The Dance of the Voodoo Handbag

'˜'њThere was food enough to eat: I caught fish, and ate fruit and survived. But I was mad from loneliness and lack of female company. I was dying for a shag. And then one day, as I'm walking along the beach, I come upon this handbag.'ќ'˜

'˜A handbag?' I said.

'˜A voodoo handbag,' said Fangio. '˜But let's let the bloke tell it. 'њI recognized it at once,'ќ says the bloke, 'њbecause we'd docked a while back in Haiti and I'd been to one of the voodoo temples to see the black girls dancing with their kit off. And on one of the altars I'd seen one of these handbags. All covered in skulls. Real weird shit. So I pick up this handbag from the beach and I open it up. And out comes this beautiful woman. A genie like, she materializes right before me.'ќ'˜

'˜Get away,' I said.

'˜Shut up,' said Fangio. '˜'њ'˜You have freed me from the voodoo handbag,' says the genie, '˜where I have been held captive for a thousand years. In order to reward you I will grant you a wish.' Well, I should have said, '˜Get me off the island,' but I didn't. All I could see was this beautiful woman and I was gagging for it. '˜I want to make love to you,' I said. But the beautiful genie shook her head. '˜Genies don't have those parts,' she said, pointing to her groin regions. And I was desperate, so I said-'ќ'˜

'˜What about giving me a little head, then?'

'˜Correct,' said Fangio. '˜However did you guess?'

'˜Because it's a crap old joke and I've heard it before.'

'˜I haven't,' said the fat boy. '˜So you think he was making it up?'

'˜I think you made it up.'

'˜Oh yeah?' Fangio reached beneath the counter and brought out what appeared to be a tiny Homburg. '˜So what do you make of this then, sucker? He left his hat behind.'

I examined said hat. '˜This,' I said to Fange, '˜is the hat of a glove puppet. The hat of a Norris the Boil glove puppet, to be precise. Norris was the creation of an illustrator called Albert Tupper back in the 1950s. Albert wrote a whole series of books based on Norris' adventures. Norris was a boil on the back of a nightclub owner's neck and he got into all kinds of humorous scrapes. Sadly, however, the world was not ready for books about buboes and Albert died, the tragic victim of a freak accident involving rubber bands and a bathing cap.'

Fangio whistled. '˜You sure know your spin-off products,' he said.

'˜Buddy,' I told him, '˜in my business, knowing your spin-off products can mean the difference between crawling the kerb and fouling the footpath, if you know what I mean, and I'm sure that you do.'

'˜Excuse me, chief,' said Barry, '˜and I do hate like damn to break in on you like this. But much as I know that talking a lot of old toot in bars is an important part of the Lazlo Woodbine methodology, I can't help feeling we're losing the plot here.'

'˜Patience, Barry. It will all become clear.'

'˜Yeah, right.'

'˜So,' said Fangio, '˜I'm sorry you don't believe me about the man with the little head. Perhaps if I showed you the handbag.'

'˜He left the handbag here? The voodoo handbag?'

'˜Said he felt embarrassed carrying it around. Said it made people stare at him.'

'˜Show me this handbag and show it to me now.'

'˜Sure,' said Fange, reaching down. '˜No, wait just a moment, I have to serve this customer.'

I turned to look at the customer in question, and frankly confess that I liked what I saw. She was beautiful. A goddess. A Helen of Troy. An Aphrodite. A Venus. She was graceful and majestic, leonine and lovely, radiant and ravishing, cute and curvaceous- '˜I like the way you think,' she said, and she grinned through a gap in her teeth.

'˜Let me get this for the lady,' I said to Fange, who was pulling her a pint of mild.

What a gentleman you are.' She grinned again and swung round in my direction.

'˜The name's Woodbine,' I said. '˜Lazlo Woodbine. Some call me Laz.'

'˜Pleased to meet you, Chas.'

'˜Er, Laz,' I said. '˜Laz is my name.'

'˜Oh, excuse me.' She turned her head on one side and bashed her right ear with her fist. '˜Got a bit of carrot stuck in my left ear,' she explained. '˜You know how it is, as much as you can eat for a fiver, so you get your head right down into that old salad bowl.'

I concurred. (Well, you would!)

'˜Stuff it in while you can, I always say,' she grinned, gappily.

'˜I do so agree.'

'˜Well, you would.'

Fange served the lady with her pint. '˜Another for yourself, sir?' he asked.

'˜Just a look at that handbag,' I said.

'˜Oh yes, handbag, handbag, now what did I do with that handbag?'

While he was looking I thought I'd engage the dame in conversation. Chat her up a bit and see where it led. Dazzle her with the old sparkling repartee. Mould her like putty, then play her like a violin.

'˜You don't sweat much for a fat lass,'. I said.

'˜Smooth talker,' she replied, giving me a slap across the jaw that loosened several fillings. '˜And don't think I don't know your game.'

I smiled, charmingly. '˜Haven't I seen you in movies?' I continued.

'˜Perhaps.' She swallowed her ale and wiped froth from her chin.

'˜I know I have,' I said. '˜I'll get it in a moment.'

She turned her face in profile and pointed to her nose.

'˜I've got it,' I said. '˜You're Jabba the Hutt.'

She smacked me right in the gob. '˜Casanova,' she giggled, '˜you'll be the death of me.'

I clicked my jaw. It didn't seem to be broken. '˜You've got a good right hand there,' I said, in the voice of one who knows these things. '˜Try this one for size,' and I kicked her in the stomach.

She doubled right over, but came up fast. '˜You really know how to treat a lady,' she said as she head-butted me in the face.

I fell hard on my neck, but I knew I was winning her round. I got to my feet and I hit her with a stool. '˜Your place or mine?' I asked her.

'˜Mine,' she said, pulling a knife.

'˜I hate to interrupt you two love birds,' said Fange. '˜But I've found the handbag.'

I kicked the dame's knife from her mitt and laid her out with a blow to the skull. '˜I'll be right back, honey,' I told her.

Fangio placed the handbag on the bar counter. '˜So what do you think?' he asked.

I cast a professional eye over the handbag. '˜My goddess,' I said. '˜I think this is it.'

The bag was about twenty inches high, handbag-shaped, covered in skulls and cast in plaster. Billy's mum had said that I'd know it when I saw it, and now that I'd seen it I knew it.

I didn't know what to say. I'd been searching for this handbag for ten long years. The search for this handbag had taken me from Bramfield to Brentford. And into another dimension. I'd crossed trackless deserts, wandered in the hinterlands, plundered the tundra, hitch-hiked and mountain-biked, staggered and swaggered, sallied forth and headed north, looked in high places and vast empty spaces, abseiled down- '˜Put a sock in it,' said Fangio.

'˜I'm speechless,' I said.

'˜No kidding?'

'˜I am speechless. I'm lost for words. Struck dumb, choked for utterance. Made mute. Put to silence. Robbed of all-'

'˜The secret, chief,' said Barry, '˜is in knowing when to stop.'

'˜You're right, Barry. But we've done it. Pulled off the big one. Solved the case. Got things sorted.'

'˜That we have, chief.'

'˜Swept aside all obstacles. Stemmed the current. Weathered the storm. Come home safe to port-'

'˜Hand over the handbag, shithead!'

I turned in some confusion.

Danny stood in the doorway to the dingy hall. He had a pistol in his hand.

'˜Danny,' I said. '˜This is a surprise. I thought we'd said our fond farewells in the alley.'