'I don't wish to hurry you along,' said Periwig. 'But we must take the bus out in ten minutes for its one and only tour of the day. If you do have anything to say, then I suggest you say it now.'
'Only this.' Big Bob gathered his thoughts and shrugged away their sadness. 'The world beyond the boundaries of Brentford changes daily. Here the changes are imperceptible. Yea then, here fore to and here to fore, we are an historical anomaly. We are, without changing a single thing, a working historical theme park.'
'Suburbia World,' cried Periwig. 'That should pull them in by the thousands.'
'Dost thou really think so?'
'No, I dost not. As ideas go, Big Bob, it's no idea at all. I can see that it might have a certain charm. At least for you, anyway. That nothing would have to be changed or added to the borough. That it would just be a theme park. And if it was cleverly advertised along those lines in the right way, to the right people, that the potential should be there. But it wouldn't work, people really do need thrills and spills nowadays. Even if they only get them through their Mute Corp terminals in their own front rooms. It was a brave attempt, but it would never work.'
'You really think not?'
'Sorry,' said Periwig.
Big Bob set free a fourth sigh of the day. 'Well if you say that it wouldn't, then I suppose it wouldn't,' he said, lifting his mighty frame from the bus-seat deckchair and stretching limbs in the sunlight. 'We've been friends since we were children. I trust you, Periwig. Thou art a good man too. But it seems a pity though, I really thought it was a good idea.'
Periwig shrugged and struggled to his feet. Looking up at Big Bob, he said, 'No harm done in mentioning it. But I wouldn't go mentioning it to anyone else. You wouldn't want them laughing at you behind your back, now would you?'
'No, I wouldn't. Thankest thou, my friend.'
'No worries,' said Periwig Tombs. 'No worries at all.'
Big Bob donned his official tour-guide jacket.
Periwig donned his official driver's jacket.
Big Bob climbed onto the lower deck of the bus and stood in the special place for the conductor to stand.
Periwig climbed into the cab and sat in the driving seat.
Big Bob made a wistful face and thought away his theme-park plans.
Periwig smiled a broad smile with his little kissy mouth. His brain raced forward, scooping up potential here and potential there. And he could see it all, Suburbia World Plc with Periwig Tombs (OBE of course) sitting in the chairman's seat of power. This was an idea just waiting to be sold. An idea with untold potential. An idea so simple, yet so grandiose, that he wondered how he hadn't ever thought of it himself. But it was now an idea firmly planted in his head and he, Periwig Tombs, would see it to fruition. There were millions to be made if this was played out rightly. And he, Periwig Tombs, would have a large share of those millions. After all, it was his idea. He had thought it up.
Big Bob Charker turned his back, and Periwig Tombs laughed silently behind it.
2
The wheels on the bus went round and round.
Round and round and round.
The guide on the bus was whistling sadly. The driver of the bus was smiling. The people at the bus stop saw the bus. The people at the bus stop waved.
Periwig Tombs did changing down of gears, bringing professionally to a halt, applying of the handbrake, switching off the engine and climbing down from the cab.
Big Bob Charker did saluting, then he stepped down from that special area where the conductor stands.
Six jolly tourists stood at the bus stop. Well, at least five looked jolly. Four of these were Japanese students, you could tell by the cut of their clothes. The fifth was a lady in a straw hat and she looked jolly too. The sixth was a young man, a pasty-faced youth and he looked far from jolly.
He was dour. Dour and downcast, glum and gloomy and grim. He glowered at his boots and scuffed them on the pavement. At intervals, of increasing frequency, the lady in the straw hat elbowed him in the ribs and told him to perk up.
Big Bob smiled upon all and sundry. 'Greetings all and sundry,' smiled he.
The Japanese students grinned and nodded. One said, 'Hello, goodbye.'
The lady in the straw hat smiled. The dour youth glowered grimly.
'My name is Big Bob Charker,' said Big Bob Charker. 'And I shall be thy tour guide for today.'
The dour youth mumbled grimly. The lady in the straw hat smote him on the head.
'I'm sorry,' said Big Bob, addressing the lady, 'but is there something wrong?'
'It's him,' said the lady, elbowing the youth once more. 'My son, Malkuth. He didn't want to come, but I made him. It's a lovely day, I told him, and I've already booked the tickets and if you think you're going to spend today sitting over your Mute Corp PC like you do every other day, forget it, you're coming on the tour whether you like it or not. That's what I told him and that's the way it's going to be.'
'Quite so,' said Big Bob. 'Well, good day unto you, Malkuth.'
'Poo!' said the youth in a grumbly tone, lowering his head a tad lower.
'You'll enjoy it, I promise thou,' said Big Bob.
The youth looked up and offered him a bitter glance. 'You've got pink stuff on your tie,' he observed.
The lady in the straw hat smote her son once more. 'Don't be so rude to the gentleman,' she told him.
'It's quite all right,' said Big Bob. 'It was unprofessional of me to come on duty with a stained tie. I apologize.'
The lady in the straw hat smiled at Big Bob, one of the Japanese students said, 'Okey dokey.'
'Get on with it,' whispered Periwig. 'Introduce me.'
'Ah yes,' Big Bob continued. 'This is our driver, Mr Periwig Tombs.'
'Morning each,' said Periwig. 'Lovely day for it.'
The youth looked up at Periwig. 'You have a very large head', said he. 'Was that cap made specially?'
Periwig smiled the smile of a professional. The professional who relies on his tips to make up the balance of his wages.
'My wife,' said Periwig Tombs, 'put a gusset in the back. She's very good with her hands. And a remarkably beautiful woman. Do you have a girlfriend?'
The lady in the straw hat laughed rather loudly. The youth grew gloomier still.