Waiting for Godalming Read online

  ‘Out of the way there,’ I went, and, ‘Don’t you get cream on my trench-coat, buddy, or I’ll punch your lights out.’

  I made my way to the gents with sartorial elegance intact, leaving only two men dead on the dance floor. Oh, and one woman too, but that had been an accident.

  The Richard E. Grant lookalike had his back to me now and as I didn’t really know the correct form when addressing God in person, I thought it best to ask Barry.

  ‘Just be polite,’ said the little green guy. ‘And call Him sir. He always likes that.’

  ‘Fair do’s.’

  The dude hadn’t come as his favourite food, but I guessed God had more class than that. He wore the kind of suit that doesn’t come off the peg, or out of the Next catalogue. I’d only ever seen a suit like that once before and that was on the body of a businessman, who’d spilt soup on me at a Masonic maggot roast in Barking, back in ’93.

  Mr Godalming was chewing the fat with a dame done up as a Danish. She looked to be about sixteen years of age, had long black hair and a tiny moustache and answered to the name of Sarah.

  ‘So Sarah,’ I heard Him say. ‘What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?’ A real class act.

  ‘Er, excuse me, sir,’ I said, in a manner calculated to give no offence, ‘but are you Mr Godalming?’

  He turned slowly to face me and high above the DJ’s din I heard the angels sing. He fixed me with a stare from His clear blue eyes and my piles began to shrink. He opened His mouth to speak to me and I knew at that very moment that I, Lazlo Woodbine, private eye, stood in the presence of God.

  And I damn near soiled my underlinen.

  Well, it was that close.

  ‘Excuse me, sir,’ said I, and I backed at some speed to the gents.

  ‘Very stylish, chief,’ said Barry, somewhat later as I washed my hands in the sink.

  ‘The guy’s God, for God’s sake. I’ve never been face to face with God before.’

  ‘No, I guess not, chief. I should have warned you. He can have that effect on people.’

  ‘But it is Him, Barry. It’s definitely Him. I solved the mystery of His disappearance, in less than a couple of hours. Mind you, it hasn’t had the usual gratuitous sex and violence, nor the alley full of corpses leading to the final rooftop showdown, but hey, I’ve solved the Big One.’

  ‘You haven’t persuaded Him to go back to His wife yet, chief.’

  ‘Mere detail, Barry. I’ve found God and that’s a pretty big number.’

  ‘So Cliff Richard says.’

  ‘Right.’ I dried my hands on a paper towel and readjusted the tilt of my fedora. ‘Let’s get this done,’ said I.

  I swung the gents door open and returned to the bar of the Crimson Teacup.

  ‘Damn and damn and double blast,’ said I. ‘The holy bird has flown.’

  I thrust my way into the chaos of culinary cavorters. Pushed past a guy dressed up like a dog’s dinner and a dame dressed down in duck à l’orange. Glided by a geezer in gammon gateaux and two in taramasalata. Squeezed between a sassy sal in a sexy seafood salad and a white-faced wimp in a whitebait waistcoat, waving a waffle iron. I was carefully manoeuvring myself around a red-necked raver in a rabbit-fish ragout, when I spotted the sweetmeat known as Sarah standing soberly by the sound system, swigging Sauternes and savouring a sauerkraut sandwich.

  I unholstered the trusty Smith and Wessex-Arms-Wednesday-night-chef’s-special.

  ‘Where is Mr Godalming?’ I shouted in Sarah’s shell-like. ‘Spill the beans or eat some lead, it’s all the same to me.’

  She shot me a glance like she was gobbling Gumbo, or chewing on cheap chitterlings. ‘You’ve just missed him. He went out the back door with two guys.’

  I beat my way back through the crowd. Battering the beanfeast barn-dancers and shovelling sitophiliacs to the right and left of me. Certainly I would have liked to have indulged in a bit more alliterative whimsy, all that fellow in falafel and a flapjack fez kind of caper, but I was in a hurry here and when time is tight you don’t count sheep or lard the lambs, or even munch the mutton.

  Now normally I open doors with caution. I mean, you never know what lies beyond them and like I’ve said before, I work only the four locations. My office, the bar, the alleyway and the rooftop. So I can’t go off kicking open every door that lies before me, no matter how big the temptation. But the way I see it is this, a bar’s back door always leads to an alleyway. So I put my boot to this one and kicked down the son of a—

  BANG BANG BANG and BANG again.

  The sound of gunshots came to me and they weren’t music to my ears. I pride myself that I can identify almost any handgun in the western world, simply by hearing it fire. And so I knew right off that the sounds of firing were coming from a pair of P37 Narkals, Greek army issue revolvers, pearl-handled probably, with the blue metal finish.

  I took a peek round the doorpost to gauge the situation and then ducked back to regain my wits and then burst forth with my gun held at the ready.

  BANG BANG BANG then BANG again.

  There were two guys at the alley’s end, pumping bullets, thus and so, into a third on the ground. I didn’t ask any questions and I didn’t offer any deals. I let off just two straight shots and the two guys joined the third.

  ‘Nice shooting, chief,’ said Barry.

  ‘Thank you, Barry,’ said I.

  I made it down the alley, checked out the gunmen to make sure they were dead and then turned over the victim who was lying face down in the mud and red stuff.

  And then I leapt up all in a lather and damn near soiled my underlinen for a second time off.

  ‘Oh God!’ I cried. ‘It’s God! I felt His power and now He’s dead. Oh God! Oh God! Oh God!’

  ‘Hold on to yourself, chief, easy now.’

  ‘But God’s dead, Barry, He’s dead.’ I began to do the wee-wee dance.

  ‘Then he can’t have been God, can he, chief? God wouldn’t go getting Himself shot dead in an alleyway. That’s not how God does business. This must be some other Richard E. Grant lookalike.’

  ‘Yeah, but if God was being a man. So He could pull the Jewish chicks and everything. He’d be vulnerable. He could be killed.’

  ‘Well, chief, I suppose He could. But it’s not very likely, is it? God getting Himself shot in an alleyway.’

  ‘So you reckon it’s the wrong guy? Do ya, Barry? Do ya?’

  ‘Has to be, chief, has to be.’

  I breathed a mighty sigh of relief. ‘That had me going for a minute,’ I said. ‘I mean imagine if it really had been God. I’d be in really big trouble with His wife, wouldn’t I?’

  ‘Big, chief. Bigger than big. The biggest that ever there was.’

  ‘And what about the weather, Barry? What with God controlling the weather, the way He does. Imagine what might happen to the weather with Him no longer in charge of it.’

  ‘It doesn’t bear thinking about, chief.’

  ‘Well, phew,’ said I. ‘All I can say is phew.’

  ‘I’ll join you in that one, chief, phew.’

  I straightened my hat and turned up my collar. ‘Let’s go back inside,’ I said. ‘It’s getting chilly out here.’

  ‘You’re right, chief, downright bitter.’

  ‘And it looks like rain.’

  ‘Snow, chief, looks like snow.’

  ‘Not at this time of year, surely?’

  Something hit me right upon the snap-brim. ‘Hail,’ I said. ‘It’s hail. No, it is snow. No, it’s rain, no, it’s, oh, the sun’s come out again. No it’s not…’

  ‘Chief,’ said Barry.

  ‘Barry?’ said I.

  And then the hurricane hit us.

  8

  Two hours prior to the terrible death of God and the rather unseasonable change in the weather, Icarus Smith and Johnny Boy knelt on the floor of the late Professor Partington’s shed, worrying at a map of the world, which now had been cut into many tiny pieces.

  �
�Try putting that bit there,’ said Johnny Boy.

  ‘Please leave it to me,’ said Icarus Smith. ‘I am the relocator and this is the stuff of my dream.’

  ‘I’ve got a piece of Afghanistan here.’

  ‘Then kindly give it to me.’

  Johnny Boy handed Icarus the piece of Afghanistan, then clambered to his feet and stood with his hands on his hips, peering quizzically over the lad’s stooped shoulders.

  ‘The secret’, said Icarus, ‘is for me not to think about it. Just let it happen naturally. Just let the right pieces fall into the right places. That’s what the science of relocation is all about.’

  ‘Things don’t just fall into place by themselves,’ said Johnny Boy, stretching his tiny arms and clicking his tiny neck. ‘Things require a catalyst. And the ‘relocation’ theory of yours requires you to be its catalyst. But you’re making a right pig’s earhole of the map.’

  ‘It will all fall into place,’ said Icarus. ‘Trust me.’

  ‘Oh, I do trust you. Don’t get me wrong. I’m just suggesting that you need a little help with this one. I’ll pop up to the house and get us a cup of tea. A cup of tea always helps.’

  ‘No,’ said Icarus, turning, ‘don’t open the shed door.’

  But it was too late. Johnny Boy had opened the shed door and a breeze from the garden came curling in, lifting the pieces of map from the floor and whirling them into a fine little papery snow storm.

  ‘Oooh,’ went Icarus, snatching here and there and everywhere.

  ‘Ooh,’ went Johnny Boy, joining him in this.

  ‘Just shut the door. Shut the door.’

  Johnny Boy hastened to shut the door.

  Bits of map came fluttering down to land here, there and everywhere.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Johnny Boy.

  ‘Just hold on,’ said Icarus Smith.

  ‘You’ve got it?’

  ‘Yes, I think I have. Look at the way the pieces have fallen. Look at all the different colours. The colours of the rainbow. Like the flowers on the floral clock. Help me gather them up.’

  Johnny Boy helped in the gathering up and in the sorting out.

  Icarus Smith did the putting into order and then the laying down. ‘Some came in violet, some in indigo, in blue, green, yellow, orange, red, They made a pretty row.’

  ‘Rainbow,’ said Johnny Boy. ‘That’s pretty.’

  ‘Yes it is. And now the biro lines join up and spell something.’

  ‘What do they spell? What do they spell?’

  ‘Words,’ said Icarus. ‘They spell, TOP OF THE BILL. What does that mean, TOP OF THE BILL?’

  ‘I know what it means,’ said Johnny Boy.

  ‘Then tell me, please.’

  ‘Me and the professor,’ said Johnny Boy, and he bowed grandly to Icarus. ‘Me and the professor were once top of the bill.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Back in the nineteen fifties. Long before you were even born. The professor was a stage magician, Vince Zodiac, he called himself, or the Vince of Darkness, I liked that one. But he was a pretty rubbish magician and he was usually near the bottom of the bill. Until he met me. I’ve always been right down at the bottom. Life’s like that, when you’re a midget. But anyhow, I met the professor one night in a bar. He stepped on me, people often do. He was rather drunk. Drank far too much, the professor. Mind you, if he hadn’t been drunk, he wouldn’t have seen the flowers on the floral clock. Even if the floral clock doesn’t exist.

  ‘But I digress, he was drunk and I was sore because he’d stepped on me and he bought me a drink and we got to talking and that’s how the stage act came to be. Professor Zodiac and Johnny Boy. He dressed up as a headmaster and I was dressed as a schoolboy and made up to look like a ventriloquist’s dummy. I had a special box with air holes that he used to carry me in and out of the theatres in. No-one twigged that I was a person and not a dummy. We made it to top of the bill.’

  ‘So where is the formula hidden?’ asked Icarus.

  ‘I’m coming to that. Top of the bill we were. But just for the one night. The professor drank too much champagne at the backstage party and knocked me out of my box. I didn’t half howl. And the game was up. That was the professor out of showbiz. But he felt a duty to me, because he was a good man and he was never cut out for showbiz anyway, he was a scientist. He stuck with me and I stuck by him. We were good friends.’

  Tears came once more to the eyes of the tiny man.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ said Icarus. ‘But do you know where the formula is hidden?’

  ‘Of course I do. We were only ever top of the bill at the one place and that was the Chiswick Empire. That’s where the formula will be hidden.’

  ‘Then let’s go,’ said Icarus Smith.

  ‘They pulled it down,’ said Johnny Boy. ‘Years ago.’

  ‘So what’s there now?’

  ‘On the site? A multi-storey car park.’

  Icarus gnawed upon a knuckle. ‘Did the professor own a car?’ he asked.

  ‘He did, but he didn’t drive it much. He’d drive it drunk and in the mornings he wouldn’t be able to remember where he parked it.’

  ‘So where is this car now?’

  Johnny Boy shrugged. ‘I haven’t seen it for weeks. It could be anywhere.’

  ‘Like for instance, parked in a multi-storey car park?’

  ‘Ah,’ said Johnny. ‘That might just be.’

  ‘Then I will go and search for it. What kind of car did the professor drive?’

  ‘A red Ford Fiesta. But there’s millions of them. I’ll know the one when I see it.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Icarus. ‘I was thinking of going alone. There might well be danger. There always is, in the movies.’

  ‘I’m coming too,’ said Johnny Boy, stamping his tiny feet. ‘I’ve trusted you from the word off. Why did you think I trusted you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Icarus shook his head. ‘I’ve been wondering about that.’

  ‘Because I can see.’ Johnny Boy pointed to his little dolly eyes. ‘I can see the truth. I can see who’s who.’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘Wake up, sonny. I can see because I took the drug. I was the only one the professor could trust. And if you’re going to take it too, you’re going to need me there. You won’t like what you see, when you see it.’

  Icarus Smith left the house of the late Professor Partington, struggling under the weight of a case. It was not a briefcase this time, although he certainly hadn’t struggled under the weight of that, it was a special case. A case with air holes in it.

  The conductor of the Chiswick-bound bus wouldn’t let Icarus get on with his big case. Icarus was forced to hail a taxi.

  The taxi driver tossed the case into the boot and slammed it shut. Icarus winced and climbed into the passenger seat. ‘Chiswick High Street and fast,’ said he. ‘I’ll tell you when to stop.’

  The taxi took off at a leisurely pace.

  Icarus chewed upon his bottom lip.

  Had Icarus been looking into the driver’s mirror, he might well have noticed the long dark automobile with the blacked out windows that was following the taxi. It was the same long dark automobile that had been parked in a side road opposite Wisteria Lodge when Icarus had entered the house, two hours earlier. And it had driven quite slowly up the road behind him, when he left the house.

  But Icarus apparently hadn’t noticed the car upon his arrival, nor when he left, and, as he wasn’t looking into the driver’s mirror, he didn’t notice it now.

  Icarus sat and gnawed upon his knuckle. He was fully aware that he was in considerable danger. The men from the Ministry of Serendipity would probably stop at nothing to get their hands on the professor’s formula. And also Mr Cormerant’s briefcase and its contents. Bringing Johnny Boy along for the ride had not been the best of ideas. Although, if Johnny Boy had taken the drug and he was right about Icarus needing him to be there when Icarus took it…

  Icarus gnawed some more. He’d
actually considered leaving the boxed-up Johnny Boy on the bus. Someone would have let him out sooner or later. It would have been cruel, but it might have been kinder in the long run. But Icarus certainly didn’t think that leaving him in the boot of a taxi was any solution to anything.

  ‘Can’t you go any faster?’ asked Icarus Smith.

  ‘Of course I can go faster,’ said the cabbie, in the voice that cabbies use. ‘But I won’t.’

  Icarus glanced across at the cabbie. He was your typical cabbie. He talked exactly as your typical cabbie always talks and looked exactly the way that your typical cabbie always looks. Even down to that curious thing they do to their hair on the left hand side and that odd business with the tongue when they pronounce the word “plinth”.

  “Plinth”, as certain men who have the knowledge know, is one of the sexiest words in the world, when spoken slowly by a woman. It involves certain open-mouthed tongue-work. It is very erotic.

  ‘I’ve done the knowledge, you know,’ said the cabbie, doing that other thing that cabbies always do. That thing with the eyes. That is far from erotic. ‘And I know the name of every street in Greater and Inner London off by heart. You can test me if you want.’

  ‘I don’t want,’ said Icarus.

  ‘It might make me drive faster.’

  ‘All right,’ Icarus sighed. ‘Name a street beginning with W.’

  ‘No, that’s not what I mean. You name a street in London and I’ll tell you how to get to it.’

  ‘Chiswick High Street,’ said Icarus.

  ‘No, not Chiswick High Street. We’re almost in Chiswick High Street. A street that’s nowhere near here. One that’s on the other side of London.’

  ‘Mornington Crescent,’ said Icarus, recalling the address of the Ministry of Serendipity.

  The cabbie scratched at his hair on the left hand side. ‘There’s no such street,’ he said. ‘You’re pulling my blue carbuncle.’

  ‘Your what?’

  ‘It’s what my wife calls my willy. She’s an architect.’

  ‘Could you drive a little faster?’

  ‘Give us another street then.’