The Brentford Chainstore Massacre

by Robert Rankin

  ‘I think it more than likely. These are not just businessmen we’re dealing with. These people kill without pity.’

  ‘It’s the dark side of the force then, is it?’ Jim asked.

  Professor Slocombe raised an icy eyebrow.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Jim. ‘But what are we going to do?’

  Professor Slocombe shook his head sadly. ‘I wish I knew,’ said he. ‘I really wish I knew.’

  Dr Steven Malone had a smile upon his face. It was a big smile, a broad smile, a real self-satisfied smugger of a smile. No normal fellow could have pulled off a smile like that. It takes a real mad bastard to do the job properly.

  And now he chuckled. Like they do. And then he laughed. And then he tapped his fingers on the item that lay before him on his dining table.

  And that item was Pooley’s casket.

  What a joke. By sheer chance he’d been looking out of the window and seen that Irish lout who had stitched him up for fifty quid go running by with his mate. And his mate had put down the casket. And Dr Steven had crept out and filched it away.

  Dr Steven examined the casket. He lifted the lid. Empty, but evidently a thing of great age. An antique and in good condition. There were jewels on this casket. They looked real enough. Dr Steven laughed again.

  And then he took the lid in one hand, put his knee upon the casket, applied pressure and ripped the lid right off.

  Then he laughed again.

  And then he left the room.

  And then he came back again, carrying something wrapped in a towel. ‘Here you go, little one,’ he said. ‘Away in a manger, no crib for his bed.’

  And he placed the baby in the casket.

  A soft and golden glow surrounded the child as it stirred from its sleep. Its eyes flickered open and stared up at the gaunt figure all in black and white.

  The eyes were golden, shining as though lit from within. And the child’s mouth moved. A gurgle and a little cough. ‘Dada,’ said the baby.

  ‘Yes, that’s right,’ said Dr Malone. ‘I am your dada. Go to sleep now.’

  ‘Good night, dada.’

  ‘Good night, little boy.’

  ‘Good afternoon,’ said Fred. ‘Any progress to report? Teatime looms; I trust you have everything under control.’

  ‘We do,’ said anonymous fellow one.

  ‘We don’t,’ said his companion. ‘But we’re getting there.’

  ‘Hm,’ said Fred. ‘I like not the sound of this. Where are the scrolls?’

  ‘Where indeed,’ said the first anonymous fellow.

  ‘I have the fire stoked up,’ said Fred. ‘I can add you to it. I’m not at all bothered.’

  ‘We do have the situation under control,’ said number two. ‘Which is to say that we are certain the scrolls are still in Brentford.’

  ‘But you don’t actually have them.’

  ‘Not as such, no.’

  ‘Right,’ said Fred. ‘Tell me all about it.’

  ‘Well,’ said number two. ‘Derek here––’

  ‘Who’s Derek?’

  ‘I’m Derek,’ said Derek.

  ‘Oh,’ said Fred. ‘I didn’t know you actually had a name.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Derek. ‘I’ve had it since I was christened.’

  ‘Don’t use that language in here. And I suppose you’re going to tell me that you have a name too.’

  ‘I just did,’ said Derek. ‘It’s Derek.’

  ‘Not you. Him.’

  ‘Clive,’ said Clive.

  ‘Derek and Clive.’

  ‘Live,’ said Derek and Clive.

  ‘Go on then,’ said Fred. ‘Tell me it all. And then I’ll decide which of you I throw on the fire.’

  ‘Derek here’, said Clive, ‘drugged the council chamber. It was a real hoot. I was looking in through the window. A lady in a straw hat got bonked by these stoned councillors. One of them stuck his––’

  ‘What about the scrolls?’

  ‘Couldn’t find them,’ said Clive. Went round to the Professor’s house, donned the old cloak of invisibility the way one does and had a good shufty about. The casket was there but it was empty. Later the two louts took the casket round to the local pub. Probably to sell it. We called it a day then and came back here.’

  ‘Didn’t you forget something?’

  ‘No, I don’t think we did.’

  ‘Their heads!’ shouted Fred. ‘What about their frigging heads?’

  ‘Ah now, we thought about that,’ said Derek. ‘And we considered it better to let the louts lead us to the scrolls. Then cut off their frigging heads.’

  ‘So what exactly are you doing back here?’

  ‘Dunno,’ said Clive. ‘What are we doing back here?’

  ‘Money,’ said Derek. ‘We want lots of money.’

  ‘For what? You haven’t done anything yet.’

  ‘For bribery and corruption. Set friend against friend. Break the community spirit. They’re thick as pus from a weeping wound, these Brentonians, they all club together. A bung here and a bribe there will set them at each other’s throats.’

  Professor Slocombe stoked up the fire. ‘What I should have done’, said he, ‘was to cast a spell of return over the scrolls. Then, wherever they were, all I’d have had to do was summon them.’

  ‘Things always seem so simple when you look back at them, don’t they?’ said John.

  ‘Urgh!’ went Jim. ‘Urgh! Uuh! Argh!’

  ‘I do so agree,’ said John. ‘An advanced form of Esperanto is this, or what?’

  ‘No, I’ve got it, I’ve got it.’

  ‘Well, don’t get any on me.’

  ‘The old ones aren’t always the best,’ said the Professor.

  ‘No, I really have got it,’ said Jim. ‘Things always seem simple when you look back at them. John’s right.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Look back at them,’ said Jim. ‘Don’t you get it?’

  ‘No,’ said the Professor. ‘I don’t.’

  Jim sighed. ‘It’s so simple. I should have thought of it at once. Go back. In time. I can do that. I go back in time and see who pinched the casket.’

  ‘Give that man a big cigar,’ said John Omally.

  Dr Steven puffed upon a big cigar, the way proud fathers do.

  On the dining table lay the casket, in this lay the golden child. Upon the floor lay the lid and in this lay the other one.

  Dr Steven stooped and peered. There was something not quite right about the other one. Only two had survived the terrible zinc tanks and they had both been cloned from dried blood from the Turin Shroud. But they were by no means identical.

  The golden child exuded warmth and joy.

  But this one.

  Dr Steven blew cigar smoke into its face.

  The features twitched. Dark they were. Swarthy. The hair was black, the eyebrows and the lashes. But there was an all-over blackness about this child. A little shell of darkness seemed to surround it. A palpable thing. Whenever Dr Steven fed it with the bottle he felt his fingers growing cold. There was something far from right about this baby.

  The fact that everything about all of this was far from right eluded Dr Steven. ‘What exactly are you?’ asked the genetic engineer.

  The baby’s dark eyes opened and they focused. ‘Dada,’ it said, in a deep dark tone.

  ‘Does it need to be dark?’ asked Professor Slocombe. ‘Should I switch off the lights?’

  ‘No problem.’ Jim settled himself on the chaise longue. ‘Where did Celia Penn go?’ he asked.

  ‘She went home,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘We had a chat. I won’t bore you with the details.’

  ‘Secrets again.’

  ‘Indeed. Yes.’

  ‘And whoever knocked upon your door? Did they give you any trouble?’

  Professor Slocombe winked.

  ‘You did that. To get us off on our way.’

  ‘I’d like to get you off on your way now, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘No p
roblem, Professor.’ Jim closed his eyes. ‘Do the road drill, John.’

  ‘Do I have to?’

  ‘Yes, you do.’

  ‘Brrrrm,’ went John.

  ‘In A minor.’

  ‘That was A minor.’

  ‘That was B flat,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘Like the blues. The blues are always in B flat.’

  ‘Just do it like you do it, John.’

  And Jim drifted off. ‘Om,’ he went, drifting backwards.

  ‘What is Om?’ Omally asked.

  ‘The Universal note,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘In Hinduism, the sacred syllable that typifies the three gods, Brahma, Vishna and Shiva, who concern themselves with the threefold operation of integration, maintenance, and disintegration. Birth, life and death. Om as a symbol is more powerful than the pentagram or cross. It represents love and love of life, without fear of death. To give and to receive this symbol is an act of love.’

  ‘Why is Jim Omming?’ Omally asked.

  ‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ said Professor Slocombe.

  ‘Om off to Alabama with a banjo on my knee,’ sang Jim Pooley.

  A long black car with blacked-out windows drew up outside the Professor’s house. At the wheel sat a chauffeur, whistling.

  ‘Shut up the bloody whistling,’ said Clive.

  ‘I can whistle if I want to.’

  ‘And I can rip your frigging heart out,’ said Derek (him being the God-damn crazy ape-shit one-man killing machine of the partnership).

  The chauffeur stopped whistling.

  ‘So what happens next?’ said Clive.

  ‘We wait ‘til they come out. Follow them and nab the scrolls.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Clive.

  ‘Now I’ll tell you what I want,’ said Derek.

  ‘What you really, really want?’

  ‘What I really, really want is a Zigger cigar.’

  ‘And what is that, exactly?’

  ‘I haven’t the faintest idea. But I really, really want one.’

  ‘Actually I had one once,’ said Clive. ‘But it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Hey, hang about. Are they coming out?’

  ‘No,’ said Derek. ‘They’re not.’

  ‘You’re not doing it properly, are you, Jim?’

  ‘I’m sorry, John, I can’t seem to get in the mood.’

  ‘Should I Brrrrm some more?’

  ‘I don’t think it will help.’

  ‘I could put you under hypnotically,’ said Professor Slocombe.

  ‘No thank you,’ said Jim. ‘I can manage on by myself.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s altogether true.’

  ‘Look, it’s my magic, let me do it on my own.’

  ‘I’m sorry. Go ahead then.’

  Jim closed his eyes and drifted back. And then Jim opened his eyes and he screamed very loudly.

  ‘Jim, are you all right?’ Omally hastened to his side.

  ‘John, it was terrible. Terrible.’

  ‘Not the murdering of the monk again?’

  ‘Far worse. Bodies all cut to pieces. In tanks. Women’s bodies.’

  ‘Holy God,’ said John. ‘Tell me exactly what you saw.’

  Professor Slocombe looked Jim deeply in the eyes.

  ‘In a basement,’ said Jim. ‘The bloke who took the casket. He’s got a basement full of dismembered bodies. Floating in tanks. Pregnant bodies without arms and legs. It’s the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen in my life.’ Jim lurched to his feet, flung himself through the open French windows and threw up all over the garden.

  ‘That won’t please my roses,’ said Professor Slocombe.

  At length Jim returned, pale-faced, to the study. ‘Weirdest thing of all,’ said Jim. ‘This bloke. The murderer. He was really strange. There was no colour to him. He was all in black and white.’

  ‘Ah,’ said John Omally. ‘Then we have the bastard.’

  18

  Do dah. Do dah. Do dah. Do dah went the police cars.

  And Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

  Chief Inspector Westlake stood in the Professor’s study. ‘You are absolutely certain about this?’ he asked. ‘There can be no mistake?’

  ‘Jim?’ said the Professor.

  ‘I saw it,’ said Jim. ‘It was real.’

  ‘Absolutely certain,’ said Professor Slocombe.

  ‘If it’s true,’ said the Chief Inspector, ‘it will clear up a lot of unsolveds. Not murders, but bodies going missing from morgues. We’ve had eight in the last eight weeks.’

  ‘The chap’s the duty physician at the Cottage Hospital,’ said John Omally.

  ‘Dr Malone?’ The Chief Inspector shook his head.

  ‘Genetic engineer,’ said Professor Slocombe. ‘I’ve never met the fellow but I know of his work.’

  ‘So do I,’ said Jim. ‘Go and arrest him.’

  ‘All in good time, sir. His house is surrounded. We do things softly softly here.’

  ‘What are they doing now?’ asked Clive.

  ‘They’ve got one of those big battering ram things,’ said Derek. ‘I think they’re going to smash down the door.’

  ‘Oh, goody. Do you think it’s all right for us to stay here? We shouldn’t have the chauffeur drive us somewhere else?’

  ‘I just killed the chauffeur,’ said Derek. ‘He was whistling again.’

  ‘Things are working well for us. But what do you think all this police presence is about?’

  ‘I haven’t the foggiest idea. Ah, here come the louts.’

  ‘You just leave all this to the professionals,’ said Chief Inspector Westlake.

  ‘My pleasure,’ said the Professor. ‘My only wish is to recover a casket that I believe is in the doctor’s house.’

  ‘Something of yours, is it?’

  ‘A family heirloom.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve always wanted to see one of them. They actually weave real hair, do they?’

  ‘By the yard,’ said Professor Slocombe.

  ‘Makes you proud to be English,’ said John.

  ‘But you’re––’ Professor Slocombe paused. ‘Yes, I know exactly what you mean.’

  ‘I don’t,’ said Jim.

  The battering ram didn’t go KNOCK. It went BASH. And then it burst right through. Uniformed constables stormed into Kether House, electric truncheons drawn, hopes of their use growing fiercely.

  Constables toppled into the hall, constables rushed into the ground-floor rooms, constables pelted up the stairs. Constables pelted down other stairs. These constables saw things that would later waken them screaming from their sleep. Many of these constables did as Jim had done in the Professor’s rose garden.

  Chief Inspector Westlake wiped a handkerchief across his mouth and stared about the basement hell. ‘Bastard,’ he said. ‘Mad bastard. Where is he?’

  ‘Gone,’ said a chalk-faced constable. ‘No trace. But, Chief Inspector, there’s worse over here. Far worse.’

  ‘What have you seen, constable?’ The Chief Inspector looked.

  The constable turned back a length of tarpaulin, exposing four tiny twisted dead things.

  Chief Inspector Westlake turned away. ‘Holy Mother of God,’ he whispered.

  In the dining room Professor Slocombe patted Jim upon the shoulder. ‘Well done,’ he said.

  Jim looked down upon the empty casket. ‘Are they in there? I still can’t see them.’

  ‘They are there. Well done.’

  ‘I’d like to go now, if you don’t mind. This place turns my stomach. There’s evil here.’

  ‘Yes, there is.’ The Professor stroked the Om he wore about his neck. ‘Great evil, so close to my own home, yet I never knew.’

  ‘How did he get out?’ asked John. ‘This place was completely surrounded.’

  ‘A secret tunnel, probably. These houses are very old.’

  ‘I’ll have to ask you to clear the house, please, Professor,’ said the Chief Inspector, who looked like death. ‘We’ll need the forensic boys in
here. This is very bad. Very bad indeed.’

  ‘I would like to help you with the forensic examination, if I might.’

  ‘You are eminently qualified. I would appreciate it.’

  Professor Slocombe offered the policeman a certain handshake. ‘Upon the square and beneath the arch,’ he said.

  ‘Should we take this back to your place, Professor?’ John Omally lifted the casket.

  ‘Best to. I will be along presently.’ Professor Slocombe made mystical finger-motions over the casket and spoke certain mystical words.

  ‘Goodbye, then.’

  ‘They’re coming out,’ said Derek. ‘They’ve got the casket. Although it hasn’t got a lid on any more.’

  ‘But the bloody thing’s empty.’

  ‘Are we absolutely sure of that?’

  ‘Well, it wouldn’t hurt to take a look.’

  ‘No, it wouldn’t.’

  Jim stopped to take deep breaths. ‘I can’t believe all that stuff in there,’ he said. ‘What was that about?’

  ‘Madness,’ said John. ‘Plain and simple.’

  ‘Plain and simple? I don’t think so.’

  ‘Perk up, Jim. You got the scrolls back. You’re a genius, my friend.’

  ‘I suppose the Professor wouldn’t mind if we had a drink or two at his expense while we were waiting, to celebrate as it were.’

  ‘I’m sure he wouldn’t.’

  ‘Good. Because I certainly need some.’

  The limousine backed up really fast. An electrically driven window drove down and a hand reached out to snatch the casket.

  ‘We’ll take that,’ said a voice behind the hand.

  ‘No you damn well won’t.’ Jim drew back.

  ‘Run,’ was John Omally’s advice.

  And Jim took it.

  ‘After them,’ shouted Derek.

  ‘No need to shout,’ shouted Clive. ‘Which way are they going? How could the frigging chauffeur see through this tinted windscreen?’

  ‘I think he wore dark glasses.’

  ‘Oh, that would be it, then.’

  ‘Run, Jim.’

  ‘I’m running. I’m running.’

  ‘Take the scrolls out of the casket. It’s less to carry.’