Knees Up Mother Earth (15 page)

“Is that hyphenated?” asked Tim.

“No, it’s Welsh.”

“But they
are
dead,” said John Omally. “They’re preserved corpses. They’re mummies.”

“I thought they were sisters,” said Tim.

“Technically speaking, they’re not entirely dead,” said Howard, “although I have to confess that
he
is.” And Howard pointed a long and twiglike digit over the shoulders of the three Beverley Sisters, who sat in their glittering stagewear staring sightlessly into space, towards …

“That’s Tom Jones,” said Tim. “The Rock Gods once supported him in Abergorblimey in Wales. No, they were Citizen’s Arrest then. Tom made the lead singer – Kevin ‘Pud-Puller’ Smith, it was then – flush the bog for him after he’d had a Gordon
[23]
.”

“Tom Jones is dead?” said John Omally. “This is news to me.”

“Died in a car crash in Nevada in nineteen eighty-three. The CIA put out a hit on him due to his involvement with a covert operation that sought to liberate the captive space aliens from Area Fifty-one.”

“You can’t put dead rock stars on stage,” said John.

“Tom’s never really been
rock
,” said Howard. “He’s more pop and ballad. But of course you can put them on stage, it’s done all the time. Animatronics, remote control, recorded tapes. How do you think that Cher goes on and on, always looking the same?”

“Dead?” said John. “You’re telling me that Cher’s dead, too?”

“I always thought she was,” said Tim.

“Please keep out of this,” John told him. “But how come you have Tom Jones’s body in your van?”

“You phoned me up, asked for him to appear. He’s just finished his latest British comeback tour and I was boxing him up to return him to the States, so you caught me at the right moment. You’re not in the biz, are you?”

“Who’s that?” John pointed.

“Tina Turner,” said Howard, “but you can’t have her tonight. One of her legs has come off and I’ve got to glue it on again.”

“This is absurd,” said John Omally.

“It’s business.” Howard shrugged. “After Elvis snuffed it, along with Marc Bolan in the same year, the music industry decided that although sales figures went up after well-known musical figures died, there was more money to be made if they ‘kept them alive’ indefinitely. My dad worked in Hollywood as a special-effects man. EMI employed him to wire up Tina and Tom after they died at Nutbush City Limits in a freak accident involving some green, green grass of home and a pot of fish paste.”

“Was there any CIA involvement in that?” Tim asked.

“Funny you should say that,” said Howard.

“I thought so,” said Tim.

“And they really look convincing when they’re on stage?” John asked. “Even though they’re dead?”

“That would appear to be the case, wouldn’t it?” said Howard.

“Then we’d better get them unloaded before anyone sees us.”

“Fair enough,” said Howard. “Would you like Cliff as well? I brought him along on the off chance.”

And so they came, if not in their thousands, then at least in their hundreds – the plain folk of Brentford, the plucky Brentonians, dolled up and dressed to kill. John Omally sat at the door, taking the money.

“You got the Beverleys,” said Old Pete, viewing the hastily penned poster that now adorned the wall behind John. “I thought they were dead.”

“Free admission,” said Omally. “Move through, please.”

“Can we get autographs after?” asked a lady in a straw hat. “If I’d known Tom Jones was going to be here, I’d have worn a pair of knickers to throw on the stage.”

The Rock Gods now sat in their dressing room. It wasn’t a dressing room as such; it was Jim Pooley’s office, which was better than some dressing rooms, but not as good as most. And it was now a very crowded dressing room/office. Howard was testing out the Beverleys with his remote control. Tom Jones was propped up by the window. And an all-girl funk/soul band rejoicing in the name of Stevie Wonderbra were going through a workout routine, much to the pleasure of Tim McGregor. And Tony Hancock. And then there were the jugglers. The Rock Gods weren’t happy.

“Where’s my opossum?” asked P.P. Penrose (lead singer).

“And where’s my lady-boy?” asked Captain Venis Wars (bass guitarist).

“And my Smarties without the red ones?” asked Steve “Chucky” Wykes (lead and rhythm).

“And my two ounces of Moroccan Black?” (Jah Dragon on drums.)

Tim McGregor finished off his seventh pint of Large. “Guess who I just shagged in the back of a van?” he asked.

“Tina Turner?” said Captain Venis Wars.

Tim McGregor grinned.

The Stripes Bar was now filling up. Rather well. All the team were there, dressed in a selection of suits supplied to John Omally by Mr Gavin Armani, who ran the men’s outfitters in the High Street, in return for an endorsement on the team’s shirts. They were shaking hands with all comers and draining pints of Team Special that Omally had laid on especially for them.

“I have great hopes for this evening,” said Ernest Muffler. “Things are going to change, we are going to succeed.”

“The builders didn’t turn up today,” said Billy Kurton. “My patio’s never going to get finished.”

“When we win the cup,” said Morris Catafelto, scratching at that nose of his that so resembled an engineer’s elbow, “you’ll be able to buy a hundred-acre estate in Spain and patio over the whole blinking lot.”

“Do you really believe we’ll win?” asked Trevor Brooking (not to be confused with the other Trevor Brooking). “I mean, let’s be sensible here, those tactics we practised – they’re not exactly orthodox, are they?”

“They’re great,” said Ben Gash, the goalkeeper. “They keep you buggers well away from my end of the pitch.”

“Listen,” said Dave Quimsby, “I can hear a lark rising in Candleford
[24]
.”

“Will there be chicken on a stick?” the lady in the straw hat asked Omally. “I do like chicken on a stick.”

“Please move along, madam,” Omally told her. “You’re holding up the queue.”

“Canapés are so important at a function,” said the lady, “especially one where Tom Jones is going to appear. Chicken on a stick there should be. And mule fingers to dip in your soup.”

“And strained crad,” said a gentleman with a whiskered face. “The lady in the straw hat is correct. Is the meal included in the price of admission?”

“I once had sprouts dipped in chocolate and deep fried,” said the lady. “But that was at a wedding in Tierra del Fuego. They really know how to live, those Tierra del Fuegans.”

“You think
they
know how to live,” said the bewhiskered gentleman. “I once attended the ordination of a wandering bishop in Penge—”

“I’ve heard it’s a very nice place,” said the lady. “But I’ve never been there myself.”

“Very nice,” said the gentleman. “And you should have seen the dips they had, and tasted them, too. There was super gnu and trussed snapping toad and creamed jackanapes and—”

“Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all?” asked the lady.

“No,” said the gentleman.

“So I said to Val Parnell,” said Tony Hancock, who’d tired of Jim’s office, to Alf Snatcher, who tired easily of sitting due to his waggly tail, “if my name does not go above the jugglers, I will not appear.”

“I once asked my wife,” said Alf, “what her favourite sexual position was and do you know what she said?”

Tony Hancock shook his head.

“Next door with the neighbour,” said Alf.

“Old Pete,” called Omally to Old Pete, who was loafing about close at hand, “will you take over on the door for me? I have to get things organised inside.”

Old Pete smiled the smile of one who had been loafing about close at hand awaiting the opportunity to make the acquaintance of the ready cash. “It would be my pleasure,” he said.

John Omally bagged up what money he had already taken, stuffed it into the poacher’s pocket of his jacket, left his seat on the door and took himself inside.

The Stripes Bar was now very full. In fact, it had never known such fullness before. Mr Rumpelstiltskin stood behind the bar, a frozen, terrified figure. The bar staff John had engaged for the evening were, however, going great guns. These were young bar staff.

And female.

Tracy waved a delicate hand towards John. “Good do, innit?” she called.

John gave Tracy the thumbs up. “Make sure the team get as much of the Team Special as they want, on the house,” he called back. And John’s eyes fell upon the breasts of Tracy and verily the sight thereof brought joy unto John. For John had made intimate acquaintance with these breasts in times past, and hopefully would do so again in times soon to come. “Speak to you later,” called Omally. “I have to get things started.”

John Omally eased his way through the crush, mounted the stage and took up the microphone. He blew into it and did the old “one-two-one-two”.

Feedback flooded The Stripes Bar and brought the crowd to attention.

“Good evening, all,” said John, in the manner of the now legendary Dixon of Dock Green.

“Nice start,” said Constable Meek, who had come along in plain clothes to “observe the proceedings”.

“Eh?” said Constable Mild, whose clothes weren’t quite so plain and whose tie would have caused a riot in Tibet.

“Welcome, each and all,” said Omally. “Welcome and thank you for attending this Night of the Stars to raise funds for our club and team. I feel confident in saying that you are about to enjoy a night to remember.”

“Kenneth More was in
A Night to Remember
,” Old Pete said to Small Dave as he relieved him of his entrance fee and pocketed same. “It was all about the
Titanic
, if I remember correctly. And I do, because I went down on it.”

Norman regarded his reflection in the dressing-table mirror of the marital bedroom. “Pretty damn hot to trot,” said the shopkeeper, grinning and straightening his wig. “A regular dandy.”

The mothballs were out of the pockets of his granddaddy’s double-breasted evening suit. This suave apparel now graced Norman, who took a little bow before the mirror.

“My lords, ladies and gentlemen,” said Norman, “and indeed Her Majesty the Queen, it is with great pleasure that I receive this Nobel Prize for Services to Mankind. So great, however, is my wealth now that I couldn’t possibly accept the cheque.”

“What are you babbling about?” The voice of Peg swelled from the
en suite
bathroom that Norman had constructed in the wardrobe.

“Just singing, my dear. Are you almost ready to go?”

“I’ll be ready when I’m ready and not a moment before.”

“Time heals all wounds,” said Norman. “And it’s a small world. Although I wouldn’t want to have to paint it.”

“What was that?”

“I said ‘take your time’.”

“Don’t worry, I will.”

Norman grinned at his reflection. If only she knew, he thought, if only she knew. But she wasn’t going to know, because he was not going to tell her.

Norman had slipped out during the afternoon to the local Patent Office (next to the town hall, in the building with the weathervane shaped like a DNA strand on the top) and there had registered five (count them!) five brand-new never-before-registered patents. And if all went well, and Norman could think of absolutely no reason why all should not go well, he would very shortly be very, very, very rich indeed.

“I shall buy a castle,” whispered Norman to his reflection. “An old castle on top of a hill, with a laboratory in it. And I’ll have all manner of equipment sparking out all over the place and those big we-belong-dead levers that you throw and there—”

“What was
that
?”

“Nothing, dear. There I will uncover the formula, The Big Figure. I think I’ll go water-skiing, too, I’ve always fancied that.”

“Fancied
what
?” Peg appeared from the
en suite
. She wore the gold figure-hugging strapless Lurex number she had worn upon the night Norman met her, in that time so long ago, at The Blue Triangle Club in Ealing Broadway. On a Tuesday night in May, with Jeff Beck on stage and Norman full of Purple Hearts. The gold Lurex figure-hugger hugged somewhat more than it used to. Peg had let it out, inserting gussets of the pink gingham persuasion, which lent her the appearance of an exploding cushion.

“How do I look?” Peg asked.

“Like an expl … Like a vision,” said Norman.

“Yes.” Peg viewed the area of herself that the dressing-table mirror was capable of reflecting. “Like a vision.”

“From the Book of Revelation,” whispered Norman. “Shall we be off?”

Off and running, up upon the stage at The Stripes Bar, were a local tribute heavy-metal band called IRONIC MAIDEN (in capital letters). They were
very
loud. The crowd pressed themselves back from the stage, feet were trampled upon, drinks spilled and voices raised.

These raised voices went unheard.

“I quite like
them
!” bawled Mr Rumpelstiltskin towards Old Pete – the noise of the band had raised the barman from his vertical coma.

“I’ve got my deaf aid switched off,” the oldster replied. “You’ll have to shout. Give me a large dark rum and put it on Mr Omally’s bill, I’m on the door.”

Mr Omally was up in Mr Pooley’s office. It was a very, very, very crowded office. John could but barely squeeze himself into it. “The jugglers go on next,” he said. “Can anybody hear me? Where
are
the jugglers?”

“They’re practising over there,” Tim McGregor told him, “with bits of the Beverley Sisters. And I’ll tell you something else.”

“If you must,” said John.

“The Rock Gods aren’t happy,” said Tim. “No opossum. No lady-boy. No dancing dwarves. No angel fish in an aquarium shaped like a handbag. No—”

“Have Stevie Wonderbra arrived?” John asked.

“Yeah,” said Tim, “but there’s something not quite right about them.”

“I saw them play at The Shrunken Head a couple of weeks ago,” said John. “I hope they’re wearing the same short skirts.”

“The one that was standing next to me taking a pee in the gents was,” said Tim.

“Eh?” said Omally.

A knocking sounded at the office door. John wriggled about and managed to winkle it open an inch or two.

“The Count Basie Orchestra,” said a dapper fellow beaming through the crack at John. “Can we come in?”

Jim Pooley awoke to find his bath water cold. “By Crom,” said Jim, who occasionally favoured some Robert E. Howard, “I must have dropped off. I work too hard. Better get off to the gig.” Jim tried to rise from his bath, but, strangely, he could not.

“That’s odd,” said Jim. “Must have a bit of pins and needles in the old pegs. Probably stress-induced. It’s like that for we high-powered business types. I hope my hair doesn’t go white – although I wouldn’t mind a bit of greying at the temples. Very Stewart Granger.” Jim struggled to rise once more. And found to his horror that not only did his legs not work, but his arms weren’t working either.

“Either you come out, or we come in,” the fellow from the Count Basie Orchestra called through the door crack.

“I can’t get out,” John called back to him. “This room appears to have reached critical mass.”

“Can you pass out our bowls of jelly babies, then?” called the fellow. “The ones with the black jellies taken out. I mentioned them in the list of riders.”

“Can’t seem to get to them right now,” called John. And, “Not now, madam,” he continued, as one of the Stevie Wonderbras squeezed forcefully against him.

“Sorry,” said the Wonderbra. A rather tall Wonderbra. With a rather deep voice for a girlie.

“Get the orchestra on stage,” John called through the door crack. “I’ll be with you as soon as I can.”

“Mr Omally,” called the voice of Howard, “do you have any superglue? This Beverley’s head keeps falling off.”

IRONIC MAIDEN came off stage to very little applause. They made Devil-horn finger gesturings towards the crowd and headed for the bar. The Count Basie Orchestra began to set up their music stands and tune their instruments.

Sitting behind the moneymaking table on the door once more, Old Pete stuck his wrinkled mitt out for money. “It’s a fiver,” he said, “for the boys of Brentford.” And then he looked up at the latest arrival.

The latest arrival looked down upon Old Pete. Not that the ancient moneytaker could see the new arrival’s eyes. These were hidden, along with his face, in the shadow of the new arrival’s broad-brimmed black hat.

It was a
very
black hat.

It matched in blackness the blackness of the new arrival’s long black coat, which swept the ground, showing only the toes of his very black boots.

Old Pete shuddered, as one does when someone “walks over your grave”.

The figure of darkness dipped into an atramentous pocket with a nigrescently gloved hand and drew out a five-pound note. He held this towards Old Pete who viewed it with a rheumy eye. The figure made curious gurgling sounds, which might have passed for speech. Old Pete took the fiver.

It was cold and damp.

But a fiver
was
a fiver and Old Pete pocketed same.

“Go through, please,” he said in a tremulous, whispery tone.

“Help!” The voice of the incapacitated Pooley had a tremulous tone to it, too, but there was nothing whispery about it.

“Help!” Jim cried. “Man in trouble here. Not waving, but drowning – well, not drowning as such, but
HELP
!”

But his voice echoed emptily; Jim’s landlady was no longer in the house. She had dolled up and offed herself to the big event at the football ground.

“Help!” wailed Jim. “Somebody help. Something very odd and scary has happened to me.”

“There was something very odd and scary about that fellow,” said Old Pete, shuddering once more. “Oh hello, who’s this? Watchamate, Norman.”

“Watchamate, Old Pete,” said Norman.

“And who is this you have with you? Mae West, as I live and wheeze.”

“Shut your trap, you superannuated turd,” said Peg.

“I love it when you talk dirty.” Old Pete sniggered.

“Two,” said Norman, digging in his pockets for change and then recalling that he’d left his wallet behind in the bedroom. “Oh dear.”

“Oh dear?” asked Old Pete.

“I seem to have left my wallet behind.”

“You can owe me,” said Old Pete. “Don’t worry, I won’t forget. And Norman …”

“Yes?” said the suave-looking shopkeeper.

“Did you destroy all that stuff in your lock-up, like I asked you to?”

“Well,” said Norman, “now that you ask …”

Old Pete smiled upon Norman. The smile quite put the wind up the shopkeeper. “Never mind,” said Old Pete. “Did you come here in your van, by the way?”

“Actually, we did,” said Norman. “Why do you ask?”

“No reason. Go on through, have a good time, stay late.”

“Thank you, Old Pete,” said Norman.

“Get a move on, you,” said Peg.

“Move,” shouted John. “Move back so I can get out of the door.”

“We’re all a bit jammed,” said Tim. “Careful now, you almost spilled my pint.”

“I have to get out of here.” John pushed and shoved.

“Careful where you’re pushing, mate,” said the surprisingly tall Stevie Wonderbra. “You nearly elbowed me in the nuts.”

“We could pass you over our heads,” said Tim, “to the window and you could climb out. There’s a fire escape – I was sick on it earlier.”

“By Crom,” said John Omally.

The Count Basie Orchestra launched into a Robert E. Howard swing number. Not a lot of people are aware that as well as penning the now legendary Conan the Barbarian series, Robert E. Howard also played tenor sax with John Steinbeck’s Jumping Jazz Cats in the nineteen thirties. Something to do with authors not pulling as many women as jazz musicians in the nineteen thirties. Probably.

“I know this one,” said Councillor Doveston to Mr Rumpelstiltskin the barman. “It’s about bees.”

“It never is,” said the barman. “It’s about the silent-screen actress Theda Bara. Howard was in love with her. Her name is an anagram of Arab Death, you know.”

“The production department at Fox thought that up,” said Councillor Doveston. “And I should know, I was one of them. A
Thedaoptrus barata
is a kind of bee, a bit like a Klaatu Baradu Nikto, but with more stripes.”

“You live and learn,” said the barman, ignoring the many pleas that were coming at him for some service at the bar. “Which is to say that some folk live and learn. Me, I know nothing.”

“He looks to me like a man who knows nothing,” said a casual observer who had recently escaped from the “special” ward at the Brentford Cottage Hospital. “But then, what would
I
know? I’m psychotic, me. Anyone got a handbag I could have a poo in?”

“I’m in the poo here,” called Jim Pooley, “and growing very frightened, won’t someone help me,
please
?”

“Is Jim Pooley here?” Professor Slocombe asked Old Pete.

“Haven’t seen him, Professor,” replied Old Pete, “but I expect he’s inside, putting his weight to the bar counter lest it collapse unexpectedly.”

“I’ll just have a word with him, then.”

“Fiver admission,” said Old Pete. “Please, sir, if you will. Good cause and all that.”

“Good cause indeed.” Professor Slocombe drew out a medieval chain-mail purse and counted coins from it.

“I’ve no change for golden guineas,” said Old Pete.

“Then keep the change – and, Peter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Best put back the thirty-five pounds that have
accidentally
fallen into your waistcoat pocket.”

“Yes, sir, I will indeed.”

“And, Peter, it might prove necessary that I visit you in the near future with regards to certain herbs that you grow upon your allotment patch.”

“Ah,” said Old Pete, and a certain significant look was exchanged between the two ancients. “I am always at your service, sir.”

“That is good to know.” Professor Slocombe smiled, extended his hand and had it shaken in a significant fashion.

Professor Slocombe entered The Stripes Bar. It was very, very, very, very crowded now, but a path cleared before him.

“Has anybody seen Jim Pooley?” asked the professor.

Jim Pooley hollered some more and then took to listening. Surely that creaking sound was the hinges on the front door. And a slam. And yes, footfalls in the hall.

“Help!” Jim resumed his hollerings. “Upstairs here, me, Jim Pooley. Down but not out. But trapped in my bath. Please help me.”

“Thanks for your help,” called John Omally, gaining the fire escape and all but slipping to his death upon vomit. “Jugglers next, then Stevie Wonderbra, then the Beverleys, then The Rock Gods. Then, er, well, Tom Jones for the finale, I suppose.”

“We’re bigger than Tom Jones,” squeaked P.P. Penrose, whose face was pressed against the upper windowpane of the raised-at-the-bottom-bit window. So to speak. And very badly, too.

“Taller, maybe,” called the voice of Tim McGregor. “And less dead, perhaps.”

“And
where
is my opossum?” demanded P.P. Penrose.

“See you later.” John made his slippery way down the fire escape.

“Escape,” whispered Jim, as footfalls fell footsteplike upon the stairs. “In here,” he shouted. “Help me, please.”

The Count Basie Orchestra played a jazz classic about fire escapes, bath tubs and …

“Bees,” said Councillor Doveston.

“Ernest Hemingway wrote that song,” said Rumpelstiltskin. “He used to play sax with Evelyn Waugh.”

“Waugh?” said Councillor Doveston. “What was he good for? Absolutely nothing. In my opinion.”

“If I had an opinion,” said the casual observer, “it would be that the barmaid over there looks as if she’d know her way around the inside of a string vest.”