Sex and Drugs and Sausage Rolls

by Robert Rankin

  ‘No, you’re right about that.’

  ‘I know you’ve wanted to,’ said Litany, teasing about at her hair.

  ‘It doesn’t seem right. I thought that, perhaps, you and Jim…’

  ‘Oh no,’ said Litany. ‘I never would have.’

  ‘But he meant a lot to you.’

  ‘But not in that way. He was someone I wanted to meet. Have always wanted to meet.’

  ‘Who? Jim?’

  ‘I can’t explain it to you now. But one day I will, I promise.’

  John rose from the bed and stretched a bit. ‘I’d better get downstairs,’ he said. ‘And see how things are going.’

  There were things going on all over the place on this particular day. At the Brentford nick, for instance. There were things going on in there.

  ‘Right,’ said Inspectre Sherringford Hovis. ‘Right, now listen up here.’

  He had a little row of constables lined up before him. They were an anonymous-looking bunch. But then constables always are. It’s only when they rise up through the ranks and become detectives and suchlike that they take on all those lovable eccentricities that turn them into characters.

  Inspectre Hovis took a pinch of snuff and paced over to the big notice board behind his desk. ‘These young fellow-me-lads,’ he said, pointing to a row of twelve grainy photographs. ‘These young fellow-me-lads here.’

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ said an anonymous constable who had a good memory, ‘but aren’t they the young fellow-me-lads who were caught on the speed-trap cameras five years ago?’

  ‘Correct,’ said Hovis. ‘An unsolved case. And one that hangs over me like some sword of Androcles.’

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ said an anonymous constable who had been classically trained, ‘but surely that should be Damocles. Androcles was the chap with the lion, you know.’

  Inspectre Hovis nodded thoughtfully, paced over to the constable and stamped upon his foot. The classically trained constable hopped about for a bit and then returned to anonymity.

  ‘One of these young fellow-me-lads,’ said Hovis, returning to the photographs, ‘is a murderer. I know this as surely as I know the back of my own head.’

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ said an anonymous constable who had studied anatomy as well as turns of phrase. ‘But surely that should be hand.’

  Hovis paced over and stamped on his foot.

  ‘To continue,’ said the Inspectre. ‘I know for a fact that these young fellow-me-lads are big fans of the Beatles. And if they do not turn up at the concert in Gunnersbury Park today then I’m a Welshman.’

  Hovis paused.

  The anonymous constable with the geography ‘O’ level kept his counsel.

  ‘Just testing,’ said Hovis. ‘Now, I want all you lot in plain clothes.’

  ‘Oooooooooooo,’ went the anonymous constables. ‘Plain clothes, how exciting.’

  ‘Yes, and none of you are to wear your helmets this time. It gives the game away. I want these young fellow-me-lads and I want them today. Do I make myself clear?’

  The constables nodded anonymously.

  ‘Right, then receive copies of these photos from the front desk, get into your civvies and shove off to the park. Do you understand me? Shove off!’

  Small Dave would dearly have loved to have shoved off.

  But sadly he could not. They had banged Dave up in the high-security wing of the new Virgin Serving-the-Community Secure Accommodation Unit, which stood upon what had recently been an area of outstanding natural beauty, right next door to the Brentford nick.

  Small Dave was a Rule 42 merchant. Solitary confinement and a close mesh on the window.

  So Dave kept himself pretty much to himself. And busied himself with a pastime of his own.

  Small Dave was tunnelling out.

  Now, the major problem with tunnelling out is this: What do you do with all the earth?

  Small Dave asked Norman about this during one of their little afternoon get-togethers, Norman inhabiting as he did the cell next door to Dave, and having already removed several of the bricks from the dividing wall by means of a chisel he’d fashioned from soap.

  ‘The secret,’ said Norman, ‘is to dig not one hole but two. And put all the earth you’ve dug from the first hole into the second one.’

  Small Dave made the face of thought. ‘But what about all the earth you’ve dug from the second hole?’ he asked.

  ‘That’s where the science comes in,’ explained Norman. ‘If you dig your second hole twice the size of your first hole, there’ll be enough room in it for all the earth.’

  Small Dave made with the approving nods. ‘And is that how you’re meaning to escape?’ he asked.

  ‘Actually, no. I thought I’d just blow my way out with the help of this stick of dynamite that Zorro the paper boy smuggled in.’

  Small Dave whistled and returned to his digging.

  Soap whistled quietly to himself. ‘I’m never going to find Geraldo amongst all this mob,’

  And quite a fair old mob it was by now. They were still plodding in through the park gates and bottle-necking up amongst the concession stalls and T-shirt stands and beer wagons and overpriced Portaloos and all the rest that had been flown in beneath a fleet of airships. But the Brentford sun was shining bravely and it did have all the makings of a beautiful day.

  The world’s media were there in force. Camera teams and up-front girlie presenters in boob tubes and belly button piercings. Eager to grab the old sound-bites from the kids for the evening news.

  Because the Beatles could still make the news. They were British Institutions, each of them. And they were safe and cosy establishment figures. Part of society’s furniture.

  They’d been bought off with their medals from the Queen (John had apologized for giving his back and Prince Charles had bunged him a replacement in the Royal Mail). And they gave the public what the public thought it wanted. Which is slightly different from giving the public what it actually needs.

  Yes, the Beatles were forever fab and the devil take the man who says they’re not.

  A girlie presenter in a boob tube with belly button piercing stuck out her mic towards a not-so-fattish chap in a black T-shirt and shorts. ‘And do you dig the Beatles?’ was her question.

  ‘Not really,’ said the chap in a squeaky voice. ‘I think they’re pretty crass. Although we’ve just come here straight from their last gig at Wembley Stadium.’

  ‘But their last gig at Wembley Stadium was twenty-five years ago. You wouldn’t even have been born.’

  ‘Ah, no, of course not,’ said the chap. ‘What I meant to say was that we’ve just come here after watching it on video. But it’s really the Gandhis we’ve come to see.’

  ‘You dig the Gandhis, then?’

  ‘And then some. And this concert’s going to be special.’

  ‘Special? In what way special?’

  ‘Just make sure your cameras are pointing at the stage after the Beatles finish their set,’ said Geraldo. ‘You’ll see something you’ll never forget. Trust me. I know what I’m saying.’

  ‘Trust me, I know what I’m saying,’ said The Voice.

  ‘Well, you should,’ said Wingarde. ‘You’re God.’

  ‘Precisely,’ said The Voice. ‘So perhaps you’d like to hurry up with what you’re doing. God does not like conducting conversations with people who are sitting on the toilet.’

  ‘I’m almost done,’ said Wingarde, making the face of strain. ‘So what is it you want me to do this time?’

  ‘Something important that must be done today.’

  ‘But I’m meeting the Beatles today and I’m making history again. This concert could never have happened if it hadn’t been for me.’

  ‘Are you forgetting me?’ asked The Voice.

  ‘No, sir.’ Wingarde finished his bottom business, rose from the bog seat, turned around and peered down at his doings.

  ‘Why do men always do that?’ asked The Voice. ‘It’s disgusting.’
r />   Wingarde shrugged and wiped his bum. Doing that horrible thing some people do, of folding and refolding the paper.

  ‘Word has reached me,’ said The Voice, ‘that something is going to occur today. Something that could jeopardize my plans. And we wouldn’t want that to happen, would we, Wingarde?’

  ‘Certainly not, sir,’ said Wingarde, flushing the toilet and pulling up his pants.

  ‘So you’re going to deal with it for me.’

  ‘Oh, must I?’ Wingarde complained. ‘I have to meet the Beatles. Do you think Lennon will remember me?’

  ‘I shouldn’t think so, no. But I want you to go to the allotments and dig up—’

  ‘Allotments?’ went Wingarde. ‘Dig up?’ went Wingarde.

  ‘Your AK47,’ said The Voice.

  ‘My what? My what?’

  ‘Wingarde. You and I have been reshaping history. Reshaping history so that we can reshape the future. This time the future will go the way that I want it to go and nothing and no one will stand in my way. Do I make myself clear, Wingarde? Do I?’

  ‘Yes, sir, yes.’ Wingarde clutched at his head. ‘But couldn’t you get someone else to do whatever it is? Get True Father to do it. He wouldn’t mind if you told him.’

  ‘I do not wish Dr Tril … er … I mean, True Father … I do not wish True Father to hear my voice. You will do it, Wingarde. You will do it because I’m telling you to do it. You will do it, or else!’

  Wingarde mumbled and grumbled and fretted.

  ‘And I’ll tell you what else you’ll do.’

  ‘What’s that?’ mumble-grumbled and fretted the lad.

  ‘Wash your hands before you leave this bathroom. Ghastly little tick.’

  23

  Johnny Quinn would have been chuffed.

  To have seen Armageddon: The Musical performed as a rock opera, live upon stage in front of one hundred thousand young men in black T-shirts and shorts. That would have been quite something. That would have made his day.

  But sadly old Johnny couldn’t make it there in person. He had long since traded in his Biro for a shroud. And although it would be nice to think that he was sitting up there on a cloud somewhere, smiling down upon the proceedings, it is far more likely that he is way down deep in a place less pleasing.

  So Johnny wouldn’t be seeing the show. Which was a shame, because it was a killer.

  The Gandhis looked the business and the Gandhis were the business. They were rock stars and they did what rock stars do.

  You can keep all your rappers in sportswear. And your dressed-down bands from the North. And you can forget all that pompous pants about, ‘We’re into music, not image’, or worse than that…

  UNPLUGGED

  Any musicians who play UNPLUGGED should be taken out quietly and put to the sword. A rock star should look like a rock star and a rock star should play like a rock star. And that means the twenty-minute Stratocaster solo and that means hair and that means leather. And if it’s too loud you’re too old.

  And if you don’t like it, then you can, in the words of Axl Rose, ‘just fuck off.’

  And another thing, too, while we’re at it. It is not just the right of every young person to go off to a three-day rock festival, get smashed out of their bonces on forbidden substances and blow their minds to rock ’n’ roll.

  IT’S THEIR DUTY!

  These things must be done and they must be done now! Too soon the jammy sandwich in the expensive sound system. Too soon the housework and the family saloon.

  Remember the credo your fathers forgot.

  TURN ON – TUNE IN – DROP OUT

  And grow your hair big while you still have some to grow. And never trust anyone over thirty.

  It was around three thirty when Gandhi’s Hairdryer opened the show and raised high the banner of rock.

  It was big hair and tight leather trousers. It was Pigarse with his bulging crotch and Litany in a red rubber catsuit and four-inch stilettos. It was Ricky with his Stratocaster.

  It was rock ’n’ roll.

  A great sigh rose from the crowd as Litany walked onstage. Ten zillion male pheromones took to head-butting one another. A coachload of Paul McCartney fans thrust their knitting into their handbags, pulled their cardigans over their faces and fled.

  And that was only the blokes (satire? Or not?).

  Cheer and ogle went the boys in the black T-shirts and shorts. Rock ’n’ roll and rock went Gandhi’s Hairdryer.

  It is virtually impossible to describe in mere words a great rock performance. But, as Norman once said, ‘It is only by attempting the impossible that we will achieve the absurd.’

  So, let us pan gently across the stage with our belletristic camera, and, shunning the holophrastic, cry havoc and let slip the doggerels of war.

  No. Let’s not.

  Let’s go see how Soap is getting on.

  Soap Distant and John Omally were down the front in the snake pit. That Holy of Holies before the stage, where only the Blessed possessing the sacred stage pass may bang their exalted heads and play their ethereal guitars.

  And, as the Gandhis pumped out ‘The Dalai Lama’s Barn Dance’, and Litany’s vocals and Ricky’s Strat meshed and intertwined and Pigarse’s backbeat drove fists of sound through stomach walls and Dead Boy Doveston’s Rickenbacker bass (the 1964 4001S model) underlaid a funk groove previously only achieved by the now legendary Bootsy Collins, whilst Matchbox Finial produced the power chords, Soap and John made mad eejits of themselves and worked up a sweat you could drown in.

  And, as the last power chord crashed out and the final drum roll did its thing and the impossibly fast twiddly-diddly show-off Stratocaster tail-piece flourish blurred away to an end, the audience erupted into orgasmic applause, which shook the ground and registered 3.6 on the Richter Scale.

  Which was a pretty good opening for any show.

  ‘Brilliant.’ John raised peace-fingers, whistled and cheered.

  ‘That was something,’ gasped Soap.

  And all around them was hubbub and hollering, pushings of bodies and crush.

  ‘John,’ Soap shouted with what breath he could find. ‘I have to speak to you. It’s very important.’

  ‘Later.’ John whistled some more.

  ‘John, it’s very important.’

  ‘Later. Later. Leave it, Soap.’

  Soap Distant bawled into John’s ear. ‘John, I know who killed Jim.’

  John Omally froze amidst the roaring, cheering crowd. ‘What did you say?’ he mouthed at Soap.

  ‘I know who killed Jim. I have to talk to you.’

  John mouthed a ‘Come on,’ and pushed Soap through the crush.

  ‘Come on!’ Wingarde shouted at his chauffeur as the long red, white and logoed limo slid between the building sites of Brentford. ‘Get a move on, I’m missing the show.’

  The chauffeur made a huffy face in the driving mirror. ‘Well,’ said he, in the manner known as camp, ‘if you hadn’t spent half the day digging on your allotment.’

  Wingarde cradled the bundle on his lap. An oilskin cloth swathed the AK47. From between his gritted teeth he mumbled, ‘It wasn’t my frigging fault that I couldn’t remember where I’d buried it.’

  ‘Excuse me?’ said the chauffeur.

  ‘Nothing,’ grumbled Wingarde.

  ‘You should have marked the place with a stick or something,’ said The Voice in Wingarde’s head.

  ‘A stick?’ said Wingarde.

  ‘A stick?’ said the chauffeur.

  ‘Shut up!’ said Wingarde.

  ‘Don’t tell God to shut up,’ said The Voice.

  ‘Not you, sir,’ said Wingarde.

  ‘That’s more like it,’ said the chauffeur.

  Wingarde whispered into his hand. ‘You could have told me where it was buried. You are God, after all.’

  ‘That’s very sweet of you,’ said the chauffeur, whose hearing was very acute, ‘and I’ve always rather fancied you. Shall we give the concert a miss, do you th
ink, and just go back to my house?’

  Back in Gunnersbury House, with the Gandhis’ encore rattling the windowpanes and playing merry hell with the foundations, John Omally sat at his grimy kitchen table and listened in silence while Soap told him his tale.

  ‘Oh my God,’ he whispered, when the lad had done. ‘Oh my God, my God.’

  Soap stared at the Irishman. He looked on the verge of collapse. The colour had faded away from his face and his hands shook terribly.

  ‘I’m so sorry, John,’ said Soap. ‘Sorry about Jim and sorry I had to spring all this on you.’

  ‘It’s all right, Soap.’ John took breaths to steady himself, but these met with little success. ‘It’s all right. It all makes sense to me now. Why Geraldo wanted my autograph when he met me. Why Jim was so secretive. All of it. It all falls into place.’

  ‘So you can see why it’s so important that we find Geraldo today.’

  John nodded slowly, his voice was scarcely a whisper. ‘You find him, Soap, and let me deal with Wingarde.’

  ‘Now hold on, John. Don’t do anything stupid.’

  ‘Stupid?’ John’s eyes flashed and his trembling hands became fists. ‘He killed Jim and that’s all I need to know.’

  ‘Yes, I know that’s how it looks. But we can’t actually prove anything.’

  ‘He’ll confess to me,’ said Omally. ‘And then I will carry out his execution.’

  ‘No, John, that isn’t the way.’

  Omally climbed unsteadily to his feet. He reached out a hand to Soap, who took it. ‘Soap,’ said he. ‘This is where you and I part company again. You’re a good man, Soap. Jim was a good man and you’re a good man too.’

  ‘You sound a bit like Brian Epstein,’ said Soap. ‘But please don’t do this, John.’

  ‘It has to be done. Call it revenge, call it whatever you will. But I have to do it, all the same.’

  Soap looked up at Omally and they solemnly shook hands. ‘There’s nothing I can say that will talk you out of this, is there?’ said Soap.

  ‘Nothing, my friend.’