Smoke And Mirrors

The First Room

In the first room a smiling blonde woman wearing a spangled bikini, with needle-tracks down her arms, was chained by a hunchback and Uncle Fester to a large wheel.

The wheel spun slowly around, and a fat man in a red cardinal's costume threw knives at the woman, outlining her body. Then the hunchback blindfolded the cardinal, who threw the last three knives straight and true to outline the woman's head. He removed his blindfold. The woman was untied and lifted down from the wheel. They took a bow. We clapped.

Then the cardinal took a trick knife from his belt and pretended to cut the woman's throat with it. Blood spilled down from the knife-blade. A few members of the audience gasped, and one excitable girl gave a small scream, while her friends giggled.

The cardinal and the spangled woman took their final bow. The lights went down. We followed the flashlights down a brick-lined corridor.

The smell of damp was worse in here. It smelled like a cellar, musty and forgotten. I could hear somewhere the drip of rain. The Ringmaster introduced the Creature-"Stitched together in the laboratories of the night, the Creature is capable of astonishing feats of strength". The Frankenstein's monster make-up was less than convincing, but the Creature lifted a stone block with fat Uncle Fester sitting on it, and he held back the dune buggy (driven by the vampire woman) at full throttle. For his piece de resistance he blew up a hot water bottle, then popped it.

"Roll on the sushi," I muttered to Jonathan.

Miss Finch pointed out, quietly, that in addition to the danger of parasites, it was also the case that bluefin tuna, swordfish and Chilean seabass were all being overfished and could soon be rendered extinct, since they were not reproducing fast enough to catch up.