just tell him . . . the Scarlet Pudding. Be seeing you.’ And with that it ran across the steps, scaled a drainpipe, swung across the ivy-clad walls, leapt into a tree . . . and disappeared. The front door opened.

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‘Butler, what the hell is going on here?’ demanded Iffy. Butler staggered over to the balck cab and released the door catch. The interior emptied its human effluent on to the gravel. Mark West was first on his feet. ‘This is not very amusing, he announced ‘My dress is ruined,’ screeched Laetitia. Cynthia remained on the floor, exhausted, counting the gravel chips, whilst Margot used Roderick as a doormat as she berated the stork-like figure of the laird. ‘Are you in charge here?’ she demanded angrily. ‘I’m Lord Iffy Boatrace, twenty-fifth Laird of Findidnann and master of all that you see.’ he swept his hand across the horizont, like Moses about to spout the Ten Commandments. ‘You are all my guests,’ he declared grandly. ‘And my butler is at your service. We dine at nine, but the poet’s in the Moet, ho ho ho.’ Iffy cackled like a drain. Nobody laughed. ‘Until then,’ he paused dramatically, ‘au revoir.’ And she slammed the door violently. ‘Hasn’t changed a bit,’ chirped Roderick from the door. ‘Mad as hatter,’ declared Mark. ‘That’s what I mean. Hasn’t changed a bit since I knew him at school. He was off his trolley even then.’ ‘Speaking of trolleys,’ Laetitia whirled to face Butler. ‘You had better take our bags into the house. Or do we have to sleep out here tonight?’ ‘Yes,. You can do some bloody work for a change,’ grunted Margot, addressing anybody who was male.’I’m off for my meditation.’ She clumped up the steps in her yellow wellies.

‘I have to fix my hair,’ declared Laetitia brazenly and toppled towards the door on her heels. ‘What do we do now?’ shrugged mark, surveying the empty taxi and the wrecksage of suitcases strewn around. ‘We do what any English gentleman is taught to do,’ smiled Roderick, picking himself up from the floor. ‘Butler,’ he ordered sharply. ‘Carry on.’ And with that, the two old Thigwellonians strode off happily toward the house Cynthia remained on the floor, ignored by her husband, 48

chips of limestone still adhering to ther chocolate-covered mouth. She turned her head slowly to where the butler was leaning back on the car, ashen-faced, nose smeared with blood, and still gagging from the choking he had received. ‘What nobility,’ she thought. ‘What goodness and dedication, what selflessness and Christlike capacity for forgiveness he must have.’ A tear formed in the corner of her eye and trickled in a salty line to the side of her mouth. She could fall in love with a real man like that, she decided. She licked her lips and tasted her tears. More savoury than chocolate she thought approvingly.

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9 The Joy of Marriage Butler was not exactly a haute cuisine chef. Lord Iffy had given him the task of preparing a dinner for seven people, but he was just not up the task. Still he presevered and now at least every available pot was steaming, every available oven was roasting, and Butler himself was beginning to feel a little more relaxed as he flitted about amongst the bubbling cauldrons like an alchemist in the final stages of a great work. He was so engrossed in the removal of the huge turkey from the oven that he did not see Cynthia West dragging her bare feet down the stone staircase behind him. ‘Butler,’ she moaned. ‘I need food.’ ‘Good lord.’ Butler nearly dropped his turkey. ‘You can’t be down here, ma’am . . .’ ‘Food, I need food.’ She grabbed an isolated cucumber from the table in front of her and gnawed at it rapaciously. ‘If you give cheesecake,’ she added, ‘I’ll fuck you’ ‘Out of the question, ma’am,’ exclaimed a horrified Butler, backing away. Cynthia had appeared naked, but for a skimpy white

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nightshirt, her mascara smudged around her eyes like a vampire. She pursued Butler across the kitchen. ‘I’ll be good to you,’ she promised hoarsely. ‘You can use me how you like. I just need love.’ ‘I can make you a ham sandwich,’ he stuttered nervously. ‘I LOVE YOU!’ she screamed and rushed at him, slamming him up against the pantry door. ‘I love you! I love you!’ She repeated. ‘Ever since setting my eyes on you I have loved you! A man who can clean, who can cook, so godly, so good, so manly, so, so . . .’ She caressed the top of his apron. ‘So powerful . . . take me Butler, take me now!’ ‘B . . . b . . . b . . . out of the question, ma’am. Anyway I have the washing up to do.' ‘Washing up.’ She put her hand to her breast and raised her black eyes heavenward. ‘Washing up. God, I love you . . . mmmmm.’ She grabbed a piece of melon from a nearby tray and swallowed half of it in a single bite. ‘I love to wash up,’ she munched, pieces of juicy melon sliding down her chin. ‘I love to clean, to cook, to serve, to care for my man. I’ll do it for you.’ She fell to her knees and grasped the pressed edges of his trousers. ‘I love cleaning,’ she sobbed, her breath breaking into klaxon-like sobs. Butler gulped. Come back Slasher, he thought, all is forgiven. ‘Does your . . . er . . . husband know?’ he began. ‘HIM!’ exploded Cynthia. ‘Him? He hates me. All he thinks of is his cock!’ Butler sympathized; so did he. ‘All fifteen inches of it.' ‘How much?’ ‘Why do you think I married him?’ she wailed. ‘HOW LONG did you say?’ gasped Butler. ‘I married his knob, that’s all, and now I’m sick of it prodding, poking, prying, dangling on the floor, tickling my neck at night. Everytime he had a wank I had to repaint the bloody ceiling. He said it was stalactites . . .’ Butler let out a low whistle of astonishment and biological 51

curiosity. ‘You were the recipient of . . .’ he began slowly. ‘Sometimes he used to fold it in half,’ she interrupted. You can’t take that sort of thing for long.’ Butler thught back to his encounter with Slasher Munro. ‘No, maybe taht was only twelve-and-a-half inches,’ he thought. ‘ . . . And when we first met, he was using a bin liner as a, as a . . .condom.’ She burst into tears again and hauled herself up the front of Butler’s apron till her face was just below his. ‘Just don’t leave me alone,’ she pleaded, grabbing a lump of raw steak from the grill tray and cramming it into her jaws. She fell back against the meat chopping table, chewing paranoically and in a few seconds, she had swallowed the lot. She belched loudly.

‘I need a real man, Butler. A whole man, a pure man. I need you.’ Her huge hands ripped his apron away as she staggered towards him once more, lust burning in her eyes. Butler thought of the raw steak and turned pale. This woman was capable of anything. . . The shrill tinkle of the front doorbell saved him. The little red counter bobbing up and down in the servants’ information window told him who was ringing and from where. ‘Ah,’ he yelled, far too loudly. ‘Front door. Must be going.’ He thrust the entire forty-pound turkey at her. ‘Here,’ he shouted, ‘eat this.’ ‘Bloody ridiculous,’ swore Brian Taylor, against a red-skied Scottish sunset. ‘Not only was the pub not open, but the publican was a pervert, trussed up like a chicken. There’s been some serious fucking interbreeding up here, I can tell you,’ He staggered through the door and glared at Butler. ‘Get me a drink, man,’ he ordered. ‘Your wife is upstairs, sir,’ Butler responded, back in his element. ‘What sort of drink would you prefer?’ ‘A bottle of Scotch and a glass of water.’ Brian belched and fated simultaneously, rippling the shiny seat of his trousers. ‘Where is the old cow, anyway?’ he demanded. 52

‘Let me have your coat and show you to your room, sir,’ replied Butler. They mounted the stairs, Butler standing behind the staggering Taylor, in case he fell over. Butler led him past Margot and Roderick’s room to the one next door, where he opened the door and watched him topple inside. ‘Hello darling,’ he slurred, exaggerating the last word venomously. ‘What are we dressed up as tonight - Henry VIII or a fucking Christmas fairy . . .’ The door shut and Butler moved off soundlessly, back towards the staircase. ‘Aaugh!’ Thud. ‘Aaugh!’ Thud. ‘Aaaaugh!’ Margot finished her fiftieth press-up and bounced off the floor, breasts flopping across the top of her distended belly. ‘I think I’ll wear the boiler suit for dinner,’ she yelled. ‘That’s nice, dear.’ ‘Where’s my knob?’ she demanded. The half-shaven face of Roderick appeared fom the bath-room, two large cuts bleeding on his chin. ‘The little man in the box?’ he said brightly. ‘Yes,’ she replied testily.‘Did you bring my mains adaptor?’ ‘Under the bed, dear.’ She grabbed the large wooden box from under the four poster. In the bottom of the box, padded securely, lay the device. She set up the base plate and searched for a plug. Finding one behind a chest of drawers, she inserted the mains adaptor, turning the two-position switch to ‘mains’. There were a series of settings - ‘slow rotation,’ ‘fifteen-minute superstud’, ‘twohour rotation’, ‘lesbian encounter’, and ‘five-minute quickie’. She selected the last. Going back to the wooden box she took a scoop of ‘looby lube’ jelly in one hand, and a copy of Erica Jong’s Fear of Flying in the other. Squatting above the toadstool-like vertical head of the machine, she smeared herself with looby lube, turned to page one, switched on and squatted down.

Roderick had purchased the new device from a shop in

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Tottenham Court Road. He remembered how his ears had turned pink when he saw what it was, and how the air had turned blue when what it did was described to him. Now he heard it, a loud buzzing sound punctuated by jackhammer-like thumps and the familiar ‘aaugh, aaugh’ sound of Margot enjoying herself. He tried to continue shaving but found it impossible as the mirror began to vibrate. ‘Are you all right, my darling?’ he shouted above the buzzing and crashing. ‘Fuck off, I’m busy. I’m having an orgasm,’ Margot yelled back angrily. ‘Aaugh,’ she spluttered. ‘Aau . . . Aaaaur . . . AAAAURGH!!!’ Roderick flung open the bathromm door to see his wife convulsing wildly on the floor, the huge toadstool monstrosity struggling and jerking within her. Margot’s head had smashed its way through the wardrove door and become trapped, whilst her arms banged against the wooden sides in submission. ‘Aaurgh.’ ‘Aaugh.’ AAURGH!’ she screamed. Roderick wrenched on the mains cable, but the whole socked ripped out of the wal. ‘Aaurgh,’ echoed Margot, inside the body of the wardrobe. Roderick changed tactics and pulled on the base plate of the machine. He had been jolly good at tug o’ war at school, but Margot’s vaginal muscles, developed by months of natural childbirth exercises, held the killer sexual device in a bull-terrier-like grip within her. Roderick braced his feet against the wardrobe and heaved with all six foot four inches of his mighty frame. ‘You’ll pull my - AAAURGH! - fucking head off!’ cried Margot. Her pelvic thrusts smashed through the first floor-board supporting the wardrobe which threatened to topple and crush both of them. ‘Turn it off, you pillock!’ she shrieked. Gosh, thought Roderick, wasn’t Margot clever? And he flicked the switch on the base plate. 54

Margot’s bottom began to stop thrusting up and down in its slam-diving pursuit of the orgasmic, but then began to rotate, as if she were being roasted on a spit. ‘You idiot!’ she yelled. ‘You’ve put it on two-hour rotation. Help me. Help me. AAAAAAYAAAUGH!!!’ Roderick rushed into the hallway, stark naked, and banged on the next door. ‘Oh, crikey, open up. Margot’s being attacked by a huge electronic worm. Do open up,

please?’ ‘Permit me, sir,’ came a voice behind him,. And Butler reached above his head to the fuse box. The house plunged into darkness. The lights came on again a few seconds later. Butler stood holding the offending vibrator by its mains leads as if he were a fisherman displaying a prize lobster. ‘Awful thing,’ muttered Roderick aghast, peering at its glistening oily head. ‘Oh, my goodness me,’ whimpered Laetitia beholding Roderick’s massive naked frame. She pressed her gold-painted nails to her mouth.’What has been going on?’ She examined Roderick’s hairy chest, hairy navel and huge hairy balls. Her jaw dropped. ‘Oooh,’ she squealed. ‘A naked man.’ And her bottom wiggled in horrified delight. Brian Taylor’s balding, curly-haired head appeared around the doorway. He grinned at Roderick. ‘Been giving yourself a good dicking, have we?’ he chortled. ‘Why, er, well, I’, stuttered Roderick, his ears glowing and his balls retreating into his abdomen. ‘Brian!’ admonished Laetitia. ‘Can’t you see he’s upset? You poor boy,’ she cooed, pinching his scarlet cheeks. ‘It must have been awful.’ ‘Worraloadof shite,’ spat Brian Taylor and went back to bed.' ‘Cynthia,’ yelled Mark West from the room three doors down. ‘Cynthia!’ he called again, emerging out onto the landing with a torch ‘Hello,’ he said brightly as he saw Butler. ‘Good job I 55

Was in the scouts, you know. Be prepared and all that.’ He indicated the torch. ‘I was sure i could hear Cynthia a moment, ago. Have you, er, seen her?’ ‘No, sir,’ replied Butler, lying. ‘Perhaps she went to take some air before dinner.’ ‘Oh God, no,’ muttered Mark, grasping the torch firmly. I’d better go and look for her.’ With that he set off forthrightly down the stairs. Butler remained motionless holding up the device. ‘What,’ he asked distastefully, ‘shall I do with this?’ ‘I never want to see it again,’ stammered Roderick firmly. ‘Infernal thing . . . get rid of it.’ ‘And will Mrs Tennison be all right now, sir?’ ‘I’ll let you know, Butler.’ ‘Then I shall continue to prepare dinner for nine o’clock, sir.’ Butler padded noiselessly off down the hall. ‘Well,’ said Laetitia, taking the opportunity to visually rape Roderick one more time. ‘You’d better get some clothes on. Otherwise, ‘she added, licking her lips in that predatory smile, ‘you’ll turn blue.’ She giggled and shut the door. Butler reached the bottom of the stairs, out of sight of the bedrooms, then broke into a run and hid behind the cloakroom door. He had it now. He looked at the dildo in his hands. This act of God. How ironic, that through the pursuit of the Laird’s madcap grouse-shooting scheme, his own idea could now be brought to fruition. Fate was on his side. He would finish it . . . Tonight, he thought, with an inward smirk of joy. Roderick shut the door quietly. The wind was knocked out of his body with enormous force as

Margot headbutted him in the stomach. ‘Next time,’ she yelled, ‘leave me alone when I’m coming. It’s my body, so it’s my right to choose. Now get on the bed and get your dick hard.’ ‘Yes dear,’ gasped Roderick painfully, glad, anyway, that Margot still loved him. 56

PART THREE The Best Laid Plans . . .

57 - 58

10 The Maiden Run Mark went outside into the chill of the swirling Scotch mist. His electric torch beam cut through the damp air perhaps only thirty feet in front of him. It fastened on the deserted wreck of the taxi and followed the line of the driveway until it was swallowed up by the pitch blackness. ‘Cynthia?’ he called nervously, still standing on the stone steps, his shadow cast by the yellow lights of the bedroom windows. Mark shivered; he did not like the dark and he was afraid of ghosts, of which there were probably quite a few round here. He knew, he was an expert. ‘There are no ghosts,’ he muttered to himself firmly, and set off down the driveway clutching the torch. The gravel drive met the roughly tarmaced single-track road which glistened black in the moisture-laden atmosphere. Mark followed it, scanning his flashlight from left to right and periodically calling his wife’s name. The road followed the contour of the moorland and dropped into a small depression. Mark could see the comforting lights of Findidnann Hall being extinguished one by one as the crest of the hill rose behind him. Then he was surrounded by blackness and silence, apart from

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His footsteps, which seemed to be reflected back at him by the blanket of mist. ‘What the hell are those?’ he exclaimed suddenly, catching sight of some regular and very unusual-looking indentations in the boggy soil at the side of the road. He peered more closely. They were quite clearly made by a creature with three toes, and one human-shaped foot. Mark thought back to the three-toed, furry-legged taxi driver. ‘Something damn funny is going on here and I’m going to get to the bottom of it,’ he vowed resolutely. He set off in pursuit. The tracks continued behind the ridge, out of sight of Findidnann Hall, for about five minutes and then crossed a small stream which although full of water, lay still and cold in the night. The tracks vanished on the other side. ‘Shit,’ he hissed, shining his torch around. He knew what had happened. The monster had moved along the line of the stream, almost certainly away from Findidnann Hall, and the tracks would reappear later on. In the meantime, any casual onlooker would simply be puzzled by their disappearance, and would be put off by the water. ‘It really was a good job I was in the scouts,’ thought Mark as he gingerly placed his foot into the knee-deep, icy water. Then he set off in pursuit once more. Butler had locked the door at the top of the kitchen stairs and raced down the stone spiral steps, hands shaking as they gripped Margot’s murderous rubber rocket. At the bottom he almost fell over in his haste to rush towards the door, behind which his mechanical love beast lay. Flakes of white paint showered him like dandruff as he kicked the door open with indecent haste and revealed the machine within. He fell upon it with an orgasmic cry of joy, grabbing a spanner in one hand and unsheathing the steel stump over which the rubber head would be moulded. With a small metalworker’s mallet he softly battered Margot’s toy until it fitted snugly. Then he applied the molecular adhesive which would bond rubber to metal as if they were one. He giggled manically and rubbed his hands ..

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Together with glee, doing a little dance on his tiptoes at the same time. ‘My beauty,’ he smirked. ‘A little bit of brasso to polish up your cylinders, some lubricant on the sharp end, and you’ll bring a smile to anyone’s face . . . What’s that? He moved like lightning to the doorway as he heard groaning from the kitchen. ‘Oh fuck it, she’s still here, ‘ he snapped remembering Cynthia. ‘Oh well, I’ll tell her to sod off and . . . ‘he froze. Cynthia’s torso lay spreadeagled on the meat chopping table, dressed solely in her which cotton nightgown. Her feet were on the ground and her buttocks undulated underneath the material like two copulating ferrets. Her head was stuck firmly inside the carcass of the fortypound turkey which Butler had thrust at her before answering the front door. All that remained of the turkey was skin and bone. ‘What have you done with my turkey?’ he cried furiously. ‘Eaten it,’ groaned Cynthia. ‘How did you get your head stuck inside the carcass then, you useless piece of baggage?’

‘Trying to eat the rest of it,’ answered Cynthia. ‘Yuri Garagin,’ she vomited violently, the turkey carcass slamming up and down on the end of her neck as its semi-digested breast meat exploded through the bird’s sternum like psychedelic liquid concrete, cascading across the chopping table like and incoming tide. Cynthia caught sight of Butler through the hole in the side of the bird’s rib cage where she had blown out the contents of her stomach. ‘Butler,’ she gurgled. ‘Fuck me now.’ ‘Fuck you?’ he screamed. ‘Fuck you? I wouldn’t . . .’ An evil grin crossed his features and his black eyebrows angled down sharply. ‘I wouldn’t say no,’ he uttered softly, licking his lips. Cynthia hoisted her nightdress over her hips, revealing deliciously fleshy buttocks crossed with a suntan line caused by the briefest of bikinis. She thrust a hand between her legs and started to masage her moistening furry snatch. ‘Take me,’ she shuddered, the turkey carcass tossing from one side to the other in ecstasy.

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‘Yes dear, yes darling, yes my precious . . . My sweet, mon petit chou chou.’ Butler’s voice faded as he checked Pelvotron’s equipment in the other room. He ran down the pre-sex checklist: power terminals connected, erectile fluid prepared, orgasmic cycle correctly adjusted (he didn’t want a premature ejaculation on the first test run), telescopic mountings operational all was ready. ‘If you don’t fuck me soon. I’ll scream,’ shouted Cynthia histerically. Buttler looked up and took a deep breath. This was it. He flicked off the control panel cover and switched on. The machine emitted an even humming sound as the electrics began to pump fluid around in readiness. A green light appeared on the panel. ‘Ready.’ Butler turned the silver key to the right and a red light clicked on. ‘Armed.’ His eyes lit up as if arc lights had been switched on behind his retinas and his quivering finger pressed the last three command buttons: ‘Seek and Penetrate’. ‘Full Auto’ and, the final on, ‘Initiate’. ‘Now,’ he growled. ‘Go get her, old girl.’ Mark’s legs were numb with cold. He had been knee-deep in the freezing water of the muddy stream for five minutes now, wading trough the swirling mist, and still no sign of any more tracks. He had begun to despair when the stream forked off to the right, the main body disappearing into the night. Mark examined the new tributary with his flashlight. The edges of the channel looked as though they had been dug at some point with a spade. He shone the light on the surface of the water; the stream led straight into a samll hillock, a large patch of heather bristling over the point where it disappeared. He climbed out of the icy brook and squelched upwards. Grasping a thick clump of the bush, he pulled. ‘My God!’ he gasped, as the heather swung aside on oiled hinges to reveal the lair within. The entire hillock had been carefully excavated and landscaped. Mark had

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His Backwoodsman’s badge from the boy scouts, but this hide, well, he’d never seen anything so professional. The beam of the torch fell on the contents of the nest. In the corner lay two large, plastic, three-toed furry feet; a dayglo coloured Mohican wig, with plastic skull cover; various other artefacts of a theatrical nature and an empty, waterfillable plastic hunchback. The light continued around the walls. In the last corner lay a huge pile of dead birds slung on top of one another haphazardly, perhaps fifty of them in all. ‘Damned fishy,’ Mark exclaimed, closing the door, switching off his torch, and cocking an ear to see if he had been followed. ‘Damned fishy,’ he repeated and splashed back into the stream to go home. What Mark West did not see were the small, radio-controlled antennae that sprouted from the head of every ‘dead’ bird, and the tiny propellers that protruded from each anus. Butler’s machine pivoted on one caterpillar track and squeaked across the kitchen floor, its bulbous end gleaming as lubricant was sprayed upon it every 1.2 seconds precisely. Cynthia was almost on the point of orgasm. ‘Hurry up, Butler, dammit, hurry up.’ Butler moved behind her and placed two trembling hands on her buttocks, parting them slightly to afford a better view. The huge head of the machine was efficiently positioning itself behind her vagina and was doing its sums. Bore, stroke, timing and angle required. The hidraulic steel tube slid out another two inches whilst the telescopic mountings dropped the angle for better upward thrusting. ‘Now! Now!’ Cynthia screamed. But the machine was patient; it was waiting for the eact dead centre of the labial cleft to gyrate into its cross wires. ‘Yesss!’ Cynthia’s body stiffened as the metal rod shot forward like a stiking cobra, the hissing pneumatic release plunging it deep into her womb. No sooner had it hammered her ovaries once than it withdrew like lightning, squirted more

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Lubricant on its work surgace, and struck again. The entire cycle took precisely 1.2 seconds. Butler held on to Cynthia’s buttocks fiercely as the machine struck more rapidly, adding a further four telescopic inches so taht the piston-like head was always inside her, and was striking from within. ‘Stop!’ she screamed. ‘Haven’t you come yet?’ ‘I’m a long stayer,’ shouted Butler above the hissing and squirting lubricant. He was a little perturbed; the machine was programmed to come, but had no done so. He examined the two silver Christmas balls he had suspended under the hydraulics. They were empty. He had forgotten to fill them with ejaculatory fluid and without it the machine would not stop. If the machine were to go into orgasm mode without any means of ejaculating itself. . . ‘Good God,’ he thought. ‘Two hundred and fifty strokes a minute is okay for five seconds, but for any longer. . . ‘ He release Cynthia’s buttocks and ran into the pantry, crashing through the shelves and

looking for a pot of double cream. ‘Who’s there?’ wailed Cynthia. ‘Butler, were are you? Butler, Butler, But. . . Wooargh!’ Butler dashed out of the pantry, the bucket of cream in his hads, but she was gone. He looked down the long, stone-flagged corridor that led to the tradesman’s entrance at the rear of the house. The door had been battered down with enourmous force, and twin caterpillar tracks led up the embankment and out onto the misty moor beyond. In the distance, Butler could just hear the distant whine fading. The delinquent Pelvotron hurtled over Findidnann moor like a rabid man battle tank. Instead of a gun, though, it bore a gyrating, white-robed figurehead, face covered with a turkey carcass, impaled upon its pistoning probe and was pitching over the heather at thirty miles per hour. Cynthia was screaming abominably from inside the tur-key’s innards as two hundred and fifty thursts per minute penetrated her swollen cleft with the 'kerchung kerchung

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Kerchung’ report of the compressed air used to initiate the orgasmic cycle. The high-pitched whine of the electric motors cut through the silence of the mist. It would be a long time before the batteries ran down. . . Butler was distraught. He looked hopelessly at the track disappearing into the mist. His machine, the mighty Pelvotron, gone, perhaps forever. A tear formed in the corner of his eye. It was his life’s work and now . . . And now. . . He slumped, ashen-faced, against the outside wall, unable to concentrate his mind. He looked at his watch. It was 8.15 p.m. The reali-zation hit him like a thunderclap. He had no turkey, no main course: that wretched woman had eaten it. ‘Get a grip, John Butler,’ he muttered, thinking in cockney. ‘Pull yourself together.’ He thought deeply. No one knew Cynthia had seen him or been in the kitchen, and no one would ever find her out there on the moors on a night like this. ‘So.’ He sniffed the air sharply. ‘A main course, my lad.’ Butler glanced at the bucket of cream in his hand, and then at the caterpillar tracks of Pelvotron. There, in the light of the kitchen doorway, were numerous shiny brown globules, most frequently dropped out of the backs of rabbits. Butler grinned and evil grin. ‘Bit of cream, Worcester sauce and mustard, they’ll taste just like vegetarian meatballs.’ He put the bucket of cream on the sink unit and went to find a shovel. Mark West was halfway back down the main course of the Stygian stream when he heard the noise. ‘Bats,’ he thought. The noise drew closer and a distinct rhythmic moaning could be heard, as if a hound of hell was loose on the moors. The hairs on the back of his neck felt needle sharp and his palms began to sweat. ‘There are no ghosts,’ he growled, grinding his teeth. This was obviously some sort of trick, he thought, or else he had disturbed the maniac taxi driver in the course of

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whatever nefarious work he was up to. Mark scrambled out of the water and hid behind the ridge. Whatever it was, it was coming closer. He would wait until it was almost upon him and them ambush it. Mark gripped his flashlight for reassurance. He damn well knew how to belt somebody with it as well, he thought. The screaming and wailing seemed to fill the moor as Mark West sttod up and switched on his torch. ‘The game’s up, whoever you are.’ Pelvotron flattened him as it ran along the crest of the ridge at top speed. One of its tracks knocked the legs from under him as he performed an involuntary somersault which drove the wind out of him. Mark picked himself up. He had not seen whatever had hit him in the darkeness and he had lost his torch. He was now very frightened indeed. The awful device ran down the hill at the end of the ridge, still pumping ‘kerchung kerchung kerchung’ in its orgasmic attempt to shoot its absent load. At the bottom, the robot ran around in a small circle and headed back the way it had come. ‘Mother!’ screamed Mark West. The rotten cadaverous head, pumping and jerking in mid-air, bore down on him like the fifth horseman of the apocalypse on PCP. The white burial shroud flapped in the wind as the fiend rode on top of the mist, threatening to open up the very gates of hell itself with its blood-curdling shrieks. ‘AAAAGH!’ Mark threw his arms up in the air and dived off the ridge, running in panic through streams, across bogs, into thick clumps of bracken, until he fell exhausted on to a large rock. He could neither hear nor see the phantom which had attacked him. He also had no idea whatsoever about where he was. He took a pace off the rock and was swallowed thighdeep in bog. ‘Fucking hell!’ he exclaimed. ‘Well, I got in here somehow, so I must be able to get out. Lucky I brought some matches. Be prepared and all that.’ The matches were soaking wet.

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Pelvotron ignored the being that leapt out of its path as it careered down the ridge with a female glove puppet stuck on its prong. The water of the stream however was a different problem altogether and the caterpillar tracks ground into the mud flailing uselessly, sinking down until Cynthia’s feet splashed into the water two hundred any fifty times a minute. The water soaked everything, but especially the two Christmas tree balls which were totally submerged and now full of smelly Scottish stream water. ‘Kerchung kerchung KACHUNG PSSSS.’ A huge jet of water squirted from the hosepipe-sized nozzle in the glans of the beast, shooting Cynthia straight off the end as if a water cannon had been fired up her arse. She flew through the air a full six feet before splashing into the stream face down, turkey beast bone

upwards. She did not move. Pelvotron, however, found its ejaculatory fluid being instantly replenished by the ditch water, and spent its next happy orgasmic hours squirting evel-smelling liquid around the moors, like a Thames fire boat.

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11 Dinner is Served

Iffy had been at the brandy before dinner. As matter of fact, Iffy had been at the brandy since the guests arrived, and Butler was dreading the consequences. He remembered the last time that Iffy had hit the bottle, on a trip to a small but very influential Arab Emirate. Lord Iffy, sent by the Foreign Office in a grave error of judgement, staggered off the plane clutching a vodka bottle and cast a lecherous eye over the 1,000 masturbating Arab schoolchildren laid on in his honour. Zigzagging up to the Sheikh and his yashmak-clad 250th wife, he shook the wife’s hand first, addressed her as Darth Vadar, and asked if her husband was a Catholic on account of all the children. There were questions in the House of Commons. Butler shuddered. Presently, Iffy was juggling hard-boiled eggs very badly whilst perched like a rooster on the arm of his chair at the head of the table. ‘Not bad, eh?’ he shouted tremulously, the eggs all coming to rest in his blanched white hands at last. Roderick, Margot, Laetitia and Brian all remained unimpressed. They’d had a long chaotic journey and now this

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crane-like, squawk-voiced, interbred aristocrat was trying to do a circus trick. They were all very hungry. ‘Oh well, suit yourself,’ muttered Iffy with a sigh. ‘BUTLER!’ he yelled. ‘Get the scoff on the table!’ ‘Very good, sir,’ Butler went to fetch the main course.

The formal dining room at Findidnann Hall was, as one would expect from such a savage country, largely military in decor. Stern family portraits of the warriors in the family ancestry of Findidnann lined the oak-panelled walls, and, guarding the double doors at each end of the room, were four full sets of armour, each equipped with a twelve-foot pike in its mailed fist. Above the twenty-foot long table itself, right in the middle of the room, hung a massive crystal chandelier. Butler wheeled in the main course trolley, unveiling the meatball substitute in cream and mustard sauce. Margot peered at it, genuinely puzzled. ‘What is it?’ she demanded sharply. ‘A vegetarian dish, ma’am,’ Butler replied. ‘Vegetarian? That’s very enlightened. I’ll have two portions then,’ smiled Margot proudly. ‘What’s it called?’ chirped Laetitia. ‘Rabbit Findidnann,’ Butler said with a smirk, as he loaded Margot’s plate. ‘RABBIT?’ Margot screamed, grabbing Butler by the throat. ‘Er, rarebit, ma’am,’ he choked, palms sweating. ‘What is it in French? Squaled Laetitia. ‘I mean, all cuisine is in French if it’s any good.’ ‘Ahem.’ Butler cleared his throat dramatically. ‘Rarebit а la derriиre, ma’am.’ ‘How romantic.’ Laetitia clasped her hands together. ‘I want meat,’ Brian Taylor grunted, emerging from his gin and tonic. ‘Not this rarebit shit.’ ‘We don’t have any I’m afraid, sir.’ ‘Why the fuck is there a bloody great carving tray and a full set of meat knives laid out then?’ Brian wheezed. Butler was stumped momentarily. ‘Tradition,’ he replied. 69

‘Bollocks.’ Brian Taylor re-entered his glass. ‘Whatever, whatever, whatever. Just serve the wretched stuff, I’m famished,’ ordered Iffy. ‘Rather,’ smiled Roderick, pleased that Margot was quiet for a few seconds. Dinner continued. Laetitia talked about herself, Brian Taylor talked to his bottle, Roderick tried to get a word in edgeways but was heavily ignored, and Margot consumed three pounds of overdone vegetables and had several helpings of rarebit derriиre. Iffy waited until the foultasting coffee had been served, then slipped off one of his stilettos and banged it like a gavel on the table top. ‘A toast,’ he proclaimed, screwing in his monocle. ‘Absent friends.’ Butler had a violent choking fit in the corner. ‘Are you all right, Butler=‘ asked Iffy suspiciously. Butler noded silently, red faced. Iffy cleared his throat. ‘Fellow Thigwellonians and consorts,’ he began. ‘I’m not his consort,’ growled Margot menacingly. ‘I can’t even play a musical instrument,’ giggled Laetitia fluttering her eyelids. Iffy’s face bore a pained expression. He began again. ‘Friends, Thigwellonians, countrymen. . . ‘ ‘I’m not a man. I WILL NOT be stereotyped,’ ranted Margot. ‘For Christ’s sake bloody well shut up and listen to me the lot of you!’ roared Iffy, his eye growing bloodshot behind his monocle.

‘More democratic-sounding, anyway,’ Margot muttered. ‘Thank you,’ he hissed. ‘Tomorrow at two p.m. we people assembled here will mak sporting history. For several generations my family has been breeding a race of super-productive birds, based on a popular sporting species, which will result in their being available for sport all year round. But,’ he paused for effect, ‘but only here, on Findidnann estate.’ ‘Jolly clever,’ shouted Roderick, enthusiastically clapping loudly until his ears blushed and he had to stop. 70

‘I didn’t know birds could play basketball ’ tittered Laetitia over the cracking of Roderick’s palms. ‘Sport?’ mumbled margot. ‘What kind of sport?’ ‘Shooting,’ Iffy announced. ‘The humble grouse, long since ennobled, will acheve a new notoriety, a new lease of life as the Iffy grouse, superior in every way, supercedes its . . .’ ‘Over my dead body.’ Margot stood up, flinging her napkin down into her unfinished rabbit droppings. ‘That can be arranged,’ wheezed Brian, who had his head on the table. ‘Shut up.’ Margot threw a bread roll which hit his bald head and bounced off into a corner. ‘Don’t you behave like this is a country and western movie,’ screeched Laetitia also standing up. ‘This is a stately home.’ ‘ I’ll behave how I like, you over*-titted American pig.’ ‘Good show, eh Butler, what?’ enthused Iffy. ‘Poor, innocent creatures!’ cried Margot, ‘This is a weekend of mass murder, poor innocent creatures blown to pieces by aaaaurgh!’ She stamped her wellies and went purple. ‘Steady on, old horse,’ said Iffy, taken aback. ‘Murdering fascist!’ she screamed. Iffy ducked under the table as she hurled a plate of rabbit’s droppings at him like a frisbee. ‘Worse than Hitler,’ she screamed. ‘Nothing wrong with Hitler,’ muttered Butler, who had all of his albums, under his breath. ‘Class traitor!’ ranted Margot, taking advantage of her bat-like hearing to excuse her throwing a table knife at him, which missed, shattering the glass case and finally coming to rest in a stuffed Labrador. Butler dived behind a suit of armour as Iffy’s head popped up from underneath the table and grinned at Roderick. ‘Food fight, old chap. Every man for himself!’ cried Iffy, hurling a chocolate mousse at Laetitia. ‘Oh, rather,’ exclaimed Roderick, bounding out of his chair and pelting the cowering Butler with cold brussel sprouts. 71

Iffy’s mousse stuck pneumatically to one of Laetitia’s breasts chocolate dribbling down the rhinestone-studded crinolene.

Laetitia stood up in panic, eyes popping out of her skull, mouth agape, arms rotating. ‘Brian!’ she screamed. ‘Brian, do something,’ she began systematically sticking a fork in the neck of her paralytic husband. ‘Hit him for me, you asshole! Wake up, you bastard!’ she yelled, drawing blood with the prongs. ‘You upper-class dickhead!’ shouted Margot at Roderick. ‘This is a fucking class war, not a fucking lah de dah bunfight.’ ‘Not any more it isn’t,’ called Iffy as he spin-bowled an orange at Margot’s temple. ‘You fucking bastard. I’m going to kill you!’ she roared, grabbing one of Brian Taylor’s wellobserved carving knives and baring her teeth. Roderick grabbed her arm. ‘Steady on, old girl, he is the host you know.’ ‘Aaaaaurgh!’ Margot chopped at the air as Roderick tightened his grip. ‘Kill him, kill him, kill the mother-fucker, he ruined my dress,’ wailed Laetitia. Iffy cackled histerically. ‘Still a vegetarian, Margot?’ he guffawed. ‘Excuse me, ma’am,’ said Butler, crawling towards Laetitia on his hands and knees from behind the armour, ‘But if I may clean your dress. . .’ ‘Don’t touch me!’ Laetitia screamed histerically and hurled a silver coffee pot at him. Laetitia was a lousy shot. The coffee pot clanged into the suit of armour once worn by the fifteenth Lord of Findidnann, rattling its metal plates as it rocked on its base. The twelve-foot metaltipped pike, which balanced precariously in its mitten, dislodged and fell swiftly towards the door, severing the electric cable which not only supplied the power to the huge chandelier, but also suspended the massive construction which hung 72

Like the sword of Damocles over the struggling Margot Smith. The pike was still pretty sharp after three hundred years and Butler watched open mouthed as it sliced cleanly through the cord with an almighty blue flash. Simultaneously, the dining table was split asunder and Margot’s spluttering screams of indignation were silenced as the chandelier crowned her, chopping the oak table in two as it crashed down in a splintering haze of shattered bulbs and fragmented crystal. The room remained in pitch blackness for a full thirty seconds. ‘Fucking hell, Butler!’ exclaimed and astonished Iffy. ‘Fucking good fireworks, what!’ ‘Aaaurgh,’ Margot groaned feebly, half brained by the bras centrepiece of the chandelier. Butler felt his way around the walls and found the door; his hand curled up around the doorknob and he pulled himself to his feet. SMACK! The double doors burst open and a awoodworm-infested panel smashed into the servant’s nose, re-opening the afternoon’s nosebleed and knocking him to the floor. Silhouetted against the hall lights stood a hunched figure in rags, trembling and smelling distinctly of ditch water. ‘What the hell have you done with Cynthia?’ snarled Mark West. The wall lights flicked on around the room. Iffy stood by the door at the other end. ‘Bit late for dinner,’ he remarked dryly. ‘You did it.’ Mark West pointed at Iffy. ‘Not me, old man - never had it, never will.’ ‘Then it was you!’ screamed Mark, advancing on the smi-comatose Margot with his hands in strangulation mode. ‘You and your bloody plastic abomination, you kidnapped her, didn’t

you?’ ‘Steady on now,’ muttered Roderick, releasing Margot’s 73

knife hand and clasping Mark fraternally around the shoul-ders. ‘We’re all friends here you know, remember the school song: ‘Thigwell Thigwell all stand together Thigwell Thigwell all kinds of weather Thigwell Thig. . . Aaargh’ Roderick clasped his buttocks as Margot savagely thrust the carving knife into his juicy gluteus maximus. ‘Blood, blood, oh my God.’ Laetitia swooned and flopped all over the back of her comatose husband. ‘I’ll bash your brains in, you cow,’ growled Mark, renewing his approach on Margot as Roderick rolled on the floor clutching his bum. Two enourmous explosions rocked the walls as Lord Iffy let off both barrels of a twelve-bore Purdey into the ceiling, bringing down bucketfuls of loose plaster and chunks of splintered wood. ‘Not tonight you won’t,’ declared the Laird sharply,’one attempted murder a day is quite enough, eh Rodders?’ ‘Just a flesh wound, Iffy, I’ll be fine tomorrow. Wouldn’t want to miss the shoot,’ Roderick grinned painfully. ‘Yes yes yes, jolly good. Well, stick a plaster on it. You’d better see to that wife of yours, most extraordinary woman. She is a woman I suppose?’ he muttered. ‘Now, Butler,’ he ordered, turning to the cowering servant, ‘See Mr. West to his room.’ He jabbed the barrels of the gun towards the door. ‘I shall see to the good Mrs Taylor . . . Myself.’ He smiled thinly. ‘Go on, sod off,’ he roared and Butler scuttled out. Mark grabbed his sleeve as they turned the corner and were out of sight of the dining room. ‘Butler,’ he whispered. ‘I have to speak with you. Look, old man, Iffy’s a fruitcake, Roderick’s half-baked and Margot’s in this thing up to her neck. I think you’re the only one here I 74

Can trust. Listen.’ He caught his breath. ‘There’s something damned weird going on out on that moor.’ Butler stiffened anxiously. ‘You’ll think I’m crazy, but I saw a white-robed phantom with a disfigured head, screaming like a hell hound and riding through the mist two feet off the ground.’ Butler went white and grasped at a chair for support. ‘Then you have seen it,’ gasped Mark. ‘You’ve seen it too, I’m not raving mad.’ Butler nodded silently. He certainly had seen it. ‘And that’s not all,’ Mark continued. ‘I’ve found the lair of that homicidal cab driver out there. Only he’s not really a driver, and he’s not really a punk because I found his disguise.

He’s a proacher dammit - I saw all the birds.’ Butler’s ears pricked up. ‘Oh really? Where might one find this poacher’s lair? I’m sure the Laird would thank me for nipping this chappie in the bud . . .’ ‘Look,’ offered Mark, ‘ I’ll tell you where it is, you just help me to find Cynthia. I know a conspiracy when I see one . . .’ 75

12 Bumps in the Night

Iffy watched as Roderick extricated Margot from the chan-delier and staggered off to bed arm in arm with her, a large red patch staining his breeches where the carving knife had entered. When they had gone, Iffy placed the Purdey on the dining table and emptied his pockets of the half a dozen shells he had taken just in case. He looked at the clock. It was eleven p.m. ‘Time for bed, Mrs taylor,’ he grunted, slinging the corpse-like Laetitia over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift. ‘But first,’ he added enthusiastically, ‘a few questions.’ He went up to his study and locked the dor. He dumped Laetitia in his favourite high-backed chair, coughing irritably as the dust billowed out of the cushions; he lit an oil lamp in the corner of the room and set it on the table next to the American. Then he took a tape measure from a drawer and measured her breasts. He measured their individual size, volume and circumference. With a pair of vernier calipers he measured the nipples and finally with a pair of dividers he measured the size and capacity of her mouth. Iffy sat down with a sheet of paper and a slide rule for 76

five minutes then after scribbling incomprehensible symbols by the light of the oil lamp sat back satisfied ‘I think,’ he mused. ‘I know all about you, Mrs Taylor.’ He got up and strode over to the bookshelves, running his fingers down the book spines until he found his late uncle’s works. He examined the titles: Breasts and Women’s Brains, The Psychology of Mammary Glands, The Nipple and the Empire, and his greatest work Human Psychology as Determined by Breast Mouth Relationships. Iffy’s uncle had been fascinated by breasts and Iffy longed to continued his research, specially with such an obviously degenerated and low creature as this awful colonial female. He examined the tables in the book, correlating his measurements with their predictions. Laetitia began to stir. ‘Where am I?’ she moaned. ‘Where am I?’ she moaned.

‘You’re quite safe,’ said Iffy soothingly. ‘You’re friends.’ ‘Are we alone?’ she asked wistfully. ‘Yes, we are,’ replied Iffy, jotting something do a small notebook. ‘This place is so wonderfully romantic.’ Laetitia sighed. ‘So peaceful after that horrid dinner with that awful woman.’ ‘You mean Margot?’ ‘Yes, her. The Goodyear blimp.’ She looked around the room. ‘What’s that?’ she pointed at Iffy’s telescope. ‘That is my window on the celestial world, my view of the stars. I am something of an amateur astronomer.’ ‘You mean it’s a telescope?’ she translated. ‘Yes, it’s a telescope,’ said Iffy, somewhat deflated. ‘Let me see,’ she asked. ‘Oh, I don’t know if that’s . . . ‘ But she had already grasped the brass cylinder and was peering out on to the misty moor. ‘For hundreds of years men have seen this veiw, and now they are all gone. Ondly their spirits remain, shadows in the old oak walls which have seen all but which tell nothing, 77

such is the depth of their knowledge.’ She clasped her hands together poetically. ‘Lord Iffy,’ she said joyously. ‘I feel as though I have been part of this tableau before, perhaps in another life, maybe I was destined to meed you . . . ‘she trailed off, misty*-eyed. How awful, thought Iffy, what a dreadful woman. ‘Are you implying that you might in some way be related to me?’ he asked sternly. ‘Perhaps spiritually,’ she implored. ‘What’s your maiden name?’ he demanded, taking a copy of Burke’s Peerage from the lower shelves. ‘Tortellini,’ she replied. ‘But that’s Italian,’ he exploded, slamming the book shut. ‘So are your shoes,’ she snapped, looking at his Gucci stilettos. ‘Don’t see what that has got to do with my parentage.’ he retorted. ‘Just take my word of it.’ Laetitia clasped her hand over Iffy’s pudgy fingers. ‘Take me into your clan,’ she whispered. ‘Eh?’ said Iffy. Laetitia dragged him on to the balcony overlooking the moor and leant on the balustrade, her bottom thrust out at him. She looked down at the thirty-foot drop. ‘I feel giddy, Lord Iffy, I feel weak from the height, take advantage of me.’ She slapped her own rump firmly. ‘Impregnate me with the blood of the Picts, the Scots, this savage island nation. Give me the Dunkirk spirit. Invade my Normandy, breach my portcullis.’ ‘Just a minute,’ shouted Iffy nervously, running in to grab his uncle’s psychology manual. He hadn’t bargained for this. He had been a virgin for all his thirty-five years, having never found a woman whose blood was sufficiently blue for him to intermingle with. The hand of the twenty-third Lord of Findidnann, formerly dead and thoroughly stuffed, reached out of its glass case and held Iffy firmly by the wrist as he ran past.

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‘I wouldn’t do it if I were you, sir,’ came the gruff Aldershot monotone. ‘You,’ hissed Iffy. ‘You’ve got a damned nerve. My uncle would turn in his grave.’ ‘He wasn’t using the body at the time, sir, so I took the opportunity to set up an OP here.’ ‘OP?’ queried Iffy. ‘Observation Post, sir. All part of the job.’ ‘Have you ever had sex over a fire scape?’ yelled Laetitia. ‘Beg pardon?’ shouted Iffy. ‘Wow, being up this high makes my head go al gooey, and I feel really horny and I want you . . . RIGHT NOW !’ she demanded. ‘Coming dear,’ replied Iffy, who had no intention of so doing. ‘Well, what the hell do you want, and what am I going to do with her?’ he whispered. ‘And make it fast.’ ‘At this very moment, sir I have observed one of your guests, Mark West, in collusion with your butler, plotting your permanent demise.’ ‘Good God, I must investigate at one.’ ‘Sink me with your Socottish Armada!’ wailed Laetitia. ‘What the hell am I going to do with her?’ ‘Leave her to me sir,’ said the corpse, releasing Iffy’s wrist. Iffy belted along the corridor and ran down the stairs to the dining room. It was empty, apart from Brian Taylor lying in an alcoholic slump at the other end of the table, and the house was silent. More significantly, the double-barrelled twelve bore and six cartridges had disappeared from the table. Iffy started to sweat. Laetitia had become frustrated. ‘Why can’t i ever get laid in this country?’ she roared, in a fury. The glass display case opened and out stepped the twenty-third Lord of Findidnann. ‘Who are you?’ she gasped. ‘I am the twenty-third Lord of Findidnann.’ 79

‘But you’re dead, you’re stuffed!’ she exclaimed in horror. ‘Not all of me,’ replied the Aldershot monotone. ‘Wow!’ she marvelled. ‘Aristrocratic necrophilia. Oh well, who gives a shit.’ The snapping of suspenders echoed out across the moor. Brian Taylor rolled his head over so that his ear rested on a dinner plate. The dining rom slowly came into focus. He stared down at the crippled table across which he was sprawled, its back broken like some torpedoed aircraft carrier, its centre covered with the demolished chandelier. Shards of crystal sprinkled the surrounding floor, and a trail of blood led towards the main doors. ‘Whatthefooksgononhere?’ grunted Brian, pushing away from the table and sitting upright with difficulty. He looked at his watches. There were three of them, and all six hands told the

same story - half-past five. Mr. Taylor belched loudly. ‘Opening time, my boy.’ He rose unsteadily to his feet. ‘Time for a bevvy.’ he wheezed and lurched over to the drinks tray. The drinking habits of the Glaswegian alcoholic are akin to those of a grizzly bear let loose in a honey shop. One day, David Attenborough might even make a film about it. Until then, however, Brian Taylor made his traditional comment on discovering that all the bottles were empty. ‘Worraloadofshite,’ he slavered, drooling from one side of his mouth as he inspected the empty bottle tightly, he staggered through the doors, fell down the stairs, told a stuffed badger to be quiet and fell out into the early morning blackness, as he headed towards the ‘Bonny Hacienda’. 80

Roderick snored loudly. Immediately after dinner he had put Margot to bed where she lay in the four-poster like a large mound of pillows stuffed under the sheets, and then he had stuck a huge, cross-shaped plaster on his bottom. Now he lay contentedly, curled up in a foetal position, his woolly hat firmly in place, his thumb stuck in his mouth, and a set of very warm furry long-johns covering him from hairy chest to hairy toes. Margot lay alongside him on her back, arms by her side, legs and body ramrod straight, her feet bolt upright beneath the covers. Suddenly, her eyes snapped open like roller blinds. One hand swiftly removed the cold compress from her head, and pulled on her overalls and boots. Roderick continued to snore as she crept silently out of the bedroom and stealthily moved downstairs. Butler clutched the map he had been given by Mark West. He now knew where the wretched creature had its lair and he knew when the birds in it would fly, but for the last few minutes he had been racking his brains trying to think of a way to despatch the despicable secret agent. He crept upstairs to the Laird’s study. He listened quietly at the door before he pushed it open. It squeaked protestingly and a floorboard creaked on the landing as Butler’s highly polished leather shoes glided into the room. Butler flicked on his torch. The beam fell upon the glass case formerly occupied by the twenty-third Laird of Findidnann. ‘My God,’ he breathed. ‘Empty.’ The beam took in the rest of the room. On the floor lay various pieces of ladies’ underwear, various parts of the dead Laird’s uniform, a tape measure and a set of vernier scale calipers. Butler stood puzzled for quite a few moments. He thought he knew the Laird pretty well, but after what Mark had said, and now. . . this. Butler knew of the Laird’s predilection for dressing up in women’s shoes and even stockings, but only below the knee. Never had stooped as far as garter belts. 81

and knickers, or . . . he gulped, dead men’s clothing. Actually, dead men’s clothing was something with which John Butler had had plenty of dealings in his more criminal capacity. He had frequently hired out the suits of the deceased for further funereal occasions, but he couldn’t imagine the market for a nineteenth-century red tunic and trousers. Butler’s train of thought snapped back to the present as he heard a rustling noise beneath the balcony window. Soundlessly, he moved over to the telescope and peered over the balustrade into the flower beds below. There was no sign of anyone. He waited for a few seconds, then re-entered the room and quickly ran his torch along the book titles on the library shelves. The beam stopped and Butler removed a slim, black paperback from the dust-encrusted woodwork. He smiled at the title - The Part-time Anarchists’ Guide to Booby Traps and Explosive Devices. ‘This should do the trick,’ he muttered, sneaking out to the landing, with the book concealed in his trousers. As the doors closed, the rustling beneath the balcony began again, as if a small rodent was excavating a burrow. Butler did not hear it. Mark West heard everything. Locked firmly in his bedroom wardrobe and covered in a sheepskin coat, he grimly gripped the bread knife which Butler had loaned him for protection. His teeth ground together all night in fear, suspicion and rage, but his paranoia about ghosts had intensified to such a degree that he felt incapable of action until morning. He listened intently to the house and its occupants, the wind moaning as it whirled around the damp walls outside. He listened to the creaking footsteps on the landing and in the hall, the opening and closing of the front door three times, and the squeaking of hinges from Iffy’s study, which happened twice. Mark lay still, hardly daring to breathe, vowing to recover Cynthia and to exact a horrible revenge on her kidnapper. 82

Butler crept through the tradesmen’s entrance, past the shattered remains of the back door through which Pelvotron had left. Picking his way through the now defunct vegetable garden, he arrived at the gardener’s shed. The gardener had not been to Findidnann for several months now (the Laird was too poor to pay him), and no one had been near the shed. Butler pushed against the rusty lock and the wooden door eventually gave in. He shone the torch around the cans and buckets which were stacked up on the shelves. Five minutes later, Butler, stagered back into the kitchen, his arms full of pots, nails and tools. He laid his terrorist utensils on top of the draining board and peered at the instructions in the book. Pressure cooker, weedkiller. . . He checked off the ingredients in the recipe . . . Sugar, rusty nails, ball bearings, rubber band and an old crow scarer. He smiled a thin smile. Whatever was out there, he’d do for it tomorrow. . . for good. Lord Iffy crouched, stooping in the old priest’s hole behind the portrait of his uncle in the hall, his eyes peering out of the slits in the picture where his uncle stared haughtily down at the front door entrance. He squatted silently, watching as three shadowy figures crept out through the front door at various times in the night, the second one apologising profusely to a stuffed badger. Only two returned before morning..

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13 Taking the High Road

‘Here we go, here we go, here we go’. Brian Taylor raucously zig-zagged down the windy road away from Findidnann Hall in pitch darkness, singing his favourite football chant as he went, his bottle raised to the invisible moon beyond the misty sky. As he reached the bottom of the hill he stopped, swaying helplessly. He had run out of words to sing. He looked at the crest of the hill, three of them as a matter of fact, and a broad lopsided grin crossed his alcohol-numed features. ‘You take the higheeh rooooad,’ he began slowly, ‘And I’ll take the low road. . .’ Then he stopped again, his pickled brain unable to recall the rest. Brian Taylor put himself on the starting blocks. He was back at school, the fastest 100 metres in Motherwell. He crouched in the mist and lurched forward, scrambling up to the top of the hill. ‘YOU TAKE THE HIGH ROAD’ he screamed at the top. ‘AND I’LL TAKE THE LOW ROAD.’ He plummeted to the bottom again. ‘And I’ll be in . . .’ there was the lopsided grin again, ‘ . . . SCOTLAND BEFORE YE!’ He tore up the hill again with unusual coordination and hurtled down the other side, falling face down in the 84

Stream where Pelvotron continued to squirt obscenely into the night. ‘Kerchung kerchung pss, kerchung kerchung psss.’ Brian extracted his face from the mud and watched admiringly as the little machine pumped away furiously. ‘Wha hey, Mac Scottish Mac Roadworks. You’re doin a good job there sonny.’ He slapped its metal belly. ‘Good lord.’ He suddenly noticed the white-clad, turkey-headed body of Cynthia lying in the ditch. ‘My God!’ he exclaimed. ‘A dead mac sheep.’ She didn’t move. ‘Probably that filthy big-eared pervert Roderick,’ he murmured unreasonably. ‘Anybody with a wife who wears wellies in sheep country . . . Too dodgy, eh? He addressed his empty whisky bottle again. ‘Well, goodnight to ye, ye bonny Scottish Mac Roadworkers.’ He paused. ‘What’s tha?’ In the gloom he saw a bright light fizzling in the damp air. ‘Time flies when you’re having fun, eh? Jock McVitie Barcelona, you rogue, opening time already?’ He lurched towards the light, splashing through the half-dry stream bed, by now mainly mud, as Pelvotron continued to irrigate the countryside. ‘You’ve changed the decor a bit, Jock,’ he chortled. ‘Spit and sawdust is it now?’ He peered inside the hollowed-out hole, a bright light glowing over the entrance. ‘Jock?’ He examined the contents of his discovery more closely, juggling them in his vision until his eyes rested on the discarded punk outfit.

‘Fancy dress, is it?’ he yelled. ‘Well, I’m game for that, but I’ll have none of your bondage perversions.’ He put the outfit on, hunchback and all, but ate the cheese earrings, being rather hungry and not, after all, having pierced ears. ‘Jocky, my boy, you owe me a dram for this!’ he yelled. ‘Where the hell are you, Jock?’ ‘Joock?’ ‘Jocky,’ he gurgled. ‘Jocky . . . Jockystrapon.’ He fell over in the muddy stream, collapsed in laughter. His expression changed abruptly, a few seconds later, 85

And a thunderous frown creased his receding hairline. ‘You’ll not mess with my liver any more, McVitie Barcelona. I’m comin’ tae find ye . . . ‘ And so, the three-toed, furry-footed hunchbacked Glas-wegian staggered off into the mist, once more in search of the ‘Bonny Hacienda’, his false Mohican on back to front and his eyebrows in the back of his bald head. A shadowy figure watched Brian Taylor disappear into the mist. It was hiding in a halfconstructed sheep dip pen. As the drunkard’s boozy revels faded out of earshot, the shadow flitted furtively out into the mist, his back towards the brightly lit lair. Clutched to its chest, it carried a large metal pot. The ‘Bonny Hacienda’ was reputed to have been built from the beams that composed the Spanish galleon shipwrecked in 1588; and Jock McVitie Barcelona, its landlord, was a descendant of Josй Barcelona, the sole surviving Spaniard. As a matter of fact, everyone in the village was descended at some point from Josй Barcelona, whose prowess as a Latin lover had been sought out by every female in the village, all of whom he had impregnated, along with a not inconsiderable number of sheep. In any case, Jock culminated the line of hispanic Scots-men, and proudly dominated the village. He was, until the possessor of one of the few telephones in Dubl’une, and he ran the post office when he felt like it. Should the need arise for petrol, one had only to ask for him to unlock the single pump and, of course, if you were a guest of British Rail, voila, Jock the station master. Some years previously, Jock had taken to wearing a wooden leg below his right knee in hte belief that it would encourage tourism. In the summer months he was often to be seen hobbling up and down the main street adorned with a stuffed parakeet on his shoulder, grimacing and spitting in a sub-Long John Silver display of over-acting. As a result, no tourist ever came near his pub for fear that he was 86

A raving lunatic. Now, however, he lept soundly, snoring loudly enough to rattle the window panes, and buried under a mountainous pile of blankets His slumber was noisily interrupted by the violent shaking of his front door and by the foulmouthed oaths coming from the streets outside. ‘Getthefuckoutthere, ye pervert,’ roared Brian Taylor.

Jock grabbed his wooden stump from beside the bed. Not only did it keept tourists away but it also doubled as a very efficient blunt instrument. ‘Who the bloody hell’s that?’ grumbled Jock, climbing down the steep wooden stairs in his heavy woollen night cap and night dress, looking like the dwarf Snow White rejected. ‘Open up, ye canna keep a bevvy from me, McVitie.’ The bolts slid back and the door opened a little, so that Jock could identify this maniac. ‘Jocky, me boy.’ Brian spread his arms wide in exaggerated greeting and staggered back a pace. He tossed the empty whisky bottle casually over his shoulder where it smashed in the street. ‘No more to drink,’ he wheedled, wobbling on his three-toed plastic foot covers. ‘Just an incy bincy little one,’ he giggled. Jock opened the door, a curious grin on his unshaven white chin. ‘Normally never, but seeing as its you . . .’ he gestured grandly for Brian to enter the pub. ‘Spoken like a true Scottish gentleman,’ he slurred, stepping over the doorway. ‘Thwack!’ The blow from the wooden leg hit him on the back of the head. ‘Ye scummy sassenach bastard,’ Jock yelled, raining blows on the unfortunate drunkard. ‘Jocky me boy indeed.’ He kicked him in the balls. ‘Incy bincy one,’ he mimicked and booted him in the kidneys. ‘You’ve got a nerve coming here after tying me up and stealing my taxi. What’ve you done with it?’ ‘Thwack!’ 87

‘Degenerate scum.’ ‘Thwack!’ ‘Thwack!’ ‘Thwack!’ Brian Taylor woke twenty minutes later. His eyes regis-tered only a blur, and his brain, such as it was, registered only pain. His body informed him that he was upright, and tied to a chair. ‘So, you’re awake are ye? Well?’ Jock pressed his face up close to Brian’s. ‘You’d better talk. In Dubl’une no one can hear you scream.’ Jock sat down and finished stripping the electric flex he was about to connect to Brian’s. You’d better talk. In Dubl’une no one can hear you scream.’ Jock sat down and finished stripping the electric flex he was about to connect to Brian’s nipples. ‘The voltage hereabouts is pretty variable,’ Jock added, matter-of-factly, ‘but I think you’ll find it sufficient. . .’ he paused and whispered in Brian’s ear ‘ . . . sufficient,’ he gestured, ‘to turn you into a fucking big prawn cracker.’ Brian Taylor was suddenly sober. ‘You’ve made a mistake . . .’ he gulped. ‘No, you’ve made the mistake,’ returned Jock, admiring the final piece of copper wire and cutting a lenght of sellotape. ‘Look, I’m not who you think I am. I found this outfit on the moor.’ ‘Oh yes,’ laughed Jocky. ‘And I suppose you’ll be telling me next that the shepherds wear them to help their sheep’s digestion. Of course, I’ve found hundreds of three-toed disguises in the Scottish Highlands. . .’ His tone changed viciously. ‘What do you take me for?’ He picked up the two wires. ‘It’s at Findidnann Hall,’ Brian blurted out.

‘What is?’ ‘Your taxi. It’s there. I’ve seen it. It took my wife there from the station. Look, you can check, call her up on the phone. She’ll tell you. I was down this pub, but you were tied up and it wasn’t open. I couldn’t possibly have nicked your taxi . . .’ ‘There is no phone at Findidnann hall.’ ‘Oh no.’ Brian despaired. ‘And what would you know of Findidnann hall anyway?’ 88

‘That’s it!’ exclaimed Brian. ‘Look, there’s an invitation to Findidnann hall in my breast pocket, and a train ticket for the last train here today. How could I possibly have stolen your taxi if I was on the train, eh? Jock thought for a moment and then felt inside Brian’s jacket, producing and examining the slim white invitation. ‘You’ve earned yourself a reprieve, Mr. Taylor, if that’s who you really are,’ said Jock generously. ‘But you’d better do some straight talking if you don’t want me to fry your nipples to Chicken McNuggets.’ ‘Whatever you want,’ breathed Brian Taylor in relief. The Scottish are a funny lot when it comes to drinking. Long ago they invented the spirit known as whisky, and subsequently spent most of their time rampaging, pillaging and fatally wounding their countrymen in a whole series of clan wars. These days most of that sort of thing has been tamed and turned into a game called soccer, which is of course only an excuse to revive ancient Celtic traditions of hooliganism and goalposts worship. Had Robert the Bruce been around today, he would no doubt have spent several hours contemplating the spider crawling up the crack in the cell walls of a Glasgow Constabulary before finding inspiration and killing the jailors to make his escape. Such determination in the face of impossible odds had been the principle factor to save Josй Barcelona’s bacon when he landed ashore from the shipwreck in 1588. He had lain low for several hours, listening to the anguished screams of his comrades being cruelly despatched by the bloodthirsty Scots, who liked nothing better than to see a genteel Spaniard drink whisky for the first time. It was inevitable that they would find Josй in the end, and, of course, it had to be the women who did. Brandishing flaming torches they scoured the beaches for any remaining men. They howled and beat their considerable breasts in anguish at having no more Spanish men to use, abuse, mutilate and torture. Once their husbands had finished 89

Feeding the Spaniards whisky by the half gallon to test their mettle, the weak-livered where turned over to the girls, while the ones who came through the whisky ordeal intact were allowed to live. Alas, no one passed the test, as the multitudinous piles of evil-smelling Spanish omelette vomit bore witness. The Scottish men had long since passed into deep and contented heathen sleep, snoring loudly enough to levitate a claymore, but the women were still out for blood.

‘Here’s one alive,’ cried a toothless grandmother, smacking her mouth with relish, ‘and pretty too.’ The congregation of hessian-clad women swarmed like ants over the sand dune behind which Josй was hiding. They held their smouldering torches up in the air to pick out his form amongst the grasses on top. Josй kept his cool. He spoke English. ‘Hi, I’m Josй Barcelona.’ He lay on his back and groaned hopefully. Their faces gegisterd nothing but savage intent. The whites of thier eyes blazed in the night with bloodlust. Josй cleared his throat nervously. ‘I’m from Spain, I . . .’ ‘Aaeeee.’ The women howled in anger, moving closer. Josй heard the sound of a dagger being drawn from its scabbard. ‘Er, I’m a real big Shakespeare fan . . .’ he started, but stopped as it became clear that Shakespeare was persona non grata after publishing Macbeth. ‘And . . . I’ve got a really big knob,’ he shouted confidently. The Scottish savages stopped shrieking, beating their breasts and mutilating their clothing. ‘How big?’ screeched one of them pushing to the front. Josй dropped his trousers. ‘That big,’ he growled. The women fell back. A hubbub of confused voices was raised in consternation. ‘I’ve never seen the like of it before.’ ‘And on a foreigner too,’ cried another. ‘Twould be like being fucked by a haggis!’ In the light of their descovery, they began to discuss whether Josй Barcelona’s fate should be somewhat different. 90

From that of his fellow crew members. The women elected a spokeswoman. She squatted down by his ear. ‘Can ye use it?’ she whispered. Josй was offended. ‘Mother of God, I am the most fertile man in Catalonia,’ he proclaimed indignantly. ‘My seed is of the highest quality and I guarantee a good time . . .’ Josй Barcelona was not a soldier; he was a gigolo. The Captain of his galleon had been incensed by the embarrasing romantic encounters of his wife. Forbidden by the Catholic church from divorcing her, he had hired Josй to satisfy the woman’s seemingly endless usts whilst she accompanied her husband on his glorious voyage of conquest to England. Josй had been listed, to the crew’s amusement, as her brother. ‘Show me,’ the Scottish women demanded. ‘Show me how you give a woman a good time.’ ‘What here, in front of all these people?’ squeaked Josй, professionally hurt. ‘I need a little privacy.’ ‘You’re a wimp, but okay.’ Jackie McKenzie raised her voice and screamed out, ‘Right, fuck off the lot of you, if he’s nae good I’ll slit his throat.’ ‘When do we get our turn?’ they howled. ‘Later,’ yeled Jackie, pulling out her own knife and holding it to Josй’s jugular vein. ‘If it’s nae good,’ she added, ‘I’ll chop it off.’ Josй performed spectacularly, fearing for his life as the woman battered his chest and raked claw-loads of skin from his shoulders, but she was definitely satisfied. ‘There’s no man in the village can get it up any more,’ she complained. ‘They’re all too drunk. And the women are without child now for five years, d’ye understand?’

‘I am a professional,’ declared Josй, ‘and I . . . ‘ ‘Enough of the smooth talkin, ye scumbag. If I’m to keep ye alive, you’ll have to pay me and the village a dowry . . .’ Josй thought for a second. ‘The galleon treasure,’ he said. ‘I buried it earlier tonight on the beach. If the women agree 91

To spare my life and find me professional employment, I’ll tell you where it is.’ ‘A deal, Mr Barcelona.’ Thus it was that the whereabouts of the treasure of the Spanish galleon was revealed to the villagers of Didnann. They subsequently used it to pay for a major sixteenth-century construction programme, building most of the current village of Dubl’une, as it came to be known by modern times. Josй, however, had done a very sharp deal, because he had omitted to mention the most valuable treasure of all, the personal fortune of the woman he was screwing on board the ship. He had hidden that elsewhere, for future, more secure, re-burial. The secret did not die with him. On his deathbed, Josй, in a fit of uncharacteristic amateurism, revealed the map explaining the location of the burial site. But for some reason it was never found, and the Hall which stood on the spot, Didnann Hall, became known as Findidnann Hall, which brings us back to resent-day Scotland, and Josй relative in the Bonny Hacienda.

PART FOUR The Plot Thickens

93 - 94

14 The Breakfast Club Brian and Jock were drunk. Very drunk. Twenty-four different varieties of Scotch whisky had passed their lips since Brian had explained the mad Laird’s scheme to the eccentric innkeeper. They were still talking – Brian in his punk outfit and Jock addressing the end of his wooden stump in a maudlin fashion – by the time the first rays of light seeped through the fusty old hessian curtains of the pub. ‘From what you tell me,’ Jock ruminated. ‘There’s been some mighty queer goings-on at the hall. Frankly, it disna surprise me.’ ‘Eh? Brian wiped a sniffle on the back of his hand and tried to comprehend. ‘You’ve heard, of course,’ whispered Jock, ‘About the treasure?’ ‘No,’ mumbled Brian, the alcoholic fog lifting slightly at the thought of money. ‘Of course ye haven’t, nobody has, because I never told no one,’ cackled Jock, thumping Brian over-enthusiastically with his stump. ‘When his uncle died,’ he continued, ‘That

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sassenach pervert was left the house and contents, but the inheritance went to his half brother, Ferdinand Alfonso Boatrace. They never got along, and Ferdinand spent the money, then ran off and disappeared. Some day he joined the Foreign Legion, others reckon he joined the Merchant Navy and was sold into white slavery in Africa . . .’ ‘What about the treasure?’ ‘Never found,’ exclaimed Jock, triumphantly. ‘The villagers of Dubl’une buried it in 1590. Only one map was ever made.’ ‘So, where is it?’ Brian’s voice was stone cold sober and quivering in excitement. Jock chuckled. ‘Where is it?’ repeated Brian. ‘I know,’ growled Jock. ‘I have the map.’ ‘Show me?’ asked Brian slyly. Jock roared with laughter and slapped him on the knee. ‘Take that bloody ridiculous outfit off. I’ll cook ye a haggis breakfast, and then we’ll pay a visit to that walking sex-crime on the hill. Then I’ll show ye.’ Brian struggled to pull off his three-toed feet and peeled his skull cap mohican off with difficulty; but try as he might, the water-filled inflatable hunchback would not yield, in spite of several alarmingly rude Glaswegian requests. ‘Jock,’ roared Brian, ‘Get this fucking strap-on rubber johnny off ma back man, I canna do it maself.’ ‘Yer a daft bugger tae ha put it on in the first place, Brian Taylor,’ mumbled Jock, as he

fumbled with the absurd webbing which attached Brian to his prosthetic hump. ‘Funny thing now . . .’ mused Jock as he peered closely into the translucent plastic of the bag. ‘It’s nae bloody funny, get rid of it,’ growled Brian. Jock sighed. ‘I’ve never seen . . . I mean who in their right minds would put an alarm clock in a plastic bag and then fill it with water? Still, off it comes.’

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Sunrise came peacefully. A pre-dawn gentle breeze had washed away the mist and fog and then died down to leave the landscape moist and expectant as the sun rose over Findidnann Hall. The first small birds began to chirp excitedly as they flew around the chimneys, looking for small female birds or the most inconvenient spot to have a crap. Into this scene of Highland splendour, unchanged since at least yesterday, came the explosino. As explosions go, it was a pretty small one, but the orange and black mushroom cloud of smoke and flames was clearly visible from Lord Iffy’s residence. Something in the village no longer existed. ‘What was that?’ yelled Roderick, sitting bolt upright in bed, his pom-pom tassel bobbing furiously on the end of his nightcap. Margot karate-chopped his throat with unbelievable violence. ‘I’m asleep,’ she growled through clenched teeth, and slammed a fist into his chest, so hard that he fell back to sleep.’ Roderick, however, was already out for the count. The Bonny Hacienda lay in smoking ruins, huge black dollops of oily smoke congealing in the sky above it. Lying in the street was all that remained of Brian Taylor and Jock McVitie Barcelona – a three-toed, furry foot cover . . . Mark West leapt out of his wardrobe hiding place screaming, wild eyed, and clutching his bread knife in his trembling right hand. He resembled an apoplectic Blackbeard on acid. ‘Cynthia”’ he screamed, grinding his teeth and staring manically at the bedroom door. ‘They’ll never take me alive!’ he hissed and crawled back into the wardrobe. Butler was at the top of the highest turret only seconds after the explosion had rocked him out of a black and dreamless sleep. Panting with exertion from the climb, he stood in bare feet and shirt tails, focusing one of Iffy’s telescopes on the village.

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‘Bloody hell, Butler, damn good fireworks, what? You surpassed yourself.’ Butler turned to see a dishevelled-looking Lord Boatrace screwing his monocle into his eye as fiercely as he had ever seen him do it. ‘Covered in bloody brick dust,’ continued Iffy. ‘Nearly fell out of me bloody portrait. Damned good dream I was having as well, bent over female auctioneer, all the straps and flying gear,

had a bloody good time with the hammer I should say, har har . . .’ ‘I didn’t do it, sir,’ shouted Butler, anxiously. ‘’What?’ grunted Iffy. ‘Lemme see.’ He elbowed his way to the telescope. ‘I say, Butler, it’s that damnably awful pub. What a stroke of luck. I owed him a lot of money that McVitie chappie, don’t suppose he needs it now. One less of the bastards, eh?’ Iffy snapped the telescope down to its portable length and beamed a smile at the sunrise. ‘What a day, Butler, eh? Beautiful sunshine, half my debts wiped off the face of the earth, and grouse shooting after a fine English breakfast. Perfect.’ Butler, not for the first time, was astonished at Lord iffy. ‘Good wheeze, eh, old chap. See you downstairs for brekkie in ten minutes. Wake our virtuos guests, there’s a good fellow. Oh yes, and, er, put some trousers on.’ Lord Iffy disappeared down the turret stairs as Butler stared at his own exposed kneecaps huddling together for protection against the morning chill. ‘We’ll see who’s wearing the trousers by the end of today.’ He growled, reverting once more to his thick cockney twang. Just then, a bird crapped on his head. Laetitia staggered down into the war zone that was all that remained of the dining room. The chandelier rested at a crazy angle in the middle of the broken-backed dining table, adorned all around with the broken dishes and cutlery that had slid down to the middle of the wreckage from both ends of the oak surface.

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The walls had been liberally pasted with splotches of dessert and fresh fruit which were now beginning to smell rather offensive, and a gaping hole in the roof above the head of the tables and chairs bore witness to Lord Iffy’s impromptu shoot-out the night before. In the corner of the room was the breakfast trolley, prepared by Butler. It as a traditional English breakfast of three-day-old toast, butter frozen so hard it was impossible to cut and a jug of milk merely sufficient to satisfy a thirsty kitten – a small one at that. His piиce of rйsistance was an enourmous two-gallon tea urn full of a brew so strong that it would have incapacitated a whole regiment of Indians, curry or no curry. ‘I can’t eat this fucking shit!’ >Laetitia had staggered over to the table somewhat bandy-legged from her evening’s encounter. A similar problem is often experienced by men at sea, after several months of rolling around on the ocean wave. It had taken only several minutes of someone rolling around on Laetitia to produce the same effect. Her eyes were almost black with mascara, and her face was a mask, knee-deep in foundation sludge. She was not, as Californians put it, a morning person. ‘What in God’s name happened to you?’ Mark West stood in the doorway, his facial muscles clenched into knots, the eight-inch blade concealed beneath his jacket. ‘I might ask the same question, honey,’ spat Laetitia, turning to face the hopeless victim standing before her. ‘I mean, it’s not everyday that . . . Jesus, you stink, I can smell you from here.’ Mark looked down at his turn-up trousers bottoms. They were full of congealed sheep shit and ditch water, which had matured in the wardrobe overnight. His hand grasped the handle of his knife more firmly.

‘At least it’s a bit more natural than ten tons of ruddy face cake and perfume like a French whorehouse,’ he retorted angrily. ‘What’s for breakfast, chaps?’ roared Roderick enthusi-astically, limping vigorously from his wounded buttock, but

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managing a valiant smile, despite the huge bruise spreading around his throat. ‘I say, what a damend fine-looking brekkie, eh?’ He rubbed his hands together vigorously in anticipation. Roderick sttod alongside Mark West, towering above him in fact, glancing a little nervously from side to side at the lack of activity. ‘Good Lord, I’m sorry,’ started Roderick suddenly. Were you waiting for me? Damnably rude of me to be late. Still, tuck in anyway. OK?’ and with that he strode forthrightly to the trolley and began to devour half a loaf of flexible toast together with a couple of pints of tea. ‘Where’s that wife of yours? Growled mark. ‘Upstairs, old man, bit off-coulour today.’ Roderick continued to munch contentedly, as if fattening himself up for the slaughter. ‘Where’s your wife? Er . . .’ Mark cut him a filthy look. ‘Sorry, old chap. Forgot. Any news on her whereabouts?’ ‘I thought perhaps your wife might know.’ ‘WELL, I DON’T, so you can stop barking up that tree right away.’ Margot stood at the top of the stairs, arms folded, tapping one booted foot loudly and impatiently on the floorboards. An enourmous bump protruded from her skull. The doors at the other end of the room crashed open as Lord Iffy knocked them aside in spectacular fashion. ‘Good morning, good morning, good morning, good morning!’ he yelled. ‘All recovered from the Big Bang?’ He winked slyly at Laetitia, quietly wondering what she looked like without makeup. ‘It’s not a good morning,’ grunted Mark. ‘It’s a simply splendid morning,’ exclaimed Roderick. ‘Not if you’re a game bird it’s not,’ retorted Margot. ‘Who asked you?’ shouted Mark. Laetitia could stand no more. The sight of Roderick piling slab after slab of nauseous toast into his mouth and the smell of the tea urn, like distilled soldier’s boot leather, was too much. She threw up daintily in the palm of her hand,

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Then watched it cascade through her fingers to the polished wood floor. Lord Iffy ignored the interruption. ‘Nevertheless,’ he roared, ‘We will sally forth after a decent interval and blow a few of the

bounders out of the sky, eh? Grouse for supper.’ ‘Disgusting and immoral,’ shouted Margot, who was still keeping her distance from Mark not so much for fear of her life, but mainly because of the smell. ‘A noble contest,’ continued Iffy pointedly. ‘Of skill and strategy against a cunning adversary . . .’ ‘Cunning?’ exclaimed Margot. ‘It’s fucking brown brird with the brain of a sparrow against half a dozen psychopaths armed with heavy artillery. By the time you’ve blown holes in it there’s nothing left to eat anyway, and what little there in left is full of lead . . . Well, I hope you all fucking choke on your shotgun pellets and die of fucking lead poisoning, the lot of you.’ She paused. Iffy opened his mouth to speak. She continued. ‘And since I can’t persuade any of you, including my ex_husband. . .’ She threw Roderick a filthy stare. Roderick dropped his tea mug and scalded his fot, then hopped up and down screaming silently. ‘. . . to deviate from this folly,’ she carried on, ‘I shall take no further part in this obscene ritual. I am going to bed.’ She turned on her heels and stamped loudly up the stairs back to her bedroom where she slammed the door loudly, and yelled her customary ‘Aaaaaurgh!’ The population of the breakfast room stood open-mouthed. Roderick had expected at least a severe beating and possibly a broken rib or two. ‘There’s always one, isn’t there,’ remarked Iffy as casually as he could. ‘Butler”’ he yelled, ‘Bring in the guns.’ Butler struggled into the room clutching six shotguns. ‘I suppose you all know how to use these things?’ said Iffy, glancing at Laetitia. ‘I was raised in Texas, and I could shoot the dick off and armadillo before I was ten,’ she drawled.

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‘Charming,’ said Mark dryly. ‘I suppose you know how to shoot as well,’ he bawled at Roderick. ‘Oh gosh, yes. I was an awfully good shot actually, snapshooting a speciality. How about you?’ ‘County clay-pigeon champion,’ Mark replied, matter of factly. ‘Three years running.’ Iffy’s face fell. ‘I say, old man.’ Roderick was impressed. ‘WELL DONE.’ ‘Where the fuck did you pick up this lot from, Butler?’ hissed Iffy furiously. ‘They weren’t supposed to be able to shoot straight.’ ‘Well, you knew one of them,’ murmured Butler hotly. ‘I forgot, didn’t I. I remember standing on his bloody ears after rugger. I just forgot about the riffle team, that’s all. Hope this bloody secret agent’s done his stuff. I don’t want all my birds going up in smoke in five minutes.’ Butler repressed a smirk of satisfaction. ‘Gun dogs,’ exclaimed Roderick. ‘Where are the gun dogs?’ ‘Eh?’ ‘One has to have retrievers to pick up the dead birds. . .’ ‘If there are any dead birds,’ replied Iffy. ‘Yes, but . . .’

‘And if there are any birds worth picking up,’ Iffy confirmed, ‘Then there will be dogs.’ Butler’s expression was deadpan. ‘Good then, half and hor, see you outside in the old hunting apparel, what ho.’

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15 A Sporting Event

Mark West had had a wash, but was not in any better temper. The water had been cold. Laetitia met him on the steps outside the front door, looking somewhat more glamorous than she had at breakfast. 'It's not an aerobics class, you know,' Mark sniffed grumpily. 'Li'l ole me likes to get on a nice workout outfit to, er, put me in the mood. You know, I'm a very inner person.' Mark looked her up and down, then opted for the upper part of her. Laetitia's boobs were tenuously restrained by the sparkling pink leotard, but the nipples shot forward prominently like two cigarette butts stubbed out on poached eggs. The poached eggs reminded him of breakfast. He hadn't eaten any, and he was still famished. He ogled her crutch, and the way that her thighs always parted to reveal a great deal of daylight around her pussy. Despite his lack of sleep, Mark felt a stirring under his armpit, as his member began to snake upwards in erection and threatened to poke out of his collar. Laetitia pulled out her walkman headphones and adjusted them over her ridiculous hairstyle, bouffant in the extreme, 103

Which was suported by a gold lamй headband and sprinkled with glitter. The glitter was echoed on her leg-warmers, underneath which were vastly expensive Ivan Elavonitch ballet tights. Beneath those were the standard Miss USA all-year-round, guaranteed suntan and sweaty crotch tights - just in case you ever needed to take all of your clothes off in a crowded gymnasium. Beneath all of this was a pair of legs. By now the legs had started to walk on the spot, and the blood-red painted fingernails twitched convulsively to the beat of a dreadful anonymous American rock band. Mark watched her little red-booted feet pitter-pattering and crunching on the gravel drive with a look of horror on his face. It was a bizarre sight in the Scottish Highlands. 'How's Brian?' he yeled. 'WHO?' screamed Laetitia, oblivious to her effect on the environment. 'Take those things off for a second, can't you?' shouted Mark, waving his arms. One headphone came off as she continued to twitch. 'Brian,' she panted, 'Is probably making an ass of himself in some bar somewhere like he

usually does, and I for one do no give a damn.' Click. She switched off the tape recorder and regarded Mark with a carnivorous smile. 'You don't look too worried about your wife at the moment either. I mean, you're going out shooting, not looking for her.' Mark thought of Cynthia, then thought of the gun. No, he did still vaguely love her, he supposed. He looked at Laetitia's heaving breasts and the athletic-looking labial cleft pouting through her leotard. Well, he mused, maybe I don't vaguely love her quite as much as yesterday. He cleared his throat. 'Are you actually any good at shooting?' 'Are you any good in bed?' She levelled her gaze directly at him and licked the tips of her screwed and glued 10,000 dollar teeth with the top of her glistening tongue. Mark caught his breath sharply and turned away just as 104

His rogering piece shot out of his collar like a coiled snake and hit him under the chin. 'Good God,' he choked. 'Well, well,' boomed Lord Iffy, flinging open the double front doors, 'The early Bird catches the worm, eh?' He delivered anoher sly wink at Laetitia. He was a splendid sight. An enourmous racoon hat from the North West frontier of Canada surmounted his beaky monocled visage, and the red serge tunic of the Royal Canadian Mounties, which had formerly belonged to a dis-tant Boatrace cousin, clad his concave skinnyribs. A pair of huge, piratical-looking tigh-high patent leather stiletto-heeled boots completed the outfit . . . and Lord iffy was wearing his best fishnet stockings again, having recovered them from their muddy demise at the hands of Bill Symes-Groat. 'My God, you look wonderful,' Laetitia cooed. 'Nothing like a uniform to show off the man, eh,' declared Iffy, 'Butler!' Butler staggered into view, looking like a cross between a pack mule and Marley's ghost. Bandoliers of ammunition criss-crossed his black tie butler's outfit, and he struggled under the weight of half a dozen shotguns and a picnic hamper strapped to his back. In his teeth he carried a four-foot telescope by its carrying strap. 'Yyyygumpf,' he grunted, swaying in the doorway precariously and grinding his teeth on the leather of the telescope. 'So, off we go, eh,' said Iffy. 'Follow me.' And with that he strutted down the steps and wiggled off down the driveway the blanched flabby cheeks of his buttocks showing through the fishnets above his high boots. Laetitia looked at Mark. Mark looked at Laetitia. Butler looked forward to getting it over and done with, then Roderick looked over his shoulder. 'Follow that man,' he boomed, almost blowing the overladen servant out of the doorway. 'I wouldn't go so far as to call him a man,' Mark advised 'Real men don't wear fishnets.' 105

'I don't know,' Laetitia mused defensively. 'You English guys are all too straight. I think it gives a man something.' 'I'd like to fucking give him something,' thought Butler, in a thick London accent. 'I'd like to give her something,' thought Mark, horrified at the prospect but enslaved by his rampant libido. 'I think we'd better be orf, otherwise we'll get the bird, phaw harumph, haw haw.' Roderick strode down the steps, now limping only slightly and laughing with his painfully tortured English boarding school laugh. The kind that is only heard when something is really not funny at all. Margot waited upstairs in bed like an undischarged cannon waiting for a taper. She had sent Roderick to Coventry when he returned from breakfast to change into his ridiculous plusfours and tweed jacket. She had simply lain still and stiff on the bed, thinking contemptuous thoughts and snarling softly through her nose, 'Aaaurgh, aaurgh, aaurgh,' like a ferocious Morris Minor ticking over. She heard his booming laughter receding down the drive and waited till she could hear nothing at all except the background morning buzz of the Scottish Highlands in summer. Then she made her move. She tiptoed cautiously down the main stairs and quietly opened one of the front doors, peering through the crack to check that no one was around. Only the dooless taxi remained outside, looking forlorn in the growing heat of the morning sun. Luckily, it was shaded by the large tree that . . . 'Funny,' thought Margot. 'I could have sworn that tree wasn't there yesterday.' She felt the bump on her head. It was very painful so she pressed it harder. The pain got worse. 'AAAAURGH!' she exploded and scurried down the steps, spurred on by the night's memories. With only a passing glance at her environment now, she scuttled futively around to the flower beds underneath Lord Iffy's balcony and fell upon them with the zeal of a mole in a worm hatchery. 106

'I'll show you fucking hunting.'Heaps of soil and dirt flew from her spade-like fingers as she excavated. 'Over-privileged bourgeois scum.' She reached the cartridges buried in the earth and pulled out the shotgun shells, blowing the soil off them. 'Aaaurgh.' She tugged at the wooden object and it came free. It was a beautifully made shoulder stock and was attached to Lord Iffy's shotgun. Margot cleaned off most of the dirt, then loaded it, locking the mechanism, which closed with a very reserved-sounding, welloiled English aristocratic click. She heard the sound with distaste. She would have preferred one of those AD-47s or a Uzi, the choice of most discerning liberationist revolutionaries, but this would have to do. The bandage around her head came off and she pulled out a speckled bandana, bought from an Indian clothing stall in Notting hill Gate. Tying the rag around her head she looked at her reflection in the window. 'Passable,' she approved. 'I shall call myself the revo-lutionary spearhead of the FLF.' An so the praetorian guard of the newly inaugurated Findidnann Liberation Front crawled up to the ridge around the back of the house, checked its bearings, and crept off in the direction of Roderick, Mark, Laetitia, Butler, and enemy of the people number two on the hit list, Lord

Iffy Boatrace. So who was number one? The shooters arrived at the butts, some 500 yards away from the house. Butler sank down, exhausted after ditributing guns and ammunition and setting up Iffy's telescope. 'Come on, Butler, cheer up,' grinned Iffy. 'They'll be up in a minute.' 'How do you propose to get grouse in the air without any beaters?' asked mark sarcastically. 'This whole bloody ridiculous exercise looks like a wild goose chase to me.' Iffy looked pained and offended. 'These birds, old man, well they're. They're not your average sort, old chappie,'he began.'You see, for centuries my family. 107

Have been shooting things. Pretty much anything that’s ever moved on land, sea or air – a Boatrace has probably bagged one. The problem was taht one had to go a damnable distance to find things to shoot after most of the local fauna had been blasted into oblivion. The wretched animals used to run away, damned unsporting.’ ‘Undestandable in the circumstances I would have thought,’ said Mark dryly. ‘Wuite so, quite so,’ said Iffy dismissively. ‘The point is my family, more correctly myself, have devised a way to make animals, in this case our feathered friend the grouse, come directly towards us. Splendid, you see, no overheads, haw haw.’ Laetitia applauded pathetically, smacking her manicured palms together. ‘I think that’s really smart. We could do with something like that in the States.’ ‘Utter bullshit,’ stated Mark West flatly. ‘And furthermore, if these mythical birds don’t appear in the next five minutes you’re in deep shit.’ He sat down on the grass and glared at everyone. Roderick cocked his weapon and aimed it skyward, sweeping the barrel towards the wispy clouds that streaked the blue sky. Butler groaned at his stiff back. He was sweltering now in his black butler suit. He peered out onto the moors. A few hundred yards away was a small mound with a large sycamore tree growing out of it. Butler was puzzled. That tree, he thought – he hadn’t noticed it before. Iffy yelled excitedly as he peered down his telescope. ‘They’re coming dammit. Butler, the grouse are up!’ It was 11:45 am. A pair of birds broke cover and climbed to about 150 feet, circling before they headed towards the butts, zig-zagging violently. Roderick gave them both barrels. ‘Crrump, crrump.’ The sound of the shots rebounded across the moor. The first bird got it in the engine room. 108

Smoke trailed out of its tail feathers as it went down out of control, a hundred feet in front of the guns. The second shot took the entire wing off the number two bird, which cartwheeled through the sky in a slow tunbling arc of death, to land behind them. ‘Good shooting, old man.’ Mark West, for once, had some-thing good to say. Laetitia was clapping furiously now and careful to indent her breasts on his midriff as she did so. ‘What a star,’ she breathed. ‘Yes, er, well done old chap,’ mumbled Iffy in consternation. This was not supposed to happen. ‘Butler,’ he ordered. ‘Fetch me my other electric blue stilettos. I won’t be able to hit a damn thing in these thight boots.’ Iffy needed to do a bit of quick thinking and while most people put their thinking caps on, Iffy changed shoes. For someone whose brains were in their boots, it was rather appropriate. Morning turned into afternoon, and the birds acme in pairs fairly regularly, but despite the grouse being somewhat larger than an armadillo’s dick, Laetitia could not hit one: neither, for that matter, could Mark West. Roderick, however, had downed twenty-five definites and several probables and was beaming with a radiant no-vegetarian grin. ‘Damned good hunting,’ he exclaimed. ‘Hmm, yes. Well, you must be er, jolly hungry old man. Yes, well, er, mind you don’t get indigestion.’ ‘I think there’s something bloody strange going on.’ Said Mark. ‘I could swear that those birds are flying in zig-zags to avoid being hit. I’ll tell you what, I wouldn’t want to fucking eat one.’ ‘You’re just jealous,’ accused Laetitia. ‘I think Roderick’s a perfect English gentleman and VERY talented.’ Margot crawled and grumbled through the heather on her stomack, covered in cuts and bruises, pushing the gun ahead of her. Every few feet whe paused to look over the top of 109

The vegetation to check where the birds were coming from. Whoever was releasing them from their cages would be the first to die, she decided. ‘Aaurgh.’ Her palm pressed into a pile of sheep shit and slid from under her, so that her face fell into a pile of rabbit droppings. ‘Male rabbit, fuck bastard!’ she screamed, spitting out the little rabbity ex – breakfasts. ‘Why don’t your sort ever clear up?’ The indignant rabbit looked up at this insult, twitching its head around to glare at this strange new addition to the crawling livestock of Scotland. Margot glared back, hoisted herself up to shoulder height and lobbed a large lump of earth at it, but missed. ‘AAAAAURGH!’ she hissed, stamping the ground with her fist in frustration. She breathed heavily for a second, then narrowed her eyes into slits of determination as she resumed her prickly path through the heather. ‘What was that?’ shouted Roderick. ‘What was what?’ said Iffy, peering intently into his telescope. ‘I saw an animal out there, a great big woolly spotted thing. It waved at me.’

‘Probably a sheep, old chap,’ replied Iffy, pivoting the telescope to the right a fraction. ‘But it waved at me,’ Roderick insisted. ‘Sheep don’t wave.’ ‘Snarling sheep probably.’Lord Iffy pulled his eye away from the tube and screwed in his monocle. ‘Lots of’em around here, nasty horrible things, and believe me, they’ll wave at you.’ ‘Bollocks,’ exploded Mark West. ‘Snarling sheep. I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous in my whole life.’ ‘The Lock Ness monster is not the only unknow phenom-enon in Scotland, you know,’ said Iffy tersely. ‘The snarling sheep is a dangerous and ferocious adversary, capable of severing a man’s wrist with a single bite. They are very shy, rarely seen and . . .’ 110

‘Roderick,’ squealed Laetitia. ‘Look over there.’ Two more muddy-looking grouse broke cover and flapped upward out of the heather. ‘Oh crikey.’ Roderick tracked the birds intently. Bang. ‘Damn and blast.’ His jaw set hard as he drew again and squeezed the trigger. Bang. He lowered the barrels; one bird was weaving erratically. ‘I winged the blighter,’ he shouted enthusiatically. ‘Mmmmmm,’ mused Iffy. The grouse turned malevoulently towards the butts, its aerial quivering in the afternoon air, its payload doors already open. Its wings clicked into the glide position, tail feathers down as it dived vertically towards the disbelieving Roderick who had turned white and was glued to the spot. At the last second he covered his face with his firearms to prepare for the impact and let loose a blood – curling scream. The secret agent’s lips formed a thin smile as he drected his bombing run on Roderick. ‘Enough to scare him,’ he decided. ‘and make him incombatant for now.’ He recalled his own words, ‘Nobody shoots down my birds without answering to me first.’ There would be a reckoning for Mr. Tennison. ‘Cat shit,’ howled roderick, two white eyes and a red mouth surrounded by brown shiny lumps which leaked thin gruel like streaks down to the corners of his mouth. ‘Gosh, so it is,’ exclaimed Iffy ‘Tuna and liver I’d say, several days old and jolly mature. I’d go and have a wash if I were you.’ Margot saw the last two birds leave the hole in the tree by the grassy knoll. Grasping her shotgun more tightly now, she took several slow breaths and cocked the weapon. ‘You’re in there, you bastard,’ she thought, ‘Sending inno-cent creatures to their deaths.’ ‘AAAAAAAARGH! AAAAAAAARGH!’ Margot broke cover and hurtled over the heather towards the tree. ‘Die, you 111

bastard!’ she screamed, jumping with both feet on to the grass around the tree and pulling the trigger. The flash bang of the report knocked Laetitia off her feet and sent Iffy scurrying to his telescope. ‘What the fuck was that?’ exclaimed Mark, looking out at the black smoke ring rising from the moor. ‘I say,’ said Roderick, who had wiped most of the big lumps out of his eyes. ‘What are those?’ He pointed at two yellow flying objects dropping and tumbling through the sky. ‘I suspect that they are the mortal remains of your wife,’ commented Iffy, squinting hard through the eyepiece. Butler uncovered his head and peered over the top of his cover out at the moor. The tree was no longer in existence. If he could have stood on the very spot, he would have noticed a large crater, into which two yellow, size six and a half wellington boots had just fallen. Above the hole the grouse wheeled and swooped like vultures. 112

16 MURDER MOST MAMMARY

‘I tell you he killed her,’ hissed Mark West to the Butler. They were standing outside the front door, looking generally conspiratorial and up to no good, in the way that paranoid people usually do. ‘What possible evidence would . . .?’ ‘I don’t know, Butler, but all i do know is that since I came to this wretched place, my wife has disappeared, even though she’s probably not exactly bothered, and someone’s been blown to pieces. Personally, I always thught that Margot was a lesbian bitch who had a crush on Cynthia, and that she was responsible . . . not to mention the fucking maniac in the village with the taxi.’ He paused and let out a deep breath. ‘Does that still work?’ He indicated the taxi. ‘Should do,’ replied Butler. ‘That’s it then, I’m off. I’m calling the police.’ Butler grabbed his arm. ‘Where do you propose to do that?’ ‘From the nearest phone, any pone . . .’ ‘The only telephone is in the village pub.’ 113

‘The Bonny Hacienda?’ ‘Yes.’

‘I’ll have to use that one then. Look let go of my bloody arm, it’s getting dark already . . . ‘ ‘The Bonny Hacienda no longer exists.’ ‘What? Don’t be ridiculous,’ Mark snorted. ‘It was blown up and burnt to the ground at dawn this morning. I saw it from the top turret, not question about it.’ ‘Fucking hell!’ exclaimed Mark. ‘There’s a mass murderer on the loose up here and we’re stuck overnight? Well, not me, squire. Where’s the nearest town? I’ll drive there.’ ‘You’d never make it,’ said Butler flatly. ‘I siphoned out the petron on Iffy’s orders this morning. There’s enough to get to the village and back, that’s all.’ ‘Can’t we put it back?’ ‘I’m afraid we can’t. My Lord required hot water for his bath this morning and, er, well . . . ‘ ‘So we’re stuck here for the night after all.’ ‘It very much looks that way.’ ‘Shit.’ Mark sat grumpily on the top step and stared at the magnificent sunset which was beginning to fill the sky. ‘Savage beauty,’ he thought. ‘Red, the colour of passion, the colour of blood.’ Earlier in the day it had taken Butler and mark several hours to administer to the twin problems of Roderick Morte D’Arthur Tennison and Laetitia P. Taylor. Roderick had been the easier of the two. At the sight of his wife’s yellow wellies flying through the air, along with the other more unidentifiable bits, Roderick had simply registered mild surprise, emitted a softly spoken ‘Good Lord, whatever will her mother do to me?’ and fallen backwards into a catatonic trance, rigid as a board. The main problem had been .........the rigid six foot slab over the hundred yards back to the house, but, having established that he was breathing and his heart was beating, Roderick didn’t require much more attention. He now reposed upon his bed like an Arthurian corpse, arms across his chest, 114

naked except for a sheet on his midriff and a cold damp towel across his forehead. Laetitia had reacted somewhat differently. The Americans are very fond of a good death. The more poignant and closer the relative, the bigger the funeral, the more expensive the flowers, the more highly paid the organist and the minister. The American death industry had persuaded people that bankruptcy for the living was infinitely preferable to poverty for the dead. Ramses II would have had difficulty topping a few of the really good death celebrations that Laetitia had attended. Sudden death, however, was quite a different matter. Public lamentation, hopefully a couple of TV interviews, including a character sketch of the deceased and the phone number of the person being interviewed (in case they should want to further their ambition and be on a game show), was par for the course. Laetitia fell to the floor, beating the earth with her fists, tears rolling down her cheeks in rivers of mascara, wailing as Margot’s yellow wellies hit the dust. ‘WUG glug glug,’ she spluttered. ‘She was my friend. She was all of our friends. Wug glug glug,’ ‘No, she wasn’t. I couldn’t stand her,’ muttered Butler under his breath. ‘Waaagh wug gug glug.’ Laetitia prostrated herself. ‘Take me instead, take me , take me.’ )She had heard this line in The Exorcist and thought it rather effective.) ‘Bit late for that,’ Iffy chortled, looking at her in wonder.

‘Are you all right?’ Laetitia looked up. ‘Heartles fiend,’ she wailed and scram-bled off the floor, waving her claws at him. ‘Buter!’ squeaked Iffy, ‘Restrain her.’ ‘With pleasure, sir,’ said Butler, grabbing her and pinning her to the ground, where she broke into fits of sobbing and muttered mortifying confessinos to the afternoon sky. ‘Stick her next door to Roderick, Butler. Give her something to put her to sleep. You know, a finckey mink or something.’ 115

‘Mickey Finn, sir. Butler corrected. ‘Yes yes yes, granted. Just get her out of my sight. I am going out there to take a look at what’s left.’ And he strode off across the moor to examine the debris. Mark and Butler cooked up a pretty mean cocktail between them. It was quite remarkable that two men from such differ-ent backgrounds would both know the best way to get a girl flat on her back in fifteen minutes. It was a shame that only one of them could do something about it afterwards. The sun finally dropped over the horizon and darknes enveloped Findidnann hall. Upstairs, in Roderick’s bed-room, Laetitia began to stir on the bed where she lay alongside him. Multiple triple-expansion engines breaking huge granite stones rocked in her head. The winds of hades hurled in her earlobes. Her guts felt like shit and smelt like them too for that matter. But whatever the state of her involuntary hangover, she was sure it could not be as bad as the emotional distress felt by poor, benighted, bereaved Roderick. Laetitia groaned, but reached over nevertheless and mas-saged his brow with the cold towel. Something deep in the subconscious of Roderick morte D’Arthur Tennison stirred. It was probably the cold towel that did it, with its associations of matronly administrations of cold compressed after rugby-inspired concussions at boarding school. ‘Oh matron,’ he groaned out loud. ‘There there, poor boy,’ Laetitia soothed. ‘You’ve hit a rugged post jolly hard with your head, and you’ve been unconscious for two days.,’ said matron. ‘Your parents have been awfully worried about you, not to mention your missing your part in the school play. Still, your health is more important and Mr. Cartwright will just have to wait till next year. You’ll be pleased to hear that Cylinder Multitude understudied your part.’ ‘Oh no, matron, I can’t stand him.’ ‘Really, Roderick,’ she scolded. ‘You must learn a little 116

Tolerance and humility. If you weren’t so ill I’d tap you on the bottom with a slipper.’ ‘Roderick, Roderick can you hear me?’ Laetitia’s voice cut faintly through the mist of the memory. ‘Cylinder Multitude’s going to make a funk of it . . . you bastard . . .’ Roderick tossed from

side to side, then lay still. ‘matron,’ he exclaimed in a child-like voice, ‘Matron, why are you washing me there?’ ‘Because it’s dirty and must be cleaned out.’ ‘Gosh, matron, what’s that?’ ‘This is what I use to clean you out.’ ‘I didn’t know I was that dirty.’ ‘You boys don’t know how filthy you are. Rubbing against your little jock straps, sweating at your little desks. It’s a wonder it hasn’t turned black.’ ‘Black?’ exclaimed Roderick in horror.’ ‘Don’t worry,’ Matron replied calmly. ‘I’ll suck the worst of it out, just like a bad splinter. . .’ ‘Splinter, ouch, aah aah.’ Roderick’s pelvis began to undulate on the bed as the shhet covering his midriff developed midriff bulge to a very considerable height. ‘Wow,’ breathed Laetitia. Her hangover micaculously dis-appeared as she imagined this sixfoot hairy monster at the age of thirteen dressed in short trousers and laying on the operating table with a monstrous penis squirting seminal fluid all over a nurse’s breasts. She ripped off the shhet and exposed Roderick’s huge, blue-veined pulsing member, trembling in the dim electric light. ‘hang on in there, honey,’ she prayed, divesting herself of her various pairs of tights. ‘What’s that, maton?’ cried Roderick in anguish, writhing on the bed. ‘This is an enema, Roderick.’ ‘Does it help you to suck the poison out?’ ‘In a way . . . in a way.’ Laetitia was ready. She fastened her fanny lips around the bulging end of his penis. She was soaking wet. 117

‘So big,’ moaned Roderick. ‘God yes,’ thought Laetitia. ‘So hard,’ he thrashed on the bed. She savoured the moment before she would impale herself on his pork dagger. ‘So cold,’ he squeaked. ‘Cold?’ And then it happened. Roderick’s erection collapsed like a nervously built card house as Matron shoved the tube up his bum and sucked hard on the end. ‘I don’t like it,’ he cried and tears ran dwon his cheeks. Laetitia was furious. ‘Every fucking Englishman I ever got near had some fucking problem. Jesus Christ, the only perons I’ve fucked on this vacation has been a frigging ghost!’ She sat down despondently, then looked at Roderick. ‘But I’m not giving up on you, not when you’re hung like a donkey. I’ll give you blue blodd. I’ll make it hard.’ She straddled his face and smothered his nose and mouth till he almost choked. His tackle remained soft. She sucked the shaft of his penis, lovingly licked his rectum, rubbed her wet bagina against his thigh, blew in his ear, bit his ear, sucked his nipples, inserted his finger in his anus. Nothing happened. She tried a multitude of combinations. Still nothingh happened. There was one thing she had not tried, something that only she could do, and something that

not everyone enjoyed. Laetitia sat on his chest. ‘Litlle mama’s boy, huh?’ she taunted, pushing up one of her monumentally huge breasts and smothering his face with it. ‘Like it a little rough, do we?’ She let the other huge tit swing freely till it smacked him on the side of the head like a wet cat fish. With one huge breast each side of his head and Roderick’s large nose snoring eagerly against her perfumed breast bone, Laetitia commenced what she called ‘Mrs Newton’s cradle.’ She swung one pendulous mammary gland up in the air 118

And let it fall smack into the side of Roderick’s head. The impact sent the other tit wobbling skyward, only to fall back again to repeat the process. ‘Smackety smack, smackety smack.’ Laetitia sat for several moments with her tits flying from side to side, bouncing off the poor man’s cranium, but still nothing happened to Roderick’s penis. It remained soft and curled up like a hibernating snail. Then something else happened. Roderick stopped breathing. He was quite deaad. In the blackness outise, tree branches rustled in the cool, early evening breeze. The wind moaned through the creaking boughs, with the exception of one particular tree which was in rather a hurry to get home. The newish-looking sycamore, darted agilely down the drive, whistling ‘Frиre Jacques’ as it did so. The high-pitched scream from inside the house froze it in the middle of the road. It listened intently, but there was no more sound. A little chuckle permeated through the bark as it waddled off down the road. 119

PART FIVE The Final Solution

120-121-122

17 Lord Iffy Investigates Iffy had stodd that afternoon on the very spot where Margot had met her demise. The crater was still smoking, and in it lay the remains of two very frayed-looking yellow wellies. Stuck in the ground some distance away where the bent and shattered remains of Lord iffy’s favourite Purdey. ‘What a way to go,’ he exclaimed sadly, examining the antique firing piece. ‘Blown to bits in the hands of a raving lunatinc.’ He sifted through the soil around the site, grunting and murmuring, refocusing his telescope at close range, examining the bizarre objects he found. Pieces of an aluminium colling vessel, bits of rusty nail ans assorted shrapnel . . . He cast his eyes around. There was one more thing he needed to find, on more piece. . . ‘Aha.’ He swooped down into the crater and pulled out one of the wellies, sniffing it with distaste. ‘What awfully smelly feet,’ he thought, but his real interest was not chiropody. He examined the sole of the boot carefully then let out a yelp. ‘The game’s a-foot, Boatrace!’ he roared triumphantly. 123

The first sign of Roderick’s death had been rigor mortis. His temple were already quite severely bruised but Laetitia would not give up. It was not until the body had chilled somewhat taht Roderick’s penis finally became hard. ‘At last, you blue-blooded sucker,’ she hissed. ‘You’re mine.’ And she leapt upon his rigid frame, which looked little different in death to the way it looked in life, apart from its rather large protrusion. The scream occurred at 8.37 p.m., while Iffy was examining several cutting implements and kitchen artefacts in his study. He was making copious notes, with several of his uncle’s textbooks on criminology open around him, when he heard the shriek. ‘Roderick’s dead. WAAAAAAGH!’ screamed Laetitia, doing a tap dance on the landing in her bed sheet. ‘There’s a dead man in the bed, there’s a dead man in the bed!’ she wailed. Mark West was first on the scene and grabbed hold of her shoulders. Butler and Lord Iffy raced up the stairs from opposite ends of the house, Butler racing rather more effectively, since he was not wearing Guccy stilettos. Iffy took in the scene, the hysterical naked woman, the stiff naked man, and drew a deep breath. ‘Mark West,’ he boomed. ‘Take her to your room and keep her quiet.’ He paused. ‘Butler, com with me and bring my telescope.’

‘Cause of death a blunt instrument, severe bruising to both temples. He’s had a pretty brutal beating if you ask me.' Death was no stranger to John Butler and this corpse was the first real stiff he had seen for a while. Iffy sat across the room on a milking stool, examining every inch of the body with his telescope, now set up on its tripod. 'Perhaps', he murmured. He had only heard of one case similar to this, but he felt eminently qualified to investigate. 'Perhaps,' he said, 'We should have a word with Mrs. Taylor.' Crossing to Mark's room, he ushered him out of the way in order to begin his investigation. 'I only want to ask her 124

A few questions,’ said Iffy flatly. ‘And Butler will be here all the time.’ ‘He was such a nice man,’ sniffed Laetitia, blowing her nose on the sheet. Iffy ignored the comment and paced the room, perched on his high heels and fishnets, his Mounty jacket glowing red in the dim light by the bedside. ‘When you were put to bed this afternoon,’ he began, ‘You had all your clothes on, so why did you go to all the trouble of takeing them off before, running out onto the landing and screaming blue murder, haw haw.’ ‘I . . . I was too hot when I woke up – it’s not very hygienic to sleep in your clothes, you know.’ ‘I wouldn’t describe these,’ said Iffy brandishing Laetitia’s nylon tights, ‘as very hygienic at all. In fact, they’re very smelly.’ He raised them to his nose and sniffed. ‘A little fishy, wouldn’t you say?’ ‘If you get off smelling my underwear that’s your problem,’ sneered Laetitia. ‘But, oh, he was so gentle.’ She burst into sobs again. ‘The point,’ continued Iffy, ‘about smells, is that to the trained nose they are about as characteristics as a fingerprint, and this nose,’ he tapped his white bony beak with his index finger, ‘is pretty damned good. We found the same smell on these,’ he held the tights up to her sniffling face, ‘as we did on his thighs, chest, fingers and mouth. Also,’ he added slowly, ‘the strongest and most recent aroma emanates from his penis.’ ‘He was horny,’ protested Laetitia. ‘He was dead,’ replied Iffy. ‘No, he wanted it, he . . .’ ‘You tortured him for hours, then beat him around the head until he died, then you fucked the corpse . . . Not even I, in all my studies of pornographic literature, have come across anything so bizarre.’ ‘So how did I beat him up?’ retorted Laetitia. ‘And what with? You’ve got no evidence.’ 125

‘You beat him to death with your breasts, Mrs Taylor.’ ‘Impossible. Don’t be ridiculous, you’re just a filthy old man.’ ‘Science, Mrs Taylor, will prove me right. I have seen only one documented case such as this,

but my late uncle was very thorough in his notes. Death by mammary gland trauma.’ ‘Prove it. You’re crazy.’ Iffy spun round and held up a slide to the light. ‘You know what this is?’ Laetitia was silent. ‘This is what we took from the sides of Roderick’s temples, and this,’ he produced a second slide, ‘is what we took from your loetard.’ He pressed his monocle in firmly and pushed his nose down level with the suspect. ‘A nipple print, Mrs Taylor, and they match perfectly.’ Iffy closed the door behind them. ‘Butler,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m going to have to put Mark West in there with our little necrophiliac seductress to keep an eye on her. In the meantime, I want you to bring every available meat cutlery knife upstairs into Roderick’s room. I feel the need to investigate further.’ ‘Butler,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m going to have to put Mark West in there with our little necrophiliac seductress to keep an eye on her. In the meantime, I want you to bring every available meat cutlery knife upstairs into Roderick’s room. I feel the need to investigate further.’ Butler turned pale. ‘You’re not going to . . . ‘ ‘Just do as I say, old fellow, it’s not as bad as you think.’ ‘He’s quite mad, you know,’ said Mark to Laetitia, who was sobbing quietly on the corner of the bed. Mark had his back pressed against the bedroom door. ‘I felt so sorry for him, really I did,’ she blubbed. ‘He couldn’t even get a little ole stiffy. For that matter,’ her tone hardened up, ‘show me a goddamned Englishman who can.’ She relapsed into tears once more. Iffy’s voice drifted down the hall through the closed door. ‘NO, NO, NO, NO, BUTLER. I WANT SOMETHING MUCH BIGGER, BIG ENOUGH TO REALLY SLICE A BREAST!’ 126

Mark shuddered at the thought. ‘He’ll kiss us all. I am quite confident that he has brought us all here to die one by one; then he’ll dismember us and eat the bits. I think he’s a cannibal.’ ‘Oh my god.’ Laetitia’s lips twitched uncontrollably. ‘You see, he’s accused me of killing Roderick.’ ‘Of course he has,’ said Mark. ‘That’s because he needs and excuse to kill you. You know, madman’s logic and all that. Anyway, how does he reckon you did it?’ ‘With thises,’ she said and let the sheet fall away from her breasts. In the dim light, the brown and red glow reflecting off the walls and bed made her breasts look like new additinos to the solar system, or at least aliens worth negotiating with. Mark West nearly choked. ‘Ridiculous,’ he whispered hoarsely. Laetitia stood up and let the sheet fall from her waist, revealing her athletic thighs and evenly tanned muscular claves. ‘Help me, Mark,’ she begged, approaching him and gently raking her claws down the soft skin of his neck. ‘We have to escape.’ She blew softly in his ear. ‘WOW!’ She jumped back in horror as Mark’s huge fifteen-inch penis extended to its full length and hurtled out of his

collar just below his right ear, poking her in the nose. ‘What’s that?’ she yelled. ‘What does it look like?’ grumbled mark, red with embarrassment. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ she said, horror changing to curiosity. ‘Get it out, I want to have a look at it.’ ‘Well, I er . . . ‘ She fluttered her mascara-glued eyelids at him. ‘Pretty please?’ She giggled girlishly. Mark West’s erect penis resembled nothing more nor less than a tent pole with an apple on top. As he stood naked now before her, almost twenty-five per cent of his blood supply was engorged in his sexual organ, which bounced up and down gently in tune with his pulse. 127

Laetitia moved towards him astride its lenght, feeling it slide under her bushy pubic hair. ‘I guess this must be what a witch feels like on a broomstick, honey,’ She smiled. ‘I wouldn’t know,’ croaked Mark with a dry throat. She slid back down it again and grasped the head with both hands, pulling him towards the bed. The she bent over and rubbed the hot glans against her moistened opening, bucking her hips with a mule-like thrust to spear herself on the end. ‘Ohohohohohoh,’ she moaned, dragging all the bedcovers off with her claws and digging in to the mattress. ‘Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me,’ she screeched. ‘Come in my mouth, come on my tits, come in my hair, you bastard. I love you, oh oh oh God I’m coming you swine, oh oh harder harder. I hate you. I hate you, you beautiful fucker. Treat me like a dog, tie me up, whop me with your willy, you wicked warlock. Tie me to the stake and let your braves do their worst . . . ‘ Mark was taken aback. What could he do? He hadn’t actually done anything except stand there and let this woman impale herself. ‘Deep it down a bit,’ he hissed. ‘AAAow,’ wailed Laetitia even louder, as if someone had stepped on a cat’s tail. ‘Fuck me till my head comes off, come up my nose . . . ‘ ‘Ssh, be quiet. Christ, Iffy will be in here if youcarry on like this.’ ‘Oh, ooagh, ooh, oooarg,’ she spluttered. ‘Fuck my asshole, puncture my poop chute, drive it up my hershey highway . . .’ ‘Fucking shut up will you?’ complained Mark. ‘. . . ram it in, say hi to the brown dirt cowboys, backscuttle my hole in one . . .’ Anything to shut her up, thught Mark. Here goes: and so he sank his penis swiftly, firmly and six inches deep. Laetitia screamed louder than when she discovered Roderick’s death. She screamed louder than when whe discovered Roderick’s death. She screamed louder than when she had been born, and that was pretty loud, and she continued to scream, thumping the bed with her arms and thrashing her head on the mattress. ‘There’s no fucking need to overact, for God’s sake,’ yelled 128

Mark, but she continued to yelp and moan in ecstasies of agony or viceversa, when Mark West decided that giving her the remaining nine inches of tent pole was all that he could do to silence this wretched screaming woman. He took three brisk paces forward. She was silent. He paused to savour the stillness and the sweat on her buttocks. ‘Was it good for you?’ he asked quietly. ‘Hello, anyone home?’ he asked again louder. He took her hand - it was loose and floppy. He felt her wrist for a pulse. There was none, and his erection began to subside rather quickly. Despite the twenty-five per cent of his blood returning into his system, Mark’s face was still very pale. ‘Oh no, not another one,’ he mouthed. 129

18 Escape Iffy kicked the door open and beheld the scene – Laetitia collapsed on the bed, mouth agape, eyes bulging out of their disbelieving sockets; and mark West, plugged into her rectum, with his anaconda-like sexual organ slowly deflating. ‘We appear to have caught you red, er, ended shall we say?’ remarked Iffy. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ stammered Mark, white as a ghost. ‘I would say that she was dead,’ said Iffy, indicating the body. ‘That she probably died of multiple orgasms bringing on cardiac arrest, and that you are most certainly responsible.’ Mark’s penis finally slithered out of Laetitia’s puckered and pierced back passage, and dropped down between his legs, where it swung obscenely, dripping brown spots onto the carpet and smelling very offensive. ‘She liked it,’ he suggested. ‘That’s exactly what Laetitia said about dear old Roderick . . .’ started Iffy. ‘And she killed him as well,’ Butler chipped in his six pen’worth as he moved into the open doorway. 130

‘In your own words of this afternoon, Mr West, you are in deep shit.’ Iffy suppressed a wry grin. ‘Butler,’ protested Mark, ‘You surely can’t intend to take the word of this fiend – the word of a transvestite, eccentric, intrebred nutter – against mine.’ ‘The evidence looks pretty good to me, sir,’ replied Butler, dangling his finger in the air and waving it to simulate the pendulum motion of Mark’s penis. ‘You bastard, we had a deal!’ shouted Mark. Iffy raised his had. ‘Silence!’ he yelled. ‘I know you had a deal. I may look like a bloody fool,

and I may dress a little unusually and come up with some crazy schemes, but when it comes to crooks I know about most things, and Butler,’ he jerked his thumb at the now decidedly uncombortable-looking manservant, ‘Is a lousy crook.’ Iffy entered the room and paced around the bed, regarding the cropse with a twinge of sadness. ‘What a specimen,’ he thought. ‘When all this is over I think I shall bottle those breasts for my late uncle’s collection.’ He shook his head and cleared his throat. ‘Ahem, Butler over here is in a difficult situation. He thinks that he killed Margot by accident with a home-made explosive device constructed out of an aluminium pot. This device was not inteded for her, it was intended for someone else.’ Butler’s jaw dropped. Iffy raised his hand to silence him. ‘This unfortunate woman also believed that she had killed poor Roderick by mammary trauma to the cranium, something that I wanted her to believe in order to guarantee her safety. But she did not kill Roderick nor, Butler, did you kill Margot.’ Butler was astounded. ‘Well, who did?’ ‘He did,’ said Iffy, nodding his head at Mark West,’ and we caught him hard at work destroying the evidence – to whit, Laetitia.’ Mark looked round like a caged animal, eyes darting nervously around the rom. ‘You’re off your rocker. Roderick, Margot . . .?’ 131

With one enourmous stiletto-heeled stride, iffy made it to the wardrobe and flung it open, snatching up Mark’s carving knife. ‘So how do you explain this?’ ‘It’s for self-protection. . .’ ‘Self-protection and coated with a rare African posion causing death by paralysis twelve to eighteen hours after administration . . .’ ‘You mean Roderick . . .’ exclaimed Butler. ‘Roderick was accidentally skewered by Margot at dinner last night with this vey knife: that’s how the poison got into his system.’ ‘But I had nothing to do with it!’ shouted Mark. ‘Jesus, I wasn’t even there.’ ‘Precisely,’ said Iffy. ‘You weren’t at dinner. And where were you? You were out on the moor with some cock-and-bull excuse leaving footprints all around the site of the explosin.’ ‘Well, I did wander around and find a . . .’ ‘You tried to fucking kill me,’ growled Butler, forgetting who he was supposed to be. ‘E told me to go out and find out where some poacher ‘ad ‘idden a load of birds . . .’ ‘Where you would be blown to smithereens,’ finished iffy. ‘No, no, I was looking for Cynthia. . .’ ‘Getting rid of her body more like. You two didn’t exactly get along. We’ll find her no doubt, hidden away somewhere out there. . . ‘ Iffy stared out at the night and turned to Butler. ‘So you see, old chap, you are the hero of the hour.’ ‘I am?’ he puzzled. ‘But for your lousy cooking, we would all have been as stiff as boards by nine o’clock tonight, and you would have been in bits all over the moor.’ ‘The turkey!’ Butler gasped.

‘And the carving knife that would have carved it,’ said Iffy, holding up the evidence, ‘giving each one of us an orally administered dose of poison minute enough to be undetectable. The only persons not at dinner or not eating 132

dinner were you, Butler, and him.’ He jabbed his finger at Mark. Iffy paused in his moment of thiumph. ‘So you had to be lured out on to the moor and blown to pieces, ironically whilst planting a bomb of your own. You’re not a very clever villain are you, Mr West? The whole scheme pretty much went wrong from the beginning, but with a few people being in the wrong place at the wrong time and the odd sexual indiscretion here and there, it began to look like a series of appalling coincidences . . .’ ‘Now look here,’ began Mark, ‘anyone taking one look at this situation could only call it misadventure, and anyway . . . hang on a minute, just before Cynthia disappeared from my room she said she was going to get something downstairs, food, she . . .’ He looked into Butler’s eyes. There was no mistaking the guilty, shifty glare that returned his gaze. ‘You!’ mumbled Mark. ‘You!’ he shouted louder and lunged at the manservant, who fell back against the wall as Mark grappled with him. Iffy moved fast to crash the door shut. Mark West saw the carving knife he was clutching out of the corner of his eye. ‘Oh shit,’ he exclaimed. Releasing his choke-hold on Butler’s throat, he leapt over Laetitia’s stiffening corpse on the bed, towards the window. Butler sank to the floor, gurgling and choking. Iffy gamely made an attempt at a rugby tackle, grabbing at West’s disappearing trousers as he slithered over the window edge. ‘Damn!’ cried Iffy. ‘Damn, damn, damn and blast him!’ he raged, clutching Mark West’s trousers and underpants in his right hand. ‘Still, he can’t get far on a night like this with no trousers on. My God. The car. Butler . . . come on!’ Iffy grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and almost threw him down the main staircase. Iffy flung open the front doors. The taxi was still there. He held out his hand. ‘Keys,’ he demanded and Butler felt in his jacket pocket. Mark West fell into the blackness, minus this trousers and boxer shorts. ‘Thanks God for Oxford bags,’ he thought. Iffy’s 133

Grip had pulled the grey flannels over his leather brogue shoes, and now he struck the earth beneath the window, some fifteen feet below. It was a moonless night, black as pitch, but Mark West stumbled off into it, limping on one ankle. One hand clutched at his penis, the other fumbled in front of him, grasping in the darkness. He walked into the gardener’s fence, erected at knee level. ‘Oh Christ,’ he shouted as his shins cracked on wood.

Limping on both legs now, he straddled the obstructoin and felt his way round to the shed. It seemed too obvious a place to hide: he could not stay for long. His left leg rattled against a metallic object leaning against the rear wall. He reached down and felt the tubular steel, the rubber and spokes. ‘A bicycle,’ he exclaimed softly. He remembered it was mostly downhill to the village. The tyres felt like there was enough air in them. He lifted it over the fence, stuffing his penis through the buttons of his shirt front so that it poked out from around his navel. The prospect of having his precious member shredded in the bicycle spokes was not very appealing. ‘Here we go,’ he thought and swung into the seat. Alas, there was no saddle to greet his bare bottom, merely a rusty on*-inch metal pole. ‘What do you mean you can’t find them?’ screeched Iffy. ‘What do I pay you for?’ ‘You don’t pay me,’ grumbled Butler. ‘Don’t come the raw prawn with me. What did you do with them? When did you see them last?’ Butler had put the taxi ignition keys on his most important key ring, the key ring that held the keys to his baby, the keys that had disappeared out onto the moor along with Cynthia and Pelvotron. ‘Er, er, they must have dropped out of my pocket this afternoon while I was carrying Roderick.’ ‘I’ll get to the bottom of this later. We’ll have to hot wire 134

The ignition- you do it, I haven’t got a clue about mechanical things, and don’t make a fuck up of this . . .’ A banshee wail cut through the night as Mark West’s bottom got a rusty re-bore from the seat stub. ‘Butler, start the car, and get the headlights on. I’ll see what the devil that noise was.’ Mark West’s eyes filled with tears as he slowly pulled his sphincter off the metal spike. Should he see a doctor or a gynaecologist when he got home, he wondered? If he got home, he thought suddenly, and kicked down hard on the pedals, ignoring the pain and standing up over the crossbar. He rode over the lawn towards the road but Iffy waddled forwards from the cover of the wall and grabbed him. ‘He’s on the gardener’s old bike, Butler!’ he yelled. The car coughed spasmodically as the starter motor flailed uselessly away in the darkness. Mark West lashed out with his right fist into Iffy’s face. There was a crack as he struck him above the eye, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Boatrace was felled. The bicycle wobbled precariously but Mark gritted his teeth and hung on grimly, hitting the gravel of the driveway with a sense of relief, and continuing down the road towards the sanctuary of the village. The taxi spluttered into ife and the headlights erupted across the moor, slicing into the darkness. Iffy hobbled across to the driver’s side clutching at his eye. ‘Get out,’ he screamed at Butler. ‘I’ll drive.’ ‘I think I’ll drive under the circumstances, sir. I mean . . .’

But Iffy pushed him over and leapt into the seat, engaging reverse gear with an appalling ‘kerrunch’ and flattening his foot against the accelerator pedal. Mark West pedalled furiously, pushing the bicycle into absurd angles to keep it on the road as he sped downhill away from Findidnann Hall. He saw the lights illuminate the sky as the car engine started, and then lost them as he descended into the dip where Brian Taylor had commenced 135

His sing-song. Faster and faster he rattled, legs whizzing round and round untill they could no longer keep pace with the wheels; his feet flailed uselessly as the bike freewheeled towards the village. His hands grabbed the brakes, but there were none; the brake blocks had long ago rotted away. He saw the ‘men at work’ sign up ahead but could not stop. He tried to avoid the highest barrier . . . ‘Ooooh shit,’ he yelled as the handlebars smacked into the woodwork, and he somersaulted through the air to land in the half-wet concrete of the newly constructed sheep dip pens. The taxi roared backwards, spraying gravel chippings from its smoking wheels as Iffy rammed it firmly into the stone column which flanked the main steps. Butler covered his face with his hands in terror. ‘Wrong gear, sir,’ he screamed. ‘Fuck off Butler. I come from a family of automobile pioneers.’ The car kangaroo hopped across the drive as Iffy discovered first gear but forgot to use the clutch. ‘Change gear!’ yelled Butler, lurching forward. ‘What?’ roared Iffy. ‘SECOND GEAR.’ Iffy looked down and grabbed the gear lever with both hands. ‘It’s stuck, damned thing,’ he protested, wrestling with the stick. ‘Mind the fucking gatepost,’ shrieked Butler, grabbing the vacant steering wheel as the headlights revealed the forbidding granite post ahead. The taxi lurched and wheezed out of the gates, surviving the near collision by inches as Iffy managed to rip the gear lever out of first and into neutral. From that moment on, it was all downhill. Mark West came to, lying face down in the concrete. He heard the protesting scream of the taxi’s engine as the lights 136

Panned around the moorland casting eerie shadows into the concrete pit. The taxi screamed past, engine revving as Iffy floored the accelerator, but declined to put the motor in gear. Mark decided he had betterstay put for a while.

‘Brakes!’ screamed Butler, seeing the T junction approaching. ‘They’re not working,’ yelled Iffy, slamming his ffot repeatedly on the clutch in panic. ‘Damned British Leyland . . .’ The taxi almost toppled over as it spun through 180 degrees, tyres squealing and filling the night air with the stench of smouldering rubber. It stopped in the middle of the road junction, its engine purring softly once more. The headlight beams burned through the rubber fog that rose all around it. Inside, Butler released the hadbrake with a sigh of relief. He was bathed in sweat and had aged years in a matter of minutes. ‘Cor, pretty exciting, what? I must go for a drive more often, eh? Damn fine quick thinking, Butler!’ Butler groaned in his seat. ‘I think we should stay here for a while sir. This T-junction seems to be pretty strategic. He’ll have to come this way if he comes by road and we’ll never find him tonight otherwise, not with a mist coming down.’ There was indeed a thin film of Scotch mist forming on the windscreen, and swirling in the headlights. ‘Very well, Butler, I agree. We shall stay here until first light, and then, if we haven’t got him, we shall backtrack and have a look out on the moors. I suggest that you take the first watch. I’m pretty tuckered out after all that driving, you know.’ Butler looked at his watch. It was almost midnight. ‘When do we change shifts?’ ‘Butler,’ admonished Iffy. ‘Really! I should like a 6:30 a.m. call and if you can rustle up a couple of scrambled eggs on toast, that would be dmanably decent of you. Anyway, good night and good hunting.’ 137

Iffy started snoring almost immediately, sounding remarkably like a straw sucking at the bottom of an empty can. Butler marvelled at the way he could just drop off to sleep. Butler was always disturbed by his terrifying recurrent dreams. ‘No shame,’ he thought, ‘these aristocrats.’ 138

19 The Sun Comes Up The first early bird swooped low over the high turret of Findidnann Hall, hoping in vain for that bald head to reappear for target practice. The owner of the bald head shook the numbness out of his bones and prodded the numbskull next to him.

‘Excuse me, sir, this is your 6.30 a.m. call,’ ‘Rabbits!’ exclaimed iffy and leapt out of his seat into the road, poised like a flamingo. Butler had to put up with this every morning. ‘Morning, Butler,’ greeted Iffy as if the word ‘rabbits’ had never existed. ‘No sign of him, eh? Very well, first gear it is then.’ Butler rolled his eyes heavenward, as the car lurched forward back up the hill. They drove erratically onwards. ‘There, sir, there it is, on the left by the roadworks sign.’ Butler pointed excitedly at the mangled remains of the gardener’s bicycle, its front wheel twisted and broken where it had skidded into the barrier. Iffy found the brake pedal this time and the taxi squealed to a halt. 139

‘No time to lose, Butler, he must be injured, he can’t have go far . . .’ Iffy started to hobble over to the building site on his high heels. ‘In here sir, look.’ Butler had glanced into one of the concrete pits. It was Mark West. More or less where he had lain after falling off his bicycl. ‘Wot a fucking ‘orrible way to go,’ grunted Butler, averting his eyes. Iffy arrived out of breath. ‘Pretty damned ironic if you ask me,’ he commented, running his gaze over the corpse. Mark West had lain face down that evening in the half set concrete. Every extra second had sealed his fate. All evening, as the cold had nmbed his limbs and chilled his mind, he had struggled, pulled, cajoled, smashed with his fists till they were bloody, but the first seven inches of his penis remained set hard in the concrete, and could not escape. ‘Death,’ remarked Iffy, ‘by indecent exposure. A lesson for us all.’ You know the Eastern thing about karma and all that. You know what those awful coloureds say, “What goes around comes around”? Very true Butler.’ Iffy stared at him hard. ‘Very true.’ They got back in the car. Iffy insisting on driving, so Butler reluctantly started the engine for him. The car weaved unsteadily round the first bend, roaring full throttle in first gear. ‘Should I pull the lever yet, Butler?’ demanded Iffy. ‘Put your foot on that first,’ Butler pointed at the clutch, ‘then pull it.’ ‘Righto, old chap, here we go.’ Iffy pressed his ffot on the clutch, grabbed the gear lever and wrenched it into second gear, keeping his other foot flat down to the boards on the throttle. ‘Nothing’s happening, old man!’ he roared above the engine. ‘Let go of the clutch,’ mouthed Butler, almost inaudible above the din. The car rocketed forward as the screaming engine was violently connected to the gearbox. 140

‘Christ, Butler, we’re doing almost twenty-five miles and hour.’ Iffy wrestled with the wheel and wrenched it hard over to negotiate the next bend, but the road was too narrow, sufficient at that point for only one vehicle’s width, while Iffy needed at least half a truck’s length of space to get round it safely.

‘Abandon ship!’ he shrieked, as the car trampled over the heather and buried its nose in a ditch, steam hissing and rising from its radiator. ‘You’ve really fucking done it now,’ complained Butler, from the silent and wrecked cockpit. ‘They were your bloody instructions,’ snapped Iffy. ‘We’ll just have to walk.’ He scrambled in an ungainly fashion out of the twisted chassis, and crawled up the bank to stand on the road. ‘Christ, Butler, come and look at this,’ he yelled urgently, his eyes riveted to the middle of the tarmac. ‘Jesus,’ complained Butler, ‘What have you . . . what the fuck is that?’ he exclaimed slowly. ‘That,’ said Iffy grimly. ‘is a Mark 1 British Army-pattern pressure-operated vehicle mine, and I do believe that it was intended for us.’ In the middle of the road, flush with the surface, lay a circular twelve-inch diameter metal plate. ‘Somebody must have put it there last night, after we went past,’ murmured Butler, seriously worried about his karma by now. ‘Quite correct,’ snapped a harsh voice in front of them. ‘I did.’ Iffy and Butler looked up. Wing Commander Bill Symest-Groat was wearing army fatigues and was holding a pump action twelve-bore shotgun. He stood up, legs twelve inches apart in the military at-ease position on the crest of the road above them. ‘You two are the most repellent pair I’ve laid eyes on in many a year. Not only that, you’re stupid beyond all belief. Did you really,’ he seered at Iffy, ‘did you really believe taht you were talking to a plum pudding that was a member of the Special Forces? Ever heard of ventriloquism?’ 141

‘So who was he?’ demanded Iffy. ‘The secret agent? Master of disguise and concealment? Builder of radio-controlled game birds – a fucking stupid idea if I may say so . . .’ ‘Told you so,’ hissed Butler. ‘Shut up,’ growled Iffy, kicking him. ‘The secret agent?’ he continued, walking towards them down the hill and levelling the shotgun. ‘Poisoner of carving knives, infiltrator of dead ancestors, fucker of American tarts, booby trapper of hunchbacks, three-toed kung fu expert, arboreal phanthom. . .’ ‘Arboreal what?’ grunted Butler. ‘It means he’s good at dressing up as trees.’ ‘Indeed I AM,’ roared Symes-Groat. ‘I am all of these things and I would have been a good blower-up of vehicles had you two clowns been able to keep a fucking car on the road at twenty-five miles an hor with no traffic. So now I have to do the job personally.’ He flicked off the safety catch. ‘What’s he going to do?’ quivered a terrified Butler. ‘You are going to have and accident,’ declared Symes-Groat. ‘Your motor vehicle has just crashed into a ditch and caught fire, alas with you in it. Pretty neat, eh?’ ‘You’ll never get away with it,’ sneered Iffy defiantly. ‘I already have,’ murmured Symes-Groat. ‘Watch me.’ He wriggled his thumbs underneath his double-barrelled chin, and Iffy watched in horror as the skin began to peel away in strips, until the whole fabric of Wing Commander Bill SymesGroat’s face came off in a web of gluey plastic and false hair. ‘You!’ exclaimed Iffy in horror.

‘Me, myself, I, old boy, the very same. The displeasure will be all yours.’ ‘Bloody ‘ell,’ exploded Butler. ‘It’s your double, your Lord-ship.’ ‘My half double to be precise, ‘ muttered Iffy grimly. ‘Quite correct both of you. May I introduce myself to your 142

Manservant, Ferdinand Alfonso Boatrace at your service. ‘He gave them a supercilious smirk. Butler thought his chin was even weaker than Iffy’s. ‘Though I was dead, didn’t you eh? Sold into slavery in Africa was the family rumour, I believe, after squandering uncle’s money on whores and gambling so they said. You didn’t do much better, did you old man? Broke, not a penny to your name, and you dream up this ridiculous scheme to make money. Played right into my hands of course. Getting rid of the extraneous baggage posed a bit of a problem but, as it turned out, they did a pretty good job of it themselves.’ ‘Let’s make a deal,’ started Iffy, ‘I can overlook this little incident. . .’ ‘Let me tell you what the deal is, my dear half-baked half-brother,’ interrupted Alfonso firmly. ‘You will get into that car where you will burn jolly nicely until you’re unrecognizable. I will then go and live in your house and assume your identity, which, as your butler pointed out, I am eminently capable of doing.’ ‘You’ll still be broke,’ shouted Iffy. ‘You can’t sell the house because of legal rubbish. Anyhow, I tried it and no one wants it, it’s faling apart, so you’re back where you started.’ ‘Not so, dearest sibling,’ hissed Alfonso. ‘I have located a map showing the last resting place of the famed Dubl’une treasure, about six feet under Butler’s pantry in fact, so my money problems will be temporary to say the least . . . Now, get in the car.’ He waved the gun barrel menacingly. ‘What if we don’t?’ replied Iffy valiantly. ‘Then you’ll have to shoot us, and that will show up on forensics too easily.’ ‘Never give up do you? Very well. Let me put it another way.’ He took a deep lungful of morning air and exhaled loudly. ‘Butler here is on the run from the nick, but you were too stupid to suss that one out, so I shoot him dead first, then I kick the fuck out of you and put you both in the car – then I torch it and sling in the gun too. What do you think? Argument or accident in the front seat? Criminal trying to kidnap or lover’s tiff between a pair of pooftahs?’ He 143

Spat. ‘You’re not renowned for being the straightest person in the world, dearest Bro, and this sorry specimen could pas for an arse bandit anywere.’ Butler started to move towards the car. ‘You’re crazy!’ screamed Iffy. ‘Better to be shot than burned alive. . .’ ‘Maybe I’ll just wound him then,’ Alfonso grinned. Butler opened the car door and got in, sitting glumly in his seat. Alfonso took a step towards Iffy. ‘In the Foreign Legion I was, y’know,’ he remarked casually. ‘I’ll take your eyeballs out first if you don’t move.’ He advanced another step.

Pelvotron had beavered away eagerly for hours, humming and coming, squirting gallons of juicy malodorous ditch waer around the moors until the supply became exhausted and the machine had sunk into the mechanical equivalent of a post-coital nap. Its circuits, however, remained alert and aware, programmed irreversibly in ‘seek and penetrate’ mode. Not even a straying sheep had come within range to trigger its arousal stage. This morning, however, was different. And the little electrical noises buzzing from its internal motors should have told the unwary observer that this would be a one-way love affair. As the juicy morsel passed by, the cross wires that aimed its steel shaft started to tingle. The caterpillar tracks slowly and soundlessly ground their way out of the dry stream bed, and rolled across the moor towards ground zero. Alfonso’s face was contorted in a sneer of malice. ‘Filth!’ he accused. ‘My people are gong to get rid of your sort for good, and soon,’ he added, clenching his fist and staring contemptuosly at Iffy who remained at the side of the road unmoved. 144

Pelvotron broke cover and hit the road, travelling at its top speed of around thirty miles per hour, driving considerably better than Lord iffy. It targeted the muddy, parachute camouflaged, denim-clad bottom before it. It required pin-point accuracy to hit at the right angle and speed so rubber-ended monster would hurtle into the victim’s anus, squeezing between his very muscular Foreign Legion issue buttocks. Alfonso heard the high-pitched whine at the last second. He looked around and his mouth dropped open. ‘What the fuck . . .’ but no further sound emerged as Pelvotron hit full force with a dull ‘phplat’ sound. His trousers split, followed shortly by his soft fleshy sphincter. Alfonso’s arms flew skyward as his body jerked off the ground, skewered on the end of the speeding knob. His legs bicyled through the air in agony, as he hurtled forward at thirty miles an hour. Iffy dived for cover in the front seat of the car. ‘What the fuck is that thing, Butler?’ he screamed. Butler ws cowering under the dashboard. He had seen it coming. ‘Well, sir, it’s a little invention that I . . .’ Kerrump! An earth-shaking explosion, throwing tarmac and loose earth fifty feet into the air, silenced him. Iffy’s head cautiously poked out of the car door. The rever-berations of the report had finished rattling through the dawn and the last pieces of soil had fallen on to the roof of the car. ‘He’s gone, Butler,’ he whispered in astonishment. Un-steadily, he staggered to the spot where Pelvotron had run over the mark 1 British Army vehicle mine, moving at thirty miles per hour, whilst still furiously buggering Alfonso. There was no Pelvotron any more. Nor was there a sign of Alfonso. Just a bloody great hole.

20 The Hereafter ‘Hoisted by his own petard, Buter old chap. What did I say about karma? Incidentally, damned useful invention of yours, that Pelvotron thing, got us out of a damned sticky situation back there. When all this is finished I may let you build another one. Could be quite entertaining, you know.’ ‘If I may say so, sir, I . . . ‘ began Butler. ‘Just shut up and dig!’ ordered Iffy. Iffy sat in the kitchen outside the pantry doorway on a chaise longue dragged protestingly downstairs by Butler. In a silver bucket alongside lay one open champagne bottle filled, for reasons of thrift, with tap water. ‘Soon have the real thing, eh Butler?’ chortled Iffy. ‘Yes sir.’ Butler was down to six feet under the pantry floor and had been digging for several hours with a pick axe, shovel, and his bare hands. Sweet ran in rivers down his back and chest as he toiled in the stifling heat and dampness of the small pantry. ‘I’ve got it, sir!’ he exclaimed suddenly as his pick-axe handle splintered wood. 146

Iffy leapt off his couch as Butler struggled to free the ancient ship’s chest from its tomb. ‘Here . . . it . . . comes,’ he heaved, hauling on a brass ring attached to one end. ‘For God’s sake be careful,’ squealed Iffy. Butler let out a sigh of relief. ‘Got it, sir.’ The trunk lay upended in the trench. ‘Break the ruddy thing open, man.’ Iffy gestured manically. Butler swung the pick at the rusty padlock, once, twice. Then it caught behind the rotting backplate. He prized the lock away from the wood, which splintered and snapped softly, moist after all those years of burial. Iffy furiously polished his monocle, breathing on it with almost every breath. ‘Well, well! Open it you fool,’ he breathed desperately. The lid was raised. In the bottom lay a small envelope. Butler and Iffy stood in stunned silence. Butler nervously cleared his throat and reached down to pick up the paper. ‘This seems to be about it, sir,’ he said quietly and lifted it up to the Laird. Iffy snatched the envelope and tore it open. A second later he screeched in anguish and hurled the champagne bottle at the opposite wall where it smashed to pieces. He ran up the kitchen stairs screaming oaths. The letter lay on the stone floor where he had dropped it. Butler reached out os his hole and read the words written in pencil on a piece of excercise-book paper, hurriedly torn in two.

To whom it may concern. IOU on treasure. You can sue my descendants for it. Love Uncle ‘Rotten old bastard,’ mumbled Butler. 147

Lord Iffy remained silent for almost twenty-four hours. His monocle fell out as he sat in his favourite, high-backed Victorian arm-chair, but he did not replace it. His face was stone grey and his breathing shallow. Twenty-four hours he had remained in that seat, and the noise of a delivery van coming up the driveway did not provoke even a blink of an eye or a twitch of his nose. Butler answered the door with surprise, seeing the armoured, dark blue Securicor Ford Transit pull up, and the helmeted and uniformed guard get out, unlock the back door and retrieve a small padded jiffy bag. ‘Bit cut off up here, aren’t you?’ a thick Scottish accent enquired, his face half-concealed beneath his acrylic protection visor. ‘Sign here.’ He handed Butler a pad which the manservant signed without looking at it. His eyes were glued firmly to the envelope. ‘Here you are, sir,’ said the guard cheerfully. ‘Good morning.’ He turned and ambled off towards his van, which soon disappeared over the hill. Butler opened the jiffy bag. Inside was an airmail envelope covered in USA stamps and marked ‘Strictly private and confidential. For the eyes of Lord Iffy Boatrace only’. Butler became quite excited and turned around to go upstairs, but what he saw froze him to the spot. It was covered in slime, its lips sucking and bubbling on the excrement and mud which caked its body. Bloody sores erupted from its feet and outstretched hands. It took halting steps towards Butler. He uttered a shriek of fright and raced up the stairs to Iffy’s study, locking the door behind him. He threw the envelope into Iffy’s lap. ‘There’s a fucking monster downstairs, like a zombie,’ he panted. Iffy ignored him and slowly, painstakingly opened the envelope as if in a dream. His lips drooped open and shut as he read the first few lines. 148

Dear Lord Boatrace Following our meeting this summer in Los Angeles, I have great pleasure in confirming your appointment as United Kingdom Liaison Officer for Jimmy Reptile Evangelism Incorporated. Enclosed you will find two round-trip tickets to LA, where you will attend our first International Conference and Prayer Meeting as a personal guest of the Rev. Jimmy Reptile. I need not tell you how important and lucrative this conference can be to all of us. Hugs and holy water. Yours in faith

Hyapatia Comebody Personal Asst to Rev. Reptile P.S. I will be in Room 415 Iffy put the letter down slowly as the fire of inspiration lit the engine room of his brain. ‘Butler,’ he began, a huge grin rising on his face. ‘I,’ he started even louder, ‘AM A FUCKING MISSIONARY.’ He stood up and flung his arms in the air, knocking a nearby vase to the floor. ‘TV evangelism, Butler, prime time. My God, do you know how much money there is in that? That’s what Alfonso meant when he said “My people are going to get rid of your sort.” The stupid sod went and are going to rid of your sort.” The stupid sod went and got converted to some senile old flea bag’s TV show! He was probably going to give him the bloody house and everything.’ Iffy’s tortuous mind was really spinning now. ‘Pack, Butler, pack right now, we’re of to Los Angeles.’ Iffy wrenched open the door as Butler uttered his protest. ‘Don’t do that, sir, there’s . . .’ Now it was Iffy’s turn to freeze on the spot. He peered closely at the apparition that had followed Butler upstairs, the 149

Torn and wretched clothes, the slime. Suddenly, Iffy laughed quickly and strode past it down the stairs. ‘Morning, Cynthia,’ he yelled. ‘That was the best fuck I ever had in my life, you bastard’ she croaked. ‘Oh no,’ said Butler. “Two days in a stream breathing through a hole in a turkey’s breastbone is not my idea of fun, so if you want to make this relationship work, then I’m going to make a few changes. . .’ Butler screamed as Cynthia grabbed his trousers and pressed her excrement-covered face to his crutch, her hands tearing at his fly buttons, her mouth contorted like a vacuum-hose monster. Iffy popped his head around the dor. ‘Not packed yet?’ he asked brightly. ‘Help!’ screamed the man being eaten. ‘Don’t need any, old chap,’ replied Iffy brightly. ‘What am I going to do?’ shrieked Butler, rolling his eyes to the ceiling as Cynthia took a mouthful of flaccid foreskin. ‘Adopt the position, old chap,’ laughed Iffy. ‘What?’ ‘The missionary position, of course.’ Lord Iffy slammed the door.