Link Arms with Toads! (26 page)

He quoted a price at her and she gasped.

“
I thought I was beyond amazement, but clearly I’m not, for that figure truly made me quiver,” she said.

“
It can easily be doubled,” declared Tommy.

“
No thanks. I’ll settle for the first price if I decide to buy. But are you sure you’re offering me the secret of
heavier
than air flight? I don’t count balloons as authentic aviation.”

“
You won’t be disappointed, young lady.”

“
Here’s the bulk of my savings. I shouldn’t do this but either my hand or purse has evolved a mind of its own and wants you to take this fistful of banknotes. Where’s the secret?”

“
Catch!” roared Tommy as he shot up.

Prudence snatched the object that came spinning at her. “A bottle! One lousy bottle of non-sequiturs! I detest fresh non-sequiturs but the pickled variety are even worse. It’s not even full, but empty! I’ve been conned by a hoodwinker with extra headgear. But it’s an old bottle and the cork pops out with a giggle. What’s this?”

Up rose a genie with expanding turban and benevolence. “Any wish at all is yours. If it’s logical I’ll do my best. Don’t wish for extra wishes. That loophole was closed ages ago.”

Prudence fumed. “Of all the fabulous things that come from the East, a genie is one I can do without.”

“
Sorry to hear that,” said the genie.

“
I’d rather have a magic carpet. They can fly but don’t need wings. All the lift is generated by the shape of the rug itself. As for propulsion, they don’t require engines or fuel.”

“
Like frisbees,” ventured the genie.

“
Not quite. You should be teaching at the local university if that’s the way your intellect operates.”

And so it appeared. A magic carpet. Woven by the slaves of perverted monks in icy Tibetan sweatshops from yeti hair, which naturally levitates, hence the necessity for it to grow downwards into scalps to stop it flying off. Prudence Mooncup mounted it and carefully sat in the exact middle with crossed legs and fingers. The fibres itched her upper thighs, exposed legs being her one concession to bohemianism. Smooth, creamy. And she flew away. Soon enough, Huknibonk-on-Stench was no more than a stain on a world tablecloth far below.

Remember Prudence, for Prudence is wise.

Like caution. And owls.

*

I let the iridium box slip through my fingers and it grazed the yeti’s left elbow as it went down, then bounced with a hollow boom off the lip of the wall, clattered into a thicket.

“
Disappointed?” asked MeMeMeMeMe.

“
Yes,” I admitted sourly, “for it wasn’t even a proper non-sequitur. At first it seemed not to follow from anything that had gone before, then the balloonist turned up and the illusion was exposed. I don’t suppose I’ll ever get a refund. What an idiot!”

“
No you’re not. You’re mildly clever.”

“
I was referring to Tommy Tindertub. He’s the cretin! He’ll never win an award for good business ethics if he keeps behaving like that. I parted with cash for plain recursion.”

“
Maybe it’s not nearly as bad as that.”

“
Meaning what, Mr U?”

“
Told you before not to call me that. Anyway. Perhaps it really was a genuine non-sequitur. Maybe Tommy’s intrusion into it was just a sort of copyright notice or trademark symbol. It’s
his
non-sequitur, after all, and we must protect our memes.”

“
Our
what
?” I spluttered angrily.

“
Memes, Mr Heckoid. Mental genes. Ideas passed from mind to mind like buttons among the coatless.”

“
Oh those. I thought you said ‘mimes’.”

“
I assure you I didn’t. I don’t believe in protecting
mimes
. Not at all. I dislike street theatre intensely. I even advocate smiting those pavement thespians with bunched fists!”

And so I was reassured. Almost. Not quite.

I said, “Consider the pun on the word ‘prudence’. That also relates the tale to what occurred earlier.”

“
Could be coincidence. Give it the benefit of the doubt.”

“
Expected to grant another benefit of the doubt, am I? Enough doubts on benefit already. We need to break their dependence on benefit, smash the benefit culture!” I roared.

“
Here, here!” he replied with a nod.

“
You concur?” I squinted.

“
No, I was merely indicating that
here
is a good place for us to climb down from the wall safely.”

And it was. So we did. Slowly, awkwardly. At the bottom a wild dog locked hungry and unreasoning jaws onto the base of MeMeMeMeMe’s right stilt but was kicked off instantly. I watched it soar in a high arc and lap sunshine with its tongue.

“
Do yeti hairs really levitate?” I asked.

“
They contain natural hydrogen peroxide, which is why they’re so pale blond in colour. In the distant past the peroxide ran out. Now each hair is a sealed tube filled with gas.”

“
What’s your favourite musical instrument?”

“
The honest lyre,” he said.

“
Have you ever stolen a cheese through an open window of a house by spearing it on the end of a stilt?”

He nodded without shame. “Yes I have.”

“
What flavour of cheese?”

“
Stilton. After the impalement…”

“
If a canoe takes twelve times as long as a book to float down a river of ink, how much longer than a worried frown does it take a broad smile to float down a river of tears?”

“
I really don’t care, Mr Heckoid.”

“
The reason I ask these questions is because I want to get to know you much better. It’s possible that a sincere friendship might evolve from our unhygienic physical proximity.”

“
I doubt it. Will you be quiet please?”

A lesser man would have smarted at such a rebuke but I merely sagged into a bottomless depression. Yet I didn’t drop my gaze. Then I caught the glint of something remarkable in the distance. I shielded my eyes with my hands and blinked. Yes, it was there, without a doubt, a pyramid! It had to be the non-sequitur store. I glimpsed it for a moment between the waving branches of a willow and though it was lost to sight again, at least I had a definite direction to aim for. MeMeMeMeMe was too far beneath to have spotted it, so I said casually:

“
Turn about ten degrees to the south west.”

“
For any particular reason?”

“
You’ll learn soon enough. There are roses and a patch of convolvulus to get through, then a forest of mutant daises and buttercups. Then you’ll have to pass a
dandy lion
, a lion dressed in antique clothes. I bet Tommy Tindertub sold them to it!”

“
He’s quite the vertical entrepreneur!”

“
Politely put. Indeed.”

We waded into a tangle of rose bushes, scattering petals in our wake, filling the air with intoxicating perfume. I felt drunk. Then I realised that MeMeMeMeMe had accidentally trodden on a whisky still, forgotten and illegal, from way back. That’s why the scent was so heady. Nothing to do with overrated roses, but everything to do with alcohol. I caught a second glimpse of the pyramid, bigger now, before we reached the convolvulus. We were on the brink of cheating a nightmare, an achievement that’s only a daydream for most people.

The other obstacles in our path turned out to be minor annoyances and no match for an adult yeti. We suddenly broke out into a clearing. Across a smooth plain stood the pyramid. It was surrounded by smaller buildings and seemed part of a lost city.

MeMeMeMeMe needed no spare urging to accelerate toward it and he allowed the wind to comb his hair into the style of a comet as he hastened over the level ground with great galumphing strides that struck xylophone notes from the parched earth.

But something wasn’t quite right.

Having said that, nothing’s ever quite right, so the fact that something wasn’t quite right now was normal enough. Then I relaxed. But maybe I relaxed too much. Bad omen.

In yeti culture, bad omens are lucky.

But I was Albert Guppy Heckoid, a kind of man. Not a yeti, not yet or ever. Not even a kind man.

Which made the situation trickier.

By this time we had reached the base of the gigantic pyramid and were bounding up the steps eight at a time. Then I knew what the problem was. Steps. Do pyramids have steps? The Egyptian sort certainly don’t, but the Mexican type do. We were ascending the wrong sacred edifice! The non-sequitur store must be elsewhere. This was Mayan or Aztec territory and consequently I was utterly afraid. Irreversible sacrifice of newcomers was too significant a component of the worldview of those chaps for my taste and I wanted to be elsewhere.

But MeMeMeMeMe was already at the top.

And I was there with him!

He lowered me to the ground against my will and I shivered anxiously while he regained his monstrous breath. He soon had it back. We looked around and listened. A faint rasping came from behind the altar. Peering over it, the yeti beckoned me to look. Gingerly I complied and saw a low feathered couch with a nude figure lying on it, a priest racked with fevers and slick with sweats. He looked familiar, mostly because he was, partly because he was holding in his weak grip a mirror angled towards me with my own pale face framed in it.

“
He’s dying but obsessed with studying his complexion in that looking glass. How vain can you get?”

The yeti stroked his Himalayan chin. “That’s incorrect. He’s checking to see if his breath makes mist on the reflective surface. A reliable way of knowing if he’s alive or not.”

“
Now it’s sliding out of his fingers…”

There was a dull thud rather than a tinkling crash. This mirror wasn’t a glass model but a circle of polished obsidian. MeMeMeMeMe walked to the couch and kneeled next to the sick priest, feeling his wrist to take his pulse and clucking his tongue.

Now I had an opportunity to slip quietly away, but I dithered too long while I tried to work out
why
the doomed priest was familiar to me. Then he turned his dim gaze in my direction and wheezed a greeting. Abruptly I knew exactly who he was.

“
The owner of the wig emporium!”

He displayed long black teeth, not rotten but stained with psychotropic juice from some divine plant.

“
Yep, it’s me, right enough. Toupée Amaru is my name. Bet you want to know how I got here before you? The Underground Hiking Society are responsible for that, having mapped the entire network of tunnels that run under the gargantuan expanse of grotesque gardens. I was never in danger of getting lost. There’s a passage that directly connects my shop with this pyramid and it’s fairly easy to traverse, with none of the hazards of upper world travel, no dogs, walls or thorns. Truth is, I’ve always been an Aztec priest, the wigs are just a front for my real concerns, all of which involve the worship of Huehuecoyotl, god of mischief and trickery, a shapeshifter whose hobbies include creating strife between living mortals. I adore him and do bad stuff in his name.”

“
That sounds lovely and constructive,” I lied.

“
Let me declare,” he continued, “my hatred of non-sequiturs. I simply can’t stand them. I like things to directly follow from other things. Cause and effect. Logical progression’s the only responsible kind! That’s why I located my wig shop next to the non-sequitur store. Gave me a chance to sabotage the despicable business, to misdirect potential clients away from their portals, reduce the number of non-sequiturs in circulation. A bitter struggle for me, but I had a secret weapon. Wigs. What mightier tool can one imagine against the tyranny of randomness? So many meanings, so many separate branches of progression! For example,
wig
is an old word for ‘holy’. And the whigs were strong political fellows. Another meaning of WIG relates to aviation.”

“
A round of applause for that!” I cried.

“
No really, it does. Stands for Wing In Ground, which is a specialised effect that allows suitably designed vehicles to ride over a cushion of air between two short wings and the surface. Aircraft that utilise this system are still at the experimental stage but an influential cartel of engineers has invested faith and money in their ultimate success, not least because of the vastly increased fuel efficiency. So much for that! Every day I pray to Huehuecoyotl for fresh hairpiece-themed notions to thwart those pesky non-sequiturs! My existence has been directed to that single purpose, but I’m dying now and don’t have a successor. The other Aztecs who dwelled here emigrated to find jobs in catering, retail and surveying. They forsook the gods and abandoned me.”

“
That’s all very nice but really we must be getting along now. We only popped up here for the view.”

“
In that case I’m sorry for wasting…”

At this point the yeti interrupted. “Don’t listen to Mr Heckoid, he’s not really in a rush and neither am I. On the contrary, if we can aid you in any capacity before you expire, let us know. Having said that, I’m unclear on one detail. The name Toupée Amaru sounds more Inca to me than Aztec. You’re not a fake, are you?”

“
I’ll check. One moment. No, I’m not.”