“I have seen the film of it,” said Pooley, “dubbed from the original Japanese it was.”
“And the lights upon the allotment,” said Soap, “what would you take those to be?”
“The work of the council,” said Omally firmly, “another plot to confound honest golfers.”
Soap burst into a paroxysm of laughter. Tears rolled down his pale cheeks and he clutched at his stomach.
“Come now,” said Pooley, “it is no laughing matter, those lads have it in for us.”
“Have it in for you?” gasped Soap between convulsions. “You witness a test run of laser-operated gravitational landing beams, the product of a technology beyond comprehension, and you put it down to the work of Brentford Council?”
“If you will pardon me,” said Pooley, somewhat offended, “if it is the product of a technology beyond comprehension I hardly feel that we can be blamed for finding it so.”
“Quite,” said Omally.
“And your journey here through the solid concrete floor of an empty allotment shed?”
“I have been meaning to ask somebody about that,” said John.
“It was a hologram,” said Pooley, matter-of-factly.
“Oh, of course, one of those lads.”
“I must apologize for your rapid descent,” Soap explained. “I had a great deal of trouble in keeping the door open long enough for you both to enter. I was unable, however, to stop the Cereans bringing down the lift.”
“Come now,” said Pooley, who had always been fond of the phrase, “be fair Soap, all this is a little hard to swallow.”
“Nevertheless, it is true. As true as the fact that you are sitting here, a mile and a half beneath Penge, drinking one-hundred-and-fifty-year-old Rhine wine.”
“Penge?” Pooley shook his head once more. “Where the hell is Penge?”
“I’ve never been quite certain myself, but I’m told that it’s a very nice place.”
John and Jim finished their second bottles and sat in silence wondering what in the world they were to do next. Omally sat glowering into the carpet. Pooley took off his jacket, which was starting to steam at the shoulders. “All right,” he said at last, “say that we do believe you.”
“I don’t,” Omally interrupted.
“Yes, well, say that we did. What do you suppose we can do about it? How can we -” he indicated himself and his bedraggled companion “- how can we battle it out with an intergalactic strike force? I myself possess a barlow knife which is good for whittling and Omally has an air pistol. Could you perhaps chip in with a few Sam missiles and the odd thermonuclear device?”
“Sadly no,” said Soap. “But I am open to any suggestions at this time.”
“I have one to make,” said John Omally bitterly. Pooley covered his ears.
14
Small Dave lay in his hospital bed for some days before the doctors released him. He seemed sound enough physically, a little scorched about the extremities, but nothing more… It was his mental state which put the wind up the hospital staff. The constant talking to himself. Still, there was no law as yet against that sort of thing, and he wasn’t a private patient, was he? The doctors consequently turned the dwarf postman out on to the street and left him to fend for himself.
At length he returned to the boarded-up shell which had been his family seat for countless generations. As he stood peering up at the blackened brickwork there was little emotion to be found upon his elfin face. With a mere shrug, a brief display of hand-flapping, and a word or two to an invisible companion, he turned upon his heel and shambled away towards the Ealing Road.
Neville watched him pass from the Swan’s doorway. “Vindictive, grudge-bearing wee bastard,” was all the part-time barman had to say.
As the dwarf receded into the distance, Neville noted to his dismay that a bouncing, striding figure, sporting a lime-green coiffure and a natty line in bondage trousers, was rapidly approaching, his denim pockets bulging with coin of the realm and his trigger finger already a-twitch. It was, in fact, twitching at a rate exactly equivalent to that of the nervous tic the part-time barman had recently developed in his good eye.
“Damn,” said Neville, as Raffles Rathbone offered him a cheery wave. The bouncing boy squeezed past him into the saloon-bar and jogged up to the Captain Laser Alien Attack Machine. “Good morning to you,” he said, addressing the thing directly. “Ready for the off?”
With a single movement he tore aside the “Out of Order” sign Neville had Sellotaped over the video screen and cast it across the floor.
“Broken,” said the part-time barman, without turning from his position in the doorway. “Coin jammed in the mechanism, won’t work.”
Nick eyed the barman’s rear quarters with suspicion. “I’ll give it a try, to make sure,” he said slowly.
“Brewery say to leave it, might blow up if anyone tampers with it.”
“Can’t see any coin,” said the lad, squinting into the slot.
“I have my orders. Have to wait for the engineer.”
“Really?” Nick’s ill-matched eyes flickered between the barman’s back and the humming machine. A florin hovered in his hand and a look of indecision wrinkled his brow.
Neville turned suddenly. “Best leave it, eh?”
The coin was an inch from the slot and the youth’s hand was beginning to tremble. A certain electricity entered the air, and with it the distinctive wail of a harmonica, as next door in the rear yard of the Star of Bombay Curry Garden, Archie Karachi performed an apt rendition of “Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling”. It was not that he had any knowledge of the drama enacting itself within the saloon-bar of the Swan, but rather that his son’s bar-mitzvah was coming up and he wanted to put on a decent show.
Neville’s nervous tic accelerated slightly, but he fixed the boy with a piercing gaze of the type favoured by cobras whilst surveying their four-footed lunch. Nick for his part was not really equal to such a battle of wills. He did his best to look determined, but a bead of perspiration appeared upon his lofty hairline and, taking with it a quantity of green dye, descended towards the bridge of his nose, leaving an unpleasant slug trail behind it.
“Leave it, eh?” said Neville.
“I… er.” The boy blew the green bead from the tip of his nose. A minute passed, a long long minute. Nothing moved in the Swan but for a twitching eyelid, and a synchronized right forefinger. Nick’s face was now striped, giving him the appearance of a sniper peering through long grass.
Neville’s good eye was starting to water. Somebody had to crack.
“I’ll have a half of shandy please,” said the boy, breathing a great sigh of relief. Neville smiled broadly and turned towards the pumps.
There was a sudden metallic click, a clunk and then… Bitow Bitow Bitow Bitow went the Captain Laser Alien Attack Machine.
“It’s all right,” said Nick sweetly, “it’s mended. You can phone up the brewery and tell them to cancel the engineer.”
Neville ground his teeth sickeningly and clutched at the counter top. He had been so close. So very, very close.
Old Pete entered the Flying Swan, Chips close upon his well-worn heels. “Good day to you, Neville,” said the ancient. “A large dark rum if you please.”
Neville did the business, the exact coinage changed hands, and the part-time barman rang up “No Sale”.
Old Pete eyed the player at the games machine with contempt and unplugged his hearing aid. “Pardon me whilst I withdraw into a world of silence,” he told Neville.
“Have you seen anything of Pooley and Omally?” the part-time barman asked.
“Pardon?” said Old Pete.
“Pooley and Omally!” shouted Neville. “Plug the thing in, you old fool!”
Pete refitted his jack plug. “Haven’t seen them,” he said, sipping at his drink.