The Japanese Devil Fish Girl (8 page)

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Authors: Robert Rankin

BOOK: The Japanese Devil Fish Girl
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A pistol clicked at his neck.
 
‘Nothing,’ said George. ‘I saw nothing and I heard nothing.’
 
‘Good boy, then.’
 
And George was once more alone.
 
 
Somewhat later and considerably shaken, George Fox left the tent auditorium. There was no sign of Macmoyster Farl, the fearsome policemen or the Gentlemen in Black. George Fox sighed and shivered.
 
Then discovered, to greater distress, that Professor Coffin’s handcart had been stolen.
 
8
 
P
rofessor Coffin was not best pleased at George’s return.
 
He was not best pleased by the lateness of George’s return. Nor by the fact that George did not return in the company of the professor’s handcart.
 
He did, however, take stock of George’s condition.
 
George had an all-in look to him. A down-and-out and all-in look. Certainly George was exhausted physically. He had dragged upon a wooden pallet, begged from the pharmacist, five cannisters of formaldehyde and ten of distilled water. Violet nosegays, to the number one hundred, and a pair of those new facial masks that were presently quite the thing amongst the surgeons of the London Hospital.
 
Professor Coffin asked to be given his change.
 
George forked it over with a shaking hand.
 
Professor Coffin viewed his glum assistant.
 
‘What ails you, boy?’ he asked. ‘You have a sorry look to you and it’s not for the loss of my handcart.’
 
George sat himself down upon the rear steps of the showman’s wagon and buried his face in his hands.
 
Professor Coffin heard the sniffling sounds and laid a hand upon young George’s shoulder.
 
‘Tell me all and tell it to me now,’ said he. ‘And if anyone has harmed you it will be the worse for them.’
 
It was approaching late afternoon now and although Professor Coffin had erected the exhibition tent, winched the Martian in its covered tank down from the wagon and single-handedly manoeuvred it into said tent, then hauled up the banner that announced the ‘Most Meritorious Unnatural Attraction’, set out the bally rostrum, climbed upon it and proclaimed the meritorious nature of his unnatural attraction, he had taken not a penny of a profit.
 
True, he’d drawn money from Rubes, but once inside the tent and almost brought to blindness by the reek of the pickled beasty, all had made with knotted fists and demanded back their coin.
 
Sorely vexed, Professor Coffin was, but not too vexed to see another’s pain. He sat himself down beside the sorrowful lad and asked once more to be told what was what.
 
George then told his tale, most dismally.
 
‘Macmoyster Farl,’ said the professor, when the tale was done. ‘There is a name that brings back memories.’
 
‘You know him?’ asked young George. ‘Then is he genuine? He knew my name and yours too, Mr Snodgrass.’
 
‘Ah, and plah.’ Professor Coffin spat. ‘’Tis true enough for me, I so regret. But I have never met the man, only heard the stories.’
 
‘He claims that he has travelled to the planets and he spoke to me of very curious things.’
 
‘A hero of the Crown,’ said the professor. ‘A captain of the Middlesex Regiment of the Queen’s Own Electric Fusiliers. He served in the Martian campaign and to all accounts saw terrible things upon that Godforsaken planet. He won the OCE – the Order of the Celestial Empire – for deeds of bravery, but on a second tour of duty became somehow marooned. He wandered alone upon that lifeless world for five years before an archaeological expedition sent out by the Royal Society found him.
 
‘Of course, Mars is now part of the Grand Tour if you have the wherewithal to pay for your flight, but five years back, before the dawn of passenger travel in space, the visits to Mars were few and far between.’
 
‘A hero of the Crown,’ said George. ‘You would not think today that he had ever been a soldier.’
 
‘When archaeologists fetched him up from Mars he was stark roaring mad. He was committed to St Mary of Bethlem’s asylum, otherwise known as Bedlam.’
 
‘And there perhaps he has been returned,’ said a sighing George. ‘The manner of his arrest was most curious. Two pale bodies in funeral black took charge of the affair. And one of them—’ And George once more buried his face in his hands.
 
‘A Gentleman in Black,’ said Professor Coffin, gravely. ‘No good ever came from crossing the path of one of those terrible fellows.’
 
‘Who are they?’ asked George, from between his fingers.
 
‘It is better not to know.’
 
‘He threatened me.’
 
‘I am sure that he did.’
 
‘He frightened me.’
 
‘I am sorry.’
 
George Fox lifted up his head and gazed at the professor.
 
‘I am so sorry,’ he said. ‘Once again I have let you down. I am no good to you, best I seek employment elsewhere.’
 
‘No, not a bit of it, my boy. I agree that of late you have cost me more than somewhat. But such is the showman’s lot. One day a feast, the next an empty platter. But we will triumph somehow. Tell me more of what Macmoyster said.’
 
‘He said that the book would be opened to me. That I would find Her. And that upon my shoulders would rest the future of the planets.’
 
‘I see your cause for glumness. But what of this book of which he spoke?’
 
‘The Book of Sayito’
, said George.
 
Professor Coffin smiled. ‘Otherwise known as the Venusian Bible.’
 
‘Indeed,’ said George, recalling his conversation with Ada Lovelace, she of unhappy memory. ‘But what
that
would have to do with me would be any person’s guess but my own.’
 
Professor Coffin rose to his feet and gave a twirl of his cane. ‘I will give my thoughts to these matters and should revelations whisper at my ear, I will whisper at yours. But for now,’ and he gave a bow to George, ‘the temperature drops and my thinking is that if we drain friend Martian’s tank and speedily refill it, deck our tent with nosegays and set you upon the bally, we might turn a profit by evening time and fill our bellies withal. What say you to this, my loyal z—
assistant?’
 
‘I say yes to it,’ said George. And shook the professor’s hand.
 
 
In less than an hour, the horrid work done, George took his place on the bally. Barker for the evening, he sought to make the professor proud.
 
And so George Fox called out to passing Rubes. Tonight the Most Meritorious Unnatural Attraction took on new life, breathed into it by George.
 
‘Come one, come all,’ he called to all and sundry. ‘View the fiend in all of its terrible form. Behind this wall of canvas lurks the most evil being in all of the universe. Phnaarg by name, the King of all the Martians. Brought to book by General Sir Macmoyster Farl OCE, hero of the British Empire, who engaged the wicked monster in swordplay one upon one.’ And George enthusiastically mimed such swordplay, cut and slash and parry with Professor Coffin’s cane. ‘Come see for yourself and marvel and thrill. No unaccompanied ladies or children under five.’
 
When the distant chimes of ten were heard from Hounslow clock tower and the crowds had melted away and were gone, Professor Coffin smiled.
 
‘Splendid,’ he cried, a-counting of coin. ‘Positively splendid.’
 
‘Did I make you proud, sir?’ asked George Fox.
 
‘Beyond all words, my boy, beyond all words.’ Professor Coffin danced a copper penny on his palm. ‘The take is more than a pound, my boy, and what do you think of that?’
 
‘I think,’ said George, ‘as I counted them in, that it is considerably more than that. In fact, it is precisely—’
 
‘Two pounds, one and tuppence,’ said Professor Coffin.
 
‘Yes, precisely that.’
 
‘And one-third of it is yours.’
 
‘A third?’ said George. ‘But you only pay me one-quarter. ’
 
‘But you did magnificently. We will make a showman of you yet.’
 
It took much time to fold the tent, winch the Martian back into the showman’s wagon, lock all and sundry within
and
disable the traction engine (for Professor Coffin had spied minions of Mandible Haxan lurking in the crowd), but finally the professor and his valued assistant set off for sustenance and ale.
 
The taverns of Hounslow never closed during the Hounslow Fair. They served beer and victuals twenty-four hours of the day. Professor Coffin led young George past many a rowdy alehouse before tuning into a narrow side street and walking up to an unlit door.
 
‘A more select establishment,’ he explained to George, whose stomach rumbled loudly. ‘But just one thing before we enter. This is where the exclusive brotherhood raise their cups.’
 
‘The exclusive brotherhood?’ George Fox queried.
 
‘Come, boy,’ said the professor. ‘The unique ones. The very special people. Many are close friends of mine and have worked with me in the past. You will find most as charming as can be. If you show politeness to them, it will be returned to you.’
 
‘I am confused,’ said George. ‘But perhaps it is from lack of food.’
 
‘And you’ll dine well tonight and I will buy you ale.’ Professor Coffin knocked upon the door.
 
There was a moment’s pause and then the sounds of drawing bolts and then a face peered out into the darkness.
 
‘Quenten, my good friend and fellow.’ Professor Coffin stepped from the dark and gave the fellow hugs.
 
The fellow said, ‘My good friend Cagliostro.’
 
And as this hugging went about its friendly business, George stared on. Somewhat goggle-eyed and roundly lipped in the mouth department.
 
For Quenten was not as other men. There was a difference to the face of Quenten that cut him out from the crowd. A quality of uniqueness. Something very special.
 
Quenten winked over Professor Coffin’s shoulder.
 
Winked at George.
 
Winked at George with a single eye.
 
In the very centre of his forehead.
 
9
 
‘Q
uenten Vamberry the Third,’ said Professor Coffin, making the introductions. ‘And this is my assistant, George Fox.’
 
Quenten Vamberry parted from the professor’s embrace and wrung George Fox’s hand between his own. ‘Damnably fine to meet you, George,’ he said.
 
‘And me you, sir, yes.’
 
George found himself led into a comfortable room that smelled of hops and tobacco smoke. Lamps fuelled by whale oil with dark heavy shades hung in wall sconces and dropped pools of light upon scrubbed oaken tables. The hubbub of merry conversation did not cease as George entered this room, no one looked up at him, no one paid him any mind.
 
‘Porter?’ asked Quenten of George and the professor. ‘Porter and supper, I’m thinking.’
 

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