Under Gornstock

by Clive Mullis

  He gave a wry grin and squeezed her waist. ‘Maybe, but I’ve always made money, in all my ventures, and this is just going to be another. I reckon if we get this right it will be the biggest thing to hit Gornstock — ever.’

  ‘Yes, but how much?’

  Cornwallis flapped his hand dismissively. ‘Nothing that I can’t afford, just trust me. We’ll own thirty percent of the whole thing.’

  Chapter 3

  ‘How much?’ asked Frankie incredulously, the shock apparent by the motionless double-beef patty with bacon, extra cheese and relish poised an inch from his mouth.

  ‘Forty thousand dollars,’ replied Rose, daintily pecking at hers. ‘But that’s just for starters. Jack and Goodhalgan cobbled together some figures but the costs could rise. He’s in it for thirty percent.’

  ‘Thirty percent of forty thousand?’ Frankie tried to count on his fingers but the bun got in the way. ‘I make that twelve thousand dollars he’s putting in. Bloody hell!’

  Rose nodded. ‘It’s a lot of money but the dwarfs are doing all the donkey work. Jack’s money is just to pay for making all the stuff they need.’

  ‘Goodhalgan must have that much stashed away somewhere, so why get Jack involved?’

  ‘Look, there he is.’

  ‘Who, Jack?’

  ‘No, you idiot. We’re meant to be working, if you’d care to remember.’

  ‘Sorry, it were the shock. You don’t hear that amount of money spoken about often.’

  ‘You do if you live with Jack. We had dinner with his mother and father the other night and you really wouldn’t believe the amounts they were talking about, even forty thousand is small change to them. Anyway, you know that.’

  ‘Yeah, I just forget sometimes. So why’s Goodhalgan roped him in then?’

  ‘Because… Hang on, let’s get a little closer.’

  They were in Treadle Street where fashion and music meshed together. Young and upcoming designers and music makers serviced the public from little boutique shops, selling all manner of garments and sheet music to a discerning clientele. If you bought stuff from Treadle Street then you could claim to be “cool,” as the young people were fond of saying.

  Frankie still had trouble getting his head around some of the words used nowadays. To him, cool meant not being warm, a bit on the chilly side.

  Rose elbowed him in the ribs. ‘Come on, or we’ll lose him.’

  They were following a minor government official from the ministry of Arts and Sciences. A man suspected of being involved in the peddling of illegal copies of Morris music, stolen from the register. The government held the copyright of all Morris music, anyone buying or playing Morris incurred a cost and people had to pay accordingly. Recently, though, a flourishing trade in forged and counterfeit copies had come to the surface and the Morris Council, unhappy that money due to them now lined someone else’s pocket, engaged Cornwallis Investigations to catch the man.

  ‘Why are we doing this anyway?’ asked Frankie. ‘It’s only bloody Morris music. I can’t stand the sodding stuff, like most people.’

  ‘No, I can’t either, but it’s illegal and we’ve been asked to catch him. Jethro managed to get out of it by suggesting that the Bagman sort it out but he said he had much more important stuff to deal with, so the minister contacted Jack. Weren’t you listening when we were talking about it?’

  Frankie sighed. ‘No, I fell asleep during that bit. The baby’s been having bad nights. Tulip has a touch of colic; so me and Isabella haven’t had much rest.’

  ‘Poor Isabella, she said there were a few baby problems.’

  ‘Yeah, I wouldn’t mind but she keeps bringing Tulip into our bed; hence my lack of sleep.’

  ‘Er, Frankie. I think you’re treading on dangerous ground there.’

  ‘Eh? What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean you should be helping, taking it in turns.’

  ‘Ah, a bit of a problem there; I ain’t got the wherewithal.’ He indicated what he meant by pointing at bits of Rose. ‘Feeding, for the use of.’

  Rose pulled a face. ‘Tulip doesn’t need feeding all the time. A bit of a cuddle sometimes works and you can definitely do that.’

  ‘Yeah, well, mebbee I could,’ he conceded.

  ‘Good, I’ll expect to hear that you’ve been doing your bit when I next see her.’

  ‘Yes, Rose,’ said Frankie, sighing in defeat.

  ‘Come on,’ she said, digging her elbow into his ribs for the second time, this time with a bit more force.

  Frankie gave her a wary look and then rubbed the painful bit as they followed the man a little further up the street.

  ‘Here we go,’ said Rose.

  The man gave a furtive look over his shoulder before stepping up to the door of Clackthorn’s Emporium, the addendum beneath the sign saying, “Quality Quivering Quavers,” and entered the establishment.

  ‘Quick, we might catch him red-handed,’ said Rose, picking up her pace.

  ‘All right, I’m coming,’ said Frankie. ‘But you still ain’t told me why Goodhalgan wants Jack’s help.’

  ‘Because… Well, if the dwarfs put up a sign which said, “Come to us and we’ll take you for a ride,” what do you think would happen?’

  ‘Er, nothing. People would think there was something iffy about it.’

  ‘Exactly. But if Jack said it?’

  ‘Ah, I see. What you mean is that he will lend a bit of, what’s the word? Oh yes,’ and he clicked his fingers. ‘Gravytas to it.’

  ‘Close, but it’s gravitas, and yes, he would.’

  Frankie nodded in understanding as they got to the shop’s window. They looked in and saw the official talking to the kid behind the counter. He passed a brown packet over to the lad who then went to the till.

  ‘Time to move, I think,’ said Frankie, becoming business-like for the first time that day.

  The door swung open and the two detectives walked in. The official swung his head around at the intrusion but the lad just looked up and smiled a welcome.

  ‘Be with you in a minute, dudes,’ he said as he counted out some cash. ‘Got some heavy stuff over there if you want to browse.’ He pointed to a rack of brightly coloured printed sheets, each one a separate design of artwork. ‘They’re really real, if you know what I mean.’

  Frankie didn’t and he looked askance at Rose who wore the same perplexed expression.

  ‘Dudes? Heavy? Really real? What does he bloody mean?’ asked Frankie, bemused.

  Rose shook her head. ‘I’m young, but even I’m lost with that lot.’

  Frankie and Rose walked nonchalantly up to the counter and pulled out their handcuffs. The lad and the official had resumed their conversation when the cuffs clicked on their wrists.

  ‘You pair are nicked,’ said Frankie, grinning.

  ‘Hey, man. What’s this?’ protested the lad. ‘I ain’t dun nuffink.’

  ‘You’ve just given this gentleman some money for those bits of music in front of you, which means you are knowingly receiving stolen goods; this gentleman being the one who nicked them in the first place, which is why you are both nicked,’ explained Frankie patiently.

  The official groaned and hung his head, it all seemed to be going so well up to this point, and nobody ever wanted the sheet music for Morris dancing. The man in the music shop doctored the score by putting a proper beat to the dirge, bringing it up to date and selling it on. How could that be a crime?

  Rose held out her hand for the shop key as the lad looked up. They would come back later and search the place for more illicit material.

  ‘What happens now?’ asked the official as they walked down the street.

  ‘We bangs you up,’ replied Frankie, stifling a yawn. ‘Then someone comes to talk to you, then you confess, then you go before a judge, and then you get banged up again. That is if you’re lucky. If the Bagman decides he wants a word, which he might, seeing you is an official in the government, then… let’s just say it could be a very i
nteresting experience.’

  The official’s eyes came out on stalks. ‘The B… Bagman?’ he stuttered, horrified at the thought.

  ‘Oh yes. Now I come to think about it, that’s the most likely outcome. Crime against the State, you see. The Warden will definitely hear about it and then the Bagman will have to speak to you. I reckon he’ll be pretty annoyed.’

  ‘Frankie,’ warned Rose. ‘You’re scaring the gentleman.’

  ‘Am I? Oh, sorry. I’m sure the Bagman will only use some of the methods at his disposal to get a confession from a minor official like what you is.’

  The lad from the music shop laughed. ‘The Bagman is a myth, there’s no such person. Everyone knows that.’

  ‘Do they?’ asked Frankie. ‘Be sure to tell him that when you meet him.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Oh, you’ll meet him too. You’ve been receiving government documents, don’t forget. But if you say he doesn’t exist then you’ve got nothing to worry about, you can just ignore what he does to you.’

  Rose stuck out an arm and a cab pulled up.

  ‘Scooters Yard,’ instructed Frankie, still grinning, as they piled in.

  Once they deposited the prisoners in the cells, Rose and Frankie headed to the canteen for a well-earned brew. They walked down the corridor, pushed the door open and headed over to the perpetually boiling pot to pour themselves a coffee. A few feelers looked up at their entrance and one nodded a greeting — feeler being the nickname for a police officer, named after their founder, Lord Carstairs Fielding.

  ‘Sergeant,’ the lone greeter said to Rose, who held the rank of sergeant in the police as well as being a private detective. Up to a couple of days ago, she’d been instructing some new recruits on how to follow suspects.

  ‘Hello, Cecil,’ she replied to Constable Toopins, known to most as Dewdrop. ‘I’ve been thinking about your little problem and I reckon a bunch of flowers and a slap-up meal might be the answer. A girl likes to think she’s appreciated, you know.’

  Constable Toopins opened his eyes wide in hope and expectation. ‘You really think so?’

  Rose nodded. ‘All couples argue from time to time, you and Felicity are no different to anyone else. Me and Jack, Frankie and Isabella, we all have rows.’

  ‘What?’ asked Frankie, hearing his name mentioned.

  ‘Just that you argue with Isabella from time to time,’ said Rose. ‘Cecil here has had an argument with his girlfriend.’

  ‘Oh, right; is that all? Isabella sometimes stops speaking to me for days on end. It’s worth having the row just to get a bit of peace.’

  ‘Frankie,’ admonished Rose. ‘You don’t really mean that?’

  Frankie shook his head and grinned. ‘Well, not all of it.’

  Rose beetled her brow.

  ‘Well, none of it actually. I was just having a bit of fun.’

  ‘I should hope so to. Isabella has a lot on her hands with Tulip.’

  ‘I do my best,’ returned Frankie. ‘She’s my daughter too, you know.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ she replied, holding up a hand.

  Constable Toopins decided to make himself scarce. He knew that Frankie and Rose could carry on for hours arguing back and forth, and anyway, Rose had given him a suggestion so as soon as he finished the shift he would book a table.

  ‘Where’s he gone?’ asked Rose.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Cecil. I was just talking to him.’

  ‘But you’re not talking to him now. He’s buggered off.’

  ‘He probably thought you were going to offer your advice.’

  ‘I would’ve if he’d stayed around long enough. I know a lot of things about women.’

  ‘Hmm, Isabella might be really interested to know that.’

  Frankie gave a wink. ‘You had a life before Jack, so I had a life before Isabella.’

  ‘From what Jack says yours tended to be a bit more… how shall I say it? Transient.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean. All my ladies knew what was what and were more than willing.’

  ‘I think we can stop this conversation now, Frankie. I dread to think what you’ll come up with next.’

  They found themselves a table and sat down. The hubbub of a busy police canteen went on all around them and they studied the constables as they took their breaks before going back out on the streets.

  Rose felt a degree of pride as she looked at the mix: both men and women, where before, it had just been men. Now a steady influx of females infiltrated the male domain and she had been part of the revolution.

  Commander Jethro MacGillicudy had been enthusiastic when she had first mentioned the idea and after a bit of thought, he had the papers run an ad. He recruited twelve girls then, and now there were thirty, with many more to come.

  ‘So Jack’s definitely going ahead with it then?’

  His question knocked Rose out of her reverie. ‘Oh, yes. He says it’s the future, this transport thing. They’ve just got to come up with a snappy name for it.’

  ‘You mean like the “Underground.” Or, as the tunnels are like a cigar container, why not call it the “Tube”? He, he, he.’

  ‘That’ll never catch on, Frankie,’ replied Rose, sighing. ‘We’ve got to come up with something better than that.’

  Chapter 4

  ‘Right,’ said Cornwallis, rubbing his hands together as the little group assembled on the street. ‘You’re going to be the very first to trial this. Three sections of The Pipe have been completed and you will get on and off at each of the entrances.’

  ‘The Pipe?’ queried Frankie. ‘What sort of name is that?’

  ‘It’s the name that Goodhalgan and I have come up with, as the tunnels resemble a pipe.’

  ‘Reckon my ideas were better.’

  ‘Yes, I heard about them,’ replied Cornwallis.

  ‘And what’s wrong with them?’ asked Frankie indignantly.

  ‘Nothing, but they don’t run off the tongue. The Pipe is short, catchy and easy to remember.’

  ‘So’s the bloody flu,’ responded Frankie sourly.

  Cornwallis took a deep breath but decided not to answer as he caught a look from Rose. She wore a half-smile with a slightly inclined head. The look said things were amusing but to leave it at that, as Frankie felt nervous about the prospect of travelling under the ground with all that rock above his head waiting to fall down right on top of him. It’s amazing what a single look could convey.

  Commander Jethro MacGillicudy along with Constables Cecil Toopins and Felicity Dill were present for the dummy run. Rose especially invited Dewdrop and Felicity as she had a soft spot for both of them and as some ruffles had appeared recently in their relationship, this may be a way of smoothing some of them out. They were an incongruous couple as Felicity once adorned some of the more downmarket tabloids as a page three woodcut. She was pretty much all that a young man wanted and desired; being blonde, slim, pretty and delightfully formed. Dewdrop had somehow been the one to catch her, much to everyone’s surprise, least of all, Dewdrop’s. He had a stick-thin body with a dark mop of unruly hair and until recently seemed to sport a near-permanent droplet of snot on the end of his nose; hence the name Dewdrop. Heads shook in disbelief as the pair walked arm in arm down the streets.

  MacGillicudy stood with his hands in his pockets as his moustache and side-whiskers twitched, more in trepidation rather than expectation as he waited for the inevitable descent into the dwarf tunnels. A big man, more muscle than fat with hair just beginning to silver, he wore his civilian clothes rather than his normal commander’s attire, and at that moment, he wished that he and Cornwallis weren’t quite such firm friends.

  ‘Come on, Jack, let’s get this over with.’

  ‘Soon, Jethro,’ replied Cornwallis. ‘We have to wait for the signal.’

  ‘Signal?’

  ‘Yes.’ Cornwallis sounded exasperated. ‘It’s the first run and we want it to go right.’

  ‘Oh, so when it�
��s up and running, people will have to stand out here and wait?’

  ‘No, no, no. They’ll be able to go and wait inside, by the track. This time we want your experience on the whole operation.’

  ‘Well, if you want my opinion, I don’t need to travel on the thing. I can tell you now—’

  ‘Jethro,’ interrupted Rose. ‘That’s not like you. You sound worse than Frankie.’

  MacGillicudy sighed and took a deep breath. He thought about speaking, then he glanced at the two constables by his side and then thought he’d better not, as their commander saying he might be just a tiny bit scared might give the wrong impression. Besides, they may decide to talk back at the Yard and his credibility would go out the window. ‘If you’d let me finish, Rose, I was just about to say that this whole thing is a splendid idea and with Jack and Goodhalgan involved, it’s certain to be successful.’

  Rose opened her mouth to say that she didn’t believe him when a smiling dwarf appeared in the entrance wearing a little uniform. The black trousers had blue trimming down the legs and the black jacket had blue lapels and cuffs. A black peaked flat cap perched on his head, a little blue line along the front of the peak. His long unkempt beard threw the smartness out of kilter as he looked like a scruffy child with a false beard going to a fancy dress party.

  ‘Welcome to The Pipe,’ he intoned gravely. ‘If you would care to follow me.’

  Everyone stood waiting as the dwarf looked up at each face in turn. Eventually, Felicity stepped forward, cast a withering glance at Dewdrop then pulled on his arm to get his leaden feet moving.

  ‘I’m coming, Flick, wait a minute.’

  ‘You said you couldn’t wait to try it out. It’s an honour for both of us. Think on it; we’re going to be the very first, Cecil, the very first to try out this new mode of transport. We’re pioneers, you and me.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Cornwallis. ‘This is Gornstock progressing, moving into the future, modern times just around the corner. Think on what it will mean for the city with transport links to every corner.’