The Japanese Devil Fish Girl (38 page)

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Authors: Robert Rankin

BOOK: The Japanese Devil Fish Girl
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‘We are quite near to the front now,’ said George. ‘Should we just sort of blend into the queue, do you think?’
 
Ada had already blended, so George slipped in beside her.
 
‘Oi there, deary,’ said a lady in a straw hat. ‘Are you pushing in front of me?’
 
‘We have special tickets,’ said George. ‘And as you can see from our fine apparel, we are members of the upper class.’
 
‘Well la-di-da,’ said the lady. ‘And there was me thinking that you were nothing but a jumped-up barrow boy with ideas above his station.’
 
‘Nothing could be further from the truth,’ said George, craning his neck to see how far he now was from the door. ‘I am a lord and this is my lady wife.’
 
‘Well, may all the saints preserve us from scrofula, buboes and palsy, syphilis, gangrene and gout. And there was me thinking that you were none other than young George Fox who ran away from home rather than put in a decent day’s work on the fruit and veg barrow as his dad and his granddad had done for years before him.’
 
‘Mum,’ said George.
 
‘You’re a very bad boy,’ said the mother of George. ‘But you seem to have done all right for yourself. Could you lend me half a crown?’
 
But then the crowd took a certain surge forwards and George lost sight of his mother.
 
‘Who was that?’ Ada asked.
 
‘I think it was my mother,’ said George. ‘Though it might have been my dad.’
 
Ada’s request for an explanation was lost in the push of the crowd. ‘Hold on to me tightly, George,’ she shouted. ‘We cannot be parted now.’
 
 
Inside the cathedral it was cool and calm and almost silent. A reverent hush descended on all as they passed through the great arched portal. The smell of incense hung faintly in the air, mingling with the scents of elderly woodwork, brass polish, tapestried kneelers, candle wax and that certain fragrance only found in churches.
 
To George’s amazement he saw that pews had been cleared and stacked to the sides, and that a great ‘inner temple’ had been erected to house the marvellous statue. This, however, was no pious work of holy art. More a crude showman’s booth, constructed of canvas and scaffolding and painted with symbols of numerous religions.
 
George saw something else up ahead and touched at Ada’s elbow. A party of Venusians, perhaps numbering a dozen, tall and erect with their ostrich plumes of albino hair rising above their grave-faced heads and their perfumers gently swinging from their long, slender fingers. They had nearly reached the canvas booth and stood like marble statues.
 
‘This is all going to end very poorly,’ said George, ‘if they seek to reclaim the statue for their own people.’
 
Ada Lovelace nodded her head. ‘And see up there,’ she said.
 
George looked up and noted a group of beings huddled as best they could huddle in the gallery above the choir stalls.
 
‘Burghers of Jupiter,’ said George. ‘And yes – I surely recognise them to be the survivors of the party that accompanied us to the volcano.’
 
‘Move along, please,’ said a verger with a yellowed face and deep cadaverous eyes. ‘There’s thousands queuing to see what must be seen. Hasten along now and do not hold them up.’
 
George and Ada took several paces forwards. George called back to the verger. ‘Sir,’ he said, ‘might I take a moment of your time?’
 
The verger shuffled up and nodded his jaundiced head.
 
‘The man who brought this great wonder to England—’
 
‘Professor Coffin, the mighty explorer and hero of the Empire.’
 
‘Yes,’ said George. ‘That very fellow. Is he in attendance with the statue?’
 
‘Indeed yes.’ The verger’s head bobbed like a mad canary’s.
 
‘So he sits within that booth?’
 
‘The sacred shrine, yes.’
 
‘Might I ask one more thing?’ said George, and proceeded to ask without waiting for permission. ‘What is your personal opinion of the statue? You are a man of faith. What do you believe it to be?’
 
‘It is Sayito,’ said the verger. ‘All truly devout Christians who have studied the Apocrypha know of Sayito. Moses received the knowledge of Sayito when he received the Ten Commandments from God upon Mount Sinai. The story goes that when he descended from the mount and found the Israelites worshipping a brazen calf, he flung down the tablets of stone, including a great grimoire dictated to him by God.
The Book of Sayito
, that grimoire was called. And it was pieced together and is said to still exist, written in a universal language that all can understand.’
 
‘So who do you believe Sayito to be?’ George asked.
 
‘The Mother of God. The Grandmother of Christ. We kneel in this great cathedral and we worship God Almighty. But God Almighty, He worships Sayito.’
 
A chill ran through George Fox and his teeth gave little chatters. ‘Thank you for your time, sir,’ said George to the verger and he and Ada moved forwards.
 
‘I do not suppose,’ George whispered to Ada, ‘that some kind of plan is now forming within that extraordinarily beautiful head of yours?’
 
‘I was thinking,’ Ada whispered in return, ‘that
that
is a very large stained-glass window.’
 
‘Very large,’ said George. ‘And noted for it.’
 
‘Large enough to perhaps accommodate the nose of an airship. Say if someone was to crash one, perhaps the one that circles above, through it, connect lines to the statue, tow the statue out into the sky and away at speed to its temple.’
 
‘That is an outstanding plan,’ said George. ‘I foresee a number of difficulties. But then no doubt so do you. And no doubt also you have plans for how they might be surmounted.’
 
‘Not really,’ said Ada. ‘I just made up the first thing that came into my head in the hope that it might inspire
you
. Oh look, it would appear to be our turn.’
 
The Venusian party had entered the ‘inner temple’, seen what there was to be seen, made hasty abeyances before the holy statue and then been hustled out by two burly ‘protectors’. They left the ‘inner temple’ as George and Ada entered it. The looks upon their faces lacked for their usual composure.
 
Burning censers flanked the beautiful statue. The flames reflected in rainbow hues about the golden Goddess. If anything, She looked even more beautiful than the first time George had seen Her. But there was something about that uplifted face, a sadness, a vulnerability that George had not seen before.
 
Ada Lovelace caught her breath and curtseyed unconsciously before the holy sculpture. ‘Oh George,’ she whispered. ‘She really does look very like me.’
 
‘Well, my, my, my,’ came a most familiar voice. ‘If it is not my dear friend and fellow traveller, George. And if my senses do not deceive me, he has married the lovely Ada.’
 
George looked up towards the canvas awning that served as a sloping ceiling. There, amidst lofty scaffolding, was a sort of throne chair, bolted to safety and containing the unsavoury personage that was Professor Cagliostro Coffin.
 
‘You swine,’ said George simply. But simple can often say so very much.
 
‘That is no way to speak to your ex-business partner. Have you seen the crowds, George? Thousands of Rubes. I shall be a millionaire by the end of the week. And six months from now—’
 
‘There may not be a six months from now,’ called George. ‘Do you not realise what you have done? You have committed the Great Blasphemy. The Martians may even now be rising from the volcano crater in their war craft to murder us all.’
 
‘Oh please, George,
do
give me
some
credit.’ Professor Coffin laughed. ‘I am not a fool, far from it. There will be no Martian attack. The volcano is, how shall I put this,
somewhat full
. I purchased many, many, many boxes of explosives before I returned to the island. If any of the Martians survived the enormous rockfall, it will take them many years to dig themselves out.’
 
‘You fiend!’ cried Ada Lovelace.
 
‘Oh come now, my dear,’ returned the professor. ‘I have brought the greatest treasure in the universe to London. Her Majesty is awarding me a knighthood. My autobiography will, I believe, top the list of best-selling tomes for years to come. A fiend, you think? Me? Surely not. I am Professor Coffin. Hero of the Empire.’
 
George Fox felt himself at a loss for words.
 
Ada snarled at the man who sat above.
 
‘I do wish we could chat some more,’ called down Professor Coffin, ‘but so many people are queuing and anxious to see my treasure that I regret you must take your leave.’
 
‘I will be back,’ called George and he shook his fist. ‘You have not heard the last of me.’
 
‘Oh, on the contrary.’ Professor Coffin leaned most forward in his throne-like chair. ‘You fail to understand. You will be taking your leave now, but you will not be returning. You cannot be allowed to wander abroad telling who knows what kind of tales about me. I regret to tell you, George and dear Ada, that this is a final farewell.’
 
Professor Coffin clapped his hands. ‘Gentlemen,’ called he.
 
Two unsavoury types, none other than the burly protectors, appeared, one from either side of the statue’s base.
 
‘Allow me to introduce you to my business associates, ’ called Professor Coffin. ‘This gentleman is Bermondsey Bob, the bad bruising bare-fist brawler.’
 
Bermondsey Bob grinned evilly and gave a little bow. He was big, brawny and sported hands the size of Christmas turkeys.
 
‘And this is his companion Limehouse Lenny, the Laughing Lepidopterist.’
 
George said, ‘Lepidopterist?’
 
‘A geezer ’as to ’ave an ’obby,’ growled Limehouse Lenny. ‘For when ’e ain’t owt mutilatin’ corpses and a-droppin’ of small children down wells.’
 
‘Quite so,’ said George.
 
‘Show him your cut-throat razor, Lenny,’ cried Professor Coffin.
 
Limehouse Lenny showed his razor. It was a very large razor.
 
‘Mr Bob and Mr Lenny will now escort you from the premises.’ Professor Coffin rose from his chair and gave a little bow. ‘Please do not make a fuss about this. It would be almost blasphemous to shed blood upon holy ground. Farewell to you, George, farewell to you, Ada. We will not be meeting again.’
 
39
 
A
da and George were led from the inner temple. They were nudged along a stone corridor and out through a small door into the cathedral yard. A yard that was surprisingly quiet, given all the thousands who mobbed about the cathedral’s front. Here was a little island of peace in the midst of a human sea.
 
A four-wheeled funeral cortège carriage with blinds at its windows and high black plumes to each corner stood at the centre of the yard, with two rather wretched-looking black ponies attached to the shafts.
 
‘On board,’ demanded Bermondsey Bob, giving George just a hint of the biffings to come with a monstrous fist. ‘We’re goin’ on a little journey, we are.’
 
‘A one-way journey,’ said Limehouse Lenny, laughing as he said it.
 
Ada turned upon the deadly duo. ‘Gentlemen,’ she said, ‘I do not believe for one moment that such fine specimens of manhood as yourselves would harm a helpless female.’
 
‘You’d be surprised at the depths we’d stoop to.’ Bermondsey Bob did sinister grinnings.
 
‘Especially me,’ said Limehouse Lenny. ‘I’m a ravin’ nutter, me.’
 
Ada winked at Limehouse Lenny. ‘You’re very handsome, ’ she said.
 
The Laughing Lepidopterist, a leprous brute with a broken nose, few teeth that were not blackened stumps and a single eye to call his own, viewed the lovely tousled woman with interest.
 
George looked aghast at Ada, but she merely squeezed at his hand.
 
‘There’s little I would not do for a beau like you,’ she said to Lenny.
 
‘And what about me?’ asked Bermondsey Bob.

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