The Most Amazing Man Who Ever Lived (29 page)

Thelma and Louise, who had
considered it prudent to slip away on the approach of so many policemen, looked
on as Cornelius and Tuppe were led away to God knows where.

‘Now
that’s what I call a bummer,’ Norman said.

‘They’ll
get free,’ Thelma told the dead boy. ‘We still have plenty of time.’

High in the cab of the
leading military vehicle, a half-track of French design, English construction
and sometime Iraqi ownership, sat three men. One was clad in full khaki kit,
the beret of a Desert Rat perched on his red-faced head. Another was all in
green tweed and commanded more than his fair share of seat. The remaining wore
the remnants of a double-breasted suit and showed signs of extensive tar and
feathering.

‘Splendidly
achieved, Chunky,’ said Green-Tweeder to Red-Face. ‘And my thanks for picking
me up from Bramfield Halt.’

‘Watched
all the lunacy on the go last night from my billet at the kinky vicar’s,’ said
Chunky Wilberforce. ‘Presumed you were at the back of it, so phoned up the
chaps at the old eco-friendly reclamation centre and had them hot-foot it over
here to get the ball rolling. But what were you doing at Bramfield Halt, any
way?’

‘Never
mind,’ said Rune.
[22]
‘And we have
you
to thank for all this, do we, Mr Rodway?’

‘Er, well,
I…’ The estate agent shook a puzzled tar-spattered head. ‘I suppose you do,
yes.’

‘And in
your modesty you were making away from the town on foot, carrying nothing but
that big bulging suitcase, when I spotted you and had Chunky stop to pick you
up.’

‘Er,
well, I…’ went Mr Rodway once more.

‘Lucky
that we did eh?’ said Rune.

‘Er,
hm…’ said Mr Rodway.

‘I am
pleased,’ said Rune. ‘Most pleased, the town cleared well ahead of schedule. I
think we can bring forward the deadline. What say you, Chunky?’

‘Got
all the pylons you need round here,’ agreed the old soldier. ‘In the
restricted
zone. Have ‘em sawed down for you tonight, if you wish. Get ‘em up and in
place by tomorrow.’

‘Splendid,
splendid, splendid,’ said Rune, clapping his mighty hands together. ‘Then I
shall reschedule. Midnight tomorrow night. Quite splendid.’

And up, or wherever, at
The Universal Reincarnation Company, had anyone now chosen to pull out a
cabinet drawer and examine the files within, that anyone would have been most
surprised to observe that the expiry dates on the lives of all those listed
within was no longer calculated at midnight Friday next. It was now midnight
tomorrow night.

Quite
un
-splendid
really.

32

Old Claude tinkered
merrily away with the Karmascope affair attached to the single working big sky
nozzle. He had been most pleased by the sudden appearance of the drenched Mr
Rune and had attributed this sudden appearance to immediate success on the part
of young Norman.

‘You
just keep sending the bastards up, sonny,’ crowed Old Claude.

‘And
I’ll keep sending them down as maggots, we’ll soon get the job jobbed. And then
I’ll fix the bastard up here. You see if I don’t.’

The bastard-up-here had
now drawn the bolts on the unappealing door to the abandoned lift shaft. He
fanned his nose against the fetor that rose from within. ‘Claude,’ he called.
‘Dear Claude, are you down there?’

His
voice echo-echoed. No reply echoed back.

‘I’ve
come to set you free,’ called the large controller. ‘Just say the word and I’ll
lower a rope.

Echo-echo,
but still no reply.

‘He’s
got out, hasn’t he?’ said Jack Bradshaw.

‘It is
a very strong possibility, but we must make sure.

‘Do you
want me to get a volunteer to go down then, sir?’ The large controller stared
at Jack.

And
Jack stared back at the large controller.

‘Oh
no,’ said Jack. ‘Leave me out please.’

‘All in
a good cause,’ said the large one, snatching Jack by the collar and hefting him
through the open doorway. ‘Let me know what you find.’

‘Aaaaagh!’
went Jack Bradshaw, heading on down.

‘Aaaaagh!’ went Tuppe.
‘Stop hitting me with that truncheon.’

‘Sorry,’
replied the policeman. ‘My hand slipped, I aimed at your mate.’

‘Oh,
that’s all right then.’

‘No it
isn’t,’ Cornelius levelled a foot at the constable’s kneecap.

‘Ouch,’
said the constable, welting the tall boy on the head.

‘Ouch
too,’ said Cornelius.

‘That’s
enough now,’ said a superior officer (superior to what eh?). ‘Shut the cell
door on these two villains and let’s go up to the canteen for a cup of tea.’

‘Could
you send down one with two sugars?’ Tuppe asked.

‘And
some aspirins?’ said Cornelius. Slam went the cell door.

Clunk
and click, the key in the lock. Tuppe slumped down on his bottom on the floor.
Cornelius slumped down beside him.

‘I’m
hungry,’ said Tuppe. ‘We haven’t had breakfast.’

‘As
soon as I get us out of here we’ll have some. ‘Ever the optimist, you will be
paying for it, with
what?’

‘
Ah,’ said Cornelius.

‘Ah
indeed,’ said Tuppe. ‘Trying to bribe the superior officer with all your money
didn’t seem to work too well, did it?’

‘Easy
come, easy go?’ Cornelius suggested. ‘Exactly where are we now, anyway?’

‘Bramfield,’
said Tuppe. ‘Delightful little country village, five miles north of Skelington
Bay. I saw the road sign while we were coming up in the police van. You had your
head down, policemen were striking it with sticks, I recall.’

‘Ali,’
said Cornelius. ‘Well delightful as it may be, I think we should be leaving it.
So if you’d like to favour me with the way
you’d
do it, we’ll up and
out, OK?’

‘I
thought you’d never ask,’ said Tuppe.

‘I must ask you to keep
moving on,’
bellowed the loud hailer atop a
military vehicle of dubious origin.
‘Single file along the lanes, please.
You will soon be at Bramfield where food, drink and shelter will be provided.’

‘This
is inhuman.’ Thelma drummed her fists on the vehicle’s armoured side. ‘You’re
driving women and children along like cattle.

It’s a
violation of human rights. The court at Strasburg will hear about this.’

The
steely snout of a machine pistol appeared through a gun port and fixed its aim
on a point between Thelma’s eyes. ‘Just keep moving, you,’ barked a voice from
within.

‘Leave
it,’ said Louise. ‘You can’t argue with a man who has a gun for a dick.’

Thelma
spat onto the vehicle as it drove on, issuing orders through its loud hailer.
She was very upset about all this.

Hugo Rune was far from
upset. He sat in the lead car of the half a convoy that was not evacuating
people for their own safety. His half comprised big bulldozers to the number
four and superannuated, though still serviceable, Sherman tanks to the number
three. And his own vehicle, which made, er, eight altogether.

‘About
these cars on the rampage, Rune?’ blustered Chunky Wilberforce. ‘All very
successful in clearing the town, I grant you, but how do you switch the buggers
off?’

‘Mr
Rodway?’ asked Hugo Rune. ‘Your thoughts on this please.’

Mr
Rodway shrugged and made a foolish grinning face. ‘Wait until they run out of
petrol?’ he suggested.

‘Sound
enough thinking,’ said Rune. ‘But if, as you have told us, this is some
infectious automotive disease, we should not wish our own wheeled conveyances
to come down with the sickness.’

Mr
Rodway glanced out of the slatted armoured window. ‘I’ll bet those tanks you
have there could make a real mess of them,’ he said, with no small degree of
malice in his voice.

Chunky
looked at Rune.

And
Rune looked at Chunky.

‘Gung
ho, Chunky,’ said Hugo Rune.

‘Hello-ho,’ echoed the
voice of the large controller. ‘What news there, Mr Bradshaw?’

‘You
bastard,’ muttered Jack Bradshaw, which echoed quite well back up the shaft.

‘Pardon?’
enquired the large controller.

‘The
bastard
isn’t here,’ called Jack. ‘There’s what looks like some kind of hot-air
balloon down here. He must have escaped in it. Throw down a rope and hoist me
out.’

‘Don’t
seem to have one on me at the moment, Jack.’ The large controller slammed shut
the nasty door and secured the bolts.

‘You
bastard,’ shrieked Jack Bradshaw. ‘Let me out of here, you bastard!’

‘Let me out of here,’
cried Cornelius Murphy. ‘Let me out, I say.’ He turned back to Tuppe. ‘Is that
all right for you?’

‘That’s
fine,’ said Tuppe. ‘The more you cry out in a police cell, the more you’ll be
ignored. Just keep shouting and I’ll get on with getting us out.

‘I’m
innocent!’ cried Cornelius. ‘Let me out! Let me out!’

‘Let me out!’ raged Jack
Bradshaw, but the large controller didn’t hear him. The large controller was
now back in his office. It was a palatial office. It had the lush, pile
carpeting. It had that marble bath-tub. It had a wall safe.

The large
controller turned the combination lock of this. ‘Interference all round,’ said
he, in a large voice. ‘Time to put a stop to all this, I think.’ He opened the
safe door. He crossed to his great big desk, pulled open a draw and took out a
pair of padded gloves.

He put
on these padded gloves.

He
returned to the wall safe.

He
delved into the wall safe.

He drew
out a square, black box.

It was
a very very cold, square, black box. That sort of whispery white mist that
rises from chest freezers rose from it. A horrid smell too.

‘Hello,
boys,’ said the large controller, stroking the lid of the box. ‘It’s been a
long time, hasn’t it? And the big G did think you’d all been disposed of when
He closed Hell down, didn’t He? But I’ve looked after you here and now it’s
time to release you from your confinement and get you on the go once more.

Murmer,
murmer and evil growl, went the contents of the cold, black box.

‘My
sentiments entirely,’ whispered the large controller. ‘We enjoyed ourselves
while we were running Hell, and we will enjoy ourselves again. When you and I,
and the other Is that are me, are running everything. Oh what jolly good times
we will have. But for now there is something you must do. My brother is
proceeding with his plan to take absolute control of Earth, but there’s a
little fly or two in the ointment and you must seek them out and wipe them out.
As horribly as you please, of course. After all, you’ve waited oh so long,
haven’t you?’

Darkly
growl and murmer.

‘Yes,
you
have.
Well, no longer. I will instruct you on who you must seek and
destroy. The rest is up to you. Just get it done and quickly, you know what I
mean?’

‘Aw
shit!’ whispered Old Claude who was skulking outside the door. ‘I know
just
what
you mean.

‘I should have stayed with
Cornelius,’ said Norman to Louise. ‘You know what I mean? But I went skulking
off as soon as I saw those policemen. What is it about the arrival of policemen
that makes you feel guilty even when you aren’t?’

‘Their
helmets,’ said Louise.

‘Oh,’
said Norman.

‘I
think we should be doing some more skulking off right now,’ said Thelma.
‘That’s Bramfield up ahead and it looks like they’ve erected some kind of
compound to march everyone into. I’m not having that. They’ll be tattooing our
wrists next; this is really all very wrong.

‘We
need to get back to Skelington Bay,’ said Norman. ‘And we need Cornelius and
his pal with us.’

‘Any
ideas?’ Thelma asked.

‘Of
course,’ said Norman. ‘Plenty.’

‘Tuppe, I’m banjoed,’ said
Cornelius. ‘I’ve done plenty of screaming for help, I’ve been ignored aplenty
and now I’m banjoed. Tuppe? Where are you Tuppe?’

‘Where do you think you’re
off to?’ asked the driver of the final Jeep in the military convoy that was
chivvying along the refugee column, swerving to a halt.

‘I have
to take a leak behind the hedge,’ said Thelma. ‘Do you want to watch, or what?’

‘Not
really my thing,’ said the driver. ‘What about you, Clive?’ he asked his
companion.