A Blink of the Screen (3 page)

Telephone lines all over the world smouldered, melted, and slowly fused together as Crucible was plagued with offers from the big financial magnates. Advertising firms fought for the Devil’s patronage. Work on the London–Hell tunnel was progressing fast under Crucible’s supervision. The Devil moved in with him, saying that all the cranes and bulldozers and what-not were making Hell hell.

‘See how Cerberus loves his Yummy-Doggy! Your dog can have that glossy coat, those glistening fangs, those three heads, if you feed him Yummy-Doggy! Yummy-Doggy in the handy two-ounce tin! Cerberus says Yummy-Doggy is scr-r-rumptious! Ask for Yummy Doggy!!’

‘Men of distinction smoke Coffin-Nales!’

‘Tell me, Lucifer, why do you smoke Coffin-Nales?’

‘I like that cool, fresh feeling; the flavour of the superb tobacco; the fifty pounds your firm’s paying me for these corny adverts –’

‘Tell me, sir, what are your views on the Colour Bar?’

‘Well, I – er – I mean to say – um – er well – er that is –’

‘What do you think of the younger generation?’

‘Well – er – um – ah – yes! Definitely!’

‘Do you agree that violence on television is responsible for the deplorable increase in the Nation’s crime statistics?’

‘Well, ah – um – no. That is to say, er – yes. I mean, er – no – ah – um.’

‘Thank you very much, sir, for coming here tonight and giving us your views on topics of immediate concern. Thank you. Well, ladies and gentlemen, tune in next week for another –’

Crucible surveyed the company dispassionately. There was the usual bevy of disgruntled back-benchers, would-be starlets, bored reporters, and of course, the usual fatigue party of Guards, all sipping themselves horizontal on third-rate champagne. A motley and mottled crowd. Crucible, who was becoming quite an expert on crowded atmospheres of late, diagnosed this one as a particularly fruity blend of stale smoke, Fleurs de Mal, and methane, not to mention the occasional waft of carbon monoxide. He turned to
the
Devil, who was performing wonders with the cocktail shaker.

‘This, my friend, is what is laughingly called a party; a ritual still found in the better parts of Belgravia. It seems to consist of a—’

‘Oh, lay off it, Cru. This is the besteshed jag I’ve hadsh in five hundred yearsh, and I’m gonna make the besht of itsh—’

A muffled
crump!
indicated that the Devil had ‘made the besht of itsh’, to the best of his ability.

It was a crisp November morning, and in the secluded thoroughfare that was Cranberry Avenue the birds were singing, the leaves were falling, and Crucible was having his breakfast. Between mouthfuls of bacon and mushrooms, he gave the newspapers the swift port-to-starboard. The gossip column caught his eye and he remembered the Devil.

Throwing the paper in the waste-bin, he wiped his mouth on his napkin and padded into the spare bedroom.

Chaotic was the scene that met his eye. Paper hats, balloons, and streamers were lying around the room and there were of bottles not a few. The Devil himself, still clad in Crucible’s second-best dress-suit, was sprawled across the bed, snoring loudly.

‘Wakey-Wakey!’ shouted Crucible, heartlessly. The effect was impressive. The Devil shot a clear two feet in the air and came down clutching his head; the language he used turned Crucible’s ears bright red.

Crucible busied himself in the kitchen, and returned with a cup of black coffee.

‘Here.’

‘Ouch! Not so loud.’ Slurp! ‘Oh, that’s better. What happened last night?’

‘You tried the effect of vodka and Green Chartreuse.’

‘Ouch!’

‘Quite. Now, best foot – er, hoof, forward. Hell’s opening ceremony is at twelve.’

‘I can’t go like this – ouch!’

‘Sorry. You’ll just have to drink gallons of black coffee and bear it. Now, come on.’

Jazz resounded around the walls of Hell. Pop music echoed along the dark corridors, mingling with the click of slot machines. Espresso coffee flowed in rivers. The scream of hotted-up motorcycles mingled with the screams of banshees both ghostly and human (guitar strumming, for the use of ). The growth of Hell’s popularity only equalled the growth of the Devil’s bank account.

Up high in his balcony, on the wall of Hell, the Devil poured himself a drink of water and took three tranquillizer pills.

The storm raged. For the last month the Northern Hemisphere had been beset by thunderstorms unequalled in the records of mankind. The weather-men spent all their working days testing their corns, seaweed, and other oracles but had to confess themselves at a loss.

In the large study of his new country house, Crucible threw another log on the fire and settled himself deeper into his armchair. The storm continued.

His conscience, perforce the most robust and untroubled in Europe, was troubling him. Something was wrong with this Hades business. Certainly not on the monetary side, for his commission over the last three weeks had been exceedingly generous, as his country house, two cars, five race-horses, and one yacht plainly stated.

Hell had been a great success. The Top people were going to flock there and it had had the approval of the Establishment.

But something was wrong. Something to do with those heavy storms.

Somewhere in his mind, the inner Crucible, equipped with wings, halo, and harp, was bouncing up and down on Crucible’s conscience. The thunder murmured.

Poomb!

The Devil appeared, looking very agitated, and ran to Crucible’s cocktail cabinet. He poured himself a Belladonna, and whirled round to Crucible.

‘I can’t stand any more of it!’ he screamed. His hand was shaking.

‘More of what?’

‘Your lot! They’ve turned my home into Bedlam! Noise! Noise! Noise! I can’t get a good night’s rest! Do you realize I haven’t slept for over two weeks? Nothing but yelling teen—!’

‘One moment. You say they disturb you?’

‘Very funny!’

‘Why not close Hell for a while and take a holiday?’

‘I’ve tried. Heaven knows—!’

Rumble!

‘I’ve tried! Will they leave? No! A bunch of thugs threatened to “get” me if I tried to close their noisy, blaring paradise—’

RUMBLE!

‘I can’t move without being mobbed by savage hordes of autograph hunters! I’m famous! I can’t get a bit of peace! It’s Hell down there!’ The Devil was now kneeling on the floor, tears streaming down his face. ‘You’ve got to help me! Hide me! Do something! Oh God, I wish—’

The thunder split the Heavens in twain. The sky echoed and re-echoed with the sound. Crucible slumped in his chair, his hands clapped over his bursting eardrums.

Then there was silence.

The Devil lay in the middle of the floor, surrounded by light. Then the thunder spoke.

‘DO YOU WISH TO RETURN?’

‘Oh, yes sir! Please! I’m sorry! I apologize for everything! I’m sorry about that apple, truly I am!’

On the bookshelf, a bust of Charles Darwin shattered to fragments.

‘I’m sorry! Please take me back, please –’

‘COME.’

The Devil vanished. Outside, the storm subsided.

Crucible rose, shaken, from the chair. Staggering over to the window, he looked into the fast-clearing evening sky.

Then out of the sunset came a Hand and Arm of light, raised in salute.

Crucible smiled.

‘Don’t mention it, sir. It was a pleasure.’

He closed the window.

SOLUTION

T
ECHNICAL
C
YGNET
,
1:10
,
J
ULY 1964

I really can’t remember this one. There was a period, a long, long time ago, when I was dashing out ideas and concepts and half-baked bits of dialogue to see if, magically, they would catch fire and become a decent short story or novel. Those that didn’t make it were dumped in the bit bucket, and if you can remember what that means then you have been around computers for as long as me. I must have written it and then danced away to try something else
.

‘Gold? or is it diamonds this time?’

Pyecraft swung round. ‘What the—!’

The Inspector stepped through the tiny hatchway into the cockpit, and pointed vaguely towards the small rear cabin.

‘There is a very large parachute compartment back there. I had to throw out your parachute though, so it’s in your own interest that you watch the controls.’

Pyecraft eased the joystick back. ‘I’ll have your hide for this,’ he
muttered
. ‘After the indignity of a search at Lemay, you stow away on my private plane—!’

‘Why don’t you shut up?’ suggested the Inspector sweetly. ‘There are just the two of us here, so we’ll have less of the “outraged citizen” act. It doesn’t suit you.’ He lit a cigarette and carefully refrained from offering one to Pyecraft. ‘Johan Pyecraft, I arrest you in—’

‘What for? You can’t prove a thing.’

‘Smuggling.’

‘Smuggling what? His arm slid slowly down between the seats to the small brass fire-extinguisher.

‘I don’t know yet. However, you have made fifteen trips over the mountains, in these battered old aircraft, in the past three weeks; you suddenly have a lot of money; and you are a known smuggler. So I say to myself, Gustave, I say, where is he getting all this money? And I answer myself, Gustave, mon ami, he is back in his old trade.’

‘You found nothing at Lemay.’ Pyecraft grasped the extinguisher.

‘Exactly. And so you must have brought it on to the plane since. Therefore you will please to turn the machine around and—’

He sidestepped neatly as the heavy extinguisher flew past him; Pyecraft, caught off balance, finished the swing in the centre of the instrument panel.

High on the frosty mountainside two small figures huddled round a feebly glowing fire.

The Inspector looked again at the remains of the aeroplane.

‘That was good flying.’

‘We might as well have crashed; if the cold doesn’t get us the wolves will.’

They both gazed at the fire for a few moments.

‘Come on,’ coaxed the Inspector. ‘You might as well tell me now. Just what was it that you were smuggling?’

Pyecraft looked at him sadly.

‘Aircraft,’ he said.

THE PICTURE

T
ECHNICAL
C
YGNET
,
1:11
,
M
AY 1965

Good grief! That was a long time ago! I’m quite glad I never tried to sell this one, but once again I was playing with the words to see what happens. It’s a thing that authors do sometimes
.

It wasn’t really a superb work of art.

The artist had painted the sky the wrong colour and covered it with blotches in an attempt, seemingly, to hide his mistake; the perspective, what there was of it, was wrong; and the vegetation would not have been found in the wildest nightmare. The whole thing was a surrealistic portrait of hell.

Even the frame barely held together.

Jon kept it on the wall – one of the padded walls – of his cell. Strange and horrific though it was, it was some connection with the Outside, some reminder that there were other things besides eating, sleeping, and the occasional visit of the doctors. Sometimes they would watch him through the grille in the padded door, and shake their heads.

‘No cure,’ said one.

‘Unless we take away that – that picture,’ said the other.

‘You will kill him if you do.’

‘He will kill himself if we don’t; you know that it was the cause of his – his –’

‘His madness.’

‘There is no other word for it. That picture is the centre of his life now; I believe it is the only thing that he does not doubt. Yesterday he told me that it portrays the only true world, and that this one is really false. We can do nothing against such stubbornness.’

‘Then it is either kill or cure?’

‘Yes. I will tell him when I examine him. Perhaps the shock of having his world removed will cure him.’

It didn’t seem to. Jon still sat hunched and brooding in the corner of his cell, staring at the picture, trying to remember …

He heard the soft tread in the passage. They were coming to take away his picture; there was so little time left! He made one last, tremendous, despairing effort …