The Brentford Triangle

18

After leaving Norman’s garage in the early hours of the morning, Pooley found little joy in the comforts of his cosy bed. He had listened with awe and not a little terror to the amazing revelations which Omally had skilfully wrung from the shopkeeper. Although Jim had plaintively reiterated that the Earth-balancing-pyramid theory which Norman had overheard, that lunchtime so long ago, was gleaned from the pages of an old comic book, as usual nobody had listened to him. What small, fitful periods of sleep he had managed were made frightful with dreams of great floating camels, materializing pyramids and invading spacemen.

At around six o’clock Pooley gave the whole thing up as a bad job, dragged on an overcoat, thrust a trilby hat on to his hirsute head, and trudged off round to the Professor’s house.

The old man sat as ever at his desk, studying his books, and no doubt preparing himself for the worst. He waved Pooley to an armchair without looking up and said, “I hope you are not going to tell me that during the few short hours that you have been gone you have solved the thing.”

“Partially,” said Jim without enthusiasm. “But I think John should take full-credit this time.”

The old man shook his head. “Do you ever feel that we are not altogether the masters of our own destinies?” he asked.

“No,” said Jim. “Never.”

“And so, what do you have to tell me?”

“You will not like it.”

“Do I ever?”

Pooley eyed the whisky decanter as a source of inspiration but his stomach made an unspeakable sound.

“Would you care to take breakfast with me, Jim?” the Professor asked. “I generally have a little something at about this time.”

“I would indeed,” said Jim. “Truly I am as ravenous as Ganesha’s rat.”

The Professor tinkled a small Burmese brass bell, and within a few seconds there came a knocking at the study door which announced the arrival of Professor Slocombe’s elderly retainer Gammon, bearing an overlarge butler’s tray loaded to the gunwhales with breakfast for two.

It was Pooley’s turn to shake his head. “How could he possibly know that I was here?”

Professor Slocombe smiled. “You ask me to give away my secrets?” he said, somewhat gaily. “Where would I be if you deny me my mystique?”

“You have mystique enough for twenty,” said Jim.

“Then I will share this one with you, for it is simplicity itself.” He rang the small bell again and Gammon, looking up from the coffee he was pouring into the fine Dresden china cups, said, “Certainly, sir, two lumps it is.”

“It is a code with the bell-ringing,” said the enlightened Jim.

The Professor nodded his old head. “You have found me out,” said he. In reality, of course, Pooley had done nothing of the kind.

Gammon departed at a mental command, closing the door behind him. Pooley set about the demolition of the steaming tray load. Between great chewings and swallowings, he did his best to relate to the Professor all that he had seen and heard that night.

Professor Slocombe picked delicately at his morning repast and listened to it all with the greatest interest. When Pooley had finished his long, rambling, and not a little confused monologue, he rose from his chair and took out a Turkish cigarette from the polished humidor. Lighting this with an ember from the grate, he waggled the thing at Pooley, and spoke through a cloud of steely-blue smoke. “You would not be having one over on me here, would you Pooley?” he asked.

“I swear not.”

“Norman has a camel in his lock-up garage which he teleported from the Nile delta and which openly defies the law of gravity?”

“Not openly. Norman is keeping the matter very much to himself.”

“And he plans to alter the Earth’s axis by teleporting the Great Pyramid of Cheops into Brentford football ground?”

“That’s about the size of it.”

Professor Slocombe fingered the lobe of his left ear. “We live in interesting times,” he said.

Pooley shrugged and pushed a remaining portion of buttered toast into his mouth.

“The idea does have a certain charm, though,” said Professor Slocombe. “I should really have to sit down and work it out with a slide rule. For the moment, however, I feel it would be better if he was dissuaded from going ahead with it. I think we should nip it in the bud.”

“I think John and I can fit that in between engagements,” said Pooley sarcastically. The Professor raised an eyebrow towards him, and he fell back to his toast chewing.

“How near to completion do you believe his project to be?”

Pooley shrugged again. “Days away, by the manner in which he spoke. Omally, using his usual ingenuity, suggested that he might avail himself of any serviceable components from the Captain Laser machine, once he had successfully disabled it. That idea alone was enough to win him over to the cause. What with thinly-veiled threats of exposure and the assurance that his action would not only save mankind as we know it, but also secure him readmission to the Swan in time for the darts tournament, he was putty in Omally’s grubby mitt.”

“It would certainly be nice to clear all this up before darts night,” said the Professor enthusiastically. “I have booked a table at the Swan, I would not care to miss it for the world.”

“Let us pray that none of us do,” said Pooley. “Would there be any chance of a little more toast?” Professor Slocombe reached for his small brass bell. “I know perfectly well that it is not how you do it,” said Jim.

“The toast is on the way,” said Professor Slocombe, smiling broadly.

Neville limped painfully up the stairs to his room, bearing with him the special mid-week edition of the Brentford Mercury, which had flopped unexpectedly through the Swan’s letter-box. Propping it against the marmalade pot, he lowered himself amid much tooth-grinding on to the gaily-coloured bathing ring, which rested somewhat incongruously upon his dining chair.

As he sipped at his coffee he perused the extraordinary news sheet. BRENTFORD HOLOCAUST! screamed the six-inch banner headline with typically restrained conservatism. “Many arrests in Battle of Brentford, rival gangs clash in open street warfare.”

Neville shook his head in wonder at it all. How had the trouble started? It was all a little hazy. That Pooley and Omally were involved, he was certain. He would bar them without further ado.

He groaned dismally and clutched at his tender parts.

He surely could not afford to bar any more clients; something desperate was going to have to be done to persuade Norman to return to the fold. And Old Pete; he was sure he had barred him, but he was equally certain that the old reprobate had been in the night before. Perhaps he hadn’t. He would bar him again just to be on the safe side.

He perused the long columns of journalistic licence which covered the Mercury’s front page. It had been some kind of political rally, so it appeared, the Brownshirts or the League of St George. Apparently these extremists had been drawn into combat with the martial acolytes of the Brentford Temple of Dimac. The police had acted bravely and justly, although greatly outnumbered. There was some talk of decorations at the Palace.

Neville skimmed along the lines of print, seeking to find some reference to the original cause of the incident, but none was forthcoming. The Swan didn’t even get a mention, nor did the names of any of the regulars appear amongst the list of arrested villains destined to go up before the beak this very morning. With the arrival of the boys in blue the Swan’s stalwarts had either melted away into the night or retired to the tranquillity of the saloon-bar to engage in games of darts and dominoes.

He read the final paragraph. The gallant bobbies had, so it was stated, become involved in a hair-raising car chase through Brentford with a black nineteen-fifties Cadillac which had roared away from the scene of the crime during the height of the disturbances. They had pursued it through the maze of backstreets until unaccountably losing it in a cul-de-sac.

Neville folded the paper and flung it into the fireplace. He would get to the bottom of all this, just as soon as he could get it all clear in his mind. But for now only two things mattered: firstly, that Norman be reinstated as soon as possible in a manner in which neither party would lose face and one which would not anger his pagan deity; and, secondly, that the ice pack which he now wore strapped between his legs got another top-up from the fridge.

Small Dave sat in the sewage outlet pipe at the old dock, which he now called home. His face wore a manic expression into which it had been moulding itself, a little more permanently, with each passing day. He had given up such niceties as hygiene, and now lived for only one thing.

Dire and unremitting vengeance!

Some way further up the pipe, hovering in the darkness, was a misty figure, visible only to the small postman and to certain members of the animal elite.

Small Dave ground his teeth and spat into the daylight. So Norman had the camel penned up in his garage upon the Butts Estate, did he? He had always suspected the shopkeeper, and now Edgar had confirmed his suspicions.

“We have him,” sneered the dwarf, raising a tiny fist towards the sky. “Right where we want him.” He grinned towards the spectre, exposing two rows of evil-looking yellow teeth. Edgar Allan Poe shifted uneasily in the darkness. He was not at all happy about any of this. He had made a big mistake in allowing himself to become involved with this diminutive lunatic, and sorely craved to return to the astral plane. Although a grey and foggy realm, which offered little in the way of pleasurable diversion, it was infinitely preferable to this madhouse any day of the week.

Sadly, by the very nature of the laws which govern such matters, he was unable to gain release, other than through the courtesy of the being who had called him into service. The mighty fire which had raged through Small Dave’s house, eating up many thousands of copies of his books, had acted as some kind of sacrificial catalyst which now bound him to the material world.

Edgar Allan Poe was thoroughly Earthbound, and he was in a very, very bad mood.

At a little after eleven-thirty John Omally reached the Flying Swan. He would have reached it sooner but for the throng of reporters from the national dailies who had accosted him in the street. With his usual courtesy and willingness to be of assistance he had granted several exclusive interviews on the spot.

Yes, he had been there in the thick of it, braving the rubber bullets and the tear-gas. Yes, he had been the last man standing, by virtue of his mastery in the deadly fighting arts of Dimac. No, he had only saved the lives of three of his companions, not four, as was popularly believed. And no, he was sorry, he could not allow any photographs to be taken, modesty forbidding him to take more than his fair share of credit in saving the day.

Patting at his now heavily burdened pockets, Omally entered the Flying Swan. Neville was at the counter’s end, supported upon the gaily-coloured rubber bathing ring which he had Sellotaped to the top of a bar stool. He was studying a picture postcard which boasted a rooftop view of Brentford, but upon Omally’s approach he laid this aside and viewed the Irishman with distaste.

“You are not welcome here,” he said in no uncertain terms.

John smiled sweetly. “Come now,” he said, “let us not be at odds. You have no axe to grind with me. I come as the bearer of glad tidings. All your troubles are over.”

Neville’s good eye widened. “All my troubles are over?” he roared, but the exertion sent blood rushing to certain areas which were better for the time being left bloodless and kosher. “I am a ruined man,” he whispered hoarsely, between clenched teeth.

“A regrettable business,” said John. “If I ever see that fellow in the black suit again, I shall do for him.”

Neville said, “Hm,” and pulled the Irishman the pint of his preference.

“Have one yourself,” said John.

Although the deadly phrase burned like a branding iron upon Neville’s soul, he was loath to refuse and so drew himself a large medicinal scotch.

“About this being my lucky day then?” he said, when he had carefully re-established himself upon his rubber ring. “You will pardon my cynicism I hope, but as the bearer of glad tidings you must surely rival the angel of death announcing the first innings score at the battle of Armageddon.”

“Nevertheless,” said Omally, “if you will hear me out then you will find what I have to say greatly to your advantage.”

Neville sighed deeply and felt at his groin. “I believe that I am getting old,” he told Omally. “Do you know that I no longer look forward to Christmas?”

John shook his head. He didn’t know that, although he wondered how it might be relevant.

“I haven’t had a birthday card in ten years.”

“Sad,” said John.

“At times I wonder whether it is all worthwhile. Whether life is really worth all the pain, disappointment, and misery.” He looked towards Omally with a sad good eye. “People take advantage of my good nature,” he said.

“No?” said John. “Do they?”

“They do. I bend over backwards to help people and what do I get?” Omally shook his head. “Stabs in the back is all I get.” Neville made motions to where his braces, had he worn any, would have crossed. “Stabs in the back.”

“I really, genuinely, can help you out,” said Omally with conviction. “I swear it.”

“If only it were so,” moaned Neville. “If only I could see some ray of hope. Some light at the end of the dark tunnel of life. Some sunbeam dancing upon the bleak rooftop of existence, some…”

“All right, all right!” Omally said. “That’s enough, I’ve been kicked in the cobblers a few times myself, I know how much it hurts. Do you want to know how I can help you out or not?”

“I do,” said Neville wearily.

Omally peered furtively about the bar and gestured the barman closer. “This is in the strictest confidence,” he whispered. “Between you and me alone. Should you wish to express your gratitude in some way when the thing is accomplished, then that is a matter between the two of us.”

Neville nodded doubtfully. Whatever it was that Omally was about to say, he knew that it would as usual cost him dearly. “Say your piece then, John,” he said.

“As I see it,” John continued, “you have two big problems here. Five, if you wish to number your wounded parts. Firstly, we have the problem of the rapidly approaching darts tournament and the Swan’s prospect of certain defeat, should Norman fail to captain the team.” Neville nodded gravely. “Secondly, we have that.” Omally gestured towards the shrouded video machine, which was even now receiving the attention of a green-haired youth with a large nose and a pair of wire-cutters. Neville bared what was left of his teeth.

“If I was to tell you that I can solve both problems at a single stroke what would you say to me?”

“I would say free beer to you for a year,” said Neville, rising upon his elbows. “But for now I must say, please get out of my pub and do not return. I am not able to assault you physically at present, but be assured that when I am fully restored to health I shall seek you out. You add insult to my injury and I will have no more of it.”

John tapped at his nose. “We will let the matter drop for now, as I can see that you are feeling a little under the weather. By the by, might I take the liberty of asking after the postcard.”

“You may,” said Neville, “and I will give you that small part before you depart. It is from Archroy, he says that he has now removed the Ark of Noah from the peak of Ararat and is in the process of transporting it through Turkey to Istanbul. He hopes to have it here within a week or two.”

“Well, well, well,” said Omally, grinning hugely. “We do live in interesting times, do we not?”

“Get out of my pub now,” growled Neville with restrained vehemence, “or truly, despite my incapacitation, I shall visit upon you such a pestilence as was never known by any of your bog-trotting ancestors in all the hard times of Holy Ireland.”

“God save all here,” said Omally.

“Get out and stay out,” said Neville the part-time barman.