Gog

by Andrew Sinclair

  “Like this?” Gog says. And he swings his right fist into the rosebud of Magog’s mouth. For it is Magog standing there before him, Magog of the nose like the iron blade of a scythe so sharp that his eyes lie far back in their sockets out of fear, Magog of the face both glib and bony, Magog the lord of Mammon and Moloch and Machine, with his servant kneeling in front of him and wiping away the mess from his feast. And Gog sees Magog’s lips split on his knuckles and the blood spurt out from Magog’s mouth and the body of Magog stagger back and fall against a table. And Gog looks down at his own fist in wonder, and lo, Magog’s teeth have scored the back of his hand so that Magog’s blood and his mingle and join on his fist, the blood of brothers.

  As Magog comes forward, his left duke stuck out in the old boxing stance, as classy as Molineaux versus Cribb in the print on the wall, the waiter rushes at Gog, swatting him with his napkin as if he were a fly. Gog is unsighted, and Magog hits him four times, one-two to the belly, one-two to the face, before Gog can push the waiter back, white tie over tails under a table. And Magog weaves in again, one-two to Gog’s left brow, a left and a right that strike and smart and make the lids swell up over the eye into a sudden patch of flesh. But as Magog dances back, his hip catches on the edge of a bench and he is checked, just as Gog swings his right fist into his enemy’s body. Magog grunts and bends, but recovers; his flesh is hard with muscle under his dandy airs.

  For every time that Gog strikes Magog unsatisfactorily on shoulder or side of the head, Magog dabs through a dozen blows to Gog’s vital parts, raising up lumps and bruises, reducing Gog’s sight to an oozy blur as if he were squinting through a slit in a tank turret in the rain. Yet Gog’s huge advantage in weight and his own good condition from walking or war training makes him wear Magog down. Magog slips and falls once when he strikes Gog, because Gog is rushing at him so fast that the force of his own blow is turned against him. Gog drops his fists and begins to grapple with Magog, to wrestle with him and bend him and twist him and wrench him and knead him and pulp him and rack him, ignoring the blows which Magog rains on his sides and neck. At last, Magog is bent backwards over a table, with one of Gog’s hands at his throat and the other confining his wrists in a single manacle. Gog leans forward with his weight to choke Magog; but his enemy does not fight. Magog goes limp, until Gog loosens his grip. Then he smiles and sits up on the table, dusting off his jacket with his hands.

  “You can’t kill me,” Magog says. “You know that. Or you’d swing for it. As it is, you’re going in the dock for assault and battery. The first policeman I see will put you in custody.”

  The alcohol explodes in Gog’s boiling blood and he sees Magog’s­ head in front of him become blue as a copper’s helmet with a bright crown of hairy metal and he raises both of his clenched fists on high and he brings them down on his enemy, who slips sideways so that Gog dashes his fists onto the table. Then Magog is off and running through the door of the chophouse out into London, where the newsmen are crying, “Victory over Japan, Victory over Japan! End of the War! Read all about it!”

  So Gog is off after Magog down the sunny streets, with the drunken people all about him, cheering and waving, off after the dapper dishevelment of his pin-striped quarry, whose lank height puts him head and shoulders above his fellow men. And Gog blunders on implacably in pursuit, cannoning off anyone in his way without so much as a sorry. He sees Magog go to ground in a crowd round a speaker on a box on Tower Hill, disappear by stooping and ducking among the heap of listening human heads.

  Short of breath, drunk and dazy in the heat, Gog lumbers into the crowd. The Tower skitters and reels before him, its careful blocks jigging and slipping, its battlements askew. The voice of the speaker, who, who? It’s proof, proof at last, the voice of the Pardoner. And there he is, head high and sharp as a splinter under his cockle-shell hat, addressing the people where Magog’s gone to ground.

  “Pardon, we must ask pardon, ask pardon from the Almighty, what have we done? We have destroyed cities as if we were the Almighty, without so much as a pardon. And we eat and we drink and we’re merry, not to say tipsy, because we’ve won the war. But we haven’t asked pardon. Oh yes, killing a Jap’s not the same as killing a kraut which is not the same as killing a good fellow Britisher. But all the same, you’ve got to have pardon. Only three and six, pardons, done up in legal seals, worth it for the sealing wax alone, take you straight to heaven or wherever else you want to go eventually. Buy my pardons, three for ten bob, bargain family offer, don’t leave a loved one behind. They’re dipped in the holy water of Jordan itself, I went there special by submarine. I’d give ’em away for free, but I’m collecting for our poor blind toiling brothers, the pit ponies, who help to keep us warm o’ nights. Pardon me, if you want to celebrate with a clean conscience, you’d better get a pardon for all what you did in the last war. Only another two and six and I’ll give you another pardon you can date yourself. Keep it handy, and you’ll be absolved from what you do in the next war too . . .”

  As the Pardoner patters, Gog searches round among the crowd, ducking into any gap between the pressed bodies, looking for a squatting Magog but finding usually a child and once a dwarf. Then as Gog turns to the Pardoner to ask him if he has seen Magog, there is a heaving on the far side of the mob and Magog bursts out, doubled up and running down into the ruined City towards St. Paul’s. And Gog fights his way out of the press, shouting, “Let me be, people, my people. There he goes, Magog. Catch him, catch him.” But the crowd looks at him curiously and parts before him and lets him run off, none following.

  Then Magog’s sprinting down Tower Hill, so off at his heels, heart hammering, lungs gulping, the booze making a blitz on the walls still standing, so they reel and totter and fall thundering down the road. And it’s slip on the cobbles, skid, recover. Turn down Thames Street past the pier, with Tower Bridge spearing up its spires, gothic-fantastical. Jog past the Customs House, taxes on the goods of the ages, duties on tobacco and pepper and ambergris, percentages on cinnamon and stinkwood and ladies’ brollies, a cut on beaver pelts and whalebone and brass trays from Benares. Pay, pay, ye holds disgorging, pay to the man in blue uniform, pay out your imposts, the left wing of each Muscovy duck, a barrel and a half of sperm oil from Antarctica, half a hogshead from Oporto, the spare ribs of every carcass from Argentina, the stoppers from all the flasks of myrrh from Damascus, corkage on bottled Beaujolais and poundage on Copen­hagen butter and tonnage on coals from Newcastle, strip off your sacking, your wrappers, your bindings, expose the entrails of bales and clots of wool and jute veins and hawsers intestinal, watch him pick out the auguries and note the sums to pay in his little blue book, see him peek out the crannies of the packets of poppy dust, the sweet cooked weeds of the orient that waft their takers on cloud and drift to nirvana, c/o Lavender Wharf, London.

  Pant on, blood pounding, feet pumping past Billingsgate, shuttered and reeking, afternoon sleeping. Salt stink of mackerel and cod and herring, who’ll come and buy me, eel and flounder and whitebait, a pint for thruppence, shrimps and cockles and whelks big as soft tennis-balls, hangars of boxed catches inside those empty halls, who knows, in half a hundred crates the sections of the Loch Ness monster, only fourpence a fillet, gamey but tasty, maybe a whole mermaid on ice, serve her up with hollandaise and sea-shells on her nipples and an oyster in her navel, more likely find a manatee or a dugong or a dolphin, netted unwary but eaten by necessity, sad sea-flesh in slices from sources unknown, all sending out odours from Davy Jones’s Larder big as the Seventh Sea, stinking of brine and the clinging odour of fish blood. Ho, ho, porters and boxers, now afternoon dozing, come and catch Magog, gut him like a herring and tan him like a kipper, gaff him in his belly-button and smoke him like a salmon, pack him in olive oil and can him sardinewise, slice off his blubber and render him for glycerine.

  Stop to get breath under the viaduct of the new London Bridge, not fallen down, not fallen down, my fair lady. Magog stops ahead, panting and looking back, ready to
run off if Gog moves, ready to gulp air as long as Gog does. All about among the bombsites, warehouses still stand, treasure cliffs, merchandise in its myriads, mountains, Matterhorns. Behind the walls high as China, citadels of goodies, counties of fleeces fit to wrap the ice caps in and melt the floes, making a flood lower than the deluge of molasses and treacle swilling out the brick caverns on either Thames’ side. See, Magog’s off again. Push feet, shove will, on, on.

  What’s in these canyons of cornucopia? Why, there’s matches enough to blaze a bonfire to fry the moon, carpets in intricate patterns to maze the whole metropolis, strings of onions to peel and swamp the universe with God’s blubbering, Andes of fat for soap heaving with maggots like Pacific swells, dried bananas in black sticks as if all the world’s forests were burned for charcoal, metal Appenines of canned spam, Saharas of dried eggs, Kala­haris of powdered milk, vats of cod liver oil for Britain’s bonny babies that would calm a North Sea of troubled waters, distillate of orange from all the groves in Florida, tea-leaves like plagues of ants in every nook and crack, sponges to dry up the Pool of London and not even be moist, argosies of turkish delight, cargoes of prunes, merchantmen of candied peel, convoys of marzipan . . . all to be consumed, consumed, consumed utterly and turned to sewage to wash away down the river that floated the fleets of Eldorados into its wharves.

  But pound, pound down the pavements, under the railway bridge, trains hammering and roaring overhead, skull reverberate with their iron fuss, blood jangling with booze, bells clanging with peace come, sweet peace, now run sweet peace in peals of iron clappers, on after Magog, how can we have peace if Magog still rules, Magog high as the Monument, high as the high bowler of St. Paul’s rising above the ruins just as Magog’s yellow-metal skull rises above his dirty dandy suiting?

  Turn up Bread Street Hill after the quarry. Breaths sharp as lances in the lungs. Stop and puff. Watch Magog duck his head between his knees to net air. There’ll be no bread for you, my people, no bread except in coupons, in rations, in toil and sweat and labour, unless Magog’s got his skull stove in on the gutters of the hill, unless we’re blitzing in that round crown of power that sits on the cathedral of the shoulders of authority. So jog onwards up the hill, catch him bending before you, boot his arse forwards, strike at his shoulder-blades going away, so he turns in a fury, lashes back and stops you, then darts off up Bread Street Hill, as though he didn’t always eat cake.

  So Gog pursues Magog through the City in a running fight, coming up on him to hit him, briefly ding-dong ding-dong at each other like the church bells pealing victory, but all is ruin now, rubble and wrack of spire and office, boarded windows and tarpaulins over the doors, slug Magog with a haymaker, then gasp as his one-two thuds in your short ribs and he’s off again, run, run, never catch him, no breath left, stitch in the side, stop and pant, see him halt ten yards ahead, watch each other, move and he moves, so we go through the shattered City with the bells pealing victory, so we go on to St. Paul’s clanging out peacetime, so we go with Magog parted from his avenging shadow by ten yards, so we play tag through the streets never further never closer, ten yards between us, Magog dogged by Gog through the victorious people and the victorious ruins, only the great bowler of St. Paul’s looming above the wasteland of fallen brick and fallen stone.

  And it’s down Ludgate Hill past the boozers and the singers and the yellers and the cheerers, crying peace on earth and goodwill for all men, but Magog’s still in front, power rampant and elusive, power to ground you down and blow you up, power to sweat you and beat you, power to thread your muscles into wet strings and scoop out your brains like egg-yolks. Kill that power, kill him, kill Magog, as he’s under the railway bridge, looking, looking for a bobby, blue helmet and big boots. But anarchy’s ablaze today, city on riot, roisterers and revellers, even the coppers dead drunk in the pubs, and there’s no one to save Magog as Gog clumps along after him, past the beery glass doors of the King Lud, oh, you rebuilt the first Lud’s Town that’s now corrupt to London, you girdled it round with towers innumerable, making the citizens build stone houses full of silks and satins, that no other city should have fairer palaces within. Good King Lud, old King Lud, step down from your pub sign and clock Magog with your mace, bash in his slick hair till the blood runs out of his ear-drums. He wants to pull down your alleys and terraces and byways, he wants to gridiron your crazy quilt of a city and make it into barren arteries of commerce. Clobber him, good King Lud, drop your board on his brainpan. Sweet King, hear your faithful Gog, always your liege servant for the past and preservation.

  But Magog’s across Ludgate Circus up Fleet Street, with the presses and the afternoon editions pounding out their lies and vans about him, pulping out their propaganda about peace for ever, no more war now, Britain Wins War, Cock of the Walk and the World, Who’ll Dare Tweak The Lion’s Tail Now, Empire for Ever. No, no, can’t you see, it’s either peace or power. Which will you have, Britannia? Throw in your trident, give up the seven seas for your puddle? Then you’ll have the shield of security, who’d want such an isolated little island? So throw your type out at Magog, feed him into the flatbeds, stamp him with letters, use his blood as ink and bring out a new edition, Magog Is Dead, Loud Sing Halleluia, Peace On Earth, Empire Ended, Each To His Own Back Garden, To Hell With Whitehall, To Heaven With Us All.

  But the newsvendors and the passers-by let Magog through, they don’t lynch him, and Gog must pound on, till, sudden as a flicker, Magog whisks through a narrow entrance off the Strand just short of the Aldwych, nicks into a slit between offices that holds only a black door and a red light. And as Gog pursues him, the door opens and Magog’s in and Gog just gets his foot in the jamb and shoves against the door closing, shoves and strains and heaves, till the door opens suddenly and Gog falls into a hallway on hands and knees.

  Darkness with spots of fire. Slow stealth of seeing. Light creeping like a beggar into eyes. Gold blur. Gold shape becoming twin giant standing bombcases, joined at the side, fit for a squadron of Halifaxes to drop and disintegrate the moon. The interiors of each shell-case are scraped out. On two large wireless sets winking with red and white and green valves sit a girl, painted all over with silver except for her breasts, and a boy, painted all over with gold except for his genitals. As Gog rises to his feet before them, the girl says, “Which way, cock?” and Gog says, “Magog, which way did he go?” And the boy says disgustedly, “Bints again.” And the girl points to a curtained alcove to the right and presses a button beside her, which causes a small mine to explode under Gog’s feet and sends him scampering for cover through the alcove into the den of the Fat Girl.

  Her room is fitted out like the cockpit of a vast bomber. Past the plexiglass windows, clouds elevating nude girl angels served by terrible priapic red imps float by in front of a duck-egg sky. Through the glass floor, an aerial view of London, from which tiny flames and puffs of smoke erupt and cut-out model buildings collapse and spring up again in an endless whirligig of destruction and reconstruction. Stuck onto various houses are pins holding up coloured flags to mark the peculiarities of the occupants. Here in Belgravia, MR QLP – WHIPS/PINPOINT HEELS; in Chelsea, MRS RFL – SAILORS/SPADES WITH GOATEES; in Soho, MR AAS – RAPE/THIN WITH DUMB SCREAMS; in Pimlico, MISS HUP – SCHOOLGIRLS/SLIPS & CANES. The vices of London are each pin-pointed and docketed for blasting with brimstone and fire from the heavenly brothel, so that a glance serves to locate the target of a client’s tastes and deviations for instant annihilation. Sitting before a gigantic dashboard of dials and wheels and levers, the Fat Girl billows out of a tight black leather flying-suit that cuddles each ounce of her overflow as lovingly as the hide covers a plump hippopotamus. And as Gog watches, she shouts, “ ’Old on tight, me ’earties, loop t’ loop, double jelly roll.” And she pulls and wiggles a giant metal phallus labelled Joystick.

  Immediately, the metal walls shake and shiver and shudder, some making revolutions like huge tin drums for blasting popcorn. The air is howling and screeching and
shrieking with pain and ecstasy. Thunderous detonations go crrrp, crrrt, crrrk over the loudspeakers. Gelignite by the ton blasts beneath Gog’s lobes. In front of the cockpit, a film begins whirring like a propeller, a film taken from the nose of a diving Stuka. The earth hurtles towards Gog horrendously and horizontally, then at the last moment before crash it is stripped off as if peeled aside in débris and black fume. Gog feels his stomach lurch and heave and, dammit, yes, a foul itching of nervous desire begins to pluck at his groin. The cockpit steadies as the Fat Girl pulls the Joystick back to the level and the crescendo of bombardment and sexual appetite whimpers down to a distant bang or grunt. A girl enters, clad in spotless white dungarees cut away at each breast and at the crotch. The Fat Girl looks at her watch. “ ’Alf after three, Laureen,” she says, “time ter goo in Noomber Seven. ’E like boonk service. An’ doant leave yer ’orsetail.” The girl switches a hairy whip and goes off to one of the nine tin doors set into the walls; this one is marked Fuselage 7. As she yanks open the door and walks in without warning, Gog reads on the back of her white dungarees Air Crew 3.

  “Well, well,” says the Fat Girl turning to Gog, her loamy vowels already sharpened by a cockney whine, “if it ain’t ole Goggie. ’Ow’s yer keepin’, luv? Oop in smoke fer long? Got all kinky after blitz, too? Theer’s lots that way noo. They’ve got ter ’ave it sceery, like. Ain’t t’ same, reely, ’avin’ a scroo noo without block-buster or V-2 breathin’ fire doon yer arse. So Crookie an’ Rosy ’ave blitz service ten time a night. ’Ave our aerothrills an’ yer spills it, or yer mooney back. T ’appy direct ’it. Yer can be ’igh as kite an’ yer doant leave t’ ground. No vertigo in our gogo. But I’ll treat yer special, luv. Thousan’ bomber raid an’ rockets. If that doant shift yer, yer better shoot oop shop an’ min’t’ pigs.” She looks at Gog appraisingly, her small eyes glancing and her squashed lips wet as a trodden plum. “Still like ’em ploomp, ducks? ’Ere, I’ll see if Crookie can tek a breather. ’E’s workin’ overtime these days. Those bloody atom-bombs ’ave got all t’ fairies an’ nymphos fair crawlin’ oop wall, cruisin’ fer bruisin’ from ole Crookie. ’E used ter say ’e was like Channel, never dry oop. But noo, yer coold chuff off from Dover ter Calaay an’ yer woant get yer boots wet.”