The Sprouts of Wrath (20 page)

Meek wound down his window. “Back up!” he shouted towards the goggle-eyed policemen in the convoy behind. His words were of course lost in the noise of the screaming engine. The bulldozer struck the bonnet of the lead car. Meek threw himself out of the vehicle as it upended to fall upon the car behind. Hovis leapt up and down shouting through his loudhailer and brandishing his gun. Meek watched in horror as the bulldozer minced the line of police cars into unrecognizable scrap. Rune turned upon his heel and strode off up the road whistling a tune of his own making.

“Now, Jim!” cried Professor Slocombe. Jim fumbled with the phial and dropped it beyond the reach of the circle.

“Your little diversion has come to nothing. Goodbye, Professor!” cried the Soul of the World.

Jim flung himself towards the silver bottle. As he left the circle, darkness closed about him, the world came to an end.

Pooley clambered to his feet, brushing away the strands of long coarse grass which clung to his clothing. The land about him was flat endless tundra, relieved only by the occasional gnarled black tree. Somewhere nearby a river ran, but Jim was unable to see it. Shielding his eyes against the curious magenta glare of the sky, he sought a habitation, a hostelry perhaps? There was nothing. But then there was something.

Borne upon a wind, so light as to scarcely stir the grass, he heard the faint sounds of chanting. And then the jingling of bells, the rattle of harnessing, the tread of the heavy horses. The creak of the wagon wheels. A procession wound towards him, those at the van swung censers, and intoned the chant. Their garments were of rough brown cloth, soiled through much hard travel, their feet unshod, their faces grave. These men and women were exhausted, they had travelled many miles without rest, they stumbled, staggered, but they marched on.

Pooley watched them sadly as they passed. The heads of the great horses were down, their flanks ran wet. The wagon wheels turned in faulty circles, their unequal spokes wrought with the signs of a former zodiac. And Jim watched those who rode the high-sided wagons, the witch-faced women with their bearded chins and tattooed brows. And he glimpsed the treasures which they guarded. Sprawling upon the cushions of hay were infants, swollen and grotesque, the size of oxen. The children of the great folk. The last of their line. They gurgled and croaked, their naked skins grey, their eyes without lustre. Now behind them, in the far distance, the thunder rolled and broke. The sky seethed angrily and muttered threats.

Pooley heard the cry, in a language he knew not, yet understood. “Onward, onward to the Iron Tower. Onward to the sanctuary.”

The witch-women drove hard upon the faltering horses and those that maintained the endless chant marched on upon wooden legs. And Jim limped after them across the plain and now the wind grew and howled and drove him onward. And there upon the horizon he saw the tower, stark and black, a distant needle piercing the sky. And the cry went up from the marchers and the women drove ever harder upon the dying horses. “Onward, onward, King Bran is coming.”

And from the heart of the dark and rolling clouds, lightning broke and scoured the land, and the thunder was now the hooves of an approaching army. “Make haste to the sanctuary.”

And of a sudden the tower filled the sky, and a drawbridge fell like the hand of benediction. The marchers broke into a run. A horse floundered and dropped dead in the shafts of the lead wagon. Men and women tore it away, rolled the body aside, dragged and heaved at the wagon, swarmed towards the drawbridge. “Make haste, make haste.”

Jim limped after them. A wagon overturned, spilling its ghastly load. The witch-women deserted it, ran screaming. The horsemen thundered nearer. The horsemen of King Bran. And Jim ran, as though the devil was at his heels. And now two called out to him, called through the crashing elements, the terror, the lightning and the pounding hooves of the approaching warriors. A man and a woman, braced against the driving winds, crying through the maelstrom, “Hurry, Jim, this way!” — Pooley shielded his eyes. “John,” he gasped, “Jennifer, I’m coming.”

Then hands grasped him, pulled him back, back from the drawbridge, the threshold of the sanctuary. “Stop, do not enter, you must not enter.”

“Take the bottle,” cried Paul Geronimo, “uncork the bottle!”

“Do it now!” his brother urged. “Only you can!”

Jim’s brain reeled, torn with doubt, indecision and fear.

Paul thrust the silver bottle into his hand. “For the Professor, do it now, open the bottle!”

Pooley stared towards Omally; he was stepping back into the iron tower. Only one wagon had entered, the others were abandoned, people screamed, fled, the winds tore. The horsemen of King Bran bore down upon him. The drawbridge began to rise. Pooley ripped the stopper from the bottle.

A beaming face beamed out across the nation. “This is the London Olympics.”

Old Pete switched off the television set. “It’s not the same without Anne Diamond,” he complained bitterly. The sound of his letter-flap creaking on its rusty spring drew his attention. “Hello,” said Old Pete, “it’s not Giroday.”

Upon the unwelcoming mat lay a silver-foil envelope. YOUR PERSONAL INVITATION TO THE BRENTFORD OLYMPICS. “Gold dust,” said Old Pete, pressing it to his lips. “Thirty-carat gold dust.”

“Gold dust,” said Inspectre Hovis. “At each of the sites where disturbances occurred, and last night it was in the air, on my clothes.”

Rune sat over a bowl of Tibetan muesli. The mess-room of the Brentford nick was crowded with bandaged officers hunched over their breakfasts. “The alchemist’s quest,” said Rune. “Pure gold. It is a powerful instrument in any hands.”

“Whoever is at the bottom of this is taking the piss,” said Hovis, applying himself to his cornflakes. “Having a pop at me personally.”

“I don’t like to say I told you so,” said Hugo Rune. “Well, actually I do, as it happens.”

“A bulldozer,” spluttered Hovis, spraying the magus with half-masticated flakes of golden corn. “A bulldozer wouldn’t go through the wire. I’ve got six police vehicles smashed to a pulp, a dozen officers banged up in the Cottage Hospital, my reputation, for what it was, is in tatters. My job will be on the line for this.”

“To offer you my sympathy would be as futile as it would be fallacious. You wasted your opportunity.” Rune brushed cornflakes from his shoulders. “Your man was distracted, I could sense it. It will be more difficult now.”

“Don’t even think about raising your fee,” said Hovis.

“You must do it my way, Inspectre. It will take a few days. Keep the gasometer under constant surveillance, arrest anyone who attempts to leave it. Other than for that, bide your time and wait for me to give you the word.”

Hovis pushed his breakfast bowl aside and took to the contents of his cane, pecking a hearty blend of Moroccan Black cut with cocaine in his left nostril. “If you cross me, Rune,” he said, “I will have your wedding tackle for cufflinks.”

“I am Hugo Rune,” said Hugo Rune. “Lord of the seven spheres. Master of the cosmic consciousness, Laird of Cockpen and hereditary heir to the Grand Mastership of the Golden Dawn. I think therefore I’m right.”

“You’d better be.” Hovis looked up towards the magus, but the chair was empty. Hugo Rune had gone.

Professor Slocombe nudged the sleeper on his chaise-longue with a slippered toe. “Wake up, Jim, I want you to look at something.”

Pooley rubbed at his eyes and creaked upright. “I don’t remember dropping off,” said he, stretching his arms and yawning hugely. Suddenly he jerked into realization. “Blimey,” he gasped. “Last night. All that.” He gaped at the study. It was as it ever had been, confusing, but in order. “Did I dream it, what happened?”

“You saved our lives, Jim.”

“Really? But I wasn’t here, something happened, I was somewhere else.”

“I know, and now I begin to understand.”

“Has he gone?” Jim stared about fearfully. “Is he — is it — dead?”

“Not yet, I regret.”

“Oh God,” said Pooley. “Then we can expect more of the same.”

“Or worse, I suspect. But come, I want to show you something.” The Professor led Jim to his desk where a beautiful Victorian brass microscope stood. “Have a look in here.” He indicated the eye-piece.

Jim took a peep. “Bloody hell!” he swore, leaping back. “It’s alive in there.”

“Indeed, very much so. What did you see?”

“Little things, buzzing about like crazy, they looked …”

“Yes?”

“Angry,” said Jim, “Very angry.”

“And so they are. They are the very stuff of our friend Kaleton.”

“Friend?”

“My apologies, the word is most inappropriate. They are, if you like, a portion of his very essence. The silver flask drew in a quantity of his substance. He left in some confusion before it could take more, but what we have is sufficient.”

“So what does it mean?”

“It means that the non-man Kaleton is a ‘Grex’. A large body of separate organisms which when grouped together form the semblance of something else, either for camouflage or defence. Certain bacteria have the ability to do this when faced with starvation. They pass a message through a chain of single cells, amalgamate into a larger form and refunction in a different manner. They lose their individuality in the cause of mass survival.”

“It’s a bit early for me,” said Jim.

“Then look upon it as a microcosm of human society. A single naked individual could not survive, but in harmony, in rapport with the whole, protected and fed by the whole, he or she is able to function, to exist. Kinship, harmony, team spirit, that is loosely how society maintains its equilibrium. As a single body.”

“Hm,” said Jim. “It’s not the same. We may be part of the whole en masse, but we are each individuals, not one big homogenous blob. It doesn’t compute.”

“Oh, it does. It may be impossible to predict what a single individual will do, but one can predict with absolute accuracy what, say, a million people will do at any given time. They will get up at a certain hour, go to work at a certain hour, take lunch at a certain hour.”

“Yes, I get the picture,” said Jim, “although I don’t like it. Every man is an island, I am not a number, I am a free man, that kind of stuff.”

“No-one could ever doubt that you are an individual, Jim.”

Pooley chewed upon the Professor’s words that might have been a compliment. If it was, he meant to savour it, he didn’t get them that often. “What about this Soul of the World stuff?” he said presently.

“It is an ancient belief,” said Professor Slocombe, “universal as the Flood legend. The Buddhists believe in Rigdenjypo, king of the world, who dwells at the very centre of the planet in Shamballa, capital city of earth. All religions, past and present, have recognized a single Divine Creator, a God of the gods. Kaleton does not claim to be the universal deity, he claims to be the very spirit of this planet. Soul of the World made flesh.”

“And do you believe his claims?”

“No,” said the Professor, “I cannot. I dare not. His case is well argued, mankind has much to answer for, but there are too many contradictions. To quote an old chess-playing chum, and putting it crudely, ‘If the earth seeks to lose man, it has merely to fart.’”

“Well, whoever, or whatever he is, he means business.”

“Perk up, Jim, we’re not beaten yet.”

Pooley stroked his jaw. “Something he said struck a chord, I’m trying to think what it was.” Professor Slocombe jiggled Pooley’s brain cells with an unspoken word. “Ah yes,” said Jim, “I remember. About the stadium, two feet in the water and three upon the land.”

“Yes?”

“It’s the old rhyme, ‘The Ballad of the Two Kings of Brentford’, you remember?”

“Tell me.”

“‘There live two kings of Brentford

Who fought for a single throne.

One lives in a tower of iron

and one in a tower of stone.’”

“Go on.”

“There’s a verse that goes,

‘And a black star rose above them

A sword in every hand.

Two feet upon the water

And three upon the land.’

That’s it.”

“There’s more,” said the Professor, “can you recall?”

“No,” said Jim, “my brain is gone. Something about a final battle and a ‘heart of burning gold’, but I can’t remember it.”

“Never mind, you have done very well. Two feet in the water and three on the land, the black star, that is clear enough.”

“I’m starving,” said Jim.

“Then I shall ring for breakfast.”

“Is it on the tariff or on the house?” asked Jim who, despite evidence to the contrary, was still nobody’s fool.

“On the house,” said the Professor. “You have certainly earned it.” He rang a small brass bell and Gammon appeared almost upon the instant, tray in hand. “You know what this means?” the Professor asked as Pooley set about the morning’s fry-up.

“Go on,” said Pooley, between munchings.

“It means that we must enter the stadium, the heart of it all lies right up there.”

“It will be a long hard climb.”

“An impossible climb, defended at every inch, I shouldn’t wonder, but you’ll find a way.”

“Me?”
Pooley choked upon his toast.

“Oh yes,” said the Professor. “I am confident that you will come up with something.” Then you are a fool to yourself, thought Jim. “Oh no I’m not,” said Professor Slocombe.

At a little after eleven, Pooley stood in the Professor’s garden, breathing fresh air and pointedly ignoring the weeds which sprouted on the west lawn. The invisible barrier was down, which seemed a hopeful sign, and the sky was blue. At least Jim assumed it to be blue, for looking up, he remembered that what he was actually seeing was the image projected by the underside of the great stadium. The black star which rose above them. Jim shrugged away the chill which crept up his back, put his best foot forward and strode down to the Swan. “The condemned man enjoyed a hearty pint” being the order of the day.

To Jim’s amazement, the bar was already quite crowded, the piano was playing and Neville was going hell for leather behind the pump. The part-time barman spied Pooley’s approach as did a shabby-looking man in a greasy brown trilby, who cowered behind his newspaper.

“Well, well,” said Neville, “the wanderer returns.”

“Watchamate, Neville,” said the dejected Jim, “and a pint of Large, please.”

“And where’s your mate then?” Neville did the honours at the pump handle.

Pooley perused his unpolished toecaps. “I have no idea,” he said softly. “Hasn’t he been in then?”

“No,” said Neville, “he’s done a bunk.” He placed the perfect pint before his patron. “Jim, is everything all right?”

Pooley shook his head. “Anything but. I don’t know what’s happened to John, the Professor says …”

“Three more pints over here.” The voice belonged to Norman.

“Excuse me, Jim, I’ll be back in a minute.” Neville scooped up the pennies Pooley had placed on the bar and went off to serve the shopkeeper.

“He’s bunging money about like there’s no tomorrow,” said Old Pete at Pooley’s elbow. “I’d dive in now if I was you.”

“Oh yes, and what’s the celebration?” Jim asked, out of no particular interest.

“This Gravitite business. You know, that wondercrap that holds the stadium up. Norman’s knocked up his own version and you’ll never guess what?”

“He’s won the Nobel prize.”

“Not yet. But he took his formula down to the patent’s office and it turns out that there’s no patent on it. The other geezer never got around to having his registered. Norman is sitting on a gold mine.”

“My old brown dog,” said Jim. “Bravo the shopkeeper.”

“My thoughts entirely.”

“Watchamate, Norman,” called Jim along the bar. “How’s tricks then?”

“Never better,” crooned the half-drunken shopkeeper. “One for my good friend Jim, please, Neville.”

“Cheers, Norman,” said Old Pete, “nice one, old mate.”

“And another down that end for the fogey.”

“I’ve never cared for him, you know,” Old Pete confided in Pooley, “gets right up my nose he does.”

Jim sipped thoughfully at his pint. “He’s all right, he’s an individual.”

“He’s a bloody nutcase! So where’s your mate then? Work-shy as ever, it seems.”

“I don’t know, I’m not sure.”

“Thought he’d be getting some mileage out of these.” Old Pete drew out his silver envelope. “Did you get yours?”

“What are they?”

“Free tickets for the big match, everybody’s got one.”

Pooley raised his eyebrows and his glass. “Everyone in Brentford?”

“That’s the size of it. A bit of good has come out of this fiasco.”

“I wouldn’t go if I were you,” Jim advised. “In fact, I’d give the whole thing a very wide berth.”

“My thoughts entirely, yet again. I’m advertising mine in
The Times
, there’s a bungalow in Eastbourne in this for me. I’ll give you a fiver for yours if you want.”

Pooley hunched low over his pint, which was shortly joined by Norman’s freeman. “Mine seems to have been delayed in the post. If you want to give me the five spot now, I’ll drop it round when it arrives.”

“Do I look like a cabbage?” Old Pete asked. “On your bike, Pooley. Good luck, Norman.” He raised his glass towards the inebriate shopkeeper. “Here’s health!”

“So, Jim,” said Neville, when he had done with his servings, “what’s to do then?”

Pooley shook his head. How could he possibly explain what was going on to Neville? In the cold light of day it all seemed so much nonsense. He was still not certain that he had actually seen what he thought he had seen. It was too grotesque. The more he thought about it the more convinced he became that it was some drug-induced fantasy, brought on by incense and whisky. But John, however, remained quite as dead. “I’m not well,” Jim told Neville. “Something I ate or something. As for John, I just don’t know, truly.”

“I’m sorry you’re not feeling up to much, Jim. You said something about the Professor before we were interrupted.”

“It was nothing.” Without Omally, Jim felt pitifully alone, somehow incomplete. “Nothing at all, it doesn’t matter.”

“As you please,” replied the barman. “But listen, if John does show up, you can tell him he can have his job back here. He played straight with me. I owe him a lot.”

“We all do.” Pooley raised his glass. “You are a good man, Neville. There’s nothing the matter with mankind when there’s blokes like you around.”

“Well, thank you, Jim, I appreciate that.”

“You’re in a bloody wet mood,” said Old Pete. “Seen the light, have you?”

“Something like that — belt up, you old bastard.”

“Thanks very much,” said Old Pete.

There was a sudden disruption in the middle of the bar. “Watch this,” said Norman, clearing space in the crowd. “Now just watch this.”

The onlookers and good-time-charlies, who had been accepting his free drinks, drew back to a respectful distance and egged him on. “Watchagonnado?” they asked.

“A demonstration of the Norman Hartnell Mark One Flying Jacket, Wallah!” Norman opened his coat. Around his waist was a broad belt loaded with lead weights and general junk of the heavy variety. “The miracle of Normanite,” Norman unbuckled the belt and it fell to the floor with a loud crash. “Up and away,” To massed amazement, he rose from his feet and drifted towards the ceiling. “He leaps tall buildings at a single bound!” the shopman called down to his speechless spectators.

“Bloody idiot,” muttered Old Pete. “My glass is empty yet again.”

“Give the man his due,” said Neville. “That is not the kind of thing one sees every day.”

Norman bobbed about on the ceiling, giggling foolishly. To Pooley’s rear the shabby-looking man in the greasy brown trilby rolled his newspaper into a tight tube, inserted something dubious into the end and placed it to his lips.

“For he’s a jolly good fellow,” sang the crowd, “and so say all of us.”

“If he throws up on my carpet, he’ll pay for the cleaning,” said Neville. “Pooley, look out!” Jim ducked instinctively. Something whistled past his left ear and thudded into the haunches of a souvenir Spanish bull upon the bar shelf. “Stop that man!” cried Neville, but the crowd was too entranced with Norman’s antics. The shabby-looking man fled the Swan. “It’s a blowpipe dart,” said the part-time barman, examining the bull’s punctured rump. “By the gods!”

“That bastard Bob is not giving up,” Pooley climbed to his feet. “Thanks very much, Neville.”

The barman sniffed at the end of the dart. “Curare,” he said. “He was out to kill you, Jim, and in my pub, the bloody cheek.” Old Pete chuckled, Pooley had nothing to say. “Curare,” said Neville, “a distillation from the Amazon plant
Cameracio Apolidorus
. The natives boil up the tubers and the roots, you know. The poison maintains its potency for years, a single prick and you’ve less than a minute to say your prayers. Attacks the central nervous system, you see.”

“Thank you,” said Jim. “I had no idea you harboured an interest in toxicology.”

“I did a night-school course at the Arts Centre,” said the barman, “from their Poisoner in Residence. Funny what you remember.”

“Oh, dead amusing, yes. And how are you on anti-gravity? Your man Norman looks to be in some difficulty.”

Indeed the floating shopman was exhibiting signs of extreme discomfort. He was flattened against the ceiling and now very red in the face. “Oh help!” wailed Norman. “Get me down, for Godsake!”

Neville sighed deeply and climbed on to the bar counter, disciplinary knobkerry in hand. “Take hold,” he called. Norman gripped the knobkerry, the onlookers gripped the barman’s ankles. Amidst much puffing and blowing and with no small utterances of profanity, the zero-gravity shopkeeper was returned to terra firma and the weighted belt was hastily clamped once more about his waist.

“It’s handy stuff though,” said Norman, breathlessly. “Got it sewn into the jacket, you see.”

The onlookers saw. “Clever,” they said, wondering if the source of the free drinks had now dried up. “You are a genius, Norman.”

“A large brandy on me for Mr Einstein,” said Pooley, pressing his way through the crowd.

“My thanks, Jim.” Norman checked his belt. “Perhaps in my zeal, I overdid it. I shall have to watch the walk home, or I could end up in orbit.”

“Norman,” said Jim, “could I have a word or two with you in private?”

“As many words as you wish, Jim, what’s on your mind?”

Pooley led the shopkeeper away to a quiet corner. The onlookers looked on in disgust and purchased their own drinks. “A small word,” said Jim.

“And why not?” Norman tapped his nose. “From one millionaire to another.”

“Ah, you heard about my bet.”

“There’s not much stays quiet in Brentford. I do live next door to Bob after all.”

“Quite so, but listen, Norman. This Normanite of yours. A man wearing such a flying-jacket could, I suppose, drift up to the stadium, could he not?”

Norman looked doubtful. “If the wind was favourable. I don’t think I’d care to take my chances though. You could end up, well, up, indefinitely speaking.”

Jim nodded thoughtfully. “Somewhat dangerous, yes I agree. It’s a pity though.”

“What are you up to then, Jim?”

“Not me,” said Pooley, “the Professor. He wants to get a look at the stadium before it opens, some matter of public safety, I believe.”

“He’s got his free ticket, hasn’t he?”

“I understand he’d like a private viewing.”

“He’s a man of some influence, can’t he swing it with the organizers?”

“I don’t think they would approve, this is something of a secret operation.”

“Ooh.” Norman placed a finger to his lips. “Mum’s the word, eh? Well, I might be prevailed upon to …” He made thoughtful faces.

“To what, Norman?”

“To drive him up.”

“What?”

“A little top secret project of my own.” Norman spoke in the conspiratorial whisper much favoured by conspiratorial whisperers. “I have done a bit of a conversion job on the old Morris Minor. The Hartnell Harrier is now the Hartnell Air Car.” Pooley shook his head, the man was a genius. “A revolution in personal transportation with almost limitless potential in the fields of haulage, commuter-carriage, inter-city travel, et cetera, et cetera. Another first for Hartnell International.”

“Does it work?”

“Does it work? How dare you? It’s a bit spartan at present, only a prototype, but when they start rolling off the production line. I’ve come up with some great little modifications,” Norman rattled on with boundless enthusiasm, “a single tiny switch which cuts out those annoying red dashboard lights that always come on when you’re half-way up a motorway. Rear headlights to revenge yourself on those blighters who come up behind you at night with their main beams on. A sweety dispenser, in-car commode, automatic pilot, self-contained …”

“You don’t waste any time once you’ve an idea in your head,” Pooley put in hastily, to staunch the verbal flow which showed no immediate signs of abating.

“There’s no time like the present, Jim. A lot of it is still in the ideas stage, but the car does work, I’m telling you.”

“And would you be prepared to take the Professor up to the stadium?”

“Why not? I’d like a sneak preview myself. There are also one or two matters I’d like his advice on. Tit for tat, eh, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.”

“I’m sure he wouldn’t!”

“When does he want to go?” Norman asked.

“Tomorrow night, how does that sound?”

“The night before the games start.”

“What?” said Jim. “They’ve brought them forward?”

“Yes, it was announced this morning, didn’t you know?”

“No, I did not, oh dear.” Jim chewed upon his knuckles.

“There’s no sweat, the car will be ready, sounds like a bit of an adventure. Yes, I shall look forward to it.” Norman raised his glass. It was empty. “Want another, Jim?”

“I’ll get them,” said Pooley. “Another pint?”

“No. Just a light ale, don’t want people thinking I’m a heavy drinker, light, heavy, get it, eh?” Norman tapped at his weighted belt and giggled foolishly. “Can’t keep a good man down, eh? Good man down? There I go again.” He creased up with mirth.

“Norman, you are a caution,” said Pooley, taking the glasses up to the bar. As he stood waiting to be served he pondered upon the rare coincidence that Norman had conceived and constructed the very means by which he and the Professor could enter the stadium, exactly when it was required, and that he should just happen to bump into him at the very moment. Many would argue that such a chance was one in a million, improbable to the point of near impossibility and they would no doubt be absolutely right.