Paul made as to affect a surly frown which caused him considerable pain. “This mean warpath for certain,” he muttered. “Many scalps decorate lodge before teatime.”
Barry glanced sidelong at his bandaged brother. “Paul,” he said, “Paul, you really are quite certain about us being the dual reincarnation of Geronimo, aren’t you? I mean, there couldn’t be any mistake now, could there? I mean, I reckon we’re on a hiding to nowhere here… I mean…” For his outspokenness, brother Barry received a blow much favoured by the now legendary Billy Two Rivers and known as the Tomahawk Chop. “You bastard, I’m telling Mum.”
“Break it up in there,” a Metropolitan Police voice called through the peephole, “and get on your feet, you’ve got a visitor.”
A heavy key turned in the lock, making all those really good noises that jail door locks make in prison movies. The door swung in to reveal a grinning Constable Meek, bearing three teacups and a plate of digestives on a regulation enamel tray. “Here you go, Tonto,” he smirked. “Sorry, we’re out of firewater.”
“Half hour on red ant’s nest with honey pot up back passage wipe smile off your face,” said Paul Geronimo, making an obscene North American gesture.
Barry rubbed at the new bruise on his head. There had to be something to this reincarnation business, civil engineers just did not come out with off the cuff remarks like that. “Two sugars, please,” he said.
“You’ve got a visitor,” said the still smirking constable, placing the tray upon the bunk. “Great white chief come smoke pipe of peace.”
“That will be enough of that, thank you, Constable.” The voice belonged to Inspectre Hovis, who now followed it into the cell. He carried beneath his arm a buff-coloured folder. “Kindly relock the door behind you, Constable, and await my call.” Constable Meek slunk away, slamming the door dramatically behind him. “Now,” said the Inspectre, taking a digestive from the plate and seating himself. “Would you like to tell me all about it?”
Paul Geronimo looked Hovis up and down. “Under articles of Geneva Convention, we tell you nothing but name, rank and telephone number,” he said. “So go suck.”
“I see,” said Hovis. “Then let me tell you something. This is my first day in Brentford.”
“Careful it not your last,” said Barry.
“My first day,” Hovis continued. He delved into his pocket and drew out a small brightly coloured book. “Do you see this?”
Paul nodded. “It famous Guide to Brentford, written by esteemed local author P.P. Penrose.”
“Author of the Lazlo Woodbine thrillers,” Barry added.
“Quite so,” said Hovis. “I purchased it this very morning.”
Paul studied the ceiling and made war-drum sounds beneath his breath.
“It is my belief,” said Hovis, “that a guidebook tells you as much about a town by what it does not say as by what it does.”
“Esoteric dichotomy alone insufficient basis for theoretical reasoning,” said Paul. “Brave who always search skyline for enemy smoke ofttimes walk in buffalo shit.”
“Be that as it may,” said Hovis. “Then I shall confine my observations to what the guide book does say.” He thumbed it open and, between munchings of his biscuit, read aloud. “The historic Borough of Brentford is notable for, amongst other things, the beauty of its womenfolk, the glories of its architectural heritage and the quality of its fine hand-drawn ales. In the year 49 AD Julius Caeser…”
“Beg to interject,” said Paul, “but noble history of borough well known to us. We born and raised here.”
“All right,” said the Inspectre. “Then, to be succinct, it is this. In one thousand years of recorded history Brentford has never known a race riot. Not until today, when you incited one.”
“We done what?” queried Barry.
“Incited a race riot.” Inspectre Hovis took a signed statement from his file and glanced it up and down. “Did you or did you not refer to Councillor Clyde Merridew Ffog as ‘Mangy white cur fit only for roasting over a slow fire’?”
“Well, er,” said Paul.
“And a Mr Julian Membrane, who is recovering, I am pleased to say, from the tomahawk wound, records in his statement that you made the inflammatory remark, ‘Yellow blood of palefaces belong painted on toilet walls’.”
“We true victims of racial harassment,” cried Paul Geronimo, rising from his bunk and dragging his brother with him. “Long-nosed white dog twist truth like snake twist…”
“There you go again,” said Hovis. “This is not going to look very good on my report now, is it? Inflammatory remarks of a racial nature, damage to council property, disturbing the peace, inciting riot, grievous bodily harm, assault with a deadly weapon, resisting arrest, insulting behaviour, need I go on? You’ll get five years for this lot, I shouldn’t wonder.” He gestured towards Paul’s blackly dyed and magnificently braided barnet and made scissor snips with his fingers. “At Her Majesty’s barber shop.”
Paul fingered his hair; it had taken three years to grow. Brother Barry’s grazed chin sank on to his buckskin chest. “We up shit creek in barbed wire canoe,” he observed.
“How aptly put,” said Inspectre Hovis. “Now what do you suppose we should do about it?”
Paul peered dubiously towards the gaunt vulture, hovering upon the opposite bunk. “What exactly are you suggesting?” he asked.
Hovis folded his mirrored pince-nez into an elegant tortoise-shell case and slid this into his top pocket. He reached forward for another biscuit and fixed Paul Geronimo with a penetrating gaze. The brave wilted visibly. “Well?” said Inspectre Hovis.
“Er… um,” said Paul Geronimo.
“Squaw who dance too long round cooking pot praising cook find that meal grown too cold to eat, if you get my meaning.”
“I do,” said Paul, “I mean I think I do.”
“Well, what say we smoke pipe of peace and parley just a little?”
“I can dig it,” said Paul Geronimo.
Forty-five minutes later, the final cell door having closed upon his departure, Inspectre Hovis strode into the newly painted office that was now his own, placed his bum upon the chair and his heels upon the desk. All in all it had been a most satisfactory day. By skilful manipulation he now had half the town council virtually in his pocket. He had spared the borough the embarrassment their prosecution would have brought upon it and himself the ensuing notoriety for having arrested them in the first place. He had become blood brother to the dual reincarnation of Geronimo and been invited out to dinner by one of the most attractive women it had ever been his privilege to interrogate. All in all it had been a most satisfactory first day.
Reaching for his cane, Hovis flipped open the silver top and withdrew a pinch of ground black Moroccan snuff. He offered this to an eager nostril and drew deeply upon it. But there was little time for self-congratulation. He was here upon a mission, one upon which the fate of his entire career could be said to rest. Like Dick Whittington and the Count of St Germaine, Inspectre Hovis had come to Brentford with only one thought in his mind. The search for gold.
11
From its eyrie atop the tower, the Memorial Library clock proclaimed the hour of six. Soft breaths of late spring honeysuckle shared the air with other smells of early evening. Smells which mingled to become that special suburban smell which is the sum of its parts. Smells of frying fish, of Scotch whisky, of cheap cigar smoke, of exclusive perfume and of other smells, strange and haunting and unfathomable.
Of frying fish. Old Pete turned the large salmon steak (an unexpected gift from Neville) in his cankerous frying pan and whistled “When the Boat Comes In”. Young Chips barked an off-key counterpoint. It hadn’t been a bad old day all in all and there was still the evening to come.